Well, it’s here. This year, we are using the curriculum entitled Boomerang Express, featuring an Aussie theme (anyone else thinking OUTBACK?) Seriously, though, this week should be a great week as God’s Word is opened to children. The stories center in the life of Peter and include calls for children to center all of their lives on Jesus (Following Him, Worshipping Him, Confessing Him, Serving Him and Obeying Him). Last night, our church did a service devoted to praying and serving to ensure that this week happens to God’s glory. Will you join me in praying to that end. That we would serve in the strength that God supplies so He is glorified. Also, pray that children would see the light of the glorious Gospel in the face of Christ.
Commentary on Tiller’s Death…
Albert Mohler, my favorite cultural commentator, has weighed in on the unfortunate death of George Tiller, Abortion Provider, yesterday. His commentary is excellent. Here’s an excerpt:
Proponents of abortion rights often charge that the rhetoric of the pro-life movement leads to violence. After all, we describe abortion as murder and point to the business of abortion as the murder of the unborn. We make clear that abortion is the taking of innocent human life and that what goes on in abortion clinics is the business of death.
We make these arguments because we know they are true. Abortion is murder. What goes on in those clinics is institutionalized homicide, often for financial profit. Abortion is a moral scandal and a national tragedy and a blight upon the American conscience.
But violence in the name of protesting abortion is immoral, unjustified, and horribly harmful to the pro-life cause. Now, the premeditated murder of Dr. George Tiller in the foyer of his church is the headline scandal — not the abortions he performed and the cause he represented.
We have no right to take the law into our own hands in an act of criminal violence. We are not given the right to take this power into our own hands, for God has granted this power to governing authorities. The horror of abortion cannot be rightly confronted, much less corrected, by means of violence and acts outside the law and lawful means of remedy. This is not merely a legal technicality — it is a vital test of the morality of the pro-life movement.
And as he concludes, he says:
Murder is murder. The law rightly affirms that the killing of Dr. George Tiller is murder. In this we must agree. We cannot rest until the law also recognizes the killing of the unborn as murder. The killing of Dr. George Tiller makes that challenge all the more difficult.
Mohler’s commentary is excellent and spot on.
The King Is Our Substitute…
This seems like a good summary of where we were this AM. I, for one, really sensed my unworthiness of such a thing as the Gospel. That My King would die in my place is awesome thought. If you are looking for the quote by Spurgeon I used at the beginning, I referenced it last week. It is also available in a sermon entitled, “The Blood Shed For Many.” Enjoy!
Short Term Mission Trips…
Over at Desiring God, Bill Walsh, who helps oversee International Outreach, has been doing a series of posts all week on short term mission trips. Very good stuff to consider if you have something planned this summer or are wondering about the long term vision of these short trips…
Rethinking Short Term Missions (Day 1)
Effect of Short Term Missions on Poverty (Day 2)
Our Needs & Their Needs (Day 3)
Teaching as a Short Term Missions Strategy (Day 4)
Doing Missions As Servants (Day 5)
Next Conference Audio Online…
Audio from the NEXT Conference is up and online (for free).
The Preeminence of Christ Joshua Harris
Christ’s Incarnation D.A. Carson
Christ’s Life Kevin DeYoung
Christ’s Death C.J. Mahaney
Christ’s Resurrection Sinclair Ferguson
Christ’s Return Sinclair Ferguson
Just Do Something Kevin DeYoung
Radical Womanhood Carolyn McCulley
Gospel-Centered?
C.J. quotes Spurgeon, who said this…
“Dear friends I am going to preach to you again upon the cornerstone of the gospel. How many times will this make, I wonder? The doctrine of Christ crucified is always with me. As the Romans sentinel in Pompeii stood to his post even when the city was destroyed, so do I…every thing else can wait, but this one truth must be proclaimed with a voice of thunder. Others may preach as they will but as for this pulpit it shall always resound with the substitutions of the Christ…Our blessed Savior would have us hold his death in great reverence; it is to be our chief memory we cannot think of that death too often.”
This is where we are headed again this weekend. We will be exploring the themes of the Gospel in Jesus’ Roman trial. I think Spurgeon is onto something here: our Savior would have us hold His death in great reverence and we can never exhaust the thought that we could give towards it. Therefore join me this Sunday as we come to awe and wonder again at the incredible Gospel of Jesus Christ. Prepare your heart as we enjoy the Lord’s Supper as well.
A confession of deeply felt reality…
Reading through Herman Bavinck’s Reasonable Faith, I came across the following quote, which helped me realize something about doctrine. Here’s the quote:
This declaration of faith on the part of the church is not a scientific doctrine, nor a form of unity that is being repeated, but is rather a confession of a deeply felt reality, and of a conviction of reality that has come up out of the experiences of life. The prophets and the apostles, and the saints generally who appear before us in the Old and New Testament and later in the church of Christ, did not sit and philosophize about God in abstract concepts, but rather confessed what God meant to them and what they owed to Him in all circumstances of life. God was for them not at all a cold concept, which they then proceeded rationally to analyze, but He was a living, personal force, a reality infinitely more real that the world around them. Indeed, he was to them the one, eternal, worshipful Being. They reckoned with their lives, they lived in His tent, walked as if always before His face, served Him in His courts, and worshipped Him in His sanctuary. (p.25)
Too many theological discussions today forget that we are dealing with a real Being. We must reckon ourselves accordingly to God Himself. It is easy to treat God, as Bavinck says, as a cold concept to analyze rather than a living personal force, a reality more real that the world around us. Amazing! Hope you are encouraged today to draw near to this real One.
New Hillsong United…
Some of my favorite Christian music is produced by Hillsong United. I love the way they combine subjective expression with truth and longing to glorify God. Their music is typically energetic, passionate and leads me to glorify God. Therefore, when I heard their new album, A_Cross // The_Earth: Tear Down The Walls, was released today in the US (they are based in Australia), I was (to use an 80’s phrase) stoked. Here’s a link to the album in Amazon, which allows you to listen to many fo the tracks. Enjoy.
Longing for Jesus’ Reign…
I feel like Spurgeon, who in this letter to his father from September 19, 1850 said:
Yes, where Jesus comes, He comes to reign: how I wish He would reign more in my heart; then I might hope that every atom of self, self-confidence, and self-righteousness, would be quite swept out of my soul. I am sure I long for the time when all evil affections, corrupt desires, and rebellious, doubting thoughts shall be overcome, and completely crushed beneath the Prince’s feet, and my whole soul be made pure and holy. But so long as I am engaged within this house of clay, I know they will lurk about, and I must have hard fighting through the victory by grace is sure. Praying is the best fighting; nothing else will keep them down.
– Spurgeon’s Autobiography (Volume 1, p.189)
I read this and felt like it was another restatement of what we looked at this morning and thought you might enjoy it.
Put It To Death!
Today’s sermon is now online. In it, we look at Peter’s denial from Mark 14:66-72. Gotten some good feedback and how this made our battle with sin and temptation come alive, so thanks for that. Some might wonder about that quote from Sinclair Ferguson on killing sin I alluded to in discussing the way sin seeks to master us from Genesis 4:6-7. You can find the quote here. Hope you have a good week fighting sin and temptation to the glory of God.
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