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Weekend Recap – No Boasting

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Boasting is such a sinister, sneaky thing in our lives.  It seems like we’re merely drawing attention to something that we had a  part in, but our motives for such a pursuit are often suspicious.  My sermon on 4/27/14AM entitled Faith Alone: No Boasting from Romans 3:27-4:12 is now online.  This sermon sought to show how being made right before God by faith alone should mean that we don’t boast in it as something we’ve done, but that we boast in the Lord.  I hope this sermon encourages you in this regard and hope you had a blessed Lord’s Day.

Easter Roundup 2014

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My 4/20/14AM sermon, Resurrection Truths from the book of Romans, is online.  This sermon sought to unpack how resurrection truth is presented in this book.  From the assumption that Jesus did indeed rise from the dead, to the effect that it has upon our lives, to how we access this salvation message, Romans has it all.  I hope the sermon was encouraging to you.

It was a great morning.  We sang great songs.  I’m thankful to Kathy and Whitney Lansdowne for singing Forever (We Sing Hallelujah).  Here’s a video of this song if you liked it.  This particular version also features a great spoken word:

Good Friday – Mourning Over Our Sin, Triumphing Through Christ’s Victory

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Good Friday is always one of those days of mixed emotion.  John 19:37 says that Jesus was pierced to fulfill Scripture and that Scripture is Zechariah 12:10.  Looking upon the one we’ve pierced and mourning.

Make no mistake.  We pierced Him.  Sure, a Roman guard was the agent doing the deed, but it was our sin that put Him there.  I was meditating on this text again and read this helpful piece from the Gospel Transformation Bible on Zechariah 12:10-13:9:

“Mourning for sin comes through a pouring out of God’s grace and spirit (12:10). Repentance is a gift from God, worked by his Spirit, not an attitude that we drum up. Our sins have pierced the Lord not just metaphorically but literally, as our sin was paid for at the cross. That reality should make us weep over our personal sin, as well as the sins of others in our community. Yet the cross denotes not merely the sad reality of what we have done to God but also the triumphant reality of what he has done for us. At the cross, my sins pierced Christ, but the blood which flowed from his wounds forms a cleansing fountain that washes away all of my transgressions (13:1). As we confess our sins in true repentance, the blood of Christ purifies us from all our unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). For that reason, when we fix our eyes on the cross, we not only mourn for our sins, but we also glory in the grace of God that saved us and which will ultimately renew all creation.

“The Good Shepherd that the Lord provided would be struck down (Zech. 13:7), resulting in difficult times of testing and purification for the flock. This prophecy is fulfilled in the death of Christ and the scattering of the disciples that followed (Matt. 26:31). The Christian life is a constant experience of trials and difficulties, yet these afflictions are God’s means of refining his people and setting our hearts firmly on our heavenly home. And through it all, we know that our trials are not to punish us in anger but to train us in love. For Jesus was punished on our behalf, so that every trial can only be from a heavenly Father (not a detached Judge), for our good.

This Good Friday, let’s fix our eyes on the cross and not just mourn over our sins but glory in God’s grace that saved us and will one day make all things new.  

Love and Strategic Recklessness

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Here’s a post I wrote that appeared on our church’s mission blog (the CBC H2Go blog) today:

One of our mission team’s core values is that we’d be strategically reckless:  forsaking our security/comforts in this life for the everlasting joy that’s found in Christ.  It seems we’re giving up so much, but then, again, when we consider what we’re gaining (Christ) it’s really nothing.  I was thinking about how this relates to love.  Love is risky.  Love is saying “no” to ourselves and laying our lives down in service to others.  For this reason, Paul commanded the Romans to “owe no one anything except to love each other, for the one who loves one another has fulfilled the law” (Romans 13:8).  In other words, when we love, we are so in tune with God’s heart that it can be said of us that we are obeying all that God intends for us.  

Love.  It seems so easy, yet is a very costly thing.  Today, how might love inspire your strategic recklessness?  How does Christ’s love compel us to be loving in our actions?  Let’s step out as a strategically reckless people in love. 

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I would add that today the Christian church celebrates Love.  Maundy Thursday is about that new commandment that Jesus gave that we love one another.  This really connects well with this theme I wrote about for the Missions blog.  Hope you’re inspired by the love of Christ, which is controlling you, to be the loving people you’re called to be.



T4G Recap (Part 2 with Audio Links)

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I was privileged to attend Together for the Gospel last week in Louisville, KY (and even wrote an update after Day 1).  If you don’t know, this is an every other year gathering of pastors in the evangelical stream.  We come together from different denominations but are united by one message: the good news that sinners can be right with God because of Jesus Christ, who lived a perfect life, died and rose again, reigning today from heaven.  This year’s conference theme was taken from Romans 1:16 and how we should be unashamed in the Gospel.  Here’s how the messages shook down:

Tues:
Mark Dever: The Certain Victory of Christ’s Church an Encouragement to Evangelism
Thabiti Anyabwile: The Happiness of Heaven in the Repentance of Sinners
Al Mohler: The Open Door is the Only Door, the Singularity of the Gospel in a Pluralistic Age

Wed:
Kevin DeYoung: Never Spoke A Man Like This Before: Innerancy, Evangelism and Christ’s Unbreakable Bible
David Platt:  Relenting Wrath: The Role of Desperate Prayer in the Mystery of Divine Providence
Matt Chandler: Christ Is All

Thurs:
Ligon Duncan: The Gospel By Numbers
John MacArthur:  Mass Defection: The Great Physician Confronts The Pathology of Counterfeit Faith
John Piper: Persuading, Pleading and Predestination: Human Means in the Miracle of Conversion

(All of these sermons are available for audio or video download, so enjoy!)

These men are my heroes.  To a man, they have served faithfully and marked me through their service in the Word.  So, when I get a chance to hear them live at one conference, it’s like the All-Star Game.  But, God used these sermons in many ways to cement and solidify my heart in Gospel reality.

On top of this benefit, I was able to attend with brothers in Christ who love Christ and me.  They asked hard questions, pressed for fellowship and provoked me to good deeds.  We drive intentionally (12 hours) to have plenty of windshield time to dream, discuss and have unhurried time with one another.

So, I’m grateful for this opportunity.  It was a great week.  I’m still digging out from being gone, but found it to be a rich time.

Holy Week Help

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Here’s a quick round up of 2 resources I’m utilizing this week…

1) John Piper’s Devotional Love To The Uttermost.  Here’s their description:

Love to the Uttermost: Devotional Readings for Holy Week is designed for Lent 2014. The readings begin on Palm Sunday, end on Easter Sunday, and aim to focus our attention on Jesus he displays his love to the uttermost (John 13:1). These meditations on the self-giving love of Christ are all excerpted from the preaching and writing ministry of John Piper.


This resource is available as a Mobi (Kindle), EPub (iDevice), or PDF.  Enjoy.

2) In conjunction with Justin Taylor’s book, Final Days of Jesus (my review here), there are videos being posted every day related to each day of Jesus’ final week.  Here’s the Palm Sunday and Monday versions for you to enjoy:




My hope is that these resources bless you and your worship of the Risen Christ this holy week.  

T4G Day 1 Recap (#T4G)

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I’m privileged to attend the 2014 Together For The Gospel conference.  This is a conference I’ve attended since its inception in 2006, so this is my fifth time attending (it’s held every other year).  This year, I’m attending with one of our elders, a friend our church supports in India and another friend in ministry from St. Louis.

We began our journey on Sunday and finally arrived late Monday.  We grabbed supper with another couple our church supports to check in on their ministry.  We took in a pre-conference called Band of Bloggers.  This conference included some rock star bloggers from my neck of the evangelical world and discussed how platform building relates to the Gospel.

The afternoon session began with Mark Dever introducing the conference theme (Being Unashamed of the Gospel) and encouraging us through Isaiah 36-37, that God won’t abandon us in the amazing task of making His fame known to others.  Thabiti Anyabwile continued our afternoon session by helping us see how heaven rejoices in the news of repenting sinners from Luke 15.  Our evening session was Albert Mohler holding relentless to the exclusivity of Christ, specifically in Acts 4.

Some other highlights included seeing old friends.  Gatherings like this assemble some of my best friends in ministry.  So being able to connect with them and make new friends is a tremendous encouragement.  The singing (7000 mostly MEN!) of songs old and new is always a highlight.  One song that stuck out to me last night was All Creatures Of Our God and King.  There were two new verses introduced for that song:

All the redeemed washed by His blood,
Come and rejoice in His great love.
Oh, praise Him! Alleluia!
Christ has defeated every sin;
Cast all your burdens now on Him.
Oh, praise Him! Oh, praise Him!
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
He shall return in pow’r to reign;
Heaven and earth will join to say
Oh, praise Him! Alleluia!
Then who shall fall on bended knee?
All creatures of our God and King!
Oh, praise Him! Oh, praise Him!
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
I’m, again, so grateful to get to participate in this conference.  So, thank you Meg, family, church and others that enable me to enjoy such a thing.

Weekend Recap – All Under Sin

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My 3/30/14AM sermon, All Under Sin from Romans 3:9-20, is now online.  This sermon was a hard one to preach (as a sinner) but one in which the good news of the Gospel shined so brightly that it brought great encouragement.  Until sin is bitter, the Gospel doesn’t taste sweet.  So, this sermon got at the reality of our sin and then drove us to a Christ-centered dependance.  I hope it’s encouraging to you.

Book Review – Final Days of Jesus

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I had the privilege to read and offer this short review of Crossway’s The Final Days of Jesus earlier this month.  This is a fascinating work and one, quite honestly, that you’ll want to have in your library.  It’s written by Andreas Kostenberger and Justin Taylor (here’s a link to Justin’s blog on this book, which gives you a feel for its visual layout).

The table of contents is simple: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.  One week.  This book is about one week, but it’s not just any normal week.  It’s the one week in which the lives of so many people have been changed.  It’s the final week of Jesus Christ.

This book takes this final week, imports all the Biblical texts describing this week, harmonizes them, and gives the reader commentary on what’s happening and why it’s so important.  I read this book when lent began a few weeks ago and remember thinking that it would be an amazing book to work through on the Palm Sunday through Easter week.  Even if that doesn’t work, though, this book would prove profitable in helping readers know what happened in this final week of Jesus Christ.

I know this statement will get my nerd card stamped for another year, but this book is cool for its graphics and charts.  I grew up reading the encyclopedia and love those little stat corners of the USA Today.  There are parts of this book where huge amounts of data are cohesively presented as a picture or chart.  Having these are almost worth the price of the book.

So, I’m happy to recommend this book to you.  Read it and allow what the Bible says about the greatest person who ever lived come into clear focus.  Your life won’t be the same by looking at the Final Days of Jesus.