From One Degree to Another

Phil Auxier's Blog

Connect

Weekend Recap – Walking

by

Had a great morning in worship with the people of God at Crestview. We were in Colossians 2:6-7 for a sermon entitled Walking In Christ. This sermon really highlighted how our walk in Christ is based on our past reception, that Christ is the focus of our walk in Him (obviously) and walking in Christ will cause us to explode in gratitude to God.

I hope you had a great Lord’s Day as well. There was much to apply here, especially being grateful and seeing my complaining demeanor as a revealer of my ingratitude.

Weekend Recap – Easter

by

What an amazing weekend!

We began with Good Friday service at UVBC and enjoyed a great night thinking about the cross and fellowshipping with others.

On Sunday morning, I read Isaiah 53:8-12 and we sang “Come People of the Risen King” to bring in our morning festivities. After this, we had a church wide brunch, then Sunday School (my class watched Piper preach a sermon: I Have Seen the Lord), then AM Worship.

In the morning worship, since we are a working through Colossians, I overviewed what this book showed about the resurrection, specifically:
3 truths concerning the resurrection…
I. The resurrection establishes Jesus’ preeminence (Colossians 1:18)
II. The resurrection gives us hope of salvation (Colossians 2:12-13)
III. The resurrection calls us to live a life that honors Christ (Colossians 3:1)
I thought we had an amazing day and I hope we can continue to be shaped by the resurrection.

Weekend Recap – Protection

by

Another Lord’s Day is completed. I was really grateful to God for His enablement yesterday.

We began in SS, looking at Paul Tripp teaching on how worshipping God as Creator and Sovereign helps establish right relations horizontally in our marriages. Meg and I were remarking over lunch how helpful this perspective was.

In the AM service, my sermon was from Colossians 2:4-5 entitled Protection. The audio is online, but unfortunately, the podcast isn’t working (Sorry). This sermon was a blessing to me, in seeing how God doesn’t leave His people to their own devices, but graciously reveals the truth to us. To put it simply: God protects us by revealing truth to us, empowering us to live out that truth and compelling us to maintain our trust in Jesus.

Then, in small groups, we continued wading through the Gospel Centered Life curriculum, seeing how the Gospel relates to all the commands of the Bible. The summary of this time: the commands drive us to despair of keeping them to the Gospel and the Gospel frees us to delight in following them.

It was an amazing day and God was so gracious to teach us. Hope you had a tremendous Lord’s Day as well.

Weekend Recap – 3/21

by

Enjoyed a tremendous Lord’s Day yesterday…

In SS, I lead a class through Paul Tripp’s What Did You Expect? Curriculum. We were in Session 8 yesterday which helped wrap up 1 John 4. One line in particular stood out to me: “Our lack of love for others in rooted in identity amnesia” meaning, we’ve forgotten God’s love for us in Christ.

In AM worship, we sang songs of Jesus’ reign and then settled in to Colossians 2:1-3 in a sermon entitled Comfort in Struggle. This sermon really sought to orient us to be a church that encourages one another. Paul sought to encourage the Colossian believer in all that they were facing, and, through his words to them, we can get insight for our lives as well.

In PM worship, we looked at the Flood narrative in our Jesus in the Old Testament series. Specifically, we honed in Genesis 6:5-7:14 with the sermon entitled The Flood: Judgment and Rescue. I was personally affected in holding out God’s punishment for sin (as righteous judgment) and then holding out God’s amazing rescue and how these point to Jesus.

Finally, I concluded the night by leading our Men’s Theological Discussion Group on The Bible: Inerrancy and Authority. We dug into Scripture looking at how God has always been a speaking God, how He inspired Scripture and safeguarded it and finally we discussed issues like the canon and other related things. We read portions of The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy.

While this was a very full day for me, it is productive to see God’s Word impact lives and realize the amazing privilege I have in getting to teach these things to others. There is so much to live based on what I teach and I hope that I can apply these things this week.

Bible Conference 2010 (Part 1)

by

For the past 2 days, our church has been enjoying Dr. Don Whitney and his teaching on Praying Through Scripture and Biblical Meditation. Here are the sessions so far:

Friday PM:
Praying Through Scripture – 1
Praying Through Scripture – 2

Saturday AM:
Biblical Meditation – 1
Biblical Meditation – 2
Biblical Meditation – 3

In the course of one session, Whitney mentioned a chapter from his book Simplify Your Spiritual Life entitled Do What You Can, a helpful encouragement for women with young children. He has that particular article online for your benefit, so check it out.

We look forward to his teaching tomorrow on Family Worship.

Weekend Recap – Jesus, Sin and Gospel Toil

by

Well, Sunday is nearly wrapped up. (We are starting a new class for men on theological topics that meets at 8PM.)

This morning, we looked at Gospel Toil from Colossians 1:29. It seems that Paul expended himself in amazing ways for the sake of the Gospel’s advancing, yet he was always quick to rely on God and His power for all good things. I felt the need to call us to rely on God’s power by trusting in Jesus.

This evening, we looked at Jesus in the Fall from Genesis 3:1-24 in our Jesus in the Old Testament series. It seems that one clear conclusion we should reach when seeing sin enter the world is how we need rescued (or, more specifically the need for a Rescuer). Enter Jesus and the prophecy of Him in Genesis 3:15.

I thought it was an amazing day with much to encourage us.

Weekend Recap – Proclaiming Christ

by

I thought we had a great Sunday yesterday. My sermon was on Colossians 1:28 entitled Proclaiming Christ. This text really compelled us to be those who are speaking truth about Jesus (as opposed to simply “living a life that tells something” whatever that means). Specifically, we are told to speaking words of warning, instruction and communicate with purpose.

We ended by “proclaiming the Lord’s death until He comes” in the Lord’s Supper. It was a fitting way to say something about Jesus.

Hope you all had a great Lord’s Day as well.

Weekend Recap – Glorious Mystery/Glorious Creator

by

Had a full Lord’s Day. My SS class is going through Paul Tripp’s What Did You Expect Curriculum and coming face to face with selfishness week in and week out.

The AM Sermon was from Colossians 1:26-27 and was entitled Gospel Mystery. A mystery, from this text, included truth hidden in the past and revealed to God’s saints. The mystery is Christ in us, the hope of glory. It was a humble reminder of what God has to do to save us.

The PM sermon looked at Jesus in the OT, specifically, the Creation account in Genesis 1:1 on and was entitled Jesus in Creation. Many times, we read this creation account as if God the Father is acting alone, but the NT is quite clear that Jesus was the Creator. I sought to remedy that with this message and was, again, humbled to see the glory of God in Jesus.

Weekend Recap on Ministry…

by

Yesterday’s sermon from Colossians 1:25 is now online–entitled Ministry: From, To, For. This sermon greatly affected my heart by allowing me to see afresh how ministry is from God, to us as individuals and for the benefit of others. It also affected me in showing me how arrogant I often function in ministry. As God’s Word called me to humble service, I could find grace.

In small group last night we talked about different kinds of righteousness that we use to inflate our position before God. These performance driven righteousnesses easily get us from centering all that we are on Jesus and His Work for us. One they didn’t mention might be:

MINISTRY RIGHTEOUSNESS — “I’m serving in the church, doing what God has gifted me to do. Surely my obedience in this area and care for others establishes my position before God.” Nope! It doesn’t replace the cross and my need for it daily. I hope you are encouraged, then, to serve in the strength that God supplies, so that HE is glorified.

Weekend Recap – Perseverance

by

Today’s sermon, Gospel Perseverance, from Colossians 1:23 is now online. The outline was pretty simple, getting at motivations for perseverance…

I. We persevere continuing in our faith.
II. We persevere recognizing the scope of the Gospel.
III. We persevere remembering the change the Gospel produces.

I loved the way the passage unfolded to our corporate practice of the Lord’s Supper. We need the encouragement to persevere because we are so prone to think that because we believed at one point in our lives, we are no longer responsible for living out those truths with more and more belief. We need to heed this passage and “not shift from the hope of the Gospel that we heard.”