[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
As you will remember, back in early January I had surgery to repair a major tear in my rotator cuff. Progress has been agonizingly slow. My range of motion is nearly back to what was before I fell and badly injured my shoulder. So now strengthening the shoulder muscles around the rotator cuff is the order of the day. I’m anxious do more and more but my PT (physical therapist) keeps reining me in, slowing we down. I want to get back to Rock Steady but neither my PT nor the surgeon who repaired my shoulder think I’m ready for that yet. They want to see slow, steady progress and that is happening. But, then patience has never been my strong suit.
I tell you this because as I was reflecting on their approach to my regaining the needed strength to return to Rock Steady, it dawned on me that this is an apt metaphor for our spiritual growth as Christians. We want to rush ahead to the next step in our spiritual growth (whatever that step might be) instead of patiently waiting and learning what needs to be learned in this stage of our growing sanctification. We prefer mountaintop experiences rather than the slow methodical growth that is the product of laboring in the valleys of life. I’ve been to the Rocky Mountains at least 2 dozen times and while standing atop a 14,000 foot peak is exhilarating, there’s very little life in those higher elevations; all the lush growth is down the valleys. That is where our faith is tested and it is by means of that testing that we are strengthened for greater obedience to our Lord.
I know I’m mixing my metaphors here, but I trust the point is made. Spiritual growth, our growth in grace is slow but it is inexorable if we will but devote ourselves to the process. Would I prefer to be using a 25 pound dumbbell for my bent over shoulder rowing exercise rather than the measly 8 pounder I’m currently using? Certainly!! But I will get there if I stay the course, if I follow the path my PT has laid out for me. But it’s going to take time. And so it is with the path our Lord has laid out for us. Our progress on that path is sovereignly ordained. But that does not mean that we have no part to play. Paul says it this way in Colossians 1:29–To this end I also labor, striving according to His working which works in me mightily.
If we will daily trust our Lord to lead us in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake (Psalm 23:3), if we run with perseverance and endurance the race that is set before us (Hebrews 12:1) then, as our path, as our course nears its destination, we can say with Paul I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I’ve kept the faith. (2 Timothy 4:7)
This Lord’s Day I’m going to begin a three-part series looking at the three actions described in our vision statement that serve to reflect the glory of God. The first way in which we may reflect His glory is in our passion for Christ. Our primary text will be Philippians 3:7-14. I will get the Order of Worship out to you in the next day or so.
Things are moving ahead at a good pace for calling Pastor Tim as our next pastor. We have the date, place and time set for his interview and examination by the Presbytery of Ohio. It will be at Grace OPC in Columbus, Ohio. It will be on June 28 with a start time of 6:30 PM. Tim has already contacted the presbytery of which he is presently a member–the Presbytery of the Southwest. They have set a tentative date of either July 12 or 13 for their special meeting where they will officially release pastor Tim to the oversight of the Presbytery of Ohio. We are all learning some new dance steps here.
Please remember that Feet ‘n Eat is coming up in a couple of weeks.
Announcements/Calendar
· June 15– Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23–Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25–Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30–Feet ‘n Eat– Turkey Run State Park
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
It is what Jesus is, not what we are, that gives rest to the soul.—Charles Spurgeon
Satan cannot deny but that great wonders have been wrought by prayer. As the spirit of prayer goes up, so his kingdom goes down. —William Gurnall
To desire revival… and at the same time to neglect (personal) prayer and devotion is to wish one way and walk another. —A.W. Tozer
A man ought to live so that everybody knows he is a Christian… and most of all, his family ought to know. —D.L. Moody
We have to pray with our eyes on God, not on the difficulties. —Oswald Chambers
Forgiveness does not restore credibility, and character must be seen as something that can be lost far easier than gained, much less restored. —Albert Mohler
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Confession ≠ Repentance
Ty Gooch
It’s beautiful when Christians humbly confess their sin to one another and cling to the gospel yet again (James 4:7–10).
Maybe we were repulsed by our sin after a gospel-centered sermon, a Christ-anchored Bible study, or a meaningful time of prayer. Perhaps we’ve been confronted with our iniquity after a friend’s rebuke (Proverbs. 27:5), a spouse’s edifying correction (Ephesians 4:15, 25), or a time of self-examination during the Lord’s Supper (1 Corinthians 11:28). In these moments, the Holy Spirit gives a heart-wrenching conviction of sin that’s either newly uncovered or old and rusty. Emotional brokenness and convincing contrition quickly follow, and we’re suddenly in glorious agreement with God about our sin. READ MORE…
Old Books, New Books, and Trends That Fade Away: Lessons Learned From a Book Sale
Luke Holmes
800,000. That’s how many books were for sale at the recent used book sale I went to. I make a point every year to attend the sale of the Metropolitan Library System of Oklahoma City. All paperbacks were 50 cents and hardbacks were only a dollar! You can’t find better bargains than these. People roll in suitcases, storage tubs, boxes, wagons, and I even saw one guy with a giant trash can. With all these books for sale, there are bound to be some treasures, right? READ MORE…
When Sin Looks Delicious
Tim Challies
Do you ever have those days where you just want to sin? Sin looks delicious while righteousness looks distasteful. Sin looks satisfying and holiness looks frustrating. You wake up in the morning with a desire to do what you know you should not desire to do. Your heart echoes with what God said to Cain: “Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you.” And your desire is for it.
You Can Hate Abortion and Love Women: What’s Under the Debate over Life
Scott Klusendorf
Seeking adventure, you post the following syllogism to your social-media page and hang on for the ride:
Premise 1: It is wrong to intentionally kill innocent human beings. Premise 2: Abortion intentionally kills an innocent human being. Conclusion: Abortion is morally wrong.
Right away a friend is typing. Six minutes later, you have a string of comments, not all of them nice. “Why do you hate women?” “What are you doing for kids after they’re born?” “Do you have a uterus? If not, shut up!” You expected controversy, but marvel how a simple syllogism provoked such outrage. It feels like something else is going on here. Indeed it is. READ MORE…
How a True Calvinist Fights
John Newton
As you are likely to be engaged in controversy, and your love of truth is joined with a natural warmth of temper, my friendship makes me solicitous on your behalf. . . . I would have you more than a conqueror and to triumph not only over your adversary but over yourself. If you cannot be vanquished, you may be wounded. To preserve you from such wounds as might give you cause of weeping over your conquests, I would present you with some considerations. READ MORE…
Seven Encouraging Reasons to Pray
Colin Smith
It may be in a hospital or at some other moment of crisis, but at some time most people feel that they want to pray. That is true of thousands and millions of people who would never darken the door of a church.
Here is something that the church has to offer. Christian people have something that at some point, most people in our community and in our country will feel that they need—to pray. Christians know how to pray, or at least we should.
But do we know why we pray? Here are seven reasons we pray which are meant to encourage you in your pursuit of Jesus Christ. READ MORE…
Is God equally active in causing the salvation of the elect and the damnation of the reprobate?
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
It is so delightful to look out my office window and see the sun shining with no threat of rain on the immediate horizon. Summer does not officially begin until June 21, but it feels like summer now and I’m certainly okay with that, as I suspect most of you are as well.
I’ve been reading a book recently entitled Learning to Love the Psalms by Robert Godfrey. I had no idea as to the complexity and the insight it took to arrange the Psalms in a way they are (divinely) arranged…and there is a pattern to their arrangement. Long have I been aware that the Psalms are divided into five books but I did understand the some of the emphases that are unique to each book.
Dr. Godfrey explains it this way. “Is the book of Psalms as a whole largely random in its order? It is just an anthology of poems that would mean that just the same if the poems were in an entirely different arrangement? It is tempting to think so. Even after many years of living with the Psalms, I did not sense any particular flow to the Psalter. In recent years, however, I have begun to see a structure in the Psalms. From conversations with faculty members, from reading books on the subject, and from my own study, I have begun to understand something of the development and movement of the book of Psalms. I do not feel that I have reached any comprehensive conclusions about the position of every psalm in the Psalter. But I hope that by conveying what I discovered, I can help others appreciate the Psalter and perhaps even advanced on what is done here.”
He has certainly done that for me. He has given me an even greater appreciation for the beauty and great value of the Psalter. In recent years the Psalter (the 150 poems or songs that comprise the Psalter) has increasingly become my lodestar.
At last month’s session meeting, the elders asked me if it would be helpful to preach only every other Lord’s Day.
Initially, I was reticent to do so, thinking that I would be shirking my duties and responsibilities. However, with their encouragement and recognizing how increasingly difficult it is to stay focused on the task in front of me…the preparation of a sermon, I acquiesced to their kind offer. Sooo, until my retirement date of July 31, I will preach only every other week. We will have other brothers bringing us God’s Word on the alternating Lord’s Days. This week David Franks will be in the pulpit for us. He always does a fine job. The Order of Worship is attached.
Isn’t our Lord so very good to us? For a congregation to unanimously elect to call a new pastor is, I would think, somewhat rare. There is very often at least one “malcontent” in the congregation who is never quite satisfied. But God moved in hearts of our congregation so that there was absolute unanimity. That is what we had prayed for and our Lord heard our prayers.
I’ve been in contact with the Moderator of our Presbytery, Danny Olinger, and we have a firm date on which the special meeting of presbytery will take place. That date is June 28. The location and time has yet to be finalized but we should be able to nail that down as well very shortly. Please pray for all the details that have yet to be worked out for a smooth transition.
Announcements/Calendar
· June 9 –Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 10–Ladies Meeting
· June 15 –Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23–Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25–Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30–Feet ‘n Eat– Turkey Run State Park
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
The knowledge of Jesus Christ is the very marrow and kernel of all the Scriptures; the scope and center of all divine revelations: both Testaments meet in Christ…The right knowledge of Jesus Christ, like a clue, leads you through the whole labyrinth of the Scriptures.–JohnFlavel
We wept when we were born though all around us smiled; so shall we smile when we die while all around us weep. —C.H. Spurgeon
The mere fact itself that God’s will is irresistible and irreversible fills me with fear, but once I realize that God wills only that which is good, my heart is made to rejoice. —A.W. Pink
Trust in God, not explanations from God, is the pathway through suffering. —Ray Ortlund
The upside, to a sinner, is that an impersonal, amoral force makes no ethical demands on anyone. The downside, however, is that there is nobody home. —R.C. Sproul
The holiness of the triune God is the perfection, beauty and absolute purity of the love there is between the Father and the Son. —Michael Reeves
Sin doesn’t love us. It tries to use us, abuse us, enslave us, control us, and ultimately destroy us. Sin takes from us and gives nothing in return. —Tim Chester
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
LOVE IS NOT A FEELING
Carl R. Trueman
The recent open letter to Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School is a model for responding graciously yet firmly to wrong-headed attempts to address Christianity and the LGBTQ issue. After the school announced in an email that its alumnae magazine would in future carry notices of same-sex unions, a group of alums gently skewered the false alternative of love or Christian teaching, thereby demolishing the school’s argument for this policy change.
False alternatives are standard fare in contemporary Christian approaches to political issues, where “love”—a code word for whatever the political piety du jour may be—is set in opposition to “dogma” or “doctrine”—code words for whatever piece of traditional Christian teaching is deemed to be inconsistent with said political piety. Therefore, the Georgetown Visitation incident is emblematic of a larger problem: The school’s policy change does not represent a more Christian approach, but actually expresses the secular mindset in a Christian idiom. READ MORE…
Just Showing Up
J.K. Wall
What, if anything, is distinctively Christian about our work?
From time to time, I hear Christians ask this question. A good part of the answer comes from Woody Allen.
The filmmaker is credited with saying, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” Or, to give it a Christian twist, 80 percent of “doing the Lord’s work” is just showing up.
Our God works through means. Often those means are us. For instance, if we want to see justice done on earth, we first have to go to work. If we don’t show up, justice typically doesn’t happen. READ MORE…
Are There Degrees of Sin?
R.C. Sproul
Historically speaking, both Roman Catholicism and Protestantism have understood that there are degrees of sin. The Roman Catholic church makes a distinction between mortal and venial sin. The point of that distinction is that there are some sins so gross, heinous, and serious that the actual commission of those sins is mortal in the sense that it kills the grace of justification that resides in the soul of the believer. In their theology, not every sin is devastating to that degree. There are some real sins that are venial sins. These are less serious sins in terms of their consequences, but they don’t have the justification-killing capacity that mortal sins have.
Many evangelical Protestants have rejected the idea of degrees of sin because they know that the Protestant Reformation rejected the Roman Catholic distinction between mortal and venial sins. As a result, they’ve jumped to the conclusion that there are no distinctions between sins in Protestantism. READ MORE…
Three Approaches to Ecclesiastes
Peter Krol
In my observation, Ecclesiastes is second only to Revelation in the number of competing interpretive approaches available to readers of the book. It offers a great case study in how perception can drastically affect both interpretation and application. This fact ought to motivate us to be as meticulous as possible in observing the text within its context.
I’ve found interpreters of Ecclesiastes to fall into three general categories, though there are subtle distinctions of flavor even within each category. For an excellent and thorough review of interpretive approaches to Ecclesiastes, along with a careful analysis of the text itself and its place in Scripture, see this helpful (though lengthy) article from the Kerux journal. READ MORE…
The Bible’s Three Big Lessons on Debt
Tim Challies
The Bible has a lot to say about money, and for good reason. Money, we find, has a uniquely powerful way of exposing our hearts and displaying our priorities. Ultimately, we see that it comes down to a matter of loyalty: “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matthew 6:24). As Christians, we must love God rather than money, for “the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils” (1 Timothy 6:10).
As the Bible teaches about money, it warns about debt. In fact, it offers three big lessons on debt. READ MORE…
What We Lose When We Collapse the Four Gospels into One
Petar Nenadov
The ordinary Christian adult would struggle to articulate why we have four Gospel accounts rather than one. Wouldn’t it be simpler if we only had one account? Do differences among the four accounts invite unnecessary doubt? Do similarities among the four accounts create unhelpful redundancy?
Many people read the Bible a verse or two at a time, simply looking for a quick dose of inspiration. They might think they’re faithful Bible readers, but they’re barely scratching the surface. They’ve been trained to read small sections—not entire books—of the Bible, and this practice negatively affects their reading experience.
As a father, I see how most resources for young children don’t teach them to read entire books of the Bible, especially when it comes to the Gospels. Children’s books about Jesus tell stories without saying which Gospel account they come from. Books that helpfully summarize the whole Bible, such as The Jesus Storybook Bible or The Biggest Story, collapse the four Gospel accounts into one as well. They don’t explain how Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John differ from and complement one another. READ MORE…
Retake Your Heart: Five Reasons for Fresh Courage
David Mathis
“Take heart.” Imagine hearing those two words, as the disciples often did, from the mouth of God himself in the flesh.
And yet how flat these words can fall when we say them to our own hearts. If only we could up and redirect our hearts. None of us wants to be down. Far too often, though, our hearts seem to lie beyond our reach, outside our control.
However discouraged you may feel, your flagging heart never lies beyond the reach of Christ. No matter how troubled, how unsettled, how fickle, how disoriented, how despondent, Jesus can handle your ailing heart. “There are many sorts of broken hearts,” says Charles Spurgeon, “and Christ is good at healing them all.” READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
Between Monday’s holiday, preparations for a very important congregational meeting and a wedding to attend on Saturday (which I’m sure a good number you will be attending as well) I’m running just a little bit behind. Soo, I’ll be brief this week.
I read one of the best descriptions I’ve ever seen of all that Christ suffered for us in order to merit our salvation. It asks and answers a truly foundation question, one all need to be able to answer correctly. It appeared in a recent GraceGem.
Why did Christ die at Calvary?
(Don Fortner)
“But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.” Hebrews 2:9-10
The most wondrous of all God’s works is the work of redemption. When we attempt to contemplate what that work involved, we are lost in astonishment. When we think of the unutterable depths of shame and sorrow into which the Lord of glory entered to save us, we are awed and staggered.
As we trace the path of our Savior from the throne of life to the tomb of death; and behold Him who was rich, for our sakes, becoming poor, that we through His poverty might be made rich–we cannot fathom the depths of the wonders before us.
We know that every step in the path of our Redeemer’s humiliation was ordained in the eternal purpose of God. Yet, it was a path of . . . immeasurable sorrow, unutterable anguish, ceaseless ignominy, bitter hatred, and relentless persecution.
It was a path that brought the Beloved Son of God, the Darling of Heaven, to suffer the painful, shameful death of the cross.
Who could have imagined such things as these?
Standing at the foot of the cross, I behold the Holy One . . . nailed to the cursed tree, covered with His own blood and the spit of an enraged mob, made to be sin, forsaken and cursed of God His Father.
Knowing that this is the work of God’s own hand, I am lost in astonishment! I am filled with reverence and awe (2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 3:13).
Awed as I am with reverence for my crucified Lord, still there is a question that I cannot suppress, a question that reason and sound judgment cannot fail to ask. The question is, WHY? Why did the Son of God suffer such a death? Why did God so torment His beloved Son and kill Him in such a horribly ignominious way?
Was it to save my soul? I know that He did so that I might live. He suffered, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring me to God. But was there no other way for the omnipotent God to save me?
Was all this done to demonstrate the greatness of God’s love to me? I know it was (Romans 5:8; 1 John 3:16; 4:9-10). But God could have revealed His love to me in some other way. Why did He slay His Son? What necessity was there for the Son of God to suffer and die upon the cursed tree?
Only one answer can be found to that question. The JUSTICE of God had to be satisfied. There was no necessity for God to save anyone. Salvation is altogether the free gift of His grace. But, having determined to save His elect from the ruins of fallen humanity, the only way God could save His people and forgive their sins was by the death of Christ. “Without shedding of blood is no remission” (Hebrews 9:22). The justice of God had to be satisfied, in order for God to save His people. And the only thing that could ever satisfy the justice of God is the blood of Christ!
This Lord’s Day, I will return to the theme of unity as found in Ephesians 4:1-6. I’m emphasizing this theme because of its great significance to that which we will do immediately following the morning worship service.
Following the benediction we will move from a worship service to a congregational meeting. The purpose of this meeting is, as you well know, to determine whether or not to extend a call to Rev. Tim McClymonds to be the next pastor of CCOPC. Brothers and sisters, we are at a critical juncture in the life of this church. What you decide at this meeting will have long-term repercussions…for the good we certainly hope.
I hope that every single member of Christ Covenant will be present to take part in this most crucial decision. All communicant members 18 years or older and only those who meet that criteria are permitted to vote. The vote will be by paper ballot. At least 80% of the votes cast must be in favor of extending this call to Pastor Tim but it would be
marvelous were the call to be unanimous. That would be a sign of tremendous unity. The order of worship is attached.
Following the congregation meeting will have our regular monthly fellowship meal. It is going to be glorious day for the body of Christ.
Announcements/Calendar
· June 2–Special Congregational Meeting
· June 2– Fellowship Meal
· June 3–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 9–Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 10–Ladies Meeting
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23–Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25–Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30–Psalm/hymn sing (outdoors around a fire)
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
The chief aim of the enemy’s assaults is to get rid of Christ, to get rid of the atonement, to get rid of his suffering in the place of men. —C.H. Spurgeon
Our obedience is not the grounds of our relationship (with Jesus) but the overflow of it. —Jared Wilson
No temptations do hurt or harm the saints, so long as they are resisted by them. —Thomas Brooks
We must remind ourselves that God loves us, not because we are loveable, but because we are in Christ, and the love which the Father has for his Son flows over to us because we are in him. —Jerry Bridges
Shall a wicked master of a family think to maintain his authority over others while he rebels against the authority of God? —Richard Baxter
It is ever the Holy Spirit’s work to turn our eyes away from self to Jesus; but Satan’s work is just the opposite of this, for he is constantly trying to make us regard ourselves instead of Christ. —C.H. Spurgeon
All the temptations that befall the saints shall be sanctified to them by a hand of love. —Thomas Brooks
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Pursue Integrity Relentlessly
John MacArthur
A small item I read in the news twenty years ago has stuck in my mind ever since. The Rockdale County High School Bulldogs basketball team of Conyers, Georgia, won their first-ever state championship in March of 1987, rolling over all their opponents. After eighteen years of coaching the team without a championship, coach Cleveland Stroud was ecstatic.
But a few weeks after the championship game, Coach Stroud was doing a routine review of his players’ grades when he discovered that one of his third‑string players had failed some courses, rendering the player academically ineligible for the basketball team.
The struggling student was by no means a factor in the team’s victory. He was an underclassman who suited up for games but hadn’t actually seen any playing time all season. During one of the semifinal matches, however, with the team leading by more than 20 points, Coach Stroud wanted to give every player an opportunity to participate. He had put that player in the game for less than 45 seconds. The ineligible man had scored no points. His participation had in no way affected the outcome of the game. But it was, technically, a violation of state eligibility standards. READ MORE…
It’s Submission, Not Subjection
Tim Challies
The Bible has a lot to say about submission. It’s a theme, a command, that appears with regularity. Christians are told to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ (Ephesians 5:21). Wives are instructed to submit to their own husbands (Ephesians 5:22). Church members are directed to submit to their pastors (Hebrews 13:17). In summary, we are all to submit to God in every way (James 4:7) because all authority ultimately flows down from him (Romans 13:2). It turns out that our submission to people is indistinguishable from our submission to God.
Submission is a tricky concept made all the more difficult by our naturally sinful rebellion to the very notion of it. Submission is simply acknowledging sources of authority and arranging ourselves accordingly. However, we are all quite convinced we can get along perfectly well without ceding to authority. We understand how others might need that kind of leadership, but we sure don’t! This rebellion begins in infancy and continues to death. We hate to submit to people because we hate to submit to God. Just as submission to people is a facet of our submission to God, rebellion against people is a facet of our rebellion against God. READ MORE…
The Night That Took My Wife: How Grief Imprisoned Us to Grace
Reid Karr
If I could have known somehow that the Lord would call my wife, Kyra, home to be with him, I would have begged him to take me instead. Our girls were only six, four, and two. What hope did I have of raising them alone? The thought was unthinkable. It simply didn’t make sense.
But, as we know all too well, the Lord’s ways are often not our ways. So, on August 14, 2015, I woke up to a new reality and a new, previously unthinkable world, one which did not include my precious wife to live and walk and parent alongside. READ MORE…https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-night-that-took-my-wife
Was George Whitefield a Christian?
DEALING WITH THE TAINTED LEGACY OF AMERICAN HISTORY’S GREATEST PREACHER
Jared C. Wilson
“Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.” Exodus 21:16
What are we to make of evangelicalism’s historical “heroes” who carry with them still a tainted legacy of sin? Such is the question constantly facing the American Church as we contemplate the theological and evangelistic impact of men like Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield, both of whom owned and, at points, defended the sinful institution of chattel slavery.
Both of these men leave behind an incredible record of gospel-rich theology and preaching. There is a reason we still study their work today and why many of us find much in it that edifies and stirs our affections for Christ. Many are reluctant to admit the great sin of these figures, believing that doing so may eradicate their contributions to church history. Many of course readily admit the great sin of these figures for the very purpose of indicting their contributions to church history. Still others assert we must accept all of their contributions, good and bad, as the consequence of honest historical appraisal. We must admit the good and the bad, because both the good and the bad we do leave their own legacies. Certainly the historical evil of slavery continues to impact American society today.
When Patrick Mead took his father, Bill Mead, to live in a dementia care facility the week after Thanksgiving, he taped a note to his dad’s door. Mead wanted the staff members to know about the new resident in Room 14, even if his father couldn’t tell them himself.
“My name is Bill Mead,” the letter began. “I was born in abject poverty. I became a warrior (U.S. Navy, Korea War era). I then laid aside my weapons and became a minister and missionary. I traveled the world, spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ. …
“I am slowly leaving this earth for my heavenly home. This may take a while. Thank you for remembering who I was and who I am. I am a man, a warrior, a missionary, a father, a friend, and so much more. And I have one more river to cross.” READ MORE…
ABORTION AND EUGENICS
Clarence Thomas
In the Supreme Court’s May 28 decision in Box v. Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, the Court declined to review an Indiana law prohibiting abortions on the basis of race, sex, or disability. Justice Clarence Thomas’s concurring opinion, excerpted below, describes the connections between abortion advocacy and eugenics, and the ways in which abortion is a tool of modern-day eugenicists.
This case highlights the fact that abortion is an act rife with the potential for eugenic manipulation. From the beginning, birth control and abortion were promoted as means of effectuating eugenics. Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger was particularly open about the fact that birth control could be used for eugenic purposes. These arguments about the eugenic potential for birth control apply with even greater force to abortion, which can be used to target specific children with unwanted characteristics. Even after World War II, future Planned Parenthood President Alan Guttmacher and other abortion advocates endorsed abortion for eugenic reasons and promoted it as a means of controlling the population and improving its quality. As explained below, a growing body of evidence suggests that eugenic goals are already being realized through abortion. READ MORE…
The view from ‘Doralzuela’: How refugees at ground level describe socialism’s latest failure. Will young Americans listen?
Marvin Olasky
It’s 1,376 miles from Caracas, Venezuela, to Doral, a Miami suburb now known as Doralzuela because so many refugees from the world’s latest socialist experiment now huddle here, yearning to be free.
They come in the footsteps of refugees who fled Cuba in the 1960s, when Peter, Paul and Mary were singing in coffeehouses, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” Each verse concluded, “When will they ever learn?” That question should now be addressed to fans of socialism and socialist candidates.
The 20th century was a century of education. We learned what happened when ambitious politicians from 1917 through 1949 in three of the world’s most powerful nations—Russia, Germany, and China—used socialist hopes to gain power. Soviet socialism probably killed 20 million and Chinese socialism 65 million. The butcher’s bill for Germany’s National Socialists (commonly known as Nazis) may have totaled 70 million lives. READ MORE…
IN PRAISE OF FAITHFUL ENDURANCE
Jeremy Writebol
I love how Captain America says that with a bloodied lip and bruised cheek. And as he gets back up, dusts himself off, and pulls the straps of his shield tighter around his arm he jumps back into battle, never willing to give up.
The ethos behind this kind of endurance is rare among us today, especially in the church. Too often, many churches are like revolving doors: people come in, stay a while, find something that bothers them, and then move along to the next church.
I don’t say that to pass blame. There are many good reasons to leave one church and find another. Nor do I intend to say that this problem only exists among non-staff members. However, ministry does require resolve, and those who are in it for the long haul encourage others to faithfully endure. READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
Psalm 111 begins with these words: Praise the Lord! I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart, in the company of the upright, in the congregation.
The psalmist then goes on to give more than a dozen examples of the sort things for which we can be thankful.
1. Thank God for His great works.
2. Thank God for His righteousness. (mentioned twice)
3. Thank God for His grace.
4. Thank God for His mercy.
5. Thank God for His provision of food.
6. Thank God for His covenant.
7. Thank God for His power.
8. Thank God for our inheritance.
9. Thank God for His faithfulness. (mentioned twice)
10. Thank God for His justice.
11. Thank God for His precepts.
12. Thank God for His trustworthiness.
13. Thank God for His uprightness
14. Thank God for His redemption.
What you are you thankful for today?
I trust that you who have spent any time with Pastor Tim and Anlle this past week have found them to be delightful, to be passionate their faith and to really care for people. This Lord’s Day, Pastor Tim will be covering all the parts of the worship service that are reserved for ministers alone–the salutation, the pronouncement of pardon, the ministry of the Word, the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and the benediction. Pray that God’s Word might go out with power and accomplish that purpose for which He sends it forth. The Order of Worship is attached. Please make use of it in preparing your family to worship our great and mighty God.
Just as an FYI, Pastor Tim and Anlle will be joining the crew going down to Neighborhood Fellowship this Lord’s Day. They want to get a peek at that aspect of who we are as well.
Announcements/Calendar
· May 26—Neighborhood Fellowship
· May 26—Sheridan Health Care (worship service)
· June 2–Fellowship Meal
· June 2–Special Congregational Meeting
· June 3–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 9–Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 10–Ladies Meeting
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23–Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25–Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30–Psalm/hymn sing (outdoors around a fire)
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
The man who does most good to souls is often the simple believer who says to his friends, ‘I have found a Saviour; come and see him.’ —J.C. Ryle
If we would have any sin subdued, we must not only labor to overcome it…but must invite Christ to abide in its place. —The Valley of Vision
One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove at the Last Day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time. —John Piper
There is a great gulf between the Christianity that wrestles with whether to worship at the cost of imprisonment and death, and the Christianity that wrestles with whether the kids should play soccer on Sunday morning. —John Piper
We must remind ourselves that God loves us, not because we are loveable, but because we are in Christ, and the love which the Father has for his Son flows over to us because we are in him. —Jerry Bridges
You must come to a point of being willing to offend, or else you’ll never say much of anything.—Elliot Clark
I am a creature, created in the image of God, fully dependent on him and fully accountable to him. —Jerry Bridges
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
If We Could See Sunday from Heaven
Marshall Segal
Have you ever caught yourself looking past Sunday morning? Has the promise of the week ahead ever begun to eclipse the wonder of gathering with God’s people?
You probably don’t despise church, but you might still quietly pine for the extra rest that afternoon and evening. You might long for another week to start. A temptation arises, at times, to take Sundays for granted and start looking forward, instead, to what comes on Monday: to routines, relationships, events or activities, maybe even to work. Church slowly, even imperceptibly becomes an interruption in the week, instead of the culmination.
How does the awe-inspiring weekly gathering of God’s chosen people devolve into a stoplight — an inconvenient intrusion in the flow of our lives? Often, it’s because we’ve started worshiping something else the rest of the week.
Do we want an unfailing friend? Such a friend is the Lord Jesus Christ.
The saddest part of all the good things of earth is their instability. Riches make themselves wings and flee away; youth and beauty are but for a few years; strength of body soon decays; mind and intellect are soon exhausted.
All is perishing. All is fading. All is passing away. But there is one splendid exception to this general rule, and that is the friendship of Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus is a friend who never changes. There is no fickleness about Him: those whom He loves, He loves unto the end. Husbands have been known to forsake their wives; parents have been known to cast off their children; human vows and promises of faithfulness have often been forgotten.
Thousands have been neglected in their poverty and old age, who were honoured by all when they were rich and young. But Christ never changed His feelings towards one of His friends. He is ‘the same yesterday, today, and forever.’ (Heb. 13:8.) READ MORE…
Would You Accept More Gospel Hostility If It Also Meant More Gospel Openness?
Stephen McAlpine
I was speaking to a well regarded UK apologist, pastor and author by Skype from Scotland the other day and he said this: It’s never been more hostile to the gospel, but never more open either.
What he meant was that while there is a concerted push against the Christian frame among the political, cultural and legal class of his nation, and in the West in general, there is also a wave of openness to the gospel that he’d not witnessed before.
And that’s in Scotland, which is about ten years ahead of Australia in terms of the secular push in the state. There’s a positive glee in people when Christianity takes another battering; a sense that we’ve had things our way for too long, and the chickens are coming home to roost.
The Book Your Pastor Wishes You Would Read (But Is Too Embarrassed to Ask)
Tim Challies
I’ve seen churches where the pastor has been treated terribly—a slave forced to cede to the congregation’s every whim. I’ve seen churches where the pastor has been treated heroically—a superstar who exists above all critique and accountability. Surely the biblical position avoids both extremes and treats the pastor far better than either a slave or a celebrity. It treats him as a shepherd or, better still, an under-shepherd who serves on behalf of the great Shepherd of the sheep, Jesus Christ.
For a pastor to thrive in his God-ordained role, both he and his church must know the nature of their relationship and be willing to do their part to make this a healthy, happy dynamic. And this is exactly the subject of Christopher Ash’s new book The Book Your Pastor Wishes You Would Read (But Is Too Embarrassed to Ask). READ MORE…
The Surprising Role of Guardian Angels
John Piper
What did Jesus mean in Matthew 18:10 when he said, “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven”? He meant: Let the magnificence of every unimpressive Christian’s entourage of angels silence our scorn and awaken awe at the simplest children of God.
To see this, let’s clarify, first, who “these little ones” are. “See that you do not despise one of these little ones.” They are true believers in Jesus, viewed from the standpoint of their childlike trust in God. They are the heaven-bound children of God. We know this because of the immediate and wider context of the Gospel of Matthew.
This section in Matthew 18 began with the disciples asking, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” (Matthew 18:1). Jesus answers, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3–4). In other words, the text is not about children. It is about those who become like children, and thus enter the kingdom of heaven. It’s about true disciples of Jesus. READ MORE…
Why Is Love not a Mark of the Church?
Barry York
In the book Hitting the Marks: Restoring the Essential Identity of the Church, I present the historic, Reformed understanding that the three key identification marks of a true church are the faithful preaching of God’s Word, the right administration of the sacraments, and the proper exercise of discipline. In response, I am often asked the question above. Why is love not among the marks of the church? After all, Jesus Himself said,
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. (John 13:34-35)
With such a clear indication by the Lord that love identifies us as His followers, then how can it not be included as a mark of the church? Why, with the emphasis placed upon it here, is love not THE mark of the church?
Though I do address this question more fully in the ninth chapter of the book, let me give my short answer followed by a brief explanation. My answer to the question “Why is love not the mark of the church?” is simply this: “It is!” Now let me explain. READ MORE…
Clearing Your Conscience – Acts 24:16
Andrew Kerr
It is vital for every Christian to keep the conscience clear. There are many things of which the world, flesh and devil may accuse us, which may be true or false. To serve well in the church, and shine light on the state, we must know we’ve done right to maintain a vibrant witness. As Paul says to Felix in his trial at Caesarea: “So I always take pains to have a clear conscience both towards God and man.”
Popularly, some call conscience ‘the Policeman of the Soul’. Vine’s Expository Dictionary defines conscience as
“…a co-knowledge with oneself, the witness borne to one’s conduct by conscience, that faculty by which we apprehend (learn or understand) the will of God, as that which is designed to govern our desires.”
Every person has a God-given conscience – it is seared by sin, cleansed by Christ’s blood, realigned by chastening, and retrained and honed by Scripture. READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
We enjoyed a fruitful and instructive visit Dr. Jim and Jenny Knox last evening as they gave us an in-depth look at what they will be doing upon their return Uganda, hopefully as early as this August. They are a delightful couple.
Fun fact last night: Dr. Jim asked if any of us knew how big the continent of Africa is. We would all agree that it is pretty big, right? But just how big is it? He showed us a picture of Africa overlaying a number of other geographical areas. What it revealed was that Africa is larger than the combined land mass of the continental US, China, India, Pakistan and most of Western Europe. I knew Africa was large, but not that large.
Next month will have the joy and privilege of entertaining another missionary family, the Mike McCabe family who serve in China. It will be on June 25. Please put that date on your calendar. As most of you know, China has really clampdown on Christians and their churches. Mike and his wife, Lili, will likely have some insights that are far more in depth than what we read in most other forms of media.
I found this brief Grace Gem by J.C. Ryle pretty basic but incredibly challenging. I trust it will encourage you today as well.
Holiness is the habit of being of one mind with God, according as we find His mind described in Scripture. It is the habit of . . . agreeing with God’s judgment, hating what He hates, loving what He loves, and measuring everything in this world by the standard of His Word.
A holy man will strive to be like our Lord Jesus Christ. He will not only live a life of faith in Him and draw from Him all his daily peace and strength, but he will also labor to have the mind that was in Him and to be conformed to His image!
Here are a couple of reminders for you.
First, the session of CCOPC has called the congregation to a day of fasting and prayer on Friday (tomorrow) in anticipation of and as part of the preparation for the visit of Rev. Tim McClymonds and his wife Anlle. So whether you fast for one meal only or for the entire day, use the time you would normally eat to pray instead. Pray for wisdom for all of us, that we might be able to discern our God’s will for our congregation. Pray that an observable spirit of unity would pervade the body. Pray that all the necessary details for calling a pastor would be accomplished in a timely fashion. In the OPC, there are a number of steps that need to be taken. Pray, brothers and sisters…pray.
Second, please remember that in connection with the coming of Tim and Anlle we will be having a Fellowship Meal this coming Lord’s Day, providing opportunity for you to meet them and spend some (limited) time with them.
Third, remember that we will be having two open houses which will provide a much better opportunity for you to interact with Tim and Anlle. The first is Monday evening at our home. Start time will be at 7:00 pm with no specific end time. The second will be at the Stoneking’s home. Again, the start time will be 7:00 pm. If your family is planning on attending either of these open houses, please RSVP either Patti or Charla. You can call, email or text.
The Order of Worship for this Lord’s Day is attached.
Announcements/Calendar
· May 19—Fellowship Meal
· May 19—Young Adults Fellowship Group (Tim & Anlle will be in attendance)
· May 26—Neighborhood Fellowship
· May 26—Sheridan Health Care (worship service)
· June 2–Fellowship Meal
· June 2–Prayer service
· June 3–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 9–Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 10–Ladies Meeting
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23–Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25–Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30–Psalm/hymn sing (outdoors around a fire)
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
Startle not when I say it,—I fear that many men proudly ask to be humble: they desire to be humble in order that they may be admired for it. —C.H. Spurgeon
Often the work of the Lord itself may be a temptation, to keep us from that communion with him which is so essential to the benefit of our own souls. —George Muller
Do not allow me success that exceeds my sanctification.–Tim Challies
Even those who oppose Jesus are themselves being sustained by his powerful word. —Andrew Wilson
Although my memory’s fading, I remember two things very clearly: I am a great sinner and Christ is a great Savior. —John Newton
A humble Christian studies his own infirmities, and another’s excellencies.– Thomas Watson
One way sinners enter the kingdom is by first entering our kitchen. Some will only come to the table of the Lord after first coming to our dinner table. —Elliot Clark
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Why Did God Command Hosea to Marry an Immoral Woman?
Derek Bass
What would you say if a Christian friend claimed God had told him to marry an immoral woman? To say the least, you’d have reservations, right? You’d probably tell him what the Bible says about being “unequally yoked” and warn him of the dangers of missionary dating.
But what should we make of the fact that God seems to have told Hosea to do exactly that? The prophecy of Hosea is probably best known for the scandal of Hosea’s marriage to Gomer. So the question is straightforward: Why did God command his prophet to marry an immoral woman? READ MORE…
WHEN BROKEN PEOPLE SHOW UP AT YOUR BROKEN CHURCH
Simonetta Carr
It’s easy to find articles indicting the church for its failure to welcome and help people with mental illness. A Google search of these keywords brings up dismal results. That’s probably because we are quicker to report bad news than good ones. There are, in fact, loving communities where people with mental illness find love and inclusion. I found such a church in Tucson, Arizona. The pastor of Covenant Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC), Christopher Chelpka, invited me to speak about my book, Broken Pieces and the God Who Mends Them (P&R, 2019).
I was immediately impressed. The congregation was genuinely warm and hospitable. It was obvious they wanted people to feel at ease. And yet, they were eager to learn more and to continue to improve.
I knew at least one person in the congregation was struggling with a form of mental illness, a young lady named Summer. She had contacted me by email and told me she was going through a difficult time. On the Sunday I attended Covenant OPC, she was getting ready to leave for a residential treatment program in another town. In God’s providence, I happened to sit in the pew behind her. READ MORE…
An Overview of the Nineteenth Century
Nicholas R. Needham
In many ways, not just politically, but morally, culturally, and even spiritually, the nineteenth century was dominated by the French Revolution of 1789 and its aftermath. The French Revolution introduced a new force into world history—democracy as “gospel.” When the French middle classes seized power from a decadent monarchy and aristocracy, they were driven by an Enlightenment devotion to the sovereignty of reason in human affairs. No tradition, however ancient or venerable, must be allowed to stand in reason’s path. This was quite different in spirit from the American Revolution of 1775–81, which took its stand on acknowledged British legal principles. By contrast, the French Revolutionaries wanted to jettison history and re-create human society afresh, based on purely rational ideals. This was reflected in their reform of the calendar: 1789 became Year 1. Time was no longer to be measured by the Savior’s redeeming birth but by humanity’s revolutionary rebirth.
When today we think of democracy as a kind of self-evident political gospel to be sold to (or imposed on) the world, we are showing ourselves to be children of the French Revolution. It may be worth reflecting that very few Christian thinkers at the time agreed with this idea. Partly, this was because they believed in original sin. Humans are incapable of behaving rationally for very long. The very fate of France’s revolution demonstrated this when the “rational republic” was soon transformed into the personal military empire of Napoleon Bonaparte, plunging Europe into the Napoleonic Wars (1803–15). Those years of bloody turmoil ended when Napoleon was finally defeated at Waterloo in Belgium by a coalition made up (chiefly) of Britain, Prussia, Austria, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Russia. READ MORE…
Honor Your Father and Mother
Douglas Bond
No more of parental rules,” declares Calvin (from the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes) as he and Hobbes strut north to be masters of their fate in the frozen Yukon. “Good riddance to those grown-up ghouls!” Life will be grand, so Calvin thinks, because there he won’t need to put up with—much less honor—his parents.
In a culture that honors youth, “Honor your father and your mother” (Ex. 20:12a) makes no sense. Isn’t honor something we seek for ourselves? So what’s all this about giving it to others? READ MORE…
The Joy of Justification
Nick Batzig
Theologians have often considered justification by faith alone to be “the heart of the Gospel” for the simple reason that justification is a legal declaration of pardon and righteousness–a once-for-all judicial act of God toward believers. Justification is judicial not transformative in nature. The justified believer has been acquitted before the divine tribunal and declared righteous “only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone (WSC 33).” Nevertheless, there is a real joy produced in the heart of the believer on account of the imputed righteousness of Christ. Just as Jesus experienced sorrow on account of the imputation of our sin, believers rejoice in the fact that God has clothed us in the righteousness of another. Hugh Martin, in his book The Shadow of Calvary, explained: READ MORE…
The Everyday Relevance of Eternal Life
Matt McCullough
In my circles, talk of God’s kingdom resonates well. It’s earthy. It’s life-affirming. It’s a call to be out in the world working, creating, even reforming as agents of the King. The kingdom of God feels relevant, and it is.
Eternal life, on the other hand, can come off as merely an amorphous alternative to hell. At best, it can be difficult to connect with. At worst, it can seem like a diversion from things that deserve our attention—a distraction from the beauty of this world or an attempt to escape from its problems.
This reaction to the promise of eternal life is as old as the promise itself. In John’s gospel, where eternal life has an especially prominent place, Jesus’ relentless focus on eternal life drives many of His hearers away.
Consider John 6. Jesus feeds five thousand people with a few loaves and fish. The crowds then track Him down, hoping for more. Jesus, sensing their true motive, says: “You are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life” (vv. 26–27). READ MORE…
A Censorious Spirit
Nick Batzig
Sinclair Ferguson once lamented the fact that whenever he overheard others discussing some public theologian or individual at a conference, the statements were almost always prefaced with a negative comment such as, “Well, you know, the problem with him is…” Sadly, those sorts of conversations are far from uncommon among those of us who have been in the church for any length of time. We are all almost certainly guilty of making similar statements about brothers and sisters and, we have, no doubt, been the objects of such pejorative statements. So what are the marks of this all too common spiritual deficiency? And, how can we check our spirits so that we rid them of this censoriousness? READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good evening brothers and sisters,
This is going to be brief today as I’ll be writing something a bit more fulsome about the plans we are making for the visit of Rev. Tim McClymonds and his wife Anlle as he candidates for the position of our new pastor.
This Lord’s Day I will be teaching from Ephesians 4: 1-6, looking particularly at the unity which is absolutely essential for a healthy church. Please pray that God’s Word would go forth with power. The Order of Worship is attached.
Please remember that next week on Wednesday, we have the privilege of hearing from Dr. Jim Knox about his plans for a return to Uganda as a medical missionary. Please be sure to join us that evening. Start time is 7:00 pm
Announcements/Calendar
· May 13—Ladies Group
· May 15—OPC missionaries, Dr. Jim and Jenny Knox present their ministry
· May 19—Fellowship Meal
· May 19—Young Adults Fellowship Group (Tim & Anlle will be in attendance)
· May 26—Neighborhood Fellowship
· May 26—Sheridan Health Care (worship service)
· June 2–Fellowship Meal
· June 2–Prayer service
· June 3–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 9–Young Adults Fellowship Group
· June 10–Ladies Meeting
· June 16–Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· June 17–Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
· June 23– Neighborhood Fellowship
· June 25– Mike and Lili McCabe (missionaries to China)
· June 30– Psalm/hymn sing (outdoors around a fire)
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
If you win people to biblical principles but fail to win them to the biblical Christ, you will simply create religious people who lack the power to change. We create tidy unbelievers. —Jared Wilson
In times of adversity, believers comfort themselves with the solace that they suffer nothing except by God’s ordinance and command, for they are under his hand. —John Calvin
Christ leads me through no darker rooms than He went through before. —Richard Baxter
If the truth offends, then let it offend. People have been living their whole lives in offense to God; let them be offended for a while.–John MacArthur
Much of my learning to follow Jesus is unlearning to follow myself. —Burk Parsons
When we see salvation whole—its every single part is found in Christ, we must beware lest we derive the smallest drop from somewhere else. —Sinclair Ferguson
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
The New Thought Police? Facebook’s Evicted Seven And The Future of Free Speech
Al Mohler
Every major news event has a shadow—and sometimes the real story is hiding in the shadow. It is elusive, it is hidden, but it must be brought to the light in order to fully understand the consequences of any newsworthy development.
A story that demands that kind of closer look came with an announcement last week from Facebook. The social media giant announced that it had banned seven people from using its platform. The New York Times reported, “After years of wavering about how to handle the extreme voices populating its platform, Facebook on Thursday evicted seven of its most controversial users, many of whom are conservatives, immediately inflaming the debate about the power and accountability of large technology companies.” READ MORE…
What Should We Do with Books by Fallen Leaders?
Tim Challies
Today’s article was sparked by a question from a long-time reader of the site. “With the sad removal from ministry of yet another prominent pastor, I’ve been wondering how we are to view their ministry retrospectively. What do we do with their books? With their sermons? With their tweets and blog posts?” He told of a Christian bookseller who has been left with entire boxes of titles by an author who was removed from ministry. Would it be wrong to try to sell them? Would it be right for him to take the loss and to throw them away? The questions remind me of a gloomy photo snapped outside what was formerly Mars Hill Ballard’s building, a photo of a dumpster filled to overflowing with rain-drenched copies of Mark Driscoll’s A Call to Resurgence. READ MORE…
The Gospel of Inclusion Is Far Too Narrow
Trevin Wax
One of the ways error can creep into the church is when people attempt to simplify the Christian faith by picking up one truth—a real truth that makes up part of the Christian faith—and then holding tightly to it while letting go of other important truths. Over time, that one truth, separated now from the rest of orthodoxy, gets called into action and becomes a weapon against Christianity’s other truths.
One truth, divorced from all the others, becomes the unassailable foundation for a new creed, and then a new religion gets constructed upon it. READ MORE…
Church Membership Is an Office and a Job
Jonathan Leeman
Christians have a long tradition of referring to elders and deacons as church “officers.” The nomenclature rightly recognizes the role and responsibilities that Scripture gives to our leaders. It also points to the honor due to pastors (1 Tim. 5:17). People show respect to officers, right?
I don’t want to downplay any of this.
But . . . church membership is an office, too. It’s a job that comes with authority and responsibility. We can call a lieutenant an “officer” without diminishing the honor due to a general.
What’s at stake here is not just academic, but pastoral and biblical. Too many Christians today view their relationship with the local church consumeristically—as if churches were gas stations. You drive around once a week looking to fill your tank spiritually. You find the station with the lowest prices and the car wash option. Maybe you join the rewards program. Church membership is that rewards program. Loyalty to their brand brings extra benefits. READ MORE…
Who’s to Blame When the Shooter Is One of Our Own?
Carl Trueman
Last weekend’s news of another synagogue attack was shocking but, sadly, not a shock. Mass shootings, while thankfully not routine weekly occurrences, have become a matter of “when” rather than “if” in modern America.
Yet, this attack at the Chabad of Poway synagogue in California stirred particular interest and questions among Christians since the suspect, 19-year-old John Earnest, was reported to belong to a Presbyterian church. In fact, he was apparently a member of a nearby congregation in my own denomination, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC).
In our response to such evil, we instinctually want to find an explanation or pinpoint a source to blame—in this case, some (even within the OPC) learned about his affiliation and speculated about hate preached from OPC pulpits. Faced with another’s tragedy, we are tempted to put our enemies at fault and score points for our side. But such tidy speculation loses sight of the complexity of such matters and casually commits the serious sin of slander. READ MORE…
Grab Hold of God: The Importance of Wrestling in Prayer
Vaneetha Rendall Risner
I struggle with knowing how to pray. Should I trust that everything is in God’s hands and rest knowing he will do the best thing for me? Or should I cry out to God earnestly to change the situation, giving him reasons to answer my prayer?
Wrestling with God or resting in him. Which is better?
Resting seems godlier, trusting that God will give me what I need without even asking. It seems more holy, more faith-filled, more biblical. Resting seems to indicate a more mature faith. But when I look at the Bible, I see a fuller picture of prayer. Jesus tells us to ask, and it will be given to us (Matthew 7:7) and that if we abide in him, we can ask for whatever we wish, and it will be done for us (John 15:7).
Not only that, Jesus exhorts us “always to pray and not lose heart.” He tells the parable of the unjust judge, who gave the widow justice because she kept coming to him and likened that to the way we need to cry out to God (Luke 18:1–7). He commended the Canaanite woman for her faith and did what she asked because she was persistent, giving Jesus reasons to answer her (Matthew 15:21–28). When Jesus spoke about prayer, he told us to bring our requests to God. READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters.
The author of Hebrews opens that letter with these words:
1God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,
2has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds.
(Hebrews 1:1-2)
Then in 2 Peter 1:19-21 we read,
19So we
have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay
attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and
the morning star arises in your hearts.20 But know
this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation,21 for no
prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit
spoke from God.
And then in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, Paul tells us that
16All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,
17that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
So
from these verses, the question I would ask is, “How does God speak to
us today?” Well, based on Hebrews 1:2, you might answer that He speaks
to us by His Son, and that would
be true enough…that’s what the verse says. But how does Jesus
speak to us today? Do we hear a clear audible voice from heaven, such as
Peter, James and John heard when they were with Jesus on the Mount of
Transfiguration? Many today claim that Jesus
speaks to them directly and tells them this, that or the other thing.
Many claim that
God told me to do this, that or the other thing…that God spoke them audibly.
Luther,
in his typically blunt fashion, answers the question of how God speaks
to us today in this way: “Let the man who would hear God speak read Holy
Scripture.” That is pretty
sage counsel, would you not agree?” God speaks to us through His written Word.
Our Confession of Faith asserts that “The
whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His
own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set
down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced
from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether
by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions
of men.”
Simply
put, brothers and sisters, the Bible contains all the insight, all the
counsel, all the direction, all the answers we need with regard to our
salvation and our faith and
life. But to get those answers, we must read, study and meditate on the
Scriptures.
This
Lord’s Day it is my intention to finish up 1 Peter. Peter closes his
epistle with a series of commands, eight of them altogether. That will
be the focus of attention. Please
pray that God might use the preaching of the Word to accomplish those
purposes for which He sends it forth. The Order of Worship for this
Lord’s Day is attached.
The
session was delighted to share with the congregation last Lord’s Day
that we have a wonderful man who will be coming to candidate as our
potential future Pastor. His name is
Tim McClymonds and his wife’s name is Anlle (pronounced An-jay with the
accent on the first syllable). They will arrive May 18 and return home
May 26. Tim will be preaching on the 19th and 26th. The session is still
in discussion as to how we can arrange for
each family to meet Tim and Anlle and hear something of their story as
well as provide you with the opportunity to ask questions of them. It
will likely involve multiple evenings at multiple locations. We will
let you know soon as we have a firm plan in place.
But in the intervening time, let me encourage you to be formulating
some questions that you would like to hear them respond to.
Our
Fellowship Meal is this coming Lord’s Day, so please plan accordingly.
Of course immediately following that meal we will return to the
sanctuary for a season of prayer. I’m
going to change the format a bit and rather than make use of the ACTS
outline, I’m going to put together an extensive list of specific
requests. If you have items you would like to see included on that list,
please contact me either today or by mid-afternoon
tomorrow.
We
are also planning to have an additional Fellowship Meal on May 19 while
Tim and Anlle are with us. We are endeavoring to expose them to as much
of our “body life” as we can in
the short time they will be with us.
On
your calendar, please set aside the evening of May 15 as well. That is
the evening we will be having Dr. Jim and Jenny Knox with us, updating
us on their plans to return to Uganda
as medical missionaries. Our young people need to be exposed to the
breadth and width and depth of the Kingdom of God. Please make this a
priority.
Announcements/Calendar
·
May 5—Fellowship meal
·
May 5—Season of prayer (immediately following Fellowship meal)
·
May 6—Adults Fellowship group (townies)
·
May 7—Deacons meet
·
May 8—Session meets
·
May 13—Ladies Group
·
May 15—OPC missionaries, Dr. Jim and Jenny Knox present their ministry
·
May 19—Fellowship Meal
·
May 19—Young Adults Fellowship Group (Tim & Anlle will be in attendance)
·
May 20—Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
·
May 26—Neighborhood Fellowship
·
May 26— Sheridan Health Care (worship service)
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
The tongue exists to reveal our hearts. —John Calvin
The devil is always the governor where God’s government is refused. —Richard
Baxter
The
love of God in our culture has been purged of anything the culture
finds uncomfortable. The love of God has been sanitized, democratized,
and above all
sentimentalized. —D.A. Carson
All of God’s people are ordinary people who have been made extraordinary by the purpose he has given them. —Oswald
Chambers
If
all your prayers came true this week, who would be converted, whose
marriage would be restored, what great gospel advance might there be,
and what missionaries
would be sent out? —Kevin DeYoung
Brethren, it is easier to declaim against a thousand sins of others than to mortify one sin in ourselves.
—John Flavel
Satan may build a hedge about us and fence us in and hinder our movements, but he cannot roof us in and prevent our looking up. –
Hudson Taylor
Great grace and small gifts are better than great gifts and no grace. —John
Bunyan
Ordinary Christians Will End Abortion: Eight Ways You Can Help
Tim Counts
When
the Romans would leave unwanted newborns out to die, it was the
Christians who would rescue and raise them. May our history become our
legacy.
Our
nation has been shocked in recent months by extreme abortion laws that
seem to be hitting us one after the other, starting with New York
passing a sweeping
abortion law that loosened the requirement for who can be an
abortionist, removed protections for unborn babies involved in violent
crimes, and allowed abortions through all nine months of pregnancy.
Days
later, the governor of Virginia talked about a bill that was in
committee, and then calmly discussed how a survivor of a late-term
abortion could be killed
if the mother and doctor agreed. Then Senator Ben Sasse fast-tracked a
bill protecting babies born alive during late-term abortions, saying
that all US senators should be able to go on record against infanticide.
It was shut down and continues to be.
I’m
a pastor in Vermont, where we have been facing our own bill in state
government, which some have called the most radical abortion legislation
in the world.
It has zero restrictions on abortion. Now they are working on passing a
state constitutional amendment that would enshrine abortion as a right
that “shall not be denied or infringed.” If only Vermont were alone in
this. Multiple states now are considering
similar legislation, even as other states are trying to protect preborn
babies more.
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Ordinary Christians Will End Abortion: Eight Ways You Can Help
Tim Counts
When
the Romans would leave unwanted newborns out to die, it was the
Christians who would rescue and raise them. May our history become our
legacy.
Our
nation has been shocked in recent months by extreme abortion laws that
seem to be hitting us one after the other, starting with New York
passing a sweeping
abortion law that loosened the requirement for who can be an
abortionist, removed protections for unborn babies involved in violent
crimes, and allowed abortions through all nine months of pregnancy.
Days
later, the governor of Virginia talked about a bill that was in
committee, and then calmly discussed how a survivor of a late-term
abortion could be killed
if the mother and doctor agreed. Then Senator Ben Sasse fast-tracked a
bill protecting babies born alive during late-term abortions, saying
that all US senators should be able to go on record against infanticide.
It was shut down and continues to be.
I’m
a pastor in Vermont, where we have been facing our own bill in state
government, which some have called the most radical abortion legislation
in the world.
It has zero restrictions on abortion. Now they are working on passing a
state constitutional amendment that would enshrine abortion as a right
that “shall not be denied or infringed.” If only Vermont were alone in
this. Multiple states now are considering
similar legislation, even as other states are trying to protect preborn
babies more.
READ MORE…
On Headcoverings
Barry York
Why does my wife not wear a headcovering? Simply put, because she is not a prophetess. Please let me explain.
Women
wearing headcoverings has been a practice in churches as diverse as
Amish, German Baptist, Mennonite, Orthodox, Pentecostal, and Scottish
Presbyterian ones. Often in Reformed churches
one will see headcoverings practiced by some households in the
congregation, if not by the entire church. From colonial times even up
to our fathers’ generation, our culture, which was undeniably influenced
greatly by Biblical Christianity, saw women regularly
don caps, bonnets, hats, and veils in the church. So it raises the
question. Are head coverings necessary attire for the Christian woman?
It is well …A great hymn came from the pen of a troubled—and troublesome—man
Janie B. Cheany
The
luxury liner was steaming through a calm, star-studded night when it
happened. Fast asleep after days of rough weather and turbid fog,
passengers were thrown from their beds by a violent
shuddering and noise like an explosion. The prow of an iron-hulled
sailing vessel had rammed them amidships and split the hull. Passengers
who were not killed in the crash crowded the deck and swarmed the
lifeboats. Many were crushed under the collapsing mainmast.
A
young mother from Chicago clutched her 2-year-old daughter and tried to
keep her other three girls close. “Don’t be afraid,” little Annie told
her. “The sea is His and He made it.” Within
minutes the ship rolled over, spilling the family into the sea. The
mother clutched frantically as her baby was torn out of her arms.
READ MORE…
WHY DOES THE LORD BLESS US AND IS ITS TIMING SIGNIFICANT?
Stephen Kneale
A
couple of days ago, I wrote about how the only ministry failure is the
failure to remain faithful. You can read that post here. Our call is not
to success in numbers, finances or ministry
output but to obedience to our call and faithfulness to Christ. But I
want to be clear, there is no straight line between faithfulness and
blessing.
A
while ago, our church went through something of a rough patch. I won’t
rehash the gory details but it was a less than pleasant time that those
still with us – chief amongst them myself and
my wife – are delighted is long behind us. It is also notable that, not
long after that time, things began to happen for us as a church.
READ MORE…
The Next Frontier in Pornography
Tim
Challies
It
been claimed that pornography drives technology. This claim is
over-stated, no doubt, but what’s clear is that pornography very quickly
and cleverly takes advantage of new communication technologies.
As one commentator says, “If we invent a machine, the first thing we
are going to do—after making a profit—is use it to watch porn.” If you
don’t believe me, just do a little research into VHS, DVD, internet,
iPhone, and a host of other innovations that were
created for any number of purposes but which very quickly became major
conduits for porn.
READ MORE…
Will We Learn in Heaven?
Randy Alcorn
I
heard a pastor say, “There will be no more learning in Heaven.” One
writer says that in Heaven, “Activities such as investigation,
comprehending and probing will never be necessary. Our understanding
will be complete.” [1] In a Gallup poll of people’s perspectives about
Heaven, only 18 percent thought people would grow intellectually in
Heaven. [2]
Does
Scripture indicate that we will learn in Heaven? Yes. Consider
Ephesians 2:6-7: “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in
the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that
in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace.”
The word show means “to reveal.” The phrase in the coming ages clearly
indicates this will be a progressive, ongoing revelation, in which we
learn more and more about God’s grace.
READ MORE…
Simply Put: A New Podcast That Explains Theology in Simple Terms
Nathan W. Bingham
As
a new Christian, did you ever feel “stumped” by theology? Maybe you
were listening to a sermon, and it seemed like the pastor was speaking
another language. Or perhaps you picked up a study
Bible and realized you may need a dictionary, too. From imputation to
justification, theophany to theodicy, keeping all these concepts
straight can be a challenge.
Simply Put is a new weekly podcast to help you build your Christian vocabulary.
READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor
Mark
Now
to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask
or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in
the church by Christ Jesus to all generations,
forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In
the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men
are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the
really important things are the things about
which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
On the Christian calendar, tomorrow is Good Friday. It is the day which, historically, the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church has identified as the day our Savior was crucified, died and was buried. It is the day which literally crushed the expectations of every single one of His disciples. It is the day that ended with unfathomable sorrow, immeasurable grief and extreme anguish of soul for all who knew Him….for all who placed their hope and trust in Him. What they experienced was an utter sense of helplessness. What could they possibly do now? Jesus was dead. All their hope was destroyed as Jesus cried out from the cross, “It is finished.”
Hope is a precious commodity. People can endure more than they ever thought possible if there is a glimmer of hope. But when hope dies something inside us dies and needs to be restored, or dare I say “resurrected?” The immense value of hope cannot be minimized. Paul identifies it as one of the chief virtues we all desperately need. And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:13).
The importance of hope, the significance of hope is illustrated by the frequency with which it appears in Scripture. Here is a sampling of some verses that speak to the nature, the effects, the benefits and the Object of our hope.
24Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart, all you who hope in the Lord. (Psalm 31:24)
22Let Your mercy, O Lord, be upon us, just as we hope in You. (Psalm 33:22)
11Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall yet praise Him,
the help of my countenance and my God. (Psalm 42:11)
114You are my hiding place and my shield; I hope in Your word. (Psalm 119:114)
5I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I do hope. (Psalm 130:5)
1Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; 4and perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. (Romans 5:1-5)
25But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. (Romans 8:25)
10Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; 11not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; 12rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer. (Romans 12:10-12)
13Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)
17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, 18the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. (Ephesians 1:17-18)
4There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. (Ephesians 4:4)
27To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. (Colossians 1:27)
23Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. (Hebrews 10:23)
3Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. (1 Peter 1:3)
13Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:13)
15But sanctify [b]the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear. (1 Peter 3:15)
With the death of Jesus, His disciples were bereft of all hope. Their Messiah, their Savior had died an ignominious and shameful death. He was accounted as accursed, for the Scriptures tell us that 13Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”). (Galatians 3:13)
But what they did not recognize, what they did not understand was that Jesus had to die if we were to have any hope of life. He died so that we might live. What they never could have guessed was that this same Jesus who laid down His life had the power to take it up again. This was His own testimony in John 10.
15 As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. 16And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.
17 “Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. 18No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.” (John 10:15-18)
So, yes, Jesus died in a most horrible manner. Yes, His body was taken down from the cross and placed in a tomb so that He was buried. But the grave could not hold Him. On the third day, Jesus burst forth from the grave, just as He had repeatedly told His disciples He would do. But because they did not have ears to hear, because Jesus seemed to be speaking a foreign language when He talked about His coming mistreatment and death, they simply could not grasp the concept resurrection. But all that was about to change.
The Scriptures tell us that early on the first day of the week, some women who had been among His most faithful followers, went to the tomb to further prepare His body for a proper burial. In Matthew’s account, two women are identified by name: Mary Magdalene and the other Mary. Mark identifies three women by name: Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James
and Salome. Luke identifies three by name (Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother James) but also adds this comment: and the other women were with them. John mentions only Mary Magdalene.
In Matthew’s account, the two women were met by an angel who descended from heaven, rolled back the stone and then told them that he knew they were seeking Jesus who had been crucified. And then he said to them, “He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay. And go quickly and tell His disciples that He is risen from the dead.” (Matthew 28:6-7)
But before they could return to where the disciples were gathered together so that they might tell them this glorious news, 9“behold, Jesus met them, saying, ‘Rejoice!’ So they came and held Him by the feet and worshiped Him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell My brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see Me.” (Matthew 28:9b-10)
Mark’s account contains some variations. He wrote: 1Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint Him. 2Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen. 3And they said among themselves, “Who will roll away the stone from the door of the tomb for us?” 4But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away—for it was very large. 5And entering the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a long white robe sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. 6 But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid Him. 7But go, tell His disciples—and Peter—that He is going [a]before you into Galilee; there you will see Him, as He said to you.” 8So they went out quickly and fled from the tomb, for they trembled and were amazed. And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.
Mark adds this slight twist to his account of Jesus resurrection: 9Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons. 10She went and told those who had been with Him, as they mourned and wept. (Mark 16:9-10)
Luke’s account has some several variations as well. He wrote, 1Now on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they, and certain other women with them, came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared. 2But they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. 3Then they went in and did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4And it happened, as they were greatly perplexed about this, that behold, two men stood by them in shining garments. 5Then, as they were afraid and bowed their faces to the earth, they said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? 6He is not here, but is risen! Remember how He spoke to you when He was still in Galilee, 7saying, ‘The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.’ ” 8 And they remembered His words. 9Then they returned from the tomb and told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. 10It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them, who told these things to the apostles.
John’s account has additional information not found in any of the synoptic Gospels. He wrote: Now the first day of the week Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. 2 Then she ran and came to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him.” 3 Peter therefore went out, and the other disciple, and were going to the tomb. 4 So they both ran together, and the other disciple outran Peter and came to the tomb first. 5 And he, stooping down and looking in, saw the linen cloths lying there; yet he did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; and he saw the linen cloths lying there, 7 and the handkerchief that had been around His head, not lying with the linen cloths, but folded together in a place by itself. 8 Then the other disciple, who came to the tomb first, went in also; and he saw and believed. 9 For as yet they did not know the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead. 10 Then the disciples went away again to their own homes. 11 But Mary stood outside by the tomb weeping, and as she wept she stooped down and looked into the tomb. 12 And she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. 13 Then they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him.” 14 Now when she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, and did not know that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” She, supposing Him to be the gardener, said to Him, “Sir, if You have carried Him away, tell me where You have laid Him, and I will take Him away.”
16 Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to Him, “Rabboni!” (which is to say, Teacher). 17 Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to Me, for I have not yetascended to My Father; but go toMy brethren and say to them,‘I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and toMy God and your God.’ ”18 Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that He had spoken these things to her. (John 20:1-18)
Both Mark and Luke record the response of the bulk of the apostles to the news that these women had brought to them. 11And when they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. (Mark 16:11)
11And their words seemed to them like idle tales, and they did not believe them. (Luke 24:11)
They knew that He was dead and buried and that was the end of the story. All the wishful thinking in the world could not change those facts. They were utterly without hope and no alleged sightings of a living Jesus could change that.
Imagine what it must have been like to be in such a state of mind, to be in such despair and despondency that they could not even entertain the possibility that these women had actually see the risen Lord.
And now imagine their shock when two of their brothers who had been traveling to Emmaus were describing their encounter with the risen Lord when suddenly there He stood, right in their midst, for that is exactly what happened. Luke records for us the amazing response of those gathered there. Even with Jesus standing before their very eyes they could not get their minds around the fact the He had risen from the dead. It took a while for that reality to settle in.
32 And they said to one another, “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?” 33 So they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, 34 saying, “The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” 35 And they told about the things that had happened on the road, and how He was known to them in the breaking of bread.36 Now as they said these things, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, “Peace to you.”37 But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit. 38 And He said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself.Handle Me and see, for aspirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”40When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. 41 But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, “Have you any food here?”42 So they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb. 43 And He took it and ate in their presence. (Luke 24;32-43)
Brothers and sisters, I trust this Scripture-laden recounting of our Lord’s resurrection has instilled a longing within you to gather with your brothers and sisters this Lord’s Day to celebrate this eternity-altering event. Eternity itself will not prove adequate to tell of the glories of our Lord, to extol His great sacrifice on our behalf. Of course this is far from being a rarity. We celebrate our Lord’s Resurrection every single Lord’s Day. Let’s not forget that.
My sermon this Lord’s Day will be focusing on the importance of gardens to the story of redemptive history. Our God makes use of a wide array of literary devices to move that story forward. He uses types and anti-types, metaphors and similes, symbolism and allusion, alliteration and acrostic to name just a few. Several of the most pivotal events of redemptive history are played out in gardens. I will get the Order of Worship to you in the next day or so.
I thought I would give you a link to my all-time favorite Contemporary Christian song about our Lord’s resurrection. It wonderfully portrays the impact on those who understand just how much we need Jesus our Lord and the difference His resurrection makes for us. It’s an oldie but goody.
Please remember that our Spring Feet ‘n Eat is this Saturday for those who are able to make it. UPDATE: Postponed because of rain.
The following Saturday we need the help of many to take care of a number of projects around our building. The lists are on the back table and there are still plenty of spots available to sign up for a particular job.
Our Resurrection Day breakfast is this Lord’s Day. There is still time to sign-up online.
Announcements/Calendar
· April 20 – Spring Feet ‘n Eat UPDATE: Postponed because of rain
· April 21 – Resurrection Day breakfast
· April 21 – Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
· April 22 – Ladies Group
· April 27 – Spring Workday (at the building)
· April 28 – Neighborhood Fellowship
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
Prayer is as natural an expression of faith as breathing is to life. —Jonathan Edwards
The more you read Scripture, the more you actually talk to God rather than think about fear.—Edward Welch
We are not heard for our many words, but for the cry of our hearts. —John MacArthur
The most important exhortation in complementarianism is not for women to sit down, but for men to stand up. —Kevin DeYoung
Ease and luxury, such as our affluence brings us today, do not make for maturity; hardship and struggle however do. —J.I. Packer
Death breaks the union between the body and the soul, but perfects the union between Christ and the soul. —Thomas Watson
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
It’s time to go on the offensive
Rebecca McLaughlin
When it comes to giving reasons for our faith, we Christians are playing far too defensive a game.
We’ve believed that Christianity is declining. It isn’t. We’ve assumed Christianity can’t stand up in the university. It can. Too many of us think Christianity is threatened by diversity. It never has been. And too few of us think Christian sexual ethics are sustainable in the modern world. They are. On these and many other fronts, we have conceded far more ground to secularism than it deserves.
But we’ve also been playing too aggressive a game. We’ve majored on point-scoring and culture-warring, when the Bible calls us to “gentleness and respect” (1 Pet. 3:15). We’ve propagated weak arguments without listening to real experts. And we’ve blindly stepped out into cultural traffic, rather than taking our lead from those with the credibility to speak.
If we are to be faithful in this cultural moment, we must be neither retreaters nor attackers, neither (needlessly) defensive nor (faithlessly) aggressive. Instead, we must go on a “gentle offensive.” Here are five things that will help. READ MORE…
He Sealed His Fate with a Song: The Most Famous Psalm in Scripture
David Mathis
The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.” (Psalm 110:1)
He almost sealed his fate that Sunday. Riding in on the humble steed (Matthew 21:7; Zechariah 9:9), he had stirred up the whole city with messianic hopes (Matthew 21:10–11). Then Monday he cleansed the temple, and refused to rebuke the children’s hosannas (Matthew 21:15–16). Now there was no turning back, and he confirmed it with his words on Tuesday.
With each passing hour, Jesus drew nearer to the lion’s jaws. In just three days, he would be shamed and humiliated, tortured and executed — each step toward Calvary met with increasing friction. Yet, on the inside, he was singing.
As he walked that harrowing road, he was rehearsing the Psalms and living out the ancient Script with every act of faith. On Tuesday, he drew the Psalm from its blessed scabbard, stumping the brightest minds of his day and silencing the loudest mouths. Now, their only recourse would be to kill him. READ MORE…
What Do Expiation and Propitiation Mean?
R.C. Sproul
When we talk about the vicarious aspect of the atonement, two rather technical words come up again and again: expiation and propitiation. These words spark all kinds of arguments about which one should be used to translate a particular Greek word, and some versions of the Bible will use one of these words and some will use the other one. I’m often asked to explain the difference between propitiation and expiation. The difficulty is that even though these words are in the Bible, we don’t use them as part of our day-to-day vocabulary, so we aren’t sure exactly what they are communicating in Scripture. We lack reference points in relation to these words. READ MORE…
How the Lord’s Supper Reminds Me of the Lord’s Grip
Daryl Crouch
Learning to ride a bike on a bike that has no brakes. Dabbing my fingers in red paint and chasing my sisters around while screaming “Bloody fingers! Bloody fingers!” Crawling under the choir loft to play war after Royal Ambassadors on Wednesday nights. Those events set up memories early in my life that I’ll never forget.
While taking the Lord’s Supper recently, I saw again how early spiritual patterns are often the ones that sustain us later in life.
A man named Roger captured my attention because he suffers from early onset dementia. Roger is a faithful husband, father, and grandfather, but he is now in a season where his loving wife picks him up from a residential care facility every Sunday and brings him to church. He provided well for his family over the years and saved enough money to make possible his care.
Roger’s capacity is limited, his memory short, his usefulness waning. Yet every Sunday he shows up to worship King Jesus with a smile on his face. Always in slacks, a dress shirt, and a perfectly tied necktie that lands just above his belt buckle, Roger stands with hands clasped in front, moving them up and down to the sound of the music as he sings every word of every song.
After attending the first service, Roger stands in the back of the sanctuary during the music of the second service. His participation is never distracting, but never passive. He may have forgotten some things, lost a few skills and a few steps, but he hasn’t forgotten how to worship his great God. READ MORE…
Proudly Humble
Tim Challies
Sometimes pride looks an awful lot like humility. There are times that our pride convinces us to put on a great show of what looks to all the world like humility so that we will be seen and acknowledged by others. We swell with pride when we hear, “He is humble.” It is a tricky thing, the human heart—prone to deceive both ourselves and others.
The Apostle Paul was a genuinely humble man. He had a deep awareness of his own sin and a profound sense of his own unworthiness before God. When he wrote to the church at Philippi, he went to great lengths to explain that he knew himself to be the chief of sinners. He remembered with shame that by persecuting the Lord’s church, he had persecuted the Lord Himself (Phil. 3:6; Acts 9:4). He had much to humble him. READ MORE…
You’re Dead, Start Acting Like It
Chris Thomas
Or maybe I should have led with, “You’re Alive, Start Living Like It!” Both statements are true. At least that’s what Paul argues in his short gospel-rich book to the Colossian believers.
As the fragmentation of our modern, Western culture breaks its banks and washes sediment into our churches, as the gaps widen and the edges grow sharper, as the rhetoric rages ever brighter and the disenfranchised retreat in bruised hurt — now, even as much as it was needed then, we need to hear Paul’s fatherly exhortation:
If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh. (Colossians 2:20–23, ESV)
We believe the Church should have open access to Scripturally/Theologically sound edifying Christian literature and that one need not be held back from having a significant Christian library because of cost. Our ministry at Monergism involves providing quality Christian literature in accessible formats for free. These eBooks are high quality (not scanned) and available in ePub, .mobi (kindle) & .pdf formats, each with actively linked table of contents. The links below will take you to the download page. Lord Willing, this list will continue to grow. CHECK THIS OUT….
The Best Hike in Every State
Alpine scrambles and beach-front strolls; multi-day singletrack adventures and quick urban escapes; soaring trees and rolling sand dunes—every state in the country has something to offer intrepid hikers. So we rounded up a bucket-list-worthy, best-of-the-best guide. AN AMAZING RESOURCE… Where was this 40 years ago!!!
Blessings,
Pastor Mark
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the really important things are the things about which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good afternoon brothers and sisters,
It
has been a very hectic week and there is yet much to do over the next
couple of days, so I’m covering just the basics in this Post-it.
This
Lord’s Day we will continue our exposition of 1 Peter. Our text will
again be 1 Peter 4:12-19 where Peter gives his largest (and last)
commentary on the theme of suffering. This is a meaty
series of verses so we are taking two weeks to cover them. The Order of
Worship is attached.
Our
annual Resurrection Day Breakfast is next Lord’s Day but there is still
time to sign up if you have not already done so. You can do so in one
of two ways: either on line (Patti sent that
out again yesterday) or on the sheet on the back table.
Please
put April 27 on your calendar. Our deacons have scheduled a workday for
some much-needed Spring cleaning and repair work. There is a list of
projects on the back table from which you
may choose. There are lots of slots yet to be filled. I would remind
you that this is our “home” and we need as many family members as
possible to accomplish these numerous tasks. So please stop by and sign
up for one (or more) of these projects. A fair number
of them can be done as your schedule permits.
Announcements/Calendar
·
April 14 – Young Adults Fellowship Group
·
April 15 – Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
·
April 20 – Spring Feet ‘n Eat
·
April 21 – Resurrection Day breakfast
·
April 21 – Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
·
April 22 – Ladies Group
·
April 27 – Spring Workday (at the building)
·
April 28 – Neighborhood Fellowship
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
Be
sure thou art watchful more than ordinary over thyself, in those things
where thou findest thyself weakest and hast been oftenest foiled. The
weakest part of a city needs
the strongest guard. —William Gurnall
The
battle for our Sundays is usually won or lost on the foregoing Saturday
night, when time should be set aside for self-examination, confession
and prayer for the coming
day. — J.I. Packer
Memorizing
Scripture strengthens your faith because it repeatedly reinforces the
truth, often just when you need to hear it again. —Donald
Whitney
Faith begins where man’s power ends. —George Muller
He that lacks assurance of God’s love, converses too much with Satan. —John
MacArthur
Screwtape,
teaches his apprentice nephew, Wormwood, the art of deceiving mankind
by saying “A moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all –
and more amusing.”
—C.S. Lewis
Prayer is the spiritual leech which sucks the poison of sin out of the soul. —Thomas
Watson
To
read the Bible is not merely an exercise in intellectual comprehension;
it’s an opportunity to stand before the throne of the King of the
universe. —Jonathan
Leeman
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Love Actuarially
Jared C. Wilson
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
— 1 Corinthians 13:7
Love
is fulfillment by way of emptiness. It would not seem to work that way.
This is why nearly every worldly notion of love—and even some churchy
notions of love—try to get at the fulfillment
by way of filling. We want our eyes filled with sex, our ears filled
with platitudes, our bellies filled with morsels, our minds filled with
daydreams.
And
then there is the way of Jesus. The Lord of the Universe who, not
desiring to exploit his deity, empties himself. Obeys even in the
personal famine of the desert. Commits even in the darkness
of the garden. Serves even in his final hours. Even washes the feet of
those who, if they knew better, should be hugging his neck! And he loves
all the way to the cross. He loves all the way from his heart to the
splattered ground beneath his pierced feet.
READ MORE…
Jordan Peterson: High Priest for a Secular Age
Bruce Ashford
An
article in The Spectator recently described Jordan Peterson as “one of
the most important thinkers to emerge on the world stage for many
years”—and they have a point. Peterson went from being
virtually unknown in 2012 to perhaps the most famous public
intellectual in the world in 2018.
He
has more than 2 million followers on YouTube and more than a million
followers on Twitter, and his 12 Rules for Life has sold approximately 3
million copies in less than a year. The book
tour is reaching stadium crowds of up to 100,000 people.
Many
reasons can be given for Peterson’s rapid ascent and expansive
influence. But most important, I think, are his social status as a
clinical psychologist and his unique ability to respond
to a certain set of conditions inherent to our secular age.
Recently,
I wrote a chapter for an upcoming book about Peterson (Lexham Press).
My assignment was to evaluate the reason for his meteoric rise. In this
article, I’ll briefly summarize some of
the main lines of argument.
READ MORE…
Christian Discourse in an Age of Outrage
Nick Kennicott
The
world has never seen an age like today, filled with so many
self-proclaimed experts who know so little about their professed area of
expertise. The modern cycle of news and opinions coupled
with the publishing power of the internet has helped create an
environment where a ten-minute Google search replaces years of research,
study, and education. A person’s “extensive” findings can be
immediately shared on social media. The ensuing comments overflow
with other “experts” holding opposing opinions. Battle lines are drawn.
Insults are hurled. And all involved parties are filled with anger and
dismay over the ignorance of those who dared question their freshly
acquired, strongly held beliefs. This raises
an important question: How should Christians seek to conduct themselves
in such a cantankerous environment where everyone is primed to be
outraged by their newfound adversaries?
Roger
Nicole wrote: “Christians have not managed in many cases to win over
their opponents. They have shown themselves to be ornery; they have
bypassed some fairly important prescriptions of
Scripture; and in the end, they have not convinced very many
people—sometimes not even themselves!”1 In an age of outrage, Christians
have an obligation to model Christlikeness with discourse that is
“worthy of the gospel of Christ” (Phil. 1:27). In the heat
of the moment, it can be easy to allow our emotions to overtake us, but
the Bible provides basic principles that should inform Christian
discourse.
READ MORE…
When Our Voices Fail
Rob Looper
Three
weeks ago this past Thursday (March 21), I decided it was probably
best, because of my mother’s serious health situation, for me to head
home to South Carolina after worship on the coming
Sunday to be with her. The next day, Friday, I received a text from my
brother telling me that things had suddenly declined with my father’s
health. Although his health had not been great, he was not on our radar
as far as being our imminent family health
concern.
Early
the next day, a Saturday morning, I sat on a plane contemplating the
sudden turn of events, determined to get as many texts out as possible
before having to put my phone on airplane mode.
My heart and mind were a jumble of worry, fear, and potential
anticipated tasks. One minute all things had been carrying on as
always–and the next minute I faced the real possibility that both of my
parents might be gone, just like that. I was struck at how
hard it was for me to think, much less write, anything that seemed like
a sensible sentence.
As
I stared out the window, without warning, the melody and words of
hymns–so many, rich, precious hymns–began running through my mind.
Overwhelmed with emotion, I texted a friend:
The
comfort, especially in light of the Latin origin of the word, that
solid hymnody brings in times like this is a beautiful, poignant irony.
When I cannot find words in my heart to bring to
my lips, these truth-laden, Scripturally-rich hymns rise in my spirit!
It is as if they are an incarnation of the Spirit’s intercession to
embrace my groaning, wordless heart. Now I can voice within what cannot
form in my mouth–and not only am I sure that
the Father has searched and known my heart, I am strengthened by his
glorious Gospel with music that carries me back to his never-failing
Word.
READ MORE…
3 Reasons Christians Cannot Commit the Unforgivable Sin
Michael Bird
There
is a point in the synoptic gospels where some scribes from Jerusalem
alleged that Jesus cast out demons by the prince of demons, Beelzebub.
Jesus replies to them that they shouldn’t have
said that because they are committing blasphemy against the Holy
Spirit.
Mark
3:28-29: Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and
every slander they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit
will never be forgiven; they are guilty of
an eternal sin.
Matthew
12:31-32: And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be
forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone
who speaks a word against the Son of Man will
be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be
forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.
Luke
12:10: And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be
forgiven, but anyone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be
forgiven.
Because
of these texts, many Christians have wondered: Is it possible for a
Christian to commit the unforgivable sin of blasphemy against the Holy
Spirit?
READ MORE…
8 Questions You Must Face as You Fight Pornography
Deepak Reju
Peter
sits in his room, staring at the screen. He’s been in this position a
thousand times, and yet again, he feels trapped. Earlier in the day, he
saw a scantily clad woman walking down the
street, and it stirred him. He hasn’t shaken the image of her. He’s
aroused. He wants to act out. He knows where to find pictures online.
Will he do it again or will he hold off?
Cheryl
fought (again) with her boyfriend, and afterwards, looked at nude
pictures online. She didn’t want to do it, but it helped to numb her
charged feelings. A mixture of shame and guilt overtake
her, and she avoids eye contact with her pastor when she leaves church
on Sunday. Will she ever defeat this wretched sin?
As you counsel Peter or Cheryl, consider eight questions.
READ MORE…
Now
to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask
or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in
the church by Christ Jesus to all generations,
forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In
the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men
are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the
really important things are the things about
which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
[Copy+paste from Pastor Mark Melton’s weekly email…]
Good morning brothers and sisters,
It
looks as if Spring may finally have arrived. Temperatures in the 50s
and 60s over the next two weeks is a good sign. It has been a long, hard
winter. ‘Course that could be just my age talking.
All I know is that it is delightful to walk outside and feel a warm
breeze on my face instead of a biting cold wind.
Patti
and I have been reading in Luke’s Gospel. Yesterday, we read this verse
from chapter 9: “Now it came to pass, when the time had come for Him to
be received up, He steadfastly set His face
to go to Jerusalem.” This is actually a paraphrase of a verse from one
of the four Servant Songs found in Isaiah, all foretelling the coming
Messiah. Isaiah 50:7 says this: “For the Lord God will help Me;
therefore I will not be disgraced; therefore I set
my face like a flint, and I know that I will not be ashamed.”
As
these four Servant Songs progress, the mission of the Messiah comes
more clearly into focus. I have included them in this Post-it for your
edification. They would be a helpful resource upon
which you might reflect and meditate as we approach the celebration of
our Lord’s resurrection.
141“Behold! My
Servant whom I uphold,
My Elect One in whom My soul delights!
I have put My Spirit upon Him;
He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles. 2 He
will not cry out, nor raise His voice,
Nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. 3 A
bruised reed He will not break,
And smoking flax He will not quench;
He will bring forth justice for truth. 4 He
will not fail nor be discouraged,
Till He has established justice in the earth;
And the coastlands shall wait for His law.”
491“Listen, O
coastlands, to Me, And take heed, you peoples from afar! The Lord has
called Me from the womb; From the [a]matrix
of My mother He has made mention of My name. 2 And
He has made My mouth like a sharp sword; In the shadow of His hand He has hidden Me, And made Me a polished shaft; In His quiver He has hidden Me.”
3 “And
He said to me, ‘You are My servant, O Israel, In whom I will be glorified.’ 4 Then
I said, ‘I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and in vain; Yet surely my [b]just
reward is with the Lord, And my [c]work
with my God.’ ”
5 “And now the Lord says, Who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant, To bring Jacob back to Him, So that Israel is [d]gathered
to Him (For I shall be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, And My God shall be My strength), 6 Indeed
He says, ‘It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob, And to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also give You as a light to the Gentiles, That You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth.’ ”
504 “The Lord God has
given Me
The tongue of the learned,
That I should know how to speak
A word in season to him who is weary.
He awakens Me morning by morning,
He awakens My ear
To hear as the learned. 5 The
Lord God has
opened My ear;
And I was not rebellious,
Nor did I turn away. 6 I
gave My back to those who struck Me,
And My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard;
I did not hide My face from shame and spitting.
7 “For the Lord God will
help Me;
Therefore I will not be disgraced;
Therefore I have set My face like a flint,
And I know that I will not be ashamed. 8 He
is near who justifies Me;
Who will contend with Me?
Let us stand together.
Who is [a]My
adversary?
Let him come near Me. 9 Surely
the Lord God will
help Me;
Who is he who will condemn Me?
Indeed they will all grow old like a garment;
The moth will eat them up.
52 13 Behold, My Servant shall [a]deal prudently; He shall be exalted and [b]extolled and be very high. 14 Just as many were astonished at you, So His visage[c] was marred more than any man, And His form more than the sons of men; 15 So shall He [d]sprinkle many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths at Him; For what had not been told them they shall see, And what they had not heard they shall consider.
531Who has
believed our report?
And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 2 For
He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant,
And as a root out of dry ground.
He has no [e]form
or [f]comeliness;
And when we see Him,
There is no [g]beauty
that we should desire Him. 3 He
is despised and [h]rejected
by men,
A Man of [isorrows
and acquainted with [j]grief.
And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him;
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
4 Surely He
has borne our [k]griefs
And carried our [l]sorrows;
Yet we [m]esteemed
Him stricken, [n]Smitten
by God, and afflicted. 5 But
He was wounded[o] for
our transgressions,
He was [p]bruised
for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
And by His stripes[q] we
are healed. 6 All
we like sheep have gone astray;
We have turned, every one, to his own way;
And the Lord [r]has
laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
7 He was oppressed
and He was afflicted,
Yet He opened not His mouth;
He was led as a lamb to the slaughter,
And as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
So He opened not His mouth. 8 He
was taken from [s]prison
and from judgment,
And who will declare His generation?
For He was cut off from the land of the living;
For the transgressions of My people He was stricken. 9 And [t]they
made His grave with the wicked—
But with the rich at His death,
Because He had done no violence,
Nor was any deceit in His mouth.
10 Yet it pleased
the Lord to [u]bruise
Him;
He has put Him to grief.
When You make His soul an offering for sin,
He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days,
And the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand. 11 [v]He
shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied.
By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many,
For He shall bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore
I will divide Him a portion with the great,
And He shall divide the [w]spoil
with the strong,
Because He poured out His soul unto death,
And He was numbered with the transgressors,
And He bore the sin of many,
And made intercession for the transgressors.
This
Lord’s Day we will continue our exposition of 1 Peter. Our text will be
1 Peter 4:12-18 where Peter gives his largest (and last) commentary yet
on the theme of suffering. This is a meaty
series of verses so we will take some time looking at them in detail.
The Order of Worship is attached.
Please
remember that our fellowship meal is this Lord’s Day as well and that
will be followed by a season of prayer. We have much about which we
need to be praying, so please join us as we
avail ourselves of this powerful means of grace.
Finally,
please put April 27 on your calendar. Our deacons have scheduled a
workday for some much-needed Spring cleaning and repair work. There is a
list of projects on the back table from which
you may choose. I would remind you that this is our “home” and we need
as many family members as possible to accomplish these numerous tasks.
So please stop by and sign up for one (or more) of these projects. A
fair number of them can be done as your schedule
permits.
Announcements/Calendar
·
April 7 – Fellowship Meal
·
April 7 – Prayer service (immediately following Fellowship Meal)
·
April 8 – Ladies Group
·
April 10 – Session meets
·
April 14 – Young Adults Fellowship Group
·
April 15 – Adults Fellowship Group (townies)
·
April 20 – Spring Feet ‘n Eat
·
April 21 – Resurrection Day breakfast
·
April 21 – Adults Fellowship Group (westsiders)
·
April 22 – Ladies Group
·
April 27 – Spring Workday (at the building)
·
April 28 – Neighborhood Fellowship
Classic/Encouraging Quotes
Do
you feel loved by God because you believe he makes much of you, or
because you believe he frees you and empowers you to enjoy making much
of him? —John
Piper
The true treasure of the church is the most holy gospel of the glory and grace of God. —Martin
Luther
The decay of the church is never the fault of the world. Inward spiritual decline always precedes outward collapse. —Sinclair
Ferguson
Learn
much of your own heart; and when you have learned all you can, remember
you have seen but a few yards into a pit that is unfathomable. —Robert
Murray McCheyne
What
an almost infinite field there is for mercies negative! We cannot even
imagine all that God has allowed us not to do, not to be. —Frances
Ridley Havergal
God
is not glorified by self-generated righteousness or human will power.
He is glorified when we both make it our aim to glorify Him and depend
on Christ through His Spirit to enable us
to do so. —Jerry Bridges
A fearer of God steers the rudder of his life according to the compass of the Word. —Thomas Watson
Important/Helpful/Challenging Links
Self-Righteousness Wears Many Disguises
Trevin Wax
Recently,
I wrote a column about the preface to Jesus’s parable of the Pharisee
and the tax collector and what that introductory comment tells us about
the connection between trusting in yourself
and looking down on others. When we look at the parable itself,
particularly the description of the Pharisee, we should take note of
just how easy it is to be self-deceived about our own
self-righteousness.
Today,
we’re used to reading the worst possible motives into the character of
the Pharisee. But Jesus’s original listeners would not have assumed that
the Pharisee was the bad guy, not at first.
They would have seen this Pharisee as a model citizen—a decent,
upstanding religious man who was pious in his practice.
READ MORE…
How Not to Study the End Times
William Boekestein
Eschatology,
the study of the last things, is a fancy word for something we all
already do. All of us think about the end. Yes, our culture and our
fears push to the periphery thoughts of our
death and the life hereafter. But count on it: at some point in your
life, you are going to agonize over what will happen to you after you
breathe your last. You can’t attend a funeral—whether of a religious or
nonreligious person—without hearing somebody’s
eschatology, their concept of what happens after death. We are all
eschatologists. But that doesn’t mean we always engage the end times
well. In at least three ways, we could go wrong in this most basic
theological discipline.
READ MORE…
Calvin’s Failed Missionaries Were Just the First Wave in Brazil
Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra
When
Vinicius Pimentel was 12 years old, his parents got divorced, and he
started going to church by himself in Americana, São Paulo.
He
didn’t go to the Nazarene church he grew up in, but to a
neo-Pentecostal church. At first, there “was not a lot of good theology
but not a lot of bad theology—just love for Jesus and evangelism
and, of course, the gifts of the Spirit.”
But
over the 12 years he spent there, the teaching moved steadily into
“more health-and-wealth theology and coaching to be the best version of
yourself,” Pimentel said. As a leader, he worked
hard to attract more people to the faith, even planning a disco party
at the church.
“We
tried to attract people with any possible strategy, to convince them to
be converted,” he said. And then he broke his leg. He calls it his “God
wrestling with Jacob” moment.
“I had more time to be at home on the internet,” he said. While browsing a Christian YouTube channel, he clicked one that was at the top because it was trending in the United States—evangelist Paul Washer’s “shocking message.”
And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel. (Judg. 2:10)
It
seems incredible that it could happen. Only a generation after Joshua,
Israel no longer knew the Lord. How is such a development possible?
This
is a very important question, not just for the ancient Israelites, but
for us. Churches, too, have seen sudden decline from one generation to
another. How can we understand and prevent
this kind of calamity?
The
book of Judges provides a very clear answer to our questions. Its
answer does not say everything that might be said in general, but it
does say specific, crucial things that we must ponder
to understand both Israel’s situation and our vulnerability.
READ MORE…
Does Modesty Matter Anymore?
Chris Thomas
I’ve
wanted to write this post for some time. I believe it’s a message
needed more than ever, yet part of me is still fearful. I’m afraid my
voice will be swept up among the boorish voices of
ignorant men keen to blame their juvenile lusts on someone other than
themselves. My options then are to either dissent silently, or swing in
my opinion of what Scripture says. I’m not willing to do either.
Though
there has been a growing voice, dominant in wider society and growing
in volume even within the church, that has said, “Modesty is for a
by-gone era, it holds no purchase now.” — I cannot
escape that in the currency of God’s values, modesty matters. I guess
the question we must ask though is, why? Many who argue for modesty
(often men) use as their foundational argument the effect on men when
modesty is laid aside. I’d like to come back to
that argument a little later, but first I think there is a greater
principle at stake when considering modesty in today’s culture.
READ MORE…
Cultivating Earth and Eternity
J.K. Wall
Sixty
years ago this year, Henry Van Til’s The Calvinistic Concept of Culture
was first published. It’s still must reading today.
Why?
Because it presents a clear solution to many of the controversies we’ve
seen over the relationship of Christians to culture, church to state.
The key to solving them is the mediatorial
kingship of Christ.
READ MORE…
Blessings,
Pastor
Mark
Now
to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask
or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in
the church by Christ Jesus to all generations,
forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)
“In
the sphere of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which men
are agreed are apt to be the things that are least worth holding; the
really important things are the things about
which men will fight.” J. Gresham Machen
“When Christ calls a man – he bids him come and die.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
