Michael Reid Ward

Ephesians Series: Theological Foundation

2011-04-18T07:28:00.000-07:00

Theological Foundation: Ephesians 1:5-14

We saw last week that the thesis statement of the letter was that God is to be praised for who He is, for what He has done, for how He has done it and for why He has done it. This week we will see Paul lay out the theological foundation of the letter. In it is an explanation of divine side of God's redemptive work and a theological description of the spiritual blessings that we receive as a result.

First blessing, Adoption Grace (5-6); In love, God predetermined to adopt us (through Jesus, or in Christ). Blessed us, just as He chose us, before the foundation of the world. He determined to adopt us, according to the purpose of His will. What is His will? He chose us in order to make us holy and blameless before Him. Now, what is the purpose of His will? The praise of His glorious grace. That is why Paul starts with praise, remember in verse 3, because the praise of His grace (vs. 2) is the purpose of His will to bless, just as He chose, in Christ, before the foundations of the world.

Here, Paul explains how He chose us, He predestined us for adoption. Adoption is the heart of the gospel! The first spiritual blessing is adoption, and adoption is always by grace. Our adoption is through Christ, just as we were chosen in Christ. So, every spiritual blessing is found in Him. So, on top of our adoption, or in our adoption, or as part of our adoption, we receive, at conversion, at least 3 main spiritual blessings:

Redemption (7-10); Redeemed; to purchase back, to pay the debt owed to buy a person out of slavery. Our redemption comes through His blood – blood is the payment of our sin debt, that is owed to God to purchase us out of bondage to sin. In Jesus we have redemption. It is not a possession, but a standing which we have been given once and for all as part of our adoption by grace. With redemption comes the forgiveness of sins – the debt of sin we owed is now forgiven, forgotten by God and we are set free. This is of course all according to the riches of grace that God has lavished on us in Christ. Why does Paul continually remind us of this point? Because t is the purpose of the will of God, our praise of His grace! In order that we are better able to praise His glorious grace, God makes known to us the means of our receiving grace: in wisdom and insight, God made the mystery of His will known to us – Why is it a mystery? - it is a mystery because we would not know it if God did not reveal it to us. He revealed the mystery of His will to us, according to His purpose – which is what? the praise of the glory of His grace – which He set forth in Christ. So, He set His plan into motion, at the right time, in Christ, to accomplish His will – to make us holy and blameless before Him, according to His purpose – to the praise of the glory of His grace. What is that plan? To unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth. (remember that for next week) How is he going to accomplish His plan to unite things in Christ? Redemption!

Inheritance (11-12); Predestined for what? Adoption. Adoption implies inclusion in a family. Here, the family of God. As part of the family of God, we have obtained an inheritance from God the Father. Inheritance is a lot or portion that we have obtained as a possession, as part of our having been redeemed by adopting grace into the family of God. Paul then repeats the process by which an inheritance has been obtained for us; having been predestined (to what? Adoption) according to the purpose of God (what? Praise of the glory of His grace) according to the counsel of His will (what is His will here) to chose us to make us holy and blameless before Him. Then Paul give a new summary; what is the purpose of this will? (just in case we forgot) that we who are the first to hope in Christ – the first to be adopted by grace, in Christ – might be to the praise of His glory (we know, the glory of Hs grace in particular).

Spirit of Promise (13-14); In Christ, you also were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. Now, this is different. Redemption came as part of the finished work of Christ, when the mystery of Gods will was revealed, and forgiveness of sins flows from it according to God's grace in Christ. Inheritance was obtained for us as part of our being predestined to adoption into the family of God, in accordance with the purpose His will that we would be to the praise of the glory of His grace. But the Spirit comes as a result of responding to means; when you heard the preaching of the gospel (the word of truth) and believed in Jesus (in whom alone all of this is found) then, you also were sealed, certified as an authentic child of God, bearing the mark of your Father, covered and protected by the royal seal of God, as a promise or guarantee (assurance) of the inheritance you have obtained in Christ, through the redemption of is blood, by being predestined to adoption for the praise of the glory of His grace. It is a seal, a promise, a guarantee of the inheritance you have received until you acquire it, or take possession of it – at the end – why? To the praise of His glory (the glory of His grace in particular).

Now, what does this mean for us?

1.We ought to love the idea of being adopted. A predetermined choosing of God.

2. We ought to praise God, who chose us before the foundation of the world, so that He could bless us - pre-determine to adopt us, redeem us from sin to Himself in Christ, give us an eternal inheritance, and the Holy Spirit as a seal of promise.

3. We should live for the will of God – that we should be holy and blameless before Him. We should labor and strive to be godly, because we have put out hope int he living God.

4. We should live for the purpose of God – the praise of the glory of His grace.

5. We should live for the plan of God – to unite all things together, in unity and submission, in Christ.

6. We should be encouraged to persevere - to press on to acquire, or take hold of that - our inheritance, that for which Christ took hold of us - that we would be holy and blameless before Him, the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

7. Most of all, for those of us who have not done so, having heard the word of truth, the good news of our salvation, by grace, through faith in Jesus as the Christ, we ought to believe in Him – not believe about Him, but in Him – and continue to believe in Him. Those of us who have believed in Him should keep believing in Him, trust Him, place your faith in Him, that by God's grace you may be saved, redeemed, to the raise of His glory.

Ephesians Series: Spiritual Blessings in Christ

2011-04-13T09:51:00.000-07:00

Spiritual Blessing in Christ: Ephesians 1:3-14

We looked briefly last week at Paul's introduction to the letter to the faithful saints at Ephesus. We learned that how we greet people can communicate a great deal:

What we believe about ourselves -

What we believe about others -

What we believe about God -

What we believe about the Gospel -

Today we move to the body of the letter. The first three chapters are theological in nature, while the last three are practical applications of the doctrines and focus on Christian behavior. It is a letter of encouragement and admonition, written to remind us of the blessings we have in Christ; to be thankful for them and to walk in a manner worthy of them.

Riches – 5 times

Fullness or filled – 6 times

Glory - 8 times

Grace – 12 times

In Christ or in Him - 13 times

The reason I decided to continue with the book is because it was written to fight complacency. The key theme in the book is mystery (a heretofore unrevealed truth) of the Gospel, the church is; the universal body of Christ is made up of both Jews and Gentiles, the present spiritual and earthly body of Christ, the instrument of God's glory in the world.

Thesis Statement for the entire letter: 3-4

God is to be praised as the Father of our Lord, because He blessed us – just as he chose us, in Christ. God is to be praised; Blessed (eulogettos, Adj.) from eulogeo, which means to speak well of – literally “praised,” and as an adjective is applied only to God. (mkarios is the GK word used for men as in Sermon on the Mount – means happy). Here, it very literally says, “Praised be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” God is the object of praise here.

God is praised first for who he is – Paul specifically identifies God as the Father of Jesus, who is both the Christ (messiah) and our Lord. God is worthy of our praise simply for who He is, apart from anything He has ever done or ever will do.

God is also to be praised for what He has done – God is the one who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. Blessed; verb form, to bestow favor. How has God blessed us? All Spiritual Blessings; In His providential grace, God has already provided believers, at conversion, total blessing. Spiritual alludes to the fact that these blessings are all a work of God, not tat they are merely immaterial as opposed to material blessings. They are the work of God and that is why the blessing takes place in the heavenly places – literally “in the realm of God. The phrase “In Christ” is a dominant phrase in the first chapter. It makes clear that these spiritual blessings belong only to those who are justified by grace, through faith in Christ, so that what belongs to Christ is also theirs – including His righteousness, resources, position, privilege and power.

God is also to be praised for how He has done it – God has blessed us just as He chose us. Chose – we were blessed in the same manner in which we were chosen by God. To Choose (eklegomai, verb) literally means “to take” and is used only in the middle voice, in the sense of taking for oneself. To select, or to make a choice for oneself. We are chosen by God himself, for himself. In Christ – again the idea is that we are blessed in Christ, just as we were chosen in Christ. Apart from Jesus, there is no choosing and no blessing. They are made possible by the life and work of Jesus. Before the foundation of the world - Now, here is the crazy. We were blessed just like we were chosen, before the foundation of the world was lain. Through God's sovereign will, before the creation of the world, and therefore, independent of human influence and apart from human merit, God took us for himself in order to bless us and make us holy and blameless before Him.

God is to be praised for why He has done it – God blessed us, just as He chose us, so that we might be holy and blameless before Him. Holy (hagios, Adj.) “separated.” In Scripture, it's moral and spiritual significance is to be separated from sin and therefore consecrated to God, made sacred. Blameless (amomos, Adj.) “without blame,” or “without blemish.” Pure, implying wholeness with no fault being found. It is the supreme duty of all creatures to praise God. Are we fulfilling our duty of worshiping God as Paul outlines in Romans 12:1-2? We, as believers, are particularly to praise Him because of who He is, what He has done and why He has done it. God wants us to be holy and blameless, but in order for that to be a reality, we must be in Christ.

Ephesians Series Introduction; What's in a Greeting

2011-04-12T11:53:00.000-07:00

Nî hâo - Mandarin Chinese

Sawatdi – Thia

Jambo – Swahili Kenya

Guten Tag - Germany

Salvete – Latin plural

Hola Buenos días – Spanish

What's in a greeting?

“I can tell you one thing about all Indian people and it is that greeting is a very big thing for us. In fact some say that greetings are a salutation to God for them.” Quote from article on greetings - Satsrikal greeting is for all in India

“Greetings in Zambia are like a foundation that must be laid before your message can be communicated.” Missions to Zambia - Mwapoleni mukwai, Hello in Bemba

How we greet people means something. It communicates what we think of them. It can communicate what we think of ourselves. It can even communicate what we think of God – even the Gospel itself. What does how you greet people communicate what you believe?

Ephesians 1:1-2 Grace and Peace

This salutation is briefer than many in Paul's letters, probably because he knew the believers at Ephesus very well, more than in Corinth or Rome, saving his richest introductory remarks for the long blessing of God that follows.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are at Ephesus and who are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

How does Paul introduce himself?

Paul, Paul's opening greetings expand the conventional greetings found in ancient letters. He writes this greeting with the intention of communicating something in particular. Because Paul mentions his imprisonment (3:1; 4:1; 6:20), this letter should be dated to c. a.d. 62 when Paul was held prisoner in Rome (Acts 28). There was no specific occasion or problem that inspired this letter, though Paul does mention that he desired the Ephesians to know how he was getting on in prison (6:21–22).

Ephesians articulates general instruction in the truths of the redemptive work of God in Christ; the unity of the church among diverse peoples; and proper conduct in the church, the home, and the world. Unity and love in the bond of peace mark the work of the Savior as well as Christians' grateful response to his free grace in their lives.

There are two main themes of Ephesians: Christ has reconciled all creation to himself and to God, and Christ has united people from all nations to himself and to one another in his church. These great deeds were accomplished through the powerful, sovereign, and free working of the triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—and are recognized and received by faith alone through his grace. In light of these great truths, Christians are to lead lives that are a fitting tribute of gratitude to their great Lord. How does Paul lay the foundation for the teaching of all of this truth in his introduction? How does Paul re-introduce himself?

Apostle emphasizes that Paul's authority is equal to that of the 12 apostles chosen by Christ. The apostles were specifically called by Jesus and had seen the resurrected Christ. The Greek word for “apostle” is apostolos, “one who is sent” and is derived from the verb apostellō, “to send out” which was used in the Greek OT to designate those commissioned as authoritative representatives to act in the name of the one who sent them. The apostles established and governed the whole church, under Christ, and they had authority to speak and write the words of God, equal in inspired authority to the OT writers. Paul was called to be an apostle when Jesus appeared to him on the Damascus road in Acts 9. Paul specifically here calls himself an apostle of Jesus Christ, making clear that he has no authority of his own, but that he was sent by Jesus. He spoke for Christ and wrote for Christ, not himself. He makes clear that this calling is in accordance with the will of God. He did not choose apostleship, but was chosen by God. His hope and security of his calling lay at the feet of the throne of God.

How would you introduce yourself? What would it communicate about you? Our introduction must reflect the fact that God is primary in our lives, not our hobbies, jobs or where we go to school or church. How does Paul address his audience?

Saints. Literally, “holy” or “dedicated ones,” referring to the identity and way of life of all who belong to God. Paul is speaking to believers, and thus everything he says is instructive for us as believers as well. However, he is addressing a specific group of believers, those at Ephesus.

Ephesus was a wealthy port city in the Roman province of Asia. It was a center of learning and was positioned near several key land routes in western Asia Minor. Ephesus boasted the temple of Artemis (one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world). Ancient Ephesus forms an appropriate background to the book of Ephesians because of this city's fascination with magic and the occult. This helps explain Paul's emphasis on the power of God over all heavenly authorities and on Christ's triumphant ascension as head over the church and over all things in this age and the next. The Ephesians needed to be reminded of these things in order to remain resolute in their allegiance to Christ as the supreme power in the world and in their lives. But Paul is more specific than even that. Who is it he is talking to?

Those who are faithful. The faithful saints at Ephesus. Authentic believers who have not only made a profession of faith, but who have held to a confession of faith and lived out a life of faith. What does it mean to be faithful? How do we know that we are in the group that Paul is addressing? You see Paul makes clear that it is not enough to be in church and say the right things, or even to do the right things, but our lives must be marked by faith, by the grace of God in Christ. So, what is it then that Paul essentially wants to communicate in his greeting?

Grace and Peace. Paul wants to communicate the two main themes of the letter: the reconciliation of all Creation to God through Christ, and Christ has united people from all nations to himself and to one another in his church. Grace. Paul uses a wordplay on the normal Greek greeting. Where the Greeks said, “Hello” (Gk. charein), the Christians said, “Grace” (Gk. charis). Paul intentionally wants to emphasize the idea of grace, that God has acted to reconcile us to himself, not based on who we are, but based on his nature and character, not through any effort on our part, but through the blood of Christ. Peace. Not untroubled circumstances but the profound well-being that comes from resting in God's sovereignty and mercy. This is a concept first expressed by the Hebrew greeting of shalom. Jesus used the same term as part of his salutation in John 14:27, Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. Shalom has a much richer meaning than the English word does since it conveyed not merely the absence of conflict and turmoil but also the notion of positive blessing, especially in terms of a right relationship with God, and also, as a result, the idea that “all is well” in one's life. That is the second part of what Paul wants to communicate; not only have we been reconciled to God so that we are no longer enemies, but as he will teach in this letter, we have been adopted into the family of God and made join heirs with Christ. Ultimately, Paul speaks not for himself, but brings this blessing from God . . .not the Father, but our Father; and from Jesus, who Paul presents as both Savior (Christ, or Messiah) and Lord.

False Teachers

2011-03-07T14:18:00.000-08:00

In light of the recent noise concerning Rob Bell's video promotion of his upcoming book, I thought I would share a link to two sermons preached by Dr. Shawn Merrithew of Morningview Baptist Church titled "Beware of False Teachers." This is purely the providence of God as this is the fruit of his exposition of the book of Matthew and in no way a response to anything recent (though he does reference Bell in the second part).

I believe the messages are both timely and helpful in discerning truth, as we live in the daily tension of the epic confrontation between the truth and the lie. I pray they will be beneficial to those who are trying to discern what teachers are proclaimers of truth and what teaching they ought to place themselves under.

Beware of False Teachers

Dr. Shawn Merithew

Matthew 16:1-12

Series: Christ in Real Life, Real Life in Christ

Beware of False Teachers, Part 2

Dr. Shawn Merithew

Matthew 16:1-12

Series: Christ in Real Life, Real Life in Christ

Finally Arrived

2011-02-16T08:28:00.000-08:00

It is good to finally be here at Morningview Baptist Church and have my feet on the ground. It is even better to be part of the Mornigview family. As part of that family, I am excited about the opportunity to get to know everyone better. I am proud of they have held things together during the interim, and am encouraged by their openness to change. Mt friend Randy Breedlove had long and very successful ministry here and I know he will be missed. However, I am honored to follow him here and I know God has opened a new chapter in the life of this family.

That new chapter offers all sorts of new opportunities and adventures. We have a chance to rethink everything we do, how we do it and why we do it. We have a chance to rethink what family and student ministry is, should be and can be. We have a chance to be the best we can be, and do the best we can do to honor God and glorify him through our lives, our families, and our ministries. When we set our hearts and minds on that, we will find ourselves being transformed by God in our lives, used by God in our families, and delighting in God in our ministries.

In the next few weeks, we will have a great opportunity to get to know each other as God challenges us to rethink what is normal, through Disciple Now 2011. I will be meeting with all of the adult leaders at a Students Leaders Lunch on the 27^th and with the SALT Team on the following Wednesday (March 2), during the small group time (7-8 pm). In the weeks following that, I will be meeting with the Sunday School Leadership Team, FUEL Small Group Leaders, Drama Team, Worship Band, FUEL A/V Team, and other individual teams and leadership groups in order to begin to evaluate each ministry element and develop a comprehensive strategy for moving forward. We also hope to get a chance to meet each family individually over the next few months and we will have a Family Meeting with all student families each quarter beginning with the summer (sometime in May).

I pray this gives you a vision of how we are going to move forward and what we all have to look forward to as a church family as we transition to a Student and Family Ministry Model with family equipping and spiritual leadership as its focus.

Generational Faithfulness: Teaching and Testimony in the House of Faith – Reid Ward

2010-12-01T10:09:00.000-08:00

The Alethia Center - Morningview Baptist Church
Reid Ward
Deuteronomy 6:1-9
November 28, 2010

MP3: Generational Faithfulness

I. Generational Arrogance
A. Older towards younger:
Deuteronomy 6:1-2:
B. Younger towards older:
Deuteronomy 6:3:

II. Generational Faithfulness
A. The Responsibility of Generational Faithfulness:
B. The Process of Generational Faithfulness:
1) Hide them (commandments, statues and rules) in your heart:
Deut. 6:4-6:
a) Love God;
b) Obey His Commands;
2) Teach them to your children:
Education - Deuteronomy 6:7a:
3) Talk about them:
Discipleship - Deuteronomy 6:7b:
4) Display them:
a) Modeling; Deuteronomy 6:8:
b) Teaching Moments; Deuteronomy 6:9:
C. The Blessing of Generational Faithfulness:
Vs. 1 - that you may do them in the land to which you are going over -
Vs. 2 - that you may fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son’s son –
Vs. 3 - that your days may be long -
Vs. 3 - that it may go well with you -
Exodus 20:12 "Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.”
Ephesians 6:1-3 “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), "that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land."
Vs. 3 - that you may multiply greatly -
Gensis 18:19: “For I have chosen him (Abraham), that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring to Abraham what he has promised him"
Gen. 17:4-9: "Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God." And God said to Abraham, "As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations."

III. What is our Legacy?
“Here fix your center; here direct your aim; here concentrate your efforts, your energies, and your prayers. Remember, their religious education is your business. Whatever aids you call in from min¬isters or teachers, you never must, you never can, you never should, delegate this work. God will hold you responsible for the religion of your children.” John Angell James

Celebrating The Gospel Or The “American Dream”?

2010-12-01T07:25:00.000-08:00

Celebrating The Gospel Or The “American Dream”?
Developing A Gospel-Centered Holiday Mindset
By: Mike Hall

Christmas, as a holiday, has its fair share of excess baggage. The holiday has its roots in pagan and Catholic traditions. Our Puritan ancestors, to whom we owe a great deal spiritually, absolutely refused to celebrate Christmas. They called it “Foolstide” and preached against the egregious and excessive behaviors associated with the season. While there is much to criticize in the commercialism and excess that accompany Christmas, there are deeper concerns that should give us pause as we approach the celebration.

The celebration of Christmas is not in and of itself evil. There is absolutely nothing in scripture that forbids believers from enjoying the holiday. The issue is not about what is right but what is best. As believers, our focus should be on the gospel. Christmas and all of the traditions that are bound up in it can become a barrier to celebrating the beauty of the gospel. It is so easy for us to get caught up into seeking the ideal Christmas experience that we begin to focus on things that cannot bring us true and lasting peace. This is true not only of Christmas. The pursuit of the ideal Christmas is a part of the pursuit of the American dream where everybody is healthy, happy, well-fed, entertained, and comfortable in peaceful, two-story suburban housing. In an blog post related to this discussion entitled, What’s the Difference In Living For the Kingdom and Living For the American Dream, Pastor John Piper wrote,

Our testimony to the world works precisely opposite to what the prosperity gospel says. When Christians are willing to suffer for the cause of the unborn, for racial justice, and for spreading the gospel, then the world is going to say–just like it does in 1 Peter 3:15–”Where is your hope?”

Our answer will not be, “In houses, cars, and lands.” Rather, we will say, “My hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is going to take me to himself. To live is Christ and to die is gain. I’m here on earth to spread the gospel. I’m going to keep my life as wartime as I can in order to maximize my effect for showing Jesus as valuable, not things as valuable.”

If we truly believe the message that Christ and His gospel are our hope then everything we do including how we celebrate “the holidays” should reflect this understanding. There have been many attempts by believers to move in this direction. Some families reduce the amount of gift giving. Some make manger scenes the focal point of their decorations as opposed to “jolly old saint nick”. These adjustments are good in and of themselves but if we intend to avoid celebrating the American dream Christmas redux, then a more radical change of heart ad holiday are in order.

One means for helping to restore the gospel to its proper place in our December holiday is the celebration of Advent. Many people when they hear the word Advent think of a calendar with chocolates or candy inside. While Advent calendars are a modern derivative, the holiday itself has a much more richer and meaningful history as it relates to the gospel.

The word Advent comes from the Latin word adventus which simply means coming. Advent is a celebration of the gospel in the first and second coming of Jesus. It incorporates the whole counsel of Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. It’s complete focus is on Christ and it doesn’t carry all of the fluff and baggage that traditionally come with Christmas. There are many reasons why Advent should be the centerpiece of your celebrations but consider the following case built by Elliot Grudem and Bruce Benedict in a blog post from The Resurgence entitled, Why Recognize Advent:

Advent is about much more than gifts and good deeds. The story isn’t all fun and wonder. There is darkness and gloom. There is longing. There is joy and light. There is redemption and grace. There is judgment and final victory. In a way, recognizing Advent is expected. In another way, it’s counter-cultural. Advent allows you to both show the horror of sin and the blessings Christ came to make known, “far as the curse is found.” When you recognize the season of Advent over a number of services before Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, you get to talk about these things. You help your people understand why the inbreaking of God’s kingdom through the birth of Jesus is “good news of a great joy that will be for all people” (Luke 2:10). For example, during Advent you can talk about how to observe the humility of Christ’s birth amidst the gaudy overindulgence of our consumer-frenzied Christmas. You can talk about how crying out, “Come, thou long-expected Jesus” counters our demands for our best life now.

The eternal impact of a shift of mindset and practice towards a more gospel focused Advent celebration is incalculable. If we want to demonstrate to a watching world that we are serious about the gospel and its author our Savior then it is incumbent on us to ask the hard questions about the way we have always done things. Don’t let this season slip by without seizing the opportunity to find “comfort and joy” in a celebration that encompasses more than just a cute manger scene.

Westminster Bookstore - History Lives Children's Series

2010-10-29T12:49:00.000-07:00

Westminster Bookstore - History Lives (5 Volume Set)
(Paperback) Withrow, Brandon and Mindy

Makings of a Busy Summer

2010-06-02T12:58:00.000-07:00

It has not taken as long as I thought to get

things running back up to full speed at

Legacy. In the past three months, we have

been working to move Legacy forward and

I felt that it would take us until early Fall

to get back up to full speed putting

together workshops and new partnerships.

However, I have been on the phone a lot

in the past few weeks developing

relationships with churches who are

thinkingabout transitioning to a family

ministry discipleship model and making

new partnerships that may help move our

message of generational faithfulness

forward, helping us make disciples of all

people, even to the ends ofthe earth.

There are two of these relationships that

I would particularly like to share with you

this month.

In the past month or so, I have been

talking with the Family Ministry Pastor at

Red Bank Baptist in Chattanooga, TN. He

and his team have been researching and

thinking about moving their philosophy of

ministry toa family ministry model. As I

began talking with him, they were

interested in learning more about the

biblical foundations for making disciples

through a family ministrymodel. They

wanted to have a better understanding of

the various models that were out there so

they could discern which one, or

combination, might be best for their

church. They also wanted to talk about

some initial thoughts on how to transition

in implement change I was able to meet

with them in May and spend the better part

of a day sharing with them on those three

issues. It was a blessing and I believe God

is going to use that church to raise up a

generation of leaders to pass God's truth

onto the next generation.

The other relationship I want to tell you

about is with a man named Bob Dukes.

Bob and I have only had one conversation.

However, we met through a mutual friend

who serves on his board of directors.Bob

is the President and Executive Director of

World Discipleship Association. WDA is a

disciple building ministry that started here

inthe US working tomake disciples on

college campuses. They have also focused

on making partnerships and developing

centers overseas. They are now looking to

work through churches here at home and

are interested in hearing about our

Generational Faithfulness Family Ministry

Model as a possible framework and vehicle

for doing that. We are hopeful that we will

be able togo over and visit with them this

month and present the principles of our

model to them.

Please pray for us as we undertake these

new ministry opportunities as well as

continue to work with other churches and

ministry partners. We are grateful for

your support and encouragement.

Word of God Speak

2010-05-11T07:54:00.000-07:00

The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.
You let men ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water, yet you have brought us out to a place of abundance.

When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.
Whoever belittles his neighbor lacks sense, but a man of understanding remains silent.
Where there is no guidance, a people falls, but in an abundance of counselors there is safety.

Come and hear, all you who fear God, and I will tell what he has done for my soul. I cried to him with my mouth, and high praise was on my tongue.
If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But truly God has listened; He has attended to the voice of my prayer.
Blessed be God, because he has not rejected my prayer or removed his steadfast love from me!

Psalm 34:18, 66:12, Proverbs 11:2,12,14, Psalm 66:16-20 (ESV)

Legacy: A Focus on Lasting Impact

2010-05-03T10:48:00.000-07:00

I have been reminded this past month that leaving a spiritual legacy is about focusing on lasting impact, not on immediate results. Talking to several ministers about transitioning to a family equipping discipleship model, I have come to realize that there is often a disconnect between our personal motivation and the motivation of our ministry and the people around us.

Most of the guys that we work with have a real sense of conviction that family equipping is a primary role of the church. They see a biblical mandate to invest in parents for the benefit of generational faithfulness. However, the questions they ask are much more pragmatic. They wonder about how to implement smoothly to avoid pushback, how to communicate in a way that gets the most buy in from parents, and how long should this process take.

These are all legitimate questions. However, they reveal a pragmatic approach to ministry that is largely perpetuated by the expectations of their people. We have created that expectation with two generations of corporate model driven ministry that has the ministers playing the role of the professional, and ministry being measured by production numbers and consumer appeal. Timothy Paul Jones has recently reminded me that even our motivation for moving to a family ministry model may be motivated by pragmatism if we are moved primarily by statistics like the legendary drop-out rate.

I have always taught parents that the first step to implementing family worship is that family worship must be born of conviction: “You must be convicted that this is something God is calling you to do as a parent. Ephesians 6:4 says, Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. If you are not convicted of this truth, you will not follow through.” The same thing must be true for our churches implementing a family equipping model as well.

At the conference I attended this past month; Dr. Mohler laid out 8 Trajectories Toward and Adjusted Gospel: Modern Trajectory, Post-Modern Trajectory, Moral Trajectory, Therapeutic Trajectory, Aesthetic Trajectory, Materialistic Trajectory, Pragmatic Trajectory, and Emotional Trajectory. In the panel discussion that followed, John MacArthur said he thought the most dangerous trajectory for our conservative, Bible believing churches is the pragmatic.
We must be mindful, as we develop leaders for the next generation, that we teach them to live with the Bible as our ultimate rule of faith and practice, and not just to say that we believe it should be so.

Legacy Letter: Vol. 7 Issue 5, May, 2010

Final Report from T4G

2010-04-16T05:51:00.000-07:00

The final day of T4G was extra-ordinary. The first session was a talk on the presence of the Gospel in the theology of the early patristic church fathers. Ligon Duncan gave a historiography, "history of God's providence with our people," to show that neither should the early fathers be viewed as authoritative, nor should they be viewed has having lost the gospel so that it had to be completely recovered in the reformation. Duncan presented a third way to read the church fathers. He said they should be read, respectfully, carefully, and under the authority of Scripture." He asserted that is the way the magisterial reformers of the 16th century viewed the early fathers.
After a short break we heard from Matt Chandler. Matt shared about his experience with brain cancer and how it has impacted his life and ministry. The thing is that Matt had been preparing his people to suffer as a core value in their church since he became their pastor.
You read the AP Article about Matt's story to get more details and information on what he has been going through and the impact it is having. The extraordinary thing this week was that he was calling us to prepare our churches by pointing out the suffering in the narrative of Scripture. Matt closed by affirming from experience what we all know and had been talking about all week, "Jesus is better than Life." As Matt closed in prayer, I was broken as he prayed for his church, his wife and his children.
C.J. Mahaney followed Matt in order to encourage us to follow Matt's story and example by teaching our people to suffer. C.J. said that this should inform our teaching diet and that we should go after Job, Habakkuk, 1 Peter and other like texts that emphasise suffering well. He also gave a long list of resources he recommended in the practice and teaching of suffering. The list included "How Long Oh Lord" by D.A. Carson and "Beside Still Waters" by C.H. Spurgeon. More than anything he encouraged us to do this by being faithful to preach the Gospel to them, and to "be there at their side when they suffer." After this, the leaders of T4G laid hands on Matt and John Piper lead the entire conference in a prayer for Matt, his family, the church and for Matt's healing, while conference participants laid hands on other pastors in the crowd who are suffering with ongoing and terminal needs. It was powerful to say the least.
After this we had a long break, during which I finally got to the bookstore to buy the 2 books I wanted that they had not already given us. C.J. Mahaney closed the conference preaching from 2 Timothy 4:1-5 - Expository Faithfulness. The call was to preach the word, calling us out using D.A. Carson's biography of his father "Ordinary Pastor." In his unique way C.J. pointed out that the men we had heard this week were all extraordinary, extraordinarily gifted and extraordinary gifts tot he church and the rest of us . . . not so much. He said far too often ordinary pastors are discouraged pastors. He said that was the result of comparisons to other pastors and how we defined success in ministry. He called us to be faithful with our gifts 3 primary ways:
I. Be Faithful to the Message -
"Resolve to be unoriginal because we may not look like much, but there is power under the hood."
Be faithful in every season.
Be faithful to rebuke and reprove - you must be with your people to know what is appropriate.
Be faithful in complete patience - wait on God to move.
How?
1. Remember God's patience with you.
2. Remember sanctification is a process.
II. Be Faithful to your Ministry -
Be Sober Minded
Be Enduring Suffering
Be an Evangelist
III. Be Faithful to the Savior -
No rear-view mirror - look to the future reward.
Press into the Kingdom staying in the shadow of the cross.

Did Jesus Preach Paul's Gospel - T4G Day 2

2010-04-14T19:10:00.000-07:00

The evening session of day 2 was amazing. I must say that it hit at my heart and made a mockery of my legalism and any self-righteousness.
The speaker was John Piper. I have included notes below but commend to you the manuscript to this message that can be found online.

Did Jesus Preach the Gospel of Evangelicalism?
The aim of my title is not to criticize the gospel of evangelicalism but to assume that it is biblical and true, and then to ask whether Jesus preached it.
Did Paul Get Jesus Right?
So the problem I am wrestling with is not whether evangelicalism gets Paul’s gospel right, but whether Paul got Jesus’ gospel right. Because I have a sense that among the reasons that some are losing a grip on the gospel today is not only the suspicion that we are forcing it into traditional doctrinal categories rather than biblical ones, but also that in our default to Pauline categories we are selling Jesus short. In other words, for some—perhaps many—there is the suspicion (or even conviction) that justification by faith alone is part of Paul’s gospel, but not part of Jesus’ gospel. And in feeling that way, our commitment to the doctrine is weakened, and we are thus less passionate to preach it and defend it as essential to the gospel. And we may even think that Jesus’ call to sacrificial kingdom obedience is more radical and more transforming than the gospel of justification by faith alone.
So I am starting where R. C. Sproul left off in his message to us yesterday. And I consider this message as an exegetical extension and defense of what he said: “If you don’t have imputation, you don’t have sola fide (faith alone), and if you don’t have sola fide, you don’t have the gospel.” And my goal is to argue that Jesus preached the gospel of justification by faith alone apart from works of the law, understood as the imputation of his righteousness through faith alone.

Piper then gave and important word about method saying, "One of my goals in this message is to fire you up for serious lifelong meditation on the four Gospels as they stand. I want you to feel the truth and depth and wonder that awaits your lifelong labor of love in pondering the inexhaustible portraits of Jesus given us by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John."

"If you interpret faithfully the deeds and the words of Jesus as he is portrayed in the four Gospels, your portrait of Jesus will be historically and theologically more in accord with who he really was and what he really did than all the varied portraits of all the critical scholars who attempt to reconstruct a Jesus of history behind the Gospels."

Luke 18:9-14 -
I. The Big Picture in Luke’s Gospel
Every verse of all four Gospels is meant by the authors to be read in the shadow of the cross. When we start reading one of the Gospels, we already know how it ends—the death and resurrection of Jesus as a substitute for our sins (Mark 10:45; Matthew 26:28)—and we should have that ending in mind with every verse that we read. And this is exactly what each of the Gospels intends.
A. Jesus’ Most Explicit Reference to Isaiah 53
Jesus makes his most explicit claim to be the suffering servant of Isaiah 53. And, amazingly, he does it in a way that calls attention to Jesus’ work of justification through a righteous one, not only to the forgiveness of sins. In the garden the night before he died, Jesus said, “I tell you that this Scripture must be fulfilled in me: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors.’ For what is written about me has its fulfillment’” (Luke 22:37).
Those words, “he was numbered with the transgressors,” are a quotation of Isaiah 53:12. The verse immediately preceding in Isaiah 53 (verse 11) speaks of many being counted righteous (justified) by the righteous one. “Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities” (Isaiah 53:11). So in the Gospel of Luke, the way Jesus saves is by shedding his blood and for the forgiveness of sins and by being a righteous one and counting many righteous.
B. Jesus speaks explicitly of justification: Luke 18:9-14.
He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ 13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

II. 3 Aspects of the Pharisee’s Righteousness
There are three things we need to see about these people in verse 9 who “trusted in themselves that they are righteous.” They are represented by the Pharisee in the parable. First, his righteousness is moral. Second, his righteousness is religious or ceremonial. Third, he believes his righteousness is the gift of God.
A. Moral
First, his righteousness is moral. Verses 10-11:
B. Religious
Second, this Pharisee’s righteousness was religious or ceremonial.
C. A Gift from God
Third, he believed that this righteousness was the gift of God.
Not an Overt Legalist
Confirmation in Luke 17:10
4 Terrifying Words: “Rather Than the Other”

III. What Justified the Tax Collector?
He looked away from himself to God. He trusted in nothing in himself. He trusted in God’s mercy. And Jesus said, “God declared him righteous and acceptable.” That’s what “justified” means (see Luke 7:29).
A Clue in the Context
Luke 18:18-21.
Only One Thing Missing
One Thing or Three?
Jesus: God’s Righteous One

IV. Concluding implications and applications.

Implication #1: Jesus’ Gospel Is Also Paul’s

Implication #2: Nothing We Do Is Basis for God’s Acceptance

Implication #3: Our Standing with God Is Based on Jesus, Not Us

Implication #4: Transformation Is the Fruit, Not Root, of Justification

Implication #5: All Our Goodness Is Evidence and Confirmation, Not Grounds

Implication #6: The Gospel Is for Every Person and Every People

Implication #7: Jesus Gets the Full Glory
Don’t rob the Lord of half his glory in bringing you to God. Christ is our pardon. Christ is our perfection. Therefore, knowing that Jesus and Paul preached the same gospel, let’s join Paul from the heart in saying
I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.
In the end, we sing:
Hallelujah! All I have is Christ.
Hallelujah! Jesus is my life.

© Desiring God

By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: desiringGod.org

T4G Day 2 Morning Session

2010-04-14T14:14:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful morning we had at T4G! 7,000 strong for worship at 8:00 am and then a message from Thabiti Anyabwile of FBC Of Grand Cayman. He talked about how wrongly engaging the culture adjusts the Gospel. He started by showing the difficulty in even defining what culture is. Then he asked at what level we should be engaging culture; at the pop culture level, ethnic culture level, political level, or the high (structure ideas) level. Then the big question. When we engage culture, how do we define success? Can we know when we have effected it, and more can we ever know the results of the effect? Beyond that, do we know how much it has effected us int he process?
He said that when we set out to engage culture, we may find the Gospel adjusted in the process. He gave Four P's to avoid an adjusted gospel:
I. Paul's Pastoral Purpose - Col. 1:24-2:5; To make the word fully know and to present each one mature in Christ.
Is this our burden and purpose?
II. Evangelistic Philosophy Drives Purpose - Col. 2:6-7; Having received the Gospel, walk in its wisdom and knowledge.
How do we help people walk in the wisdom and knowledge of the Gospel?
III. Evangelistic Practice flows from Purpose - Col. 2:16-23; Judge according to the Gospel Purpose not according to culture.
Was not the first Jew a Gentile?
The church is by definition multi-ethnic, but it is not multi-cultural. We are being pushed up into Christ and being made a distinct new culture (third race). every human culture is fundamentally apostate. We are saved from it into a new life, made by adoption God's people. God gives us a distinct culture as His people and citizens of His kingdom.
IV. Evangelistic Perspective - Col. 3:1-4; Set your minds on things above, on Christ, and have the mind of God, the perspective of glory.
The results are found in Col. 3:5-11; "Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all."
After a long and much needed break (Thank You Mark Dever) We heard from another master, John MacArthur. He talked about the Theology of Sleep. That's right theology of sleep. He was responding to an attack against him by one in the emergent movement who accused him of being responsible, at least in part, for the 10's of thousands of people going to hell.
His response to that "neo-Finney Pelagian" attack was that he sleeps well. "I enjoy rest and refreshment because my trust is in God." He gave Mark 4:26-29 as the Magna-Carta on Evangelism. Jesus had large crowds but few real believers and this disturbed the disciples who understood the prophecy about the liberation of Israel and the international consequences of the reign of Messiah. Jesus' response was not to change his strategy (which is the response of the flesh) but to preach the Gospel (which is the response of the Spirit).
What was Jesus' evangelistic response? "The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come."
He talked about John 3 where Jesus tells Nicodemus that he must be born again to enter the kingdom and Nicodemus knew he could not be born himself but asked how he must climb back into the womb. He talked about The second thief on the cross next to Jesus who was converted without any visible human means while the first thief perished.
He then drew our attention to the idea in the Greek text that when the soil produces by itself the word is "automatically." This is the same Divine automatically used in Acts 12:10 when the jail doors open by itself.
The conclusion is that we are the farmer, responsible for casting out the seed of the Gospel, and it is the soil that makes the difference. That soil is the hearts of people , as we learned in Mark 4:1-9 where we see the six types of soil. Jesus connects the two pictures for us in His explanation of the parables in verses 10-25. There is no description of the sower. We are just casting seed. We are the means, now the power. The power is in the seed (Romans 10). I can sow the seed, but I CAN NOT CHANGE HEARTS.
So, there are four results:
1. We sow in Humility - (4:3) It is not us, but the soil that makes the difference 30, 60, 100 fold!
2. We sow in Obedience - (21-23) Because we do possess light, we do not cover it up. We are not the power, but we are the means.
3. We sow in Diligence - (24-25) We will be measured by the same standard as our casting. Our usefulness is measured by our seed sown, and our reward will be measured likewise.
4. We sow in Confidence - (30-34) In faith, our small seed produces exponential results, so that the nations (birds) may rest in it.
The session closed with a great panel discussion including those great men, Dever, Mohler and Mahaney.
Praise God it is time for me to go back for more. I will post the results tonight - Lord Willling!
Grace and Peace!

First Day at T4G

2010-04-13T19:27:00.000-07:00

I was a great first day at T4G. There is just something about 7,ooo people (mostly men) singing our hymns of praise at the top of their voices that gets you ready to be fed by the word. Mark Dever did not fail to bring that word in a powerful and thoughtful way. He talked abut how the church makes the gospel visible by its life and right loving obedience to the gospel.
That was followed by a message from R.C. Sproul where he outlined the antitheses of the gospel that he has seen and confronted in 50 years of ministry and the dangers of synthesis with those various antitheses. Obviously, the panel discussion that followed was GREAT!
After dinner at the Hard Rock Louisville, we were led in more rousing worship that brought us into a message by Dr. Mohler in which he outlined and defined 8 Trajectories Toward and Adjusted Gospel: Modern Trajectory, Post-Modern Trajectory, Moral Trajectory, Therapeutic Trajectory, Aesthetic Trajectory, Materialistic Trajectory, Pragmatic Trajectory, and Emotional Trajectory. It was very helpful for being able to talk about the dangers we all face as pastors and the dangers that our people confront on a daily basis in moving toward the theological tragedy of an adjusted gospel.
A panel discussion that included Dever, Mahaney, Mohler and John MacArthur concluded the night. With that, I find myself here, Mountain Dew in hand, reviewing my thoughts from the day for our mutual reflection.
Grace and Peace.

Getting Ready for T4G

2010-04-12T19:12:00.000-07:00

Together for the Gospel: T4G 2010 Conference from Together for the Gospel (T4G) on Vimeo.

Tuesday, April 13

9:00a – 12noon Registration

1:00p – 3:00p Session 1: Mark Dever — The Church is the Gospel Made Visible

3:00p – 3:30p Panel #1

3:30p – 5:00p Session 2: R C Sproul — The Defense and Confirmation of the Gospel — What I Have Learned in 50 years

5:00p – 7:30p Dinner

7:30p – 9:00p Session 3: Al Mohler — How Does it Happen? Trajectories Toward an Adjusted Gospel

9:00p – 9:45p Panel #2

Wednesday, April 14

8.00a – 9.30a Session 4: Thabiti Anyabwile — ‘Fine-Sounding Arguments’ — How Wrongly ‘Engaging the Culture’ Adjusts the Gospel

9:30a – 10:15a Break

10:15a – 11.30a Session 5: John MacArthur — The Theology of Sleep! (Mark 4)

11:30a – 12:15p Panel #3

12:15p – 3:00p Lunch

3:00p Wednesday Breakout Sessions
Eric Bancroft — Convincing Christianity: The Implications of a Robust Gospel in Marriage
Tony Carter — Proclaiming the Comfort of the Gospel
Kevin DeYoung — ‘Tis Mystery All, The Immortal Dies: Why the Gospel of Christ’s Suffering Is More Glorious Because God Does Not Suffer
Greg Gilbert — What Is the Gospel?
Brian Habig — Fears of the Minister
Joshua Harris — Dug Down Deep: Helping Others Build Their Lives on Christ-Centered Doctrine Michael McKinley — Unity, not Uniformity: Diversity in the Body of Christ
David Platt — An Unadjusted Gospel in an Unreached World: Connecting Gospel Theology with Urgent Missiology

4:00p – 7:00p Dinner

7:00p – 8.30p Session 6: John Piper — Did Jesus Preach the Gospel of Evangelicalism?

8:30p – 9:15p Panel #4

Thursday, April 15

8.00a – 9.15a Session 7: Ligon Duncan — Did the Fathers Know the Gospel?

9.15a – 9.30a Break

9:30a – 10:40a CJ Mahaney with Matt Chandler

10:40a – 11.10a Break

11:10a – 12:15p Session 8: CJ Mahaney — Expository Faithfulness (II Timothy 4:1-5)

Back to the Future

2010-03-31T08:11:00.000-07:00

I have been talking to several churches the past few weeks who are at various stages of transitioning from a more traditional silo ministry model, where they have the various ministries of the church divided so that their ministry elements rarely come in contact with each other, to a family equipping model, where the various ministries of the church function together under the common goal and purpose of multi-generational discipleship and missions and ultimately generational faithfulness. A main common denominator in many of these churches is the struggle they have communicating what the transition means and what it should look like to the leadership and the congregation. One of the main reasons why this seems so difficult to communicate is that most churches see themselves as family friendly places. They promote family values and preach and teach a basically biblical view of the family, and many even have a family ministry silo.
It is a challenge to communicate how our false equation between activity and spiritual growth causes stress on the already overloaded schedules of families, and how we inadvertently divide families up in the church parking lot—never to see each other again until they get in the car to return home. In many of these same churches, there is an unspoken generational arrogance that actually pits senior adults against young adults and parents against children. They can not see the difference between having disconnected ministries for children, youth, young adults, adults and senior adults, and having a vision for ministry that connects those various ministry emphases with the idea of passing down a spiritual heritage from one generation to the next through personal and family discipleship, worship and missions.
That is why the work that we are doing with these churches is so important. Legacy is able to help leaders communicate the values and vision that under-gird a true family ministry discipleship model. We are able to help communicate to parents their biblical role as primary spiritual leaders in the lives of their children and the practical elements and benefits of fulfilling that role. We are able to help them restructure their ministries under one consistent vision for reaching generations for Christ, and to reorient the various ministry elements within the various specialized ministries in order to facilitate a real partnership between the church and the home for the spiritual well-being of the families that make up the church family.
Thank you for being a part of this work with us for the glory of God.

OUR CHRISTIAN RESPONSE TO GAMBLING

2010-02-16T09:24:00.000-08:00

By Dr. Shawn Merithew
Morningview Baptist Church, Montgomery, AL

It is not often that I decide to ascend my soapbox to deal with issues that are being debated in the halls of our secular government. My first and greatest reason for this is that politicians and legislators and judges do not ultimately possess the ability to address society’s greatest ill. The reason we have so many problems in the world and in our country is because man is sinful, and the only remedy for sin is repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. Therefore, rather than pledging ourselves to a particular political party or social cause, we must first and foremost pledge ourselves to the propagation of His gospel and to prayer for the salvation of our leaders and our countrymen.

While proclaiming the gospel is to be our primary platform and purpose in engaging society, there is still value in letting our distinctively Christian voices be heard on moral issues that the Bible directly addresses. We have the privilege of living in a democratic nation, and though we would all admit to the imperfections of this system, it still affords us freedoms that we should exercise for the glory of Christ. Thus, the children of God should seek to protect the lives of the unborn and to care for orphans. We should seek to protect the institution of marriage from divorce-happy heterosexuals as well as radical homosexuals. We should be good stewards of the environment, though not in an unbiblical way that assaults biblical freedom or the primacy of humanity as God’s unique image-bearers. And we should be first among those caring for and protecting the elderly, the handicapped, the poor, and the homeless.

That is why we should let our voices be heard on the issue of gambling. Gambling is an industry in America that victimizes families and poor people in the name of entertainment and tax revenue. It fosters an addiction based upon human greed where the promise of quick, abundant wealth is continually communicated and never fulfilled. In fact, as it regards the particular issue here in Alabama, addiction counselors have called video slot machines the “crack cocaine” of the gambling industry because it is so addictive.

Gambling is bad economic policy. Gambling is a form of regressive taxation, as studies have shown that the poor and uneducated tend to gamble at a higher rate and with a much greater proportion of their income than the middle class, the rich, and the well-educated. Studies have proven that when casinos open, other local businesses suffer and often close as both discretionary and necessary income is funneled into gaming and profits sent out-of-state. According to John Warren Kindt, in his statement before congress in 1994, “For every one dollar of revenue generated by gambling, taxpayers lose three dollars in increased criminal justice costs, social welfare expenses, regulatory costs, and increased infrastructure expenditures.

Gambling increases crime. The Department of Justice and the National Institute for Justice have found significant links between gambling, crime, and druge use. A 2004 study by E. L. Grinols at MIT found that counties with casinos had notably higher crime rates than non-casino counties. A University of Nebraska study by John Jejkal in 2000 concluded that problem gambling is as much a risk factor for domestic violence as alcohol abuse.

Gambling destroys homes and families and children. SMR Research Corporation has called gambling “the single fastest-growing driver of bankruptcy.” Gambling related bankruptcies in metro Detroit increased by as much as 40-fold within 18 months of the opening of Casino Windsor, just across the Detroit river. Three years after casinos were legalized in Deadwood, South Dakota, felony crimes had increased by 40%, child abuse had increased by 42%, and domestic violence assaults had risen 80%. In Indiana, a review of the state’s gaming commission records revealed that 72 children were found abandoned on casino premises during a 14 month period.

In the National Gambling Impact Study, done at the university of Chicago in 1999, they found that the lifetime divorce rate for problem gamblers was 39.5% and for pathological gamblers it was 53.5%; for non-gamblers, it was only 18.2%. Dr. Rachel Volberg, President of Gemini Research, has noted, “Suicide attempts among pathological gamblers are higher than for any other addiction and second on to suicide attempt rates among individuals with major affective disorders, schizophrenia, and a few major hereditary disorders.”

In short, when gambling is legalized in a commnity or state, an ever-growing tide of human wreckage ensues and the economic situation of the populace worsens. Thus, our response to gambling interests should be certain and strong. Because we belong to Christ, we share His concern for the poor, for families, for children, for marriages, and for human lives. Gambling fosters greed, neglect, indebtedness, crime, a poor work ethic, and ultimately, the loss of human life. Let us therefore pray for strength for those who are fighting the Casino Moguls, let us pray for many of our legislators to be released from their blindness to the facts, let us be heard in their ears as we make the biblical viewpoint known, and let us be seen at the ballot box if they take it that far. I love you all dearly!

http://www.morningview.org/2010/02/10/our-christian-response-to-gambling/

The Meaning of Legacy

2010-02-03T11:11:00.000-08:00

Legacy; Noah Webster’s 1828 original American Dictionary of the English Language says that legacy has its root in a Latin word that means “to send” or “bequest.” It is to leave or give “a particular thing, or certain sum of money given by last will or testament.” The sentence that he uses to demonstrate the right use of the word is of particular interest to us, “Good counsel is the best legacy a father can leave to his child.”
As I talked about last week, Legacy Ministries has always been about equipping believers who could invest that equipping in the lives of young people in order to help develop spiritual leaders for the next generation. What we have learned is that nobody is in a better position to invest in the lives of students than the people that God ordained to be the primary spiritual influence in their lives, their parents. Just as the original meaning of the word implies, a legacy is something that a father (or mother) gives to his children.
Sometimes, for something to be passed on to the next generation, the old must die so that all things might become new. That is what happens in our lives when we die to ourselves and are raised to the newness of life that we have in Christ. By placing our faith and trust in the person and work of Christ, we become partakers in his death and resurrection.
As partakers with him, we gain both the forgiveness of sins and the newness of life. More than the forgiveness of sins and newness of life, we gain brotherhood. God not only forgives us and raises us up, but he adopts us as his children and makes us joint heirs with Christ. It is in our adoption as sons that we receive an inheritance, our spiritual legacy.
Praise God for the revelation of that truth in scripture. I pray that as we continue to work with families and churches that God will use Legacy to show both that God intends to use families to pass that spiritual heritage from one generation to the next, and that those families serve as pictures to a lost and dying world of the amazing forgiveness and newness of life that comes from being adopted into the family of God.
That really is why we do what we do, and I hope you will commit to pray for us like never before as God calls you to be a part of the ministry that he has called us to. Every person can have a part in sharing the Legacy message as you support us prayerfully and financially.
Again, I ask that you continue to pray for us and to support Legacy in any and every way you can. We desperately need your help to continue to help churches and families to invest in the development of spiritual leaders for the next generation.

The Legacy of Legacy

2010-01-05T10:02:00.000-08:00

I was just blown away by the idea that we are starting our seventh year of ministry. It is hard to believe how far we have come and how much work we have done to help churches and families. I sat all morning remembering those early days of forming a board of directors and applying for non-profit status. I remember driving back and forth to Troy to meet with potential board members and Rayanne asking me if we were going to move to Troy. There was no way to know then what God was doing and all that He was going to do through Legacy and in the life of our family here in Troy.
Two of our children were born here and they have all grown up here and think of it as home. We promised friends that we would visit churches when we moved here, but we immediately knew Bush Memorial was home. We could not have know then that we were choosing the church family where we would invest the next six years of our lives.
Just as our family has changed over the years, Legacy has also. We began in those early days to partner with churches to help develop volunteers and adult leaders who could invest in the lives of young people. As we worked with churches all over the southeast, we came to see that we were accomplishing our goal of equipping leaders for the next generation, but we were not helping youth ministers have longer tenures in their churches, we were not helping increase the number of students who lived from a distinctly Christian worldview, and we were not helping to decrease the number of students who dropped out of church after high school.
I remember being heartbroken in 2006 when I began to read statistical evidence that seemed to support what I had been seeing anecdotally in the churches we were evaluating. Praise God for the new vision He gave us for Legacy when I was asked to participate in an advisory board discussion at the International Center for Youth Ministry on Strategic Youth and Family Ministry. At that point, God called us to be part of a larger movement to help recover the biblical roles of churches and families in the spiritual development of children and youth.
Since that time, we have worked tirelessly to help equip churches to partner with families, and to help equip families to take on their primary role as spiritual leaders. We have hosted and participated in conferences, we have published Legacy Leadership, along with other articles on the topic in various magazines and state papers, as well as my regular blog posts at reidward.blogspot.com.
Over the past year, difficult economic times have caused us to struggle to do ministry and God has at various times called my focus to rest with my family and church family. It has been very difficult to balance everything God has laid on my heart this year. I know that we can not go on like this forever. Our financial situation has become such that something must change.
We prayed over two years ago that something would change so that everything did not have to change. It was at that point that God opened the door for me to come on staff at Bush and help lead this church toward a family equipping model. We were able to do this as an extension of what we were doing with Legacy.
It was a great asset to have a place where we were implementing ministry elements and could show that success to other churches we were trying to help. I believe it has been a great asset to the church as well, as we have networked with leaders all over the country to be on the leading edge of family equipping ministry.
Unfortunately, neither Legacy nor Bush Memorial is in a position to be able to support our family for the long-term. Legacy’s annual budget is $61,342. That is based on the projected cost for us to do ministry the way we believe God has called us to.
Roughly $40,000 of that budget is required for the basic operation of the ministry including salary, taxes and fees, office supplies and insurance. Up to that number, we are not able to invest anything but time and energy into actual ministry.
For the past two years, our actual receipts for the year have come in at just about that number. What that has meant is that for every dollar we have invested in ministry, for the Youth Leaders Conference or publishing Legacy Leadership, I have not received in salary.
This year, our total receipts from monthly donations ($22,365), and fund raising and other income ($2,190) have totaled only $24,555. As a result, we are praying for some major change. We are praying that God would meet our financial need according to His will. That might mean that our support base would pick back up and we would be able to meet our obligations. Or, that might mean that God moves us into a new phase of ministry where he leads us to a new place and invites us to join Him in a new activity.
I pray that maybe both of these things would be true in the new year. God has been leading my heart toward this moment for over a year. At various times in the past year, I have thought this might mean various things. Even now, I am not sure what it might mean, but I am sure that I have learned to trust in Christ alone and I have great joy in the anticipation of what He might be doing.
I ask that you continue to pray for us and to support Legacy in any and every way you can. Our goal is to continue to serve churches and families as we continue to follow God in developing leaders for the next generation.

Touchstone Archives: Mormon Vampires in the Garden of Eden

2009-12-03T10:37:00.000-08:00

From Russ Moore @ Moore tot he Point
The Theology of the “Twilight” Series
— Thursday, December 3rd, 2009 —

Let me preface this by saying the only people I know who’ve seen the “New Moon” movie are enthusiastic teenage girls and Boyce College Dean Denny Burk. I can guarantee you, though, that lots of adolescent and post-adolescent women in your congregation have seen the movie and are reading the novels in the “Twilight” series.

Touchstone, a magazine where I serve as a senior editor, just ran a fascinating article on the theology behind the series. Jonn Granger, who was called by Time magazine the “dean of Harry Potter scholars,” wrote this piece, focusing on what he sees as the distinctively Latter-day Saint theological-literary structure behind the series.

Read it, and think about his thesis. What does the “Twilight” series tell you about what young women in your communities are longing for? What does it tell you about the appeal of Mormonism?

Touchstone Archives: Mormon Vampires in the Garden of Eden

Family Christmas

2009-12-01T11:00:00.000-08:00

Generation after generation of Christmases are strung across the decades of family histories via journals, diaries, drawings, paintings, illustrations, photographs, and videos that stand witness to precious memories. Treasured long-standing traditions become Christmas legacies carefully fostered and presented to each new generation of children, who are taught the role they play in maintaining the family's Christmas traditions.

These traditions can be very strong. They can be most useful in helping pass down the truth of the gospel from one generation to the next. We know from Scripture that the reason God led both Israel and the early church to practice such holy days was to help remind them of the statutes and testimonies of God and to cause the children to ask why these things were all about.
There is so little left of Christmas in our culture that represents a real holy day. Therefore, we must be intentional about passing down the heritage of faith that have received. Our children may well grow up in a culture where there is no spiritual meaning to the celebration of Christmas at all. They may grow to know it as a completely self-indulgent extravaganza of commercialism if we do not work to create traditions that communicate truth across generations.

We must be careful not to confuse the story of Jesus with the story of Santa Clause. If we do that we feed our culture’s mischaracterization of Jesus and the church as means to meeting the needs of a consumer Christianity. More importantly, we call into question the absolute truth of the gospel by equating God’s ultimate revelation of himself in the person of His Son to a fairy tale.

That is not to say that we can not play Santa and allow our children the imagination of Christmas. It is to say that we must be clear with them what is really real. It would be far worse to have to convince a child that Jesus is real because he just found out that Santa is not.
We must simply be careful that our culture is not successful in causing our children to think that Santa is more important than Jesus or that a Christmas Tree is more beautiful than the cross. We must be careful that we do not set an example that the material gifts of this world are more valuable than the spiritual gifts that we receive by the grace of God.

It is better to give than to receive. However, I pray that this Christmas we will be more intentional about communicating to our children that it is most glorious and delightful of all to receive the gift of God’s Son.

Rayanne and I would like to wish you a Merry Christmas and let you know that we are praying God’s blessing on every one of you who support us and Legacy with your prayers and material support.

Multi-Site Church: Panel Discussion Moderated by Dr. Albert Mohler

2009-11-03T18:23:00.001-08:00

Multi-Site Church: Panel Discussion Moderated by Dr. Albert Mohler

Posted using ShareThis

The Measurement of Success

2009-10-21T08:31:00.000-07:00

I read a section in "Perspectives on Family Ministry" by Timothy Paul Jones this morning on The Measurement of Success. I found it so overwhelmingly true that I was compelled to share it here. I have been preaching a series on the nature and character of the church because I believe that any church who is looking for a pastor ought to have a Biblical understanding of what the church ought to be and what the church ought to do. This is primarily because how you define the church determines how you define success, and how you define success will dictate everything else you do.
"Unfortunately, pragmatism rules in our culture and in many of our churches. As a result, success is often measured by size and budget rather than faithfulness. In his book The Courage to Be Protestant, David Wells questions the pragmatic measures of success in many market-driven churches:
'How can we argue with success? I believe that we can. More than that, in this case, I believe that we must, that we should. What we have here are churches reconfigured around evangelism that abandon much of the fabric of biblical faith to succeed. They have taken a part of that faith, modified it in deference to consumer impulse, and then made of that part all there is to Christian faith. Here is a methodology for success that can succeed with very little truth; indeed, its success seems to depend on not showing much truth.'"
"The temptation to measure success 'with very little truth' is greater than any of us would care to admit. It is difficult not to measure success by budgets and numbers when salaries and positions depend on maintaining the organization."
"One of my friends was discussing family integration with a senior pastor who gave this reply: 'The theology sounds right, but the application has to be wrong because our people can't do it and it would make our church shrink.' This man was an ecclesiological pragmatist. He had defined not only right success but right theology according to what seemed to work from a human perspective."
"Before homes and churches can ever experience spiritual reformation, biblical standards for success must replace ecclesiological pragmatism. It is so easy to wear cultural lenses and to read culturally accepted practices into the Holy Scripture. That's also why it is important to step outside our culture by reading the works of saints who lived in other times and places."
"A church is successful only to the degree that it lines up with Scripture in these areas. To the degree that we lead God's church Biblically, we will experience his blessing, not necessarily in buildings and money but in churches that closely resemble what Jesus and the apostles expected churches to look like."

Leadership Thoughts: Legacy Bibles

2009-10-02T12:07:00.000-07:00

I was honored this past month to preach at Elkdale Baptist Church in Selma, Alabama. I was able to teach on the right definition, message and ministry of the church in the morning service and then to talk about generational faithfulness and the exercise of family worship in the evening. It was a good day and I was thankful to be able to share what God has made the passion of my heart.
Little did I now that my joy would be made complete days later when I received an email for a wonderful lady that I met while at Elkdale. She shared a story of spiritual legacy with me that gave me chills and confirmed in heart the absolute truth of the importance of generational faithfulness. Her name is Louise King and I asked her if I could share her story in my newsletter. She was very gracious and replied, “Sure, Reid...no problem..”
Mrs. Louise started by saying that Legacy was a, “huge word in my life.” She went on to tell me the story of her Legacy Bibles. It all started when her mother died and she began to be aware of the power of her mother’s spiritual legacy in her life. She says, “When my mom died, her Bible was left sitting there on her dressing table and the task began of deciding who would receive it.”
As is so often the case, we do not fully recognize the value of the spiritual legacy that we have been left until we are left without it. Mrs. Louise said, “I realized then what a treasure it was.”
As leaders and parents, we often undervalue the power of our own spiritual legacy. However, Scripture makes it clear that the family is the primary means by which God intends his truth to be passed from one generation to the next. That is why it is important for us as individuals and as churches to understand that we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, but our legacy will be determined by what we invest in those we leave behind.
Mrs. Louise became strikingly aware of this reality when she lost her mother and that awareness set her on a mission to pass on to all her descendants the treasure that had been left for her. She says, “At that point, I began working toward getting one of my Bibles in the hands of my children and grandchildren.”
What a grand investment, but most of us only have one Bible. I mean, I have dozens, but I really only have that one that has all of my margin notes and underlines. How could I get each child and grandchild a treasure of spiritual heritage like my “go-to-Bible?”
Mrs. Louise shares how she has gone about it. “To put it mildly, I mark my Bible. With my three daughters, I kept a Bible for three years, transferring notes from one to the other and then adding notes from sermons , studies, etc. for each one individually.”
I thought, “what a great idea . . . to pass down our spiritual legacy from one generation to the next, Legacy Bibles.” But Mrs. Louise did not stop there. What I read next brought tears to my eyes and overwhelmed me with the delight of the Lord. She continued, “I am now working through my seven grandchildren.” What a testimony!
Mrs. Louise will tell you it is no easy task, “I have had to shorten the time I keep the Bible. I am working on number three (for her grandchildren).” But she says the joy of the investment far outweighs the cost. “I can’t tell you what it is like jotting notes to them by Scripture. It is a joy in my life when I pass God’s Word on to my children.” Even something I said got passed down from generation to generation, even if she can not remember quite what it was, “Something you said Sunday morning . . . sorry can’t remember exactly what . . . But I wrote a note to Zec . . . ‘Zec, does your life reflect this verse?’”
Zec, I pray that it does and that you, like Timothy, walk in the faith of your mother and grandmother and great-grandmother.
I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. 2 Timothy 1:5

Family Ministry Investment

2009-10-02T11:47:00.000-07:00

Now that our family ministry summer is over at Bush, I am ready to get back on the road to work with churches to help move them towards a family equipping ministry model that helps them better develop spiritual leaders for the next generation.
I am looking for five churches to invest in this coming year and our goal is to help move those churches from where they are to a family equipping ministry model. I am looking for leaders who believe in three ideas.
First, that God instituted the family as the primary means of communicating his truth from one generation to the next, and that parents have the primary role in discipling their children.
Second, that God instituted the church as an aid, to equip parents for the ministry of leading their families spiritually and discipling their children, and to supplement what parents are doing at home by reinforcing it in a corporate setting.
Third, that the church fulfills a missional role, through age graded ministry, in reaching children and youth from unbelieving homes and by engaging the parents in the spiritual development of their children, reaching out to lost and broken families.
My vision is to work with those churches in three main areas. I would like to help equip their ministry team with resources and strategies to move toward a family equipping model. In this area, I think Legacy offers over five years of research in the area of youth and family ministry, years of practical experience implementing ministry strategies in local churches, and a network of ministries and churches who are making the family equipping model work in various settings.
Next, I would like to help equip their lay leadership and volunteers with the ideas and tools that they can use to communicate with parents, implement the ministry elements necessary, and invest in the lives of children and youth in a way that supplements parents fulfilling their biblical role instead of encouraging them to abdicate their role.
Most important, I would like to help communicate to parents how they can have a more positive and active role in the spiritual development of their children. In this area I think it is helpful to have someone echo the voice of the pastors in communicating parents biblical role as primary spiritual influencers. Again, we bring a wealth of research on the influence of parents. We are also able to help parents better communicate with their children by helping them understand youth culture, and giving them ideas for creating spiritual conversation. Finally, we can help parents better understand what are the primary things that they need to communicate to their children in terms of fundamental biblical knowledge, Christian worldview, and personal devotional life.
I believe in these principles and concepts so passionately that I am willing to invest in the lives of these churches, leaders and parents for an entire year. Please help me be able to do that by sharing my vision with churches who may be interested in receiving our help, and by continuing to support Legacy, so that we can invest in them for only the cost of our expenses.
Together we can make a real investment in families and develop true spiritual leaders for the next generation.

Leadership Thoughts: Family and Ministry

2009-09-04T08:25:00.000-07:00

As I have spent the last 6 years of my life focused on family and ministry, I have found great wisdom in the fact that God established the family first, in the Old Testament, and the church second, in the New Testament, as the primary means by which He intended truth to be passed form one generation to the next. The primary wisdom there is that family must come first in Family Ministry.
That is why the primary event this summer was the birth of our fourth child Aaron Gabriel Marcus Ward. Our children are our most precious gift from God, after our own salvation, and I believe the way we view family says a lot about the way we view ministry. I think it is important that we view families, particularly large families as a blessing and that we ought to honor multi-generational families.
Not only in the way we view families, but also the way we lead our families says a lot about the way we view ministry. We, as leaders, must make the investment that we are calling others to make. We must be leading our families spiritually, through family worship, bible reading, prayer and formal discipleship, as age appropriate.
The other important fact that we must remember is that anyone can lead a church, but I am the only man in the universe that can be the husband of my wife and the father of my children. God established the family first and the church second. Therefore, when He calls you to church ministry that does not allow you to abdicate your Family Ministry. For a generation we were told that was right and that was part of the sacrifice that had to be made by a minister and his family. We see now that produced a deadly trend both in our churches and in our homes.
That leads to the next big idea about Family Ministry. Ministry has to be about people, not running the organizational machine. In recent days there have been a lot of discussion in Baptist circles about the Great Commission Resurgence. I think the reason it resonates with so many is that they feel disconnected from the organizational machine that is their local church and denomination. Somewhere in our production mentality and event driven ministry models we have lost the idea that ministry is about people.
The church is people. The ministry of Jesus was always about people and never about position, power, or programming. His ministry was not about self-promotion and self-protection. It was about service and sacrifice.
Family Ministry is investment in people. When we set our focus on ideas like generational faithfulness, we begin to make investments in people and not in institutions and organizational structures. We begin to see those things for what they are, simply a means to an end. Some people find it hard to invest in this kind of real ministry because it is not cool and does not produce numbers and other tangible results. I guess that is why Jesus fed the crowd with a few pieces of fish and bread from a small boys lunch.
Finally, people represent families, no matter how “normal” or broken they may be, and all people have an innate desire to be connected to a family. At the deepest level, our people long to be connected, and their deepest need for connection is between parents and their children, and God the Father and his children. That is why the church is most often spoken of in the NT as a family, and why the church must function as a family, working as an extended family where generational faithfulness is promoted; where older men mentor younger men, and fathers disciple their sons and mothers disciple their daughters.
We must not neglect the missional aspect of Family Ministry. There is a generation of people out there who do not have believing parents, or even parents who live at home. They are lost and without father and mothers. The church must be a family to them. That is why the heart of the gospel is the heart of adoption. We must take the widows (single moms) and orphans (kids from broken homes) into the family of God, into our church family and into our personal families. We must invest in those lives and reach out through them to their families and work to restore what has been broken in this world back to newness of life in Christ.

Stone XII - Consummation: Heaven; The Presence of God

2009-09-03T12:55:00.000-07:00

After the entire course of the narrative has been played out, after the judgment, those who believe in Jesus will enter into the full enjoyment of life that they have longed for. They will hear Jesus say something like Matthew 25:34, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”
While people often refer to this kingdom as simply “heaven,” the Bible actually paints as even richer picture of a new heaven and new earth. It is a picture of promises; promises of an entirely renewed creation, promises of resurrected bodies, promises of spiritual treasure, and ultimately the promise of the presence of the glory of God.
Revelation 21:1 -4 says, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.’”

What is Heaven?
Heaven is the place where God most fully makes known his presence to bless. Although God is everywhere, his presence to bless is most clearly seen in heaven, and thus his glory, as the greatest of all blessings, is most clearly seen in heaven.
I. Heaven is a place
The new Heavens and the new Earth of Isaiah 66:22 will be a place so rich and good that the former things - like death, suffering, sorrow, and pain - will not even be remembered.
Heaven is the place where Jesus is. When he ascended into heaven, the fact that heaven is a place seems to be the point of the passage.
Admittedly, we can not see where Jesus is now, but that is not because he passed into some ethereal “state of being” but because our eyes are ill equipped to see the spiritual world that exist around us.
Jesus promised in John 14:2-3, “In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”
What will this place be like? John says in Revelation 21:11-14 that God showed him “the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. It had a great, high wall, with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed— on the east three gates, on the north three gates, on the south three gates, and on the west three gates. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
The city will be four dimensional, with its height being the same as its width and length. It will have a wall, “built of jasper, while the city was pure gold, clear as glass. The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, transparent as glass.”
God will make new both heaven and earth. Paul writes in Romans 8:21, “the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” No longer will there be thorns and thistles that resulted in God’s judgment for sin, nor will there be other distortions of nature that bring destruction. Paradise will be restored. Therefore, the world will no longer be broken, and the people will no longer be broken.

II. Heaven is a people
Those who live in the new creation will have glorified bodies, as we talked about last week, and with the curse of sin removed, all creation will be returned to its original state. Life in the new heavens and earth will include many of the good things about life here on earth, only they will all be much better.
All will eat and drink at the marriage supper of the Lamb according to Revelation 19:9. Jesus will once again drink wine with his disciples as the river of the water of life will flow through the street to the middle of the city where the tree of life will yield 12 kinds of fruit bringing eternal life. Music is prominent in the description of heaven. In fact, it appears that music and other artistic activities will be done with all excellence to the glory of God. Humans will continue to exercise dominion over the earth and its resources.
Though we will be like God, we will not be God. Therefore, we will not have infinite knowledge, not of ourselves or God, though we will know fully as we are fully known, meaning that all of God’s purpose for us will be revealed to us. So, for example, we will continue to increase in the knowledge of God who is infinite!
Finally, the renewed heavens and earth will be place where we can fully enjoy the treasures of heaven that we have been storing up during this life. This is wonderful encouragement for us to “do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith,” as Galatians 6:10 tells us. Therefore, as believers in Jesus, we ought to, according to 2 Peter 3:11-13, live “lives of holiness and godliness” while we are “waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”

III. Heaven is the presence of God
Heaven should not only be conceived in spatial and materialistic concepts, but mostly as the presence of God. When John saw the city come down, the first thing he saw was that it had the glory of God, and he heard God say, “Behold, the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.”
In addition to being a place of unimaginable beauty, heaven will be a place where God’s glory is so undeniably evident that all of creation will function in a way that is in full cooperation with his will. Therefore, the simplest definition might be "heaven is the presence of God."
In the Jewish religion there was great respect for God's name. Yahweh was comprised only of consonants, "YHWH." (הוהי) There were no vowels, and the word was thus unpronounceable. It was merely formed breath. In order to avoid using God's name, the Jews used other names and designations for the name of Yahweh.
The word "heaven" became a synonym for Yahweh to post-exilic Jews. This usage is carried over into the New Testament as can be seen in the following gospel usages:
Matthew 23:22 - "he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it."
Luke 15:21 - (Prodigal son) "I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight."
John 3:27 - (John the Baptist says of Jesus) "A man can receive nothing, unless it has been given to him from heaven."
The equation of God and heaven is also evidenced in the manner in which the gospel writers use the phrases "kingdom of God" and "kingdom of heaven" synonymously. Matthew, who wrote his gospel narrative particularly for a Jewish audience, is sensitive to the Jewish evasion of the name of God and uses "kingdom of heaven" in exactly the same contexts where Mark and Luke (writing for Roman and Greek audiences respectively) use the phrase "kingdom of God." John the Baptist, and then Jesus, and then the disciples, all proclaimed to the people of Palestine, "The Kingdom of heaven is at hand!" (Matt. 3:2; 4:17; 10:7). This was the good news of the gospel; what God, what heaven, was doing in Jesus Christ.
If heaven is the presence of God, then the popular mental conceptions found in many religious circles today are most inadequate. Pictures of clouds, harps, angels, pearly gates, and gold are figures that while true are merely earthly symbols of the reality to come. Surely we must pursue an understanding of heaven beyond these inadequate pictures.
In I Corinthians 2:9 Paul quotes from Isaiah 64:4 and does so in the context of the spiritual realities God has made available to Christians in Jesus Christ: "Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him." God is so much bigger than our finite abilities to conceptualize that any images that we can conceive are but inadequate images which become idols. Perhaps that is why the Jews generally refrain from speculating about "heaven," for it leads to forbidden idolatry. But Christians have always engaged in such speculation!
My intention this week was to create for you a mental picture of heaven as the presence of God. Would you want to participate in a "heaven" that was only what your mind and heart could conceive? I would not! I have very little imagination! The "heaven" that I could conjure up in my mind would be extremely boring! That is why so many people care so little about going there.
I am convinced that heaven is not boring. Man is made so as to only be content with God!
That is why the presence of God is the essence of heaven, and we must seriously ask ourselves the question, would I want to go to heaven if God were not there? What in heaven is valuable to us apart from the presence of God? Is God really enough?
Heaven is the presence of God.
When it comes to thinking about "heaven," we, with our finite minds, do not even know how to ask the correct questions. Mankind (religious people particularly), thinking as they most often do, in a worldly, spatial and temporal framework, ask questions like these:
What will I be like in heaven?
What kind of body will I have?
Will I be able to recognize those I love?
What will I be doing in heaven?
Will all of my desires be fulfilled in heaven?
What kind of mental or emotional recall will I have in heaven from my time spent on earth?
How big will my "mansion" be?
Will I have more than someone else?
Will someone else have more than me?
Our questions about "heaven" are framed in such a self-oriented perspective they only reveal that we do not have a clue what heaven is all about!
Heaven is the presence of God.
God's presence always implies that He is acting in accord with His character. Heaven is only concerned about, centered upon, the other person and the Ultimate Other, God, who should be our ultimate concern in heaven.
Heaven is the presence of God.
The earliest proclamation of the gospel by Jesus Himself was "The kingdom of heaven is at hand" in Matthew 4:17, because the presence of God was at hand in Jesus Christ. In Matthew 5:2, Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Jesus explained in Matthew 16:19 that the "key" to the kingdom of heaven was the confession that "Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.” The kingdom of heaven is present whenever the King is present, for Jesus said, "the kingdom of God is in your midst" in Luke 17:21. In Ephesians 1:3 Paul explains that "God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus," in Jesus Christ. The writer to the Hebrews indicates that Christians have become "partakers of a heavenly calling" (3:1), have "tasted of the heavenly gift" (6:4), and have "come to the heavenly Jerusalem" (12:22) all in relation the presence of God the Spirit in us.
If heaven is the presence of God, then is the presence of God not actively present among us and within us right now, here on earth, as Christians? Are we not actively participating in the heavenly and spiritual expression of the character of God? Is that not what the Christian life is all about? I believe it is!
The heavenly Father is desirous of expressing His nature and character through His spiritual children, Christians, the People of God, As we presently participate in the "kingdom of heaven." The kingdom Christ died on the cross to initiate and will return again to consummate. But I declare that I am not saying that earth is heaven, or even that the church is heaven. To that I would exclaim, "Good heaven, God forbid!"
Heaven is the presence of God.
Heaven is the Consummation or completion of what Christ inaugurated or started on the cross, a continuum of the life that we now have in Christ Jesus. The life that we participate in as Christians, both now and then, presently and in the future, is the life of Jesus, eternal life; the life of the heavenly reality of the presence of God.
Heaven is the presence of God.
One old circuit preacher once turned the phrase like this, “The Creator-God so designed the creature-man so as to require the presence of the Creator-God within the creature-man in order for the creature-man to be the creature-man that the Creator-God intended the creature-man to be.” Plato even once said, “We ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as we can; and to fly away is to become like God, as far as this is possible; and to become like him is to become holy, just, and wise.”
Man is not man as God intended apart from seeking for and participating in heaven, seeking for and participating in the presence of God. Therefore, it is all the more exciting that God’s fellowship with us will be unhindered. We will forever be able to interact with him and worship him as we were designed to do. This will be the fulfillment of God’s purpose to call us, as 2 Peter 1:3 says, “to his own glory and excellence.” We will forever dwell in the presence of his glory with great joy! That is the gospel, the good news about heaven. Heaven: the presence of God in Jesus Christ. Now and forever more Amen! As the song writer testified, "Heaven came down and glory filled my soul."
Heaven is the presence of God.
Our greatest joy will be that we “will see his face.” The sight of God’s face will be the fulfillment of everything we know to be good and right and desirable in the universe. In his face, we will see and experience the fulfillment of all the longing we have ever had:
The longing for love, and power
The longing for peace, and glory
The longing for significance, and beauty,
The longing for joy, and wisdom,
The longing to know truth,
The longing for justice, holiness and goodness.
We will discover that in God’s presence there is, as Psalm 16:11 says, “fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”
Perhaps the best paragraph in the whole Lord of the Rings Trilogy is when "Frodo" is honored with a song to celebrate his success in destroying the Ring of Doom.
“And all the host laughed and wept, and in the midst of their merriment and tears the clear voice of the minstrel rose like silver and gold, and all men were hushed. And he sang to them…until their hearts, wounded with sweet words, overflowed, and their joy was like swords, and they passed in thought out to regions where pain and delight flow together and tears are the very wine of blessedness.” (The Return of the King, 933)
Like those who listened to the minstrel’s song, we who see our Savior in the last day will also be made merry with the story of his victory, the grand narrative of the Creation, Fall, Redemption and Consummation. And we too will be hushed by and wounded with the sweet words that are sung of his self-sacrifice on our behalf. We will have joy like swords—bright and piercing—and all of the pain and loss of Christ’s death (and our daily dying with him) will only mix with and enhance our bliss. We will be, finally and forever, fully aware of the reality of the presence of God.

Stone XI - Consummation: Resurrection (fullness of Christ)

2009-09-03T12:41:00.000-07:00

Jesus’ work did not end with his life and death. 1 Corinthians 15:14-19 tells us that if it ended there, “our preaching would be in vain. . . your faith is in vain” and “your faith is futile,” and “we are of all people most to be pitied.” However, Jesus conquered death, was raised from the grave, and ascended into heaven. This is called the resurrection.
Noah Webster’s 1828 First Edition defines resurrection as “a rising again; chiefly the revival of the dead of the human race, or their return from the grave, particularly at the general judgment.” And the truth of the resurrection of Christ, as the first-born among many brothers, changes the way we think about life, death and eternity.

I. Jesus’ Resurrection
“But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man.
For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the first-fruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power.
For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he "has put everything under his feet." Now when it says that "everything" has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.” 1 Corinthians 15:20-28
All four gospels contain accounts of Jesus’ resurrection. Throughout the book of Acts, the apostles continually speak of Jesus’ resurrection, encouraging people to trust in him as the one who is alive and reigning in heaven. The rest of the New Testament depends entirely on the assumption that Jesus is a living, reigning Savior who is the head of the newly formed church.
Christ’s resurrection was not a simple coming back from the dead, like that of Lazarus. When Jesus was raised from the grave, he began a new kind of human life in which he had a perfect body that was no longer subject to weakness, aging, death or decay. Forty days after his resurrection, Luke 24:50-51 tells us that Jesus led his followers just outside Jerusalem “and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven.”
Once there, Jesus was “exalted at the right hand of God” (Acts 2:33). God “highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name” (Philippians 2:9). Jesus received glory and honor and authority that had never been his before as either God or man! Angelic choirs now sing praise to him, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and worth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” (Rev. 5:12) There he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

II. How should we think about life?
Again, the truth of Christ’s resurrection, then, should affect the way we think about life. Consequently, all who look to Jesus for their salvation have been “born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,” according to 1 Peter 1:3.
Christ earned us a new future life that is like his own. Christ’s life provides a pattern for ours. Although our bodies are not yet like his new body, our spirits have already been made alive with new resurrection power. This power of God helps us live the lives we were made to live, in at least three ways.
A. Insures our regeneration - The resurrection gives us the power to gain more and more victory over sin in our lives. Because of his victory over sin, we can consider ourselves “dead to sin.” Although we will not attain sinless perfection in this life, we know that sin no longer has dominion over us. It will not rule us or control us. Because of the resurrection, the power of the Holy Spirit enables us to do the work Jesus commissioned us to do.
B. Insures our justification - The resurrection insures our right standing before God. Paul says in Romans 4:25 that Jesus was, “raised for our justification.” When God raised Jesus from the dead, he was affirming Jesus’ work on the cross on our behalf; suffering and dying for our sins, paying the penalty and defeating death, sin and hell. The resurrection affirms that Jesus’ work is complete and he did not need to remain dead any longer. Hebrews 1:3 tells us, “After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand because his work was complete.”
C. Insures our resurrection - The resurrection of Christ means we will also experience a resurrection of our own. Since “God raised the Lord,” he “will also raise us up by his power,” according to 1 Corinthians 6:14. And 2 Corinthians 4:14 says, “he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us into his presence.” Paul says that in Jesus’ resurrection we see a picture of what is to come for us. Just as the sin and death of Adam was a picture of our sin and death, the resurrection of Christ is a picture, a foreshadowing of our resurrection. As such, everything that is true for us can be seen in the resurrection of Christ. When Jesus returns, “we shall all be changed, and our mortal bodies will be exchanged for immortal ones.” At the final resurrection, our resurrection, we will receive a new body just like the one Jesus now inhabits. Just as his resurrection lets us know what will eventually happen to us, his ascension lets us know where we will eventual go. And so we wait with eager longing for Christ’s return when we will be taken from this world into a glorious new one.

III. How should we think about death?
But someone may ask, "How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?" How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. All flesh is not the same: "Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor." 1 Corinthians 15:35-41
Is death a positive or negative thing to you? I know we all weep at the thought of leaving the things of this world that do matter, like family. I know we all have anxiety about the physical transition from this life to the next and the pain that may be involved. But how we view death tells us a lot about how we view life and eternity.
A. Believers - Death brings a completion to one part of a Christian’s sanctification. At death, a Christian’s soul is immediately made perfect and enters into the presence of God. However, it is not until Christ returns that Christians will experience the full perfection of both body and soul.
Death is not a punishment for Christians. Remember, there is “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. The penalty of death for sin has been paid by Christ, and the consequences for God’s children are now only corrective or instructive. Death, in the life of the believer serves as both.
God, in his wisdom, knew it was best that Christians not experience all the benefits of salvation at once. Christians still get sick, suffer from natural disasters and fall prey to acts of evil and injustice. Christians still die. All of these results from living in a world that isn’t quite right, a world not fully free from the curse of sin.
Paul tells us that although Christ defeated death when he rose from the dead, death will be the last result of sin to be removed from this fallen world. God uses the experience of death to complete our sanctification, as a means to make us more like Christ. In fact, it is very much in line with how God works in that it is not unusual for God to use hardship and pain to bring about good.
Paul tells us in Romans 8:28, “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good to those who love him and are called according to his purpose.” Sometimes this pain and hardship is the result of God disciplining his children for correction and instruction. Sometimes this pain and hardship is the result of human sin or the invention of Satan. Our response of obedience is the key to God’s good, pleasing and perfect will being revealed in us.
Yet, since God works even through our experience of death to complete our sanctification, preserving our life and general comfort is not our highest goal. Obedience to God and faithfulness in every circumstance is far more important. Even in the business of the church!
That is why Paul told the Elders at Ephesus in Acts 20:24, “I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”
Even though God uses hardships like death for a positive means in our life, it is important to remember that death is not merely natural. Those who believe there is no God think sickness and evil, injustice or death are merely natural. These things are not right, and ought not to be. Although we surely live with them now, one day all of them, even death, will be destroyed.
B. Unbelievers - When people who have rejected Christ die, their souls go immediately to eternal punishment. Their bodies remain in the ground until Christ’s return, when they will join their souls for that final “day of judgment,” as we talked about last week.
Scripture never encourages us to think that people will have a second chance to trust Christ after death. Hebrews 9:27 says, “it is appointed for each man once to die, and after that comes the judgment.” Therefore, the sorrow felt at the death of someone who we believe has rejected Christ is not a sorrow mingled with hope. When Paul thought of such people in his life, he said in Romans 9:2, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.”
Praise God that because our salvation is one by grace, through faith in Christ, and not one of works; we often do not have complete certainty that their rejection has persevered until the end. Impending death can produce true repentance and faith.
C. Our Own Death - If you have placed you trust in Christ, the Bible encourages you to not view your own death with fear. Jesus died to “deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery,” according to Hebrews 2:15. Hear that? Fear of death is slavery.
Instead, you are to view your own death with joy, knowing that after death you will be with Christ.
Paul demonstrates this clearly in 2 Corinthians 5:8 when he writes, “We would rather be away from the body and present and at home with the Lord.” In Philippians 1:23 he makes this desire personal, “My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.” If we fear death and find Paul’s words hard to believe, we must confess that to the Lord and ask that he grant us better understanding of death and greater trust in his goodness. When we die, our souls go immediately into God’s presence, though our bodies remain in the ground.
Although our souls are eternally happy in the presence of God, as we will see next week, it is still right to feel sorrow at the death of a brother or sister in Christ. Acts 8:2 tells us that when Stephen was stoned to death, “devout men . . . made great lamentation over him.” Jesus himself wept at the tomb of his friend Lazarus, both because of sorrow for his friend who died and sorrow for the pain of death that all will experience until his return.
However, the sorrow felt at the death of a believer in Christ is not a hopeless sorrow since we know that the believer has gone to be with the Lord. Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4:13, we do not “grieve as others who do not have hope.”
D. Those whom are alive - I will not spend too much time here, but it is a fact that not all will die. When Christ returns, he will finally defeat death, and will judge the living and the dead.
Our passage in 1 Corinthians 15: 50- 53 says, “I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”
Paul encourages us in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-18 saying, “For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.” So, whether we are believers or unbelievers, dead in Christ or alive at his return, the resurrection should affect the way we think about death.

IV. How should we think about eternity?
"So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.
If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being"; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man from heaven. As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven." 1 Corinthians 15:42-49
We have seen throughout, and specifically in this passage, that there are two areas in which we should think of the final resurrection consummation; the eternal soul and the resurrected body.
A. Eternal Souls - For believers in Christ, when you die, your body will remain in the ground and your soul will go immediately into the presence of God. We will rest in the non-physical presence of God, until the time when Christ returns to the earth, and we wait, as Romans 8:23-24 says, for “the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved.”
B. Resurrection Bodies - For believers in Christ, the day when Christ returns will be the final step in the application of redemption. The consummation of redemption! On that day their new, perfected bodies will be reunited with their souls.
Christ was the first, but Paul says that “at his coming” believers will also be raised in this way. All believers will receive renewed resurrection bodies just like their savior received. This process is called glorification since our bodies receive a new heavenly kind of glory. These new bodies will be imperishable, that is, they will never grow old or wear out, or ever be subject to sickness or disease. They will show no signs of aging but will instead be completely healthy and strong forever.
They will be what God originally designed them to be: far more beautiful and attractive than anything you might imagine in this age, having the excellent qualities God created us to have. They will be the living proof of the wisdom of God in creation - a creation he called very Good. And so we come full circle - from creation, through the fall and redemption, to the coming of Christ and the resurrection.
We have only one more week together, in this series. With it we will gaze upon the splendor of the reality of the eternal presence of God in all his glory. And so we do all say together, as 1 Corinthians 15: 54- 58 does, "When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: 'Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?'"
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Stone X Consummation: Return of the King

2009-09-03T12:25:00.000-07:00

We have now covered everything that is and everything that should be in the life of a believer. We now look forward with grand expectation to what will be, the consummation of the Kingdom of Christ; the return of Christ to sit in authority on his throne, the resurrection of the dead when we will attain the fullness of Christ, and Heaven, the eternal comfortable presence of God.
We will start today by looking at the return of Christ as Lord, both in this life and the life to come, and how we ought to respond to that authority. Again, everything that we have looked at until now is the past or the present, this is the future. There have been many debates in the history of the church over questions regarding the future. These debates led to a great deal of study of the “Last Things,” or “Eschatology.” Eschatology comes from the Greek eschatos (which means last) and is therefore the study of last things.

I. The Return of Christ
Jesus told the disciples that he would return to earth a second time in John 14:3, “I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”
While it is clear from this and a host of other passages, like Acts 1:11, 1 Thess. 4:16, Hebrews 9:28, 2 Peter 3:10, 1 John 3:2, that Jesus himself will return, these passages also make it clear, as Mark 13:32 does, that “no one knows” the exact time of that return, for “the son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect,” according to Matthew 24:44. Although no one can know the time or day of Christ return, we can respond as John did in Revelation 22:20 when he heard Christ say, “Surely I am coming soon.” John’s appropriate response was “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!”

II. The Events of the Return
Much of the disagreement within the church regarding Jesus’ return deals directly with the interpretation of one Bible passage in Revelation 20:1-10;
"Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.
Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.
And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever."
Now I am no expert in these things. I have not studied Revelation significantly, and I think there is a lot of stuff in the “what is” and “what should be” categories that I have to get right before I dwell on “what is to be.” However, it is important for us to have some understanding of the issues in order to be able to give an account for the hope we have in Christ, for it is a future hope! The specific disagreement has to do with the thousand years that John mentions. Many Christians term this thousand years stage “the millennium,” and they usually take one of three views.
A. Premillennial View says the millennium will come suddenly, and Jesus will return before the millennium.
B. Amillennial View says the millennium is now, that we are within the thousand years, and when it ends, Jesus will return.
C. Postmillenial View says the millennium will come gradually, and Jesus will return after the millennium.
It is perhaps not surprising that Christians have differences over their views of the future. The future can be somewhat unclear to us since by definition, it has not yet happened! However there are several things about the coming of Christ that all Christians have agreed upon.
1. All Christians believe that the final victory of Christ over Satan (described in verses 7-10) will occur in the future.
2. They believe Satan will be released from his prison to gather together for battle those whom he has deceived.
3. At that final battle, Jesus will defeat Satan and his army once and for all.
4. At the end of the battle, Satan will be thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where he will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
These are things upon which we can agree and take great hope in because Jesus told John in Revelation 22:6 that his words “are trustworthy and true.”

III. The Affects of Christ Return
While we can not know when Christ will return, and there is some debate about some of the details of his return, we can be sure of the affects of Christ’s return. Jesus said in Revelation 22:12, “I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay everyone for what he has done.” After a thousand year reign of Christ, and after the final defeat of Satan and his army, Jesus will judge all mankind from his great white throne according to Revelation 20:11-15.
"Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire."
Jesus “will judge the world in righteousness” as Acts 17 says. He “is the one appointed by God to be the judge of the living and the dead” (Acts 10:42). His “authority to execute judgment” was given to him by God (John 5:27). Revelation 11:18 makes clear that this “time for the dead to be judged” will be a time for rewarding God’s servants, and a time for “destroying the destroyers of the earth.”
Therefore, this will be a time when both those who believe in Jesus and those who do not believe will be judged. Paul says in Romans 2:6-10, He will render to each one according to his works: "to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek."
Let’s be clear, this is not talking about salvation, this is the judgment of unbelievers for punishment and the judgment of believers for reward!
A. The Judgment of the Unbelievers - For those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There was an assurance in the Old Testament, in Ecclesiastes 12:14, that “God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Those who have not looked to Jesus, by grace through faith alone, for their salvation will be judged according to what they have done.
God will be fair. The degree of punishment will vary according to what each person has done, for Luke 20:47 says “some will receive the greater condemnation.”
According to Jesus himself, when teaching on the difference between eh servant who knew his master’s will and the one who did not, in Luke 12:47-48, the punishment will also vary according to how much knowledge people had of God’s requirements. They will all be punished severely and eternally, but according to their works.
B. The Judgment of the Believer - This is what Bro. Otis always called the end of life performance review. In fact, Romans 14:10-12 says, “Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written, ‘As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.’
So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. There will be eternal life for every believer, and glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good. This final judgment will not be one of punishment, but of reward. We will be brought under great conviction as God reveals to us who he created us to be and who he called us to be in Christ, and we become painfully aware of how far short we have fallen. We will be overwhelmed with the greatness of his mercy and grace towards us. And then he will wipe away every tear . . . for Romans 1:8 declares, “There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ.”
Therefore, this judgment should not be one of fear for the believer, but one of encouragement. It should motivate us beyond all things to make it our aim as 2 Corinthians 5:9-10 says, “So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.”
Although there will be degrees of reward in heaven, everyone’s joy will be complete, because our awareness of grace will be acute, and our joy will not come from what we possess, or our status, but from our relationship with God. As it should be in this life! In Heaven, as we will see in a couple of weeks, our joy in fully delighting in God, our joy in being able to be in his presence and fall down before his throne to worship him, will be greater than the joy found in any reward! Instead of jealousy or a spirit of competition, the fact that we will receive a reward for what we have done should spur us on to “consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near,” as Hebrews 10:24-25 says.
The rewards to be had are not finite. If I get one that does not mean there is one less for you to get. We are all in this together and should be cheering each other on to please God and receive the blessing of God both in this life and the life to come!
C. The Purpose of Final Judgment - This final judgment does not take place so that God can determine the condition of each person’s heart. The final judgment will take place so that God can display his glory to all mankind by demonstrating his justice and mercy simultaneously, just as he did at the cross.
The final judgment will be so entirely fair that each person, whether destined for eternal glory or condemnation, will be dealt with more fairly than at any previous time. So much so, even those who suffer the punishment of hell will find the judgment against them as just, as every knee will bow! 1 Peter 1:17 says God will, “judge impartially according to each one’s deeds, for Romans 2:11 says, “God shows no partiality.” James 2:1 says that we should follow this example of the impartiality of Christ, “My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.” We should see people the way God sees them, particularly not according to their wealth!
God will be so glorified in his final judgment that Revelation 19:1-2 says we will shout with a great multitude "Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, for his judgments are true and just; for he has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality, and has avenged on her the blood of his servants."
D. The Application of the Final Judgment - Because there is a final judgment, we can have great hope in several assurances, without which there would be no hope in faith in Christ at all.
1. In the Final Judgment we are assured that God’s universe is fair. It satisfies our need for justice in the world.
2. In the Final Judgment we are assured that God is in control; no matter what happens, he will eventually bring about a right end to every situation.
3. In the Final Judgment we are assured that every believer should be able to forgive one another freely. For in it, we know that all accounts will be settled on that day and all wrongs will be made right.
4. In the Final Judgment we are assured that we are free from the spirit of revenge. Christians should never seek to avenge themselves, but instead “leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord,” as Romans 12:19 reminds us. When we are wronged, we can take the desire for justice to God, asking the he work it out on our behalf. We can be sure that he is just and Christ died for sin so that we do not have to. Punishment will either fall on the shoulders of Christ or on the shoulders of the offender for all eternity. We must then demonstrate mercy to others as Christ does to us, and display grace to others as Christ does to us. We must, as Jesus teaches, ask God to forgive us our sins in the same measure that we forgive those who sin against us. We must follow the example of Christ, for “when he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly,” as 1 Peter 2:23 reminds us.
Because there is a final judgment, we can also have great motivation to live each day in obedience to God and thus to “lay up treasures in heaven,” as Matthew 6:20 tells us. Even though these treasures do not earn us our salvation, they do reward us for the good we have done. More than any earthly reward or treasure ever could.
Because there is a final judgment, we have an encouragement to tell others about the good news of Jesus. God “does not wish that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance,” (2 Peter 3:9). Therefore, those who believe in Jesus should share the good news of what they believe with others.
The Bible’s clear warnings of final judgment should encourage us as believers to turn from their sin and turn to Christ alone for their salvation, by grace alone through faith alone. Finally, because of the final judgment, those who have rejected Jesus and his message will go to a place of eternal punishment the Bible calls hell. The Bible’s descriptions of hell are difficult to read, and they should be deeply disturbing to us. While we who truly believe in Christ should have no fear of hell, we should still think of it only with great solemnity and sadness.
Even God himself says, “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.” Still, the wicked must perish. As hard as it is to think about, the doctrine of hell is so clearly taught is Scripture that there is no way to escape it and remain true to God’s word. In a universe like ours where there is deep and profound evil that calls forth the just wrath of a righteous, holy God, evil can not simply go unpunished. All of God’s judgments are just and right, because “the Lord is upright . . . there is no unrighteousness in him.”
And so we say, with loud and often desperate voices, “Come, Lord Jesus come!” And in the while, let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, cheering each other on to please God and receive the blessings of God both in this life and the life to come!

Family Ministry Summer

2009-09-02T10:19:00.000-07:00

What a glorious summer it has been! As most of you know, the focus this summer has been on implementing a Family Ministry plan at Bush Memorial that we hope to be able to use as a comprehensive example and learning tool as we help churches transition to a family equipping ministry model. This past Sunday represented the official end of the summer of emphasis. However, the foundation that was lain will serve as a model for doing ministry, both at Bush Memorial and hundreds of other churches, for years to come.
What we learned this summer is something we already believed to be true, family ministry is not programs, or ministry elements, and it is certainly not just about events. Family ministry and a family equipping ministry model is an attitude or ethos. It is not something you do, it is something you believe. That sounds like biblical Christianity doesn’t it?
That is why we believe that the biblical, family equipping, model that seeks to produce a faith handed down from one generation to the next, through Parents filling their primary role as the spiritual mentors of their children and older men discipling younger men, is so compelling to this generation; because it is authentic, corporate faith that is active, distinct, generational and missional.
Because this kind of family ministry model is so comprehensive, it requires that people see beyond the individual ministry elements to the biblical core. A way of doing ministry that is generational requires believers put aside themselves and a generation of self-help, entertainment driven, consumer based ministry and take up anew an ancient idea of ministry that is grounded in service and sacrifice.
We believe that is why the best elements that we implemented this summer produced real fruit when they called people out of the normal and out of their own self-interest, and into an investment in community, multi-generational faith and service.
We have found that this requires us to put off our generational arrogance, which is the idea that one generation has an attitude of superiority that manifest itself in presumptuous claims or assumptions. It most often refers to a younger generation’s propensity to think it has all of the answers, or an older generations propensity to think it was all better in the old days.
We have also found that it requires us to put on an attitude of generational faithfulness, which is the idea of passing down one’s spiritual heritage from one generation to the next as a means of continuing, or beginning, a heritage of God-honoring, Christ-serving, kingdom-advancing children, grandchildren, great grandchildren.
That is why the central idea of this entire family ministry summer is that we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, but our legacy will be defined by what we produce in those who follow behind. We either believe that or we do not. I believe that generational faithfulness is fundamental to the survival and influence of the Church. I believe it is fundamental to the survival and influence of the family. I believe God established those two institutions as the stewards of all we know and believe as followers of Christ, and I pray you will work with us to share these principles with others.

Stone VIII - Redemption: Faith

2009-09-02T10:07:00.000-07:00

As we establish our altar of remembrance, we have heard the stories of Creation and The Fall.
We began our third movement last time, Redemption. Redemption is the idea of salvation used to express deliverance from sin. We are looking at redemption in three parts that make up the fundamental statement of Christian belief, that salvation comes by Grace alone, through Faith alone, in Christ alone.
Last time we started by looking intently on the glory of God’s grace. Grace and the atonement explain why and how God himself makes a way for our salvation, through Christ, and actually regenerates us by the work of the Holy Spirit, imparting new spiritual life within.
This week we will examine our appropriate response to the gospel call, justification by faith. We pick up where Paul concludes Romans 3 by saying, “For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.” He then uses Abraham as an example of how believers were saved in the Old Testament through faith by quoting Genesis 15:6, “Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness” in Romans 4:1-8.
Paul applies the salvation by grace through faith formulation to those who share Abraham’s faith through the rest of the chapter and clearly concludes in 5:1-2 “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.”
I. Our Response
Conversion is our willing response to the gospel call, in which we sincerely repent of sins and place our faith in Christ for salvation. The word conversion itself means “turning.” For us it represents a spiritual turning from sin to the person and work of Christ.
The turning to Christ is called faith. The turning from sin is called repentance.
A. Faith - What is faith? Faith is term that we throw around in the Christian world in a way that if you really listen, it leads you to believe that we have no idea what it really is. The primary misconception is that faith is an object in itself. So many times in our culture we talk about faith as though faith were the thing, as if we were placing our faith in faith. The result is that we quantify the object. It becomes about having more faith, and we are told we need to have more faith. That is a lie.
Faith is not the object, God is! And the key is not to have more faith, but to place your faith in God. Jesus did say to the disciples when they asked why they had failed cast out a demon that it was, "Because of your little faith.” However, He continues “For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”
What Jesus was saying was that the object of their faith was small, but that the smallest amount of faith placed in the right object has infinite power. You don’t need more faith you need faith placed in the right object. If you are a believer, then you have enough faith. For can the same faith that saved you from eternal hell not accomplish all things in Christ?
Saving faith is trusting in the work of Jesus Christ as a living person for forgiveness of sins and eternal life in the comfortable presence of God. Faith is not an object or a quantity. So, what is the nature of faith?
1. The Nature of Faith - is an acceptance of truth and trust in the promise of that truth. Therefore, it is knowledge, acceptance, and personal trust. Personal saving faith, according to the testimony of Scripture, requires some knowledge of the person and work of Christ. While faith involves more than just knowledge, it is necessary to have some understanding of who Christ is and what he has done, for Romans 10:14 says, “how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?”
Knowledge about the facts of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection are important and we should do everything in our power to make sure our children and grandchildren have a working knowledge of those facts. However, knowledge of those facts is not enough. People can know the facts and rebel against them. Even more, merely knowing and accepting the facts, or agreeing that they are true, is not enough. Each of us must decide to depend on Jesus to save us personally.
In addition to knowledge of the facts, and approval of them as true, I must decide to depend on the promise of the truth for salvation. Belief must produce the action of faith, which is trust in the person and work of Christ as the object of our faith.
2. Object of Faith - Faith is personal trust in Christ alone to save me. Because saving faith in Scripture involves personal trust, trust is often a much better word in our culture than faith or belief. The reason is that in our contemporary use of language we can “believe” something to be true without having any personal commitment or dependence involved in it. That is where far too many professing Christians actually live today. They have knowledge of the truth and profess to believe it, without any real personal dependence on it or trust in it. Therefore, they live most of their lives as though what they profess to believe is not really real! The word “faith” is often used in our culture to refer to an almost irrational commitment to something in spite of strong evidence to the contrary. It communicates a sort of irrational decision to believe something that we are quite sure is not true!
In these two popular senses, belief and faith have a meaning contrary to the biblical idea. Our use of trust is much closer to the biblical idea, of Christ as the object of faith. With this understanding of true NT faith, we can appreciate that when a person comes to trust in Christ, all three elements must be in place; some basic knowledge of the facts of the gospel, agreement with these facts as truth, and a decision of the will to depend on, or put my trust in Christ alone as my savior.
This personal decision is a matter of the heart, the central faculty that makes commitments for our being.
B. Repentance - Not only must there be a turning to Christ in faith for salvation to be real and conversion to be true and complete, but there must also be a turning from sin, or repentance. We may define repentance as a heartfelt sorrow for sin, a renouncing of it, and a sincere commitment to forsake it and walk in obedience to Christ. This definition indicates that repentance is something that can occur at a specific time and is not equivalent to a demonstration of change in a person’s life. To say that someone has to actually live that changed life over a period of time before repentance can be genuine, turns repentance into a work of obedience that would merit salvation.
Of course, genuine repentance will result in a changed life, and a truly repentant person will begin at once to live a changed life that we can call the fruit of repentance. In order to pass on from generation to generation the reality of the gospel, in our families and in the local church, we must regularly call ourselves to repentance. I believe there are three categories in which people should be called to repentance; believing sinners, unbelieving sinners and religious people.
1. Believing sinners should be called to repentance by acknowledging that they sin by both omission and commission in their thoughts, words, deeds and motives. These people are the easiest to call to repentance because they desire to adjust their lives to the will and pleasure of God. By the power of the Spirit, in the community of the church, they can change their deeds, out of their newness of heart, as God grants them “repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and that they may come to their senses and escape the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.” The next two are much more difficult.
2. Unbelieving sinners should be called to gospel repentance, which fundamentally means changing their mind about who God is and what is really important. Through the gospel they come into loving relationship with Jesus. Then their lives change out of their new heart-level love for the Lord. Like Paul, we proclaim that “they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.”
3. Religious people should be called to repentance for their religion. Religion attempts to attain righteousness apart from or in addition to the gift-righteousness given through the cross of Jesus. This is where most of us live. Religion seeks righteousness through goodness and religious devotion, mostly to various unbiblical legalisms and liberalisms.
I believe there are at least three reasons why we must call both the lost and the religious to repent as part of generational faithfulness; for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of unbelievers, because of the example of Jesus.
1. For the sake of the gospel both lost sinners and religious people ought to be called to repent because both pursue righteousness apart from Jesus’ grace, which is an offense to the gospel. We mock the cross when we live as though we can be good enough, or as if we deserve to be saved!
2. For the sake of unbelievers both the lost and religious should be called to repentance because if only the lost are called to repent, they wrongly think that the church is trying to make them into religious people. Far too often, they are right, while religious people fail to see that they are sinners too who need to repent and live humbly by grace.
3. Because of the example of Jesus both lost sinners and religious people ought to be called to repentance because it was religious leaders whom Jesus most sharply rebuked and was by whom he was most violently opposed.
Some of you, even now are upset in your spirit because I would suggest that you need to repent.
Though I have not called your name, you can be sure I am talking about you, because that is the Spirit, in the community of the church, calling you to turn from your selfish pride, humbly to the Lordship of Jesus. Or would you say you have no sin, and make God a liar!
Jesus said to the religious leaders of his day, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!”
“For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in. For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.” (Matthew 23)
If we are to follow the example of Jesus, we must be just as forthright with the religious, as with the lost, while accepting that they will most likely be our most vocal critics and opponents. To be an example of what a believer should look like, as Paul urges Timothy to do, leaders should openly confess their struggles and failures as sin in the hope of establishing a culture of humility and honest repentance in the church that gives everyone an opportunity to follow the leaders in personally acknowledging their need for Jesus’ saving, forgiving, and transforming grace.
C. Faith and Repentance work together - Scripture puts repentance and faith together as different aspects of the one act of coming to Christ. They both must occur simultaneously, as we turn away from sin, we turn to Christ, and as we turn to Christ, we rightly turn away from sin. They are two sides to the same coin of conversion. Neither comes first and they must come together. Therefore, it is contrary to the New Testament to speak about having true saving faith without having repentance, and also to speak about the possibility of someone accepting Christ as savior but not as Lord.
When we realize that genuine saving faith must be accompanied by genuine repentance for sin, it helps us to understand why so much preaching of the gospel today produces inadequate results - a generation of people who claim to believe, but who demonstrate no real faith in Christ in their daily lives.
Although we have been considering initial faith and repentance as the two aspects of conversion, or redemption, it is important to emphasize that faith and repentance are not confined to the beginning of the Christian life. They are rather attitudes of heart that continue to be acted out throughout our lives as believers.
Jesus tells his disciples in Matthew 6:12 to pray daily, “Forgive us our sins as we also have forgiven those who sin against us.” Therefore, although it is true that initial saving faith and initial saving repentance occur only once in our lives, and when they occur constitute true conversion, the ongoing heart actions of repentance and faith only begin at conversion. They should continue throughout life, and I believe become more acute as we mature spiritually. Each day there should be a heartfelt repentance for sins that we have committed, and faith in Christ to provide for our needs and to empower us to live the life of a true believer.

II. Definition of Justification
There is but one thing left in this idea of salvation by grace through faith. Once God has made the offer of salvation by His grace and we have responded through faith and repentance, there is forgiveness for our sins.
However, we are still not righteous before God. As we talked about when discussing grace, we still need the redemption that we have in Christ to be applied to us so that God can respond to our faith and do what He promised, that is, actually declare our sins forgiven.
This idea is called justification; a legal declaration concerning our relationship to God’s laws, stating that we are completely right before God and his law and no longer liable to punishment. A right understanding of justification is absolutely critical to the whole Christian faith. It is the dividing line between the biblical gospel of salvation by grace through faith alone in Christ and all false gospels of salvation based on good works.
A. Legal - The use of the term ‘justify’ in Scripture indicates that this is a legal declaration by God. This is most clearly seen in Scripture as it contrasts justification with condemnation.
Paul says in Romans 8:33-34, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies; who is to condemn?”
To condemn is to declare a person guilty. The opposite of condemn then is justify, which, in this context, means “to declare someone not guilty.” This, by its very nature is a legal transaction.
Though we have been declared innocent, we are not to be confused. We still sin and are sinful by nature. God has declared us to be not guilty because Christ has paid the price for that sin, and through faith we have received that payment.
B. Declaration - In God’s legal declaration of justification, he specifically declares that we are just in his sight. This declaration involves two aspects.
1. It means that we have no penalty to pay for sin, including past present and future sins.
2. It means that God must not only declare us to be neutral in his sight, but as we have talked about many times before, that he declare us to be righteous in his sight.

III. How does God do it?
How can God declare that we have no penalty to pay for sin and that he views us as having perfect righteousness, even though we know that we are in fact guilty sinners?
A. Imputation - Remember before we have talked about the idea of imputation.
Adam’s sin imputed to us at the fall. Christ suffered and died for our sins and our sins were imputed to Christ on the cross.
Now, we see imputation for a third time. Christ’s righteousness is imputed to us, and therefore God thinks of it as belonging to us. God thinks of Christ’s righteousness as belonging to us, or regards it as belonging to us. He reckons it to our account. Because of this idea of imputation, God can apply our sin to the account of Christ and apply his righteousness to our account, so that we might be saved, and this is applied to us by faith.
B. Through Our Faith in Christ - Faith is the instrument that God chose to use in order that we might be able to receive the justification earned by the grace of God through Christ Jesus.
1. Faith is an instrument not a work. Scripture never says that we are justified because of the inherent goodness of our faith, or the quantity of it, as we have mentioned. It never allows us to think that our faith earns us favor with God in any way.
Rather, Scripture says that we are justified by means of our faith, understanding faith to be the instrument through which justification is given to us. We are justified solely on the merits of Christ’s righteousness that is given to us, not on any righteousness of our own, for we have none. 2. God chose Faith as the instrument by which justification could be given (instead of love, joy, contentment, humility, or wisdom) because faith is the one attitude of heart that is exact opposite of depending on our self. When we come to Christ in faith, we say, “I surrender, I will not depend on myself any longer. I know I can never make myself righteous before God. Jesus, I trust you and depend on you completely to give me right standing before God.”
3. Practical Implications that result from this central idea are very important.
First, this doctrine allows us to offer real hope to unbelievers. If salvation is a free gift to be received by faith alone, than anyone who hears this gospel may hope that eternal life is freely offered and may be obtained in Christ.
Second, this doctrine gives us confidence that God will never make us pay the penalty for sins that have been forgiven in Christ. We may continue to suffer temporal consequences and God may discipline us, in love, if we continue to walk in disobedience. However, God never can or will take vengeance, or exercise his wrath on us for our sins once covered by the blood of Christ.
Third, this doctrine of justification by faith gives us the privilege of adoption. This is the act whereby God makes us, at the time of our conversion, members of his family. John presents salvation as adoption at the beginning of the gospel, where he says in John 1:12, “But to all who receive him, who TRUST in his name, he gave the power to become children of God.”
The New Testament epistles bear repeated testimony to the fact that we are now God’s children in a special sense, members of his family. And if we are God’s children, are we not then related to one another as family members? That is why the idea of generational faithfulness is so important. Not because it is our plan, or simply because it helps families, but because it is the plan of God from the beginning!
In a sense it is still future tense, in that we will not receive the full benefits until Christ returns and we ourselves have been resurrected. But as we have hope in the knowledge of Truth, confidence in the acceptance or understanding of the Truth, we also have personal trust in the eternal promise of that Truth.

Stone IX - Redemption: Christ (Sanctification)

2009-09-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

I. Definition of Sanctification
As we lay our foundation of faith, our stones of remembrance, we have covered everything that should be in the life of the believer and have arrived at how we should go forward from today - the process of sanctification that creates in us Christlikeness. We have come to the part of the application of redemption that is a progressive work that continues throughout our earthly lives as believers. It is also a work in witch God and man cooperate, each playing distinct roles.
Sanctification is a progressive work of God and man that makes us more and more free from sin and more and more like Christ in our actual lives. Paul makes this ever clear for us as we pick up in Romans 6:1-2, 11-14; “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.”

II. Differences between Justification and Sanctification
Justification by grace through faith is a once for all time legal standing. Sanctification is an internal condition that occurs continuously throughout life. Justification is entirely God’s work that is perfectly complete in this life and the same for all believers. Sanctification is a process in which we cooperate with God, and therefore is not perfect in this life and is greater in some than in others!

III. Three Stages of Sanctification
The ordinary course of a Christian’s life will involve continual growth in sanctification, and it is something the New Testament encourages us to give effort and attention to. In the New Testament we find that sanctification has three main stages. Understanding these stages may help us to evaluate where we ourselves and our loved ones are in this process and how we all might grow toward greater spiritual maturity.
A. Beginning at Regeneration - Sanctification has a definite beginning at regeneration.
A definite moral change occurs in our lives at the point of regeneration, for Paul talks about the “washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit” in Titus 3:5.
1 John 3:9 implies that once we are converted, we cannot continue to sin as a habit or pattern of life because the power of new spiritual life within us keeps us from yielding to a life of sin. This moral change is the first stage in sanctification. This initial step involves a definite break from the ruling power and love of sin. Paul says, “We must consider ourselves dead to sin, and alive to God in Christ Jesus,” in verse 11. He says in verse 14 that, “sin will have no dominion (or authority) over you,” and continues in verse 18 saying that we have “been set free from sin.” That is God’s part!
In between Paul tells believers to “not let sin reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions.” He also says, very poignantly, “Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.” That is our part!
In a very practical application, we must confirm two things to be true.
1. On the one hand we will never be able to say, “I am completely free of sin.”
2. On the other hand, we as believers should never say, “This sin has defeated me. I give up. This is just the way I am.” To say that is to give sin dominion over you that Christ died to set you free from, by his grace!
This initial break with sin involves a reorientation of our desires, and as Paul indicates in verse 17, it is an “obedience from the heart.” This change of one’s primary love and primary desires occurs at the beginning of sanctification.
B. Increases through Life - Even though sanctification has a definite beginning, the New Testament also sees it as a process that continues throughout our lives as believers. This is the primary sense in which the term is used. Even though Paul has told us that we have been set free form sin and are in fact dead to it, he recognizes that sin still remains in our lives.
He tells us in verse 12-13 “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness,” do not let it reign and do not yield to it. Our task then is to grow more and more in sanctification.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians 3:18 that throughout the Christian life, “we all . . . are being changed into the likeness of Christ from one degree of glory to another.” We are to be becoming more like Christ! Every day, in every way - Christ!
C. Complete only at Death and the coming of Christ - Sanctification is made complete at death for our souls and at the resurrection for our bodies. Because of the residue of sin in our lives, our sanctification will never be completed in this life. But in the end, it will be complete when our souls are set free from the indwelling sin of the body and are made perfect.
Even more, when we appreciate that sanctification involves the whole person, including our bodies, then we realize that it will not be complete until Christ returns and we are made new by the resurrection. What a glorious day, when he will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body (Phil. 3:21) and at his coming we will be made alive with a resurrection body and we shall fully bear the image of the Man of heaven! (1 Cor. 15)
Some may take opposition to this fact and use verses like Matthew 5:48 or 2 Corinthians 7 out of context to teach a perfectionism that holds sinless perfection is possible (maybe in fact necessary) in this life. This is an error that is simply not taught in Scripture, while there are passages throughout the Bible that teach we can not be morally perfect in this life.
Others may take this fact and use it as an excuse to not strive for holiness or grow in sanctification. This is exactly contrary to dozens of New Testament commands and is blatant rebellion.
Still others may take this fact and loose hope of making any progress in the Christian life. This is also in exact opposition to Romans 6 and various other clear teachings about the resurrection power of Christ, and his Spirit, enabling us to overcome sin. Therefore, although sanctification will never be complete in this life, we must also emphasize that it should never stop increasing in this life.

IV. Cooperation between God and Man
The role of the resurrection power of Christ, and the presence of the Holy Spirit, along with our passion and discipline, demonstrate that sanctification is a process in which we cooperate with God. We are not saying that the roles are the same, or even equal, but simply that we cooperate with God in ways that are appropriate to our status as creatures. The fact that Scripture emphasizes the role we play in sanctification, makes it imperative that we teach how God calls us to cooperate with him in this activity.
A. God’s Role - Since sanctification is primarily a work of God, as Paul prays in 1 Thessalonians 5:23, “May the God of peace sanctify you wholly,” we must talk first about the role of God.
1. One specific role of God in sanctification is his process of disciplining us as his children.
2. A second specific role of God is his causing us to want his will and empowering us to do it.
3. A third specific role of God is his equipping us with everything good for accomplishing his will.
4. A forth specific role is that Christ earned our sanctification for us and serves as an example.
5. A fifth role of God is that the Holy Spirit works within us to change us, and produces in us the fruits of the spirit that only come by walking in the Spirit and being led by the Spirit as we become more and more responsive to the desires and prompting of God in our life.
B. Our Role - Our role in sanctification, then is both a passive role in which we depend on God to sanctify us, and an active role in which we strive to obey God and take steps to increase our sanctification.
1. The passive role we play is seen our trusting God, and our prayers asking him to sanctify us. We can not be sanctified by any of our efforts if we do not first yield ourselves to God and present ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God.
2. The active role we play is best characterized in Philippians 2:12-13, “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” Obedience is always the way to work out our salvation. This means that we will work out the further realization of the benefits of salvation as we follow Christ in obedience.
We, like the Philippians, are to work at this growth in sanctification, and it is not a game. We are told that awe and reverence (fear and trembling) are the appropriate manner, for it is done in the presence of God. The reason we are to work and may expect positive results is that it is God is at work in us - our cooperation with God bears fruit because of his prior, foundational, empowering work in us. There are far too many aspects to this active role that we are to play in sanctification to deal with here. The New Testament encourages us to strive, stand, abstain, make effort, purify ourselves, discipline ourselves, train ourselves, and as Philippians 2:14-16 says, “Do all things without grumbling or complaining, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.”
One thing the New Testament does not encourage is short-cuts. In fact, Scripture gives us none! Scripture simply encourages us repeatedly to give ourselves to historic, tested means; Bible reading and mediation, prayer, worship, witnessing, fellowship, self-discipline and self-control. It is vitally important that we continually grow in both our passive trust in God to sanctify us and our active striving for holiness and greater obedience in our lives. If we neglect the active, we become passive and lazy. If we neglect the passive, we become legalist and proud. In either case, our sanctification will be deficient. That is why the wise old hymn says, “Trust and obey, for there is no other way, to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.”

V. Affects of Sanctification
What are the affects of sanctification? Can you remember in your own experience the definite beginning, the clear break from the ruling power and love of sin? Can you look back over the past few years of your Christian life and see a pattern of definite growth? Things you used to delight in that no longer interest you? Things you used to have no interest in that now hold great delight for you?
I believe the affects of sanctification can be discussed in three categories, much like the three stages of sanctification; motivation, transformation, and beautification.
A. Transformation - One of the affects of sanctification is that we see that it affects our whole person, our wills, intellects and emotions.
1. Will - Sanctification will have an affect on our will, our decision making faculty, because God is at work in us, “to will and to work for his good pleasure.”
2. Intellect - Sanctification will have an affect on our intellects, on our knowledge, as Paul says in Colossians 1:10 that a life “worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him” is one that is continually “increasing in the knowledge of God.”
3. Emotions - Sanctification will have an affect on our emotions, on what we love, as we find 1 John 15 increasingly true, that we do “not love the world or the things in the world” but instead delight to do God’s will.
Most of all, Sanctification will affect our spirit, the non-physical part of our beings; and our bodies, the physical part of our beings, as we fulfill God’s purpose for our lives to be increasingly “conformed to the image of his Son, in every dimension of our personhood, every fiber of our being.
B. Motivation - One of the affects of sanctification is that we are motivated to obey God when we realize that our obedience produces Christ-likeness in us. We fail to realize the wide range of motivations for obedience to God that are found through sanctification in the New Testament.
1. Our desire to please God and express our love for Him - as we grow in our delight in God.
2. Our desire for a clear conscience before God - as we grow in our awareness of our sin before God.
3. Our desire to be vessels for noble use and have increased effectiveness in kingdom work - as we grow in our appreciation for the work of God.
4. Our desire to see unbelievers come to Christ through observing our lives - as we grow in the grace and mercy of God.
5. Our desire to receive present blessings from God on our lives and ministries - as we grow in our dependence on the power and presence of God.
6. Our desire to avoid the displeasure and discipline of God - as we grow in our awe and reverence for God, as our fear and trembling increases.
7. Our desire for greater heavenly reward - as we grow in our desire for the eternal presence of God.
8. Our desire for a deeper walk with God - as we grow in our fellowship with God.
9. Our desire for angels to glorify God for our obedience - as we grow in our understanding of the spiritual things of God.
10. Our desire to do what God commands simply because his commands are right - as we grow in our delight in the justice of God.
11. Our desire for peace and joy in our lives - as we grow in our distaste for this world and our taste for divine things.
C. Beautification - It would not be right to end our time together without me saying that sanctification brings great joy to me. The more we grow in likeness to Christ, the more we will personally and corporately (as a family and as a church) experience the joy and peace that are part of the fruit of the Spirit, and the more we will draw near to the kind of life we will experience in heaven.
Paul said in Romans 6:22 that as we become more and more obedient to God, “the return you get is sanctification and its end, eternal life.” He realizes that this is the true source of all real joy - not houses or land, not power or popularity. Romans 14:17 says, “The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.”
As we grow in holiness, we grow in conformity to the image of Christ, and more and more of the beauty of his character is seen in us. The beauty of God’s glorious image in creation, lost in the fall, redeemed for us by Christ, is returned to us by grace, through faith, and shines forth from us. This is the goal of perfect sanctification that we hope and long for and that will be ours, by grace through faith, when Christ returns.

Stone VII - Redemption: Grace

2009-07-20T06:41:00.000-07:00

As we establish an altar of remembrance, we are half way through laying the 12 Stones of the testimony of God. We have heard the stories of Creation and The Fall and understand that we are made in the image of God, but because of the effects of sin in our lives, we are in desperate need of being reconciled to God. We left off our discussion of the Consequences of Sin with a brief look at the hope of Redemption from the book of Romans. Redemption is the idea of salvation used to express deliverance from sin. We will look at the hope of Redemption in the three parts that make up the oldest, most basic and fundamental statement of Christian belief that salvation comes by Grace alone, through Faith alone, in Christ alone.
After Paul explains in Romans 1:18-3:20 that no one will ever be able to make himself righteous before God, he goes on to explain in verse 23-26 that “since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, they are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” God’s Grace means His unmerited favor, or the giving of what we need that we do not deserve.
Since we are in desperate need of reconciliation to God and we are spiritually dead in our sin and unable to do any spiritual good, or unable to please God, the only way that we can ever be saved is for God to provide salvation for us by grace, totally apart from our work. Paul explains in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” Grace is clearly put in contrast to works (or merit) as the way God chose to reconcile us to himself.
Why did God chose to do this, and why would He chose to do it this way?

I. Definition of Atonement
Atonement is said to be the process of forgiving or pardoning a transgression. Jewish Atonement; was accomplished through rituals performed by a high priest on the holiest day of the Jewish year: Day of Atonement, which looked forward to the Messiah. Grace Atonement; refers to the forgiving or pardoning of sin through the death of Jesus Christ by crucifixion which made possible the reconciliation between God and creation. From this point forward, when we talk about the atonement, we will intend the work Christ did in His life and death to earn our salvation.

II. The Cause of the Atonement
We saw last week that God’s righteousness is the primary cause for the consequences of sin, but we may ask what is the ultimate cause of God’s offer of salvation by grace, through faith, in the atonement of Christ? To find this we must trace the question back to something in the nature and character of God. Here, Scripture points to two things: the love and justice of God.

A. God’s Love - The love of God as a cause of the atonement is seen in the most famous passage in the Bible, John 3:16 say, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.” God was motivated by His own love for His creation, namely His great love for the crowning glory of that creation, man. He was so motivated by that love that He presented His Son as a way of atonement for man.

B. God’s Justice - The justice of God also serves as a cause of the atonement because it required that God find a way for the just consequences for our sins to be paid. This is the aspect that Paul focuses on in verse 25, “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.”
Paul uses the word propitiation to explain how God could show justice toward our sin and unmerited favor towards us. We will talk more about it in a moment, but for now we can see that both love and justice serve as ultimate cause of the atonement. They work in perfect, unified harmony together as equal parts of God’s character, and both are equally important.

III. The Necessity of the Atonement
Was there any other way for God to save human beings than sending his Son to die in our place?
Before we answer that question, we need to be sure and be clear about something. When we talk about the necessity of the atonement, we mean the necessity of it in the cause of redemption, not the necessity of redemption itself. It was not necessary for God to save any people at all. Just as we talked about in creation, that it was not necessary for God to create mankind in the first place, it is not necessary that God save mankind. When we fully appreciate that “God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment;” in 2 Peter 2:4, we realize that God could also have chosen, with perfect justice, to have left us in our sins awaiting final judgment. He could have chosen to save no one, and in this sense the atonement is not absolutely necessary.

However, once God, in his love, chose to save some human beings to be returned to his image, we quickly see by the testimony of Scripture that there was no other way for God to do this other than the sacrifice of his Son. Therefore, the atonement was absolutely necessary as a consequence of God’s decision to save some human beings.

A. In Gethsemane - In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus prays, "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will," in Matthew 26:39. This prayer more than implies that it was not possible for Jesus to avoid the death on the cross and still accomplish his purpose.

B. In the Resurrection - After the resurrection Jesus makes it clear to the disciples on the Emmaus road, when he says in Luke 24:25-26, "O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?"

C. In the New Testament -
1. In verse 26 of our passage for today, Paul makes clear that if God were to remain righteous and still save people, he had to send Christ to suffer the consequences for sins: “It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
2. Hebrews makes it abundantly clear when it says, “he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people,” in 4:17, and “it was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these rites, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these,” in 9:23, when talking about how “it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.” There was no other way to save us than for Christ to die in our place.

IV. The Nature of the Atonement
What is the nature of this atonement? We will consider two aspects of Christ’s work.

First, that he obeyed the requirements of the law in our place and was perfectly obedient to the will of the Father as our representative.
Second, that he took the penalty due for our sins and as a result died for our sins.
It is important, before we start, to notice that in both of these aspects the primary emphasis of Christ’s work of redemption is not on us, but on God the Father. Jesus obeyed the law of the Father in our place, and also paid the penalty for our disobedience that the Father demanded.

A. Obedience - Christ’s obedience for us gains righteousness for us. If Christ had only secured forgiveness for us, we still would not merit heaven. Our guilt would be removed, but we would only be returned to the position of Adam in the Garden again, only to eventually fail. We would still not be righteous before God.
For this reason, Christ had to live a life of perfect obedience to God in order to earn righteousness for us. He had to obey the law his whole life on our behalf so that the positive merits of his perfect obedience could be accounted to us. Paul says in Philippians 3:9 that his goal is that he may be found in Christ, “not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.”
It is not neutrality that Paul seeks, but a positive moral righteousness. He knows it can not come from within himself and that is why he proclaims in 1 Corinthians 1:30 that Christ has been made “our righteousness,” and that by his obedience we have been “made righteous,” in Romans 5:19. We ought to ask ourselves whose lifelong record of obedience we would rather rely on for our standing before God, our own, or that of Christ?

B. Suffering - Christ’s suffering for us pays the penalty of sin for us.
In addition to obeying the law perfectly on our behalf, Christ took on himself the necessary suffering to pay the penalty for our sins. Christ lived a life of suffering in that he walked in a fallen world, he suffered tremendously during the temptation in the wilderness, in growing to maturity as Hebrews 5: 8 says, “he learned obedience through what he suffered.” He suffered the intense opposition of the Jewish leaders, and he surely suffered grief at the death of his earthly father and of his close friend Lazarus. Isaiah would predict the coming of the Messiah by saying he would be “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” Christ suffered on the cross as the climax to all his suffering on earth. The testimony of Scripture reveals at least four different aspects of the pain of the cross.

1. The physical pain and death - Death by crucifixion was one of the most horrible forms of execution ever devised by man. We do not need to sensationalize it by going into great detail. We need only to know that the beatings and torture and blood-letting and suffocation were our suffering that he bore in our place.

2. The pain of bearing sin - More awful than any physical pain was the psychological pain of bearing the guilt of our sin. We know the anguish we feel when we know we have sinned. The weight of sin is heavy on our hearts and the taste is bitter in our mouths. The more we grow in our faith the more painful & repulsive that sense should be. Now multiply that by infinity and place it on the heart and mind of a perfectly holy Son who lived only to honor his Father. What he had hated most was poured out fully upon him.
Scripture says repeatedly that our sins were put on Christ. Isaiah 53 says, “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” And that “he bore the sins of many.” Paul declares that God made Christ “to be sin” and that he became “a curse for us.” Hebrews 9:28 says that Christ was “offered once to bear the sins of many.” 1 Peter 2:24 says, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree.”

3. The pain of abandonment - The physical and psychological pain were aggravated by the fact that Jesus faced this pain alone. “All the disciples forsook him and fled,” in Matthew 26:56.
We must ask ourselves, who will stand with us on that last day. Will it be our earthly friends that we have lived so hard to impress, or will it be Christ himself who suffered in our place? Far worse than the desertion of earthly friends was the fact that Jesus was deprived the one thing he had never bee without, the perfect fellowship of his Father. He shows the anguish of having the deepest joy of his heart removed for our sake when he cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus bore our sins on the cross. He was abandoned by us and his heavenly Father. He faced the weight of the guilt of trillions of sins alone.

4. The pain of bearing the wrath of God - More difficult than all of the other suffering of Christ was the separation from God he experienced as he bore the wrath of God upon himself.
In Romans 1:16-18 Paul says that he is not ashamed of the gospel, “for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” He says that it is the power of God because, “in it the righteousness of God is revealed.” However, what makes the gospel message urgent is that Paul says, “the wrath of God is (already) revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.”
God hates sin, and when Jesus bore the guilt of our sin alone, God poured out on Jesus the fury of that wrath. As we said earlier, verse 25 tells us that God put Christ forward as a propitiation for our sins. That word means; a sacrifice that bears the wrath of God to the end and in so doing changes God’s wrath toward us into favor.
God did this to show that in His righteousness He is both just and the justifier. He could not simply forgive and forget. In his divine forbearance, he seemed to have passed over former sins, but he had actually stored up his wrath. But on the cross, all of that stored up wrath was unleashed.
Many non-evangelical theologians have objected to this idea that Jesus bore the wrath of God against sin. Their basic assumption is, “since God is a God of love, it would be inconsistent with his character to show wrath against human beings whom he created and for whom he is a loving Father.” That is a great argument. It is just wholly inconsistent with Scripture.
Leon Morris writes in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, “The whole of the argument of the opening part of Romans is that all men, Gentiles and Jews alike, are sinners, and that they come under the wrath and condemnation of God.” (p.888) The New Testament refers to the wrath of God toward man over 30 times, and Hebrews 2:17, and 1 John 2:2 & 4:10 all refer to Jesus’ death as propitiation. This is important for us because it is the heart of the doctrine of the atonement. Without it, there can be no Redemption! It means that there is an eternal, unchangeable requirement in the holiness and justice of God that sin be paid for. Before the atonement could ever have an effect on us, it had to have an effect on God and his relation to the sinners he planned to redeem. His hurt and righteous anger regarding our sin had to be satisfied.

Apart for this central truth, the death of Christ can not be adequately understood, and if it be not understood, how can it be passed down from generation to generation. We will see the resulting errors in just a second, but for now we must be sure we understand how this propitious death of Christ works.

C. Penal Substitution Atonement
This view of the Christ’s death is called the “Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement.”
1. Christ’s death was penal in that He bore the penalty for our sins when he died.
2. Christ’s death was substitution in that He was a substitute for us when he died.
It is sometimes called the Theory of Vicarious Atonement, because a vicar is someone who stands in the place of another or represents them. Thus, Christ’s death was vicarious because he stood in our place, as our representative, and took the penalty we deserve. This has been the orthodox view, or established doctrine, of the atonement throughout church history.
However, there have been others.

D. Other Views of the Atonement -
In contrast to Penal Substitution, several other views have been advocated at various times in the history of the church. I would like to quickly present the main four because they are not all crazy. In fact they are good arguments, that some people here unwittingly believe, that simply do not comply with the testimony of Scripture. Thus, we need to be keenly aware of them, that they do not come into our homes and deceive our children.

1. The Ransom to Satan Theory - This theory was first held by Origen (185-254 AD).
According to this view, the ransom Christ paid to redeem us was paid to Satan, in whose kingdom all people were by virtue of sin. It thinks of Satan rather than God as the one who required payment to be made for sin. It views Satan as having power to demand a ransom from God. It implies that we as sinners owe Satan a wage or penalty for sin.

The only problem is that it has no direct confirmation in Scripture. Scripture clearly sets God’s justice as the cause for the need for payment with respect to sin. Scripture portrays Satan as one who has been cast down from heaven and subject to God’s authority, not as one who has any right to demand anything form God. Nowhere does Scripture say that we as sinners owe anything to Satan. This theory fails to deal with all the text we have covered regarding Christ death as a propitiation for us.

2. The Moral Influence Theory - This theory was first held by Peter Abelard (1079-1142).
According to this view, God did not require the payment of a penalty for sin, but that Christ’s death was simply a way in which God showed how much he loved human beings by identifying with their sufferings, even to the point of death. Therefore, Christ death is a great teaching example that demonstrates God’s love and draws from us a grateful response, so that in loving him we are forgiven.
The great difficulty is that it is contrary to so many passages of Scripture that speak of Christ dying for sin, bearing our sin, or dying as a propitiation. More importantly, it robs the atonement of its objective character, because it holds that it had no effect on God himself! Finally, it has no way of dealing with our guilt. You must deny original sin in order to hold this view.

3. The Example Theory - This theory was taught by Faustus Socinus (1539-1604) and his followers called the Socinians. This view also claims that God did not require the payment of a penalty for sin, but that Christ’s death simply provides us with an example of how we should trust and obey God perfectly, even if it leads to a horrible death. Instead of teaching us how much God loves us, like the moral influence theory, this theory teaches us how we should live - how to have our best life now. Support for this view can be found in 1 Peter 2:21, “For this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.”
The problem is that while it is true that Christ is an example for us even in his death, this is not the complete explanation of the atonement. It fails to account for the many Scriptures that focus on Christ’s death as a payment for sins. More importantly, the theory ends up arguing that a man can save himself by following Christ’s example and by trusting and obeying God just as Christ did. It fails to show how guilt can be removed, and therefore, must be rejected.

4. The Governmental Theory - This theory was first taught by Hugo Grotius (1583-1645).
This theory holds that God did not have to require payment for sin, but since he is omnipotent, he could have set aside that requirement and simply forgiven sins without payment of a penalty. Christ’s death was nothing more than God’s demonstration that his law had been broken, and that a penalty would have to be paid whenever his laws were broken. Christ did not actually pay any penalty for anyone, but suffered only to show that a penalty had to be paid.

Well, glory halleluiah - that accomplishes nothing! The only problem with this final theory is that it commits all of the same mistakes of all of the other theories. It makes no payment, makes no atonement, it robs the objective nature of Christ’s work, it gives us no forgiveness of sin, and steals all of the value from Christ’s sacrifice. It absolutely underestimates the absolute nature of God’s justice and love!

They all try to do away with the need for the payment of a penalty for sin. They will accept Christ as a moral influence or example, but never as a substitute and sacrificial atonement. These developed from 185 to 1645 AD, they represent a progressive attempt to remove Christ from the center of redemption, and have not gone away! We need to be aware of modern teachers who try this same thing.

V. Redemption - The Result of the Atonement
What is the result of the atonement? There are four consequences for sin and four satisfactions for those consequences made by the atonement. Let’s look at them as a way of review. Christ lived a perfect, sinless life and died a horrific, sinner’s death in order to “save his people from their sins” according to Matthew 1:21.
A. We deserve to die as the penalty for sin. He paid the penalty we deserved to pay for our sin in his sacrifice.
B. We deserve to bear God’s wrath against sin. He bore the wrath we deserved to bear as our propitiation.
C. We are separated from God by our sins. He overcame the separation our sin caused between us and God by his reconciliation.
D. We are in bondage to sin. He freed us from the bondage caused by sin through his redemption.
Because of Christ’s work on our behalf, God can “deliver us from the domain of darkness” and transfer “us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.” What a great salvation!
It is all about Grace and that display of grace is generational. That is why Paul says in Ephesians, “by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
What a Savior! “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”
For this reason we bow before you, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant us to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in our inner being, so that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Take These Stones Home
Stone VII - Redemption: Grace

Read John 3:16 and Romans 3:23-26 to your children.
Share with them the Definition of Atonement that we learned this week:
Atonement; the process of forgiving or pardoning a transgression. The work Christ did in his life and death to earn our salvation.
Talk with children about how God's love motivated him to save us.
Talk with Children about how God's justice made it necessary for God to send Jesus to pay for our sins.

Share with Children that Christ’s obedience to God was very important for us to be saved.
Point out that Jesus was obedient to his Father because he loved him.
Jesus tells us that if we love God we must obey him also, just as he did.
Tell children that we should be like Jesus and obey God and our parents out of love.

Share with children that Christ's suffering was very important for us to be saved.
Point out that Jesus also suffered in order to pay for our sin.
Jesus shows us that sometimes we must sacrifice in order to accomplish God's plan.
Tell children that we should be like Jesus and be willing to suffer for what is right.

Share with Children about how Jesus paid for our sins by taking our place on the cross.
Children need to understand that we deserved to be on the cross and that Jesus did not.
Talk with children about what it means to be a substitute.

Stone VI - Fall: The Consequence

2009-07-13T06:48:00.000-07:00

We have set out together to build an altar of remembrance of the statues and testimonies of God, and endeavored to do so along the backdrop of the grand narrative of God’s story; Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation. We looked at the first movement, Creation, in three parts, Creator God, Creation Out-of-Nothing, and Creation in the Image of God.
We have looked at the ominous second movement of our grand story, The Fall, by focusing on the context and events leading up to the Fall (a crisis of belief for our first parents), and on the action of unbelief, Original Sin! This week, as we look at Genesis 3:7-8, we will see that not only does belief always produce action, but actions always have consequences. We will look at the Consequences of the Fall.
Let’s read again together starting in Genesis 3:1 through 8:
Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God actually say, 'You shall not eat of any tree in the garden'?" And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, 'You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'" But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.
Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.
And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.
We see clearly that Adam and Eve did come to know both good and evil by moral experience. Their eyes were opened to sin and they were ashamed. They immediately began to try to cover themselves in order to hide their shame. Then they were confronted with the presence of God. For the first time in their lives, they did not run to him. Instead they hid. Knowledge of evil always produces fear. Adam and eve were afraid of God because they understood who they had become.

I. Moral Nature of Sin;
Last week we defined sin as any failure to conform to the moral law of God in act, attitude or nature. We saw how the attitude of unbelief was in itself sin that produces in our lives the actions of unbelief that are also in itself sin. Our definition specifies that sin is a failure to conform to God’s moral law not only in action and attitude, but also in our moral nature. Our very nature, the internal character that is the essence of who we are as persons, can also be sinful.
Before we are redeemed by Christ, not only do we perform sinful acts and have sinful attitudes, we were also sinners by nature. As we will begin to see next week, that is the glory of the gospel, that as Paul says, “while we were yet sinners Christ died for us,” not just while we were sinning, but that while “we were by nature children of wrath.”

II. Inherited Sin;
What does this mean for us? How does Adam’s sin affect us? The Bible teaches that we inherit sin from Adam in two ways:
A. Inherited Guilt - The Bible says that we are accounted guilty because of Adam’s sin.
Paul explains as follows, “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” The context here makes it plain that Paul is not just talking about the sins we commit every day of our lives. The passage is taken up with a comparison between Adam as the first representative head of man and Christ as the second representative head.
He is saying that through the sin of Adam, all men sinned. Remember that as soon as God created a being less than himself, He knew there resided in that being a nature that was not perfect and given to fail. God gave the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil as a way to learn obedience through moral experience. However, the fall of Adam proved that the man God had made was sinful in his nature. In the fall, God thought of all mankind as having sinned.
The idea is affirmed in Romans 5:18-19 when it says, “Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.”
We were all represented by Adam in the time of testing in the Garden. As our representative, Adam sinned, and God counted us as guilty along with Adam. The technical term for this is imputation; which means to think of as belonging to someone and therefore to cause it to belong to them. Since God is the ultimate judge of the universe, and since His thoughts are always true, Adam’s guilt does in fact belong to us. God rightly imputed Adam’s guilt to us.
You may say that you did not choose Adam to represent you and that if you had been there you would not have sinned. Well, God says we would, and 1 John 1:10 says, “If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.”
B. Inherited Corruption -The Bible says we have a sinful nature because of Adam’s sin.
In addition to the legal guilt imputed to us on account of Adam’s sin, we also inherit a sinful nature. David says, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me,” in Psalm 51:5. This is a strong statement about the inherent tendency to sin that each of us has in our lives from the very beginning. However, our tendency to sin, which we received from Adam, means that in the eyes of God, we are not able to do anything that pleases Him in at least two ways:
1. In our natures we totally lack spiritual good before God.
Every part of our being is affected by sin; our will, intellects and emotions.
Paul says, in Romans 7:18, “I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is , in my flesh.” And in Titus he says, “to the corrupt and unbelieving nothing is pure; their very minds and consciences are corrupted.” Jeremiah says, “the heart is deceitful above al things, and desperately corrupt; who can understand it?”
These passages do not deny that humans can do good in human society in some sense. This inherent tendency to sin does not mean that humans are all as bad as they could be. It is saying that none of that good is spiritual good; it is not righteous apart from Christ, it is not good in terms of a relationship with God, because it springs forth from a selfish heart and sinful nature.
2. In our actions we are totally unable to do spiritual good before God.
Not only do we lack any spiritual good in ourselves, but we also lack the ability to do anything that will please God in itself. Again, Paul says, “those who are in the flesh cannot please God,” in Romans 8:8. Even more, when talking about bearing spiritual fruit for the kingdom of God, Jesus says in John 15:5, “apart from me, you can do nothing.” No act, no matter how good, is pleasing to God when performed by an unbeliever because it does not proceed out of faith and love for God. Hebrews 11:6 says, “without faith it is impossible to please Him.” Though from a human standpoint people may be able to do much good, Isaiah affirms that “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.”

III. Actual Sins
More than just the sinful natures that we inherit, that make us totally sinful in themselves, we also choose, volitionally to sin and actually do commit sins ourselves as the natural effect of the unbelief of our sinful nature. From this, two key understandings are clear from the testimony of Scripture:
That we all sin - Universal Sinfulness
That we are all responsible for our sin and will be held accountable by God - Universal Responsibility
A. Universal sinfulness - In many places, Scripture testifies to the universal sinfulness of man. Psalm 14:3 says, “They have all gone astray, they are all alike corrupt; there is none that does good, no, not one.” David said to God, “no man living is righteous before you.”
Solomon said, “There is no man who does not sin.” Paul makes an extensive argument in Romans 1:18-3:23 that all people stand guilty before God. He concludes with certainty in 3:23, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” John makes this point in the gospel exceedingly clear in 1 John 1:8-10, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.”
B. Universal responsibility - Pelagius lived from about 354 – 420 AD and was a popular Christian teacher in Rome and later Palestine. He taught that God holds man responsible only for those things that man is able to do. He said that since God warns us to do good, we must have the ability to do the good that God commands. His interpretation of a doctrine of free will became known as Pelagianism. His position denied the doctrine of inherited sin, and he was later refuted by Augustine, and was declared a heretic by the Council of Carthage, because this position is contrary to the testimony of Scripture, which affirms both that we are unable to do any spiritual good, and also that we are guilty before God.
If our responsibility were limited by our ability, then extremely hardened sinners in geat bondage to sin, could be less guilty before God than a mature beleiver who in his daily striving to obey still falls short. The true measure of our responsibility is not our own ability to obey, but the perfection of God’s moral character. Matthew 5:48 makes this plain, “You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

IV. Consequences of Sin
So sin has a moral nature in that it is a violation of the moral character of God, and we inherit the guilt and corruption of that sinful nature from Adam. As a result of that sinful nature we all sin and fall short of the glorious moral nature of God, and we are responsible for that failure and will be accountable to God, just as Adam was. So, what are the consequences of sin?
As we talked about last week, belief is always followed by actions, and actions always have consequences. Unbelief results in actions of disobedience, and disobedience results in disciplinary consequences. Just as we talked about two weeks ago, you are not being punished when you reap the consequences of your behavior or choices. When you choose an action, and you know there are consequences that come with that action, then the consequences are not punishment, they can only serve to deter you from the action or to prevent you from repeating the action.
That is what separation from God, through physical and spiritual death, and eternal Hell is, the known, just consequences for sin. Following our passage in Genesis, we see the consequences for the sin of Adam and Eve clearly marked out.
A. Separation - After God had given the specific and universal consequences for their sin to the serpent, Eve and Adam, we see in Verse 23 that, “therefore the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken.” God removed Adam from His presence. Even though God's omnipresence is affirmed the Bible freely uses language about people departing from, or being sent away from God's presence.
So how should we understand the language of departing from God's presence? Not in spatial or physical terms, but in relational terms. Or, to put it another way, it is a spiritual separation that we experience because of our sin, not a strictly local separation. Here we are confronted with Isaiah's famous words from Isaiah 59:2, “but your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.” Judah and Jerusalem suffer the same consequences as Israel previously had known. As 2 Kings 17:18-23 says, “the LORD was very angry with Israel and removed them from his presence...he afflicted them and gave them into the hands of plunderers, until he thrust them from his presence...the Israelites persisted in all the sins of Jeroboam and did not turn away from them until the LORD removed them from his presence.”
Paul characterizes the gospel in these terms in Ephesians 2:12-13 when he reminds us that when we were sinners we “were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.” Once we have received forgiveness in Christ, Paul goes on to tell us in Romans 8:38-39 that, “neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
B. Death - After they had been put out of the garden we quickly see in Verse 24 that they will surely die. “He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.” Remember, the Tree of Life was the source of eternal life in the garden. Now they have been removed from it and the way back has been guarded by an angel. The death of sin, though not immediate, is sure. And as Genesis 5:5 tells us, “Thus all the days that Adam lived were 930 years, and he died.”
Adam died, and in Genesis 4:15 we see the consequences of sin passed from one generation to the next, just as we have talked about the blessings of generational faithfulness. “Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.” This death is not just physical, but spiritual, in fact, this is Cain's fear, as Genesis 4:13 says, ‘Cain said to the LORD, "My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden.’”
Death remains as a consequence in the NT. Romans 1:32 says, “Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.” Paul affirms in Romans 5:12 that the consequence of death comes as a result of the action of sin when he says, “just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” In Romans 6:23 he famously makes death the clear consequential result for sin by saying, “For the wages of sin is death.”
In the end, access to the Tree of Life is granted to those who overcome, as it says in Revelation 2:7, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.” Access will be granted in Heaven to be a constant source of nourishment and healing to those whose names appear in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Revelation 22:1-2 says, “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”
C. Hell - For those who do not believe, who do not overcome and persevere, whose names are not written in the Blood of Christ, the final consequence of sin is eternal separation from God in Hell.
Is God present in Hell? We have to say that he is, because Scripture affirms that he is. Revelation 14:9-11 says, “In Hell there is torment day and night in the presence of the holy angels and the in the presence of the Lamb.” Secondly, to deny that he is present in all of his creation is to deny that God is infinite and immense.
When we turn to the Westminster Larger Catechism, Question 29 deals with the subject of God's relationship to those who will experience future judgment in Hell, we find a precision of thought on these matters that is often lacking today:
“Q. What are the punishments of sin in the world to come?
A. The punishments of sin in the world to come, are everlasting separation from the comfortable presence of God, and most grievous torments in soul and body, without intermission, in hell-fire forever.”
Hell is not spatial separation from God, it cannot be because God is omnipresent. No, Hell is separation from the comfortable presence of God. It is the unshielded experience of the presence of God in his holiness and just wrath, and the absence of his mercy and grace. R. A. Finlayson wrote: “Hell is eternity in the presence of God without a mediator. Heaven is eternity in the presence of God, with a mediator.”
Jesus himself readily uses the language of relational separation to describe the misery of eternal Hell. After all will he not say “I never knew you, depart from me, you workers of lawlessness,” as Matthew 7:21-23 informs us? Will he not on the last day as the enthroned King, say to those on his left “depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire,” as Matthew 25:41 affirms? Are we not right to think of Hell as exclusion from God's presence, and therefore as a state of eternal separation from him?
Although God’s discipline as a consequence for sin does serve as a deterrent against further sinning and as a warning to those who observe it, this is not the primary reason why there must be consequences for sin. The primary reason is that God’s righteousness demands it.
In Jeremiah 9:24 God says, “that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD." In order that the universe might fulfill the purpose for which He created it, that He might be glorified, God must display His moral glory; His steadfast love, His justice, and His righteousness in the earth!
Paul tells us in Romans 3:25 why God put Christ forward as a propitiation (or a sacrifice that bears the wrath of God toward sin and turns it into favor), “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested - the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
So God does not end the story without hope, but proceeds to Redemption, and so shall we.

Take These Stones Home

Talk with your children about how actions always have consequences.
One way to illustrate the point is by teaching them Newton's Three Laws of Motion:
1. If nothing happens, everything stays the same.
2. The force of an object is equal to its size and speed.
3. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
Demonstrate by rolling balls across the floor. First one at a time, talking about how nothing changes unless it hits another object and how it is only as strong as the weight of the ball and how fast you roll it. Then, have them roll a ball and you roll a ball into theirs, talking about how the action of your ball caused a reaction in the other ball.
Share with them the rest of the story in Genesis 3.
Point out that the actions of the serpent, Adam and Eve all had consequences.
(It is important to point out that God punished the serpent.)
Ask them to share something they have done where they know there was a consequence.
Share with them Psalm 14:3 and Romans 3:23.
Explain that when we sin, we deserve the consequences of sin.
Share with them that the consequences of sin are:
Separation from the presence of God.
Spiritual and Physical Death. (It is important that they understand this is where death comes from - Romans 1:32; 6:23.)
Eternal separation from God in Hell.
Be sure to share the hope of the gospel to overcome the consequences of sin - John 1:8-10.
Close by praying with them and asking God to forgive them of their sins.

Stone V - Fall: The Action

2009-07-06T08:54:00.000-07:00

We have set out together to build an altar of remembrance of the statues and testimonies of God, endeavoring to do so along the backdrop of the grand narrative of God’s story; Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation.
We looked at the first movement, Creation, in three parts, Creator God, Creation Out-of-Nothing, and Creation in the Image of God. Last week, We began looking at the ominous second movement of our grand story, The Fall. We did so by focusing on the context and events leading up to the Fall; that in the midst of the Garden of God’s provision and protection, two sermons were preached; the Message of the Law, given by God to Adam in Genesis 2 and the Message of the Lie given by the serpent to Eve in Genesis 3. In that, we saw a crisis of belief for our first parents. They had to choose which message to believe. And we saw that they chose to exchange the truth of God for a lie!
This week we will focus on the action of unbelief, Original Sin! Genesis 3:1-6 says, Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made.
He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, 'You shall not eat of any tree in the garden'?"
And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, 'You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'" But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. For, God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

I. Justifying Unbelief:
Eve chose to believe the serpent and justified it with her own eyes.
A. When the woman saw;
Like all the other trees in the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was, as Genesis 2:9 tells us, “pleasant to the sight and good for food.” The irony is that somehow the serpent has made the woman discontent with the permitted trees, focusing her desire on this one.
1 John 2:15-17 says, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world— the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.”
In warning against all that is in the world, John does not demonize the whole created order, which as we have seen was created good. Rather, he gives examples of what the believer should guard against. Human desires are part of God's creation and therefore not inherently evil, but they become twisted when not directed by and toward God. The enemy uses these three things, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, to entice us to sin.
Sin is any failure to conform to the moral standard of God (falling short of His glory) in act, attitude or nature. Just as much as our actions, sin consist in our attitudes that are contrary to the attitudes God requires of us. Scripture shows this process at work in the Garden.
B. The tree was good for food;
The idea behind the lust of the flesh is someone who lives to satisfy the desires of the physical body to the point of disobedience to God through habit, addiction or obsession. It is said that Eve took of the forbidden fruit when she saw that the tree was good for food. She thought about how good the fruit would taste, how it would satisfy her flesh. She went after the lust of the flesh.
C. The tree was a delight to the eyes;
The idea behind the lust of the eye is simply someone who lives to satisfy the desires of lust or covetousness that are provoked by visual stimulation, such as food, sex, cars, clothes, etc. It is said that she took of the forbidden fruit when she saw that the fruit was pleasant to the eyes. She saw how pretty and desirable it was, and it pleased her artistic sense. She went after the lust of the eyes.
D. The tree was to be desired to make one wise”
The idea behind the pride of life is someone who lives for superiority over others, mostly by impressing others through outward appearances - even if by deception. It is said that she took of the forbidden fruit when she believed that it was desirable to make one wise. Its deadly appeal to her, apparently, is its ability to make one wise—wise, however, not according to the “fear of the Lord.”
As we found last week, by their obedience or disobedience the human couple will come to know good and evil by experience. Experience gained by “fearing the Lord” is wisdom, while that gained by disobeying God is slavery. How smart the fruit would make her! How her husband would admire her! She went after the pride of life.
The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life: In these three things, John may have in mind the Eve’s first pursuit of worldliness.

II. Belief always results in Action:
Belief reveals itself in action. Just as much as our attitudes, sin consist in our actions that are contrary to the behavior God requires of us. James says that faith without works is dead. That is to say that we may claim to believe something, but if that belief does not produce action it is not true faith. When Adam believed what God said, he obeyed God and walked and talked with God in the Garden. When Adam believed the serpent, he disobeyed God and ate of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil.
Belief equals obedience. When I believe that Jesus is who He says He is and that God can do what He says He can do, then I will follow Christ in obedience.
Unbelief equals disobedience. When I do not believe that Jesus is who He says He is and that God can do what He says He can do, then I will not follow Christ in disobedience.
Eve believed the Message of the Lie of the serpent, in effect disbelieving God, and that unbelief resulting in an appropriate action of disobedience, “Eve took of its fruit.”
A. She ate it - The first thing we need to see here is that when Eve exchanged the truth of God for a lie, she acted on the lie. This was no mere philosophical debate with the serpent. We find that the modern proverb is not true that says, “it does not matter what you believe as long as you sincerely believe something.” Belief is always accompanied by actions and as we will see next week, actions always have consequences.
B. She gave some to Adam - The second thing we need to see here is that misery loves company. Eve ate of the fruit and she did not die, but immediately she knew evil by moral experience. Now the fruit did not look so good, taste so good, and she felt shame, she was not so wise, her husband would not admire her. What could she do, but urge him to eat as well. “See, I did not die! Have some!” Folly is the fellowship of fools . . .
C. Adam was with her - The fact that Adam was “with her” indicates a failure to carry out his divinely ordained responsibility to guard or “keep” both the garden and the woman that God had created as “a helper fit for him.” In short The Man failed to be A Man. He was there, and the Bible does not record that he says anything! He says nothing to the serpent who is actively deceiving his wife. He says nothing to his wife who is actively being deceived. He does nothing to defend his garden against the spiritual and physical attacks of Satan. Our culture, and yes our churches, are full of men like Adam, who stand by and allow their homes to be attacked, their wives and children to be deceived, and not only do they say nothing or do nothing, they partake right along with them.
D. Adam ate the fruit - The fact that Adam knowingly ate what God had forbidden indicates that Adam's sin was an act of conscious rebellion against God. Adam believed the serpent and his wife and disbelieved God. The resulting action was declaring war between God and the human race, of whom Adam was the representative head. The disastrous consequences of Adam's sin cannot be overemphasized, resulting in the fall of mankind, the beginning of every kind of sin, suffering, and pain, as well as physical and spiritual death for the human race.

III. Every Action Reveals What We Believe:
God cares about what we do, or do not do, only in that every action reveals what we believe about Him. He cares intensely about what we believe about Him. Paul said that “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved,” in Romans 10:9. That is that we believe that God is who He says He is and can do what He says He can do. If we chose to believe God, we will obey. When we obey, it shows we have chosen to believe God. If we chose to disbelieve God we will disobey.
When we disobey, it shows we have failed to believe God. Their eating of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil is in many ways typical of sin generally, in at least four ways.
A. Sin strikes at the basis for knowledge - Their sin gave a different answer to the question, “what is true?” Where God had clearly said they would die if they ate from the tree, the serpent said they would not die. They decided to doubt the veracity of God’s word and conduct and experiment to see if what God said was true. They believed that what God actually did say is not what is actually true, so they believed a lie. We also sin when we doubt God’s word and test to see for ourselves what is true; we exchange the truth of God for a lie.
B. Sin strikes at the basis for moral standards - Their sin gave a different answer to the question, “what is right?” Where God had said it was wrong to eat of the fruit of the tree, and right not to do so, the serpent said it was right to eat of the fruit of the tree. They trusted their own evaluation of what was right and good, rather than allowing God’s words to define right and wrong. They believed that it was good, so they took and ate. We also sin when we trust our own evaluation instead of God’s standard of right and wrong; we call evil good and good evil, darkness light and light darkness, bitter sweet and sweet bitter!”
C. Sin strikes at the basis for human existence - Their sin gave a different answer tot eh question, “who am I?” Where God had said that they were creatures of God, made in his image, always dependant on Him, and subordinate to Him as their Creator and Lord; the serpent said God that God was jealous of them, not for them, and did not want them to be like Him. They succumbed to the temptation to be “like God” instead of the “image of God.” They believed a creature rather than the Creator, so they exchanged the image of God for the image of Satan.
We also sin when we succumb to the temptation of idolatry and pride instead of trusting God’s best; we exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man.
D. Sin strikes at the basis for rationality - Their sin is like all sin in that all sin is ultimately irrational. It really did not make sense for Satan to rebel against God in the expectation of being able to exalt himself above God. It really did not make sense for Adam and Eve to think there could be any gain in disobeying the words of their creator.
These were foolish choices! Like Israel desiring to go back to Egypt an suffer slavery because they preferred onions to manna, they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal serpent! It really does not make sense for Satan to persist in his rebellion against God even today, knowing his defeat is complete and sure. It really does not make sense for any human being to persist in a state of rebellion against God, knowing the consequence is death. Psalm 14:1 says, it is not the wise man but the fool who says in his heart, “there is no God.” It really makes no sense for those who say they believe in God to continue to act in disobedience to what God has said, proving they have not believed.

Take These Stones Home
Read Genesis 3:1-6 as a family and discuss the importance of obeying everything God says.
Discuss this definition of Sin with your children and talk about how both our attitudes and our actions hurt God.
Sin; any failure to conform to the moral standard of God (falling short of His glory) in act, attitude or nature.
Desires of the Flesh;
Talk with children and explain to them that just because something feels good does not mean it is good.
Use examples like eating too much candy or getting a sun burn to make the point.
Desires of the Eye;
Talk with children about how our eyes make us want things that we do not need.
Craft Project - have your children cut pictures out of magazines of things they would like to have and glue them to a poster. Share with them about how advertising is designed to make things look good so we will want them, but things are not always as good as the appear.
Maybe share about a time when you suffered buyers remorse.
Pride of Life; Talk with children about how pride can cause us to do things that are wrong in order to please or impress others.
Tell the story of Nebuchadnezzar's Dream from Daniel 4:19-34 and how it was pride that caused this to happen to Nebuchadnezzar (5:20).
Play a Board Game with your children. Take special care in reading the instructions aloud to them. Ask the children if they believe the instructions are true.
As you play, point out when you obey the rules and talk to them about how when we believe something we obey what it says and when we do not believe something we disobey what it says.
As you play, obviously break the rules. When your children complain, or point out your violation, talk with them about how our actions reveal what we believe. Ask them what breaking the rules revealed about how you thought about the rules.
Share with them, "when we obey, it shows we have chosen to believe God, and when we disobey, it shows we have chosen to disbelieve God."
Make sure they understand that while it is very important to obey, it is most important to show that we believe God, because we love Him. Ask your children if they believe God has their best interest at heart and will do what is best for them.
Read with them Romans 8:28, Ephesians 3:20-21, Jeremiah 29:11.

Take These Stones Home

2009-07-03T12:26:00.000-07:00

As we continue to focus a great deal of energy building a model of family ministry elements at Bush Memorial to use in helping other churches that are making a transition to a family equipping ministry model, part of that entire approach to the summer is the fourteen week series I am preaching on Memorial Stones. These stones of remembrance from Scripture represent the statutes and testimonies that we want to pass on to our children and grandchildren.

One of the key elements that we have implemented this summer that we want to use as a model is an idea called “Take These Stones Home.” The idea here is that every week we place a section in the worship folder for parents. The section includes an outline of the message for that week along with some ideas about how parents can interact with their children around the content of the message. They are normally simple conversation starter questions or craft projects that parents can do with children to help to teach the main concepts of the message.

Sometimes we are able to offer a little more help. For instance, when we talked about Creation out of Nothing, we challenged parents to talk with their children about how science reveals who God is and how many great scientist were believers in God. We were able to provide them with a list of biographies of some great Christian scientist to read with their children.
Here are some of the suggestions:
Men of Science Men of God: Great Scientists of the Past Who Believed the Bible by Henry M. Morris
Scientists Of Faith by Dan Graves
Scientists Who Believe: 21 Tell Their Own Stories by Eric C. Barrett

This week we will talk about the disobedience of the Fall and we will give parents instructions for playing a board game with their children that will lead to conversations about our beliefs resulting in actions. The notes from these messages, including the “Take These Stones Home” notes, are posted each week here on reidward.blogspot.com. Audio and video of the messages are also available through the Legacy office.

The big Family Ministry event of this month was the Family Mission to Sun Trace. Instead of investing so many resources in a traditional VBS that did not really fit the theme of the Family Ministry Summer, we would take the show on the road and provide a back-yard VBS to a missions area in our community.

Church members served together as families to lead the games, crafts, snack and teaching times for the families of Sun Trace. It was a three day event that allowed God’s people to serve their community by working together in family units to share the Gospel with those who are less fortunate and many who have never heard the Good News.

The best part is that our children got to experience the reality that it is not all about them. They also got to serve alongside their parents and watch them care for others and hear them share the Gospel. Parents got to watch their children be missionaries to the children in Sun Trace and cross every socio-economic and cultural barrier. Both parents and children were an example of the family of God to the residents of Sun Trace who participated.

Stone IV - Fall: The Deception

2009-06-29T08:19:00.000-07:00

As we set out to lay down our 12 Stones of the statues and testimonies of God, we do so in the context of the grand narrative of God; Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation. We looked at the first movement, Creation, in three parts, Creator God, Creation Out-of-Nothing, and Creation in the Image of God.
This week we begin the ominous second movement of our grand story, The Fall. We will do so by focusing on the context and events leading up to the Fall. I believe this is the most compelling part of this story because its content is simple, yet profound.

I. The Garden
Let us look together toward the shores of the Persian Gulf, to the mouth of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers where God planted a garden in Eden. Out of that garden sprang up every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food. In the middle of the garden was the Tree of Life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil. God put the man, whom He had formed, in the Garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

II. Two Sermons
God is a preacher. The world began with a sermon. God created the world through speaking.
Here in the Garden, we see that two sermons were preached. For the first time there is a message in opposition to the message of God. There is the Message of the Law given by God to Adam in Genesis 2 and the Message of the Lie given by Satan to Eve in Genesis 3, but only one message was believed.
A. The Law - Genesis 2:16-17 says, “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.’"
1. You may surely eat; God’s command generously permitted man to eat from every tree of the garden. Nothing God had made was withheld from Adam, even the Tree of Life seems to be in play here. Based on Genesis 3:22-23; the Tree of Life was a source of sustenance for eternal, physical life and a way to confirm a person in their moral condition.
Access to this tree was banned after the Fall. However, in the end, access to the fruit of this tree is granted to those who conquer in Christian spiritual warfare, as it says in Revelation 2:7, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.”
It reappears in the New Jerusalem, watered by the living water of God’s throne, to be a constant source of nourishment and healing to those whose names appear in the Lamb’s Book of Life. "Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." (Rev. 22:1-2)
The Tree of Life, available to Adam and Eve in the Garden, stands here as a reminder of God’s complete and abundant provision for us and as a picture of eternal life in Scripture, from the second chapter to the very last.
2. You shall not eat; God’s command clearly prohibits them from eating the fruit of only one tree, the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil. If the Tree of Life represents eternal life, what does the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil represent?
It most likely represents moral experience. By either their obedience or disobedience, Adam and Eve would come to know good and evil by experience. Experience gained by the fear of the Lord is wisdom, according to Proverbs 1:7, while that gained by disobedience is slavery.
God’s law is never restrictive, but always protective. God was not trying to limit humanity in the garden. He was not holding back. He was trying to preserve what He had made and protect it.
As parents, our rules or authority should always seek to be protective, never restrictive.
A Yard fence is a protective boundary that keeps danger out and serves as a safe perimeter in which our children can play in freedom. It is not a restrictive boundary designed to keep them in, which would only provoke the desire to venture out of the fence. We are not to provoke rebellion in them.
Remember, God made us in His image, but He did not make us God. Therefore, we are perfectly made, but not made perfect. God knew that as soon as He created a being lesser than Himself, we had the potential to fall short of His glory, the potential for evil.
So, He placed the Tree of the Knowledge in the garden as a way for us to learn obedience and gain moral experience of good. So that we might not gain experience of evil and be separated from Him. That is what we should be striving for as parents, that our children learn obedience and gain moral experience of good.
3. You shall surely die; Now this is in essence, coupled with the instructions in 1:28-30, a covenant between God and Man. As with any covenant, there are blessings associated with keeping the covenant, and consequences associated with breaking the covenant. Here, the blessing is eternal life, the consequence is sure death.
This death is not punishment, but instructive or corrective. Just as God’s law is never restrictive, but always protective, His discipline is never punitive, but always corrective or instructive. How can death as a consequence not be punitive? Good question.
Primarily because consequences are not punitive. You are not being punished when you reap the consequences of your behavior or choices. When you choose an action, and you know there are consequences that come with that action, then the consequences are not punishment, they can only serve to deter you from the action or to prevent you from repeating the action.
That is what Death is here. God says, “for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” This implies a fixed certainty, not an immediate absolute. God is saying that on the day that you eat of it, the consequences of death become sure for you.
As parents, our discipline should always seek to be corrective or instructive, never punitive. We must find ways to demonstrate the reality of life, that actions and behaviors have consequences. Good behavior has positive consequences and evil behavior has negative consequences. We create and use these consequences to instruct our children about what honors God and to correct them when they fall short. In that, we can show mercy, grace and forgiveness. That is motivated by love. Punitive discipline, or punishment, leaves no room for the character of God and is motivated by pride, a desire to hurt and a warped sense of justice.
So, while the death is sure, it is not necessarily immediate. We will look more at that in two weeks when look more closely at the consequences of sin. It is important now only because it allows us to see the consequence as part of a bigger picture that is instructive, “do not eat” and corrective “you will die.”
What kind of death does this promise, is it physical, spiritual or both? There is no clear indication in the language, so the only way to find out is to continue with the story.
B. The Lie - Genesis 3:1-5 says, "Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God actually say, 'You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?'" And the woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, 'You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'" But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.""
We see that Satan the serpent showed up also to preach. Satan’s deception was in preaching a false gospel, twisting God’s word and even boldly declaring that God’s sermon was a lie. Our first parents had to choose which sermon they would believe.
Now the serpent is suddenly introduced without much detail or explanation. He is only said to be one of the beast of the field, but the initial introduction is full of ambiguity. Though he will alter be revealed as the enemy of God, here we are only given an indication of potential danger in that it is the craftiest of the beast. However, the Hebrew term, ‘arum does not carry the negative moral connotations that are communicated by the English words “crafty” or “cunning.”
So, to the original hearer and to Hebrew readers, the serpent’s initial question may have sounded quite innocent, but to the discerning ear who hears him deliberately misquote the command of God.
1. You shall not eat; The serpent does not make a declarative statement here, but as false teachers are apt to do, he only asked a question that brings the word of God into question. “Did God actually say?” If ever we hear this question asked our ears should perk to attention and we should rush back in our minds to that day in the garden.
Our serpentine preacher proceeds to twist the words of God. Does he simply misunderstand? The fact that he does not use the personal name Yahweh, or LORD, but only the generic 'elohiym, or God; may be a clue that he is motivated more by deception than misunderstanding.
Then, notice the subtlety of the lie. Instead of God’s generous permission to eat of every tree but one, including the Tree of Life, the serpent makes the protective law, restrictive, “you shall not eat of any tree in the garden.”
Eve’s response should have been a resounding “NO!” “God did not actually say that.”
Instead she tries to negotiate with the terrorist, win the deceiver, debate with the father of lies.
She tries to remain faithful to the instruction given, but it was second hand information to her and she fails to mention that the tree in the midst is clearly identified as the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil. Surely she does not want to be too technical with her confused friend or to offend him in any way. Yet, then she adds, for emphasis I suppose, “neither shall you touch it, lest you die.” Maybe that is the way Adam communicated the command to Eve.
Maybe it reflects that the woman views God’s instructions as open to human modification, Eve was a progressive woman!
2. You will not surely die; The serpent does not only directly contradict what God has said, but goes on to present what God has prohibited as something to be desired. This is exactly how God characterizes the worst kind of evil in Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!”
“You will surely die,” the truth of God,
“Your eyes will be opened, you will be like God,” exchanged for a lie.
Romans 1, concludes this way, “For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.”
It may be said that the serpent was right when he said they will not surely die, because they do not die. But, remember, we have already said that this implies a fixed certainty, not an immediate absolute. God is saying that on the day that you eat of it, the consequences of death become sure for you. So, while the death is sure, it is not necessarily immediate. Adam lived to be 930 years old!
While Adam and Eve do not cease to exist physically, they are expelled from the garden to bear the mark of wage of sin, and are cut off from the source of life and the tree of life. Out of the sanctuary of Eden, they are in the realm of the dead. They are expelled from God’s presence. And even after 903 years Adam does die.
3. Your eyes will be open; There eyes were opened, as we will see in verse 7. There eyes were opened, but all they saw was that they were naked. Their eyes were opened only to shame. As a result, their sense of guilt makes them afraid of God and slaves to evil.
4. You will be like God; God acknowledges in verse 22 that “the man has become like us in knowing good and evil.” Unlike all the rest of creation, who knows only good or evil, Man now knows both by experience. The funny, but tragic, thing is that Adam and Eve, unlike the serpent, had been made in the image of God. They are already like Him in the most significant ways. They have been given authority over the beast of the field, yet they betray the trust God has placed in them by obeying the serpent. Again, we will look at this in detail in when look at the consequences of sin, but again note the subtlety of the lie. Instead of God’s loving, instructive and corrective consequences for sin, the serpent’s half-truths rightly portray a punishment that does not exist.

III. The Loss of the Image of God
Tragically, they believed the serpent’s sermon over that of their own creator, and sin, death and chaos have ensued ever since. Most importantly, the serpent has continued to preach. Sometimes his message is very subtle and other times widely publicized.
The exchange of the truth of God for a lie . . .
The image of God for an image of an image . . .
One might even wonder whether man could still be thought to be like God. W see as quickly as Genesis 9:6 where God tells Noah that, "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image,” that even though people are sinful, there is still enough likeness of God in them that murder is still an attack on the part of creation that most resembles God and is likened to an attack on God Himself. The New Testament gives confirmation that Man is still in God’s image, when James 3:9 says that with the tongue, “we curse people who are made in the likeness of God.”
However, as a result of our sin we are not as fully like God as we were before. Our moral purity has been lost and our sinful character certainly does not reflect God’s holiness. Our will is in rebellion to the will of God. Our intellect is darkened by falsehood and misunderstanding, and our speech no longer glorifies God. Our emotions are corrupted by pride and our relationships governed by selfishness rather than love. Though man is still in the image of God, in every aspect some part of that image distorted or lost. After the Fall, we are still in God’s image - we are still like Him and represent Him - but the image is distorted by the imperfections of man that we have inherited from Adam, and we are less like Him than we were created to be. We fall short of His glory!
So, as our children walk in the image of our image, we must be sure that they walk in the image of God; that we have been restored by the work of Christ and are becoming more and more like Christ, progressively recovering more of the image of God so that what they see in us is the image of the living God, not some cheap, substitute image that is distorted and diluted and causes them to exchange the truth of God for a lie. We must believe the message of truth from God and reject the message of the lie from Satan. We must teach our children the message of truth and how to discern and reject the message of the lie.

Take These Stones Home
I. The Garden: Genesis 2:8-15
Look on a map with your children and help them find the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Based on the information in the passage, ask them to try and figure out exactly where the Garden of Eden may have been.
II. Two Sermons
Read the two passages (Genesis 2:16-17 & Genesis 3:1-5).
Talk with them about the difference between what God says and what the serpent says.
With older children you may ask them to compare and contrast the two statements.
Talk with your children about the Tree of Life and how it represents God abundant provision.
Ask them to draw a picture of the Tree of Life.
Talk with your children about how God's law is always protective and not restrictive.
Ask them to discuss some of your rules at home that they think are restrictive.
Try to either explain how those rules are protective, or ask for forgiveness.
Share with them how the consequences for their behavior are meant to instruct or correct them.
Talk with them about how every attitude, action and behavior has a positive or negative consequence.
Help them understand your discipline by explaining the difference between your motivation to instruct or correct and the motivation to punish.
Be ready for a surprising conversation.
III. The Loss of the Image of God
Talk to your children about their relationship with God.
Be sure they understand that while parents in the world want obedient, successful kids, your ultimate goal is for them to be captivated by Jesus.
Read this quote from ApParent Privilege with your children.
"In the efforts of providing for our children so that "they will have it better off than we did," have we asked what "better" is?
Is "better" a nicer car, entrance into a more prestigious university, a higher-paying job, more comfort, less suffering?
What if "better off" meant a better hunger and thirst for righteousness? What about a better prayer life that shows great dependency on the Creator of our children’s souls?
What about a child who better understands the biblical principles that guide our lives? What about a better compassion for a world that does not know Christ as Savior and Lord?
That is the kind of better I hope for." (pages 72-73).
Pray with them that your family might walk in the image of God, be restored by the work of Christ and become more like Christ.

On Adoption And Orphan Care

2009-06-29T08:13:00.000-07:00

The acceptance of Dr. Russell Moore’s resolution by Southern Baptists points to a desire to be more faithful in caring for the fatherless. Reading better than many sermons, Dr. Moore’s resolution skillfully ties this effort to its gospel roots.
Here is the resolution as accepted:

June 2009
RESOLUTION NO. 2 ON ADOPTION AND ORPHAN CARE

WHEREAS, In the gospel we have received the "Spirit of adoption" whereby we are no longer spiritual orphans but are now beloved children of God and joint heirs with Christ (John 14:18; Romans 8:12-25; Galatians 3:27-4:9; Ephesians 1:5); and

WHEREAS, The God we now know as our Father reveals himself as a "father of the fatherless" (Psalm 68:5) who grants mercy to orphans (Deuteronomy 10:18; Hosea 14:3); and

WHEREAS, Our Lord Jesus welcomes the little ones (Luke 18:15-17), pleads for the lives of the innocent (Psalm 72:12-14), and shows us that we will be held accountable for our response to "the least of these brothers of mine" (Matthew 25:40); and

WHEREAS, The Scripture defines "pure and undefiled religion" as "to look after orphans and widows in their distress" (James 1:27); and

WHEREAS, The satanic powers and the ravages of sin have warred against infants and children from Pharaoh to Molech to Herod and, now, through the horrors of a divorce culture, an abortion industry, and the global plagues of disease, starvation, and warfare; and

WHEREAS, Southern Baptists have articulated an unequivocal commitment to the sanctity of all human life, born and unborn; and

WHEREAS, Churches defined by the Great Commission must be concerned for the evangelism of children—including those who have no parents; and

WHEREAS, Upward of 150 million orphans now languish without families in orphanages, group homes, and placement systems in North America and around the world; and

WHEREAS, Our Father loves all of these children, and a great multitude of them will never otherwise hear the gospel of Jesus Christ; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED, That the messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, June 23-24, 2009, express our commitment to join our Father in seeking mercy for orphans; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we call on each Southern Baptist family to pray for guidance as to whether God is calling them to adopt or foster a child or children; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we encourage our pastors and church leaders to preach and teach on God's concern for orphans; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we commend churches and ministries that are equipping families to provide financial and other resources to those called to adopt, through grants, matching funds, or loans; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we encourage local churches to champion the evangelism of and ministry to orphans around the world, and to seek out ways to energize Southern Baptists behind this mission; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we encourage Southern Baptist churches to join with other evangelical Christians in setting aside a special Sunday each year to focus upon our adoption in Christ and our common burden for the orphans of the world; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we pray what God is doing in creating an adoption culture in so many churches and families can point us to a gospel oneness that is determined not by “the flesh,” or race, or economics, or cultural sameness, but by the Spirit, unity, and peace in Christ Jesus; and be it finally

RESOLVED, That we pray for an outpouring of God's Spirit on Southern Baptist congregations so that our churches will proclaim and picture, in word and in deed, that “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world.”

Louisville, KY

http://www.sbc.net/resolutions/amResolution.asp?ID=1194
Copyright © 1999-2009, Southern Baptist Convention. All Rights Reserved.

Stone III - Creation: In His Image

2009-06-24T05:57:00.000-07:00

In our journey through twelve stones of remembrance, we have talked about the nature of Creator God and of His creation Out of Nothing. In talking abut that, we have talked about His relationship to His creation and what that all means for us.
Today, we focus on the pinnacle of God’s creative activity, His creation of human beings, both male and female, to be more like Him than anything else in the universe. That God is to us as we ought to be to our children.

I. The Creation of Man
Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."
I want to start this morning by making just a few simple observations about the passage and then asking a couple of basic questions, before we look at what it means to be created in the image of God.
Then God said - after seven “and God said” statements in the creation narrative, here Scripture draws a conclusion by using the final “Then.” That is to say that this is the final movement, the crowing achievement.
Let us make - The text does not specify who the “us” might be. The court of God and angels can be eliminated because man is not made in the image of any of these.
Most Christians and some Jews have taken “us” as God speaking to Himself, since God alone does the making in verse 27. This would be the first hint of the Trinity in the Bible.
Man - Is it appropriate to use the word man to refer to the entire human race?
This is one of those places where the arrogant half-informed would make our children feel like they have not heard the truth by objecting to ever using man to refer to the human race in general. They would prefer that we use gender neutral terms such as humanity, humankind, or persons.
It is appropriate because there is divine warrant in Genesis 5:1-2; When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created. Adam named all of the other animals, but God named humanity Man.
Some use the fact that we can use “man” to refer to the entire human race as proof to say that there was no literal Adam and Eve because the Hebrew word translated “man” is “adam.” They imply that Adam was simply a figurative symbol for all of mankind. However, the use of a direct article in Genesis 2:7-8, 20, clearly makes the universal man “Adam,” which literally means “The Man.”
"Then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him."
Why did God create man?
As we saw a couple of weeks ago, God did not need to create man, yet he created us for His own glory. In our discussion of God’s independence, we saw that He speaks of His sons and daughters from the ends of the earth as those “whom I created for my glory,” in Isaiah 43:7. Therefore, we are to, “do all to the glory of God,” as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:31.
This fact guarantees that our lives are significant. When we realized that God did not need to create us and does not need us for anything, we could have concluded that our lives have little importance.
However, we also saw that Scripture tells us that we were created to glorify God, indicating that we are important to God himself. That is the final definition of genuine significance in our lives: If we are truly important to God for all eternity, then what greater measure of significance could we want?
What is our purpose in life?
This is a big question, but the fact that God created us for His own glory determines the correct answer to the question. Our purpose must fulfill the reason that God created us; to glorify Himself.
That is enough when speaking with respect to God. However, when we think to our own interest and individual purpose, we make the wonderful discovery that we are to enjoy God and take delight in Him and in our relationship to Him. Jesus says in John 10:10 that, “I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.” David tells God in Psalm 16:11, “in your presence there is fullness of joy, in your right hand are pleasures for evermore.” He longs to dwell in the house of the Lord forever, “to behold the beauty of the Lord” in Psalm 27:4. Asaph cries out to God in Psalm 73, Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
We are to be enjoying our relationship with God, not living as though it was a burden to bear. It is and inheritance to pass down to our children and grandchildren, not a debt that we try to leave them saddled with. The answer to the first question in the old Westminster Catechism “What is the chief end (purpose) of man?” is “Man’s chief end (purpose) is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever,” Directly from Psalm 86 and 16. Real joy is found in knowing God and delighting in the excellence of His character. To be in His presence, to enjoy fellowship with Him, is a greater blessing than anything that can be imagined.
Therefore, the normal heart attitude of a Christian is rejoicing in the Lord! As we glorify God and delight in Him, Scripture tells us that He rejoices in us. Isaiah 62:5 says, “as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.” Zephaniah prophesies that the Lord, “will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.” (3:17)
This understanding of the doctrine of creation of man has very practical results. When we realize that God created us for His glory and begin to act in ways that fulfill that purpose, then we begin to experience intense joy in the Lord like we have never known before. When we add to that the understanding that God himself is rejoicing in our fellowship with him, our joy becomes inexpressible praise filled with heavenly glory.
So, the more we know Him, the more we delight in Him, the more we delight in Him, the more He rejoices in us and reveals Himself to us. The more He reveals himself to us, the more we know Him, and more we know Him, the more we delight in Him, the more we delight in Him, the more He rejoices in us and reveals Himself to us. . .

II. Image of God
So, what does it mean to be made in the image of God? Out of all of the creatures God made, only man is said to be made in the image of God. In the most basic sense it means that man is like God and represents God. There has been much theological discussion and debate about what exactly this might mean. It would be best for us to focus our attention primarily on the meanings of the key words in the passage, image and likeness.
A. Image; is best understood as a shadow, reflection or picture of some original subject.
Many point to a common near eastern idea of the king who was the visible representative of the deity; thus the king ruled on behalf of God. Verse 26 links the exercise of dominion over the earth with the image of God. So, one can see that humanity is endowed with authority to rule as God’s representatives.
Others point to the creation of man as male and female and conclude that humanity expresses God’s relational aspects. Since verse 28 ties the call to pro-creation to the image of God, one can see that humanity bears the image of God as it functions in community, both in marriage and wider society.
B. Likeness; is best understood as similitude, or being of similar character or imitating an original. Traditionally, the likeness has been seen as the capacities that set humans apart from other animals - ways in which humans resemble God, such as in the characteristics of personhood. What is a person? What makes God three persons? Each member of the Trinity has what we have in the likeness of God - personhood; will, intellect, and emotion.
1. Will; is the capacity to make moral or volitional choices. The faculty of conscious and especially of deliberate action; the power of control the mind has over its own actions.
In the Old Testament it referred mostly to a person’s (or God’s) personal desires or wants. In the New Testament it denotes the sense of what one desires to happen as well as the act itself of desiring something to happen. The Thelema is most commonly used to refer to the will of God, and it manifest itself in believers in their being sanctified. It also occurs with respect to human will, especially in contrast to God’s will.
We often mistakenly talk about the will as being free. Our desire for something is always free by definition. What people mean, most often, by free will is that their choice is un-coerced, that they are free to choose. This, of course, is mostly the case. Rarely are we coerced at the level of choosing according to our desires.
What people often neglect is the idea that our will is just like God’s, except He has the power to actually make all of His desires happen. God can desire to do anything He wants, and He can in fact do whatever He desires. However, He will never do anything that is in opposition to His nature and character. He will not desire it, for that is not who He is.
The same thing is true for us, as much as we have the power to execute our will. When we are dead in our sin, we will desire sin and freely choose it. When we are made alive in Christ, we will freely choose life as much as we are able to overcome our flesh. And why would we ever want to desire something that God does not desire?
Now this is all very technical, I know. However, this stuff is the topic of conversation on every college campus I know of and among many High School kids, and it is the blind leading the blind out there because our churches have failed to speak on these issues with any clarity.
2. Intellect; is the ability to reason and think logically and learn. The power or faculty of the mind by which one knows or understands, as distinguished from that by which one feels and that by which one wills; the understanding; the faculty of thinking and acquiring knowledge.
This sets us apart from the animal world where instinct and trained behavior reigns. Animals can show amazing ability in solving mazes or working out physical problems, but they certainly do not engage in abstract reasoning. Animals are mostly not aware that they exist, but they certainly do not consider why they exist. There is no history of canine philosophy. No horse has ever composed an autobiography.
Our likeness is also seen in our use of complex, abstract language; our awareness of the distant future; and the entire spectrum of human creative activity that we talked about last week. Such aspects of human existence reveal that we differ absolutely from the rest of creation, and not just in degree. In the image of God, we have a unique ability to know and understand.
3. Emotion; is the ability to feel and be affected. An affective state of consciousness in which joy, sorrow, fear, hate, or the like, is experienced just as God, and Christ in particular, has demonstrated each of these emotions, as distinguished from cognitive and volitional states of consciousness.
The degree and complexity of human emotions indicate just how vast is the difference between humanity and the rest of creation. In addition to our being able to relate to God, there are other relational aspects of being in the image of God. The depth of personal harmony experienced in human marriage, in a human family when it functions according to God’s principles, and in a church when a community of believers is walking in fellowship with the Lord, and with one another, is far greater than anything else found in creation. In the image of God, we have a unique ability to be consciously affected by our circumstantial environment.
C. Dignity of our likeness
We should reflect on our being created in the image of God more often! It has been good for me. It is amazing to me that when the Creator of the universe wanted to create something in His image, something more like himself than all the rest of creation, He made us! This understanding gives us a profound sense of dignity and significance as we reflect on the excellence of all the rest of God’s creation. We are the culmination of God’s infinitely wise and skillful work of creation. Even though sin has greatly marred our likeness, we still reflect it, and all the more as we become more like Christ, as we become what God created and called us to be.
We must remember that as sinful as man can be, he still has the status as being in God’s image. Every human life, no matter how much the image is marred, must be treated with the dignity and respect that is due an image bearer of God. This has profound implications for our conduct toward others. People of every race and tribe deserve equal dignity and rights. Elderly people, those who are seriously ill, the mentally or physically handicapped, and unborn children deserve full protection and honor as human beings.
I believe abortion is murder and therefore is breaking the commandment to not commit murder. It is also a violation of the great commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves. Most importantly, abortion is a violation of the very nature of God as the giver of life and the image of God in us as His crowning glory in creation. Therefore, I believe that abortion is not primarily a human rights issue, but a sanctity of life issue and that all believers ought to uphold the sanctity of life at every opportunity, not only in matters of abortion, but those of genocide, euthanasia, and other like atrocities.
When we deny our unique status in creation as God’s only image bearers, which some extreme environmental and animal rights people already do, we will soon begin to depreciate the value of human life, as much of our culture already does, and tend to see humans as merely a higher form of animal. The result is that our children and grandchildren have lost much of there sense of meaning in life.
D. Essential Nature of our Likeness
So, what is the essential nature of man? Everyone agrees that we have physical bodies. Most people sense that they also have an immaterial part - a soul that will live on after their bodies die. But that is where the agreement ends.
In the secular realm of thought, where the majority of our culture now resides, there is the prevailing idea that man can not exist at all apart from his physical body, and therefore there can be no separate existence of a soul after the body dies. This view that man is of only one element is called monism.
Among believers in Scripture, there are two views of the essence of man.
Trichotomy is the view that in addition to the body and soul, we also have a spirit. This has been a common view in popular evangelical teaching, and the key idea here is that will, intellect and emotion reside in the soul and the spirit is a higher faculty that only comes alive at conversion and is the part that directly interacts with God.
Dichotomy is a Christian view that teaches that the spirit is not a separate part of man, but simply another term for soul, and that both are used in Scripture interchangeably to talk about the immaterial part of the man; the part that interacts with God spiritually and lives on after we die.
The key biblical understanding is that there is a strong emphasis in Scripture on the overall unity of man, as created by God. We are to grow in holiness and love for God in every aspect of our lives. There is no real distinction between the material and immaterial. However, Scripture is clear that we do have both physical bodies and spiritual bodies. We are said to be both body and soul, and body and spirit; and we live in two worlds, the physical and spiritual. I tend to default to the picture of the Trinity as part of the image of God in us, that we are one person with three essential natures that experience absolute unity in one another.
All of these insights can be put together by observing that the resemblances allow mankind to represent God in ruling, and to establish worthy relationships with God, with one another, and with the rest of creation. Here, image clearly refers to our humanity, which we inherit from Adam.

III. Adam and Eve
The Bible portrays the human race as coming from one pair of human ancestors who were created in God’s image unlike all the animals, and that this image of God is passed on to all humans. So, just as we are all created in the image of God, our children and grandchildren are created in our image. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Again in Genesis 5:1-3, “When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man, when they were created. When Adam had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image.” In other words, the magnificent image of God goes on from generation to generation.
But we know the church is not only generational, but it is also missional. Then Paul makes the sweeping statement in Acts 17:26, “And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth.” In other words, Adam, who was created in God’s image, is the father of all human beings in all ethnic groups. Therefore every tribe and tongue and nation is dignified above the animals in this absolutely unique and glorious way: humans are crated in the image of God.
With all the beautiful, God-designed ethnic and cultural diversity in the world, that truth is paramount. That truth is decisive in setting priorities for how we respect and relate to each other, and how we approach presenting the gospel to the outside world.
Adam was the perfect man, but He was not God and therefore, by definition, not perfect. Though He walked and talked with God in perfect fellowship, he chose to sin against God. Why because He was not God. We inherit from Adam both the image of God and the imperfections of man. Therefore, as we will begin to see next week, we are both made in the image of God and inherently sinful.
Just as we are created in the image of God so that we might glorify Him and enjoy Him forever, God delights in us as the crowing glory of His creation when we do glorify Him and find our deepest joy in our relationship with Him. Therefore, we should be living all of life for His greatest glory and our greatest joy and teaching our children, the image of our image, to follow us as we follow Christ for their greatest glory and God’s greatest joy.

Take These Stones Home
I. The Creation of Man
Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
Talk with your children about why God chose to create us. Ask them to draw a picture of God creating them and talk to them about their purpose in life.
What do they think God has created them to do?
How can they bring joy to God?
II. Image of God (Imageo Dei)
A. Image; a shadow or picture that is like the original.
Take to the picture your children draw of God creating them and use it to discuss the fact that they are an image of God, just like the picture is an image of themselves. Ask them what differnces they see between the picture and themselves and explain how there are differances between God and His image in us.
B. Likeness; a similitude, or being of similar character.
Talk about how we are like God because we can make choices, understand things, and are affected by our feelings. Share with them stories about when you had to make a hard choice, when you understood something new for the first time or when you expereinced strong emotions. Talk about we can be a better image of God by making good decisions.
C. Dignity of our likeness
Share with your children how humans are the culmination of God's creation because we are most like Him. Talk with them about how every human is made in the image of God and ask them how they can treat other people with dignity and respect because they are image beareres.
D. Essential Nature of our Likeness
Talk with students about how we have both a physical and spiritual aspects to our nature. Discuss how we have to take care of both our physical part and our spiritual part. You can use ideas like diet and exercise in the physical to talk about Bible reading and praying in the spiritual.
III. Adam and Eve
Acts 17:26, “And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth.”
Talk to children about how we are all descendants of Adam and Eve and that we get our human nature from Adam. This is a good time to talk to your children and grandchildren about their genealogy. Show them pictures of their ancestors and talk with them as much as you can about their heritage. You may be surprised at how interested they are!

Stone II - Creation: Out of Nothing

2009-06-17T08:50:00.000-07:00

As we continue to lay down our 12 Stones of the statues and testimonies of God, we do so in the context of the grand narrative of God; Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation.
Once again, I want us to define what we are talking about.
Doctrine of Creation: God created the entire universe out of nothing; it was originally very good; and He created it to glorify himself.
We are looking at creation in three parts, beginning last week with the idea of Creator God, and picking up this week with the idea of Creation: Out of Nothing.
Think of it. Out of nothing . . . something, everything!
How did God do it? Did he create each plant and animal directly, or did He use some kind of evolutionary process? How quickly did He do it? Was it 7 literal days, or was it something longer?

I. Biblical Evidence:
Read with me in Genesis Chapter 1:1-5
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. The Bible clearly requires us to believe that God created the universe out of nothing.
Psalm 33 tells us, “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath of His mouth . . . For He spoke and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood forth.”
In the New Testament we find a universal statement at the beginning of John’s gospel, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.”
The phrases “the heavens and the earth,” “the heavens,” and “all things” are all best taken to mean the entire universe. Paul is most explicit in Colossians 1 when he specifies “all things” as being both the “visible and invisible.” Hebrews 11:3 says, “By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.” This is to say that they were made of the spiritual, and though this is not a slam for creation out of nothing, the strange idea that creation was created out of something invisible is likely not the authors intent here.
Why is this important?
Because God created the universe out of nothing, no matter in the universe is eternal. All that we see - mountains, rivers, stars and oceans - all came into existence when God created them. This may seem elementary, but it reminds us that God rules over the entire universe and that nothing is to be worshiped instead of God or in addition to Him. Were we to deny creation out of nothing, we would have to say that some matter is eternal like God. This would be to challenge His independence, sovereignty, and the fact that worship is due to Him alone!
Positively, the fact that God created the universe out of nothing says that it has meaning and purpose. He created for something. We should try to understand and help our children understand that purpose and use creation in ways that fit that purpose, namely, to bring glory to Himself. When creation brings us joy, we should give thanks to God who made it!

II. Role of the Trinity
One of the coolest things we can learn and communicate from creation is the insight into the Trinity that it provides us.
A. Father - God was the primary agent in initiating the act of creation, and we often only think of God the Father creating the universe. However, God the Son and God the Spirit were also active.
B. Son - The Son is often described as the one through whom creation came about, as we saw in John 1:3. Paul says there is, “one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we exist” in 1 Corinthians 8:6, and that “all things were created through Him and for Him” in Colossians 1:16. What a consistent picture of Christ as the active agent carrying out the plans of the Father.
C. Spirit - God the Spirit was also at work in creation. He is generally pictured as completing, filling and giving life to God’s creation. In Genesis 1:2 it is the Spirit who is moving over the face of the deep, indicating a preserving and sustaining governance. Job says in 33:4, “The Spirit of God has made me and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.”
It is important here that the same Hebrew word (ruach) can mean spirit, breath or wind. However, in most cases, there is very little difference in the meaning. So, even if we use the terms breath of God or wind of God, it is just a figurative way of talking about the activity of the Holy Spirit in creation. So, the Father, Son and Spirit are to be praised for the work of creation!

III. Relationship with Science
At various times in history, Christians have found themselves dissenting from the accepted findings of contemporary science. In the vast majority of these cases, sincere Christian faith and strong trust in the Bible have led scientist to the discovery of new facts about God’s universe. These discoveries have changed scientific opinion for all of subsequent history.
The lives of great believing scientist like Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, Blaise Pascal, Robert Boyle, Michael Faraday, James C. Maxwell, and many others testify to this truth.
On the other hand, there have been times when accepted scientific opinion has been in conflict with people’s understanding of what the Bible says.
For example, when the Italian astronomer Galileo, who again was a believer, began to teach that the earth was not the center of the universe, but revolved around the Sun, he was criticized, and eventually condemned by the Catholic Church, because they had misunderstood what the Bible taught. However, after people began to look again at what Scripture said, they realized that all of the biblical language was from the perspective of the human observer and that from that perspective gave an accurate account that did not contradict the findings of Galileo at all.
The lesson is that we should not be afraid of science. It can not contradict what is true. Science is itself a search for truth using natural means. Sometimes we may have to re-examine science and sometimes we must re-examine Scripture. What wonderful adventures both explorations are to go on with our children and grandchildren.
In order that we all have a remedial understanding of what our culture might present to our children and grandchildren as options to the biblical explanation of the origin of the universe, I want to give 2 quick examples of views that seem clearly inconsistent with Scripture.
A. Secular Theory - For the sake of time, I want to just mention here that any purely secular theories of the origin of the universe would be unacceptable for those who believe in Scripture. By secular I just mean any theory that does not see an infinite-personal God as responsible for creating the universe by intelligent design.
Thus, the “Big Bang” theory (in an uncaused cause form where God is excluded), or any other theories that hold that matter always existed, would be out-of-hand inconsistent with the teaching of Scripture that God created the universe out-of-nothing, for His own glory.
B. Theistic Evolution - Ever since the publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species in 1859, some Christians have proposed theories trying to reconcile the Bible to Darwin’s theory. This most often takes the form of living organisms coming about by the process of evolution presented by Darwin but that God guided that process so that the result was just what He wanted.
This view is called Theistic Evolution, because it advocates belief in God and in Darwinian Macro-evolution. Now, I would love to get into the technicalities with you, but for now, it must simply be clear that an examination of Scripture reveals that theistic evolution is at odds with the biblical account of creation.
Conflicts like God’s purpose, verses evolutionary randomness lie at the heart of a fundamental difference, as we see in Genesis 1:24-25, And God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds." And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Theistic evolution also seems inconsistent with God’s creative word bringing immediate response, and God’s present active role in creating and forming every living thing.
Most importantly, the special creation of Adam and Eve is a strong reason to break with theistic evolution, as we will see more clearly next week.
C. Common Ground - Now I need to build some bridges here. Darwinian Macro-evolution is not the same thing as Micro-evolution, which teaches that small developments within species do occur over time in order for a species to adapt to different environments. There are innumerable examples of such micro-evolving, like mosquitoes becoming immune to insecticides, or human beings growing taller, and no one denies that exist. However, this is not the sense in which evolution is meant when discussing theories of creation and evolution, because they in no way prove either point!
I need to also say that there are some places where there is room for disagreement among those of us who believe in the absolute truthfulness of Scripture. Some of these are the possibility that God created a grown-up universe in which everything was old as Adam and Eve were created adults, the possibility of a break in time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 or between 1:2 and 1:3, or the possibility that the flood affected the geological data greatly.
The point is that in both our knowledge of the natural world and our understanding of Scripture, we are limited and imperfect. However, we can approach both with great confidence that when the facts are rightly understood, there is no final conflict.

IV. God’s Purpose in Creation
We learned last week that God did not need to create the universe. If He created it out of nothing, why did He do that, and why did he choose to do it the way He did?
We will see next week that it is clear that God created people for His own glory, for He speaks of His sons and daughters as those “whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made” in Isaiah 43:7. But it is not just human beings that God created for this purpose.
A. His Glory - The entire creation is intended to show God’s glory.
Even the inanimate creation, the stars and sun and moon and sky, testify to God’s greatness. Psalm 19 says, "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge."
The song of heavenly worship in Revelation 4 connects God’s creation of all things with the fact that He is worthy to receive glory from them, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."

What does creation show about God?
Primarily that His great power and wisdom are far above anything that could be imagined by any creature. One glance at the sun or starts convinces us of God’s infinite power. Even a brief inspection of a single leaf, or the wonder of a human hand convinces us of God’s great wisdom.
Who could make all of this? Who could create it out of nothing? Who could sustain it day after day for endless years? When we meditate on it, we are to give glory to God.
The creation shows His great wisdom and power, and ultimately it shows all of His other attributes as well. It seems God created the universe to take delight in his creation, for as creation shows forth various aspects of God’s character, to that extent He does take delight in it.
B. His Delight - If God created the universe to show His glory, then we would expect the universe would fulfill that purpose.
In fact, when God finished His work of creation, He did take delight in it. At the end of each stage, God saw that what He had done was good. Then at the end of the six days of creation, Genesis 1:31 says, “God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good.”
God delighted in it just as He had purposed to do!
C. Our Delight - This explains why we take spontaneous delight in all sorts of creative activities. People with artistic, musical or literary skill enjoy creating things and seeing, hearing, or pondering their creative work. God has so made us that we enjoy imitating, in a lesser way, His creative activity, and one of the amazing things about us that separate us from the rest of creation is our ability to create new things.
This also explains why we take delight in other kinds of creative activity: cooking, decorating, gardening, wood working, problem solving, invention and industrial production. Even children enjoy coloring pictures or building tall towers out of blocks.
In all of these activities, we reflect in small measure the creative activity of God, we should use them to teach about how God is creative and how it gave Him joy to create the universe out of nothing!
We should delight in it and give Him thanks!
D. Our Worship - The doctrine of creation has many applications for us.
It makes us realize that the material universe is good in itself, for God created it good and wants us to use it in ways pleasing to Him.
God intends that we partake of its fruit with thanksgiving, as the early Christians understood in Acts 2:46 when they “partook of food with glad and generous hearts.”
We should be teaching our children and grandchildren to give thanksgiving to God and trust in His provisions. God intends us to wholeheartedly enjoy creative activities (artistic, musical, athletic, domestic, literary, mechanical, etc.) with an attitude of thanksgiving that our creator enables us to imitate Him in our creativity. God intends that we have a healthy appreciation for creation that reminds us of its goodness and the blessings that come to us through it.
This should encourage young believers to do scientific and technological research to discover more of the goodness of God’s abundant creation, because God wants us all to understand that such research glorifies God, for it enables us to discover how incredibly wise, powerful and skillful God was in His work of creation, as Psalm 11 says, “Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who have pleasure in them.”
The doctrine of creation also reminds us that God is sovereign over the universe He created.
He made it all, and He is Lord of it. We owe all that we are and have to Him. We have great confidence that He will defeat all of His enemies and will be manifested as sovereign King to be worshiped forever.
In addition, the incredible size of the universe and the amazing complexity of every created thing will, if our hearts are right, draw us continually to worship and praise Him for His greatness!

Take these Stones Home

Doctrine of Creation: God created the entire universe out of nothing; it was originally very good; and He created it to glorify himself.
I. Biblical Evidence
Read Genesis 1:1-5 as a family and talk about the difference between creation out of nothing and making something out of stuff. Maybe bake a cake with your children and show them how we need ingredients to make things and God did not.
II. Role of the Trinity
Worship together by praising the Father, Son and Spirit for the different ways they participate in creation.
Maybe act out the roles of the Trinity in creation by having the Dads read the “And God Said” statements in Genesis 1, the Moms read the “And it was So” statements in Genesis 1 and have the children act out (like charades) what is happening.
III. Relationship with Science
Talk with your children and grandchildren about how science reveals who God is and how many great scientist were believers in God. Maybe read biographies with them of some great Christian Scientist.
Here are a few recommended titles:
Men of Science Men of God: Great Scientists of the Past Who Believed the Bible by Henry M. Morris
Children:
Isaac Newton, Sower Series By: John Hudson Tiner
Robert Boyle, Sower Series By: John Hudson Tiner
Johannes Kepler, Sower Series By: John H. Tiner
Along Came Galileo By: Jeanne Bendick
Teens:
Scientists Of Faith by Dan Graves
Scientists Who Believe: 21 Tell Their Own Stories by Eric C. Barrett
Galileo Galilei - Biography of the Father of Science
Isaac Newton: Giants of Science By: Kathleen Krull
Michael Faraday: Physics and Faith by Colin A. Russell
IV. God’s Purpose in Creation
Look at the moon and the stars (maybe through a telescope) and discuss how they display God’s glory, and how He delights in His creation.
Participate in some creative activity together and talk about how we are joining God in delighting in creation by being creative (try playing music, writing a story, cooking, decorating, gardening, wood working, coloring, or building a tall tower out of blocks).
At the end of any of these activities, take time to thank God for creation and worship Him!

Stone I - Creation: Creator God

2009-06-17T08:40:00.000-07:00

As we set out to lay down our 12 Stones of the statues and testimonies of God, we do so in the context of the grand narrative of God; Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation. It is fitting then that we would begin at the beginning, the very beginning. First, I want us to define what we will be talking about over the next three weeks.
Doctrine of Creation: God created the entire universe out of nothing; it was originally very good; and He created it to glorify himself.
We are going to look at creation in three parts, beginning with the idea of Creator God.
We will look at this idea by analyzing this simple sentence found in Genesis 1:1
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
When? In the beginning
Who? God
What? Created
We want to look at what each statement says, what it teaches us about God, and why it is important for us to understand.

I. Eternity of God: Psalm 90
The Bible simply assumes that God exists. In the beginning. What does this mean, but that there was nothing before this. However, the Bible is clear that in the beginning God already was. In the beginning, He is present. The primary idea here is God’s eternity.
By this we mean that God has no beginning (He has always been),
no end (He will always be),
and no succession of moments in His own being, He is not bound by time and space (before the light and darkness were divided into day and night, He existed)
and He sees all time equally vividly, yet he sees and acts within time and space in order to interact with us, so that we might relate to Him.
A. Timeless in His own being - This idea of the eternity of God is sometimes referred to as God being infinite in regards to time. That is to say that He is unlimited in relation to it. Time does not limit God or change Him in any way.
The fact that God has no beginning or end is plainly seen in Psalms 90:1-2, "Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God."
God’s eternity is also suggested in passages that talk about the fact that God always is or always exist, as in Revelation 1:8, “I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."
The fact that God never began to exist can also be concluded from the fact that He created the universe out of nothing, as we will talk about next week.
These passages show that the facts, that God always existed even before there was time, combine to indicate that God’s own existence does not have any succession of moments or any progression from one state to another.
To God, all of His existence is always somehow present - though this blows our mind because it is so different than what we experience.
Why is all of this important? Because it shows us that God is not going away, that God is not dead and that He is in fact unchangeable. If we stop for a moment to imagine what it would be like if God could change, the importance of this doctrine would become most clear.
If God could change in His being, perfections, purposes or promises then any change would either be for the better or for the worse. But if God changed for the better, then He was not really the best possible being in the beginning, so how could we know that He was the best possible being now. He would not be perfect and therefore would by definition cease to be God.
If God could change for the worse, what kind of God might He become? If he became less holy or good He would not be perfect, and again by definition cease to be God.
B. Sees all time equally - Part of God not being limited by time is His ability to see all time equally. It does not pass by Him like dots on a number line. He stands above the graph and sees all points equally from eternity past to eternity present. Psalm 90:3-4 says, "You return man to dust and say, 'Return, O children of man!' For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night."
In the New Testament, Peter tells us in 2 Peter 3:8, "But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."
With these verses taken together, we can imagine how God sees time and why this is so important for us to know and to pass on to those who come behind us. He can remember all the events of a thousand years at least as well as we can remember yesterday. God does not forget. All of history is to Him as though it just happened!
On the other hand, one day from God’s perspective seems to last for a thousand years. It is as if it never ends, but is always being experienced. All of history is to Him present to His consciousness forever.
Together we see that the whole span of history is as vivid as if it were a brief moment that had just happened, but as if it is going on forever. No event ever fades! God sees and knows all - past present and future - with equal vividness! That is our sin and our tears, our rebellion and repentance, our worship and our idolatry.
This is why God is concerned about generational faithfulness and rebukes our generational arrogance! Because for Him it is all eternal, as Isaiah 46:8-11 says, Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,' calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.
C. Sees events and Acts within time - We must guard against misunderstanding by completing the definition of God’s eternity. Paul writes in Galatians 4, But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.
God observed clearly and knew what was happening within the events of history.
At the right time, he acted within time and space.
We should never think that God does not know the difference between the past and the present. It is evident within Scripture that He acts within time and that He acts differently at different points in time, always in accordance with His nature and character, but appropriate for the day. That is why the Psalmist says in 90:12, So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.
We must affirm both that God has no succession of moments in His own being and sees all of history equally vividly, and that in His creation He sees the progress of events over time and acts differently at different points.
In short, He is the Lord who created time and who rules over it and uses it for His own purposes.

II. Independence of God
In the beginning, God. There was nothing else and God already was. That tells us that not only is God eternal but independent. By this we mean that God does not need us or the rest of creation for anything, yet we and the rest of creation glorify Him and bring Him joy. This is sometimes called His self-existence. What it means for us is that God was alone at creation and perfect. He could have gone on forever without creating anything, but He chose to create just the same, and it gave Him joy to do so.
Paul proclaims this truth to the men of Athens when he said, "The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything." (Acts 17:24-25)
Some people have said that God created human beings because He was lonely and needed fellowship. This would disregard the complete unity and fellowship of the Trinity and make God dependant on creation, making it lord over Him instead of Him being Lord over it. In John 17:24 Jesus speaks to the Father of, "your love for me from before the foundation of the world.
Some say that God created us to show off His glory." However, in John 17:5 Jesus says, "And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed."
He had all glory and shared it with Himself before we got here and He is not beholden to us for His own glory. We do Him no favors when we recognize His glory, He has done us a favor by revealing it to us and making us instruments of it. It is not just that God did not need creation for anything, it is that He could not need creation for anything. The difference between the creator and the creation is immensely and fundamentally different.
We are not lesser versions of the same kind. We are of a totally different kind, made to look like Him. It is not just that we exist and God has always existed. God necessarily exists in perfection. We do not necessarily exist, but only by God’s desire and then we exist as fundamentally imperfect.
The balancing consideration (and there is always a balancing consideration) is the fact that we and the rest of creation do in fact glorify God and bring Him joy. So, we must guard against the false idea that we are meaningless (as we will see in patheistic Buddhism). God determined to create us and determined that we would be meaningful to Him. That is where our meaning lies and where our value comes from. We will look more at that idea in a couple of weeks when we talk abut the Image of God.

III. God’s Relationship with Creation
How does this all work together? This is what we need to make sure that our children and grandchildren understand. The teaching of Scripture about the relationship between God and creation is unique among the religions of the world.
A. Transcendence - The Bible teaches that God is distinct from His creation. He is not part of it, for He has made it and rules over it. The term that we use to talk about God being much greater than creation is transcendence. Now I get a hard time about using all of these big words. However, it is important that when our children get to college they are not convinced that they are ignorant because they do not even know what they believe. Very simply, transcendence means that God is far above creation in the sense that He is greater than creation and independent of it (as we have already talked about).
B. Immanence - The Bible also teaches that God is very much involved in creation, for it is continually dependent on Him for existence and functioning. The term that we use to talk about God being intimately involved in creation is immanence. It literally means “remaining in.” The God of the Bible is no abstract deity that is removed and uninterested. The Bible is again the story of God’s involvement with His creation. It is the statues and testimonies that He wants His creation to remember. In His hands is the life of every living thing (Job12) and He gives all men life and breath and everything (Acts 17) and holds all things together (Col. 1) and upholding the universe by His word of power (Heb. 1).
Both God’s transcendence and immanence are affirmed in a single verse when Paul speaks of one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all, in Ephesians 4:6.
C. Four Opposing Worldviews - In order that we do not appear ignorant, and so that we are ready to give a defense for the great hope that we have in Christ, I want to briefly look at how the biblical view of Creator God is in direct opposition to the four prevailing views about God.
1. Materialism; This is the most common philosophy of unbelievers today. It clearly denies the existence of God altogether. Materialism would say that the material (physical) universe is all there is. This is the heart of the Naturalistic Meta-Narrative that we talked about last week that stands in direct opposition to the biblical assertion that “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Christians today who focus almost the entire effort of their lives on earning more money and acquiring more possessions are teaching practical materialism to their children and grandchildren, since their lives would not be much different if they did not believe in God at all.
2. Pantheism; This philosophy is derived from the Greek idea that everything, the whole universe is God or part of God. This recognizes the essential existence of God but denies several essential aspects of His character. If the whole universe is God, then God has no distinct personality, He is no longer unchanging, or holy. Ultimately, most pantheistic systems, such as Buddhism, end up denying the importance of individual human personalities.
When we teach that God exist, but do not exhibit any real personal relationship with Him, we pass down a heritage of practical pantheism to those who come behind us.
3. Dualism; This is the idea that both God and the material universe have eternally existed side by side. They are the two ultimate forces in the universe. The problem with this is that it indicates a false eternal conflict between God and His creation, between the spiritual and the physical. So, we can not be sure that God will triumph over the evil physical universe because it denies His lordship over creation and the fact that creation came about because of God’s will that it be used solely for His purposes and for His glory.
When we talk about God as though He was one side of a Star Wars like Force caught in an epic battle against the Dark Side, we teach a practical dualism. More importantly, when most non-Christians (including our children and grandchildren) begin to be aware of the spiritual aspect of the universe, they often merely acknowledge that there are both good and evil aspects to the spiritual realm. This is spiritual, but not belief in God or Christianity.
Most New Age spirituality is dualistic and most of the young people growing up in our churches hold more of a dualistic worldview than a biblical one. Of course Satan is delighted to have our homes and churches full of people who think there is an evil force in the universe that is perhaps equal to God.
4. Deism; This is the view that God exists but is not now directly involved in creation. Deism holds that God created the universe and that His is far greater than creation (He is transcendent). Some deists also agree that God has moral standards and will ultimately hold people accountable on a day of judgment. However, they deny His present involvement in the world, excluding His immanence. He is the divine clockmaker who wound the clock and left it to run on its own. While this does affirm many attributes of God, it denies the entire meta-narrative of the Bible.
Many “lukewarm’ or nominal Christians today are, in effect, practical deists. They live lives almost totally devoid of genuine prayer, worship, fear of God, or moment-by-moment trust in God to care for our needs. It is heartbreaking how many of our children are growing up believing God is out there because they never saw from us that He is in us!

Take these Stones Home

Doctrine of Creation: God created the entire universe out of nothing; it was originally very good; and He created it to glorify himself.
Psalms 90:1-4, Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. You return man to dust and say, "Return, O children of man!" For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.
Time does not limit God or change Him in any way.
Talk to your children about how God gave us time so that we could measure our days but that He is timeless.
God does not forget.
Talk to your children about how God does not forget by showing them how they remember today better than last week and explaining that every day is like today for God.
God’s timing is perfect.
Talk to your children about how God always does everything at the right time by explaining how there is a time for everything, like dinner time, bed time, family worship time.
God did not need to create.
Talk to your children about how God is perfect and that he does not need any thing.
Ask them, Why did God create the world?
God chose to create.
Talk with your children about how God chose to create and to make us. Explain to them that our value is grounded in the fact that God chose to make us valuable to Him.
God is distinct from His creation.
Talk with your children about how God is different from creation. Ask them to share what they think makes Him different. Share what you think makes God different.
God is very much involved in His creation.
Talk with your children about how God is involved in creation. Ask them to share things they are thankful to God for and share with them how those things show that God is involved in their lives. Share what you are thankful for and how that shows that God is involved in your life.

Spiritual Vision Conference

2009-06-03T14:37:00.000-07:00

As most of you are aware, we are spending a lot of time this summer implementing family ministry elements at Bush Memorial. Our goal is to be able to take these elements and be able to share them with other churches that are making a transition to a family equipping ministry model.

Part of that entire approach to the summer is a fourteen week series I am preaching at Bush on the 12 Memorial Stones that represent the statutes and testimonies that we want to pass on to our children and grandchildren. The series is based on Deuteronomy 6 and the narrative of Israel’s entrance into the promised land found in Deuteronomy 27 and the book of Joshua.

Central to this theme is the idea that the people remember and obey when generational faithfulness happens, and they do not know the Lord and do what is evil in His sight when generational faithfulness is not practiced (Judges 2:6-11). The notes from these messages will be posted here each week, and audio and video of the first two weeks are available through the Legacy office.

The first Family Ministry event of the summer took place on May 31st. We kicked off the entire summer with a Spiritual Vision Conference. Kara Stephens, the Director of Children’s Ministries at Bush put the conference together and has led several churches through this material. It was a wonderful start that laid the groundwork for the entire summer plan. I would like to share with you some of the key principles presented in the conference in hopes that they will spark ideas for others and encourage those who are leading transition.

Kara started the conference with three basic points upon which we must all agree in order for the other principles to have real meaning.
We want our children to be Godly—to love God alone and serve God alone.
We are willing to let our children suffer in order to follow Jesus, and let God build them up in due time.
We will measure success by God’s standards, not our own.

After agreeing on these core values, parents and grandparents were led to examine the last year of spiritual development in each child’s life by asking 25 questions like, “Have you facilitated your child’s daily worship?”

The next element in the conference is to develop a vision for the next year of spiritual growth in each child’s life by asking 25 questions like, “What specific steps can you take to help your child learn God’s word?”

Each family then worked to develop a plan to turn that vision into a reality by weekly working on these six spiritual disciplines: Worship, Bible Study, Scripture Memorization, Prayer, Giving, and Church Attendance.

I am thankful for your prayers and financial support that make this kind of generational, life-changing ministry possible for all of our partner churches. You are having an impact in the lives of young people though Legacy.

For more information on having a Spiritual Vision Conference at your church, please contact us.

The Narrative of God: Building an Altar of Remembrance in the Family of God Judges 2:6-11

2009-06-01T07:37:00.000-07:00

We talked last week about how God wanted Israel to pass down the testimonies and statues of God from one generation to another, so that there would always be a people in Israel who remembered what God had done and remembered His commandments. God gave Israel an object lesson using 12 Stones through which they could tell the story of what God had done, and Israel was obedient to everything that God commanded them to through Moses.
What is the result?

I. The people did remember and obey:
Judges 2:6-9, When Joshua dismissed the people, the people of Israel went each to his inheritance to take possession of the land. And the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the LORD had done for Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died at the age of 110 years. And they buried him within the boundaries of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of the mountain of Gaash.
However, let us not rejoice too long and rest on our laurels, because it takes just one generation that fails to pass down the inheritance which they have received.

II. What happens when we do not practice generational faithfulness?
The Bible is clear that when the generation who’s parents entered the promised land with Joshua died their testimony and obedience died with them.
Judges 2:10-11, And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD or the work that he had done for Israel. And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals.
What will be said of us here? Are we a generation that remembers and obeys or are we a generation that forgets and worships idols? What about the next generations? It is a compelling question, and the answer depends on our response. So, We must lay down our own stones!

III. Laying down our own 12 Stones:
God told Israel to use 12 stones to remember the meta-narrative of truth.
Joshua laid the 12 stones so the people would not forget.
But in one generation of self-obsorbtion and self-indulgence the people defiled the altar and forgot. God wants us to remember and pass on to the next generation the grand story of the 12 Stones. If we do not tell our children and grandchildren, who will?
For Israel the story of the stones was one of God’s people, called from slavery to deliverance into a Promised Land. Our story is the same, but it is much more grand than a specific place and time and people. Our story is one of God creating for Himself a people and calling them from the slavery of sin to redemption by grace through faith in Christ alone that we might enter into the presence of God for all eternity. We must remember that we proclaim is not just a little story, and not just a series of little stories. It is the big picture. We are accountable to the big story of God’s work as it is narrated in Scripture.
It is not enough for us to have a deep repository of biblical facts and stories, and yet know nothing about how any of it fits together. That is why we do things like Truth Project and Walk-Thru the Bible. The Bible is not just a compendium of good short stories or moralistic fables, but a grand, life-encompassing meta-narrative of God’s work of redemption in the world, that should transform our lives!
So, we will bring 12 Stones, one for each tribe of the nation of Israel. Just as Israel set up camp in four sections while wondering through the wilderness, we will bring our 12 stones in four sections that outline the grand story that we want to remember and pass on throughout our generations, so that there never will arise a generation at Bush Memorial that does not know the Lord or the work that He had done for us. As a framework for thinking about how individual biblical texts fit into Scripture’s big story, the Bible’s story line consists of at least four great movements that are absolutely necessary: Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation.

A. Creation: The Standard of Judah
Numbers 2:1-9
The Story’s first movement is creation. Every worldview, every meta-narrative, has a beginning. If we are to say anything meaningful about the world and where it is going, we must first know how it all started. Today, two stark alternatives seek to explain how this all came to be and the implications of these two worldviews are all-encompassing.
Naturalistic Meta-narrative; This is a materialistic, evolutionary assertion that everything that exists is simply and merely an accident.
Biblical Meta-narrative; This is a supernatural, creationist assertion which declares “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
The divergence between those two assertions is enormous. For, if we believe that God created the world and human beings as the theater of His glory, then we will approach all of life in a manner completely different than if we believe that all of this is merely an accident, that matter and time and energy produced all of this by chance.
The most important divergence between these two worldviews is the place of human beings.
Are we merely some kind of biological accident in the midst of a cosmological accident?
Or, are we the only creatures made in the image of God, and therefore the only ones with the ability to know God and have a sense of accountability to Him?
How you answer that questions will affect everything else you do in your life and everything your children and grandchildren will believe and do in their lives - from sexuality to the sanctity of life to the purpose of labor to the meaning of life itself.
This is literally the most basic and fundamental question: Are we made for a purpose, or are we the by-product of a chaotic universe?
That is why we will look at creation in three parts:
1. Creator God (Transcendence); Here we will be focusing on who God is in relation to creation, that He is distinct from and independent of creation, that he existed before creation and has no beginning, end or succession of moments in His being, that God is infinite and unchangeable.
2. Out of Nothing (Ex-nihilo); Here we will focus on the clear biblical teaching that God created the universe out of nothing. This means that before God began to create the universe, nothing else existed except God himself. 3. The Image of God (Imageo Dei); Here we will focus on the ideas that God’s creation was originally very good, and that He created it to glorify himself. In this, the uniqueness of man as being created in the image of God, meaning that man is like God and represents God, will be central.

B. Fall: The Standard of Rueben
Numbers 2:10-16
The first movement of the story can not explain everything we experience, so we must continue to the story’s second movement, The Fall, because we cannot understand anything about ourselves in our present condition without immediate reference to this.
It is, in fact, the fall into sin that explains all of the suffering and strife, pain and conflict in the world. Without a clear understanding of the fall and its effects, we can not understand our lives or the world around us.
We can not rightly understand the fallenness of human society, nor the groaning of creation, nor most importantly our deep need for salvation.
Sure, we know about Adam and Eve and the forbidden fruit. However, what we may not understand, and what our children must understand, is the importance, the catastrophic significance, of that sin.
The fall changed everything. The earth itself became hostile towards man, childbirth would become painful, and as they were expelled from paradise, what God had made for them and for us was lost. We are blocked from seeing it, prevented from experiencing it, prohibited from eating from the Tree of Life. Where we once walked and talked with God in the cool the day in the garden and cultivated it for our joy, we are now aliens in a hostile land.
Rather than worshiping God in the perfection of Eden, naked and unashamed, we are now reduced to weaving fig leaves and hiding under a bush to cover ourselves.
That is really the only way we can make sense out of ourselves. If we think that we are essentially good - or even morally neutral - we delude ourselves!
The fall explains why we are spiritually dead apart from Christ, and why we deserve to be. For condemnation and eternal judgment is the only just response of a holy God to the reality of who we are and what we have done. That is why we will look at the Fall in three basic parts:
1. The Deception (Satan’s False Gospel); Here we will be focusing on the context and events leading up to the fall, particularly that two sermons were preached, but only one believed and Satan’s deception in preaching a false gospel in Genesis 3.
2. The Action (Unbelief: Original Sin); Here we will talk about the origin of sin and how sin entered the human race through Adam’s choice to exchanged the truth of God for a lie: chose to be like a god instead of in the image of God.
3. The Consequence (Separation, Falling Short, Death); Here we will focus on the clear biblical teaching that sin is falling short of the glory of God, that it results in physical death for the entire human race and spiritual death for those whose sins go unforgiven, and that spiritual death is characterized primarily as eternal separation from the presence of God.

C. Redemption: The Standard of Ephraim
Numbers 2:18-24
If we left the fall as the end of our story, total destruction would be the only appropriate conclusion. But there is a third movement to the story, redemption. What we could not do for ourselves, God did. In order to bring all glory to himself, God acted to save us from our own sin.
Every great storyline needs a scandal, and this is it; that a righteous and holy God would die to pay the sin debt of a totally rebellious people, so that both His justice and mercy could be satisfied and we could be made right before Him, by Him.
We must now recognize that this story is much bigger than we could have at first thought. By redeeming sinners, God glorifies Himself and declares His holiness in a way that we would never have known if we simply knew Him as creator, as Adam did. He is now for us not just creator; He is our creator and our Redeemer!
So, we will look at redemption in three parts:
1. Grace (Propitiation); Here we will talk about the work Christ did in His life and death to earn our salvation, particularly His penal substitutionary atonement, or that He took our place in bearing the just wrath of God to pay the penalty for our sin.
2. Faith (Imputation); Here we will focus on our justification by faith by talking about how our sin was accounted to Christ and how Christ righteousness was accounted to us in order to overcome the sin of Adam that was accounted to us and our past and present sin.
3. Christ (Sanctification); Here we will talk about our growth in likeness to Christ by pointing out the difference between justification and sanctification, by looking at three stages of sanctification, seeing how we cooperate with God in sanctification, and rejoicing in the effects of sanctification.
Salvation by Grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone!

D. Consummation: The Standard of Dan
Numbers 2:25
We fail to really teach the gospel to our children and grandchildren in its awesome massiveness unless we point to the fact that God is about not only redeeming sinners but also creating a new heaven and a new earth.
He is not merely restoring the world to the paradise of Eden. For Eden was only a foreshadowing of the new earth. God is creating something far greater than the garden ever was!
Consummation is not just a return to where we began, but an arrival at what no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor heart of man ever imagined. The vision of consummation held out at the end of Revelation is greater than Genesis ever knew. It will be greater than what God called “very good.” How could the new creation be better than the original? Because Eden was never what God ultimately intended. He intended the Kingdom of Christ from before the beginning. The mind of God conceived of a world where His glory would be more magnificently demonstrated! In the garden of Eden, Adam and Eve certainly knew many songs they could sing of God’s glory as Creator, but they did not know to sing “In Christ Alone!” We are more privileged than they were. We get to sing “My Savior, My God!”
That is why we will look at the consummation of the Kingdom of Christ in three parts:
1. Kingdom (authority of Christ); Here we will talk about Christ’s authority as Lord, both in this life and the life to come, by looking at the tension between the “already” inaugurated Kingdom of Christ and the “not yet” consummated Kingdom and how we ought to respond to that authority.
2. Resurrection (fullness of Christ); Here we will talk about what happens when we die by focusing on the significance of Christ’s resurrection for us and the significance of our own resurrection in terms of our own bodies and the Kingdom of God.
3. Heaven (presence of Christ); Here we will talk about heaven as both a place and as the reality of the presence of God, by looking at both the physical and spiritual aspects and what gives them value.

Many of our people are dying of spiritual starvation because they do not know the Bible’s whole story. We are on the verge of loosing an entire generation who grew up in our churches because we have not been faithful to tell the story of what God has done. So, they do not find themselves in the story. They know the moral fables and the facts about the little stories, but a little bit of knowledge is not a big picture.
We will help them know the beginning, the middle and the end; creation, fall, redemption, consummation.
In doing this, we will help them know who they are (who we are) and where they are going. We may even find where we are going in the process. We will all be able to incorporate our little stories into God’s grand meta-narrative, and press on with burning hearts toward maturity and completeness in Christ.
But it starts with a personal commitment to the whole truth of God’s word and to intentionally passing it down to those who come behind us. Anything else is idolatry and sin. It starts with having a personal story of faithfulness of your own to tell.
Where are you today?
Where do you find yourself in the meta-narrative of God?
Some are stuck in creation and see themselves as very good.
Some are stuck in the fall and see themselves beyond hope.
Some are in redemption and see the need for the ongoing sanctification into Christlikeness.
Some others are already in consummation and think they already have what has not yet come.
Whatever God has called you to today, humility, forgiveness, grace or conviction, won’t you put your own small story aside and enter into the grand epic of God?

Generational Faithfulness: Teaching and Testimony in the House of Faith

2009-05-27T13:25:00.000-07:00

Deuteronomy is the words of Moses to Israel just before his death as Israel prepared to enter into the Promised Land, a series of farewell speeches that were committed to writing and given to the elders and priest to be passed to the coming generations of Israel. The entire book is a testament to the importance of generational faithfulness. God moved Moses to write down again the law and testimony of what God had done for Israel, for the express purpose of passing it down to those who did not come out of Egypt, but to the children of those born in the desert, who would remember nothing but a land of milk and honey.
What does Moses say? Remember what God has done and obey His commandments!
As Moses begins this second speech, he repeats the 10 commandments and speaks directly to the issue of generational faithfulness.
There are three main things we can learn from this narrative.

I. This should protect us ALL from generational arrogance:
Generational Arrogance is the idea that one generation has an attitude of superiority that manifest itself in presumptuous claims or assumptions. It most often refers to a younger generation’s propensity to think it has all of the answers, or an older generations propensity to think it was all better in the old days. George Orwell may have said it best, “Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it.” It can go both ways!
A. Older towards younger
Deuteronomy 6:1-2, Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the rules that the LORD your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long.
Our legacy will ultimately be defined by what we leave behind.
Henry Blackaby says in his book Spiritual Leadership, “Indeed, the next generation of great leaders is already evolving, but today's adults may be too preoccupied to notice.”
B. Younger towards older
Deuteronomy 6:3, Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
We stand on the shoulders of those who came before us.
Ronald Reagan said in one of his famous quotes, “Each generation goes further than the generation preceding it because it stands on the shoulders of that generation.”
C. The goal here is generational faithfulness
Generational Faithfulness is the idea of passing down one’s spiritual heritage from one generation to the next as a means of continuing, or beginning, a heritage of God-honoring, Christ-serving, kingdom-advancing children, grandchildren, great grandchildren.
The central idea of this entire family ministry summer is that we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us, but our legacy will be defined by what we produce in those who follow behind. God’s primary concern here is for what happens among the generation of people who are born in the promise. The generation who came out of Egypt had called out to God and followed Moses out on the legs of strong faith alone. They sometimes struggled to remain focused on the promise and continually chose to live as slaves to the past even after they were set free. That generation passed away in the desert as a result of their doubt. Even Moses was denied entrance into the promise God had made to Abraham so long ago.
However, God delivered the promise to their children. They will enter into the land flowing with milk and honey and God will deliver the tribes of that land into their hands. They will know what God has done to bring them out of Egypt and into this land of rich blessing. But what about their children, our children, the grandchildren of those who came before us? God is concerned that spoiled generation might forget what God has done and not obey His commandments!

II. There are four things God says we must do:
The Shema is one of the most important passages in Scripture, as it instructs parents with their God-given assignment to lead their children spiritually. In it we find outlined for us at least four things we must do!
A. God says we should teach these things to our children.
Deuteronomy 6:4-6, Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
This is primarily about spiritual education. Deuteronomy 6:7a says, You shall teach them diligently to your children. Believers are to teach their children all things according to the word of God in order to produce in them a Christian view of the world that bears the fruit of the mind of Christ. This happens primarily through the study of God’s word.
God created the family first as the primary means for this exchange of knowledge and understanding. God created the Church second as a supplement to the exchange happening in the home and to help equip the leaders in the home with knowledge and understanding.
Parents are primary and the church is secondary in the religious education of our children and grandchildren.
B. God says we should talk about these things with our children.
This is primarily about discipleship. Deuteronomy 6:7b says, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
Mature believers should be investing in the lives of younger believers to produce in them a mature faith that bears the fruit of an active faith. This happens primarily through spiritual conversation.
God created the family first as the primary environment in which wisdom is passed from one generation to the next. God created the Church second as a supplement to the exchange happening in the home and to help equip the leaders in the home with wisdom.
Parents are primary and the church is secondary in the discipleship of our children and grandchildren.
C. God says we should make them part of our everyday life and worldview.
This is accomplished in two primary ways.
1. Modeling - Deuteronomy 6:8, You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes.
Believers should be living every area of our lives so that our children and unbelievers who see our lives will be drawn into authentic relationship with Christ and so that we will be able to say to believers “follow me as I follow Christ.”
This happens when we live intentionally distinct and counter-cultural lives that reflect the nature and character of Christ in our relationships, work-ethic, finances, worship, recreation, service, and every other area of life.
2. Teaching Moments - Deuteronomy 6:9, You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Believers should use the everyday things of life to teach biblical principles to those who come behind them so that they will know what and how God thinks about the reality of the world we live in.
This happens when we intentionally look for ways to apply biblical truth to the reality of the post-modern culture in which we live by interacting with following generations in the context of their cultural setting, such as television, sports, art, theatre, relationships, music, current events and every other mundane thing!
D. God says we should do these things out of loving obedience.
We are to do things because we want to, not because we have to. We are motivated by our love for God and His great love for us. It is because He first loved us that we love Him with all of our heart, soul and strength. And if we love Him, we will share His love for our neighbors and exercise that love by drawing the two together. So, we do these things out of loving obedience rather than duty for two reasons.
1. So that our children and grandchildren will not forget.
Deuteronomy 6:10-13, And when the LORD your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the LORD your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.
Then God does something fascinating! He reminds us that this is a relational exercise, and that His intent is to bless us, as a result of our loving obedience to Him.
2. So He can bless us.
Deuteronomy 6:14-19, You shall diligently keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and his testimonies and his statutes, which he has commanded you. And you shall do what is right and good in the sight of the LORD, that it may go well with you, and that you may go in and take possession of the good land that the LORD swore to give to your fathers by thrusting out all your enemies from before you, as the LORD has promised.
I want to point out one thing in that passage that is key to our understanding. God gives us two main categories to think about, two things that protect us from idolatry, statutes and testimonies.

III. An Object Lesson from God:
A. God says He will use statues and testimonies as object lessons.
Statues are commandments and truths. This is what God wants us to remember and pass on to the generations who follow because it is those objective facts that assure us of our relationship with God. Testimonies are the stories of our obedience and God’s faithfulness that God says He will use to draw the emerging generations to himself.
Here is God’s story in relation to the nation of Israel;
Deuteronomy 6:20-25, When your son asks you in time to come, 'What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the LORD our God has commanded you?' then you shall say to your son, 'We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. And the LORD showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes. And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers. And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us.'
B. God gives Israel an object lesson.
As Moses completes this second speech, God gives the nation of Israel an object lesson. It is a wonderful story that stretches from Deuteronomy to Judges. Join with me as we walk together on this adventure through the story of God.
Deuteronomy 27:1-8, Now Moses and the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, "Keep the whole commandment that I command you today. And on the day you cross over the Jordan to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall set up large stones and plaster them with plaster. And you shall write on them all the words of this law, when you cross over to enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you. And when you have crossed over the Jordan, you shall set up these stones, concerning which I command you today, on Mount Ebal, and you shall plaster them with plaster. And there you shall build an altar to the LORD your God, an altar of stones. You shall wield no iron tool on them; you shall build an altar to the LORD your God of uncut stones. And you shall offer burnt offerings on it to the LORD your God, and you shall sacrifice peace offerings and shall eat there, and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God. And you shall write on the stones all the words of this law very plainly.
1. Joshua was obedient to what God had commanded.
Joshua 4:1-18, When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan, the LORD said to Joshua, "Take twelve men from the people, from each tribe a man, and command them, saying, 'Take twelve stones from here out of the midst of the Jordan, from the very place where the priests’ feet stood firmly, and bring them over with you and lay them down in the place where you lodge tonight.'" Then Joshua called the twelve men from the people of Israel, whom he had appointed, a man from each tribe. And Joshua said to them, "Pass on before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel, that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, 'What do those stones mean to you?' then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever."
2. Israel set up an altar of 12 Large Stones.
Joshua 4:19-24, The people came up out of the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and they encamped at Gilgal on the east border of Jericho. And those twelve stones, which they took out of the Jordan, Joshua set up at Gilgal. And he said to the people of Israel, "When your children ask their fathers in times to come, 'What do these stones mean?' then you shall let your children know, 'Israel passed over this Jordan on dry ground.' For the LORD your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the LORD your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for us until we passed over, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the LORD is mighty, that you may fear the LORD your God forever."
Why had He asked them to do this? What is the purpose? So the children will ask, “What do these stones mean” and you can tell them what God did here in your life!
3. Israel set up an altar of 12 uncut stones on Mount Ebal.
Joshua 8:29-35, Now after Israel had defeated Ai, Joshua hanged the king of Ai and buried him under a heap of stones. But not just any stones. At that time Joshua built an altar to the LORD, the God of Israel, on Mount Ebal, just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded the people of Israel, as it is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, "an altar of uncut stones, upon which no man has wielded an iron tool." And they offered on it burnt offerings to the LORD and sacrificed peace offerings. And there, in the presence of the people of Israel, he wrote on the stones a copy of the law of Moses, which he had written. And all Israel, sojourner as well as native born, with their elders and officers and their judges, stood on opposite sides of the ark before the Levitical priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD, half of them in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded at the first, to bless the people of Israel. And afterward he (Joshua) read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse, according to all that is written in the Book of the Law. There was not a word of all that Moses commanded that Joshua did not read before all the assembly of Israel, and the women, and the little ones, and the sojourners who lived among them.
Did you get that? They built the altar as God had told them to do and there they were, reading all the teachings of their grandfather Moses, all of Israel; the men, the women, the children and the outsiders. A worship service so grand the valley between two mountains (Ebal and Gerizim) served as their sanctuary, a land called Shechem where Abraham had first settled 8 generations earlier!
The Bible says in Judges 2:7 that “the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the LORD had done for Israel." Will that be said of us, of our churches and families?

Passionate About Leadership

2009-05-05T13:26:00.001-07:00

This past month I have been reminded why I am so passionate about leadership. I have been in ministry for over 15 years. During that time I have served in many capacities within the local church, and have seen both great spiritual leadership and poor spiritual leadership.
As I have watched a church transition from the leadership of a great spiritual leader and seen the various leadership styles and temperaments that have attempted to fill that void, I am reminded of something I wrote in the Introduction to Legacy Leadership, “One look at our culture and you become aware that we are in a leadership crisis. In almost every institution in our country there is a void of authentic leadership. Our government is full of people who are clouded by selfish motivation and controlled by opinion polls. Corporate America is littered with examples of leadership that lacks integrity and courage. Unfortunately, our churches are lead largely by people who are blown by every wind of culture and who are marked by reactionary methodology instead of biblical leadership. Most tellingly, our homes are simply un-lead. We have lost entire generations because of the lack of true spiritual leadership in the home.”
Spiritual leadership is not so much about who is out front or who is following as it is about where you are going and how you are going about getting there. Again, I would like to quote from Chapter 2, Influence from my book Legacy Leadership.
“There are few of us who view ourselves as leaders. There are even fewer of us who think of ourselves as spiritual leaders. When we think of the term ‘spiritual leader,’ we think of a pastor or priest, an evangelist or conference speaker, a worship leader or contemporary Christian artist. We see these people as different from ourselves, set apart somehow by their position, gift or calling.
In those ideas of calling, gifts, and position lie the root of much of our confusion. It is not the position of a pastor, evangelist, or worship leader that makes them a spiritual leader. Those titles are just positions that they hold, and while those positions do have certain requirements and qualifications attached to them, they bring with them only positional authority. That means the position has some inherent authority that comes along with it, like a police officer.
However, that positional authority does not make them spiritual leaders, only spiritual icons. Real spiritual leadership comes from being people with personal authority. Personal authority is the result of living a life of purpose, integrity, and vision that allows others to see God at work in you. Just like every one of us who is a believer in Christ has a spiritual gift, we each have a spiritual calling as well. That spiritual calling is to salvation by grace through faith in Christ, to go into all the world and make disciples, and to be an example of one who believes. Within that calling, God has a specific purpose for each one of us, but we all have a mandate to be and make disciples—a mandate to lead.”
I know that you will pray with me that God will raise up a generation of believers who will use their influence not just to make an impact in the short term but to leave a spiritual legacy that is generational and that glorifies God through its utter dependence upon Him. That is what we are about at Legacy Ministries and what I am about personally. Help us develop those leaders for the next generation through your prayers and financial support during this most difficult of physical and spiritual times.

Great Commmission Resurgence

2009-04-30T12:20:00.000-07:00

I have been getting a lot of email about the new Great Commission Resurgence that has been proposed by Dr. Danny Aiken and signed by most every major leader in the SBC. I have read it a couple of times but did not really see it as that big of a deal. Today I got an email from a friend who asked me directly "what do you think?"
I decided that I would share my thoughts for her here so that maybe more people will read the Declaration or possibly the entire manuscript by following the link below or going to http://www.greatcommissionresurgence.com/media.
Here are my thoughts and an outline of the Declaration:
I like that this is basically a call back to the gospel. There is nothing in the statement that I have trouble with and I really trust the guys who are behind this. You can read online who has signed the document and I signed it today. It is really nothing new for me because I have been around these guys for 15 years or so. This is really the worldview and philosophy of ministry that I have always been taught from. It is a statement to extreme groups on both ends of the scale who would try to divide over secondary issues. I believe we are approaching time of persecution and oppression. These are times for unity in our diversity around the absolute truths of the word of God. The next generation will see a separation of the wheat and tares. It is time for true believers of all preference and personality to labor for the bond of unity that is the love of the Spirit of Truth.
Over 10 years ago I had the pleasure of meeting Judge Paul Pressler, one of the key leaders of the Conservative Resurgence. When we met him and had him sign his book for us, my friend Jeff Jordan respectfully thanked Judge Pressler for fighting for us so that we did not have to. Pressler pulled Jeff very close and said something like this, "I did not fight so that you would not have to. I fought so that you might be able to. If you rest on what has been accomplished, it will be lost. You must fight and continue to fight for the word of God." I believe that is what this is, that continued fight.
What are your thoughts? I encourage everyone to read the statement and decide for yourself.

Toward a Great Commission Resurgence in the
Southern Baptist Convention
A Declaration
Then Jesus came near and said to them, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on
earth. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have
commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew
28:18-20, HCSB).
Preamble
Southern Baptists have always been a Great Commission people. Christ’s command to go, disciple, baptize, and teach is woven into the very DNA of our churches. By God’s grace, over the last thirty years the SBC has undergone a Conservative Resurgence that has brought substantive changes to many of our churches and all of our Convention’s seminaries and boards. We, the undersigned, are thankful for the Conservative Resurgence and believe that God has called Southern Baptists to a Great Commission Resurgence as the next step in the renewal of our denomination. It is our conviction that a Great Commission Resurgence must embrace the following ten commitments:
I. A Commitment to Christ’s Lordship.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to submit to the absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ in all things at the personal, local church, and denominational levels. (Col. 1:18; 3:16-17, 23-24)
II. A Commitment to Gospel-Centeredness.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to make the gospel of Jesus Christ central in our lives, our churches, and our denominational ministries. (Rom. 1:16; 1 Cor. 15:1-4; 2 Cor. 5:17-21)
III. A Commitment to the Great Commandments.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to recommit to the priority of the Great Commandments in every aspect of our lives and every priority we embrace as a network of local Baptist churches. (Matt. 22:37-40)
IV. A Commitment to Biblical Inerrancy and Sufficiency.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to unite around a firm conviction in the full truthfulness and complete sufficiency of Christian Scripture in all matters of faith and practice. (Matt 5:17-18; John 10:35; 17:17; 2 Tim 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21)
V. A Commitment to a Healthy Confessional Center.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to look to the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 as a sufficient guide for building a theological consensus for partnership in the gospel, refusing to be sidetracked by theological agendas that distract us from our Lord’s Commission. (1 Tim. 6:3-4)
VI. A Commitment to Biblically Healthy Churches.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to focus on building local churches that are thoroughly orthodox, distinctively Baptist, and passionately committed to the Great Commission. (Matt. 16:13-20, 18:15-20; Acts 2:41-47; Rom. 6:3-5; 1 Cor. 5)
VII. A Commitment to Sound Biblical Preaching.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to affirm and expect a pastoral ministry that is characterized by faithful biblical preaching that teaches both the content of the Scriptures and the theology embedded in the Scriptures. (2 Tim. 4:1-5)
VIII. A Commitment to a Methodological Diversity that is Biblically Informed.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to consider themselves and their churches to be missionaries in non-Christian cultures, each of which requires unique strategies and emphases if the gospel is
to penetrate and saturate every community in North America. (Phil. 2:1-5; 4:2-9)
IX. A Commitment to a More Effective Convention Structure.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to rethink our Convention structure and priorities so that we can maximize our energy and resources for the health of our local churches and the fulfilling of the Great Commission. (1 Cor. 10:31)
X. A Commitment to Distinctively Christian Families.
We call upon all Southern Baptists to build gospel-saturated homes that see children as a gift from God and as our first and primary mission field. (Deut. 6:1-9; Psalm 127, 128; Eph. 6:4)