Jesus Is The Truth

This morning's sermon, "Jesus Is The Truth", is available online at The Parson's Pulpit.

Deep Personal Love

Put yourself in the sandals of Jesus’ closest followers during those turbulent days of Passover week almost 2000 years ago. Every certainty of your life as you had known it was shattered. The Person you had come to regard as more than merely your teacher, but as your friend and master, had been viciously seized and put to death for the sake of hatred and political expedience. Additionally, you fear that you might be next on the leaders’ hit list. Your personal plans, your religious standing, and your future existence were all in a state of flux. In short, you were dazed, confused, and grieving.

As we look at the scene in John 20, the major players are all acting in a grief-shrouded state of mind. They had forgotten most of Jesus’ teachings. Their memories of the promises and prophecies of Scripture were dim. But even in this emotionally battered condition, Mary, Peter, John, and the other disciples still had two anchors for their storm-tossed hearts. They had deep personal affection for Jesus. And they had deep personal affection for one another. When their knowledge failed them, they still had love. When their hope was nearly abandoned, they still had love. When they were utterly confused and almost bereft of faith, they still had love. Love is what sustained them. Love is what drove them.

Love drove Mary and the other women to the tomb that early Sunday morning to finish the job of tending to Jesus’ body. Love motivated her horror at the empty tomb, thinking that someone had stolen Him away, and love gave speed to her feet as she hurried to tell Peter and John. Love drove the two men to the empty tomb, forgetting the potential danger of being seen openly on the streets of Jerusalem. And love caused them to believe that He was risen. Love made them hope against hope that it was true.

And before the day was out, they each had their love and hope confirmed. The risen Lord Jesus came to them. And their faith was confirmed.

For you and me today, the lessons of that Resurrection morning are many. But what we need to learn from Mary, Peter, and John is that personal love for Christ and for Christ’s people matters most. Knowledge is vital. There is no excuse for Christians being ignorant of God’s Word and His ways. Hope is important. It buoys us along the rough seas of life. But personal love for the Master is the grand distinguishing mark of a real disciple. It anchors your soul when nothing else makes sense.

How’s your love for Jesus?

The Meaning of Easter

The Bible says, in Matthew 28:5-6, “But the angel answered and said to the women, "Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.”” These two simple sentences declare the meaning of Easter in a way that no other words can. With clarity and precision, God speaks to man with a certainty that transforms mere religion into an eternity-altering reality.
First, the angel says that Jesus was crucified. He was dead, buried, his body in a tomb. He shed His perfect, sinless blood in payment of your sins. The debt that you owe to God because of your direct breaking of His laws and of your passive failure to fulfill His desires now has a pay-off. Jesus made that possible on the cross. No amount of good works you do in the future could do that. No amount of heart felt sincerity could do that. Only Jesus could do that.
Second, the angel says that Jesus is risen. He is risen! With the same power that spoke the universe into existence, Jesus took up His life again and broke the chains of death, Hell, and the grave. His resurrection is the living proof of the Father’s acceptance of Jesus’ sacrifice. It is the proof that He can give you His life…eternal life…life that begins now and lasts forever. It is proof that He loves you and that nothing will stop Him from rescuing you.
The Resurrection is the meaning of Easter. It not merely the promise of life renewed in nature or even the seasons of life. It is the promise of Life, the spiritual life that your dead soul desperately needs. And it is provided powerfully in God’s Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

New Sermons Posted

I've posted three new sermons at The Parson's Pulpit .

Enjoy.

The Role of the Pastor

A couple of years ago, I wrote an article about the role of pastors in the local churches. The audience I had in mind while writing it was other pastors. It seems to me that with the resurgence of militant Calvinism and the concurrent emphasis on multiple elders in each congregation that the role of the pastor-teacher, the undershepherd, God's man has been devalued. In Scripture and in experience, I see little evidence for demanding that each congregation have multiple elders, much less that each elder is equal in authority with each of the other elders. With that in mind, I quote my own article.

The pastor is described in the Scripture as a shepherd, elder, overseer, and
steward. These descriptions provide us with the parameters of his character,
responsibility, and authority.

Three criteria should govern the character of the man of God. First, he is an elder. That is, he should be seasoned in the service of the Lord, not new or immature in the ministry. He is to possess the proper seriousness of mind and demeanor that lends itself to the awesome task with which he is charged. It is a call to mature balance. Second, he is called to be blameless. That is, he is to be of sufficient character quality that no major character flaw can be laid to his account. He cannot be sinless for he is
a man still in the flesh and subject to the same temptations and shortcomings as
other believers. However, blamelessness indicates that the pastor is obedient,
humble, and yielded to God to the extent that he is an exemplary role model to
the believers under his charge. Third, he is a leader. That is, he is willing
and ready to step to the front and call others to follow him. He is to be
confident in his gifts and calling, but more confident in the One who called and
enables him.

The Lord lays heavy responsibility upon the shoulders of those
he calls to pastor his flocks. The pastor is described as a shepherd. That
indicates that he has the responsibility to feed, guide, and protect the flock.
He has a primary duty to feed the Word of God to the congregation. He must be
careful to declare the whole counsel of God, both the milk and the meat of the
Scriptures. He is also responsible to guide the church as a whole and believers
as individuals, so that they are equipped for life and ministry. Additionally,
he is charged with protecting the congregation from attacks, both from without
and within. This requires that he be vigilant and alert, and that he be courageous in dealing with wolves. The pastor is also described as an overseer. That indicates that he has the responsibility to provide direction for the entire enterprise of the church and to have charge for the spiritual welfare and development of its members. The pastor is also described as a steward, that is, the manager of the Master’s household.

The Bible sheds much light on the authority that goes along with the responsibilities of fulfilling the office of pastor. He is said to have "the rule", which is governing authority that congregants are admonished to "obey". The requisite authority to carry out his responsibilities is also implied in the titles "overseer" and "steward". The nature of his authority is hierarchal, moral, and spiritual. It is hierarchal in
that he is the chief officer in the chain of command of the local church, under
Christ. It is moral in that he is not to "lord over" those under his authority
by the barking of commands and presenting of demands. Rather, he is to lead and
to compel them by his example and love for them. It is spiritual in that his
exercise of authority should be with an eye to enhancing the church’s and the
individual’s relationship with God.

The role of the pastor requires a man of character who can shoulder responsibility and who can graciously exercise authority. He is the first among equals in the local body. His role demands that he have the skill to work with other leaders and officers and that he have the strength to provide them leadership. He is to be neither a despot nor a doormat. He is to be the willing patriarch of the household over which God places him as leader. In so leading, he will please his Master.

Living in the Present With the Future in Mind

Hear my recent sermon, Living in the Present With the Future in Mind, by clicking on the link.

Yes. This is a new toy for me and I'm giving it a try! ;)

Foolishness in the Name of Christ?

Like many of you, I read several blogs. In fact, I read several websites with which I do not totally agree. Three sites that I read and from which I benefit are Slice of Laodicea, Apprising Ministries, and Old Truth. Though I read and benefit from them, I find that they tend to a hyper-critical spirit; therefore I read them with a certain amount of caution. Their strength, however, is that they are alert to the errors and excesses of pragmatic, market-driven churchianity.

In a recent article at Old Truth, Jim Bublitz writes a great article about one of the latest examples of tomfoolery in the name of evangelism. He says:

I have to admit, nothing sets me off quite like this kind of
thing.
I'm talking about the way growth-driven churches irreverently
misrepresent God
as being just another one of the guys (Psalm 50:21). It
doesn't stop there
either; the biblically defined office of pastor usually
gets a downgrade as
well. Any dignity that pastors should have (1 Timothy
3:1-7 and Titus 2:7-8)
becomes expendable for the sake of hip and trendy
relevance.

The "kind of thing" he refers to is this video by Gary Lamb of Ridge Stone Church in Canton, GA. (Let me admit up front that I find rap "music" objectionable on spiritual, aesthetic, and cultural grounds.) The video is foolish and pathetic on at least a couple of levels. First, it trivializes outreach to the lost for church attendance to the level of a Saturday Night Live sketch. No, I'm not humor impaired. I'm fine with jokes, comedy, and generally cutting up in the right context. Second, it sends an unwitting message to the lost that we have a lack of fear, awe, and reverence for God...and it's okay if they do, too.

This is not what Paul had in mind when he said, "it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe." (1 Corinthians 1:21) The Spirit's emphasis is always on Christ. And Christ's emphasis is on the Word, even to the extent that He identifies Himself as the Living Word. It is the message of the Cross (His sacrificial, substitutionary death and His resurrection with power and authority) that draws men and women and young people to repentance and faith. A flip approach to advertisement and evangelism cannot produce real conversions because it and those who employ it present an incomplete and misleading gospel.

Music in Worship

Music is the Message , posted at NeoFundamentalist, gives a great, balanced perspective on the issue of music. For those of us who are not legalists concerning music, this article presents much needed food for thought.

One of the reasons that I wandered away from the fundamentalist movement a few years ago was what I saw as an undue emphasis on music standards. Acceptable music was defined by church leaders in ways that were narrow, subjective, and elitist. The pastor and/or music minister was in the position of being the arbiter of what constituted music acceptable to God. Often, leaders would refer to certain experts who shared their tastes and cultural biases. The leaders and their writings were regarded as authoritative. This approach to church music left me cold and frustrated. Having been taught that the Bible is our only authoritative rule for faith and practice, I naturally chafed under artificial rules imposed by leaders in the area of music. I could find no Scriptural corroboration for their standards and therefore felt they were being unjust in forcing their preferences on the churches. Many pastors and leaders passed off their personal tastes as "thus saith the Lord".

My tastes in music have always been generally broad and eclectic. I like some of most genres of music, with two or three notable exceptions. When I broke free of legalism, I also indulged my tastes in church music. Some I like more and some I like less. But I bought into the comteporary church notion that music is amoral (is that like being an amillenialist?)...or at least I bought into it intellectually. But even during that period of my life, there was a troubled voice of objection in the back of my mind regarding music. I still had lines that I would not cross, but I attributed them to my own prejudices and upbringing.

As I've made the course correction back towards nonlegalistic fundamentalism away from the errors of the market driven church, I am once again convinced that music is the message to a certain degree. Music is a communicative tool, an emotional and intellectual expression that both carries and calls forth moral and spiritual values from listeners.

NeoFundy's article brings some clarity to the discussion and evaluation of music that is appropriate for the churchs and for individual Christians.

Future Men

On his blog Irrelevant, Greg Linscott quotes from the book Future Men by Doug Wilson:

Music has been one of the chief culprits in the feminization of the
church. Many of the ‘traditional’ hymns of the nineteenth century are romantic,
flowery, and feminine. (I come, after all, to the garden alone, while the dew is
still on the roses.) But the recent rejection of such hymns in favor of
contemporary worship music has been a step further away from a biblical
masculinity. The current emphasis on “feeling worshipful” is frankly
masturbatory, which in men produces a cowardly and effeminate result.
The
fact that the church has largely abandoned the singing of psalms means that the
church has abandoned a songbook that is thoroughly masculine in its lyrics. The
writer of most of the psalms was a warrior, and he knew how to fight the Lord’s
enemies in song. With regard to the music of our psalms and hymns, we must
return to a world of vigorous singing, vibrant anthems, more songs where the
tenor carries the melody, open fifths, and glory. Our problem is not that such
songs do not exist; our problem is that we have forgotten them. And in
forgetting them, we are forgetting our boys. Men need to model such singing for
their sons.

While we should exercise care not to go to the opposite extreme, we would do well to de-feminize our churches. (God is no more pleased with macho than with wimpy). This feminization has shown itself most prominently in church music ministries. Balancing our approach to music both in style and in lyrical content will allow our men to more easily and enthusiastically enter into corporate worship.

Poem for America

Green Baggins posts a great poem for America by Kipling. Read it here.

May our patriotism always be seasoned by humility and dependence on the Lord.

Worldliness in Contemporary Church

One of the things about which the Lord has changed my thinking over the last 12 to 18 months is regarding the entire market oriented approach to ministry. John MacArthur states here that worldliness is the major problem in evangelical Christianity:

We keep hearing from evangelical strategists and
savvy church leaders that Christians need to be more tuned into contemporary
culture.
You have no doubt heard the arguments: We need to take the message
out of the bottle. We can’t minister effectively if don’t speak the language of
contemporary counterculture. If we don’t vernacularize the gospel, contextualize
the church, and reimagine Christanity for each succeeding generation,
how can we possibly reach young people? Above all else, we have got to stay in
step with the times.
Those arguments have been stressed to the point that
many evangelicals now seem to think unstylishness is just about the worst
imaginable threat to the expansion of the gospel and the influence of the
church. They don’t really care if they are worldly. They just don’t want to be
thought uncool.

This very mindset of supposed relevance has led many down the path to triviality. Imagine! We trivialize the Almighty Creator of the universe in our zeal to increasingly swell attendance and call it success. May He forgive us and grant us repentance from our headlong rush into "relevant" irreverence.

Books, etc.

When I previously said that the postings to the blog would come unevenly, I had no idea that it would be almost two months in between entries! But, summertime is a busy time in ministry. So, I'm glad to be back online.

Here is a list of the books I've read over the last three months. I'm providing links so that you can read what others have to say about them. I'll attempt to review some of them over the coming weeks.

Books I've recently read:

Not Like Any Other Book by Peter Masters.
Changed Into His Image by Jim Berg. This is probably the best book I've read in two years. Very helpful in one's personal walk and in discipling others.
Why Men Hate Going To Church by David Murrow.
Healing The Masculine Soul by Gordon Dalbey.
Crushed: The Perilous Journey Called Ministry by Gary Pinion.
Raising A Modern-Day Knight by Robert Lewis.
Unveiling Islam by Ergun Caner and Emir Caner.
Chosen But Free by Norman Geisler.
The Creative Leader by Ed Young.
Only God by David Ralston. Most inspiring missionary book I've read recently. Bro. Ralston was our pastor at Southside in the late '80s/early '90s.

Books I'm in the process of reading:
Lectures To My Students by Charles Haddon Spurgeon.
Come Let Us Reason by Norman Geisler and Ronald Brooks.
Set Apart by R. Kent Hughes.

Books on my shelf that are "on deck":
The World Is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman.
The Powell Principles by Oren Harari.
Roman Catholics and Evangelicals: Agreements and Differences by Norman L. Geisler.
The Way of the Master by Ray Comfort.

Have fun in your reading. I welcome your comments and insight.

A Place to Start

A place to start

So begins my modest foray into the world of blogging. If this goes like the rest of my life, these ponderings and perusings will come in spurts and floods. Of course it's my intention that they be regular. But more than likely the inspiration will come unevenly and so will the posts.

If I were to describe myself on the theological spectrum, I would choose the label "progressive fundamentalist". I'm a recovering legalist, purpose driven, do-it-the-hard-way Baptist. Now I'm just a progressive fundamental baptist seeking to be balanced and faithful in my understanding and preaching of the Word. If that makes perfect sense to you, you're better at peeling onion layers and reading tea leaves than I am!

If I were to describe myself politically, I would choose the label "conservative". I'm a limited-government, traditional family values, America first conservative. And that frankly means that I'm uncomfortable in the GOP right now because the Beltway Republicans are completely out of touch with me and my values. There are a few, like Sen. Tom Coburn, who still get it. But they are by far the minority.

Well, so goes the introductions. Welcome aboard. I look forward to our virtual walks together as we ponder and peruse faith and values as they relate to church and political life...and whatever other things come up on the radar.