Where Extraordinary Grace and Celestial Joy Meet

The following was posted by Tim Brister, the Associate Pastor of Grace Baptist Cape Coral Florida. As this blog is Word4Women I felt it appropriate to post about the wonderful difference in a man’s life and its relationship to the changing power of the Word of God.

His Word NEVER returns void!

Tonight, I participated in something that I have never been apart of in the 22 years that I have known Jesus Christ. The reason for this is twofold: I have never been in a church before that took seriously the biblical practice of church discipline, and I have never been in a church where the pastor has faithful discharged his duties of gospel preaching and pastoral ministry for over two decades. So what happened, you might ask?

In 1988, God saved a man named Steve and soon became a baptized member of Grace Baptist Church (where I serve). A few years after his conversion, Steve fell into sin and came under the discipline of the church which he refused to accept. As a result, the most severe decision a church body could ever make was practiced as Steve was excommunicated from the membership of Grace. For the next 14 years, Steve spent his life committing immoral acts, including drugs and alcohol. At one point in his life, Steve said he spent an entire month in seclusion drinking alcohol with the jaded hopes that he could die in his own misery and insanity.

It was during this time that he found an old Bible as he was reminded of what Tom had told him when he first came to Christ, “Read the Gospel of John.” After six months of prayer, Bible reading, and personal repentance, Steve emailed Tom because he struggled to believe that there would be a church who would accept him. The first person he knew he could to turn to, the person whom he said he trusted the most, was the very person who 14 years ago committed the most severe act of discipline–his former pastor, Tom Ascol.

Through a series of emails, Tom helped Steve get plugged into a gospel-centered church where he is living (which happens to also be a Grace Baptist) and shepherded him in gospel reconciliation that culminated this evening when we were able to fly Steve down to be with us in our bi-lingual Lord’s Supper service. This evening I listening to a brother’s confession of prodigal repentance saturated with tears mingled with the joys of heaven. It was extraordinary grace on display as the Great Shepherd pursued and captured one that had strayed, fallen, and wallowed in the pit of emptiness.

So many thoughts were going through my head as this was all taking place. For instance, how many pastors minister long enough to every see an excommunicated member restored in the same tenure? Given that there are so few churches today that practice church discipline, how many fewer ever see the most extreme (and painful) measures come full circle in the restoration and reconciliation of an excommunicated church member? Why was it that the person Steve wanted help and trusted the most was the pastor who 14 years ago would not let his blatant sin go unaddressed?

So many churches today do miss out on experiencing the kiss of extraordinary grace and celestial joy when the gospel not only reconciles sinners to God but also to one another in the context of a repenting and believing community who is covenanted to be a pure witness as the bride of Christ. So many pastors miss out on one of the greatest blessings of seeing Christ rescue fallen sheep because they do not hang around long enough, or aren’t willing to do love deep enough, to embrace fallen sheep and see Christ rescue them from their prodigal ways. So many wayward sinners wander into the hidden paths of prolonged rebellion without the legitimate discipline of a loving church because there is no commitment either on the part of the member to pursue holiness or the church to pursue those who fall in trespass and sin.

When I hear reports of God-moments in churches, I often hear of x number of people professing Christ, being baptized, etc., and they are all praiseworthy. But how often to we hear church members walk away from the gathered congregation with a God-moment where shameful acts of sinful rebellion is renounced in humble hearts of repentance and the forgiveness of Christ is communicated with joy and gratitude to God?

There was a time when experiences like the one tonight were not uncommon, but I have a strange feeling that this God-moment is one of which I would have a hard time sharing, except with brothers of yesteryear. But it does not have to be that way. We do not have to have undisciplined churches, meaningless membership, and cowardly pastors who are unwilling or afraid to do what Christ has commanded. I would not have had the privilege of joining angels in heaven with shouts of joy were it no for a pastor 20+ years ago committed himself to the biblical principles of regenerate church membership, church discipline, and faithful gospel preaching–marks all of which should make us Baptist. Unfortunately, my experiences leads me to believe that are marked as being weird.

As I consider myself on the beginning chapters of my pastoral ministry, I am reminded of how blessed I am to serve under the leadership of Tom Ascol whose love for church members causes even the excommunicated to call upon him first, and whose love for the church causes the angels in heaven to rejoice over the warrior shepherd that refuses to let one wayward sheep go their own way. It’s a love that does the hardest things and receives the sweetest expressions of reconciliation this side of heaven. It’s a love that is not always reporting the 99 to the church growth department but is radically pursuing for the 1 because each member counts in the church health department.

There are a lot of lessons I’ve learned about pastoral ministry and being a true church, but this one is just too good not to pass along.

How Do You Handle the Word of God?

The following entry is taken from Ed Stetzer’s Website www.edstetzer.com
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Recently I had the opportunity to travel to Europe to speak to pastors, missionaries, and church leaders. Europe is one of the most difficult and often discouraging ministry contexts in the world. Yet, the trip was incredible. Along the way, I met courageous men and women who were faithful to Jesus and his Great Commission within a culture that largely rejects their faith.

I visited worship services there and on four other continents. In every worship service I visited, no matter what country I was in, I had a simple expectation: the preacher would use the Bible in the sermon. God’s Word is certainly (at least some) part of the vast majority of Christian sermons. If a Christian preacher doesn’t use the Bible in the sermon, in fact, I’d be hard-pressed to call it Christian preaching.

But that’s where the sermon similarities end. Pastors handle God’s Word in many different ways depending upon their ministry context. In some ways, this variety can actually be good; after all, preachers are charged to preach the Word to a particular audience. Jesus himself taught in different ways at different times in his ministry. When he preached to the religious leaders of his day, he preached forcefully. In the Sermon on the Mount, he preached to his core group, the disciples, and he challenged them to go deeper. To the crowds, he preached differently still. So preachers who preach differently in different contexts should not surprise us.

At LifeWay Research, we recently studied the variety of ways pastors use the Bible by looking at 450 different sermons (all by different preachers). We gave our research team the audio files of these sermons and some objective questions about how the preacher handled God’s Word.

Thus, let me share about the research and my views on preaching at the same time. Later, we will release a standard report; in the meantime, let me share some of the results.

First, a bit about our methodology. The sermons were randomly selected from two prominent online audio sermon sources. The dates the sermons were preached fell between August 31 and September 14, 2008. A percentage of sermons were even checked a second time to verify and confirm that the research team was accurately reviewing the material.

Our sample certainly impacted the results of our study (which is why we reveal the sample source). We know that those who upload their sermons to online sites are different than those who do not. Are they younger, more evangelical, better educated, and more computer literate? We do not know for sure. But this is not an analysis of ALL preachers, only of the sample described.

Sure enough, in these 450 sermons, the preachers handled God’s Word differently. The way pastors organized their sermons varied widely. Half of pastors traveled verse-by-verse through a passage, and almost half organized their sermons around a theme. Almost one out of five pastors named and explained a Greek word in their sermon. More than half explained verses by using other verses in the Bible.

Even though different preachers handle the Word differently, I believe they’re all obligated to teach it as authoritative, not merely as a scriptural footnote proving something they already wanted to say. Four things have to be true about a pastor’s handling of the Bible if that pastor is to preach authoritatively.

1. The Word should be heard

Our central task as preachers is to present God’s Word. Paul asked a series of questions that should haunt all of us who preach: “How can they call on him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe without hearing about him? And how can they hear without a preacher?” (Romans 10:14 HCSB) A preacher isn’t a self-help guru. A preacher is not a political activist or an entertainer. Those who preach are truth-dispensers, proclaimers of the Word. If we don’t do our job as preachers, people will not hear the good news and therefore can’t respond to it. What we do is crucial.

At a surprisingly high level, most of the preachers we studied seemed to understand the need for the text. Four out of five of these sermons conveyed the correct meaning of the chosen text according to our research team’s analysis (which was not denominationally specific). I’m encouraged by this. People will not really hear God’s Word in our churches if we’re not preaching it accurately.

Of course you can preach the Word accurately and still no one will really “hear” it; we must share God’s Word in the way our hearers will understand it. No matter how accurately the Bible is preached, our message can get lost behind jargon and phrases that mean nothing to our congregations. This doesn’t mean that we should gloss over difficult words within scripture. But we do need to explain the original language and “churchy” words we use. Words we only hear in church such as “holy,” “righteousness,” and “propitiation” can help hearers understand God’s truth only if properly clarified.

Many of the preachers we studied did this. In fact, 41 percent explained at least one church or theological word during their sermon. Another 21 percent avoided such words altogether. This means more than half of the preachers we studied either avoided or at least explained some of the church or theological words they used. While this is notable, it still means that one out of three preachers are not speaking in the vernacular of their audience at least if the uninitiated or unchurched are in attendance.

Paul could have just asked, “How can they believe without a preacher?” But he didn’t. Without people hearing really hearing what you say they will not believe the message.

2. The Word should be organized

If God is orderly, and the story of creation suggests he is, then the preaching of his Word should be, as well. Having a good sermon structure matters as listeners try to make sense of your message.

A good sermon structure simply allows your listeners to more easily grab upon truth. It’s like a well-organized toolbox: If you know where everything in your toolbox is located, you can go find a tool even when your lights are out. Why? You know where everything is. A good sermon structure can do the same thing. If you’ve organized your sermon well, your listeners will be able to understand the Word more easily even when you’re dealing with difficult subjects.

But different people and different cultures think differently and organize their thoughts differently. Not everyone looks for their tools in the same places. Your task as the preacher is to know how your listeners organize their thoughts and to organize your sermon likewise. (And you should note that our sample was in English, which limited the cultural diversity of our study group.) As we studied these 450 sermons, we saw three main categories of biblical preaching. Each category pointed to an important element in biblical sermons.

Half of these preachers focused their preaching around one block of scripture text, moving verse-by-verse through the passage. In truth, every sermon should strive to explain scripture. If the sermon fails to do so, it’s hard to say the Word is central to it.

Another 46 percent of preachers focused their preaching around a main theme, question, or topic using multiple Scriptures to support it. Themes may address issues that listeners deal with throughout their life, or they might highlight a biblical principle or doctrine that should impact the listener’s thinking. Again, this method effectively helps listeners apply the Word to their lives, no matter what organizational method they use.

Finally, the other 4 percent organized their message around one main biblical character using multiple Scriptures to support the theme. This demonstrates the necessity of personalizing biblical truth letting listeners see the truth lived out in someone else’s life. (Wayne Cordeiro does a helpful job unpacking this approach to scripture in his book, The Divine Mentor.)

All of these examples are appropriate ways to structure a sermon depending upon your audience, and all point to essential elements in a good sermon.

3. The Word should be sufficient

Preachers today can be tempted to use all sorts of extra-biblical resources to make their sermons more interesting to the unchurched. Much of those efforts are good: For example, a movie clip may make a nice illustration. A quote from popular culture may show listeners the relevance of what you’re teaching. What a commentator says about a verse may help explain the scripture better.

But, the best way to explain scripture is with scripture itself. Sometimes it isn’t the most convenient place for us to go, but the Bible is simply far better equipped to explain itself than popular culture. More than half of the sermons we studied (56 percent) used cross-references to explain the Word.

I am not saying that cross-references are the only way to help us explain the Word. In many of the sermons we studied (just under half), the preacher gave contextual background information on the biblical book being studied to help listeners understand the text’s meaning. About four out of ten preachers explained their text by talking about its context or what came immediately before and after the passage. Almost one in five preachers gave little to no background information to help explain the texts they preached upon.

4. The Word should be useful

God’s Word should make a difference in the lives of our listeners. When God’s Word is preached boldly and authoritatively, people change. Paul told Timothy, “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16, HCSB)

Paul says God’s Word is useful (or profitable) to equip us to do his work. In fact, he says all of God’s Word is useful for this this includes Leviticus, Amos, and the lineage of Jesus. He doesn’t give any exceptions.

The preachers we surveyed had a definite preference for the New Testament. Nearly three quarters (71 percent) of the main biblical texts were found in the New Testament. More than a third (37 percent) of the sermons came from the New Testament letters alone. A quarter came from the Gospels.

When preachers flipped through their New Testament looking for a passage to preach upon, they didn’t flip far. Matthew was the most preached-upon and the most referenced book in the entire Bible. Genesis was the most preached-upon Old Testament book. Luke, John, Acts of the Apostles, and Romans all from the New Testament were the other most likely biblical books for preachers to use as a main text.

Every book, every page of the Bible is useful to make us more like Christ and prepare us for ministry, not just our favorite books or pages. In fact, an important part of authoritative, biblical preaching is helping listeners discover “the whole counsel of God.” (Acts 20:27) This means we have to flip further into our Bibles if we’re going to be completely obedient to our call.

How we handle the Word of God matters. As preachers, we have a limited time with our audience every week. The question is, how will we use that time? Will we handle the Word of God in a way that demonstrates its authority in our lives and over the lives of our listeners?

How important is this issue? God’s Word is bread to a spiritually lost and hungry culture. The issue is urgent. Here is my challenge: Over the next 90 days, take action steps to make your sermons more biblically relevant. The following steps will help you get started:

Listen to one of your recent sermons and assess how you handled the Bible (start by listening for how your sermon addressed the four points in this article).
Have someone you trust (maybe from outside your church) listen to a different one of your sermons and do the same assessment.
Read some books on preaching, like Christ-Centered Preaching by Bryan Chappel or The Divine Mentor by Wayne Cordiero, to help your personal approach to God’s Word.
Create a list of clear and measurable goals to strengthen the biblical content of your preaching.
My prayer is that God would do something new and deeper in all of us who have the honor of communicating his life-changing truth. May every man, woman, and child in every community truly see and hear his Word as a result. It’s really the most important concern we can address as we prepare to preach.
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Ed Stetzer has planted churches in New York, Pennsylvania, and Georgia and transitioned declining churches in Indiana and Georgia. He has trained pastors and church planters on five continents, holds two masters degrees and two doctorates, and has written dozens of articles and books. Ed is a columnist for Outreach Magazine and Catalyst Monthly, serves on the advisory council of Sermon Central and Christianity Today’s Building Church Leaders, and is frequently cited or interviewed in news outlets such as USA Today and CNN.

Ed is Visiting Professor of Research and Missiology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Visiting Research Professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, and has taught at fifteen other colleges and seminaries. He also serves on the Church Services Team at the International Mission Board.

Ed is currently interim teaching pastor of First Baptist Church of Hendersonville, TN.

Ed’s primary role is President of LifeWay Research and LifeWay’s Missiologist in Residence
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What is in Your Heart?

The Purpose of a man’s heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draw’s them out. Proverbs 20:5

Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually Genesis 6: 5

So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart, To walk in their own counsels. Psalm 81:12

When we approach any situation in life we MUST search our heart. Use the following questions and apply their principles to all areas of your life. When talking to your children, friends, spouse or even parents, use these X RAY questions to obtain the motivation of their heart. These questions are adapted from material by CCEF.

What is going on? (the situation) What is occurring at a given
moment in time?

What were you thinking and feeling when
it was occurring? (thoughts of the heart)

What did you do in response? (response
was shaped by thoughts and feelings)

Why did you do it? What did you hope to
accomplish? (Motives)

What was the result? (consequences)

For More on CCEF: www.ccef.org

Re-imagining God in the Shack

The book “The Shack” has had a significant impact on the culture and the church. This good cautionary post originally appeared on Mary’s website marykassian.com April 6th, 2009. We reproduce it here with permission and gratitude.

If you would like to read other careful reviews of “The Shack” consider those by Dr. R. Albert Mohler and by Tim Challies.
This week, Christians around the world will commemorate Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. It was at a Maundy Thursday service at the Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine in Manhattan, in 1984, that a four-foot bronze statue of Jesus on the cross was unveiled. But to the shock of the congregation, the image of Christ on the cross was, in fact, an image of Christa. It portrayed Christ as a woman, complete with undraped breasts and rounded hips.
Betty Friedan, the main force behind modern day feminism, predicted that the question of the eighties would be: “Is God HE?” The Christa sculpture was the liberal church’s response to the question. And although Evangelical Christians have been much slower to consider female gendered God imagery, the recent phenomenon of the multi-million best-seller, “The Shack,” indicates that Evangelicals, too, are succumbing to the feminist pressure to image God in feminine ways. It’s a scenario that I predicted almost 25 years ago.
If you haven’t read it yet, and are amongst the un-Shacked evangelical minority, here’s the story in a nutshell. Mack’s youngest daughter Missy is kidnapped and murdered in a remote mountain shack by a serial slime, called the Ladybug Killer. Mack goes through a denial-grief-anger-bitterness cycle until he receives a letter in his mailbox from God who tells him to go back to the shack to confront his point of pain and suffering. When Mack gets to the shack he blacks out and awakens to find himself in a cabin complete with a manifestation of the Godhead. But this is no ordinary Godhead.
God the Father, called “Papa,” is a She. An Aunt Jemima pancake cooking Mother. Think Whoopee Goldberg in an apron. And Sarayu, the Holy Spirit with an Assyrian name, is a wispy, ethereal female. Think life-sized Tinkerbell emitting rainbows and sparkles. Jesus is a human “male” – the one the three members of the Godhead collaboratively spoke into existence as the Son of God (umm… go figure). Then, in a bizarre twist that defies the orthodox image of the pre-incarnate Christ, another woman, “Sophia” appears as the divine personification of God’s wisdom. And in the end, Papa contributes to the gender-bent confusing mess by setting aside his/her female cross dressing persona for a slightly more familiar masculine one- a grey haired man with a hip ponytail.
Forgiveness and healing from pain is a valid biblical motif – one to which I am profoundly committed. But the way we heal is by running toward the God of the Bible, not by killing off or altering the parts of his character that we find politically incorrect. Not by coming up with an image of a God that is more palatable to our modern-day sensibilities. Not by altering God-revealed truth about the Trinity. Not by thinking we need to “help” God with his image. Over the years, I’ve witnessed thousands of women come to a place of healing and wholeness through the redeeming power of the unvarnished foolishness of the gospel.
The Shack contains terribly wrong concepts about God. Plain and simple. If you think it doesn’t, then you’re well on your way to accepting the image of the Christa on the cross. In a few years, you’ll be hanging her up in your church. I don’t think I’m overstating the case. In my book I’ve carefully documented the way it happened in mainline churches. The arguments used to justify their feminist Christa are the same ones the Shack uses to justify its feminized version of God. In essence, there’s no difference between the artistic image of a feminized Jesus (a.k.a. “Sophia”) hanging on a cross and the artistic image of a feminized Aunt Jemima Papa god in a book. If the latter doesn’t offend you, then the former really shouldn’t.
I’ve had good friends tell me that I’m missing the point of the Shack. Maybe I am. But maybe, just maybe, they are. Maybe they are getting caught up in the emotion of a heart-wrenching story and are failing to notice the horrendous theology that under girds it. The authors claim that “at its core the book is one long Bible Study.” This isn’t an ordinary story book. It’s a book that seeks to transform people’s ideas about God. The fiction is merely a vehicle for the theology.
How we image God matters. So the image of God the book presents matters. It matters a great deal. I seem to recall that God wasn’t terribly amused when his people imaged him in the wrong way, as a golden calf. If you’re not convinced that we should refrain from imaging God as female, and are interested in understanding more about the feminist theology rampant in the Shack, check into my book, The Feminist Mistake. If you take the time to understand the impact that feminism has had on society and church, then maybe you’ll understand my distaste for the Shack’s feminine god rendition.
When it comes down to it, my primary interest is not to engage in a debate about the merits of the Shack. It’s OK if you liked the book. There are some good messages in it, and parts that I liked very much. And it’s apparently helped people in some significant ways. So that’s the good part. But I do want you to think about the false gender-blended image of God this book insidiously presents. And I do want you to base your thinking about God and masculinity and femininity on Scripture, and not on the spirit of this age. The thing that bothers me the most about the Shack is that it wraps destructive ideas up in an appealing package and feeds it to people who have neither the discernment nor the desire to carefully separate truth from error. Most Shackites don’t have a clue about the magnitude of the implications of messing with Trinitarian imagery.
Here’s the thing. In the Old Testament, God instructed his people to reject female goddess images and images of God as a bi-sexual or a dual-sexual Baal/Ashtoreth-type collaboration. God hated this imagery so much that he had his people destroy it and all those who promoted it. The New Testament Church also fought hard against teachings that sought to incorporate female images of God alongside the male images – the Gnostic heresy, in particular. And now, it seems that the same ideas are knocking once again…. and many are throwing the Church doors wide open and welcoming them in.
What’s the big deal? Why can’t we image God as female? The main reason is that God defines who God is and how we are to image him and relate to him. God has chosen to reveal himself with male imagery. Father is HE. Son is HE. Holy Spirit is HE. That’s not to say that God is male. He encompasses everything that is good about masculinity and femininity. But that doesn’t mean that we have the liberty to think or refer to him as female. That’s crossing a line we have no right to cross.
The gender imagery that God has given us is highly important. It reflects critical truths about the nature of the Trinity. Calling him “she” violates his character and important imagery about the nature of our relationship to him. As C.S. Lewis observes,
Common sense, disregarding the discomfort, or even the horror, which the idea of turning all our theological language into the feminine gender arouses in most Christians, will ask “Why not? Since God is in fact not a biological being and has no sex, what can it matter whether we say He or She, Father or Mother, Son or Daughter?”
But Christians think that God Himself has taught us how to speak of Him. To say that it does not matter is to say either that all the masculine imagery is not inspired, is merely human in origin, or else that, though inspired, it is quite arbitrary and unessential. And this is surely intolerable: or, if tolerable, it is an argument … against Christianity. It is also surely based on a shallow view of imagery. Without drawing upon religion, we know from our poetical experience that image and apprehension cleave closer together than common sense is here prepared to admit; that a child who has been taught to pray to a Mother in Heaven would have a religious life radically different from that of a Christian child. And as image and apprehension are in an organic unity, so, for a Christian, are human body and human soul.
The innovators are really implying that sex is something superficial, irrelevant to the spiritual life… [But] one of the ends for which sex was created was to symbolize to us the hidden things of God. One of the functions of human marriage is to express the nature of the union between Christ and the Church. We have no authority to take the living and semitive figures which God has painted on the canvas of our nature and shift them about as if they were mere geometrical figures… [God images himself as masculine because]…we are all, corporately and individually, feminine to Him.
…The male you could have escaped, for it exists only on the biological level. But the masculine none of us can escape. What is above and beyond all things is so masculine that we are all feminine in relation to it.
(Quotes from C.S. Lewis Essays Notes on the Way and That Hideous Strength.)
There’s a whole lot more to be said about the importance of accurate gender imagery and the importance of honoring and preserving masculine imagery for God. But I’ll leave it at that for now. Hopefully this post has alerted you to some popular false ways of thinking that are both insidious and dangerous. The nearly universal frothing of the Christian community over the Shack shows me how very much the philosophy of feminism has influenced even the Evangelical church.

Mary Kassian
April 17, 2009
Summary: Mary Kassian is a member of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. Mary is also the founder of Girls Gone Wise, an award winning author, internationally renowned speaker, and distinguished professor of Women’s Studies at Southern Baptist Seminary.

For more on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood visit : www.cbmw.com

A Sad Case of Parental Abdication

Proverbs opens with a father admonishing his son to hear and heed his parents’ instruction and seek the wisdom of God so that life in a fallen world will go well with him:
Hear, my son, your father’s instruction,
and forsake not your mother’s teaching,
for they are a graceful garland for your head
and pendants for your neck.
My son, if sinners entice you,
do not consent.
(Proverbs 1:8-10)

In the context of formative discipline, I recently explained to my six-year-old son that God gives parents to children as a means of protecting them from harmful theologies, from harmful ideologies, from harmful people, from harmful pursuits, from ten thousand sinful proclivities that strive for kingship over human hearts, all of which abound in our post-Genesis 3 world. God calls parents, said I, to exert wisdom and maturity in teaching their children how to live and make decisions until their little ones grow in wisdom and experience to a point at which they are capable of making sound decisions. This is a fundamental, irreducible aspect that is part and parcel to the ultra-difficult duty of being a parent: protection through a Godward reorientation of the mind.
But what happens when the parents fail (and none of us succeed perfectly) to carry out this critical aspect of parenting, what Martin Luther called a parents’ duty to “stand between his family and the world, the flesh and the devil?” Fox News recently reported on a tragic example of such parental abandonment out of Nebraska. This couple has not dropped their son at an orphanage, but they have abandoned him in a way that is potentially far more deadly:
A west Omaha couple says their 8-year-old son has asked for years to wear dresses and change his name, so they’re enrolling him in a new school where he can live openly as a girl The parents say their middle child is transgender, and he’s asked to be called girl since age 4.”One night she said, ‘Every night when I go to bed, I pray my inside will match my outside. But it never happens,”‘ the mother said, recalling a conversation with her child.
The couple’s response? They hired a therapist who works with “transgendered” people to help their little boy “transition” toward a new identity and life as a girl. Sadly, this little boy-and let’s bring this beyond the sad entanglement of personal pronouns, he is a boy-is being enrolled in a new public school as a girl.
This story presents an illustration of parental abdication of a most devious sort. Instead of applying mature wisdom to help this little boy to work through a difficult stage of life-as a boy- these parents are assisting their son in throwing off God’s good created order and embracing the deeply dark and sinful reality of gender self-identification, a reality that flies under the politically-correct, therapy-driven nomenclature of “transgendered.” Instead of pointing him to transcendent wisdom and a Gospel that liberates sinners from a deadly love of self that demands the right to absolute autonomy, this Nebraska couple is pushing their son-unwittingly, no doubt, for they likely see their motive as love-headlong toward death, toward what Solomon calls “the house of the adultress,” the residence of those who reject Gospel wisdom. If their son came to them and said, “I’m wrestling with alcoholism,” would they counsel him to merely embrace his dangerous and sinful addiction? They would not. But this is precisely what they are doing by teaching their son that gender is fluid and open to self-determination.
The parents of this boy must do the difficult work of warring against the principalities and powers that are battling for their child’s very soul. They must point him to God’s good design for gender, to a God whose wisdom is infinite, whose design is good and true and right (Genesis 1:27), who alone possesses grace and power to rescue an eight-year-old boy from gender confusion. They must tell their son, “My son, be attentive to my wisdom; incline your ear to my understanding, that you may keep discretion, and your lips may guard knowledge.” (Proverbs 5:1-2) We pray that they will eschew the unwise wisdom of secular therapists and embrace the Gospel wisdom of Solomon.

Jeff Robinson
June 10, 2009

For more visit: http://www.cbmw.org/

What Steers Your Life!!

When your life seems out of control, when things are not going your way, when sickness befalls you or a loved one…Consider What steers your life?

An unerring chart by which to steer
through the dangerous sea of life

God has placed His Word in our hands for an
intensely practical purpose—namely, to direct
our walk and to regulate our deportment. The
primary purpose for which God gave the Scriptures,
is to make a practical use of them—ordering the
details of our lives by its rules and regulations

“Your word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light
unto my path.” (Psalm 119:105). The metaphor
used here is taken from a man walking along a
dangerous road on a dark night, in urgent need
of a lantern to show him where to walk safely
and comfortably, to avoid injury and destruction.

God, in His infinite condescension and transcendent
grace, has given us His Word for this very purpose,
so that we need not stumble along blindly, ignorant
of what pleases or displeases Him—but that we might
know His mind. That divine Word is not given to us
simply for information, but . . .
to regulate our conduct,
to enlighten our minds, and
to mold our hearts.

The Word supplies us with an unerring chart by
which to steer through the dangerous sea of
life. If we sincerely and diligently follow, it will deliver
us from disastrous rocks and submerged reefs—and
direct us safely to the heavenly harbor. That Word
has all the instructions we need for every problem,
and every trouble we may be called upon to face.
That Word has been given to us “that the man of
God may be complete, equipped for every good
work” (2 Tim. 3:17). How thankful we should
be, that God has favored us with such a Word!

This world is a dark place, and it is only as we take
heed to the Word, to the light God has given us, that
we shall be able to perceive and avoid “the broad
road which leads to destruction,” and discern the
narrow way which alone “leads unto eternal life.”

Our first duty, and our first aim, must be to take up
the Scriptures to ascertain what is God’s revealed will
for us—what are the paths He forbids us to walk, what
are the ways pleasing in His sight.

The Scriptures are not given us, primarily, for our
intellectual gratification, nor for emotional admiration,
but for life’s regulation. Nor are the precepts and
commands, the warnings and encouragements
contained therein, simply for our information. They
are to be reduced to practice, they require unqualified
obedience. He who treasures the divine precepts in his
heart, and diligently seeks to walk by their rule, will
escape those evils which destroy his fellows.

Thus the great business of the Christian, is to regulate
his life by, and conform his conduct—to the precepts of
the written Word, and the example left us by the Incarnate
Word. As he does so, and in proportion as he does so, he is
emancipated from the darkness of his natural mind,
freed from the follies of his corrupt heart,
delivered from the mad course of this world,
and escapes the snares of the devil.
Arthur W. Pink, “The Attributes of God”
As found in Grace Gems

Consider Holiness through the Word of God

Several years ago, my husband preached a sermon based on Hebrews 10: 23-26 “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful; and let us “consider” how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near. For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment”. He took sometime to unpack the biblical definition of the word “consider”. The word” is transliterated as katanoeo (kat-an-o-eo) and is defined as: “to observe fully, such as behold, discover, consider and perceive.” So often in our culture today we use the word “consider” rather haphazardly as if only a sound bite, a second thought, a quick glance. This is certainly not what the author of Hebrews had in mind.

Look back on the context of the word: … and let us “consider” how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds. When was the last time you actually “considered” how to stimulate/motivate another towards love and good deeds? When was the last time you “considered” how to stir yourself to love and good deeds? If you are like most of us you have probably considered how to motivate yourself and maybe even your fellow Christians but not regularly or consistently.

Now let us read what the Psalmist shows us:

How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping {it} according to Your word.
With all my heart I have sought You; Do not let me wander from Your commandments
Your word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against You.
Blessed are You, O LORD; Teach me Your statutes
With my lips I have told of All the ordinances of Your mouth.
I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies, As much as in all riches
I will meditate on Your precepts And regard Your ways.
I shall delight in Your statutes; I shall not forget Your word.
Psalm 119: 9-16

What could be a more excellent way to stir each other up than by The Word of God?

Is the Word of God worthy of “consideration”? In scripture the Psalmists says yes!

Consider how to keep your way pure;
Consider how not to wander;
Consider how to hide The Word in your heart;
Consider regularly meditating on The Word;

*******************************************************************

The doctrines of Scripture . . .
come into the mind as knowledge,
produce peace and love in the heart,
and spread the beauties of holiness
over the character and conduct.

John Angell James

“For our gospel came to you not simply with
words, but also with power, with the Holy
Spirit and with deep conviction.” 1 Thes. 1:5

 

Blessed and Blameless in The Word…

Blessed and Blameless? What might a blessed and blameless life look like and how may we accomplish such a lofty goal? The Psalmist makes it seem almost elementary, you only need to walk in the Law of the Lord, keep His testimonies, seek Him with a whole heart and do no iniquity, be diligent and have a God that will not forsake you. Wow!

Let us look for a minute at how the Lord Jesus outlined a blessed individual. Looking at Matthew 5 verses 3-12. In what has come to be known as The Beatitudes and The Sermon on the Mount.

3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
5 “Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.
6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

7 “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
9 “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.
12 “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

The word traditionally translated into English as “blessed” is in the Greek “Makarios”. A more literal translation into contemporary English would be “glad indeed” or happy.

In Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount you will find a list of “woes” along side the “blessed” verses. To be blessed is to be blameless thus absent of woes.

24″But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full.
25 “Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.
26 “Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way. Luke 6:24-26

Being “glad indeed” or happy does not mean you will never suffer affliction or feel woeful. What it does mean is that you will have a peace through all that allows you to “Count it all joy” James 1:2.

Look around you. Everywhere people are seeking happiness and fulfillment in their lives. Are YOU seeking fulfillment? Do YOU want to be happy? Dear one, if you desire a happy and fulfilled life, you must seek Him who came “that you may have life and have it abundantly” John 10:10.

Several years ago Robert Schuller wrote a book called “The Be Happy Attitudes”, in this he attempted to outline some of the attitudes and lifestyles sought after by those wishing to be “Happy”. I propose for you today that you have no better guidebook for lifelong happiness then The Holy Bible.

The “Word of His grace” proclaims . . .
rest for the weary,
pardon to the guilty,
justification to the ungodly,
adoption to the outcast,
eternal heavenly treasures for spiritual paupers!
A.W. Pink

Video

Saying NO to President Obama

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