New Year Preparation

 

From the Pastor:

Happy New Year!

For most, if not all of you, this mailout will arrive just before the new year begins. That’s good news because you will be ready to begin our new bible reading plan for the year and you will be able to prepare for the new sermon series starting this Sunday in the book of Romans. The Bible reading plan that we will begin this year is a two-year plan designed to slowly take the reader through the entire Bible in that time span while also reading either a Psalm or portion of Proverbs daily. This plan even has built in “catch-up” days in case you find yourself falling behind in your reading. I think this plan will be great for us to begin this year because it is slower paced than plans we have tried in the past, which allows the reader to spend time reading the Holy Scriptures at a more contemplative pace. Let me also encourage you to spend time in daily prayer either before or after you have spent time reading God’s Word. Scripture reading and prayer are two of the most important spiritual disciplines that the Christian must devote time to each and every day, and as your Pastor I want to provide you with the ability and the encouragement to accomplish these important tasks every day.

Secondly, let me encourage all of you that are able to join us this Sunday either in person or on the radio as I begin our new sermon series on Paul’s letter to the church at Roman. Romans is one of the most important books in all of the Bible because it explains to us the fullness of the doctrine of salvation in Jesus Christ by faith alone, while also providing us with the practical knowledge of how we are to live as Sons and Daughters of our Heavenly Father. Romans is a rich letter from beginning to end, and I pray that it will help us to not only grow in our knowledge of God, but also that it would aid us in growing in our worship, obedience, and discipleship as we take the time to examine this great letter of the Apostle Paul inspired by the Holy Spirit for the purpose of building up the body of Christ.

Lastly, I am incredibly thankful for each and every one of you and the blessing that you have been to my family and I this past year. Lord willing, come April of 2021 it will be four years since the Lord brought me here to serve as pastor of this local church body. The time has passed quickly, but the Lord has been faithful every second of every day, just like He always is. We have had the privilege of adding to our faith family in this past year through baptism as well as others joining us by letter and statement of faith. Through all of the ups and downs of 2020 I am most thankful that God has shown himself to be ever-faithful no matter what may befall us. Of course, we know this to be the case, but to see him constantly reassuring us of this reality time and time again displays how great of a Heavenly Father he truly is. May God bless us in 2021 and may He continue to grow this local body of believers in number and in faith. Sola Deo Gloria!

Anticipation

 

From the Pastor:

Luke 2:29-32

Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, according to Your word;

For my eyes have seen Your salvation which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,

A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of Your people Israel.

 

Anticipation is a huge part of the Christmas season. We anticipate time with loved ones. We anticipate all the good food we will get to indulge in. We, of course, anticipate the gifts that we will receive. But there is another anticipation that Christians should also be considering during this time, and that is the anticipation of the Lord’s return and the completion of His plan of redemption which will be experienced in the culmination of God’s Kingdom here on earth. Anticipating for that joyous occasion is what Christmas is really building towards. It’s not just about remembering what Christ has done, but it is looking forward to what He will do in the future. One of my favorite texts that highpoints the anticipation we should be feeling is the statement above made by Simeon at the circumcision of Jesus.

Simeon himself had been anticipating the time in which he would lay his eyes on the Lord’s Christ because God through the Holy Spirit had promised him that he would. Now, we do not know when the Lord had made this promise to Simeon and we do not know how long he may have waited for the fulfillment of this promise, but even if it had only been one day in advance could you imagine the anticipation of such an amazing promise made to you? I will confess here that at least on one occasion, and my sisters think there were more, I vomited (not a lovely picture I know) in nervous anticipation of Christmas morning the night before. I literally was so full of nerves and excitement that I could not contain it. Even to this day I am terrible at waiting for such events. I get nervous and restless to the point where it is almost overwhelming. So, I could not imagine the level of anticipation Simeon must have felt waiting to see the Christ.

Then the time came. Whatever Simeon may have been expecting, when the moment came the Spirit filled him with such fullness that holding the eight day old Jesus in his arms overflowed in this glorious confession. Simeon was made aware that this child he was holding was the savior of the world. That the Christ, the Messiah, had come not just to redeem his kinsmen, but to even awaken the Gentiles to their need of saving grace through the Light of revelation that was accomplished through the person and work of Jesus. God used Simeon’s great anticipation to reveal to all that were there that this child was no ordinary baby. He would continue in the verses following this text and state that even through difficulty, opposition, and even heart break this Child would save His people. A people that would be from every tribe, tongue, and nation on the planet He Himself spoke into existence. A people He had created from the dirt and breathed the breath of life into. A people that had forsaken Him, but that He would not abandon.

This week as you anticipate time with family, food, presents, and all the accompaniments of the Christmas season, anticipate the fulfillment of the salvation of Christ. Look forward in hope, joy, and love to the coming of Christ. Pray that He would return quickly to establish His everlasting kingdom here on this earth, so that the joy of His first coming would be overwhelmed by the glory of His second coming. God bless you all and Merry Christmas!

Joy to the World

 

From the Pastor:

Psalm 98

A Psalm.

Oh, sing to the LORD a new song!

For He has done marvelous things;

His right hand and His holy arm have gained Him the victory.

The LORD has made known His salvation;

His righteousness He has revealed in the sight of the nations.

He has remembered His mercy and His faithfulness to the house of Israel;

All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.

Shout joyfully to the LORD, all the earth;

Break forth in song, rejoice, and sing praises.

Sing to the LORD with the harp,

With the harp and the sound of a psalm,

With trumpets and the sound of a horn;

Shout joyfully before the LORD, the King.

Let the sea roar, and all its fullness,

The world and those who dwell in it;

Let the rivers clap their hands;

Let the hills be joyful together before the LORD,

For He is coming to judge the earth.

With righteousness He shall judge the world,

And the peoples with equity.

 

The Psalm above was the main the text used by Isaac Watts when he penned his famous hymn, “Joy to the World.” A hymn celebrating the coming of the one true King of the nations. We mostly associate this hymn with the Christmas season, but that is not believed to be Watts’s original intent. However, the hymn certainly strikes the right tone and tenor when we think of the Christmas season and the hope, joy, and love that the coming of Christ stirs us in the hearts of those who know him to be their savior and Lord. From the very first verse of his hymn, Watts states that “Let every heart prepare Him room.” In other words, it is the duty of all men and women and everywhere to submit their hearts to the Lordship of Christ because He alone posses the authority to sit on the throne of our hearts. Christ is the one and only King, and it is the obligation of all men to receive him as such. From there Watts also follows the Psalmist in prompting us to sing with joy the amazing revelation of the coming of the King. We should indeed celebrate that Christ has come, and not only in this season, but in all seasons. That’s why the third verse of Watts’s great hymn is probably my favorite…

No more let sins and sorrows grow,

Nor thorns infest the ground;

He comes to make His blessings flow

Far as the curse is found,

Far as the curse is found,

Far as, far as the curse is found.

Why is it that Christ should be celebrated and praised as our one true King? Because He alone has removed the curse that condemned sinners from the very moment our first parents fell in the Garden. Christ came and became a curse for us, so that the effects of the fall could be overcome, and one day the results of the curse will be totally reversed. When Christ comes again He will not only our fleshly bodies, but He will also renew the earth and everything in it. Nor more will the creation suffer from sins reign. Christ will rule and reign on the new earth as all peoples from every tribe, tongue, and nation sing praises of joy and adoration to the King.

The Preaching Lab Podcast

I have a podcast with a few Pastor friends. Check out our latest episode. Subscribe, rate (5 stars!), and leave us a comment about the podcast. 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-preaching-lab/id1436735773

Beginning Advent - Hope

 Sunday, November 29, was the first Sunday of Advent and the sermon focused on the hope of the second Advent of Christ because of the certainty of his first Advent. That is why this week's devotion to the church builds on the message of Hope. Enjoy... 

From the Pastor:

1 Peter 3:15-16

But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear; having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed.

Hope is a very powerful tool. Hope can give an underdog the motivation to compete against the favorite. Hope can help us overcome our fears in moments of distress. Hope can help us see through the darkest of times to find the light at the end of the tunnel. Hope can drive us to achieve way more than what we thought possible due to limitations placed on us by ourselves or others. It truly is amazing what hope can do in the life of an individual. And yet, when the Bible speaks of hope, it’s not talking about a basely optimism summoned up from our own wishes or dreams of personal or group achievement. No, Biblical hope is a trust in the foundational promises of God that are rooted in His never-changing character that are sure and consistent because they have been proven true time and time again. That is the Hope of the Christian, and the hope we want to consider this week.

In our text above, Peter is writing to believers that have been spread out due to persecution because of the Gospel of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. In this first of two epistles written to these believers, Peter is wanting to encourage them in the Gospel to keep on persevering even in the midst of their difficulties. He has directed their eyes to Christ from the beginning of the letter so that they would see themselves as a people “born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” (1:3) And as they fix their eyes on Christ this living hope would change their minds and prepare them to live as God’s holy and precious people in the midst of a hopeless world where their lives and behaviors would appear strange and alien to those around them. Then as they live this way inside of their jobs, families, and everyday lives nonbelieving people would begin to take notice, and while it may lead to more persecution in some situations, it would also serve as a testament of Christ’s sufferings for his people being the source of the willingness of his people to suffer hopefully and joyfully for His Name.

Christians should live lives that make the nonbelieving world around them take notice. The nonbelieving world should see a people dedicated to holiness, love, joy, and hope that can only come from a transcendent God. Why? Because nonbelievers think that there is little to no meaning in a world that’s simply the product of cosmic chaos. And how could there be meaning in a world where everything is decided by chance, luck, or happenstance? How could anyone take responsibility or joy for what happens to them when its just a product of being in the “right place at the right time” or benefitting from one’s perceived privilege because of their fortuitous birth.

As Christians we reject these notions because they do not honor the Sovereign God that has created the world and everything in it. This type of thinking also denies human beings any real responsibility to live in such a way that benefits others around us and rises our neighbors and society up from its constant struggle with sin and its own fallenness. To the contrary notions of the world, Christians are called to live hope-filled lives that are distinct and different. We ground all of understanding for life in the truth claims of the Bible and live joyful, thankful, and full lives based on these foundational truths. Then, when others ask why we live so differently in such dark days, we tell them of the light of the Gospel, Jesus Christ the Lord. And when they slander us or mock us for living in such a way or claiming to live by such foolish truth claims in their own eyes, their own words come back on them because our commitment to truth proves not only what we believe, but displays the inconsistencies of the secular mind and its humanistic worldview. Our Hope is Christ, and He is all the hope we need.

Fighting for Truth

 Christians must be Truth Seekers and Truth Speakers. FULL STOP! We must be a people that seek to understand the truth claims of others and their positions so that we can rightly understand their arguments. We must search out the Scriptures, the Sciences, historical claims, and all the rest to make sure that what then speak out for or against is true or can be rightly defended as the truest claims. This also means we must not create "straw men" of our opponents' positions, revert to ad hominem attacks, or fall into the trap of other logical fallacies, when depicting or arguing against what others might be putting forward. I state this because how we Speak about the truth and truth claims of others also reveals how dedicated one is to truth. We do not get to falsify other people because we believe their claims are false. We must be dedicated to seeking and speaking the truth at all times for the sake of rightly representing morality and the Christian ethic to all people.

You see Christians believe in absolute, universal, transcendent truth. Therefore, we must behave accordingly. We make no apologies for this either. NONE! We believe that God made the world and everything in it by speaking it into existence, because only He possess the power and authority to do so. We believe that He created this world in 6 literal days as a display of His power and creativity. We believe that He made everything GOOD when He made every living thing. And we believe these truth claims are the foundational truth claims of Biblical Christianity. One cannot ignore the first truth claims of the Bible and then desire to believe other parts of the book. The whole logic of the Holy Scriptures begins with the Truth claim that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." To get to sin, covenant, law, miracles, and most importantly, redemption, one must see the collective truth claims of the Bible in their total cohesion and unity to rightly understand the fullness of the story that spans the 66 books in both the Old and New Testaments. By the time one makes it to John's Gospel and reads Pilate utter the words "What is truth?" while looking Christ in the eyes trying to decide what to do with him, you should realize that this is more than just a climatic scene in a short narrative, but this is the question EVERY observer of life must ask of the Holy Scriptures and its Savior ultimately. Yet, let me digress for a moment and deal with more practical matters concerning Christians and their dedication to Truth Seeking and Speaking. 

We are still coming out of the haze of a recent election where an overwhelming number of people went to the polls, or to their mail-box, and voted in historic numbers for the President of the United States of America. Now in this election, like all the others in my life-time, there were claims made by each side that lacked truth. Perhaps in some situations they were all out lies! But politicians and their surrogates lying or manipulating truth is about as surprising as turkey and dressing at Thanksgiving. Its more expected than not, and the only true hope is it better be good! If one is at least directionally true in a sense, their perspective might be more valued than one who is outstandingly false in their words or writing. Yet, because confidence in media, politician, and the foundational systems of our country are at an all time low, at least this is what we are told by pollsters that also seem to have a truth telling problem, there doesn't seem to be any place for truth at all. (Apologies to David Wells for borrowing the title of his book "No Place for Truth") Add all of this to the skepticism of the Covid-19 crisis and how different states, counties, and municipalities have handled it, and you get a recipe for misinformation, conspiracy theories, and all out deniers of anything claimed by the media at all. And let me be clear, this is not good for society or culture at large because when no one is trusted and skepticism rules the day it makes it that much harder for Christians to make the important claims that our faith, the one true faith given to the Saints, must make to a blind and deaf world. 

To demonstrate my point, I was at a basketball game recently watching one of my children play. Now, I will openly admit I love sports to a degree that might not always be beneficial, and especially when the Arkansas Razorbacks are playing anything versus anyone. However, at this particular game I was really bothered when the rules of the game were not properly applied in a crucial situation. Yes, there are times in sports where an official or umpire might make a judgment call that I disagree with, this happens all the times in sports when fans and players are more emotionally invested than the referees and perspectives can be blinding, but a rule being applied and followed is not the same as a judgment call. Even umpires, officials, or judges deciding a case are not free to ignore, misapply, or create new rules in the middle of a contest or anything else because this affects the fairness of the game or situation overall. In other words, when truth becomes relative in one aspect of life, you can expect that it will become relative in other places as well. One must believe in absolute truth because without them nothing in life can be rightly adjudicated or evaluated according to any accepted standard whatsoever, and as my example shows this goes for all of life. 

This is why fighting for truth must be the mentality and commitment of the Christian. We must fight for truth at home, at work, at church, and everywhere else we engage others. We must seek the truth when we read claims made by others or hear facts spoken. Then, when we speak, or share materials on social media, we must only speak the truth. Yes, as Christians, we have an obligation to speak the truth in love and not use it as means to belittling those who disagree with us. Truth is not a blunt force object to put our opponents in their place, Truth is a promise to live by and a joy to share. Christians must be Truth Seekers and Truth Speakers. We cannot compromise for any reason to this commitment. Nothing is worth sacrificing truth for and Christians must lead the way in this noble pursuit. 

In Everything Give Thanks

 

From the Pastor:

1 Thessalonians 5:14-18

Now we exhort you, brethren, warn those who are unruly, comfort the fainthearted, uphold the weak, be patient with all. See that no one renders evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good both for yourselves and for all. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

The verses above are greatly beneficial to the church at all times, but especially in the midst of difficult ones. They teach us that regardless of our circumstances we are able to show kindness, goodness, rejoicing, and give thanks. Of course, we need to be taught these important lessons, because all too often we let our circumstances, or the events of the day, to manipulate our emotions into refusing to do what God’s Word commands us to do, and instead we give into sin. Instead of showing kindness, we are harsh. Rather than pursuing good, we reply with an intention to hurt. We do not rejoice and give thanks in the midst of trials, but rather we feel like we’ve not been given a fair deal and question the goodness of God. All of these instructions matter all the more when we have endured a year like this year. Many of us have said goodbye to dear loved ones this year. We’ve felt isolate, alone, and afraid. Covid has dominated our minds and the headlines, along with election concerns, and claims that all types of “existential threats” exist right outside our front doors. Anyone would seem justified in feeling overwhelmed, scared, and timid about life going forward.

However, Christians do not see the world the way that unbelievers and sceptics do. We understand that living in a fallen world comes with all types of difficulties and trials. Some of those trials come in the form of viruses and diseases. Some of those trials come in the form of persecutions. Some of those trials come in the form of the loss of loved ones. And in even more subtle terms some of those trials come in the form of perceived unfairness or unkindness from others. Yet, as believers in the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ we know that we are only strangers and aliens in this present world, and that our true home is a place still unseen by human eyes whose builder and maker is God. That’s why we are able to endure all things that a fallen world and fallen people can throw at us, not to mention the sins that are a product of our own disobedience, because our hope is not in this world or the people of this world. Our hope is in Christ and his righteousness. Our hope is in the fact that in Him we can live free and thankful. In him we can endure all things because His amazing love works in us through all of the circumstances of life for our good and His glory. We know that in life and even in death nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Therefore, be thankful this week and everyday the Lord gives you because His goodness and love surpasses all the heartache and brokenness of this fallen world.