Worth Reading

Psalm 24

Do you come to our gathered worship service expecting God to speak to you through his Word? We encourage you to prayerfully read through the passage that will be preached prior to the service to help you prepare.

Does the Bible Support Slavery

A question we answered briefly last Sunday during the Q&A of our adult Sunday school class. This article includes links to others for further reading/study.

Call yourself a Christian? Start talking about Jesus Christ.

In Jesus’ last words before he ascended, he said we are to “make disciples of all nations.” Evangelism isn’t just one part of our calling. It is central to our calling. Jesus’ last words should be our first priority.

Don’t Waste Your Summer

... in a little over three months we’ll all be moaning, “Where did the summer go? I can’t believe it’s over.” So what can we do over the next hundred days or so to help alleviate that feeling of loss? Or to put it positively, what can we do to make the most of June, July, and August? Here are twenty suggestions. (In light of the previous article, perhaps we should add 21. Tell someone about Jesus)

WSC Q&A #73

Q: Which is the eighth commandment?
A: The eighth commandment is, Thou shall not steal.
Ephesians 4:28 Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. 

Star Meade makes an excellent point in Teaching Hearts, Training Minds concerning the eighth commandment. She says that really, the first four commandments teach us about not stealing from God. That's very true, isn't it? What are we doing when we worship false gods, worship God in a way that is not pleasing to him but rather is pleasing to us, use his name without the reverence it is due, or neglect to keep his sabbath? We are really stealing from God the glory, honor, obedience, and reverence that he is due, and we are failing to the love the LORD our God with all our heart, strength, soul, and mind.

But now, the eighth commandment talks about stealing from our fellow mankind. Remember that these last six commandments are all about instructing us on how to love our neighbor as ourselves. One way we do that is by respecting them, and respecting the things that belong to them. When we steal, we are really saying to someone, "You are not as valuable as me, therefore you do not deserve the things you have. They should be mine because I deserve them." This attitude is not an attitude of love. It's not an attitude of viewing others as valuable (or more valuable) than ourselves. So over the next several weeks, as usual, we'll explore the eighth commandment and see what outward actions and inward thoughts are at play here, and how this commandment helps us to see how we can love others as we love ourselves, and ultimately bring God glory. 

 

Worth Reading

Ruth 4:18-22

Do you come to our gathered worship service expecting God to speak to you through his Word? We encourage you to prayerfully read through the passage that will be preached prior to the service to help you prepare.

8 Reasons to Preach Through Books of the Bible

This may help you understand why this has been and will be the main practice at Proclamation:

While there’s no need to be dogmatic about this kind of sermon delivery, and while I think taking time for short topical sermon series or strategic “stand-alone” messages can be good and helpful, I do think it is generally wise for a pastor not just to preach expositionally, but to preach expositionally through entire books of the Bible. I think every preacher ought to endeavor to feed his flock this way. And here are eight reasons why:

The Prayers of One Faithful Lady Availeth Much

If reading this leads us all to pray more often and more fervently, it will certainly have been worth your time to read it:

One pastor named John Lessey, upon hearing that Moody was in town, begged him to preach in his pulpit on both Sunday morning and Sunday night. Reluctantly, Moody accepted the request of this pastor of a medium-sized congregation in London. The morning sermon did not go well. The people were not responsive. They were bored and didn’t want to be there. Moody, although disinclined to preach in the evening because of the incredible apathy he witnessed in the morning, decided to go ahead and keep his word. This time it was a whole different story. . .

An Encouragement to Serve Others

How often do we think, “I really should give that person a call,” but then get distracted or sidetracked, or we don’t feel like we have quite the right words to say?

WSC Q&A #72

Q: What does the seventh commandment forbid?
A: The seventh commandment forbids thinking, saying or doing anything impure.
Ephesians 5:3-4 But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.

Once again, I find Starr Meade's family devotional on the Westminster Shorter Catechism, "Teaching Hearts, Training Minds", particularly helpful this week. She does an excellent job at reminding us of why the seventh commandment forbids what it forbids:

When people break this commandment and commit adultery, they never do it suddenly, with no warning. People break this commandment because they have been thinking about what it would be like to break it. What we do always comes from what we have been thinking. God requires us to be pure in our thinking. That means that the things we put into our minds need to be pure things. Read Philippians 4:8. This verse describes the kinds of things with which we should fill our minds. We should choose the music we listen to, the books we read, and the television shows we watch based on how well this verse describes them. When we first see or hear something that we know is not pure, we do not like it and we think that it is wrong. The more we watch or listen, though, the less it bothers us. Instead of using God's Word to decide these things, we let the shows we watch and the music we hear tell us what is right and what is wrong.

I believe this is a right, and very challenging point to make. Sin, and not just adultery, flourishes when we set our minds and hearts on what is impure. Our outward actions come from what is inside of us. If we desire to live holy, pure lives, we must feed our hearts, minds, and souls with "whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely". 

Worth Reading

Ruth 4:13-17

Do you come to our gathered worship service expecting God to speak to you through his Word? We encourage you to prayerfully read through the passage that will be preached prior to the service to help you prepare.

3 Neglected Objects of Stewardship

When you look back to the recorded teachings of Jesus in Scripture, you find a surprising number of references to the subject of personal finance. That’s not because Jesus wants our money; it’s certainly not because He needs our money. It’s because Jesus is after our hearts, and He knows that the clearest window into what we truly love, desire and pursue is visible through our bank statements.

IS C.S. LEWIS’S LIAR-LORD-OR-LUNATIC ARGUMENT UNSOUND?

...So Lewis thinks it implausible that monotheistic Jews would have invented an incarnate Messiah and he thinks that the genre of the gospels bears none of the typical marks of legends—based upon a lifetime of scholarly and leisure reading of ancient legends. Therefore, the Jesus of the Bible is the Jesus of history. And if this one Jesus were not Lord, he would be a liar or a lunatic. But he is truthful (not a liar) and sane (not a lunatic). Therefore he is Lord.

or

...There is another alternative: perhaps the Jesus presented in the Bible is not the true Jesus of history. The Jesus of the Bible may not be a liar or a lunatic or a Lord but rather a legend. In other words, the Jesus of the Bible is not the Jesus of history, so your claims about what must be trust about the Jesus of the Bible do not lead to conclusions about the actual lordship of the Jesus of history.

But C. S. Lewis can help with the rebuttal here. . .

You Need the Local Church to Be Healthy

When I first began to follow Jesus, there were things that I began to understand well. . . One of the things it took me a long time to fully understand was how central the church was to what God was doing. . .

There is no good, healthy, regular pattern of the Christian life if you are not joined with a local church — if you are not in covenant with other Christians.