Preaching and Prayer
Making preaching and teaching a priority doesn’t mean devoting hours and hours to the study, it will mean some of that, but it also means meeting with the people, knowing them, knowing the pressures that they face, the temptations and pressures they feel and their spiritual temperature, so that preaching can be done well and relevantly and applicably to those God has called me to preach to, It’s not being an academic, it’s not being hidden behind a towering pile of commentaries. It is working hard to exegete both the word of God and the people of God.
I try to use the summer time to stop and take stock of where I am and where we are. As I do it’s always helpful to return to first things. Specifically what need to be the first things in my diary on a week to week basis, what are the priorities that we determine the reality of day to day ministry.
There is always lots to do and the good is often the enemy of the best. And so it’s been helpful to sit and try to weigh up this week does my diary reflect what ought to be my priorities in ministry. Acts 6 gives us a bit of a template when we look at the Apostles priorities when faced with the danger of distraction with good ministry but not the most necessary ministry.
There twin priorities were prayer and the teaching of the word. And they acted wisely in engaging others to take on the serving of tables – a good and necessary outworking of the gospel.
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Moved
The Bible is full, complete revelation of God. Inspiration is the activity of God by which He superintended the reception and communication of His message, even in the specific words used, while still allowing for the style and personality of each writer, with the result being the Word of God.
For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. (2 Peter 1:21 KJV)
For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:21 ESV)
21 For not by will of man was borne at some or other prophecy but by spirit holy being borne spoke the holy of God men. (2 Peter 1:21 The Apostolic Bible Polyglot)
21 οὐ γὰρ θελήματι ἀνθρώπου ἠνέχθη προφητεία ποτέ, ἀλλʼ ὑπὸ πνεύματος ἁγίου φερόμενοι ἐλάλησαν ἀπὸ θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι. 2 Peter 1:21 (NA28)
21 Not for the will of man was brought forth prophecy at any time, but men by the Holy Spirit being brought spoke from God. (2 Peter 1:21 translated from the NA28 Greek text)
It is vital that we “get it” that without the foundation of the inspiration of Scripture, all we have is human subjectivity as the basis for truth and that opens the door to the mindset of “anything goes.” We see this with heretics. We see this in liberal churches and denominations. As soon as they drop the Bible as the authoritative Word of God then all sorts of heresies creep in and it isn’t long before all these people stand for has about as much substance as malformed jello. Several years ago my good friend in the Lord, Chris Rosebrough, debated Emergent leader Doug Pagitt on the doctrine of Hell. I wrote this post back then as a response to that debate. I am reposting it now because it is still pertinent to what we are studying. There are still false Christian leaders who are teaching doctrinal fallacies leading people astray. As I listened to the debate what I marveled at most was the patience of our brother Chris in dealing with the absolute indefiniteness of Pagitt on all topics pertaining to how we know what is truth. It was a bit like trying to nail that malformed jello to a tree in a stiff breeze. In any case, what did we expect? I mean, Pagitt is a heretic. He isn’t a Christian.
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Our Problem Isn’t Simply “Racism,” It’s “Otherism”
Written by J. Warner Wallace |
Friday, November 25, 2022
All of us favor “our own”. There are “otherists” in every profession, organization and social group. Wherever there are people, you’ll find this kind of behavior, although our “otherism” will probably be expressed differently depending on the group, situation or historical context. Racism is perhaps the simplest form of “otherism” because it is based on the most obvious feature each of us possesses: our physical appearance. But make no mistake about it, the real problem, the root problem, is far more troubling. “Otherism” can employ nearly any distinctive feature we possess as the impetus for bias and favoritism. Knock down one reason to divide from one another and another can be easily be pressed into service. We do it all the time.Several years ago at a memorial service held for the ambushed police officers in Dallas, Texas, the President said, “Faced with this violence, we wonder if the divides of race in America can ever be bridged. We wonder if an African-American community that feels unfairly targeted by police, and police departments that feel unfairly maligned for doing their jobs, can ever understand each other’s experience.” In the years that followed, the division only seems worse. Few would argue that we are increasingly divided as a nation, and many identify race as the basis of this division. But racism is simply the expeditious term we apply to a much more common and troubling experience: as humans, our problem isn’t simply racism, it’s what I call “otherism”.
I noticed it many years ago when my German in-laws expressed an interest in my profession as a police officer. One of them asked me what kind of pistol my agency issued. I told him we carried a Glock Model 21. He immediately winced and said, “Ugh, that’s an Austrian gun.” Mind you, this relative was born and raised in Southern Germany, less than one hundred miles from the Austrian border. When I visited the region, many years earlier, I couldn’t tell any difference between the southern Germans and the northern Austrians I met. From my perspective, these two groups looked the same, sounded the same, ate virtually the same food, and lived in the same region of Europe. For all intents and purposes, these two groups should find much around which they could identify and unify, but the line on the ground had become an excuse for division; a way for each group to identify (and separate from) the “other”.
Years later, while serving on our agency’s gang detail, I saw something similar occurring between “cliques” of gangsters in Los Angeles County. Young men of the same race, ethnicity, socio-economic status and region went out of their way to separate from one another, even though they had so much in common. They wore different colors to amplify their sense of “otherness”. They would even kill each other based on the colors they wore, even though without these clothing distinctions, they couldn’t tell each other apart.
Our innate “otherism” (our desire to separate from one another in any way possible) is so deeply rooted that even if every man on the planet was physically identical to every other man (and every woman identical to every other woman), we’d still find some way to separate from one another. Perhaps all the people who live at an even address would express a bias against those who live at an odd address. As crazy as that sounds, our “otherism” is that hardwired into our fallen human nature. In fact, there is a growing body of scientific research demonstrating this “otherist” predisposition.
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Can I Lose My Salvation? (The Doctrine of Perseverance)
It’s Christ’s Word that warns, guides, teaches, and encourages us as we persevere in faith. We may think of Peter, who, after having fallen away for a time, was restored to Christ on the strength of His truth spoken to him (John 21:15–17). If we wish to endure, it’s imperative we become children of the Word. And so, we look to Christ. We listen to His Word. And finally, we situate ourselves among His people.
Few things burden the Christian more than when a person who once professed Christ wanders from the Gospel. If you take inventory of your own experience, you may come up with a list of names of those who once mentored you in the faith, led your church in worship on Sundays, or even taught the Bible to you yet ultimately (it seems) left the faith. Tragically, the world is filled with people who once apparently walked the path of obedience but didn’t continue on it.
This phenomenon isn’t new. The author of Hebrews warned those to whom he wrote against matters like drifting, rebellion, and disobedience (Heb. 2:1; 3:16). He even at times presented these warnings in conditional terms: “We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end” (Heb. 3:14).
When it comes to the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, we must recognize that these warnings in Hebrews are real warnings, directed toward Christians. There’s no sense in which they are to be ignored on the basis of self-proclaimed security. Instead, as Sinclair Ferguson notes, “the New Testament warns us by precept and example that some professing Christians may not persevere in their profession of Christ to the end of their lives.”1
We must be careful that we don’t grow careless or prideful when it comes to persevering in the faith. In fact, the doctrine should produce in us a careful urgency to heed the biblical warnings concerning apostasy. When we come to the Scriptures, we discover that the perseverance of God’s people in their salvation is a truth that is biblical, practical, and Christ-centered.
A Biblical Doctrine
What do we mean when we talk about the doctrine of perseverance? Louis Berkhof gives a helpful definition, describing it as “that continuous operation of the Holy Spirit in the believer, by which the work of divine grace that is begun in the heart, is continued and brought to completion.”2 Strictly speaking, perseverance has more to do with God’s work than with our own. It’s because God perseveres in His love for us that we’re able to continue in our love for Him. A more apt name for this doctrine, in fact, might be the preservation of the saints. God preserves, keeps, and guards His people.
With the definition in mind, we can locate the doctrine all throughout Scripture. Indeed, the Bible emphasizes the absolute certainty of the believer’s preservation. The opening verses of 1 Peter are among the clearest on the matter:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:3–5)
Three truths concerning God’s preservation of the saints arise from this passage.
First, God “has caused us to be born again” (v. 3).
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