And The Answer Is....

Here is a question that begs to be answered by each of us as we prepare to leave our homes on Sunday. Why am I going to church today?

What would be your response?

posted by john d.

The Wolf As The Door?

"For there are many who are insubordinate, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision party. They must be silenced, since they are upsetting whole families by teaching for shameful gain what they ought not to teach." (Titus 1:10-11 KJV)

For the less Elizabethan inclined the CEV - Contemporary English Version - states, "There are many who don't respect authority, and they fool others by talking nonsense. This is especially true of some Jewish followers. But you must make them be quiet. They are after money, and they upset whole families by teaching what they should not."

Paul sermon to the Ephesians included this warning, " I know that after I am gone, others will come like fierce wolves to attack you. Some of your own people will tell lies to win over the Lord's followers. Be on your guard!..." (Acts 20:29-31 CEV).

To place my posting of these biblical texts in the context of this blog you need to read Dr. John MacArthur's latest message titled 'Unholy Trinity' at the Shepherds Fellowship site which is available by clicking here .

Here are my thoughts concerning Dr. MacArthur's comments:

What can we do as orthodox, biblically sound Christians, to counter-act those heresies identified by Dr. MacArthur? Specifically what can we do as a church and as an individual believer in the Truth of the Word of God? Even when the pulpit preaches the Truth there are few that are paying attention and those outside can't hear it.

Even in our small community we have churches that are proclaiming the "health-and -wealth" gospel. There are locally available faith healers that can't heal; prophets who can't deliver on the message, etc. We have locally prosperity preachers who fleece the flock of Christ by offering everything now, contrary to Jesus' call to "taking up His cross". And there are those who preached a "works salvation" contrary to the Gospel of Grace and others who disdain the message of the gospel altogether by ordaining biblically unauthorized pastors. In our small town we even have a "Temple of Gaya" which worships the earth promoting hyper-environmentalism including it's twisted step-children such as the current climate change hysteria which is rapidly warping into population control.

So my question is, what can we, as individual biblical Christians, do to promote true Biblical Truth as evidenced in the Gospel of Christ? Can we do better than what we are doing now? How?

These are my thoughts, what are yours?

posted by john d.

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

“Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher;

“Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

What profit has a man from all his labor

In which he toils under the sun?

One generation passes away, and another generation comes;

But the earth abides forever.

The sun also rises, and the sun goes down,

And hastens to the place where it arose.

The wind goes toward the south,

And turns around to the north;

The wind whirls about continually,

And comes again on its circuit.

All the rivers run into the sea,

Yet the sea is not full;

To the place from which the rivers come,

There they return again.

All things are full of labor;

Man cannot express it.

The eye is not satisfied with seeing,

Nor the ear filled with hearing.

That which has been is what will be,

That which is done is what will be done,

And there is nothing new under the sun.

Is there anything of which it may be said,

“See, this is new”? It has already been in ancient times before us.

There is no remembrance of former things,

Nor will there be any remembrance of things that are to come

By those who will come after.

“Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher;

“Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

posted by john d.

SPURGEON’S PRACTICAL WISDOM - On More Spending

I suppose we all find the money goes quite fast enough, but after all is was made to circulate, and there’s no use in hoarding it. It is bad to see our money become a runaway servant, and leave us, but it would be worse to have it stop with us and become our master. We should try, as our minister says, ‘to find the golden mean’, and neither be lavish nor stingy. He has his money best spent who has the best wife. The husband may earn money, but only the wife can save it. “A wise women buildeth her house, but the foolish plucketh it down with here hands’. The wife it seems, according to Solomon, is the builder or the real puller downer. A man cannot prosper till he gets his wife’s leave. A thrifty housewife is better than a great income. A good wife and health are a man’s best wealth. Bless their hearts, what should we do without them? It is said they like to have their own way, but then the proverb says, a wife ought to have her will during life, because she cannot make one when she dies. The weather is so melting that I cannot keep up this talk any longer, and therefore I shall close with an old-fashioned rhyme-

Heaven bless the wives, they fill our hives-

With little bees and honey!

They soothe life’s shocks, they mend our socks-

But don’t they spend the money!

posted by Delores D.

SPURGEON’S PRACTICAL WISDOM On Spending

As soon as the spendthrift gets his estate it goes like a lump of butter in a greyhound’s mouth. All his days are the first of April; he would buy an elephant at a bargain, or thatch his house with pancakes, nothing is too foolish to tickle his fancy; his money burns holes in his pocket, and he must squander it, all the while boasting that his motto is, ‘Spend, and God will send.’ He will not stay till he has his sheep before he shears them; he forestalls his income, draws upon his capital, and so kills the goose which lays the golden eggs, and cries out, ‘Who would have thought it?’ He never spares at the brim, but he means, he says to save at the bottom. He borrows at high interest of Rob’em, Cheat’em, and Sell’em-up, and when gets cleaned out, he lays it all upon lawyers or else on the bad times.

posted by Delores D.

More MLJ

Regarding trials in the Christian life:

Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.

1 Peter 1:6,7

There is a superficial view of Christianity which would regard (trials and temptations) as quite impossible, the kind of view of the Christian life which simply says that all the problems have gone and now 'I am happy all the day'. Such people cannot accept Peter's description for a moment and would say of any Christian who is 'in heaviness' that it is doubtful whether he is a Christian at all. There is that teaching concerning the Christian life which gives the impression that once one has arrived at a decision, or once one has been converted, there are no more troubles, no ripples on the sea of life. Everything is perfect and there are no problems whatsoever. Now the simple answer to that view is that it is not New Testament Christianity. That is the kind of thing which the cults have always offered and which modern psychology is also offering.

...we must look at the Christian life in this way. We are walking through this world under the eye of our heavenly Father. That is the fundamental thing, the Christian must think of himself as in a peculiar relationship to God. This is not true of anyone who is not a Christian. There is a very definite plan and purpose for the whole of my life, God has looked upon me, God has adopted me and put me into His family. What for? In order that He may bring me to perfection. That is His objective - 'that you may be made (more and more) conformable to the image of His dear Son'. That is what He is doing. The Lord Jesus Christ is bringing many sons unto God, saying: 'Behold I and the children that Thou hast given me'. If we do not start with that fundamental conception of ourselves as Christians, we are bound to go astray, and we are certain to misunderstand these things.

The doctrine of the Scriptures is, at the very lowest, that God permits these things to happen to us. I go further, God at times orders these things to happen to us for our good. He may do it sometimes in order to chastise us. He chastises us for our slackness and for our failure. We were looking in the previous chapter at the failure of the Christian to discipline himself. Peter exhorts the Christians to discipline themselves, to add to their faith, to furnish out their faith, not merely to be content with a bare minimum but to let it be a full-orbed faith. We may not pay heed to that exhortation, we may persist in our slackness and in our indolence. Well, as I understand the New Testament doctrine, if we do that we must not be surprised if things begin to happen to us. We must not be surprised if God begins to chastise us. The argument in Hebrews 12 is as strong as this: 'Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth'. If you have not known chastisement I doubt whether you have ever been a Christian. If you can say that since you have believed you have never had any trouble at all, your experience is probably psychological and not spiritual. There is a realism about Christianity, as I said at the beginning and it goes so far as to teach that God, for our good, will chastise us if we pay no heed to the exhortations and the appeals of the Scripture. God has other methods also. He does not do these things to those who are outside the family, but if they are His children He will chastise them for their own good. So we may be experiencing manifold trials as part of our chastisement. I am not saying it is inevitable, I say it may be so.


From the book "Spiritual Depression, Its Causes and Cure" by Martin Lloyd-Jones. Published in Great Britain by Pickering Publishers, 1965 (pgs. 219-220 and 224-225).

posted by john d.

To Be "Missional"

The following was gleaned from the Berean Missional Church located in St. Paul. I thought their concept of missions was good so I'll pass it along. I especially like their emphasis upon a "...call away from our personal interest and toward others."

The term "Missional" refers to a God-centered, holistic understanding of the Great Commission. This idea is also seen in Christ's charge to His disciples: ". . . As the Father has sent me, I also send you" (John 20:21b). The implications of the mission's mandate for us are derived directly from the Trinitarian nature of God - Jesus sends us just as the Father sent Him (John 20:21-22). This emphasis causes Missional church members to see the church corporately and each individual as the instrument to fulfill God's mission.

As an example, the "Missional" church will embrace an understanding of participating in the mission of God as a call for every individual Christian to leave their place of security, and to travel to the place where others are. Missions, then, is always in the direction of the other, and away from ourselves. Some may take the imperative "Go" (Matt. 28:19) as a call to go overseas. Others may see the full God-centered "Missional" implication in that it is a call to "Go" to those in their own societies and overseas. In any event, it is a call away from our personal interests and toward others. The leaders of Berean Missional Church understand that our purpose is not to rework programs, but to rediscover our mission as the body of Christ. In short, we must become "Missional."

From the BMC website located at : http://www.bemissional.org/index.html

posted by john d.