Life is Long, Life is Short

So teach us to number our days, that we may get a heart of wisdom. (Psalm 90:12)

Encouragement for disciplers in God's church:

Life is long - so be patient as you minister to people. Don't put yourself under pressure to teach everything there is to know in a single sermon, or fix all of someone's problems overnight. You are likely just one factor among many in an individual's spiritual life and growth. In most cases God began His work in someone before bringing them your way, and in most cases God will continue His work in someone after moving them on from your influence. One plants, another waters, but God causes the growth. 

At the same time...

Life is short - so maintain a sense of urgency as you prepare people for eternity. You never know how long someone will be in your life. God in His grace can use your momentary influence to change an individual for eternity! Life is a vapor. Your speaking God's truth to someone today may be vital.

May the Lord give us wisdom and grace as we minister in light of these two realities.

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Kevin DeYoung and Shane and Shane at Five Points Community Church

I'm grateful for Five Points Community Church in Auburn Hills, MI. Their elders are examples of faithful ministry and their church is known in southeast Michigan for their clarity and passion in proclaiming Christ. Another reason I'm grateful for them is because they regularly serve area churches by making good resources available. For example, they recently hosted a conference on adoption that some members of our church really appreciated and benefited from. In about a month or so, Five Points is hosting a one day seminar on preaching entitled Preaching Christ: The Pastor as Herald of the Gospel. The speakers are Kevin DeYoung, Stephen Um, and Brent Nelson. If you're a pastor in the Metro-Detroit area, this is something to clear your schedule for. You can register here.

That same night, the church is hosting a Shane & Shane concert. While the cost of the seminar covers the price of admission to the concert, anyone can attend. You can purchase tickets here.

Here's a song of theirs I've listened to a number of times since my daughter was born, because it always feels like it was written with me specifically in mind. If you have a daughter, listen to this and be challenged and encouraged to draw your daughters attention to Jesus (watch the whole thing).



*Cross-posted from David Crabb

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An Elephant In The Room That We Need To Quit Feeding

I want to personally thank the Lord for Pastor Kent Hughes. Years ago he and his wife Barbara wrote a book that has been an enormous blessing, encouragement, and personal challenge to me through the years. It is titled Liberating Ministry From The Success Syndrome. If you plan to go into ministry, this is a must-have book for your journey. If you are already serving the Lord in ministry you ought to read this book. In this little jewel you will be reminded of the things that really matter in your ministry: things like faithfulness, humbly serving, consistent prayer, living a holy life, as well as a number of other important, Biblical, core measurements for your ministry.

Why is this important? Because what I have found (and I'm not the only one) is that no matter the denomination or affiliation, no matter how noble the attempt to counter-act it, no matter how many times you tell yourself otherwise, you will feel the pressure to measure yourself and others based on NUMERICAL RESULTS in ministry. I've seen this in the fundamental Baptist circles I once inhabited and I'm seeing it again within the conservative evangelical circles. Why is this the case? Depravity. Ego. Pride. Pride is in the hearts of both those who brag on the numbers, and those who are jealous of the numbers. The Hughes' book is one of those works you need to go back to again and again to remind yourself of what is really important.

"OoooOoo...."

For example, you will want this book handy when you attend that next Pastor's conference where the website advertisement, printed literature, and public introduction of a speaker includes the fact that Dr. Big Britches' church currently has 25 million in attendance with satellite campuses on Mars, Jupiter, and Venus each having thousands of aliens coming to Christ each week. Once you arrive back home you can sit down again with this book and remind yourself that God doesn't judge your success or failure as a pastor based on the number of alien rear-ends sitting in the seats of a galactic super-campus in the far reaches of the Milky Way galaxy. The Scriptures say, "Moreover it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful" (1 Cor. 4:2). Faithfulness is your measuring stick. Are you being faithful?

Of course, this isn't an excuse for laziness and apathy on our part as pastors! We must work hard, pray often, study diligently, plan effectively, delegate wisely, implement strategically, and witness boldly. And when we have done these things, let's leave the results up to our Sovereign God who calls His elect to Himself according to His infinitely perfect will. And let's be thankful that He has counted us worthy to be a part - no matter how big or small - of this Gospel work.

- Dan McGhee

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Preach Christ, and You Will Have Morality

"I believe that as people's confidence in Christ grows, they do, ordinarily and inevitably, bear fruit that accords with faith. Thus, there is no need for some trade-off here, or some alleged dichotomy suggesting that we need to preach morality if we are to have morality. No; preach Christ, and you will have morality. Fill the sails of your hearers' souls with the wind of confidence in the Redeemer, and they will trust him as their Sanctifier, and long to see his fruit in their lives. Fill their minds and imaginations with a vision of the loveliness and perfection of Christ in his person, and the flock will long to be like him. Impress upon their weak and wavering hearts the utter competence of the mediation of the One who ever lives to make intercession for them, and they will long to serve and comfort others, even as Christ has served and comforted them."

- T. David Gordon (Why Johnny Can't Preach [Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2009], p. 78)

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Six Observations of "Christianity" in America

After conducting 5,000 interviews in 2010, the Barna Research Group has identified "Six Megathemes" indicating change in the religious environment of America:

1. The Christian Church is becoming less theologically literate.
"The theological free-for-all that is encroaching in Protestant churches nationwide suggests the coming decade will be a time of unparalleled theological diversity and inconsistency."

2. Christians are becoming more ingrown and less outreach-oriented.
"Despite technological advances that make communications instant and far-reaching, Christians are becoming more spiritually isolated from non-Christians than was true a decade ago.... With atheists becoming more strategic in championing their godless worldview, as well as the increased religious plurality driven by education and immigration, the increasing reticence of Christians to engage in faith-oriented conversations assumes heightened significance."

3. Growing numbers of people are less interested in spiritual principles and more desirous of learning pragmatic solutions for life.
"The turbo-charged pace of society leaves people with little time for reflection.... Spiritual practices like contemplation, solitude, silence, and simplicity are rare. Practical to a fault, Americans consider survival in the present to be much more significant than eternal security and spiritual possibilities."

4. Among Christians, interest in participating in community action is escalating.
"Despite the increased emphasis, churches run the risk of watching congregants’ engagement wane unless they embrace a strong spiritual basis for such service. Simply doing good works because it's the socially esteemed choice of the moment will not produce much staying power."

5. The postmodern insistence on tolerance is winning over the Christian Church.
"There are fewer and fewer issues that Christians believe churches should be dogmatic about. The idea of love has been redefined to mean the absence of conflict and confrontation, as if there are no moral absolutes that are worth fighting for. That may not be surprising in a Church in which a minority believes there are moral absolutes dictated by the scriptures."

6. The influence of Christianity on culture and individual lives is largely invisible.
"The most influential aspect of Christianity in America is how believers do - or do not - implement their faith in public and private.... With little time or energy available for or devoted to research and reflection, it is people’s observations of the integration of a believer’s faith into how he/she responds to life’s opportunities and challenges that most substantially shape people’s impressions of and interest in Christianity."

Sobering observations.

Sheep tend to reflect their shepherds. Pastors, please heed these inspired words!
I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the Word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
(2 Timothy 4:1-5)

Metro Detroit doesn't need more gospel; Metro Detroit needs the right gospel.

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Distortions of the Gospel

James MacDonald of Harvest Bible Chapel in Chicago has written a tremendous article exposing "Five Distortions of the Gospel in Our Day." Here's how it begins:

A.W. Tozer and James Kennedy (both wonderful Christian leaders in their day)...believed that many, if not most, professing believers they encountered around the country were not actually saved. They were deeply troubled by the distortions of the gospel that were the result of trying to get the gospel to more people. Well intentioned yes, but eternally dangerous for the souls of men and woman who had not heard the whole message.

Let me strongly encourage you to read the whole article. It is a word of exhortation sorely needed in our day, particularly right here in metro Detroit. Many prominent pastors in our area have sadly stooped to preaching what MacDonald calls the "Cake Mix Gospel," the "Cultural Gospel," the "Cool Gospel," the "Carnal Gospel," or the "Careful Gospel." No matter how well intentioned, a distortion of the gospel is as bad as no gospel at all (Gal. 1:8-9).

Metro Detroit doesn't need more gospel; Metro Detroit needs the right gospel. Check back for more on this topic soon...

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Why Do Young People Leave the Faith?

The latest issue of Christianity Today includes an interesting article by Drew Dyck called "The Leavers: Young Doubters Exit the Church." According to the article, "the crisis of people leaving the faith has taken on new gravity.... Young adults today are dropping religion at a greater rate [five to six times] than young adults of yesteryear."

The entire article is an worthwhile read, but I want to draw your attention to a few sections that I found particularly intriguing (my emphases in bold):

A teenage girl goes off to college and starts to party. A young man moves in with his girlfriend. Soon the conflict between belief and behavior becomes unbearable. Tired of dealing with a guilty conscience and unwilling to abandon their sinful lifestyles, they drop their Christian commitment. They may cite intellectual skepticism or disappointments with the church, but these are smokescreens designed to hide the reason. "They change their creed to match their deeds," as my parents would say. I think there's some truth to this—more than most young leavers would care to admit. The Christian life is hard to sustain in the face of so many temptations. Over the past year, I've conducted in-depth interviews with scores of ex-Christians. Only two were honest enough to cite moral compromise as the primary reason for their departures. Many experienced intellectual crises that seemed to conveniently coincide with the adoption of a lifestyle that fell outside the bounds of Christian morality.

Many de-conversions were precipitated by what happened inside rather than outside the church. Even those who adopted materialist worldviews or voguish spiritualities traced their departures back to what happened in church. What pushed them out? Again, the reasons for departing in each case were unique, but I realized that most leavers had been exposed to a superficial form of Christianity that effectively inoculated them against authentic faith. When sociologist Christian Smith and his fellow researchers examined the spiritual lives of American teenagers, they found most teens practicing a religion best called "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism," which casts God as a distant Creator who blesses people who are "good, nice, and fair." Its central goal is to help believers "be happy and feel good about oneself." Where did teenagers learn this faith? Unfortunately, it's one taught, implicitly and sometimes explicitly, at every age level in many churches. It's in the air that many churchgoers breathe, from seeker-friendly worship services to low-commitment small groups. When this naive and coldly utilitarian view of God crashes on the hard rocks of reality, we shouldn't be surprised to see people of any age walk away.

The answer, of course, lies in more than offering another program. Nor should we overestimate the efficacy of slicker services or edgy outreach. Only with prayer and thoughtful engagement will at least some of the current exodus be stemmed. One place to begin is by rethinking how we minister to those from youth to old age. There's nothing wrong with pizza and video games, nor with seeker-sensitive services, nor with low-commitment small groups that introduce people to the Christian faith. But these cannot replace serious programs of discipleship and catechism. The temptation to wander from the faith is not a new one. The apostle Paul exhorted the church at Ephesus to strive to mature every believer, so that "we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes" (Eph. 4:14). Ultimately we will have to undertake the slow but fruitful work of building relationships with those who have left the faith.

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Marketing Madness

Mark Galli of Christianity Today has written a clever article parodying modern church marketing "experts." He imagines what sort of advice a marketing consultant might have offered the leaders of the early church. Here's an excerpt:

First, you need to decide on a logo quickly. Some in your movement are suggesting the cross, no doubt the same group who can't keep quiet about the crucifixion of your founder. This would be a disastrous move in our view. We'd want to do some focus groups to determine the best logo, and no, that does not come cheap. But it is well worth the investment, believe us.

As for your name, that too will take some concerted research. We recommend in the interim that you stay away from "Christians," as that will only remind people of your founder and his gruesome death. We think "Followers of Jesus" would work, as it would focus on the life of your founder and emphasize his ethical genius. It would also downplay redemptive religion, with all its talk of sin and repentance, as well as that business about his coming again (such speculative theology will do your movement no good, in our opinion). "Followers of Jesus" is also vague enough to leave room for the imagination, allowing you to shape the movement according to the felt needs of your target audience.

You'll want to read the whole thing. It's thought provoking.

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How to be a Difference Maker in Your Local Church

Kevin DeYoung provides several suggestions on how to be a difference maker in your local church. Incidentally, these are also good suggestions on how to majorly encourage your pastor!

• Find a good local church.
• Get involved.
• Become a member.
• Stay there as long as you can.
• Put away thoughts of a revolution for a while.
• Join the plodding visionaries.
• Go to church this Sunday and worship in Spirit and truth.
• Be patient with your leaders.
• Rejoice when the gospel is faithfully proclaimed.
• Bear with those who hurt you.
• Give people the benefit of the doubt.
• Say “hi” to the teenager that no one notices.
• Welcome the old ladies with the blue hair and the young men with tattoos.
• Volunteer for the nursery.
• Attend the congregational meeting.
• Bring your fried chicken to the potluck like everybody else.
• Invite a friend.
• Take a new couple out for coffee.
• Give to the Christmas offering.
• Sing like you mean it.
• Be thankful someone vacuumed the carpet for you.
• Enjoy the Sundays that “click.”
• Pray extra hard on the Sundays that don’t.
• And in all of this, do not despise the days and weeks and years of small things (Zechariah 4:8–10).

HT: Sovereign Grace blog

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T4G Gems: C.J. Mahaney

Ordinary Pastors (2 Timothy 4:1-5)

"You must preach the Word with a clear commitment to unoriginality."

"Your church may not have the ambience of a Starbucks. It may not have a cutting-edge website. But if you are faithfully preaching the gospel, there is power. And the church will be edified and the lost will be evangelized."

"Don't think you can craft faithful sermons while isolated from your people. You will not be able to helpfully apply the truth of the Word to their lives."

"So often I expect people to comprehend and apply certain truths quickly, although those same truths took me years to comprehend and apply. That is why your preaching ministry must be 'with complete patience.'"

"Most of the Biblical metaphors for ministry are borrowed from the world of agriculture. That is because God normally works in people very gradually. He is comfortable working by seasons and generations. Unfortunately, my flesh prefers seconds and minutes."

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: Matt Chandler (w/ C.J. Mahaney)

Preparing Your Church for Suffering

(Pastor Matt Chandler was recently diagnosed with stage 3 brain cancer)

"Just because you build your life on the rock of Jesus doesn't mean the storm won't hit."

It's better to go home to glory, but while we're here there's work to be done."

*C.J. Mahaney:

"Preparing your congregation for suffering should inform your preaching plan."

"The most effective way to prepare your church for suffering is to preach the gospel."

"The great mystery is not 'Why do I suffer?' but 'Why would the sinless Son of God suffer for me?'"

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: Ligon Duncan

Did the Early Church Fathers Know the Gospel?

"We should read the church fathers respectfully, but carefully - keeping in mind the ultimate authority of the Scriptures."

"Paul taught that 'wolves' would rise up from within the church. So it would naturally follow that some of the church fathers would be completely wrong."

"When you read the church fathers on doctrines which were under assault in their time, they almost always get it right. However, regarding doctrines which were not being disputed at the time, they were often wrong. In this way, ironically, heresy served the church."

"Often the fathers erred by reacting too strongly against the culture of their day. This should be a lesson for us."

"Scripture shows that the Word of God always creates the people of God; the people of God never create the Word of God."

"A study of the early church fathers proves the early dating of the NT canon, since these early fathers quote all the NT books."

"Contra Dan Brown, the early church did not struggle with the deity of Christ, but with the humanity of Christ."

"Only the affections of the Spirit, through the gospel, are a match for the affections of the flesh."

"The church fathers did not articulate gospel truths clearly enough so that doctrines like imputation would be sustained through the next several centuries. But the gospel was not lost. Fathers such as Diagnatus, Irenaeus, and Hilary of Partian clearly taught imputation and justification by faith alone."

"Reading the early church fathers is a great evidence of the inspiration of the NT documents, written just before. When you compare them, the difference in quality and glory is remarkable."

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: John Piper

Did Jesus Preach Paul's Gospel? (Luke 18)

"For some—perhaps many—there is the suspicion (or even conviction) that justification by faith alone is part of Paul’s gospel, but not part of Jesus’ gospel. And in feeling that way, our commitment to the doctrine is weakened, and we are thus less passionate to preach it and defend it as essential to the gospel. And we may even think that Jesus’ call to sacrificial kingdom obedience is more radical and more transforming than the gospel of justification by faith alone."

"I really believe that the ultimate reason God gave us four portraits of Jesus in the four Gospels is so that we would more fully and accurately see and savor the glories of the Savior that we meet personally in the gospel, and that we would enjoy fellowship with him in this life, as we know him personally from what he did and said in his days on earth."

"When it came to justification, this Pharisee was trusting in the wrong thing. He was looking at the wrong basis for his righteousness before God. He was looking at the wrong person and the wrong righteousness. He was looking to his own righteousness—and it was his, not because he created it, but because he acted it. It was not an alien righteousness. It was inherent in him. It was in his will and in his heart and in his actions. It was his, and it was put there, he believed, by God. That is what he was trusting in. And what about the tax collector? He looked away from himself to God. He trusted in nothing in himself. He trusted in God’s mercy. And Jesus said, 'God declared him righteous and acceptable.'"

"Jesus said to the rich young ruler: You lack one thing. You lack me. Stop treasuring money and start treasuring me. You want to inherit eternal life. You want to enter the kingdom of heaven. You want to be justified. Only by your attachment to me will you inherit eternal life, enter the kingdom, be justified. If you would be perfect—which is the only way into God’s kingdom—follow me. Be connected to me. Depend on all that I am for you."

"People in our day, in order to create greater moral seriousness (especially with the radical commands of Jesus) are making morality part of the ground of justification. This backfires, because it destroys the joyful confidence which alone can bear the fruit of Christ-exalting love. It takes away the one and only ground and source of the very transformation they long for."

"Settle it once and for all that the dozens of places in the Bible that make your good behavior the condition of your final salvation are a condition only as the fruit and confirmation of justification, not the ground of it. All the good that God requires of the justified is the fruit of justification by faith alone, never the ground of justification. Let the battle of your life be there. The battle to believe. Not the battle to perform."

"Give Christ all his glory in the work of salvation, not just half of it. Half is the work of pardoning sin by becoming our wrath-absorbing punishment. But the other half is the work of providing our perfection by fulfilling everything that God required of us, and then imputing it to us. Don’t rob the Lord of half his glory in bringing you to God. Christ is our pardon. Christ is our perfection."

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: David Platt

Gospel Theology Necessitates Urgent Missiology (Romans 1-11)

"We have a Master who demands radical sacrifice and a mission that demands radical urgency."

"All people stand infinitely guilty before a holy God. You ask, 'What about all the innocent people in Africa who have never heard?' They don't exist! There's no such thing as an innocent person. That's why everyone needs the gospel - because everyone's guilty."

"Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane is not a coward about to face Roman soldiers, he is a Savior about to face divine wrath."

"We don't go to the nations with a list of things to do. They already have their religious lists. When we take a checklist to the nations, we undercut the uniqueness of the Christian gospel."

Romans 10: "Christ sends his servants, who preach the gospel which people hear and believe. Not all who hear will believe, but at least some from each people group will believe" (Rev. 5).

"We can talk all day about the destiny of the unevangelized, but the goal is not to answer that question. The goal is to eliminate that question."

"May God raise up people who are not content to wait for a tingly feeling to go down their spine before getting up and doing what God has already commanded us to do."

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: John MacArthur

The Theology of Sleep! (Mark 4)

"If I believed that the salvation of sinners was ultimately up to me, I wouldn't sleep well. I understand what's at stake. I understand the reality of the wrath of God and eternal judgment. However, I have confidence in God to do the work that I can't do."

"Sow the seed and then go to sleep, because you're not in charge of the results (v. 26-27). We may be the means, but we are not the power (v. 28). We can sow the seed, but we can't change the heart."

"There are no adjectives in these verses that describe the sower. It doesn't matter if you have a tattered burlap seed bag or a designer seed bag."

"The message is not healing. The message is not free food. The message is the cross & resurrection of Jesus" (Luke 9:21-22 / 24:47-48).

"The prosperity gospel is like a Ponzi scheme - the guys at the top get rich, and the guys at the bottom are left in rags."

"You don't want to sow a synthetic seed and get a mutation."

"Where there is a genuine working of the Spirit, you don't find smug satisfaction. You find humility and brokenness."

"We are humble because we know only God can change the heart. But we are obedient because we know we are the means by which people will see the light" (v. 21-22).

"Your usefulness is in proportion to your sowing, and that leads to divine blessing (v. 24-25). I sleep well, but I don't sleep a lot!"

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: Thabiti Anyabwile

"Fine-Sounding Arguments" - How Wrongly "Engaging the Culture" Adjusts the Gospel (Colossians 1-3)

"Paul's passion was to present to Christ a pure bride. That's what got him up every morning. This is your goal as a pastor: to push people up into Christ" (1:28-29).

"We are gospel men. That is our purpose."

"Paul engaged culture by engaging the church, because God's people are the only ones who can think in the categories of 'consistent with the gospel' and 'inconsistent with the gospel.'"

"Jesus is the sovereign Lord of all creation. We need no new philosophy. Christ is all and in all" (2:9-10).

"The church is multi-ethnic, but mono-cultural."

"Engaging the culture with an earthly mind will lead to earthly living; the only way to be any earthly good is to be increasingly heavenly-minded" (3:1-11).

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: Al Mohler

How Does it Happen? Trajectories Toward an Adjusted Gospel

“False gospels are all around us, ranging from the blatantly false to the seductively revised.”

1. The Modern Trajectory
“The moment you begin to make a distinction between the 'historical Jesus' and the Christ of faith, you have already compromised Biblical Christianity.”

2. The Postmodern Trajectory
“When you come to understand liberal theology, you don’t know anything more about theology but you do know a lot more about liberals.”

3. The Moral Trajectory
“We need to avoid presenting God as fair. Perfect is better than fair. Perfect is above being interrogated by fair. With fair, nobody goes to heaven.”

4. The Aesthetic Trajectory
“We are too easily drawn toward what is merely pretty…superficial…gaudy. The cross is an example of true beauty, but is horribly ugly to the human eye.”

5. The Therapeutic Trajectory
“The gospel saves and makes well, but it is not therapy.”

6. The Pragmatic Trajectory
“Pragmatism is one of the most powerful backdrops of modern ministry. With pragmatism there is an immediate payoff, but it leads to crowds that are not churches and results that are not regenerations.”

7. The Emotional Trajectory
“How you feel about certain doctrines has nothing to do with whether or not they are true. And it has nothing to do with whether or not you should faithfully preach them.

8. The Materialist Trajectory
“We are all tempted to immanentize the eschaton: ‘Your Best Life Now.” But for the believer, our best life is future. The only people whose best life is now are those who will end up in hell.”

“The Christ who saved us is Lord of His truth. He will vindicate his truth.”

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: R.C. Sproul

The Defense and Confirmation of the Gospel - What I Have Learned in 50 Years

"What is the gospel? The Gospel is Jesus - who he is and what he did - received by faith."

"If you don't have imputation, you don't have sola fide, and if you don't have sola fide, you don't have the gospel."

"It's not your gospel. It's God's gospel. Don't try to improve it - you can't!"

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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T4G Gems: Mark Dever

This post begins a series of notable quotes from the speakers at the 2010 Together for the Gospel conference, which Joe and I had the privilege of attending.

The Church is the Gospel Made Visible

"The church is created by the gospel, then it reflects and displays the gospel to the world looking on. What kind of gospel is your local church making visible?"

"You say your church is for sinners? Good - all churches are. But Biblical churches are for a particular subset of sinners: repenting sinners."

"Church leaders must undermine Satan's lie: that love and authority can't co-exist. Leaders must reflect God's loving authority over their lives."

"When we tell unbelievers the truth about sin, they are finally given a diagnosis of their condition that makes sense."

"When believers love others in their church who have nothing in common with them, it produces a good confusion in the world looking on."

"A local church is a weird thing. It is a community that bases everything they do on things they can't see: the promises of God in Christ. Our sacrifices for God and for each other only make sense in light of eternity" (Heb. 10:34).

Mark Dever - R. C. Sproul - Al Mohler - Thabiti Anyabwile - John MacArthur - David Platt - John Piper - Ligon Duncan - Matt Chandler - C.J Mahaney

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Harvest Loves...

Check out this video and be encouraged by the opportunities God is opening up for our "Harvest Loves" food pantry. Soli Deo Gloria.

"Give to everyone who begs from you, and from one who takes away your goods do not demand them back. And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.
"If you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount.
"But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful." (Luke 6:30-36)

"As we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith." (Gal 6:10)

Please pray for this effort! Our desire is that the saving grace of Jesus Christ will be well-adorned by our kindness, and that we would have opportunity to give the gospel to many who come to receive food.

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