Examine Yourselves

2 Corinthians 13:5 (ESV) "Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!"

Drawing from Jonathan Edwards on True Christianity by Owen Strachan and Doug Sweeney, Trevin Wax offers these seven questions for examining one's claim to be a Christian.

1. Do you love God?

2. Do you love the Bible?

3. Do you love living out and sharing the Gospel?

4. Do you love Christians?

5. Do you enjoy church and draw nourishment from it?

6. Does the matter of eternity concern you?

7. Does the Bible shape your morals and ethics?

For an expansion of these questions, check out Kingdom People.

Logos+Apple=WIN!

Logos Bible Software is giving away thousands of dollars of prizes to celebrate the launch of Logos Bible Software 4 Mac on October 1. Prizes include an iMac, a MacBook Pro, an iPad, an iPod Touch, and more than 100 other prizes!

They’re also having a special limited-time sale on their Mac and PC base packages and upgrades. Check it out!

Who should repent?

He commands all people everywhere to repent. (Acts 17:30)

Thomas Watson lists 6 kinds of people who should repent:

1. Those in civil or political power

2. The flagrantly wicked

3. Liars and cheaters

4. Good, upstanding citizens; decent, moral people

5. Hypocrites

6. God's own people

Thomas Watson, The Doctrine of Repentance, pages 63-69

The Nature of True Repentance

Acts 3:19 (ESV) "Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out."

The Puritan Thomas Watson publish The Doctrine of Repentance in 1668. It is needed more now than ever. What a treasure it is! And what a clarion call it sounds! I commend this little book to you for your careful reading and meditation.

What is repentance? "Repentance is a grace of God's Spirit whereby a sinner is inwardly humbled and visibly reformed." (p. 18)

Watson lists six ingredients that formulate genuine repentance.

1. Sight of sin (seeing and perceiving sin for what it is)
2. Sorrow for sin (for the sin itself, and not just the consequences of sin)
3. Confession of sin (agreeing with God about the sinfulness of sin and not making excuses for sin)
4. Shame for sin
5. Hatred for sin
6. Turning from sin

"If any one is left out it loses its virtue."

Pick up this little book. Read it slowly and repetitively. Learn how, by God's grace, to repent.

Vacation Goals

Next week we will head out on vacation. Here's what I hope to accomplish:

1. Rest, recharge, and refresh my ministerial batteries.

2. Enjoy my family and have an attitude and actions that allow my family to enjoy me.

3. Read and journal through the Minor Prophets.

4. Read some great books. I'm packing Mere Churchianity, Sticky Church, The Fading Flesh and the Flourishing Faith, The Radical Disciple, Holy Subversion, Fear Not!, Dug Down Deep, Radical, and Jonathan Edwards: Lover of God. I hope to complete at least five of these.

5. Eat some great Tex-Mex and Chick-Fil-A.

Book Review: Insights on John

Chuck Swindoll is an excellent Bible teacher. His voice is radio perfect and his "insights" are extremely helpful. His new series of commentaries on the New Testament are a great resource and are vintage Swindoll.

These books will be useful for serious Bible Students, Sunday School teachers, and small group leaders. Swindoll writes in an engaging style without dumbing down the text. Pastors will find helpful points of application that will flesh out their sermons.

Insights on John is the second volume in this series. I received it as a promotion from Zondervan and am very grateful for it. I am currently preaching through the Gospel of John and have found it to be a helpful tool.

This book won't replace the more scholarly commentaries on John, but it will sit very nicely on your shelf next to the the NIV Application Commentary or other "expositional" commentaries.

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I Am Preparing a Place for You: Jesus and the Doctrine of Heaven

Preached at Tremont Baptist Church
May 30, 2010

John 14:1-6
¹"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. ²In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. ³And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. ⁴You know the way to the place where I am going."

⁵Thomas said to him, "Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?"

⁶Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

1. Jesus' assurance of heaven should give us hope and peace in life. (verse 1)

• This world is temporary. Do not build your life in this world. See Matthew 6:19-20; 2 Peter 3:10-13; Philippians 1:21, 23

• When you do suffer in this world, you realize that this life is temporary and God has something far greater in store for you.
  

2. Jesus is preparing heaven for His disciples. (verse 2)

• When we die, our spirits go immediately to be with Jesus. See Luke 23:43; Acts 7:59; 2 Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23; Revelation 6:9-11
• When Christ returns, our bodies will be resurrected. Our spirits will be reunited with our glorified bodies. We will live in the New Heavens and New Earth. We will have physical bodies, just like Jesus' resurrected body. See 1 Corinthians 15:42-54; 1 Thessalonians 4:14-17; Revelation chapters 21:1-22:6

3. Jesus will return to take his disciples to heaven. (verse 3)

4. Jesus is the only way to heaven. (verses 4-6)

A Commitment to Expository Preaching

My duty as a minister of the Gospel is to “preach the Word” (2 Timothy 4:2). Of all the things a pastor can do and should do, faithfully preaching to and teaching the people of God in his care is the most important. The apostles devoted themselves to prayer and the ministry of the Word (Acts 6:4). Pastors today are to follow this example today. A myriad of activities compete with the pastor’s attention, but a faithful pastor must be committed to and not dissuaded from this sacred charge (see John 21:15-17).

My commitment to the church I pastor is to preach the Word each and every week. I do this through “Expository Preaching.” Expository preaching is the method of studying a particular passage of Scripture, discovering the main point or big idea of that passage, explaining that point to the church and making points of application from that passage’s big idea.

It is my conviction that all sermons should be expository sermons in order to be faithful to the Word of God. When a preacher chooses to preach on a topic or a theme, he runs the risk of injecting his personal opinions or agendas into the sermon and neglecting the main idea of the Biblical text. Every expository sermon follows the same format: the text is read, the text is explained, and the text is applied.

This is why I normally preach through a book of the Bible in a consecutive fashion (like I’m currently doing in the Gospel of John). However, one does not have to preach through an entire book to preach an expository sermon. The key in expository preaching is to take a passage of Scripture, discover its main point, and shape the sermon around that main point.

This approach is exemplified by the great Old Testament priest Ezra. In Ezra 7:10, we read, “For Ezra had devoted himself to the study and observance of the Law of the Lord, and to teaching its decrees and laws in Israel.” Ezra committed himself to studying God’s Word and applying it to his life on a personal level. He then read the Word, taught the Word, and applied the Word to the nation of Israel.

Book Review: C.H. Spurgeon on Spiritual Leadership by Steve Miller

This little book is a gem. Steve Miller has served us all well by cataloging and synthesizing eight leadership lessons from the Prince of Preachers. We are living in an era where spiritual leadership is sorely lacking in many areas of the church. The wise counsel collected from Spurgeon's writings, lectures, prayers, and sermons in this book will help strengthen true spiritual leadership. We need fewer worldly ideas about leadership and more Biblical, Christocentric ideas about leadership.

Chapter One covered a passion for prayer. Spiritual leaders must be committed to walking and communing privately with God.

Chapter two took up the theme of faith that endures. Without bold confidence in the Lord, a minister will give up quickly.

Chapter three focused on a commitment to holiness. I looked over this chapter a couple of times, and feel the need to return to it. We face a famine of holiness in our day.

Chapter four pointed out Spurgeon's lifestyle of service and offered wise counsel in this area.

Chapter five urged us to love the Lord and His word in ever greater intensity.

Chapter six reminded us that a willingness to suffer is a key to spiritual growth and effectiveness in ministry.

Chapter seven called us to zealously proclaim God's Word and chapter eight drove home a passion for lost souls.

Miller concludes the book by noting that Spurgeon, although he was involved in numerous activities and developed dozens of large and significant ministries, ultimately had only one driving purpose and aim in his life. Everything Spurgeon did was to glorify God. God's glory was his motive. There was nothing else.

As Spurgeon said, "We must see to it that His glory is the one sole object of all we do." (Miller, p. 181)