James M. Grier Website Launched

Dr. James M. Grier, Distinguished Professor of Philosophical Theology at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary has developed a new website located at http://jamesmgrier.org/. The purpose of the website is to provide access to selected sermons, conferences, articles, book notices and reviews, bibliographies, seminars and other assorted trivia. It is offered with the hope these materials will be helpful for the work of the Kingdom in the world.

Dr. Grier is especially interested in making the material available to present and former students, particularly those from Burma/Myanmar, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Africa, Europe and the United Kingdom.

The Gospel as "the A-to-Z of the Christian Life"

“The gospel shows us that our spiritual problem lies not only in failing to obey God, but also in relying on our obedience to make us fully acceptable to God, ourselves and others.

"Every kind of character flaw comes from this natural impulse to be our own savior through our performance and achievement. On the one hand, proud and disdainful personalities come from basing your identity on your performance and thinking you are succeeding. But on the other hand, discouraged and self-loathing personalities also come from basing your identity on your performance and thinking you are failing.

"Belief in the gospel is not just the way to enter the kingdom of God; it is the way to address every obstacle and grow in every aspect. The gospel is not just the “ABCs” but the “A-to-Z” of the Christian life.

"The gospel is the way that anything is renewed and transformed by Christ — whether a heart, a relationship, a church, or a community. All our problems come from a lack of orientation to the gospel. Put positively, the gospel transforms our hearts, our thinking and our approach to absolutely everything.”

- Timothy Keller, Paul’s Letter to the Galatians: Living in Line with the Truth of the Gospel (Redeemer Presbyterian Church, 2003), 2.

posted at Of First Importance

A Sense of God's Holiness

Cornelius Plantinga reflects on the story of Jacob's ladder (Genesis 28) and what it teaches Christians today about the fear of the Lord:

"It's a great tragedy that, in an age of instant friends and popular democracy, many Christians are losing the sense of God's holiness.

"We pray against television background noise. We come into a sanctuary and yak and grin and clap our friends on the back. Our sense of God's holiness has becomes so weak that we are able to speak familiarly of 'the Lord' while stretching our limbs and chewing our gum.

"Jacob cannot worship the Lord until he has know the fear of the Lord. He has a hard night of his stone pillow, a night full of dreams and whisperings and old memories. It is an unholy night until Jacob begins to dream. For this shfity, tainted man, it may have been the turning point. It is not that Jacob is able to climb up and lay hold of God. Not at all. He never could. Jacob's God is far above Jacob's ladder. Yet by this dream and by this ladder, the Holy One of Israel descends to reach for one of his children.

"Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, 'Surely the Lord is in this place -- and I did not know it!' And he was afraid and said, 'How awesome is this place!'"

-- "Assurances of the Heart" pp.30-31 (Zondervan 1993)

Worship and Submission

Harold Best, in his book Music Through the Eyes of Faith defines worship in the broadest sense as “acknowledging that someone or something else is greater – worth more – and by consequence, to be obeyed, feared, and adored…Worship is the sign that in giving myself completely to someone or something, I want to be mastered by it. (pg. 143)

We want to be mastered by the objects of our worship. And indeed we are. We worship whatever rules our time, energy, thoughts, longings, and choices. “Those who make them [idols] become like them; so do all who trust in them.” ( Psa. 115:8, ESVPsalm 115:8 [8]Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.

This text is from the ESV Bible. Visit www.esv.org to learn about the ESV.

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-- from Bob Kauflin at worshipmatters.com

The Importance of the Doctrine of Hell

"There are plenty of people today who don't believe in the Bible's teaching on everlasting punishment, even those who do find it an unreal and a remote concept."

Here is an important article on Hell by Tim Keller.

A brief excerpt:

"If Jesus, the Lord of Love and Author of Grace spoke about hell more often, and in a more vivid, blood-curdling manner than anyone else, it must be a crucial truth. But why was it so important to Jesus?"

HT: Tullian Tchividjian

Fearful of the Wrong Things

From "The Courage to Be Protestant" by David Wells (Eerdmans):

"Evangelicals today are fearful, but they are fearful of all the wrong things. They are deeply apprehensive about becoming obsolete, of being left behind, so to speak, of being passed by, and of not being relevant....

"This, of course, was the fear that haunted the older generation of Protestant liberals, so many of whom began their lives in evangelical homes. They were overwhelmed by the need to be relevant to the culture...Their conversation partner was the Enlightenment.

"This lesson, however, is entirely lost on most evangelicals today. The reason is partly that they are treading a different path and so they do not see the parallels. Theirs is not the accommodation to high culture, as was the liberals'.

"That culture was suffused with intellectual pride and humanism, with rationalism and hostility to Christian faith. It is now dying. The Enlightenment, from which much of it arose, has all but collapsed, as has the Christianity that had made itself into an ally.

"The parallels between these older liberals and today's evangelicals are not in the culture to which they are accommodating but in the process of accommodation. Behind each is the same mind-set. The difference is only in what is being accommodated. And the dangers are all concealed beneath the apparent innocence of the experiment.

"The fact is, however, that evangelical Christianity today is as endangered by its postmodern dance partner as the earlier liberals were by their Enlightenment partner." (pp. 48-49)

HT: Martin Downes

"The Church -- God's Greatest Evangelistic Method"

A good, insightful post about the church and authentic evangelism.

HT: Tullian Tchividjian, Jimmy Davis

Grow in Your Grasp of the Gospel

“To grow in your passion for what Jesus has done, increase your understanding of what He has done.

Never be content with your grasp of the gospel. The gospel is life-permeating, world-altering, universe-changing truth. It has more facets than any diamond. Its depths man will never exhaust.”

- C.J. Mahaney, The Cross Centered Life (Sisters, OR: Multnomah Publishers, 2002), 67.

posted at Of First Importance

Israel trip pictures

As promised in our evening service, here is a link to pictures of the Israel trip.

The Transforming Effect of Assurance of God's Love

“Terror accomplishes no real obedience
Suspense brings forth no fruit unto holiness.
No gloomy uncertainty as to God’s favour
can subdue one lust,
or correct our crookedness of will.
But the free pardon of the cross uproots sin,
and withers all its branches.
Only the certainty of love,
forgiving love,
can do this.”

- Horatius Bonar, quoted by Milton Vincent in A Gospel Primer for Christians (2008), 89.

posted at Of First Importance

Why Embrace Christianity?

"C. S. Lewis says somewhere not to believe in Christianity because it's relevant or exciting or personally satisfying. Believe it because it's true. And if it's true, it eventually will be relevant, exciting, and personally satisfying. But there will be many times when it's not relevant, exciting, and personally satisfying. To be a Christian is going to be very, very hard. So unless you come to it simply because it's really the truth, you really won't live the Christian life, and you won't get to the excitement and to the relevance and all that other stuff."

This is an excerpt from a very good interview of Pastor Tim Keller, from Christianity Today.

Assurance from God's Word (Beyond Experience or Feelings)

“I suppose many do not understand themselves, when they say they want assurance; for what better assurance would you have than the word of God? If you have his word, and take his word, you need no better assurance.

"And though the assurance of sense be the sweetest, yet the assurance of faith is the surest assurance; for what you get in hand from God you may soon lose the benefit and comfort of it; but what you have upon bond in the promise, is still secure.”

- Ralph Erskine, “Faith’s Plea Upon God’s Word,” in The Works of Ralph Erskine, p. 316, vol. 2.

posted at Of First Importance

"An Explosion of Joy"

“Mission begins with a kind of explosion of joy. The news that the rejected and crucified Jesus is alive is something that cannot possibly be suppressed. It must be told. Who could be silent about such a fact?

"The mission of the Church in the pages of the New Testament is like the fallout from a vast explosion, a radioactive fallout which is not lethal but life-giving.”

—Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 116

posted at Of First Importance

"Drawing Seekers, Making Saints"

Collin Hansen, an editor at Christianity Today magazine, writes this article on "why the flagship megachurch Willow Creek is adusting its focus from seekers to saints."

HT: Tullian Tchividjian

Sinclair Ferguson Sermon Series on the Book of James

Justin Taylor posts about an excellent sermon series from Sinclair Ferguson.