Thoughts on Easter

Why is it important that Christ’s resurrection actually occurred in history, rather than simply a story that brings one a sense of hope? If Christ has not been raised, then we are spiritually dead—but, he has been raised, though. This Easter morning we were reminded that Christ is risen, and that he is the giver of true life. The apostle Paul says it thusly:

¹There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.  ² For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.  ³ For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,  ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.  ⁵ For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.  ⁶ To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.  ⁷ For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot.  ⁸ Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.  ⁹ You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.  ¹⁰ But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.  ¹¹ If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you. Romans 8:1-11

Blessed Assurance

Recently, I preached a sermon on 2 Peter 1: 1-11. The text reads as follows:

Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ,

To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ:

May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

After we finished looking at the text exegetically, we turned our attention to the subject of salvific assurance. In other words, what are we to believe about our salvation? Can we know whether we are truly saved? The Bible appears to answer this in the affirmative. Peter, in this passage, provides us with one important clue to answering these important questions. Now, the doctrine of assurance can be looked at in two ways. First (and Peter does not touch on this point), there is the objective sense in which we find assurance. Objective is defined as: “not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased.” So the objective way in which we find assurance of our salvation is by looking at the cross of Christ. Christ made sure the salvation of anyone who will come. If we have reached out to Christ and have trusted him as our only hope of salvation, then we may gaze upon the finished work of the cross as an objective means in order to find salvific assurance.

Now, Peter shows the way we experience assurance in a more subjective way. Subjective may be defined as: “existing in the mind; belonging to the thinking subject rather than to the object of thought.” In other words, once we gaze upon the finished work of the cross, we then believe. And, through the help of the Holy Spirit, we begin to seek after those Christian virtues spoken of in Peter’s epistle, which ultimately bear fruit—they become, in a progressive sense, a reality in our lives. This work of the Holy Spirit is something we sense and perceive in our lives. The apostle Peter says it in the following way: “Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

Everybody Believes in God?

I spoke for the FBCLC D-Now this last weekend. It was a great time, and the students were a blast. Since the theme was about living your whole life for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31), I thought I would start by laying some spiritual groundwork. I began with Hebrews 11:6: “And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” Honoring God with your life starts with drawing near to God. As a result, we must believe in God! I exposed the students to a number of philosophical arguments that support theism (the Cosmological argument, Teleological argument, Ontological argument, Anthropological argument, and the Moral argument—we were loving God with our minds). But in the end, I asked if we really need these kinds of arguments to justify belief in God. In other words (as Alvin Plantinga supposes), it seems right to consider belief in God as a basic belief. In the same way that we do not need arguments to justify our belief in a past (it is possible that everything came into being 10 seconds ago, complete with aged material and all of our memories) or our belief in other minds (everyone around me might just be figments of my imagination), we do not need arguments to justify our belief in God. It is natural for humans to acknowledge a transcendent creator.

          But what about the fact that some humans disbelieve that there is a God? The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 1:18-20 that “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” Romans teaches us here that we know God exists, but because of our sin we suppress the truth that he is real. God has made it perfectly clear that he is real to everyone.

But, consider, as a result of our sin, our position before God. God’s wrath (vs. 18) is looming over us. You see God is a good judge, and he always punishes sin. What would we think of an earthly judge if he let criminals go? Well, God does not exemplify the worst traits in earthly judges; rather, he is perfectly just and always punishes sin. Notice Hebrews 9:27: “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment.” This is a problem for us, because we have all sinned. Because of our sin, we are separated from God—separated from our maker! But God loves us, and he has made a way for us to be reconciled back to him. God sent Jesus (God the Son) to die for our sins. Jesus paid the penalty for sin on the cross. 1 Peter 3:18a says “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.”

For these students, I challenged them to not just know that God is real, but, to confront this knowledge and to reach out to Christ.

John 3:36 “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”

Trinitarianism and T. D. Jakes

Recently the mega-church pastor, T. D. Jakes, has admitted to shifting from a oneness view of God (a kind of modalism which denies the orthodox one God three persons formula) to a proper trinitarian view of God. This is great news! Nevertheless, it is still somewhat disturbing that a man that has built an entire ministerial dynasty upon the foundation of an idolatrous understanding of God can carry on with very little scrutiny. The following link has the full story:
http://www.gofbw.com/news.asp?ID=13742&page=2

Violence and the Cross

Violence and the Cross: Fullerism's Answer to Contemporary Attacks on Substitutionary Atonement

 

The following is an audio link of a paper that I presented at a conference, hosted by the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary several months ago. The paper answers contemporary attacks on the substitutionary atonement of Christ through a presentation of Fuller's theological writings on the subject. I welcome any comments you may have.



http://digital.library.sbts.edu/handle/10392/3756

Theological Studies Ministry

 

I have been reminded this week of how blessed I am to have been called to FBC Liberty City as minister of discipleship. I announced last Sunday that the church would be launching a theological studies ministry and offering a course on biblical interpretation (hermeneutics)—the first of several classes leading to a certificate in theological studies. I had no idea if anyone would be interested in such an endeavor. After all, we live in a post-modern time (so we are told), and people are much less interested in propositional truth—opting rather for subjective narratives. Well, the good people at Liberty City must not have received this memo, because we have had a great number of folks sign up for this formal course.

Now the discipline of hermeneutics is essentially the science of biblical interpretation. The class, then, will analyze the way in which the church has interpreted Scripture throughout history and consider what interpretive template is best employed by Christians today. What an exciting and important endeavor!

Our vision statement reads as follows:

The vision of FBC Liberty City Theological Studies Ministry is focused upon serving the Church by equipping God’s people with the necessary biblical and theological infrastructure needed to maximize their impact for Christ in their own communities and around the world.     

Thoughts on Family Ministry

Why should the “Church” engage in “family ministry”?

The notion of family ministry is important because it has highlighted a trend in church culture which is best described as “hyper-segregation.” Now, this is not a segregation based on ethnicity; rather, it is a segregation based on age or station in life. Segregation of this sort is not necessarily negative when used as an addition to a pattern of full corporate worship centered on the proclamation of God’s word. However, when taken to the extreme, segregated groups can virtually have independent church experiences concurrently within the same congregation. For example, children’s church pulls kids out of the broader corporate worship with the hopes of providing a service which speaks on the child’s level of understanding. This, in my thinking, is a trend toward hyper-segregation.

Some advocates of family ministry opine that aspects of church ministry, such as youth groups, should be abandoned all together. This is not my view. The children’s, youth, family, and senior adult ministries of the church are good and healthy ways to disciple and empower Christians in their walk with Christ. Nevertheless, this can not be taken to the extreme without negative repercussions.  We must value those times in our church experience when the broader family of God comes together to worship Christ. It is here that we as families, within the context of our broader church family, pass down the heritage of the Christian faith. Worshiping together as parents, children, singles, and elderly emphasizes the transcendent purpose (church is not about me) and universal relevance (we all must embrace Christ) of the Christian faith.

So then, families should not primarily view their identity as a segregated demographic within the church that functions concurrently, yet separately, from the church as a whole. Rather, family ministry should be viewed as a separate ministry focus (along with youth, singles, etc.), in addition to our prioritized corporate worship; wherein, we seize the opportunity to emphasize, equip, and provide the necessary tools for parents to disciple their children in the home.

Does the Bible teach this principle?

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. Eph. 6:4

Yes, Scripture here and elsewhere implores us as parents to own the responsibility of teaching our children the ways of Christ. Yet, in order to provide balance (some writers have argued that it is not the Church’s job to disciple its children), let us observe verse 1 of the same chapter where Paul gives instruction directly to children: “Children obey your parents.” In this verse Paul is instructing children. We must conclude, then, that it is proper and right that the church invest and instruct its children and youth directly and deliberately. Nevertheless, we as parents must also accept the biblical mandate to raise our children in the ways of the Lord.

How is this sacred task best accomplished?

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Deut. 6:6-7

The best way to train your children is within the context of everyday life. Discuss sermons (your young children will not understand most of the preacher’s sermon, this is ok) over lunch. Fathers, talk to your sons about the things in life that are most important—not just football. Our homes should be consecrated unto the Lord. If the only Christian instruction our children receive is through church programming, then we as parents are squandering the precious time given to us by God to impact and raise our children in the fear and admonition of the Lord.  

Our vision for family ministry in the Church, then, should be to provide tools for parents and instill a sense of urgency in them to make Christian disciples of their children, within the context of the broader church.