harvestoc.net blog, Wednesday, December 31, 2008
  Life as a Victory Parade (a meditation for the new year)
As I wrote a note of encouragement to someone today for 2009, it occurred to me that we might all benefit from the following reminder.  God grant you all a blessed new year! 
In 2Cor 2:12-13, Paul describes his travels as restless and frustrated.  Then in v14, do you know what he calls the same travels?  A "triumphal procession."  The key is the first phrase of v14: "But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us" ... the point is that even when he is worried for his friend Titus and searching the known world for him, because Paul knows that God leads him in Christ, Paul refers to this anxious search as a victory parade! 

We've talked before about what Paul's life is like in 2 Corinthians (see 4:17-18 and 11:23-28).  And yet in 2:14, he says that God in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession.  Always!  What a glorious, cloud-dispersing, energy-giving, joy-restoring, just-makes-you-want-to-run-and-shout-and-dance thought... for those who are in Christ, the greatest heartaches and confusion in life are part of the victory parade.  We don't need to know how it all fits, only that God is the one who leads us in Christ, and that Christ has already triumphed, and that we who are in Him are absolutely guaranteed to enjoy that triumph with Him forever.

So, whatever 2009 brings you, remember that it's part of the victory parade.  God in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession!

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harvestoc.net blog, Tuesday, December 30, 2008
  Photos from the Building Remodel
See them [here]

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  Embracing God (Sermon Follow-Up)
Habakkuk's name means "the embracing one" or "the embraced one," and in the first sermon from Habakkuk, I suggested that it seems that this "embrace" is more the embrace of Gen 32:24-30 than Gen 33:4.  While it is true that God embraces His own in loving embrace (who can forget the beautiful pictures of God and His people in Hosea and Song of Solomon?), this wrestling kind of embrace is a vital part of the life of a believer in this world.

We see such wrestling in faith throughout the Psalms, and we noted in this week's evening sermon that Hab 1:13-17 are a wonderful example of a believer wrestling with God--or, as we had it in the outline, "crying out to God in faith."  We'll spend more time on the "in faith" part later this week, but for now I'd like to reinforce the wrestling  part.

It is important that believers wrestle with God.  As we heard, it is the necessary result of true, living, active faith.  It was precisely because Habakkuk believed in God's power ("are You not from everlasting?") that the promised rise of the Chaldeans, and their infatuation with their own power, was so perplexing to him.  It was precisely because Habakkuk believed in God's special care and interest in His people ("my God" and "my Holy One") that the promised tortuous treatment at the Chaldeans' hands made no sense.

The very things that caused Habakkuk to be sure of the end result in v12 ("we shall not die") caused Habakkuk's consternation at what he knew would certainly happen, because he believed with all his heart that what God says will come to pass.

Seemingly unjust circumstances don't send into anguished prayer someone with a small view of God.  Why waste such energy upon a God who probably cannot do anything about it?  Confusion and pain don't send into earnest questioning someone with a distant view of God.  Why ask such earnest questions of a God who keeps Himself at a distance?

It is only those confident in God's justice, God's power, God's covenant love who know this kind of wrestling with Him. 

So the question is: do you?  Do you wrestle with God when the way things are stacking up don't seem to correspond to what you are SURE is true about Him?  Yes, there are careful caveats to make, such as the "in faith" part and the wonderful humility that we saw in Hab 2:1.  But, the legitimate question remains: do you wrestle with God?
And if not, is it...

(a) because you have no troubling circumstances?
(b) because you've already done the wrestling and come out with a Hab 3:17-19 view of them?
or perhaps...
(c) because your view of God is too small
(d) because your view of God is too distant
or maybe even...
(e) because you've never considered that those passionate, anguished, wrestling Psalms are what it looks like to trust in the God of the Bible while we live in this world.

If it's a matter of (c), (d), or (e), let me encourage you to incorporate the Psalms into your singing and praying life as an individual and as a family.  God has given His saints wonderful things to think, say, sing, and pray when they are miserable.  Praise be to God!

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  Announcements, announcements, announcements
BE PREPARED FOR THE LORD'S SUPPER in morning worship on the 4th.  Although we should always be examining ourselves, etc., we often need reminders, don't we?

NEW MAILING ADDRESS is 209 1st St NE, Orange City, IA 51041.  Mail will be forwarded from the old PO Box for some time yet, but please update your records.

NEW/TEMPORARY MEETING LOCATION is in the community rooms of Iowa State Bank (right across the street south from the new building--enter as if you're going to bank during regular banking hours, then either take the elevator or the right-hand stairs down).  WORSHIP THIS COMING LORD'S DAY IS AT IOWA STATE BANK AT 10a AND 6p.

GARY AND JEAN VANDER PLAATS have invited the entire congregation over to their home (2520 460th Street, Ireton) tomorrow evening (New Year's Eve), beginning at 7p.m.  If you'd like, bring something to share with everyone.

NO BIBLE CLASSES ON THE 4TH (curriculum for two of the children's classes, and books for new students in Gary Vander Hart's class, will not be in yet).

WOULD YOU LIKE TO HELP PAY FOR OUR NEW PIANO? The session has approved the purchase of a reconditioned Yamaha U3 upright for around $3000, shipped.  If you would like to help pay for it, please indicate so on your check or envelope and include it with your regular offering.  Any excess donations will be used for other expense associated with the new building.

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO HELP ON SATURDAY please meet at the new building around 9a.m.  In addition to whatever is being done on remodeling, we will need to transport hymnals, Bibles, resource table items, etc. (not chairs) from Unity.

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO HELP SET UP FOR WORSHIP ON THE LORD'S DAY please meet at Iowa State Bank around 9:15 a.m.

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harvestoc.net blog, Monday, December 29, 2008
  Praise for Past Tense (Sermon Follow-Up)
As I've begun preparing for next Lord's Day evening in Romans 7:13-25, one of the first things that I've noticed is a change in verb tenses.  Including the text for this week's morning sermon, up until v14 the verbs are almost all past tense; beginning in v14, they are present tense verbs.  This is an important difference to note for next week's sermon, because it indicates that the turmoil in which Paul finds himself in the rest of the chapter is the turmoil of a mature Christian.

But it is also an important difference to note in applying Rom 7:7-12 for this week.  We spent yesterday morning having Paul describe to us that even the condemning, dominating aspect of the law, the aspect from which we have been freed in Christ.  We saw that we ought to be grateful for the law's condemnation and domination, because God used it to show us that sin was very much alive in us and that we were dead. "used" ... "was" ... "were" ... past tense!

Believers ought to be grateful that the law once was condemning and dominating us!  But if this isn't past tense for us, then great is our peril indeed.  Believers aren't under condemnation anymore.  Believers aren't under the law's domination anymore.  Believers have peace with God (ch 5).  Believers walk in newness of life, obeying from the heart (ch 6).  It is this new kind of obedience at work in us that gives life to the struggle in next week's text!

So as we heard in the sermon, we should be grateful that the law showed us that we were wicked and dead and damned.  That's the only kind of person for whom Jesus--the Savior of wicked, dead, and damned people--is good news!  But this gratitude must be for something that is in our past. 

The question for you is: is the law's condemnation and domination in your past?  There are two reasons you might answer, "no."

The first possible reason for "no," would be if you have never been condemned by the law and dominated by the law.  This is quite possible, since God's law is so rarely preached these days.  God's law hasn't just been yanked from court rooms by seething secularists.  God's law has been yanked from pulpits by spineless church architects--attempting to "grow" God's church by man's so-called "wisdom."  And the result is that it is quite possible that you have attended an "evangelical" church all your life and have never had your conscience pinned under the law. 

If you're in that position, you are an evangelical without the evangel.  The gospel is not that you can have a better life and be a better you if only you would have Jesus in your heart.  The gospel is that Jesus died to take our damnation, rose to give us life, and ascended and poured out His Spirit to sanctify us.  Without the law to tell you that you are damned, dead, and wicked, there simply is no true gospel.

A second reason why Rom 7:7-12 might not be past tense for you is if you are still stuck in it!  Alas, this is all too possible.  If you hear law, and rather than a heart desire to keep it, you feel a heart desire to "get away" with breaking it while appearing to others (calligraphy!) as if you keep it, you might be stuck.  If you hear law, and rather than grief out of love for your Savior you feel singled out and condemned, then it's not past tense.  If you hear law, and rather than hearing a guide for your life, you hear a description of how bad you are, you might be stuck. 

And if you're stuck, you still need to be saved.  People who belong to Jesus have been freed from this relationship with the law.  If the law is heavy and condemning to you, fly to the cross.  Ask Jesus to free you from its slavery and make you His slave instead.  The law is not the gospel.  Law without Jesus isn't good news; it's even worse than no news at all!

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harvestoc.net blog, Sunday, December 28, 2008
  Rom 7:13, Hab 2:3, Eph 1:11 (Memorization Monday)
For next week's sermons, let's memorize Hab 2:3 and Rom 7:13.  For next week's catechism, let's memorize Eph 1:11.  God grant us diligence and success at hiding His word in our hearts, and the ministry of His Spirit to bless it to us!  Here is a pretty pdf toward those ends.

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  Hab 1:12-2:1 'My Holy One' (28-Dec Evening)
In evening worship today we heard from Hab 1:12-2:1 how believers respond to perplexing circumstances by focusing upon who God is (that He is far beyond us, right beside us, and faithful to discipline us), crying out to God in faith, and waiting upon God in humility. The audio and manuscript are available.

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  Rom 7:7-12 'When Bad People Happen to Good Things' (28-Dec Morning)
This morning we heard from Rom 7:7-12 about how God has given us a condemning and dominating law as an instrument of grace: enabling us to know our sin, misery, and death, so that we might flee to Christ's righteousness, blessing, and life.  Both [audio] and [manuscript] are available.

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harvestoc.net blog, Saturday, December 27, 2008
  Random Announcements
Tomorrow is our last Lord's Day at Unity.  Beginning next week, we'll be meeting in the Iowa State Bank community rooms until our new building is ready.

January is a "morning service month" for the Lord's Supper, so keep that in mind for the 4th.


Bible Classes start up again on January 4, with the adults all together in Gary's class on Christ in the Old Testament for now.


ESV Study Bibles are in from the group buy.  If you ordered a TruTone, your cost for it is $22.39; if you ordered a hardcover, your cost is $14.93.  If you didn't sign up but still want in, there are a limited number of additional hardcovers available at the $14.93 price.


Gary and Jean Vander Plaats have invited the entire congregation to their home on New Year's Eve, beginning at 7p.m.


If you're interested in viewing some photos from the children's program, I've uploaded some [here].

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harvestoc.net blog, Friday, December 26, 2008
  Start with Him (Sermon Follow-Up)
One of the reasons that we're interjecting a Habakkuk series (it will interrupt Genesis this week and then Romans for several more weeks in the evenings in January) is that several of us are tempted toward dejection at our current circumstances and shortcomings. 

We're about to see that Habakkuk got God's message to take his eyes off self and his immediate circumstances to consider God as God of the whole world through all time.  But this is something we've already seen twice, in two big ways, in Genesis.

Remember in Gen 15:1-6, after Abram alienated just about the whole world and gave away badly needed resources?  Remember how God came to him and drew Abram's attention to one thing after another about God?

And then, in this week's morning sermon, we saw God employ the same method as He re-called Abram from thirteen years of spiritual floundering.  The fact of the matter is that no matter where you read in the Bible, God Himself is the starting point.  Sure, it has a lot to say about why certain circumstances are the way they are, or how we ought to respond to them, or what is good for us, or what is bad for us.  But the starting point for everything the Bible teaches is who God Himself is.

Ask one of our catechism children, "What do the Scriptures principally teach?"  And you'll get the answer (if they've been trying), "The Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of men."  True as that is, without the first part of that statement, the second part falls to the ground.

So whether the ailment is unfaithfulness and self-reliance or ominous circumstances and helplessness, the cure is to direct our attention to God Himself, to center our focus upon, believe, rest upon God's great revelation of Himself.  This is in fact the cure to a common life, to borrow a phrase from Max Lucado (maybe the first and only time I ever do that).  I am, of course, using the word "common" as the Scriptural antonym that it is to the word "holy."

We saw in the morning sermon that God commanded Abram to be blameless.  We heard that this corresponds to other Scriptures in which God says, "be perfect as I am perfect" and "be holy as I am holy."  We meditated at that point on how God actually gives every believer what He has commanded... that those whom He justifies, He glorifies.  That those who belong to Jesus know that they will be made like Jesus because they will see Him as He is.

If we belong to Jesus, we must be holy, not common.  We are not our own.  We are set apart to God.  From the recent sermons in Romans 6 and 7, we have seen this connection between belonging to Jesus and obeying Him joyfully from our inmost being.  Our living and law-keeping comes from who He is, and who we become when united to Him.
So we've seen it in Genesis, Habakkuk, and Romans: the character of God Himself is the foundation to Christian thinking, feeling, speaking, and living.

Is that the foundation to your life?  We live our lives in units called days and weeks, so let me ask: is that the foundation of your day?  Is that the foundation of your week?  Do you begin each day addressing God in prayer full of who He is (Father in heaven? Whose name is hallowed?  Whose kingdom is coming?  Whose will is being carried out?); and reading His word not for "what it means to me" but what its sentences and paragraphs and sections are teaching about Him and what duties He requires of us; and bending not just your thoughts in prayer and reading but especially your affections upon Him by singing Scripture? 

And, what about your week?  Even in Adam's unfallen state God gave Him an entire day for undivided absorption in God--as opposed to God's amazing world.  When Jesus accomplished our redemption, He made His resurrection day into the God-absorption day, gathering His disciples to Himself on the first day of the week even before the ascension, and gathering His people to Himself on that day ever since so that the day itself was Christened "the Lord's Day" by the time John received the revelation of Jesus Christ.  Is the first day of the week a day of sweet, undivided absorption with God?  Do you come out of it with a renewed vision of Him, His characteristics, His works?  Do you come out not just with a reminder of facts about Him but with a focus that has been re-centered upon Him?

The chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.  We are all about God, so every day, every week, in everything... let's start with Him.

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harvestoc.net blog, Wednesday, December 24, 2008
  Lessons and Carols
Readings and singing, 9:30a.m. at Unity

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harvestoc.net blog, Tuesday, December 23, 2008
  It Could All Happen Suddenly (Sermon Follow-Up)
In the Lord's Day evening sermon, we heard God telling Habakkuk that things will get a lot worse before they get better.  We noted that while the Lord prepares the church also for enduring much trouble in this world, yet He has been pleased at times to give fresh bursts of the work of His Spirit. 

And this is one of the glorious things about belonging to such an unpredictable God.  We know that He has already given us in Christ what eye had not seen, ear had not heard, nor could man imagine.  We know the eternality and the weightiness of the glory that awaits us by how it renders light and momentary a lifetime of excruciating pain.  And on top of all of that, He adds glorious works beyond our imagining even in this age and this life.  We had a few examples in the sermon.  And I came across one more as I was preparing tomorrow's "Hebrews-four-twelve-us" devotional.

In 2 Chronicles 29, we're coming off Ahaz.  Ahaz was the Ahab of the south.  You name it, he did it: Baal, burning children alive, shutting up God's temple and opening other ones in every corner of Jerusalem, trying the Syrian gods on when he lost to them in battle.  There was no form of idolatry or wickedness that was beyond Ahaz. 

So as you begin chapter 29, you figure that this is where God lowers the boom and wipes Judah of the map, right?  I mean... we've read Deuteronomy.  We know what happens next.  As my youngest son would say, two finger-pistols blazing, "BLAM!"

Blam indeed.  But not the blam you think.  God sends Hezekiah, Hezekiah marshals the Levites, and reform comes so quick and so earnest that they have a hard time getting enough Aaronic temple priests consecrated in time for the massive revival of right temple worship that comes.  That wonderful chapter of Scripture ends this way: "And Hezekiah and all the people rejoiced because God had prepared for the people, for the thing came about suddenly."

God didn't just do it.  God didn't just do it BIG.  God did it suddenly. 

And it's just like Him to do that.  As we heard in the morning sermon, while the Old Testament is the story of how we came to need Christ, and God's promise to send Christ, and how God brought that promise through history, it also serves another purpose.  The Old Testament gives us glimpse after glimpse of who God is and what He is like with His people.  Oh, let us pray to this God of surprising, super-abounding grace for revival of the church!  Who knows what He might do?  It could all happen suddenly!

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  28-Dec-08 Worship Services

The Lord’s Day, December 28, 2008
Morning Worship, 10a.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Psalm 105:1-6
*Song – #30, Our God, Our Help in Ages Past
Serial Reading – Isaiah 49
*Song – #225, Once in Royal David’s City
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Romans 7:7-12 · Message, When Bad People Happen to Good Things
*Song – #148, How Shall the Young Direct Their Way?
*Benediction
*Song – #30 v7, Our God, Our Help in Ages Past, v7
Evening Worship, 6p.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Heb 3:5-8
*Song – #381, Brethren, We Have Met to Worship
Serial Reading – Matthew 25
*Song – #320, Rejoice, All Ye Believers
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Habakkuk 1:12-2:1 · Message, My Holy One
*Song – #370, Revive Thy Work, O Lord
*Benediction
*Song – #320 v4, Rejoice, All Ye Believers, v4
*Congregation standing as they are able

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  23-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Joel Beeke helps us think about light--why God created light first, and what we learn from the fact that "God saw the light."

We've been practicing Once in Royal David's City in our homes and began singing it in public worship this week.  You can see (and hear) the entire nativity hymn at cyberhymnal.org.  One of my favorite verses has been left out of the New Trinity Hymnal.  It's the one that follows the line "Christian children all must be mild, obedient, good as He."  Christ's perfect, active obedience in His childhood is just as necessary as it is in any other part of His life.  It is our only hope for goodness, because He alone has earned our goodness.  And it is a great help for pursuing goodness to know that Christ sympathizes in all our joys and sorrows.  The verse goes like this: For He is our childhood's pattern; day by day like us He grew.  He was little, weak, and helpless; tears and smiles like us He knew; and He feeleth for our sadness, and He shareth in our gladness.

"Do Santa right!" pleads Scott Clark, by which he means, if you're going to play/pretend with your children, make sure they are just playing and pretending too. You may remember my pleas for those who "do Christmas" to do it right-- (a) that while we remember Christ's incarnation, we impress upon our children that He is not a baby, but a died, risen, ascended, gloriously exalted and victorious Lord who rules over all things and intercedes for us, basically that we teach our children to know the real Christ, and (b) that we not reinforce the false ideas about man and salvation that come with this season, those ideas that man is basically good and that God simply "inspires the goodness in us" with "the Christmas spirit" by "sending His special gift"; make sure your children know that they and you and everyone are by nature children of wrath, without hope except in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that the very  best of our "Christmas spirit goodness" is acceptable only through His shed blood!, basically that we teach our children to believe the real gospel.

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harvestoc.net blog, Monday, December 22, 2008
  22-Dec-08 Best of the Web
When we dealt with homosexuality in Romans 1, I urged anyone who is tempted to this sin not to identify himself "as a homosexual."  The basic reason is that our identity is that of image bearer, and more specifically one of two categories: (a) one who is made as a monument of God's glory but falling short of it and therefore under wrath, and (b) one who began as type 'a' but has been surprisingly, mercifully, powerfully, astonishingly redeemed and is now marked by great love for the Savior and for graciously inviting the type 'a's to flee the wrath they deserve and embrace the Savior whom they do not.  Over at Ref21, Carl Trueman is urging us to avoid two temptations as we respond to homosexuality: (1) the temptation to compromise Biblical truth, and (2) the temptation to become hateful of those who identify themselves with that sin.

Western Christmas is in a couple days.  Copts have 15 more to go, and Greeks 16.  It's good to see pastors like David Mathis directing the attention of the people of God to Christ's current, ongoing humanity.  He is a Person, not a concept, and though we may worship Him for what He once did (become a baby), we must worship Him as He is!

Tim Challies reviews a book that sounds good.  It urges us to fight 'infobesity'.  It's not a Christian book, but based on the review, it makes excellent points (and Biblical, though he doesn't provide the Scriptures that warrant that label).

If you wonder just what is wrong with the Roman Catholic idea of the Lord's Supper, today's installment from Calvin's Short Treatise will help you. 

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harvestoc.net blog, Sunday, December 21, 2008
  Rom 7:12 and Hab 2:20 (Memorization Monday)


Tomorrow is Memorization Monday! This week, we are memorizing Romans 7:12 and Habakkuk 2:20, as we prepare our minds for next week's preaching. [Click here] for a pdf to print out for family use in memorizing.

Romans 7:12 - So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.

Habakkuk 2:20 - But the Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.



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  Hab 1:1-11 'Why Is Evil Winning?' (21-Dec-08 Evening)
In evening worship today we heard "Why Is Evil Winning?" from Habakkuk 1:1-11.  We began by observing the burden of the oracle and Habakkuk's wrestling with God.  We then noted Habakkuk's three problems:
  1. v2, God doesn't seem to be answering
  2. v3, God doesn't seem to mind sin
  3. v4, God doesn't seem to reward righteousness
Then we saw four answers that the text gives us to these problems:
  1. v5a, Observe and marvel at all of the wonderful things that God has already done
  2. v5b, Remember that God's work is mysterious and misunderstood
  3. v6-11a, You haven't seen anything yet!
  4. v11b, The good God works even through wicked people, who shall yet bear their guilt
The summary to the sermon was this: God is God, and we are not!  
Download or listen to the sermon as preached.

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  Gen 17:1 'Covenant Re-Call' (21-Dec-08 Morning)
This morning, we heard how in His perfect wisdom and love, God sometimes permits His children to struggle and go through seasons of unfruitfulness, just as He did Abram for 13 years.  We heard the gracious re-call of God to Abram, as God:
How encouraging it was that this vision and understanding of God, this outlook on and purpose in life, is given to a man who had been struggling through self-reliance and spiritual drought in his life for thirteen long years!

Download (or listen to) the sermon, asking God to give you this vision of Himself, to give you His Spirit to see and hear Him, to give you this vision/outlook on walking before Him.

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  Evening Service at 3:00p.m. Today
Out of concern for those who would like to drive home in the daylight, please be advised that the evening service will be at 3p.m. this afternoon.  See you there!

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harvestoc.net blog, Saturday, December 20, 2008
  No Bible Class -- Hymn Sing -- Building Work Tues
Just a reminder that there's no Bible class tomorrow.  Worship is at 10, so we have that extra time for preparing our hearts and praying for the service.  Some things we might ask of God: to grant us faithfulness in worship, that He would be pleased to receive our worship through Christ, that He would sustain our worship by His Spirit, that He would meet us and bless us in worship, and most of all that He would use our worship to put His glory on majestic display.

Elder Vander Hart would like to have a brief hymn sing after morning worship tomorrow.  If you can stay to sing through some of the less familiar nativity hymns that he has planned for the carols and Scripture readings on Thurs, please do.  It would be great if we could have at least a couple each of soprano, alto, tenor, and bass.

Tuesday evening at 6:00p.m., Isaac hopes to get the sheetrocking finished for the upstairs portion of the building.  Anyone who can help for a couple hours, please come!

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  20-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Today's installment from Calvin's Short Treatise on the Lord's Supper gives encouragements to take it and to do so frequently.

Recently, as our family was reading Guns of Thunder, we read through Edwards' sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," describing how patiently we have been kept and spared by the God who owes us nothing but wrath.  William Romaine says the same thing in this quote (ht: John Currid).

Tim Keller reminds us of how the gospel at the same time affirms our complete unworthiness and yet recognizes the great value God has set upon us by grace.

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harvestoc.net blog, Friday, December 19, 2008
  Reminders for Tomorrow, Sat the 20th
Matt & Maggie's wedding is tomorrow!  It's at 2 in the afternoon, less than 3 hours away.


Sheetrock haulers are needed at the building at 9 a.m.  I'm sure other workers are needed as well after it's all carried in.  Thanks!

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  19-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Did you wake up to a beautiful, white world this morning?  I was chatting recently with one of our members about how God designed snow in order to show forth the completeness of His salvation of even the dirtiest sinners.  As He created the world, He gave water and snow these properties for that purpose.  Here's a wonderful meditation on this Scriptural truth from Dr. David Murray of Puritan Theological Seminary.

CJ Mahaney continues his series on planning our time with a second look at roles.  In the most recent post, he gives sound advice about recognizing what are not our roles, and doing our planning according to what are our roles.

JC Ryle reminds us of what a glorious Savior we have--literally infinitely glorious!

Scott Clark continues to transcribe for us Calvin's Short Treatise on the Lord's Supper, now part 4.  This one like the others is full of Scriptural instruction and pastoral wisdom.  The Short Treatise is one of 13 selections of Calvin's work in this little volume.

In Genesis, we've been seeing for months that the family is at the center of the display of God's glory in the universe, that the family is the height of the goodness of God's provision and our enjoyment of it, that the family is the battleground for the great spiritual war in history, and that the family is at the center of God's plan for redemption.  These are all great principial reasons to defend the family in general and follow carefully and diligently God's design for our own families.  But there's also the reason that we often hear in places like Christian radio: God's design for the family is just plain good for kids!  Two articles from unlikely sources (the British government and UNICEF!) are making that point today: linked here and here.

Al Mohler comments on Rick Warren's upcoming inauguration invocation, pointing out that no matter how "cool" you make yourself nationally, if you do take a stand on issues such as homosexuality, you will be instantly uncool.  Sadly, there are many who are unwilling to take a stand in order to maintain their coolness.  Mohler goes on to say that just as the pro-sodomy agenda in America is disappointed with Obama's choice, so Mohler is disappointed with Warren's: praying for your leaders is one thing, but how could a responsible pastor participate in such a public event in a way that suggests support for the agenda of a man who has promised to sign the Freedom of Choice Act?

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  Shiyan's Surgery Successful
Shiyan Vander Plaats had successful surgery on her mouth yesterday, and Jean was actually able to bring her home the same day!  The doctor was very pleased.  She will need one more for her nose.  Thanks for praying!

Update with more details from Jean:
Thank you all for your prayers for Shiyan yesterday.  She did wonderfully!!  She went to sleep so calmly, no resisting the mask at all, and woke up just as peacefully.  Her surgeon decided to just reconstruct her upper lip for now -- that alone took him 2 1/2 hours.  He thought that doing the nose at the same time might be too much for her, and that it would also benefit her to be a bit older for that.  She is managing the pain well with a little help from codeine, but she looks horrible!  Very swollen and bruised with stitches sticking out of her lips and going up to her nose.  She'll be on a liquid diet for at least a week.  We were very thankful to come home before the snowfall last night.  Thank you all so much for holding her up in prayer! 
Jean

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harvestoc.net blog, Thursday, December 18, 2008
  The Devastation of Decisionism (Sermon Follow-Up)
Reflecting upon the morning sermon this week has me thinking about Finneyism and its devastating consequences in the church.

If you don't know who Charles Finney was or what he has done to the church, then just know that by "Finneyism" I generally mean the use of whatever manipulative means necessary to manufacture sincere (or insincere) responses from unconverted people that mimic (quite successfully in many cases) true conversion.

Another name for Finneyism is "decisionism"--the idea that we are just trying to get people to make "decisions" for Jesus.  The goal becomes to do and say whatever we think will get the person to make a decision, rather than to obey God in the exercises of the means of grace and cry out to Him to save.  People, after all, are much easier to manipulate than God.

We hear decisionism reported in the number of VBS "decisions" that we had this year, or "decisions" at this or that youth rally.  Nevermind that for decades the vast majority of these kids have abandoned the faith and never come back--the church keeps doing it over and over and over again. 

But what about those who stay in the church?  Matthew 7 tells us that there will be a horde of souls at the judgment who hear "Depart from Me; I never knew you" -- people who are convinced that they are converted and have convinced others, and only God, who looks on the heart, knows differently.  (Side note: let us be careful of using "God knows my heart" as a defense against the opinions of others, for if the true sinfulness of our hearts were exposed, it would be a terrible thing indeed.  "God knows my heart" are the four most terrifying words to people who know their own hearts; they are only endurable, if the end of that sentence is "and has given His Son for me anyway"!)

But the trouble for these poor souls doesn't begin at the judgment.  We have been seeing in Romans 6 and 7 the real change that real conversion makes through the union of real Christians to the real Christ.  In Rom 7:4 in this week's text, this came up again when we saw that it literally reads, "you were exterminated to the law through the body of Christ."  That's a pretty clean break.  We saw in v6 that the cleanness of this break is that now we don't just concern ourselves with outward behaviors (the oldness of calligraphy) but with genuine heart obedience (the newness of the spirit).

People who have "made decisions" but are yet unconverted can learn to talk a certain way, perhaps even to think a certain way; they can become super nice and accepting (not unlike adherents of many of the other false religions in this world).  But their very spirits have not been transformed in a Rom 6:17 - Rom 7:4 - Rom 7:6 sort of way.

But can you imagine having been "decisioned" (instead of having been converted) and trying to pull yourself up by your bootstraps into real Christian holiness?  To borrow an image from Whitefield, it's like trying to climb to heaven on a rope made of sand.  But this is exactly what we do if we try to practice decisionism and teach holiness at the same time.  (Is it any wonder that many decisionistic churches no longer teach holiness either?).  How miserable are the poor people upon whom we practice such false evangelism, whom we attempt to disciple when they are not disciples!

So that's the devastation of decisionism, but we should end with the delight of discipleship.  For, the other side of this is that there is such a thing as true conversion.  And that it is not a difficult thing.  Look to the Lord Jesus!  Abandon all idea of worthiness in self and fall upon His mercy!  God, who does indeed know your heart as even you do not, has yet given His spotless, infinitely valuable Son for such sinners.  No one who comes to Him does He cast out.  All who call upon His name shall be saved.  Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved!



Not just given a ticket to escape Hell at the judgment, but saved.  Transformed.  Made new.  Exterminated to the condemnation and domination of the law.  Made alive unto God, bearing fruit for God, obeying from the heart, in newness of Spirit. 

Now, it's possible to be converted and forget this first love.  Though we may no longer be in the flesh, there is still much flesh left in us, as we shall see in the rest of chapter 7.  But that is why God gives us passages like Romans 7 and Rev 2:4-5.  Have you ever noticed that in Rev 2:5, the "first love" is clearly defined as works and returning to it as repentance?

So, genuine converts do go through wintery seasons in their walks.  If that is you, come back!  Come back to your first love!  Behold the loveliness of Christ; rest anew upon Him who is a great Savior in every respect, able to save us to the uttermost, conforming us more and more to His image.  Dear believer, these are gospel realities; count on them--bank on them--as yours in Christ!  When we treasure Him anew from the new hearts that He Himself has given us, discipleship isn't just possible; it's a delight!

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  18-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Tim Keller stands on the shoulders of Don Carson and Jonathan Edwards to explain from the Bible that ministry to the poor is not gospel evangelism, but it is a necessary effect of believing it. Perhaps the most helpful aspect of the article is its explanation of how the very logic of the gospel shoots down all of the heart objections that we might have to helping others.  If you call yourself a Christian, but your heart does not break and wallet and schedule do not open for the poor, you need to read this article.  If you think ministry to the poor is the same thing as or even a part of evangelism, you also need to read this article.

Did you know that a large number of John Piper's books are available from the desiringgod website as  FREE PDF downloads?  For instance, The Future of Justification--an important book for understanding and defending the true Gospel from new, ancient attacks.

Do you know believers who are "waiting to find their calling in life"? These excellent thoughts on vocation from CJ Mahaney might help them.

This morning, I'm grateful for Jay Adams's simple (and just plain grammatically accurate) correction of many people's understanding of Rom 8:16.

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  17-Dec Session Meeting Roundup
Some decisions of interest that the elders made last night...

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harvestoc.net blog, Wednesday, December 17, 2008
  How Sinners Cry in Distress (Psalm 25, Prayer Meeting Devotional)
Tonight's prayer meeting folder is online [here].  The session devotional is the same as last week, because we didn't have a quorum.

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  Divine Alimony (Sermon Follow-Up)
So far in this week's follow-ups to the morning sermon, we have been focusing (appropriately) upon the remarriage for which God freed us by execution from our old marriage to the law.

In God's providence, we have good opportunity today to examine that old marriage from which we have been liberated.  One of tomorrow's "Hebrews four twelve us!" chapters is Zechariah 5, in which the prophet has a vision of a billboard-sized scroll (Zech 5:1-4).  We rightly understand this scroll as representing the law.  v3 shows us that it is written on both sides, taking us back to Exodus 32:15. 

In Both Zech 5 and Ex 32, we understand the writing on both sides to indicate that this law is not open for revision.  Ancient covenant documents could be modified by making notations on the back.  God wrote His original covenant document in stone and on both sides.  Our Lord perfectly understood this when He declared that God's moral law is unchangeable even by the covenant of grace (Matt 5:17-19).

Zech 5:1-4 emphasizes the Law's active, overwhelming, and condemning power.  First, it is active; this isn't a scroll that needs our help in unrolling and carrying around; it's a flying scroll, seeking out and entering houses all on its own.  Second, the law is overwhelming.  You and I are familiar with billboards, but they didn't have marketing majors at Post-Exile Jerusalem University; the sheer size of the scroll would have communicated the law's overwhelming immensity, its weight upon sinners.  Third, the law is condemning; not only does it seek out sinners, but it consumes the strongest of the structures they erect to hide themselves.

The picture is of a devouring monster from which there is no escape.  This is what is so exciting about our being violently executed with respect to the monster.  There's nothing more that it can do to us than has already been done to us in Christ. 

Because of the change wrought in us and our circumstances, that which was our awful nemesis is now a powerful ally.  The law's being living and active (Heb 4:12) makes it priceless as we now fight against what seems to be a law in our members (Rom 7:23).  The law's immensity now serves to magnify by relief how great is the grace of Christ that by it the Spirit works real heart-obedience to this very law in what would otherwise be hopeless sinners (Rom 8:1-4).  The law's implacable hunger underwrites the guarantee that those who are justified from it will also be glorified (Rom 8:30-34).

What gloriously good news is the gospel of Jesus Christ!  Not only have we been delivered from a (literally) Hellish marriage to the law as indomitable oppressor, but He subdues that great and glorious law to become a mighty support in our joyful service to our new Husband.  By giving us a glimpse into the character of our ex-husband, Zech 5 ought to make us grateful for how, with grace as the first principle of our life, the law now pays out great riches in divine alimony.

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  17-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Some people like Thanksgiving Dinner; others like Christmas Supper; still others like Easter Brunch.  My favorite meal is the Lord's Supper--what other meal has so perfect a Host, such rich and nourishing food, such sweet table fellowship?  You want a meal with meaning?  How about one that participates backward into the very earthly life of Christ, upward into His current life in glory, outward into His life in the body, and forward into our everlasting joy with Him in glory!  Every time we come to the table together, it takes some measure of restraint not to launch into all eight of the meal's wonderful purposes as listed in the BCO.  And the Scriptural witness isn't limited to those eight.  Yesterday, we began to get help from Calvin in thinking about the supper.  Scott Clark now has made part two and part three available.

John Currid's historical anecdotes are always encouraging.  This one reminds us that we should always be earnest and intentional in our conversation (let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt!), for we know not when or what God might be pleased to use for plucking a brand from the fire.  It also reminds me that there is much benefit to be gained in reading Christian history and biography.

In case you were wondering, I get these links not by scouring the web all day but by using a few reliable, Reformed folk who aggregate what they think are the best available.  Then I take the ones from those that I think will be most profitable to your soul.  Isn't technology wonderful?  Well, it's quite rare that I add a new individual site to those upon which I keep tabs, but today I do just that with the new blog from the Institute for Nouthetic Studies.  Of course it features, among other things, the writing of Jay Adams.  Among his first articles was this one on what every pastor ought to preach but 99.9% of us are afraid to (just wait until we get to Galatians 6!) and this one exposing how most of us use talk of God's "moving" us to cover up mental laziness and spiritual irresponsibility.  I suspect we'll be seeing more like this in "Best of the Web" entries to come.

I'm excited that the folks at Ref21 are going to be blogging through the Institutes in 2009.  If we fail to thank God for and make good use of such gifts (as the Institutes and as godly, wise men walking  us through the Institutes) when He gives them, we are guilty of base ingratitude.

John Piper reviews and recommends a book.  I am not recommending the book.  I am recommending the review if for nothing else but this quote: I read one reviewer who said, “heartwarming.” Like a rifle bullet in the head, it’s heartwarming. The heart needs something bigger and deeper than warming. And this book helps. Praise God for such wisdom!  The heart needs resuscitation by the Spirit, the electric shock of the paddles of grace, Living Water to fill its coronary arteries.  Maybe it's from too much reading of those parts of the Bible that most people don't find "heart warming"; maybe it's from remorse over all those times I played Pastor Pelagius and was "heart warming" when the patient needed better and stronger, and I was the only one in the room who ought to have known better... but I ache for this kind of bold, real Christian view of life.  I don't say these things as well as John Piper, so I'm recommending his review.  I do plan on reading the book some day.

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harvestoc.net blog, Tuesday, December 16, 2008
  Prayer Reminders
Prayer meeting tomorrow evening is in the basement of Iowa Sate Bank at 7:00p.m.

Also, please remember to pray for Shiyan Vander Plaats and family.  Shiyan is having surgery on Thursday in Sioux Falls

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  Against Parenting As Calligraphy (Sermon Follow-Up)
The last clause of the text for the morning sermon this week literally reads, "we [bond]slave in newness of spirit and not oldness of letter."  In the preaching, we learned that the basis of the analogy here  is of our thinking of law as pretty strokes on a page rather than as the substance of its ideas.  The point of the analogy is to remind us of how at our conversion, for the first time, we became concerned with the substance of our hearts before God and not just how our behavior makes us look.

Have you ever seen a facsimile of a page from a pre-printing press Bible?  I mean one of those in which there is a full-scale painting embellishing the first word of a chapter or book.  It's so ornate, so intricate, so beautiful.  But the believer knows that the beauty of that page is the words themselves, their meanings--God speaking to us using nouns  and verbs and pronouns and prepositions: translating His thoughts into Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek.  If all we were ever concerned with was the prettiness of the characters on the page, we would miss the point completely.

This is just how the unconverted person uses God's law: as a means of commending his "moral prettiness" to others, or to his own self-opinion, and even to God.

I'm afraid that there is an epidemic of this kind of idea infecting so-called "Christian" parenting in our circles today.  If we are overly concerned with how our children look to others, we are training them to serve in the "oldness of the letter."  When the standard is relaxed in the confines of the home, we hide from them the reality that God is honored by our serving in "newness of spirit." You might not teach them  bad theology with your lips, but when you freak out over something they did when guests were over, and then lazily let things slide when there are none, you are training them to be Pharisees, not Christians, not true Israelites.

And children learn Pharisaism quickly, because it goes right with their old nature. The oldness of the letter is their native serving language.

Over against this calligraphy-concern style of parenting is the one that is always concerned with the heart.  This kind of parent is grieved by seemingly small statements his son makes, and the slight pout in his daughter's countenance... often more concerned than great lapses in judgment.  Why?  Because we are looking for the overflow of the heart.  Their great need is not to be trained into more reliable performance but to be saved by sovereign grace from a nature against which all human effort is helpless.  This is why Christian parenting responds to different triggers than psychotherapeutic and behavioristic parenting; and this is why Christian parenting's answer is always the means of grace.  And we pursue these means not only when a behavior exposes the heart but all day, every day.

When it comes to ourselves, things that we "almost said," hostile or proud reflexes in our thoughts are much more disturbing than how we may or may not have been perceived by someone else.  We're downright alarmed when our hearts spend entire sermons raising critical objections rather than being sliced open, diagnosed, bound up, and directed by the Word of God.  No one can see it--in fact, on the outside it looked like we were listening well and being downright "Berean."  So why are we so disturbed? 
Because at our conversion happened something in which we were exterminated to that outward way of obeying.  When God  made us new, He made us into people who no longer cared about obeying to the outward form of what others expected.  We saw in Rom 6:17, that God made us into people who now care from our hearts about obeying to the form of the teaching into whose hands we have been entrusted: the standard of the motive, the will, the spirit, the inner being.  He made us those who serve in newness of the spirit. 

So, let us watch against having different standards for our children based on who can see them.  Let us be diligent in responding to serious heart issues, even when circumstances don't seem so serious.  And let's diligently pursue the means of grace with our children, since only by grace will this newness of spirit mark their serving instead of oldness of calligraphy.

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  16-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Here's help on the Supper from Calvin for those who feel like the Supper just doesn't "do" anything.

I regretfully informed some of our children's program actors that there is no inkeeper in Luke 2 (and likely not an "inn" so much as a guestroom).  I've also always thought that we only knew that there were three gifts, not three kings.  It turns out that I was wrong about the three kings bit.

Martin Downes quotes Doug Kelly on how we should learn theology.  This is also how I should study my sermons, and how we should all attend Sunday school, sit under preaching, listen to mom and dad in family worship, etc.

I would love for us to go through this book as a congregation at some point (anyone want to start a reading club?), but from what little I have read about it, I feel fairly confident in recommending it.  Yes, that means I haven't yet read it, so if you are planning to, let me know, and we'll read it together!

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harvestoc.net blog, Monday, December 15, 2008
  Salvation Made Us Spiders (Sermon Follow-Up)
Have you ever noticed how easily spiders run across their own webs?  If other creatures come into contact with the web, they mangle the web and tangle themselves.  It's still a perfectly good web; these other creatures simply aren't designed for  it.  The reason that the spider glides skillfully across the threads is that it does so by nature; the web is designed for it.

This illustrates what we heard about ourselves and the law in the morning sermon this week (and what we'll continue to hear throughout Romans 7).  The law has always been perfectly good.  As we will be memorizing for the 28th, v12 says, "So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good."  The problem was never with the law.  The problem was that in our sinful natures, we were unfit to use it--all it did was expose us; all we did was mess it up; and the end result was always a tangled mess of condemnation.  As long as the law itself (the web itself) controlled our interaction with it, this was the case.  We were like those other creatures.

Enter grace.  When God saved us, grace became the first principle in our lives.  He didn't relax or remove His law.  He transformed us from the inside out.  As in Gal 5:6, the law no longer controlled our relationship with itself, but faith working through love controls us.  As in Gal 6:13, what has made the difference is not that the law has been modified but that we have become new creations.  To use the imagery from our illustration, God has made us spiders.  We used to be utterly unfit to use God's good law to any profit.  Now, we have been remade--a violent death and a new marriage to Christ has fit us out for fruitful use of God's perfect law.

Salvation made us spiders.

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  21-Dec-08 Worship Services

The Lord’s Day, December 21, 2008
Morning Worship, 10a.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Psalm 103
*Song – #53, Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
Serial Reading – Isaiah 48
*Song – #55, To God Be the Glory
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Genesis 17:1 · Message, Covenant Re-Call
*Song – #42, El Shaddai
*Benediction
*Song – Handout #94, How Firm a Foundation
Evening Worship, 6p.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Heb 2:11-13
*Song – Handout #225, Once in Royal David’s City
Serial Reading – Matthew 24
*Song – #577, Stand Up, My Soul; Shake Off Your Fears
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Habakkuk 1:1-11 · Message, Why Is Evil Winning?
*Benediction
*Song – #370, Revive Thy Work, O Lord
*Congregation standing as they are able

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  Preaching Schedule Changes
You might have noticed that we're having a miniseries on Habakkuk the next three weeks. I've noticed that people continue to seem disheartened about the state of the world and our nation in specific. I myself battle this with respect to the "evangelical" church. It seems like faithfulness doesn't pay and disregard for God goes unpunished or even rewarded. This disheartening might call for an extended series through Ecclesiastes if it persists, but we'll try a three week blitz through Habakkuk first.

You might think, "Ack! Habakkuk? Really?" But you already know one of the key verses: the righteous live by faith. Though faithfulness often appears to go unrewarded, the faithful are yet undaunted, because the righteous live by faith, not by how things appear. The real point of the book (and the series), however, is to direct our gaze to the glorious object of our faith: God Himself.

Also, inserted into the Romans series on the 21st will be the sermon on Gen 17:1, "Covenant Re-Call"

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  Gen 17:1 and Hab 1:5 (Memorization Monday Redux)
Since Rom 7:7-12 has been pushed to the 28th, the following is the memory work for today/this week:

Genesis 17:1  When Abram was ninety-nine years old the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless, 

and

Habakkuk 1:5  "Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told.

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  Rom 7:1-6 'Remarried by Grace' (14-Dec Morning)
In the morning assembly this week, we heard Rom 7:1-6 proclaimed. We heard that our eternal life consists in being powerfully joined to Christ forever, and that Jesus enables everyone who belongs to Him to obey Him with all their hearts forever. The [message audio] and the [outline] are online.

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  15-Dec-08 Best of the Web
We live in an amazing age. This free online collection of resources on the shorter catechism is rich.

Kirk Cameron stars in this clip on how to fill a church with false converts, who either fall away from the faith or require "a souped up church with a cool pastor, kickin' band, and lots of activities." The bit about not even needing God and using time saved from prayer for the counseling required to prop up false converts is pointed--even those of us who oppose Finneyistic measures are sadly negligent in our prayers. I'd tell you the video was hilarious, if it wasn't such a grievously true description of the church today. (ht: Thabiti Anyabwhile)

Tim Challies provides a wonderful meditation on election from John 5.

Kirk Wellum makes an interesting (and wise) observation at a Christian bookstore going-out-of-business sale (ht: Challies). Sadly, I think the first comment is probably spot-on as well.

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harvestoc.net blog, Sunday, December 14, 2008
  Rom 7:12 and Hab 1:5 (Memorization Monday)
This week's memory work is
Romans 7:12  So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. 
Habakkuk 1:5  Look among the nations, and see; wonder and be astounded. For I am doing a work in your days that you would not believe if told.

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harvestoc.net blog, Saturday, December 13, 2008
  Some Reminders About Tomorrow
Sign up for the ESV Study Bible group buy.  Elders Vander Hart and Hakim have been using it for some time now and are delighted with it.  If what you look for in a Study Bible is to understand the Bible as well as possible, this is the one for you.  If what you look for when purchasing is that one opportunity to pay as little as possible, this is the chance for you.  Buy for yourself and all your family.  Sign up at church tomorrow.

Children need to be there at 9 a.m. sharp in the morning and 3 p.m. sharp in the afternoon.
The children's program begins at 4p.m., and there is a soup and dessert reception between it and evening worship.

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  13-Dec-08 Best of the Web
The "unworthy servants" passage in Luke 17 has often helped my soul after by His grace I have done something mighty for the kingdom.  Not only is what good we do completely by grace--what do we have that we have not received?--but even the best we do falls short of what we already owe Him!  John Piper sums it up this way: God loves us by never thanking us.

Another encouraging George Whitefield anecdote from John Currid.

A great quote from Spurgeon against erroneous preparationism.  It is true that repentance and brokenheartedness belong to faith, but we must in the same breath tell people that Jesus gives these too--since He gives it all, those who have none of it must yet come to Him!

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harvestoc.net blog, Friday, December 12, 2008
  Reminders for Tomorrow, Sat the 13th
Children's Program Practice at 9:00a.m. at Unity Christian High School.
Electrician Day at the new building (no help needed tomorrow, but much help needed carrying sheetrock on the 20th!)
Lord's Day Eve -- as it's the season of days to which customarily refer as various "eves," it might be helpful for us to remember that there is such a day in every week.  Every Saturday is a Lord's Day Eve, a preparation day for the celebration day of God.  The week is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, but let us also approach unto the Day of the Lord and stand in His holy assembly (to paraphrase Psalm 24:1,3).

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  The Importance of Gen 1-3 (Sermon Follow-Up)
As we began Lord's Day evening's sermon by tracing the Scriptures up to that point, we saw how important God has decided to make the family in creation, providence, and redemption.

But this brings up how important is another oft-contested issue: the literal and literarily narrative character of Genesis 1-3.  First of all, that's just the genre of the text.  Also important is the fact that we will lose the crucial role of the family in creation, providence, and redemption if we do away with six day special creation, a literal Adam and a literal Eve who was taken from his rib, and a literal encounter with a being called the serpent that led to the fall of the entire race of Adam.

Billions of years and introduction of species through random mutation simply isn't compatible with a quick, orderly, powerful, verbal creation--a symphonic expression of the glory of God, crescendoing to and climaxing in His image and likeness itself: man, male and female, producing more image bearers to fill and rule creation.

Without Adam's powerful life-lesson on day 6, our purpose of enjoying God forever is obscured, and marriage's starring role in that purpose is obliterated.  Without the rib, "bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh" is just a poetic description for the breeding of the (still) missing link with whatever preceded it--not an acknowledgment of Eve's queenly superiority to all other creatures as equal image-bearer, covenantally and flesh-i-ly joined to Adam.  And what then would we make of the idea of rearing children with the goal of training them in God-imaging until they can leave father and mother and enjoy a similar union.

Without the literal encounter of the literal Adam with a literal being referred to as the serpent, how is it that we all sinned in Adam, fell in Adam, and died in Adam?  And what point would there be in the Bible's obsessive interest in following  the seed who would crush the serpent's head?  And how would it make any sense that we could be saved in union with Christ, if there was not a literal fall in union with Adam?

The fact of the matter is that although one may be saved while being confused or even sinfully rebelling against 6-day special creation, or even a literal Adam and Eve, these are not insignificant issues.  They are tied at the core, with thick cords of Scripture, doctrine, and the real experience of believers for 6000 years to such issues as the glory of God in creation, the enjoyment of God in providence, and God's redeeming fallen sinners through Christ, the last Adam. 

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  14-Dec-08 Worship Services

The Lord’s Day, December 14, 2008
Morning Worship, 10a.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Psalm 102:12-22
Confession of Faith – Westminster Shorter Catechism 4-6, p869
*Song – #101, Come, Thou Almighty King · #457, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing
Serial Reading – Isaiah 47
*Songs – #521, My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less · #500, Rock of Ages
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Romans 7:1-6 · Message, Remarried to a Resurrected Lord
*Prayer and Benediction
*Song – #457, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing, v3
Evening Worship, 6p.m.
Call to Worship and Prayer – Heb 2:11-13
*Song – Handout #186, I Will Exalt My God, My King
Serial Reading – Matthew 24
*Song – Handout #272, You Are Our God; We Are Your People
Prayer
Sermon – Text, Genesis 17:1 · Message, Covenant Re-Call
*Song – #42, El Shaddai
*Benediction
*Song – Handout #214, Glory to God
*Congregation standing as they are able

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  Memorization Monday
On the back of the worship folder each week, there are recommendations for family worship--things to do with your family to keep your household feeding upon the public ordinances of the means of grace throughout the week.  

You may have noticed recently that with catechism class on hiatus, the memory verse suggestions have been Scriptures from or teaching the same truth as those we will be hearing preached on the next Lord's Day.  Even after catechism ends, let's keep doing this.  Let's memorize two verses each week from the preaching that we will hear.  
This should improve recall of both verse and sermon, in addition to filling out our understandings of the verses that we are memorizing.  Can you imagine the spiritual benefit of memorizing not just the words but the richness of meaning from over 100 verses a year?
Children, of course, with their quick minds, will also be able to memorize passages that teach the Bible truths that they are learning by means of the catechism.  We adults may need to work harder, but if you just repeat the verses 5 times a day with your children, they will probably have them memorized by the end of the week.

So, I invite you to join me for Memorization Monday.  I'll set up a post each week that will automatically be the last post of the day on the Lord's Day with the text of that week's verses for us to memorize.  It'll then be the first post in the daily email digest at the end of the day or in your inbox first thing Monday morning. 

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  12-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Russell Moore has written what I think is an important and inspiring article for parents.  His basic argument is that at stake in our parenting isn't just the shaping of behavior but our children's understanding  of several crucial doctrines.  Though this might sound intimidating, it should really be thrilling: you don't have to have a seminary education to teach your children the deep truths of God; God has designed it so that you will be doing so as you simply parent them according to Scripture.

It must be parenting day on the internet, because 9 Marks has an excellent list of 39 lessons, 20 tips, and 10 Don'ts for parents. 

For those still thinking about it, the atrocious Newsweek article supporting gay marriage, Ligon Duncan has collected in one place links to online resources about and few of the best responses to the atrocious Newsweek article supporting gay marriage (note also the link to the Frank Turk article in the comments).
Though we are in a Dutch Reformed enclave (though wait until you hear the frightening statistic about us in Lord's Day morning's service), in our broader area there are a number of Roman Catholics.  Thabiti Anyabwile gives us a quick, helpful list of differences between Protestants and Catholicism.

Heather was just asking me a couple days ago how it could  be that the disciples were so dense--Jesus told them again about  how the Son of Man had to be delivered into the hands of men, suffer, die, and after three days rise again.  This is a wonderful element of the Gospel to me, because it shows so clearly how the great obstacle to belief is not lack of information but the need for new birth!  No room for my full answer here, but Challies has given a similar answer this morning.


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harvestoc.net blog, Thursday, December 11, 2008
  No Session Meeting Roundup for Dec 10
No--we haven't decided to plunge the dealings of the elders into dark, insidious secrecy (though there are some things that are not public, and if you ever have such an issue, you will be glad for something called "executive session.").  We didn't have a quorum, so we didn't meet.  We'll let you know in advance when we do, in case you want to attend.

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  Getting the Fruit that Jesus Earned (Sermon Follow-Up)
In Lord's Day morning's sermon, we covered Romans 6:23, one of the most famous texts in the Bible.  In this follow-up, I'd like to point out the difference in that verse between "wages" and "free gift."

We've seen wage and gift language before.  In chapter 1, God told us what the wage of sin is--what sin deserves.  It deserves for us to have wrath now and wrath later.  We get wrath now in being given over to more and more sin.  We get wrath later in an eternity in Hell.  That's the proper wage of sin.

Over against that, there is the gift of justification in Rom 3:24.  In that section, Paul is arguing that faith alone can be the instrument through which righteousness comes, because righteousness is absolutely unearnable by anyone.  It has to be by grace, therefore it has to be a gift, therefore it has to be by faith.

This is exactly the point in Rom 4:4-5, where God says quite clearly that it is the ungodly whom He justifies.  He counts for us through faith what it is impossible for us to earn.

And so the language in Rom 6:23 was not new to us.  It's as if we are at the store, and there are two things behind the counter.  One is the putrifescent misery of being given over to our desires for a few more years here and Hell forever.  The other is joyful heart-obedience and treasuring of God Himself more and more for a few more years before those things become perfectly ours forever.  That's eternal life.

The Christian's pursuit of holiness is not the task by which we earn something else.  It is itself the reward that Christ earned for us.  Ever-increasing zeal for heart-obedience to the form of God's law is part of the gift.

That brings us to one last word of caution, because our remaining sin would twist even this.  Our remaining sin would, if permitted, produce in us a mindset that as our slavery to righteousness and presentation to God as living-sacrifices increases, that the good that comes from it has somehow been earned by our righteousness.

The wage/free-gift distinction in Rom 6:23 demands that we watch against this.  Just as justification was to be seen as a gift in 3:24 and 4:4, so now sanctification must be seen as a subsidiary gift, a fruit of the first gift, and therefore 100% gift!  When we get fruit, even through zealous, diligent obedience, we are still simply getting the fruit that Jesus has earned for us.

So on the one hand, let us recoil at the thought of continuing to sin, although continuing in it is exactly what we have earned!  And on the other, let us humbly rejoice that we are receiving as a free gift not just our justification, but everything that belongs to our eternal life--sanctification included.

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  11-Dec-08 Best of the Web
This is the kind of thing for which I hope some day to have the staff/talent/time to do for Harvest's singing in worship.  I love the passage, love the work of lyricizing it metrically, love the idea of signing corporately, as declarations of the glory of God, hundreds and thousands of the choicest passages in the Bible to dozens of carefully arranged, singable, tunes.

John Newton counsels us to fix our eyes upon Jesus as we patiently wait upon Him for real, substantial spiritual growth.

At "Hebrews Four Twelve Us!" we started Revelation yesterday, in which for some reason people are usually very interested; and, today's readings included Zeph 3, in which is one of my favorite verses in the Bible (Zeph 3:17).
Did you know that the Puritans--both British and early American colonial--actively opposed Christmas?  So too Charles Spurgeon.  Crosswalk writes of a  lady named Pam Ferris, for whom conversion included dropping Christmas.  It's interesting, if you read page 2, that their Christmas supporters are academicians from Fuller and Biola--not really confidence inspiring there.  Peters' second explanation for Dec 25 is actually interesting and clever (which is not the same as plausible or supported by evidence).  I do hope that we can be as continuously mesmerized as Spurgeon was with the eternal Son become (first humiliated and now all-glorious) Man. If those of us who come to Pam's, and the Puritans', and Spurgeon's convictions end up seeing the Savior as less human or less glorious, how much better it would have been for us to celebrate Christmas!

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harvestoc.net blog, Wednesday, December 10, 2008
  Family Trouble Is a Great Chance to Show Off God's Glory and Grace (Sermon Follow-Up)
Lord's Day evening's sermon had a long introduction that traced the significance of family issues, hopefully making us feel how very serious a thing family trouble in general is, and more particularly the family trouble in Gen 16.
We were only 28 verses into Genesis before we saw that marriage and parenting were at the center of the climax of God's display of His own glory in creation.  By the time we finished chapter 2, we had seen that marriage and parenting were at the center of the climax of God's creatures' enjoyment of His goodness.  Another chapter in, and we saw that the family was right there at the center of God's promise and plan for redeeming sinners by unexpected, immeasurable grace.

If you are having family trouble, it is urgent that you get Scriptural help and devote yourself to living in a radically Christian way in your situation.  Your pastors (elders) would love to help you find such peace in Christ, that you are liberated to live in a way that shows the beauty of His holiness and the transformational power of His grace.  Perhaps most of all, they would love for you to show by your hope that God Himself is such a treasure as makes anything in this life worth enduring cheerfully.  This is just what the Bible means by always being ready to answer for the hope that is in you (1Pet 3:15).  If your pastors aren't interested in that... join a church that has real ones.  Seriously.
Think Hagar: scared, pregnant, friendless, young, abandoned by her child's father to the merciless care of his abusive wife... enabled by God's grace to return and submit anyway!  You might feel powerless in your family situation, but just by resting in the knowledge of God in Christ and living righteously in an impossible situation, you become a powerful testimony to His glory and grace!

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  1Cor 5:6-13 "Celebrating Christ Christianly" (Session Devotional)
Tonight's session devotional is here.

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  Psalm 24 - "Who Is This King of Glory?" (Prayer Meeting Devotional)
The questions for the devotional are in the program, here.

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  Condolences to the Pike Family
Jason's grandmother, Marlis Linstrand, passed away Monday.  Visitation is at Carlsen Funeral Home in Lemars, Thursday, 4:30p.m. to 6:30p.m., with a prayer service at 6:30.  Funeral is Friday morning, 10:30a.m., at St. Peter's Lutheran in Brunsville, with interment following at Memorial Cemetery in Le Mars.

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  10-Dec-08 Best of the Web
In hopes that everyone will take the time to read it, today's only link is to CJ Mahaney excerpting a 1997 Tabletalk article from RC Sproul on Redeeming Time.

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harvestoc.net blog, Tuesday, December 9, 2008
  WLC Q. 175. What is the duty of Christians, after they have received the sacrament of the Lord's Supper?
A. The duty of Christians, after they have received the sacrament of the Lord's supper, is seriously to consider how they have behaved themselves therein, and with what success; if they find quickening and comfort, to bless God for it, beg the continuance of it, watch against relapses, fulfill their vows, and encourage themselves to a frequent attendance on that ordinance: but if they find no present benefit, more exactly to review their preparation to, and carriage at, the sacrament; in both which, if they can approve themselves to God and their own consciences, they are to wait for the fruit of it in due time: but, if they see they have failed in either, they are to be humbled, and to attend upon it afterwards with more care and diligence.
There's a lot there; here are some questions to help:

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  One Despot at a Time (Sermon Follow-Up)
One of today's readings on the M'Cheyne Plan, was the small book of Jude, which tells us about pastors (v12, "shepherding") who had "crept" into the church and taught exactly opposite Paul. v4 tells us that they "pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ."

The word translated "Master" there is actually despot, and the word translated "sensuality" describes a condition of a complete lack of restraint, someone controlled by his desires/feelings/impulses. You see the problem. These people who were long ago designated for condemnation (4a) say that God's grace means that we don't need to restrain what we do. But that would make our desires a despot. And you can only have one absolute ruler at a time.

To suggest that grace means we shouldn't be morally disciplined is to dethrone Jesus, to deny Him as our Despot and Lord.

But Jude is a perfect little book in which to examine this. It is full of strong words against this kind of teaching, but its solution is NOT a pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps or earn-blessedness-through-discipline kind of Christianity. God forbid! Rather, it begins and ends with grace:
v1, "to those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept [passive! kept by God!] for Jesus Christ
v24, "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy,"
Amen! Let us guard against the error of balking at Christian discipline, resting and rejoicing in the Gracious One who keeps us.

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  9-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Scott Clark has written an article that is long and  perhaps difficult but which will repay its readers by helping them think clearly about the importance of getting God's Word right in worship, and how unhelpful some paraphrased songs are to that end.

Anyone can register to read the ESV text at ESV Study Bible Online and save your notes and highlighting, so that they will be available to you wherever in the world there is internet.  Every physical copy of the ESVSB comes with a code to unlock additional access to having the ESVSB study notes side by side, along with all of the articles, and excellent mp3 audio.  

Challies reviews a helpful book for interacting with the "deeds not creeds" people who think that careful, Biblical theology is a distraction from living Christianly.

I can't wait for the first volume of Doug Kelly's systematic theology.  Dr. Kelly is one of two great reasons (John Currid is the other) to think well of RTS-Charlotte.  His systematic won't just be Scripturally thorough, theologically sharp, and applicationally warm.  It will also interact with the best thinkers of the church, east and west, from every century, helping us past many of our 21st century and American/western blindspots.  Martin Downes has an advanced copy and has been tantalizing with quotes here and here.

If you've been saving for MacArthur's set of NT Commentaries, Audubon Press currently has them on sale--shipped price ($339) is over $50 less than they would be shipped from Amazon.

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harvestoc.net blog, Monday, December 8, 2008
  Our Children Are Image Bearers (Sermon Follow-Up)
In the evening sermon this week, as we heard about Biblical family roles, I noted how the angel of Yahweh commanded Hagar to submit even to a harsh mistress. In application, I told the children that they must submit to their parents, even if they consider their treatment harsh--not because their parents are more valuable than they, but because that is the position God has given them in the family.

In our first follow-up this week, I'd like for us to think for a moment from the other side. As parents, it is not just your right but your responsibility to exercise authority over your children. You may hear their thoughts--there may be times when you deem it better not to--and you make the final decision with their best interest in mind. You instruct them and discipline them.

But let's not forget the sermon's second point--that it was Sarai's cruelty, her treatment of Hagar as of diminished value, that brought the trouble to a critical point. So, parents, here's a question: do you treat your children as being equally in God's image and likeness?
Now, we can easily let ourselves off the hook here, so let's probe deeper. Do we change our tone when our children irritate us? Are we shorter, louder, harsher if their existence is inconvenient at the moment? When we do that, we are not preferring them over ourselves. When we do that, we are communicating that not only do we have a different role in the family, but that our preferences are more important, that we are more valuable.

So, our children are to recognize our role: Ephesians 6:1-3 "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), 'that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.'"

But we parents are to esteem them equal in value, equally in God's image: Ephesians 6:4 "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

Discipline and instruction are not for those times when something about them is bothering us. Discipline and instruction is our recognition that they are created in God's image and find their purpose in gloriying and enjoying God. Discipline and instruction are driven by a loving desire that they would more and more show God's glory in creation and enjoy God's goodness in renewed covenant relationship.

Children must submit to even harsh parents, but woe to the parents who "Sarai" those beneath them by afflicting their children.

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  Gen 16 'False Start, pt2'
Yesterday evening, we heard the conclusion to False Start, from Gen 16, which we began hearing last week. I'm sorry to have to post that there's no audio file, but you may read the manuscript [here].

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  8-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Scott Clark puts succinctly the Scriptural view (also summarized in our catechisms) on the means of grace. Which do you think is more important: personal devotions or public worship?

A good reminder from Spurgeon (via Ligon Duncan at Ref 21) that we walk by faith, not by sight, even with reference to our spiritual life. If you are going through a time of dryness and coldness of soul, I hope you find Spurgeon's words comforting.

We've been hearing for weeks in Rom 6 how our confidence in the resurrection later drives our obedience in our mortal bodies now. John Piper writes of having a similar experience himself. He is, of course, not the first to understand this. Here is Belgic Article 37, #58.
That, inasmuch as I now feel in my heart the beginning of eternal joy, I shall after this life possess complete blessedness, such as eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has entered into the heart of man, therein to praise God forever. (ht. Martin Downes)
Providentially following upon taking the supper together last night are today's quote from Tim Keller on "being brought into the feast" and today's reading helps at heb412 from Luke 22, showing the Lord's Supper as Jesus' both preparing His disciples to understand His death and liberating them to live lives of self-abandoned service.

Newsweek has done a cover story arguing that the Bible does not teach against homosexuality. There was a time when believers read the Bible consistently enough, carefully enough, and submittedly enough that this kind of nonsense wouldn't merit a response. But, several locally-represented denominations have been working overtime to "catch the church up" to the culture using just the kind of "Bible study" in the Newsweek article. In case you are about to hear from friends and family the sickening Scripture-twisting arguments from the article, Al Mohler's response will prepare you to answer well.

At the First Pres blog, there is a great quote from JC Ryle, arguing for the simplicity of the Gospel as the history of Christ.

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harvestoc.net blog, Sunday, December 7, 2008
  Rom 6:19-23 'Fruitful Freedom' (7-Dec Morning)
This morning in worship, we heard Fruitful Freedom from Romans 6:19-23. Specifically, we heard:
You can download or listen to the audio of the sermon as it was preached, or download the manuscript (the audio sermon is more full).

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harvestoc.net blog, Saturday, December 6, 2008
  Prepare for the Supper
We will take the Lord's Supper together tomorrow evening. Please prepare yourself and your families accordingly. Months in which it is in the evening service provide special opportunity to do that during the afternoon.

The articles that I wrote in March for helping us prepare for the supper have been lost in the website changeover. If you have copies, I'd appreciate them for when I get to rewriting them. For now, I hope that you will find very helpful the following questions and answers form the Larger Catechism:

Q. 168. What is the Lord's supper?
A. The Lord's supper is a sacrament of the New Testament, wherein, by giving and receiving bread and wine according to the appointment of Jesus Christ, his death is showed forth; and they that worthily communicate feed upon his body and blood, to their spiritual nourishment and growth in grace; have their union and communion with him confirmed; testify and renew their thankfulness, and engagement to God, and their mutual love and fellowship each with other, as members of the same mystical body.

Q. 169. How hath Christ appointed bread and wine to be given and received in the sacrament of the Lord's supper?
A. Christ hath appointed the ministers of his word, in the administration of this sacrament of the Lord's supper, to set apart the bread and wine from common use, by the word of institution, thanksgiving, and prayer; to take and break the bread, and to give both the bread and the wine to the communicants: who are, by the same appointment, to take and eat the bread, and to drink the wine, in thankful remembrance that the body of Christ was broken and given, and his blood shed, for them.

Q. 170. How do they that worthily communicate in the Lord's supper feed upon the body and blood of Christ therein?
A. As the body and blood of Christ are not corporally or carnally present in, with, or under the bread and wine in the Lord's supper, and yet are spiritually present to the faith of the receiver, no less truly and really than the elements themselves are to their outward senses; so they that worthily communicate in the sacrament of the Lord's supper, do therein feed upon the body and blood of Christ, not after a corporal and carnal, but in a spiritual manner; yet truly and really, while by faith they receive and apply unto themselves Christ crucified, and all the benefits of his death.

Q. 171. How are they that receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper to prepare themselves before they come unto it?
A. They that receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper are, before they come, to prepare themselves thereunto, by examining themselves of their being in Christ, of their sins and wants; of the truth and measure of their knowledge, faith, repentance; love to God and the brethren, charity to all men, forgiving those that have done them wrong; of their desires after Christ, and of their new obedience; and by renewing the exercise of these graces, by serious meditation, and fervent prayer.

Q. 172. May one who doubteth of his being in Christ, or of his due preparation, come to the Lord's supper?
A. One who doubteth of his being in Christ, or of his due preparation to the sacrament of the Lord's supper, may have true interest in Christ, though he be not yet assured thereof; and in God's account hath it, if he be duly affected with the apprehension of the want of it, and unfeignedly desires to be found in Christ, and to depart from iniquity: in which case (because promises are made, and this sacrament is appointed, for the relief even of weak and doubting Christians) he is to bewail his unbelief, and labor to have his doubts resolved; and, so doing, he may and ought to come to the Lord's supper, that he may be further strengthened.

Q. 173. May any who profess the faith, and desire to come to the Lord's supper, be kept from it?
A. Such as are found to be ignorant or scandalous, notwithstanding their profession of the faith, and desire to come to the Lord's supper, may and ought to be kept from that sacrament, by the power which Christ hath left in his church, until they receive instruction, and manifest their reformation.

Q. 174. What is required of them that receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper in the time of the administration of it?
A. It is required of them that receive the sacrament of the Lord's supper, that, during the time of the administration of it, with all holy reverence and attention they wait upon God in that ordinance, diligently observe the sacramental elements and actions, heedfully discern the Lord's body, and affectionately meditate on his death and sufferings, and thereby stir up themselves to a vigorous exercise of their graces; in judging themselves, and sorrowing for sin; in earnest hungering and thirsting after Christ, feeding on him by faith, receiving of his fullness, trusting in his merits, rejoicing in his love, giving thanks for his grace; in renewing of their covenant with God, and love to all the saints.

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  DVD Player Needed
Before we purchase a DVD player for the congregation’s a/v setup, we’d like to know if anyone has a working DVD player that they’re not using and would be willing to donate. If so, please contact James.

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  ESV Study Bible Group Buy
Elders Vander Hart and Hakim have been using this study Bible for several weeks and find its notes/charts/illustrations/articles excellent for helping us understand and apply the Bible text. If you or someone you know are planning to do some serious Bible reading and would like reliable help in understanding the sense of the text, we highly recommend using this study Bible. And, of course, the elders would like for everyone to be doing serious Bible reading!

We will be purchasing them at wholesale prices from wtsbooks.com, and some are contributing extra to decrease the cost of a "share" in the buy. There will be a sign-up sheet on the back table; we will be purchasing hardcover (1 share), trutone (1.5 shares, better than bonded leather), and genuine leather (2 shares). You can see the cover options at wtsbooks.com.

Share price will be determined by dividing the total number of shares ordered into the total amount of the order that isn't paid by subsidizing gifts. Translation: this will be the lowest cost way for you to purchase one of these for yourself or others.

Dec 14 will be your last day to order, so that they can be ordered on the 15th. A sample hardcover and more information about the Bible will be on the back table.

If you would like to help subsidize, put a check or envelope in the offering marked "ESVSB Group Buy."

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  3-Dec-08 Session Meeting Roundup
This summary is intended to keep the general congregation informed of things that the elders are deciding.

By way of reminder, these meetings are public meetings--you don't even have to be a member to attend. Not only would you benefit from sitting in on the devotionals, but the elders would appreciate having as much insight and input available as they cast their votes.

On Wednesday, the elders decided:
  1. To arrange the worship room in the new building so that the congregation slightly faces each other and generally faces west, with the doors at their backs.
  2. To purchase a used Yamaha U3 piano, and procure a tv/dvd player/cart for Biblical instruction videos.
  3. To do a "subsidized group buy" of ESV Study Bibles. There will be more information about this in a subsequent post.
  4. To proceed with new mover outreach, targeting those who move into are residences from outside the area.
  5. To start fellowship supper groups back up again (you can probably expect a new list on the 14th and plan to have your first supper together sometime in the last week or two of the year)
There will be an adjournment meeting on the 10th. Hope to see you there!

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  Family Roles in Salvation History (Sermon Follow-Up)
Last week's evening message was really the first half of the sermon, in which we basically identified that the sin that starts all the trouble is doubt that leads to self-reliance. Unbelief and legalism--attempting to do, ourselves, the part that we assume depends upon us--is at the fountain of all our sin!

To prepare to hear tomorrow evening's message well, you would do well to note all the household roles in Genesis 16.

We have seen through Genesis that God has put family roles at the center of how He puts His glory on display in creation. We've seen this in chapter 1 with His image, 2 with His provision, 3 with His law and gospel, 4-6 with the history of salvation, 6-9 with the type of that salvation, and 12 in how the walks of believers are tried--and that's just a general survey.

God has put not just individuals but families at the center of His revelation of Himself in the universe. This is why I've been suggesting for two weeks that Acts 2:38-39 would be good memory verses for our children. So, read Genesis 16 tonight or tomorrow afternoon and ask such questions as: what was Abram's duty here as a husband? a master? a father? What was Sarai's duty as Abram's wife and Hagar's mistress? What was Hagar's duty as a slave?

Then ask this (semi-trick) question with a glorious answer: was there anyone being faithful in Genesis 16? I'll give it away, because it's too wonderful to leave even until tomorrow evening: how does the answer to that question grandly fulfill what we saw in Gen 15?

Have a blessed time preparing for the Lord's Day.

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  7-Dec-08 Worship Service

The Lord’s Day, December 7, 2008

Morning Worship, 10a.m.

Call to Worship and Prayer – Psalm 100

Confession of Faith – Westminster Shorter Catechism 1-4, p869

*Song – #265, Come, Ye Faithful, Raise the Strain · #296, All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name!

Serial Reading – Isaiah 46

*Songs – #647, How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds · #648, My Jesus, I Love Thee

Prayer

Sermon – Text, Romans 6:19-23 · Message, Fruitful Freedom

*Prayer and Benediction

*Song – #648, My Jesus, I Love Thee, v4

Evening Worship, 6p.m.

Call to Worship and Prayer – Heb 1:10-12

*Song – Handout #186, I Will Exalt My God, My King

Serial Reading – Matthew 23

*Songs – handout #272, You Are Our God; We Are Your People

Prayer

Sermon – Text, Genesis 16 · Message, False Start, pt2

*Song – #719, A Christian Home · #246, Man of Sorrows! What a Name

The Lord’s Supper

*Benediction

*Song – Handout #214, Glory to God

*Congregation standing as they are able

You are invited to fellowship with us downstairs after each worship service!

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  6-Dec-08 Best of the Web
At "Hebrews Four Twelve Us!" you can choose to read through the Bible in from 1 to 4 different places at a time. Every day, there are a few inductive questions to help you and your family understand what each chapter's basic message is, along with a few lines of application to turn into prayer before the Lord. If you are looking for a way to fill your personal and family devotions with Scripture, you may find this site helpful.

I don't know if the "Sunday's Coming" posts by Ligon Duncan are going to be an extended series at the First Pres blog; one hopes. In today's post, he continues to ask and answer from Scripture the question, "Why do we worship?"

Challies reviews Sam Storms' new book Signs of the Spirit. I haven't read Storms, but if it is faithful to Edwards's Religious Affections, it will be faithful to the Scriptures and therefore profitable to our souls. If you have tried to read Religious Affections and given up, maybe having Storms's book alongside will help you mine these important Scriptural truths.

Do you have a sense of your lostness and find yourself wanting to escape it? Tim Keller explains that this is very good news.



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harvestoc.net blog, Friday, December 5, 2008
  5-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Neil Stewart offers some pastoral counsel in applying Psalm 27:4 to starting out our days and prioritizing our lives.

John Piper outlines seven theses for why God is not a megalomaniac for demanding to be worshiped. It is astounding to me how many people, even in our supposedly Reformed congregations, have a man-centered "God-centered"ness. Once you get what John is describing in his theses, it will change everything: worship, discipleship, evangelism, the schedule of your day, how you correct your children, what sustains you in the dark moments, what thrills you in the bright moments--everything! God Himself, ultimately, is the gospel, and I wish for all of us to know that as the reality of our lives. I absolutely loved the catechism spoof in thesis 2. Here it is to whet your appetite and make you click the link if you haven't yet:

Q 1: What is the chief end of God?
A: The chief end of God is to glorify God and enjoy displaying and magnifying his glory forever.

Q 2: Who is the most God-centered person in the universe?
A: God.

Q 3: Who is uppermost in God’s affections?
A: God.

Q 4: Is God an idolater?
A: No. He has no other gods before him.

Q 5: What is God’s chief jealousy?
A: God’s chief jealousy is to be known, admired, trusted, enjoyed, and obeyed above all others.

Q 6: Do you feel most loved by God because he makes much of you, or because he frees you to enjoy making much of him forever?

The girls at Titus2Talk give mothers who "do Christmas" some great ideas for doing Christmas right.

For some reason, people keep reading The Shack. We should probably blame our pastors and elders for not being clear enough about how dangerous it is. Strangely enough to me, those who are least likely to be hurt by reading it (the Scripturally and doctrinally solid) are the least likely to read it, and those who are most likely to be hurt by reading it (the Scripturally and doctrinally superficial) are the most likely to read it. To my mind, that combination is quite deadly. That said, Scott Lindsey has written one of the best/most careful reviews of The Shack that I have read.

Let me give you a plain recommendation: if you do not understand deeply and clearly the first 40 questions and answers of the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and cannot defend those truths from Scripture, you do not have the doctrinal or Biblical armor to read The Shack "safely," and if you read it at all, it should be under the direction of (not just "with") someone who does. If you are offended by my giving such counsel, please consider that people don't flaunt and flail about experts who give counsel about how to handle things that are extremely physically dangerous; apply the same logic to the eternal and spiritual.

It's about time our spiritual undershepherds did more than feed and play with the sheep. How about some protecting from wolves and from poisoned streams?

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harvestoc.net blog, Thursday, December 4, 2008
  4-Dec-08 Best of the Web
Westminster Seminary Bookstore has a secret sale page--20% off their already super low prices. If you have the pennies, you should buy Shepherding a Child's Heart, Instructing a Child's Heart, When Sinners Say I Do, Age of Opportunity, Fathers and Sons Stand Fast, and In Christ Alone. Give them as gifts now or later. Read them yourself. They're worth it.

Justin Taylor has linked to some of Ralph Davis's "Christmas" sermons, and I'm going to shamelessly steal the idea. Dr. Davis is one who "does Christmas right" by preaching the whole counsel of God. Take some time to listen to a sermon or three... "An Older Nativity Story" (Judges 13); "A Whole Bunch of Dead Folks for Christmas" (1 Chronicles 1-9); "What You Need for Christmas Is . . . Preaching!" (Isaiah 40:1-11). One of these days, maybe we'll have 1Chronicles 1-9 on "Christmas" at Harvest :)

Martin reminds us from Scripture that it's the bad theologians who sound good that are the most dangerous. The note is short and the quote about expressions might be confusing. But the principle is very important--and one of the reasons God gives us elders: not to protect us from the Dawkinses of the world so much as to protect us from most of the authors represented on the shelves at the neighborhood Christian bookstore!

Some great commonsense advice from Al Mohler, taking cultural trends into wise consideration as we are intentional about our parenting.

This excellent pastoral theology is on my list of ones to read (though I have to re-read Baxter and Bridges first, then Thomas Murphy, Patrick Fairbairn, and James Angell James, before I think about picking up another one). It's 50% off at RHB today, so if you have a seminary student in your life or pastor who needs some soul refreshing and call-remembering, you might consider it.

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harvestoc.net blog, Wednesday, December 3, 2008
  1Cor 5:1-5 - "Grief in Governing the (Godly?)" (Session Devotional)
Tonight's session meeting devotional is online.

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  Psalm 23 - "Fed, Led, Filled, and Hunted Down by Love" (Prayer Meeting Devotional)
Tonight's prayer meeting devotional is online.

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  3-Dec-08 Best of the Web
John Piper reminds us that delight in our true inheritance will prevent bickering over the temporary ones.

M'Cheyne, about whom John Currid writes today, was 29 when he died and yet continues to be a hero/model for this 32 year old pastor. We should be careful of how our hearts view our heroes in the faith. But God does give us parents, elders, and past saints to imitate as they imitate Christ. God grant that we would imitate M'Cheyne's Christ-like humility in ministry.

CJ Mahaney quotes Derek Kidner's exposition of the sluggard in Proverbs to help us identify the symptoms that expose this life-neutralizing sin in our hearts.

If you have time to listen to them, there is a free treasure trove of Sinclair Ferguson's sermons over at First Pres Columbia's website. God has blessed his preaching to me such that every time I listen, I feel not only that I have known that text as I had never known it before, but more importantly that I now know the God of the text even better than I had before.

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harvestoc.net blog, Tuesday, December 2, 2008
  Our Other Offensive Weapon (Sermon Follow-Up)
I've often heard, and at some point might myself have taught, that in Ephesians 6 the only offensive weapon is the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. It's even in the study notes of my favorite study Bible. But I'm not sure that's entirely true. While you have to stretch (but only a little) to describe some of the other armor as having offensive qualities, if you knew what kind of shoes were being described, you sure wouldn't say that the sword alone was for offense!

Roman soldiers wore shoes thickly studded with sharp nails. Good for traction? I suppose. But strap on a pair of those going into man-to-man combat to the death, and you'll be thinking of them as more than just your "turf cleats." The preparedness described in Eph 6:15 isn't just preparedness to run and chase; it's preparedness to stomp and slash and grind.

Now, this is important as we live out what we heard in the evening sermon this week. We saw in the text that Sarai uses satanic reasoning: She begins from doubt about the fullness of God's provision and reasons to the fact that some must depend upon her. Her action is not obedience that is driven by a heart set free; it is not response to the confidence that God in Christ has already provided absolutely everything. It is not the reckless abandonment to every word of God that faith knows and loves. Rather, the seed of doubt about the fullness of God's provision grows into the life-killing weed of self-reliance.

Satanic reasoning indeed. How do we fight such spiritual battles? How do we assault doubt in the fullness of God's provision? How do we stomp, slash, and grind self-reliance? Sarai had, in one way or another, all of the Ephesians 6 weapons, but there is a reason that I've focused upon the shoes. The shoes aren't just the "other" offensive weapon; they're the ultimate offensive weapon. All analogies break down, and here is where the one in Eph 6 does.

The Gospel--the good news about who God is, and what this very God has done in history to save those whom He should have stomped, slashed, ground, and burned--the Gospel is the white-hot core of the Word of God. If the Roman short-sword of the Spirit is the Word of God, then those Gospel shoes are light sabres in the hand of not just a Jedi but the Holy Spirit (think--"the force" in the Star Wars analogy, but there's no dark side to the force, Satan doesn't get a piece; the Holy Spirit is all of the force). The Gospel is the weapon of God, wielded by the hand of God. No wonder Paul described true Gospel preaching as being done in "the demonstration of the Spirit and of power."

So, what does this Gospel weapon look like? Eph 6:15 zeroes in on one aspect of how the Gospel prepares us for this warfare: peace. We have peace with God. Remember Rom 5:1 from the Romans series? The enmity has ended not in our being slaughtered, not even in an uneasy stand-off, but in PEACE! God is now for us. This is Rom 8:31-32 style peace. "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?"

Again from the Romans series, remember that Jesus wasn't just crucified. He is risen! This was the point of 4:25, where we noted that the accusative case of "justification" with the preposition "through" demands the following translation: "He was raised on account of our justification" THAT's why we are so certain of this peace with God, this being-for-us of God: the resurrection! On account of our justification having been completed, Christ couldn't stay in the grave any more.

And here is what this Gospel of peace looks like in the life of a believer: it looks like you facing every hardship absolutely certain that you are getting not the condemnation that you deserve for your sin, but the good and perfect gift that Jesus deserves for you by His righteousness. It means that as you groan under the pain of it, yet you know this pain was necessary: necessary for the cleansing of my sin perhaps, necessary for my being an instrument of grace perhaps, necessary for my being an instrument of justice perhaps, or perhaps... necessary for my bringing glory to God simply by suffering well in the name of Jesus Christ!

It means that I take doubt about the fullness of God's provision to the empty tomb, nay even to the right hand of God Himself where my surety sits at His right hand! THERE is the fullness of my provision. THERE is everything that pertains to life and godliness. THERE is the end of any hint of self-reliance. Look to Christ! Look to the crucified, risen, ascended, enthroned Christ!

Now that's a thickly-nail-studded-stomping-slashing-grinding weapon. How do you battle unbelief and renounce self reliance? With feet shod for preparedness with that Gospel of peace.

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  Doing Christmas Right
We celebrate birthdays in my home. God's providence caused us to be born on particular days, and causes those days to come once a year. They are excellent opportunities to lift our hearts in thankfulness for His constant torrent of mercy, to commit our ongoing life into the hands from which this mercy flows, to ask confidently both for pardon of our past sins and for help in living as willing sacrifices in view of and by that mercy!

We don't celebrate Christmas, just because some people actually think it's sinful not to celebrate Christmas. That indicates a level of religious devotion to a day that, as a pastor, I believe that I must not reinforce. And I do not feel much loss in forgoing this "holiday" with my family in order to make sure that I don't impress upon someone else's conscience that they ought to celebrate Christmas in particular seasons or on particular days.

But I do not think that it is wrong to especially remember Christ's birth on particular days or in particular seasons. This is the freedom that Paul describes in Romans 14:5-6*. And although I consider it pastorally unwise for reasons mentioned above, if an entire congregation decides together that they wish to do so, they are free to!

I only make this one plea: if you "do Christmas," please please please don't indulge in the re-baby-fication of Jesus, or the Santa-fication of Jesus. Nuance it theologically all you want, but remember that children are experts at picking up the substance of our thoughts, regardless of what clever caveats we add in our minds to reconcile what we are doing with the truth.

In plain language, that means that if your three year old's primary understanding of Jesus is that He's something like a baby doll, rather than that He is the all-glorious God-man, seated victoriously on the throne of heaven, offering Kingly grace to sinners in advance of a return visit to destroy and judge, then you have re-baby-ficated Jesus. Better not to "do Christmas" at all than to give your children that idea. A good place to start "doing Christmas right" would be to include John 1, Philippians 2, and Hebrews 1 in your family meditations. Here is a great post from Ligon Duncan, standing on the shoulders of JC Ryle, on including John 1 in your Christmas meditations.

In plain language, that means that if your four year old's primary understanding of the Gospel is that it is simply the ice cream that Jesus adds to an already pleasant life, because He understands that we don't really mean the bad things we do, then you have Santa-ficated Jesus. Jesus Christ rescues helpless sinners, without a spot of good in them, from their spiritually deathly infatuation with created things as if they are glorious in themselves. Santa-Christ gives naturally good people the nice things they deserve just for existing, and adds his name to those things to make them sound spiritual. If you don't like my poor explanation, here's a link to a better explanation from Sinclair Ferguson about the danger of Santa-Christ.

So, please, if you do Christmas, pray God and work hard to the end that the Jesus with whom your children fall in love is the real God-man, and the message in which your children find peace and joy is the real Gospel. Do Christmas right!

n.b. That this freedom does not include the freedom ever to treat any day as being as special as the Lord's Day, or as being able to increase the specialness of a Lord's Day. To do so would be to consider what God has made holy as less than what we set apart as special. Also, as the sermon of Hebrews very carefully teaches, this freedom does not include the freedom to observe particular days that were types of Christ--if you continue with other sacrifices, other priests, other Passovers, other Days of Atonement, other festivals, you assault the supremacy of the Son.

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  New Book Recommendation--John Calvin: a Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, Doxology
Believe it or not, even in Northwest Iowa, I've had people recoil at the mention of Calvin or Calvinism. Calvinism is simply the Bible-saturated view of God as all-sovereign, all-worthy, all-valuable, all-desirable--that glorifying Him is all our purpose and enjoying Him is all our pleasure.

But people like to be big, and they like God to be small. It would be rather uncouth to frown when someone says "Biblical teaching," so they just lampoon it using the name of someone who taught it faithfully, and scowl as they say with a tone between dismay and disgust, "Calvinism." That, of course, makes "Calvinist" a useful term for those of us who want to distinguish Biblical teaching from the so-called Biblical teaching that occupies the majority of the shelves of today's Christian bookstores.

If you would like to give your children (and yourself) a more objective introduction to Calvin, and more importantly, an enticing taste of what can happen to heart, mind, and lips when they are captivated with and by the glory of God, John Calvin: a Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology, is a good place to start.
Publisher's Description: John Calvin is often reviled as a humorless doctrinarian who preached an austere theology that twisted Scripture. In John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology, Burk Parsons and a cadre of godly pastors and scholars seek to set the record straight in honor of the 500th observance of John Calvin's birth in 1509. The book's nineteen succinct chapters explore aspects of Calvin's life, ministry, and teachings, and establish his importance even for the twenty-first-century church. Contributors, in addition to Parsons, include some of the most gifted and godly Reformed leaders alive today: Derek W. H. Thomas, Sinclair B. Ferguson, D. G. Hart, Harry L. Reeder, Steven J. Lawson, W. Robert Godfrey, Phillip R. Johnson, Eric J. Alexander, Thabiti Anyabwile, John MacArthur, Richard D. Phillips, Thomas K. Ascol, Keith A. Mathison, Jay E. Adams, Philip Graham Ryken, Michael Horton, Jerry Bridges, and Joel R. Beeke. The foreword is by Iain H. Murray. Indexes of Scripture passages, subjects and names, and theological terms make the book helpful for those who want to delve into specific topics. John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology is a winsome portrait that dashes stereotypes about Calvin and the theological system that bears his name.

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  2-Dec-08 Best of the Web
I'd recommend steering clear of most of the books at Christianaudio.com, BUT their free audio book of the month is almost always excellent. I suspect that's because you don't have to pay royalties to guys who have been dead for a hundred years. December is no different. Go get your free copy of the 90 Days of Morning and Evening (Unabridged) audiobook by Charles Spurgeon. Enter the code DEC2008 at checkout. Note, playing excellent Christian audiobooks is a good way to increase an infant/toddler's vocabulary, and to extend bedtime reading for older children beyond when daddy's voice has to go to bed :). By the way, here's an inexpensive and priceless idea for gifts for your children and grandchildren: record yourself reading the Bible or excellent Christian classics to them. I can help you with such a project if you'd like. Imagine the treasure it will be as part of their spiritual formation, especially if the Lord takes you before He takes them.

Many of you will remember Ralph Davis from his preaching at our church's particularization. He gave the John Reed Miller Lectures at RTS this year, and Reformation21 is serializing them in articles. The first article, on reviving love for Old testament in the church, is now available. Here's an excerpt:
I remember preaching in one of our Mississippi churches one Sunday evening while I was serving at this fine institution. After the service a faithful member of that congregation, a lady around 80 years of age who had almost lost her eyesight (but carefully listened) gave me her reaction to the Old Testament text that had been preached: 'Isn't God dear?,' she said. She did not mean that in a schmaltzy or mushy sense. She meant: Isn't God delightful? Isn't he marvelous? Doesn't he act in such ways toward us that stir up our love for him? She may have been nearly blind but she saw something with keen clarity--if you keep your eyes on God himself you will be thrilled, or at least immensely satisfied.

[...]

I simply wonder if a good bit of our 'problem' with the OT might be a heart problem. Maybe our problem is a spiritual one--maybe we are not salivating for the triune God as we read our Bibles. Maybe we're focused on sermons rather than worship. If once you have found God fascinating...that goes a long way towards curing the 'problem' of the OT.
Yesterday's sermon follow-up noted that living as God's slave is a matter of having hearts captivated with and captured by Christ; and, since it is grace alone that can do this, we ought to expect this to be the result of being genuinely "under grace." This quote from John Newton underlines from his experience how a heart set upon Christ truly must be a work of grace!

Barack Obama holds many deluded and wicked ideas that make him the most dangerous man we have voted to put in the Whitehouse in decades, maybe ever. But at the risk of offending those who would rather hear nothing good about him, I'm linking you to an article on something the Obamas are doing right. This is something I ran into when churches began inquiring to call me away from Bethesda: what will your wife's role be in the ministry? Horror of horrors, many wanted me to come with a built-in therapist, women's ministry leader, women's Bible study teacher, pianist, children's ministry coordinator, etc. Heather's role in my ministry is to be my wife and my children's mother. She may have other callings, but this one is the grandest, most essential, highest priority among the callings that God has given her. I'm glad to see Michelle getting that right, and praying that God will bring the Obamas under faithful preaching and wise counsel to thwart all of the wickedness that he touted on the campaign trail and has supported in his public life.

Derek Thomas explains the Reformed (Biblical!) understanding of preaching as simply giving the sense of what God's Word says.

[updated/added: these are sort of 'best of the web' because they do include links to people who say it better than I can]
I've written two articles today, one pleading with those who enjoy their freedom to celebrate Christmas on particular days that they would do Christmas right, another giving an explanation of what Calvinism is and why it is a helpful label, in recommending a book that should help those who have another understanding of it.

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harvestoc.net blog, Monday, December 1, 2008
  Lord's Supper in the EVENING on the 7th
Just a reminder, since we only last month began the morning/evening alternating scheme, that on December 7th we will be feasting at the Lord's table together in the evening service.

As you ought always be doing, take time this week to consider: Christ's death, resurrection, ascension, soon-coming, and body

and examine yourself--whether you are: enjoying a clear conscience because of His atoning death, and enjoying new life in the power of His resurrection, as a both confident and loyal subject under His current reign, eagerly desiring His return, and functioning as a healthy body-part, loving and serving the other members

Finally, let's spend the week reflecting upon the wonderful benefits of Christ--let's work up an appetite for the feast!

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  Move to 1st and Albany Postponed
As announced before worship yesterday morning, the elders have decided that we will continue worshiping at Unity through December. At that point, if our new building is not yet ready, we will move to the Iowa State Bank community rooms. Please make a note of this. We are not moving to the community rooms on Dec 7.

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  It's a Matter of the Heart (Sermon Follow-up)
You may be thinking that 'Emancipation Proclamation' was a rather provocative title for the morning sermon, considering the text was pressing home to us that our option is between two slaveries: slavery to sin or slavery to obedience. There's no in-between.

What exactly is being emancipated (freed)? The answer was in the last point--the heart. We heard in v17 that believers experience willing, delighted, totally committed obedience to the Scriptural standard of the excellence of God Himself.

To put it another--perhaps sweeter--way, the mark of a believer is a heart set free.

Now, this doesn't surprise us in Romans. In 1:21, we saw that everyone starts out failing to glorify God because our foolish hearts are darkened. And God rightly responded in 1:24 by giving us up in the lusts of our hearts to impurity. That's what we deserve, every one of us. And it's no surprise that in that long list at the close of the chapter that we find one of the marks of being a person under wrath is the sin of being heartless.

This was the main problem with the false Judaism in chapter 2, the religion that thought the law could save. The problem with that religion, other than that it cannot atone for sin, is that it cannot have any effect upon the heart (2:5, 2:29).

But do you remember the most recent time that we saw Romans talking about the heart? That's right--it was in 5:5, "hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." Do you remember back to that sermon--it was in the "we exult/are-full-to-bursting-with-joy" section?

In 5:5 we noted that one of the reasons that Christians are so confident of the hope of enjoying the very glory of God is that every believer has had this experience of beholding the love of God in the cross and having the Holy Spirit pour His infinite love out within our finite hearts. The result? Full-to-bursting-with-joy.

That's the same place that 6:17 took us yesterday. The love of God being poured out in our hearts. It's the same idea as John 14:15 and 1John 5:3. We had seen in v16 the grievous prospect of offering ourselves willingly to sin. Then v17 flipped it right on it's head and said, "But you're a believer! You've had the opposite experience! Obedience to God from the heart!"

That's what Christian holiness, Christian obedience is. It's a matter of the heart. It's a matter of hearts that started out in darkness and impurity. It's a matter of hearts upon which the law by itself could have no effect. It's a matter of hearts set free by grace. It's a matter of finite hearts into which the infinite love of God has been poured. It's a matter of exultant hearts, full-to-bursting-with-joy hearts, on fire for perfect obedience, undaunted by remaining sin, because we know that it will not rule over us.

Would you like such a heart? Look to Christ. Forsake all else for Him. When--and only when--Jesus captures your heart, your heart will be set free. That's the emancipation proclamation!

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  30-Nov-08 Evening - Gen 16:1-2 'False Start, pt1'
Yesterday evening, we opened up just the first two verses of Genesis 16, hearing about the sin that started all the trouble--the sin of unbelief that is displayed in self-reliance. We heard that...
The five problems...
  1. Predicting an infertile future based upon a fruitless past
  2. Assuming that God either cannot or will not help me now
  3. Assuming that I can help where God cannot
  4. Concluding that my only option is to sin
  5. Denying the clear word of God because I find it hard to believe
Conclusion: Jesus, the One who trusts, delights, and obeys perfectly is all of our hope!

You may hear the message as preached [here] and read the original manuscript [here].

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  1-Dec-08 Best of the Web
An excellent reflection by John Piper from Daniel 8 on pressing on in fruitfulness despite a world full of stomach-turning news.

Tim Keller explains how the Gospel produces both humility and boldness.

Derek Thomas is reading about the Puritans. Among other things, they excelled at preparing their hearts for worship. Below is an excerpt to whet your appetite for his post on preparing to hear preaching. Read the whole thing.
"The preacher, though certainly responsible to prepare a Word from God for the people, the people are, according to the Puritans, equally responsible to prepare their hearts to receive the Word."
Ligon Duncan quotes Jean Calvin on how we are not our own; we are God's.

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in Orange City, Iowa

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