Freedom in Christ Also Means Freedom to NOT Drink

Patrick Schreiner asks, "Are You Free to NOT Drink?" Good read.

If you can't go without a drink, if you subtly avoid socializing with those who don't, you don't know freedom in Christ.

The Ten Commandments: An Expository Sermon Series

Links to the audio for my Exodus sermon series on The Ten Words:

• Kingdom Through Covenant - Exodus 19:1-8a
• A Tale of Two Mountains - Exodus 19:8b-25
• Torah! Torah! Torah! - Exodus 20:1-2
• The Ten Words: The First Commandment - Exodus 20:3
• The Ten Words: The Second Commandment - Exodus 20:4-6
• Sinai & Impaled Chiefs: How the Jealousy of God Threatens and Rescues Sinners - Exodus 20:5-6
• Street Preachers, Sour Grapes, and Generational Puckering: Assorted Thoughts on the Law, Evangelism, and a Better Covenant - Exodus 20:5-6
• The Ten Words: The Third Commandment - Exodus 20:7
• The Ten Words: The Fourth Commandment - Exodus 20:8-11
• The Ten Words: The Fifth Commandment - Exodus 20:12
• The Ten Words: The Sixth Commandment - Exodus 20:13
• The Ten Words: The Seventh Commandment - Exodus 20:14
• The Ten Words: The Eighth Commandment - Exodus 20:15
• The Ten Words: The Ninth Commandment - Exodus 20:16
• The Ten Words: The Tenth Commandment - Exodus 20:17
• Fear and Trembling and the Gospel - Exodus 20:18-26

For previous and future sermons on Exodus, please visit this page.

{Sermon} Psalm 44 - What Our Fathers Have Told Us: What Good Dads Do

Audio here.

Exodus 20:15 – The Ten Words: The Eighth Commandment (You Shall Not Steal)

Audio here.

{SERMON} Exodus 20:14 – The Ten Words: The Seventh Commandment

Audio here.

{Sermon} Exodus 20:12 - The Ten Words: The Fifth Command (Honor Your Father and Your Mother)

Audio here.

(4/21 Sermon) Exodus 20:5-6: Street Preachers, Sour Grapes & Generational Puckering: Assorted Thoughts on the Law, Evangelism, and a Better Covenant

No audio for this past Sunday.

4/21 Audio here.

It's Not Wrong to Miss Good Friday Service & Watch #MarchMadness Basketball Instead

Years ago, holidays (holy-days) stressed me out spiritually. I felt a burden, a duty to make the day "really spiritual." Extra devotions. Extra prayer. Extra Bible reading. Extra spiritual activities. Extra church attendance.

I had to make Easter (Resurrection Sunday) be especially about the resurrection, and especially not about candy and chocolate. I had to make Christmas Eve and Christmas Day be especially about Christ's birth, and especially not about presents, stockings, lounging in pajamas, and an obese elf.

I felt heavy guilt if it wasn't extra-spiritual, more spiritual than any other day.

Then one year it hit me: God did not give the church holy-days. There isn't anything more holy about Good Friday, Easter Sunday or Christmas Eve/Day. They are just days. 

That truth gave me great peace. My righteousness was not found in extra-righteous performance and activity on holi-days. Rather, full and complete righteousness is given to me by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. He was born for me, died for me, rose for me. And his righteousness is mine by faith, from first to last. I'm not called to love that more one day than another, but to savor that every day. (In fact, that's what this song is about!)

{Sermon} Exodus 20:3 - The Ten Words: The First Commandment

Audio here.

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Torah! Torah! Torah! 10 Commandments for Interpreting and Applying "the Law"

Sermon audio here.

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How Does Fear Rob Me? Let Me Count the Ways...

I'm afraid of you. Truth be told, you're afraid of me (and others) too. And, sadly, that fear is a thief that we let rob us.

In her post, "10 Ways Fear Robs Me," Hilary Tompkins lists those ways and then offers helpful words on how the Gospel liberates us from fear. Here are her "10 Ways Fear Robs Me," the explanations of each you can read at the post:

1. Fear robs me of experiencing God's favor.
2. Fear robs me of hearing God's voice.
3. Fear robs me of honor and obeying God's leading.
4. Fear robs my trust in God.
5. Fear robs me of pursuing conflict resolution.
6. Fear robs me of receiving correction.
7. Fear robs me of being fully known in community.
8. Fear robs me of gratitude and joy.
9. Fear robs me of my voice.
10. Fear robs me of rest and peace

Here is her helpful conclusion:

War & Peace: How Church Conflict Taught a Pastor to Rest in the Gospel

In "War and Peace," Christianity Today interviews Tullian Tchividjian, successor of James Kennedy at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, about how he survived a leadership coup by finding rest in the power of the Gospel. (Tullian is the grandson of Billy Graham, author of Jesus + Everything  = Nothing.)

Here's how the interview ends:

When I speak to pastors I say, "There is only one thing that will enable you to survive, and that's the gospel. It's not whether your church grows or not. It's not having the right leadership principle. All of those things might be helpful, but the gospel is the only thing that will save you in ministry." You inevitably face crises, slander, unfair criticism, pressure to perform in your professional and personal life. You have to have a model marriage. You've got to have the model children. You've got to be the one logging hours of private prayer every day. I mean there is heavy-duty pressure on pastors to be spiritual giants. What I love about the freeing, liberating power of the gospel is I can stand up on a Sunday morning without fear or reservation and be able to identify my own idols in front of my people. I'll say things like, "I hate to admit this, but part of my motivation for preparing the sermon that I am preaching today is because I want you to think I'm a good preacher. It accentuates my sense of worth." Is that embarrassing to admit? Absolutely! But it's incredibly liberating. I don't have to feel like I have to always be on, that I always have to be performing well, that every sermon's got to be a homerun, that I've got to be modeling perfect piety before all of our people. The pressure's off. Jesus measured up so I wouldn't have to live under the enslaving pressure of measuring up for others. And that's good news.

Amen. 

Read the rest here.

Good Parenting is More About Biblical Theology Than Processes and Techniques

I appreciated these words from the introduction to Gospel-Centered Family by Ed Moll and Tim Chester (a book Paul David Tripp calls "a must read for parents," now on sale for 60%-off at WTSBooks):

The reality is there are biblical absolutes, but at the level of principles rather than processes. Good parenting is not about adopting certain techniques. It’s about living as part of God’s story and letting God’s good news shape your values, attitudes and behavior.

The Bible is not a parenting manual, but the story of what God is doing in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In the end, good parenting is more about biblical theology--living out God's Story (the Gospel), letting it shape you--than it is about prescribing precise techniques and processes.

Here's the full quote:

This is a book about gospel-centered families. The word “gospel” means “good news”. So this is a book offering good news for families. It offers ideas to help you negotiate the sometimes troubled waters of family life. 

But our good news is more than good advice. It’s more than tips based on experience. It’s about the good news of life, hope, forgiveness and freedom in Jesus, and how this good news impacts family life. 

The Bible isn’t a manual on parenting. You can’t look under “D” for “discipline” or “T” for “teenagers”. The Bible is a story – the story of God’s salvation. It tells the story of the creation of the world, the rebellion of humanity, the promises God made to Israel and the coming of God’s Son, Jesus. It tells us how God designed the world, what’s gone wrong and how God is putting the world right again through Jesus. 

This book shows how this wonderful story intersects with the story of your family. The Bible story can become the story of what God designed your family to be, what goes wrong in your family and how God can put your family right again through His Son, Jesus. 

There are two common, contrasting approaches to parenting. Some people emphasize that every family is different and so parents need to make it up as they go along. Other people emphasize biblical absolutes and so prescribe precise techniques. The reality is there are biblical absolutes, but at the level of principles rather than processes. Good parenting is not about adopting certain techniques. It’s about living as part of God’s story and letting God’s good news shape your values, attitudes and behavior.

Families come in all different shapes and sizes. Two parents, single parents, step-parents. Several children, an only child, stepchildren. We tried not to assume every family fits the two parents with 2.4 children mold. We recognize that single parents face extra challenges while step-children raise their own unique issues. But to make life easier we’ll sometimes speak of your child, sometimes of your children; of a parent and parents.

Tom Schreiner on Why the Cross is a Stumbling Block

"If righteousness comes by the law, then the goodness of human beings is celebrated and promoted. The cross, however, rejects any and all human attempts to be right with God. Righteousness is found only in what Christ Jesus has done for sinners. The message of the cross is a scandal or a stumbling block because it is an affront to human pride. Human beings take umbrage in being told that even their best works are stained with evil, that everything we do is insufficient to be right with God, and that the only basis for right-standing with God is the cross of Jesus Christ."

~ Tom Schreiner, Galatians

Galatians 4:21-5:1 - The Law's Gospel

Audio from Sunday's sermon now available (sorry, no manuscript!): 

Galatians 4:21-5:1 - The Law's Gospel

Gospel Coalition booklet series - 45% off

The new 8-book set of Gospel Coalition booklets are on sale at a 45% discount this week at WTS Books:

Get the whole set here. The titles include:

Church-planters and Pastors: Has your periphery displaced the center?

"Western evangelicalism tends to run through cycles of fads. At the moment, books are pouring off the presses telling us how to plan for success, how “vision” consists in clearly articulated “ministry goals,” how the knowledge of detailed profiles of our communities constitutes the key to successful outreach. I am not for a moment suggesting that there is nothing to be learned from such studies. But after a while one may perhaps be excused for marveling how many churches were planted by Paul and Whitefield and Wesley and Stanway and Judson without enjoying these advantages. Of course all of us need to understand the people to whom we minister, and all of us can benefit from small doses of such literature. But massive doses sooner or later dilute the gospel. Ever so subtly, we start to think that success more critically depends on thoughtful sociological analysis than on the gospel; Barna becomes more important than the Bible. We depend on plans, programs, vision statements – but somewhere along the way we have succumbed to the temptation to displace the foolishness of the cross with the wisdom of strategic planning. Again, I insist, my position is not a thinly veiled plea for obscurantism, for seat-of-the-pants ministry that plans nothing. Rather, I fear that the cross, without ever being disowned, is constantly in danger of being dismissed from the central place it must enjoy, by relatively peripheral insights that take on far too much weight. Whenever the periphery is in danger of displacing the center, we are not far removed from idolatry. 

~ D.A. Carson, The Cross and Christian Ministry

Mez McConnell: An Amazing Testimony of God's Grace

Several months ago, I read Is There Anybody Out There?, Mez McConnell’s recounting of his “journey from despair to hope.” As a child, he endured almost unbelievable abuse in his home. This led to drug abuse, violence, and prison time. His life was (slowly) changed by the Gospel and given purpose.

Having benefited from his book, I was thrilled to see that 9Marks recently posted an interview with Mez, who is now doing inner-city ministry in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Be sure to listen to the whole interview: An Amazing Testimony of God’s Grace.

It is incredibly encouraging.

Sin – Confrontation – Heart – Idol – Gospel

Dustin Shramek has a worthwhile post at Life2gether on the role of the Gospel in change. Here is his conclusion:

The gospel makes a claim on our lives. It calls us to change. It calls us to holiness and obedience. So we need to preach the gospel to one another and call each other to greater holiness and obedience. But we will never be able to heed the call of the gospel if we don’t also have the comfort of the gospel. We need to understand that in Christ our sins are forgiven. I can’t live the life God wants me to live if by living it I think God will love me more. I first need to know that God loves me and he couldn’t possibly love me more because his love is already endless. It is the knowledge and experience of that love that enables me to strive for greater holiness. We obey not in order for God to love us, but because he already does.

Read the rest.

$3 Audiobook: What is the Gospel? by Greg Gilbert -- 72 Hours Only!

Through October 8 at noon (PT), ChristianAudio is offering the audio recording of Greg Gilbert's What is the Gospel? for only $2.98.

Follow this link for the audiobook. Go here to purchase the book online ($9.35).