Moore For Christ

Blog Moved

2011-06-13T11:14:00.002-05:00

My blog has moved to my new website: joshuatmoore.com powered by WordPress effective June 13th, 2011. All blog entries and comments have been transferred to the new site.

Thank you!

The Christian's Reward

2011-06-09T09:51:00.006-05:00

I have a pondering that I will continue to ruminate for weeks to come. One of the dangers that Christians always face in our lives is the temptation of legalism. One of the lasting statements that impacted me in my seminary courses was this: "there are two manifestations of the flesh. First, and more obvious, is the natural inclination to sin and follow after worldly desires and impulses. The second one, however, is less obvious, yet all the more prevalent. The second manifestation of the flesh is the natural tendency towards self-righteousness and the belief that we can gain righteousness and God's blessing on our own merits." This, of course, is legalism, pure and simple.

One of the aspects of the Christian life that has been bugging me lately is the question concerning how our works and personal righteousness will be rewarded in heaven. How are we rewarded in heaven? Is there a correlation between binding and loosing in heaven? In other words, is there an eternal significance tied to our works on earth? Will our eternal authority, pleasures, privileges, and STAKE (so to speak) be contingent upon our holiness in this life? If this is the case, does this jive with the gospel? What is the Scriptures teaching concerning our reward in heaven?

One of the old-time Southern Gospel hymns that I sang growing up was entitled, "Mansions Over the Hilltop". Here is an example of the power of translation. For, the King James Version states in John 14:2 that Jesus says, "In my father's house, there are many mansions." Hence this consideration, "How big is my mansion going to be?" Is that contingent upon my walk with Christ? Is that contingent upon my personal holiness and devotion? The HCSB translates the verse this way, "In my father's house, there are many dwelling places." The NIV translates it, "In my father's house, there are many rooms". It seems in the context of this passage, that Jesus is referring to the house of God. Using this imagery, we can see that God's house is BIG. It does not follow then, that Jesus would be saying that there are mansions within a house, for usually a mansion is not a part of the house, it is the house. In our sense of the term, the mansion would be the whole (whereas a room would be the part), just as a house would be considered the whole. Therefore, it makes sense to see that the mansion in view here is the MANSION of God; and it has a BUNCH of rooms! This passage indicates that Jesus is going to prepare a place for YOU, believer, in the house of God. It seems in evangelical Christianity, there is a lot of emphasis on Christian reward - streets of gold, mansions in glory, jewels in the crown, bliss, and happiness.

However, I would contend that this fascination on PERSONAL reward and glory in heaven misses the point of the gospel. For, what is the true reward of the Christian? Should it not be considered that the GREATEST reward that can be given to us by God is ETERNAL LIFE? The gospel of Jesus Christ is this: we were created to have a relationship with God that was pure and holy, where we completely do his will for his glory in perfect harmony and relationship and live forever. However, we rebelled against God and suffered the consequences of sin and death. Christ Jesus, the God man, came to this earth to be our substitutionary death and punishment for sin so that we can have a restored relationship with God and to have eternal life. We have received our adoption as sons of God through our faith in Christ Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit. Yet, we await the consummation of Christ's return to be fully glorified in our relationship with God and in our inheritance of eternal life. The gospel points to us that the KEY reward that we have in heaven is perfect relationship with our Creator and ETERNAL LIFE! Think about this: does it not make sense that the GREATEST fulfillment in life is to have life eternal and a relationship that fully and perfectly glorifies and honors God in all that we do, in which we are fully and perfectly satisfied in our selves, our work, and our relationships?

The Christian's reward of Eternal Life and Perfect Relationship with Yahweh God is what will make heaven, heaven. Everything else will pale in comparison. Jesus was telling his disciples that he was about to leave, and Thomas wanted to know where he was going. Jesus responded that he was going to prepare a place for us. This place is a place where we will never see death again and we will live forever in perfect peace and harmony with the God who created us and loves us.

I'm back!

2011-05-31T11:07:00.001-05:00

I have taken a long hiatus from writing blog posts due to the need to finish up my Masters of Divinity degree from Southern Seminary. Now that this degree has been completed, I can resume writing in this blog and will be more active in the social networking scene. It is amazing how long it has been since I have posted anything on Twitter or Facebook before finishing up at Southern. I am looking forward to this new chapter in my life.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

The Divine - Human Relationship - putting things in the right perspective

2010-11-01T12:45:00.005-05:00

I am reading Bruce Ware's God's Greater Glory: The Exulted God of Scripture and the Christian Faith for my Systematic Theology I class. In my reading today, I came across a paragraph that puts our relationship with God truly in perspective. This should do nothing but humble us:

Understanding rightly our relationship with God must begin with the supremacy, the superiority, the sovereignty, and the self-sufficiency of God. Our urge to have a relationship with God just like we do with a good friend falters right here! Like it or not (and, by the way, by God's grace we should and shall like it if we do not now), this is not a relationship among equals, nor is it even a relationship with one older and wiser than myself. Rather, this relationship is radically unlike any human relationship, and one for which no explanation exists on the human level. Why would the divine partner in this relationship care to be in relationship with another? For in this relationship, one Member of the relationship knows absolutely everything (and this is not a hyperbolic expression in this case), and the other knows far less than he thinks. One Member has perfect foresight and knows every detail of what the future holds, and the other has difficulty knowing where to lay hands on his keys before he heads to the car. One Member has such perfect wisdom, insight, and discernment that there never has been a time in his entire history (a long one at that!) that his plans have proved misguided or his judgment has been askew, while the other member of the relationship through himself wise once when he figure out a clever shortcut to take, until he ended up on a long dead-end road! One Member possesses every quality or perfection in his being both infinitely and intrinsically, while the other possesses only a miniscule amount and only then because any and all of it has been graciously given to hin by the One who has it all! One Member cannot make a rock bigger than he can lift, because his power to do anything he chooses simply cannot be limited, while the other has difficulty most mornings making it out of bed, much less getting in his coffee and devotions and morning run. One Member is absolutely honest, completely trustworthy, never breaks a promise, always keeps his word, is always on (his) time, and always does his work exactly right, every time, while the other...well, let's just say that they other doesn't fare well here. (Bruce Ware, God's Greater Glory, 164.)

Thank you to the DFBC Children's Committee

2010-10-30T22:27:00.004-05:00

I want to give a HUGE thank you to the children's committee at Dresden First Baptist Church. They put on what I think is the best Fall Festival yet at Dresden First. It was highly attended and everyone seemed to have a blast.

I know how much effort and planning and logistics goes into making this event happen every year and I simply want to say THANK YOU!

And the most popular baby boys' name in England is...

2010-10-29T14:08:00.003-05:00

You may already know this but were you aware that the most popular baby boy's name in England is now Mohammed.

Check out this article:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/27/mohammed-britains-most-po_n_775145.html

This is very interesting and shows the state of Christianity in England. We need to pray for a revival of Evangelical Christianity in England, the country that gave us Baxter, Wesley, Newton, Wilberforce, Whitfield, and so many others.

Quote that convicts me

2010-10-29T13:55:00.001-05:00

"The person who prays more in public than in private reveals that he is less interested in God's approval than in human praise. Not piety but a reputation for piety is his concern." - D.A. Carson

The Origins of Halloween and the Christian Response

2010-10-28T10:40:00.009-05:00

Have you ever wondered where the holiday "Halloween" came from? Did you know that this holiday has origins both in Pre-Christian paganism and the Roman Catholic Church calendar? Did you know that the Protestant Reformation began on October 31st almost 500 years ago? As a Christian, it is important to understand the origins of this holiday and to place it in proper perspective. Therefore, this post will help to provide a Christian perspective to this interesting holiday.

Pre-Christian Pagan Origins

Halloween is originally based on the pagan

Gaelic festival entitled, Samhain (pronounced: sa:win). This was a harvest festival based on ancient Celtic polytheism. Samhain marked the end of the harvest, ending the "lighter half" of the year and beginning the "darker half". Some scholars believe that this festival was the beginning of the Celtic new year. Samhain in many ways resembles a festival of the dead; because during this celebration, the Gaelic people believed that participants could commune with those in the spirit world. In fact, the border between this world and the Spirit world became so thin during this celebration that they believed some would be caught up in the spirit world. The Gaelics had the custom of marking this festival by setting off many bonfires and wearing costumes and masks in an attempt to copy the spirits and placate them.

Association

with the Catholic Christian Calendar

The Catholic Church during its spread throughout the Roman Empire after Christianity became legal in the 4th Century had the practice of "Christianizing" pagan holidays so that Christianity would be more palatable to pagans. Thus, the Roman Catholic Church took the Roman festival of Lemuria and changed it into what is called "All Saints Day". Lemuria was a feast in the religion of ancient Rome during which Romans performed rites to exorcise the malevolent and fearful ghosts of the dead from their homes. This festival of the dead was celebrated around May 13th and became the Catholic All Saints' Day (which is still celebrated by Catholics today). This new "Christianized" holiday All Saints' Day commemorates all those who have attained the "beatific vision of Heaven." In other words it commemorates all of those who have made it out of purgatory into paradise. You can tell why this is a Catholic holiday. In the 8th Century, All Saint's Day was moved from May 13th on the Catholic Calendar to November 1 to coincide with the Gaelic festival of Sawhain (thus attempting to Christianize this festival as well - a Catholic version of killing two birds with one stone). Another holiday was then added on November 2nd entitled All Souls' Day, which is a day set aside by Catholics to pray for the faithful departed who are still consigned to Purgatory to pay for their venial sins. Thus, Catholics pray for their departed loved ones in a hope that they may assist in bringing them out of purgatory into heaven. Another name for All Saints' Day (on November 1) is All Hallows' Day (Hallow = Saint). Then, October 31st became known as All Hallow's Eve, which was then shortened to Hallow-even, thus Hallowe'en. Many of the pre-Christian pagan festivities were retained and celebrated during this Hallow's Eve day in, but then the Christian (Catholic) celebration was observed on the following two days.

October 31 and the Protestant Reformation

For Protestants, however, this day takes on a more unique significance. On October 31st, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, sparking the Protestant Reformation. Ironically, Luther's main concern in his 95 Theses was the use of indulgences (coin / money offerings given to the church) to bring loved ones out of purgatory. This, of course, is similar thinking to the concept of All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day. John Tetzel, the great Indulgence Salesman who prompted Luther's 95 Theses, was famous for saying, "Once a coin in the coffer rings, a soul from Purgatory springs." Due to the newly invented printing press, the nailed "95 Theses" was quickly printed and distributed throughout Germany and brought Luther into the radar of the Catholic Church. When Luther did not back down, he was asked to defend himself at the Diet of Worms in April of 1521, where he would not recant and only escaped death due to the protection provided by Prince Frederick and his exile to Wartburg Castle. Because Martin Luther sparked the Protestant Reformation on October 31st, 1517, many Protestants celebrate this day each year as "Reformation Day". It is a day of remembrance (officially celebrated mainly by Lutherans) held usually on the Sunday before October 31st. However, many other Protestant (including Evangelical) denominations have recently started seeing Reformation Day as a good alternative to Halloween.

Halloween Today

Halloween today has become largely a "secular" holiday that includes some seemingly innocent traditions as dressing up in costumes, trick-or-treating, jack-o-lanterns, fall festivals, bobbing for apples, haunted houses, and the like. However, the commercialization and increase in the TV media of the holiday has made Halloween a big business (sales each year average around $6 Billion). Cable-TV channels usually have special programming during the month of October leading up to the holiday that focuses on horror movies. Primetime drama and comedy programming on network television usually have Halloween themed shows. I realized the pervasiveness of this when just this evening I saw that the show Outsourced (an NBC comedy that follows an American who works as a manager in India for a call-center) had a Halloween based show tonight where there was a Halloween party in India. I need to research the practice of celebrating the holiday of Halloween in India.

An undercurrent of all these secular trends in Halloween is a fascination on death and ghoulish behavior. This fascination tends to do one of two things. It either tends to trivialize and mock death, thus taking the consequences and finality of death lightly, or it over-emphasizes and dwells too much on death making it overly gruesome and horrifying, feeding the secular (and non-Christian) fear of death. Another issue is that there is an abundance of occult and pagan practices that are either overtly practiced on this holiday or at least alluded to and toyed with. Neopaganism, although a small phenomenon, is making a comeback. Many are opting to go all the way back to the pagan roots and celebrate the pagan ritual of Samhain just as the Gaelics did over 1500 - 2000 years ago.

How should Christians deal with Halloween?

To say the least, a Christian response to the complex holiday of Halloween is tricky. The secular buy-in to this holiday is quite pervasive. Trick-or-treating and costume wearing is almost a community rite that is expected to include Christian participation. Christians (especially Evangelicals) have chosen to respond in various ways:

1. Total Refusal to Participate due to the tie-in to ancient paganism and the occult.

2. Further "Christianizing" through various ways:

a. Judgment Houses - where the church sponsors a haunted house that provides a glimpse into Heaven and Hell and is used as an evangelistic tool.

b. Fall Festivals: sponsored by churches to be a family friendly alternative (or addition to) trick-or-treating and is used as evangelistic opportunities.

c. Trunk or Treat - another evangelistic idea that ties into the tradition of trick-or-treating.

3. Deciding to celebrate Reformation Day instead of Halloween.

4. Playing along with the community in the holiday. Trick-or-treating with kids and handing out candy, but not going "all out".

5. Full acceptance and enjoyment of the holiday.

What is the best response? First, every Christian parent should be aware of the origins of the holiday and the dangers of the occult and ghoulish overtones in Halloween. Secondly, Christians should support any evangelical work that their church decides to do on this holiday to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ and provide a family friendly atmosphere to enjoy the holiday. Thirdly, as a Baptist and a Protestant, I believe we should set aside this day to also remember the heritage of Martin Luther and the significance of Reformation Day, commemorating October 31, 1517. Finally, we need to take the opportunity that Halloween gives to us to teach our children and fellow Christians the proper, Christian perspective on death. Death is an enemy, but it has been defeated and vanquished, not by divination, the occult, or pagan rituals, but by Jesus Christ. It is His death on the cross and His resurrection three days later that conquered the sting and fear of death. As it says in I Corinthians 15:54-58, "Death has been swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your victory? O Death, where is your sting? Now the sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ! Therefore, my dear brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the Lord's work, knowing that our labor in the Lord is not in vain."

DFBC Fall Festival

2010-10-28T10:34:00.002-05:00

The Dresden First Baptist Church Children's Ministry will be having our annual Fall Festival this Saturday from 5:00pm - 8:00pm. I encourage all of our AWANA clubbers and families to attend. See you there!

AWANA starts this Wednesday

2010-08-16T10:20:00.002-05:00

The new club year of AWANA begins this Wednesday night at 6:00pm! We are very excited at DFBC and have a great year planned. I hope that all of our clubbers from the year before will make it out this Wednesday! We will have a great time of games, fun, and fellowship. We will also have a pizza party with watermelons and snowcones. I am sure that we will have a blast this week. You will not want to miss it!

See you there!

Sermon Tonight - Dresden First Baptist Church

2010-08-11T12:14:00.004-05:00

Tonight, I will be continuing the Mark Sermon Series. This evening, we will be studying the miracles of Jesus found in Mark 1:29-45. The title of the sermon is, "Principles from Jesus' Mighty Acts".

I want to thank Brother Don and the church for allowing me the opportunity to preach on Wednesday nights this summer. I have thoroughly enjoyed the time with church members in lifting up prayer requests to the Lord and finishing up the 1 John series and beginning the Mark series.

I am happy to report that Brother Don will be back on Sunday after recuperating from his back surgery. He will be continuing his series in Jeremiah. We still need to be in prayer for Bro. Don while he gains more strength each day. Matt McCulley also had hernia surgery and he is recovering as well.

Looking forward to seeing everyone tonight. Blessings...

New Sermon Series

2010-06-22T08:22:00.002-05:00

This past Sunday, I was privileged to preach at DFBC during the evening worship services.
We studied I John 5:18-21. This was the final sermon in the series / exposition of I John. It took from April 2009 - June 2010, during the off and on times I have been able to preach at DFBC to get through the 19 sermons, but we have done it. I hope that the church has been edified. Starting Wednesday, I will be starting a new series on the Gospel of Mark. It is my prayer that God be glorified in this new series. I am looking forward to it!

This Wednesday's passage will come from Mark 1:1-3.

1The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, (A)the Son of God.
2(B)As it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

"(C)BEHOLD, I SEND MY MESSENGER AHEAD OF YOU,
WHO WILL PREPARE YOUR WAY;
3(D)THE VOICE OF ONE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS,
'MAKE READY THE WAY OF THE LORD,
MAKE HIS PATHS STRAIGHT.'"

Ever Wondered Why we Have a Valentine's Day?

2010-02-10T09:36:00.003-06:00

Have you ever wondered why there is a Valentine's Day? I thought I would share the Wikipedia article on the origins of Valentine's Day. As you can see, there is little about "romantic love" that is associated with the founding of the holiday. It is all about Christianity and honoring martyred saints of the Roman Catholic Church. Food for thought.

Numerous early Christian martyrs were named Valentine. The Valentines honored on February 14 are Valentine of Rome (Valentinus presb. m. Romae) and Valentine of Terni (Valentinus ep. Interamnensis m. Romae). Valentine of Rome was a priest in Rome who was martyred about AD 269 and was buried on the Via Flaminia. His relics are at the Church of Saint Praxed in Rome, and at Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church in Dublin, Ireland.

Valentine of Terni became bishop of Interamna (modern Terni) about AD 197 and is said to have been martyred during the persecution under Emperor Aurelian. He is also buried on the Via Flaminia, but in a different location than Valentine of Rome. His relics are at the Basilica of Saint Valentine in Terni (Basilica di San Valentino).

The Catholic Encyclopedia also speaks of a third saint named Valentine who was mentioned in early martyrologies under date of February 14. He was martyred in Africa with a number of companions, but nothing more is known about him.

No romantic elements are present in the original early medieval biographies of either of these martyrs. By the time a Saint Valentine became linked to romance in the fourteenth century, distinctions between Valentine of Rome and Valentine of Terni were utterly lost.

In the 1969 revision of the Roman Catholic Calendar of Saints, the feastday of Saint Valentine on February 14 was removed from the General Roman Calendar and relegated to particular (local or even national) calendars for the following reason: "Though the memorial of Saint Valentine is ancient, it is left to particular calendars, since, apart from his name, nothing is known of Saint Valentine except that he was buried on the Via Flaminia on February 14." The feast day is still celebrated in Malta where relics of the saint are claimed to be found, and also throughout the world by Traditionalist Catholics who follow the older, pre-Vatican II calendar.

The Early Medieva acta of either Saint Valentine were excerpted by Bede and briefly expounded in Legenda Aurea. According to that version, St Valentine was persecuted as a Christian and interrogated by Roman Emperor Claudius II in person. Claudius was impressed by Valentine and had a discussion with him, attempting to get him to convert to Roman paganism in order to save his life. Valentine refused and tried to convert Claudius to Christianity instead. Because of this, he was executed. Before his execution, he is reported to have performed a miracle by healing the blind daughter of his jailer.

Legenda Aurea still providing no connections whatsoever with sentimental love, appropriate lore has been embroidered in modern times to portray Valentine as a priest who refused an unattested law attributed to Roman Emperor Claudius II, allegedly ordering that young men remain single. The Emperor supposedly did this to grow his army, believing that married men did not make for good soldiers. The priest Valentine, however, secretly performed marriage ceremonies for young men. When Claudius found out about this, he had Valentine arrested and thrown in jail. In an embellishment to The Golden Legend provided by American Greetings, Inc. to History.com and widely repeated, on the evening before Valentine was to be executed, he wrote the first "valentine" himself, addressed to a young girl variously identified as his beloved, as the jailer's daughter whom he had befriended and healed, or both. It was a note that read "From your Valentine."

Bible Reading Plan

2010-01-03T22:54:00.002-06:00

Dear Church Members,

I hope that you have started the Bible Reading Plan for the 2010 Calendar Year. This year, we are following Robert Murray M'Cheyne's Bible Reading plan. This consists of four chapters a day - two from the New Testament and Two from the Old Testament. This will get you through the entire Bible in One Year! This month of January, we will be reading in the books of Genesis, Matthew, Ezra, and Acts. By the end of the month, we will have read through the entire book of Matthew, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Acts. There is also the option of having two of the readings each day to be family reading in a family devotional setting. This is a great way to get your family involved in the daily discipline of reading Scripture. I hope that this will be profitable to everyone.

Blessings, Joshua

Funny Picture at Southern Seminary

2009-12-17T22:28:00.003-06:00

There is a Catholic Church in Louisville close by the Seminary called Holy Spirit Catholic Church. I like one of the signs that it has by the parking lot entrances. Thought everyone would like it.

At Southern Seminary in Louisville, KY

2009-12-16T14:28:00.005-06:00

I am at school this week at Southern Seminary and I thought that I would share a couple of pictures of the campus. Every time I am here, I simply get in a "scholastic frame of mind". I love this campus, it is so beautiful to me.

Conversion Day

2009-12-03T10:27:00.002-06:00

Today marks the twentieth anniversary of my public profession in the Lord Jesus Christ. To commemorate this event in my life, I like to each year read the full hymn of "O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing", which Charles Wesley wrote on one of the anniversaries of his conversion. The hymn actually has many more stanzas than we normally sing. Please read the full hymn below. Thanks be to God and the Lord Jesus Christ for such a gift of grace!

O for a thousand tongues to sing
My great Redeemer’s praise,
The glories of my God and King,
The triumphs of His grace!

My gracious Master and my God,
Assist me to proclaim,
To spread through all the earth abroad
The honors of Thy name.

Jesus! the name that charms our fears,
That bids our sorrows cease;
’Tis music in the sinner’s ears,
’Tis life, and health, and peace.

He breaks the power of canceled sin,
He sets the prisoner free;
His blood can make the foulest clean,
His blood availed for me.

He speaks, and, listening to His voice,
New life the dead receive,
The mournful, broken hearts rejoice,
The humble poor believe.

Hear Him, ye deaf; His praise, ye dumb,
Your loosened tongues employ;
Ye blind, behold your Savior come,
And leap, ye lame, for joy.

In Christ your Head, you then shall know,
Shall feel your sins forgiven;
Anticipate your heaven below,
And own that love is heaven.

Glory to God, and praise and love
Be ever, ever given,
By saints below and saints above,
The church in earth and heaven.

On this glad day the glorious Sun
Of Righteousness arose;
On my benighted soul He shone
And filled it with repose.

Sudden expired the legal strife,
’Twas then I ceased to grieve;
My second, real, living life
I then began to live.

Then with my heart I first believed,
Believed with faith divine,
Power with the Holy Ghost received
To call the Savior mine.

I felt my Lord’s atoning blood
Close to my soul applied;
Me, me He loved, the Son of God,
For me, for me He died!

I found and owned His promise true,
Ascertained of my part,
My pardon passed in heaven I knew
When written on my heart.

Look unto Him, ye nations, own
Your God, ye fallen race;
Look, and be saved through faith alone,
Be justified by grace.

See all your sins on Jesus laid:
The Lamb of God was slain,
His soul was once an offering made
For every soul of man.

Awake from guilty nature’s sleep,
And Christ shall give you light,
Cast all your sins into the deep,
And wash the Æthiop white.

Harlots and publicans and thieves
In holy triumph join!
Saved is the sinner that believes
From crimes as great as mine.

Murderers and all ye hellish crew
In holy triumph join!
Believe the Savior died for you;
For me the Savior died.

With me, your chief, ye then shall know,
Shall feel your sins forgiven;
Anticipate your heaven below,
And own that love is heaven.

Reclaiming a Merry Christmas

2009-12-02T13:24:00.005-06:00

When did Christmas become like it is today? This is going to be a rambling post, but here it goes.

As a young boy and teenager, I did not mind the commercialization of Christmas, for I always enjoyed opening gifts at Christmas and cherished it as one of the greatest days of the year, one where my wishes for new toys, video games, clothes, candy, cash, and other great items came true. I would then spend the next week while off from school enjoying the gifts that I had received. It was always a highlight! Sure, as a Christian, I understood the deeper meaning of Christmas, that it was the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ and enjoyed the festivities at church each year. But as I have grown older, Christmas has become complicated. Now, I have a hard time answering the question, "What makes Christmas merry?" It seems that America's answer to this question would not line up with the biblical ideal.

What happened? Well, in my own life, the realization that there has been a secular backlash against the political incorrectness of celebrating Jesus' birth came a couple of years ago. During that Christmas season, JC Penny had an advertisement that had the music to Joy to the World in the background. But it was not the Christian version. It was the song "Joy to the World" sung by Three Dog Night which starts, "Jeremiah was a bullfrog...". When I heard that, it hit me, Christmas is no longer about Jesus Christ in this country. This year, the similar effect on me occurred when I first saw the jewelry commercial on television where a couple is skating on a frozen pond and the man intentionally falls down to give a Christmas gift to his love as she comes to his aid. The song in

the background? "I've got you babe" by Sonny and Cher.

It seems to me (I could be way off base here) that the focus has shifted from the celebration of the incarnation of Jesus Christ and the focus on charitable giving and philanthropy to a focus on the gift giving within the immediate and extended family with little or no giving to those in need. Yes, we give side notice to the plight of the poor, but the focus is on what little Johnny is getting for Christmas from Santa. When did Santa Claus go from gift-giver of the poor to gift-giver to good boys and

girls divorced from its Christian origin? This I think is the key. The change in the legend of Santa Claus in the nineteenth and twentieth-centuries, especially in America, moved Santa Claus from the category of charity to the category of giving children the toys of their dreams and all they had to do was be good. Here is the problem with this picture:

Santa Claus' other name - Saint Nicholas is based on the Christian bishop, Saint Nicholas of Myra who died in 346 A.D. He is famous for two things. First, he was a defender of Orthodoxy who in 325 A.D. at the Council of Nicaea, tradition holds that he punched the heretic Arius after Arius repudiated the deity of Christ. Also, and this gets more to the issue of Christmas, he was renowned for his charity to the POOR. He is especially well-known for donating money to three destitute, young women's dowries so that they could get married, and thus he prevented them from a life of prostitution. The name of Santa Claus comes from the Dutch "Sinterklaas" which is a hybrid of the St. Nicholas tradition and the Norse myths surrounding the god Odin. I recommend that you go to Wikipedia.com and research the origins of Santa Claus.

But, before digressing into a Santa = Satan discussion, let's answer the problem of reclaiming a Merry Christmas. Here is a list of ideas that I recommend:

1. Remember that Christmas is a festival about the INCARNATION of CHRIST = God incarnate. This is the greatest event in human history. We should focus everything / filter everything around this central and glorious truth! Glory be to God!

2. Unapologetically say "Merry Christmas" to everyone - don't worry about political correctness.

3. Celebrate the spirit of giving by investing your time in participating in charitable activities - especially giving to the poor or participating with organizations that do.

4. Celebrate your family! Spend time with your family!

5. Don't get sucked into the commercialization of Christmas. Resist it. Give gifts with meaning and purpose.

I am sure that there are many more tips and recommendations to make a Merry Christmas, but the greatest way to make this Christmas merry is to celebrate your relationship with Christ. The most merry Christmas comes with being a redeemed follower of the Christ who was born on the night that split history.

Merry Christmas!

A Conversion of Sorts

2009-11-24T09:01:00.004-06:00

I have recently made the plunge and have bought an Apple MacBook. The last time I owned an Apple was never, because I was in elementary school the last time I used one. My fondest memory of Apple computers was playing Oregon Trail. I cannot count the times I died of dysentery on the game - not even knowing what that was. It certainly is a change in computing. I am enjoying it so far. I am thankful that Microsoft has a version of Microsoft Office that is compatible with Apple Mac's.

I put the logo of Apple on the blog post for a reason. The logo is of an apple with a bite out of it. I seriously doubt that this is the motive behind the logo, but whenever I look at the image, I am reminded of the fallenness of humanity - that Adam and Eve took of the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and sinned. Just thought I would throw that imagery out there.

James vs. Paul? The dynamic between Faith and Works

2009-10-20T19:57:00.003-05:00

For those who were not at the service on Sunday, I preached on James 2:14-17. James 2:14-17 states this:

“What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”

Is James contradicting Paul here? James goes on to say specifically Abraham and Rahab were justified by works in verses 21-26. Paul states in Romans 3:23-27 that we are justified freely by grace and the propitiation of Christ Jesus our Lord (“for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and are justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.") Many in scholarship today and in the past saw no way to reconcile James and Paul. What about James and Jesus? James was a half-brother of our Lord, but some could say that James and Jesus both teach a justification by works and Paul teaches a justification by faith. Look at Matthew 5:17-20:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of Heaven.

How do we reconcile this? The words justify, righteous, and righteousness all come from the same root Greek word - dikaios. Justify in Greek is simply the verbal form of the word righteous. To justify is to make righteous. So when Jesus says that unless our righteousness / justification exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven and James says that Abraham and Rahab were justified by works and faith without works are dead, how do we reconcile that with Romans 3-6?

First, we need to realize that the way Jesus and James define and use the word justification is different than the way Paul uses it. James uses the term to refer to an expression of the faith that is in you. The justification is an evidence or a proof of saving faith. And thus, what Abraham did in his agreeing to sacrifice Isaac or Rahab in assisting the spies was to evidence the saving faith that they already possessed. Genesis 15:6 records that when Abram believed in the covenant that God made to him, Abraham believed the Lord, and God counted it to Abram as righteousness. The event referenced in James about the almost sacrifice of Isaac did not occur until Genesis 22. Therefore, Abraham was already justified by faith in Genesis 15, 7 chapters before he was "justified by works". You see how James is using this term differently - as an evidence or a proof. Regarding the Matthew 5 passage in the Sermon on the Mount, my ESV study bible notes (written Michael J. Wilkins) state this (this is not gospel but I agree with him):

"Jesus calls his disciples to a different kind and quality of righteousness than that of the scribes and Pharisees. They took pride in outward conformity to many extrabiblical regulations but still had impure hearts. But KINGDOM righteousness works from the inside out because it first produces changed hearts and new motivations (see Rom. 6:17; 2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 5:22-23; Phil. 2:12; Heb. 8:10), so that the actual conduct of Jesus' followers does in fact 'exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees.'"

This is deep stuff - BUT IT IS CRITICAL. The idea of justification by grace through faith because of the propitiatory work of Christ on the Cross (Propitiation is another word for ATONEMENT) is so mind boggling that we many times cannot grasp the concept even after salvation. Last night during class as we were going through Romans, my professor Dr. Steven Carlson mentioned this (in paraphrase):

Works righteousness and the idea that you can earn salvation or favor from God through works is the default religious view of fallen humanity. After the fall, there was within us a desire to still commune with God and to get back to that relationship. The problem is that in our fallen state, we by default assume that it is through "being good" or "good works" that this comes about. Thus, every religion in the world assumes works righteousness leads to salvation except Christianity (and I suppose Hinduism / Buddhism, which simply denies that sin exists, which is why it is so popular today).

Many of us who have lived within an evangelical context read the previous statements and say, "Sure, we get that you are saved by grace through faith and not by works, what else is new?"

But the following is what I think the hidden danger of legalism in the church:

Are you a closet legalist? A closet legalist is one that believes in salvation by grace through faith and not by works but once saved does good works to either reap the blessings of God or stave off the chastisement of God. We may think this is a proper reading of Scripture, but it robs us of the God of Scripture. It makes our God out to be some cosmic ogre demanding repayment of a stifling debt or a divine Santa Claus “making a list and checking it twice to see who’s been naughty or nice!”

NO – WE DO GOOD WORKS, WE ARE CHARITABLE, WE ARE LOVING, WE ARE OBEDIENT BECAUSE WE HAVE BEEN BORN AGAIN, WE ARE A NEW CREATION, CREATED IN CHRIST JESUS FOR GOOD WORKS AND OUR GOOD WORKS IS OUR HIGHEST FORM OF WORSHIP THAT WE CAN GIVE TO A GOD WHO SAVES!!!!!! Any other faith, any other work/deed that is not rooted in CHRIST and for his glory is DEAD.

In the Heidelberg Catechism question 86 says this: “Since we are redeemed from our sin and its consequences by grace through Christ without any merit of our own, why must we do good works?” In other words, if salvation is by grace, why be good? The answer that the catechism gives is very instructive: “So that with our whole life we may show ourselves grateful to God for his goodness and that he may be glorified through us.” We offer service to the kingdom of God not to gain his affection but in loving thankfulness for his affection. (Question 86, pulled from Bryan Chapell, Christ-Centered Preaching, p. 314)

It is my prayer that Christian evangelicalism will have a revival during the coming decades that will reclaim the true Gospel teaching of faith-righteousness in Christ Jesus. We truly are a new creation, the old has gone and the new has come. All this is from GOD WHO THROUGH CHRIST RECONCILED US TO HIMSELF AND GAVE US THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION (II Cor. 5:17-18).

Amen, Christ Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father from everlasting to everlasting!

Sermon tomorrow

2009-10-18T01:33:00.002-05:00

I will be preaching tomorrow night during the evening worship service at Dresden First Baptist Church. The title of the Sermon is "Diet Faith". We will be looking at James 2:14-17. Here is the text:

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith, but does not have works? Can this faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well," but you don't give them what the body needs, what good is it? In the same way faith, if it doesn't have works, is dead by itself. (HCSB).

May God be glorified in the services tomorrow at Dresden First Baptist Church!

Friday at the Future of Denominationalism Conference at Union University (Part II)

2009-10-13T12:56:00.001-05:00

Dr. Mohler spoke at the chapel service on Friday and discussed the question, Are Southern Baptists Evangelicals? Here are the notes that I took from his impressive call to the next generation of Southern Baptists (of which I assume I am a part).

Luke 18:8 – "When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on earth?"

In 1989, Albert Mohler wrote an article entitled, "Are Southern Baptists Evangelicals?" Even though there were some misgivings about this term, in regards to the overall options to be identified with the only place we fit is Evangelical. That term still has meaning for us. The options are Liberal, Evangelical, or everything else. We don't want to be in the everything else category, so the evangelical moniker fits. Other identification discussions also centered around the truth party vs. liberty party debates (coherent truth vs. soul liberty). The bottom line of these introductory comments for Mohler is that in 1989 it was good to know that we had friends in the evangelical world in the midst of the debates surrounding the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention. But Mohler mentioned that twenty years after this article was published, he would not write the same thing today. Today his title would bee, "We REALLY ARE BAPTISTS!"

We live in the midst of a culture and a religious experience that is marked by the following:

Confusion over religious branding and over the purpose of denominationalism
Weakness of parachurch organizations
Evangelical identity issues.

And thus the Southern Baptist Convention is headed for a crisis. And this crisis will be focused on the forging of a new identity for the denomination. Currently, across the board, we are seeing the death of cultural Christianity, which counted on people being involved in denominations and the religious experience just because it was the way it is culturally. This is no longer the case.

Today's crisis is a generational crisis and a new slogan will not suffice. What is needed now is not a new slogan, but a resurgence in the Great Commission. Only the cause of the Gospel will keep us together and strong enough to endure. The gospel is the only message that saves. We must ask the hard questions of ourselves. We have been called to be a church on mission.

This new generation is a Generation of Social Transformation, Historical Significance, and Global Responsibility. Thomas Friedman recently wrote an article identifying three "bombs" that threatened the new generation. Those bombs are the nuclear bomb (still a threat), the climate bomb, and the debt bomb. But, according to Dr. Mohler (and I agree with him), the 800 pound gorilla, or the proverbial pink elephant, in the room is what are we going to do for the cause of the Gospel!

According to author Christian Smith, today's generation is marked by a "moralistic therapeutic deism". This is a problem. Again referring to Smith, Mohler mentioned that we are less sure even about the deism part. Today's generation does not reject the gospel, but simply a shrug of indifference. This is the Generation of Institutional Disinterest and this is the Generation that the Southern Baptist Convention's new generation is called to reach.

Mohler implored the new generation not the leave the Southern Baptist Church, but to save it. We are to give ourselves not to the Southern Baptist Convention, but to Christ.

This next Generation is the Generation to Go Deep! Deep ecclesiology, deep missions, deep passion. There can be no easy believism. We should not give ourselves to the culture wars, the culture is lost and gone! We are to give ourselves the Gospel ministry – all of us.

When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth? Will he find a powerful demonstration of faith in the Southern Baptist Convention? It is Dr. Mohler's and my prayer that Christ will indeed find such faith upon the earth!

Friday at the Future of Denominationalism Conference - Union University (Part I)

2009-10-13T12:54:00.001-05:00

Friday, October the 9^th, 2009 Bonnie and I were privileged to attend the Future of Denominationalism conference at Union University on its final day. The speakers for the morning were Nathan Finn (a professor at the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary) and Dr. R. Albert Mohler (President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary). This blog will be the notes that I gleaned from these two impressive discourses on the future of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Nathan Finn discussed the idea of Baptists as Evangelicals. He stated that we are ourselves evangelicals that sometimes must swim against the evangelical currents, but must remain in the evangelical river. The major thrust of his discourse was the two non-negotiables that Southern Baptists should affirm and uphold as Evangelicals. Those two foundations should be Catechesis and Narrative.

Catechesis: We must labor to pass on a commitment to convictional integrity but we must also focus on a Christian way to read and study the Christian Scriptures. We must have a robust view of the Gospel. We must know it, teach it, and live it! We must have a theological vision for ministry. This theological vision for ministry involves:

Gospel Instinct against heterodox beliefs and to avoid the truncated view of conversion. We must get back to the life change (not easy believism). Do we have more conviction in our denomination for culture wars or for gospel ministry? We must restore our confessional convictions!
In our Catechesis, we should NOT pass on to the future some of the following things:

i. Unhealthy likeness / affinity for theological diversity and parachurch organizations.

ii. We must not pass on cultural captivity.

iii. Ethno-centrism à Southern Baptists as white southerners.

iv. Denominational arrogance and elitism – as if God cannot evangelize the lost through any other mechanism.

v. Atheological pragmatism – sacrificing the gospel ministry for what is pragmatic in regards to politics and mechanism of the denomination

vi. Penchant of bricks, budgets, and bottoms over the conversion and discipleship of souls

Narrative: We must as Southern Baptists also be focused and committed to passing on our stories.

We must pass on the stories and lives of the giants of the faith in Baptist History
We must uphold with pride that it was the Baptists who championed religious liberty over 100 years before Jefferson and the Constitutional Congress took up the call.
We must also tell the grand story of Baptist involvement in mission over the centuries.
We must tell the story of the great seminaries and colleges that we as Baptists have founded.
We must tell of the likes of Smyth, Helwys, Mercer, Broadus, Boyce, Hobbs, Rogers, McCall, Mullins, Pressler, Manly, Carey, Fuller, Dagg, Mell, Judson, Wallace, Moon, Armstrong, and others. [Blogger Interlude: how many of you can identify who I am talking about here? If you can't, this underscores the point that we need to educate our churches on the wonderful history of the Baptist movement.]

That was Nathan Finn's speech. Well done!

Union Conference

2009-10-11T17:55:00.004-05:00

Thursday and Friday, Bonnie and I were privileged to attend the conference at Union University entitled "Southern Baptists, Evangelicals, and the Future of Denominationalism".

Thursday night, Dr. David Dockery spoke on the topic of "So Many Denominations: The Rise and Decline of Denominationalism...and the Shaping of a Global Evangelicalism." Dr. Dockery did an excellent job discussing the history of denominationalism in Christian history and tactfully explained why there are so many denominational structures. What I took from his speech was that we should all realize that even though denominationalism is rampant in today's society and is getting a bad wrap, denominations still provide a context for guidance and a place of belonging. We should all strive for a denominational future that has conviction and cooperation; boundaries and bridges; structure and spirit.

Here is a good article at the Union University website about Dockery's speech:

http://www.uu.edu/news/release.cfm?ID=1570

I will be posting tomorrow some comments regarding Friday's discussions by Dr. Nathan Finn, professor at the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and Dr. Albert Mohler, President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.

Is America Turning into a Hindu Nation?

2009-10-09T13:50:00.000-05:00

Lisa Miller of Newsweek Magazine wrote this in August of 2009 and I used this in my sermon last night on I John 4:1-6. This is startling information and goes to show the challenge that American Christians have in the sharing of the gospel. God is good and Our Savior Reigns! Greater is he who is in us than he who is in the world!

Here is the Article:

“America is not a Christian nation. We are, it is true, a nation founded by Christians, and according to a 2008 survey, 76 percent of us continue to identify as Christian (still, that's the lowest percentage in American history). Of course, we are not a Hindu—or Muslim, or Jewish, or Wiccan—nation, either. A million-plus Hindus live in the United States, a fraction of the billion who live on Earth. But recent poll data show that conceptually, at least, we are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity.

The Rig Veda, the most ancient Hindu scripture, says this: "Truth is One, but the sages speak of it by many names." A Hindu believes there are many paths to God. Jesus is one way, the Qur'an is another, yoga practice is a third. None is better than any other; all are equal. The most traditional, conservative Christians have not been taught to think like this. They learn in Sunday school that their religion is true, and others are false. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the father except through me."

Americans are no longer buying it. According to a 2008 Pew Forum survey, 65 percent of us believe that "many religions can lead to eternal life"—including 37 percent of white evangelicals, the group most likely to believe that salvation is theirs alone. Also, the number of people who seek spiritual truth outside church is growing. Thirty percent of Americans call themselves "spiritual, not religious," according to a 2009 NEWSWEEK Poll, up from 24 percent in 2005. Stephen Prothero, religion professor at Boston University, has long framed the American propensity for "the divine-deli-cafeteria religion" as "very much in the spirit of Hinduism. You're not picking and choosing from different religions, because they're all the same," he says. "It isn't about orthodoxy. It's about whatever works. If going to yoga works, great—and if going to Catholic mass works, great. And if going to Catholic mass plus the yoga plus the Buddhist retreat works, that's great, too."

Then there's the question of what happens when you die. Christians traditionally believe that bodies and souls are sacred, that together they comprise the "self," and that at the end of time they will be reunited in the Resurrection. You need both, in other words, and you need them forever. Hindus believe no such thing. At death, the body burns on a pyre, while the spirit—where identity resides—escapes. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. So here is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll. So agnostic are we about the ultimate fates of our bodies that we're burning them—like Hindus—after death. More than a third of Americans now choose cremation, according to the Cremation Association of North America, up from 6 percent in 1975. "I do think the more spiritual role of religion tends to deemphasize some of the more starkly literal interpretations of the Resurrection," agrees Diana Eck, professor of comparative religion at Harvard. So let us all say "om." (ref: http://newsweek.com/id/212155/)

Greek Test tomorrow and then to Start Blogging Again

2009-10-04T14:39:00.003-05:00

I want to thank everyone for your patience during this time of busyness. Over the past few weeks I have been working a full time job while trying to prepare for a Greek Advanced Placement exam along with the assignments that have come due in my semester classes - Christian Preaching and New Testament I and II. But I should be at a point on Monday that I will be able to start blogging again.

Please pray for me as I take this exam. If I do well on it, then I will not have to take Elementary Greek and will save some moolah.

God Bless,

Joshua Moore

Going on a Little Hiatus

2009-08-24T10:34:00.001-05:00

Last week, I started my Fall 2009 courses at the Southern Seminary Extension Center. I am in the process of getting acclimated to the new semester as well as preparing for the Greek Test at the first of October. Therefore, my plate is overflowing and I am going to hold off on posts for a couple of weeks.

Thanks!

Josh

Dealing with the Guilt of Sin

2009-08-11T15:45:00.003-05:00

I wanted to write a quick Biblical encouragement to those who are dealing with the guilt of past sin or habitual sin. Are you a Christian who feels that you cannot be used of God because of some past sin that Satan keeps throwing in your face? Do you allow the Accuser to keep you enslaved to a habitual sin? I want to share this verse with you that should encourage you!

Micah 7:7-9 ESV - this passage in context is talking about the City of Jerusalem, but it has a New Covenant meaning for the Christian that is evident. Here is the text:

But as for me, I will look to the Lord;
I will wait for the God of my salvation;
my God will hear me.
Rejoice not over me, O my enemy;
when I fall, I shall rise;
when I sit in darkness,
the Lord will be a light to me.
I will bear the indignation of the LORD
because I have sinned against him,
until he pleads my cause
and executes judgment for me.
He will bring me out to the light;
I shall look upon his vindication.

This is a powerful verse. Whatever hold Satan has on you, it does not have to be this way! Yes, you have sinned, and yes, you will bear the indignation of God and the consequences of that sin. But you will not experience condemnation! There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). What an amazing promise!!! It is God who will bring you out of the darkness of sin and into the light. Do not trust your own strength, nail your sin to the cross and put it to death at Christ's finished work!

Rest in God's amazing grace! Look upon the vindication of God's almighty name in your life! He will have vindication, he will have his victory in your life!

Jerome Quote

2009-08-10T13:30:00.007-05:00

I got this off the wikipedia article for Jerome. I think this is a really great quote - similar to the "lazy hands are the devils workshop" proverb.

"Be ever engaged, so that whenever the devil calls he may find you occupied."

Jerome was a Christian in the 4th Century and was responsible for translating the Original Languages (Hebrew and Greek) into Latin, called the Vulgate. This translation of the Bible was the only authorized translation of the church (Roman Catholicism) until the Protestant Reformation.

No Other Name - Acts 4:12

2009-08-02T08:24:00.004-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, we at Dresden First Baptist Church had a scripture memory verse, Acts 4:12. Here is the verse with verse 11 to provide a small amount of context:

"This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." ESV.

This is another scripture on conversion that highlights the exclusivity of Christ. Evangelical Christians do not make up the belief that Jesus is the only way to salvation. There are ample passages of scripture that point to this doctrine, this being one (John 14:6 being another). There is no other way under the sun to receive salvation except through the blood of Christ Jesus. This has massive implications - with one I would like to highlight today:

Major Implication: If Christ is the only way, and he is, then Christians must evangelize the world for Christ and be not ashamed of the gospel! There are over 5 Billion lost people in the world today, and this statistic simply blows me away. We must work in our local churches to get connected and mobilized for Great Commission tasks. In other words, our main goal is to be about making disciples.

There is no other name, but the name of Jesus that brings peace and salvation. Let's bring that name to the nations.

Amen, let it be so.

In Nashville for Family Visit

2009-08-02T08:13:00.002-05:00

This weekend, Bonnie, Marianne, and I have traveled to Franklin, TN to visit Bonnie's parents. Bonnie's parents have recently moved to Franklin, TN (last week) and we are visiting them for the first time here. Johnny and Julia Brundige live in a great area now and we know that we have a great "get away" spot in Franklin, TN!

New Covenant

2009-07-21T13:14:00.003-05:00

The following is another posting from the past (moore4christ blog) that I am transferring over to this blog. If you have not read this before, I hope this is edifying. If you have already read this, I will be writing new posts in the coming days. This blog post was another response to a collaboration question in Old Testament II. Thank you! jtm

Perhaps the finest expression of Jeremiah’s prophetic preaching is found in 31:31-40. Jeremiah describes the new covenant as “permanent” (see especially 31:35-40). If this new covenant is “permanent,” what is its relationship to the covenant made at Sinai? Does the new covenant supplant the covenant at Sinai? Can this new covenant be broken as was the one at Sinai? Can Jeremiah’s new covenant be equated with the covenant established by Christ’s blood? Why, or why not?

Clearly, the context of Jeremiah 31:31-40 illustrates and describes a permanent, new covenant between God and His people.First I want to quickly answer these questions and then make some observational points in more detail.

What is the relationship to the covenant here described and the covenant made at Mount Sinai? I would say that new covenant does not SUPPLANT the Mosaic Covenant, but it fulfills the covenant. In other words, the covenant made at Sinai is fulfilled ultimately in this new covenant.
Can this new covenant be broken as was the one at Sinai? No, not in an ultimate sense.
Can Jeremiah’s new covenant be equated with the covenant established by Christ’s blood? Yes, I have always equated the two in my interpretation of Jeremiah 31:31-40. I see the covenant provided by the atonement of Christ for our sins and the justification that is found in grace and through faith and repentance to be equal with the new covenant described in Jeremiah 31.
With these brief responses, I would like to make the following points of observation:
Jesus definitely represents and enacts a new covenant, one that is synonymous with the covenant described in our focal discussion. The writer of the book of Hebrews makes this plain in Hebrews Chapter 8. Starting in verse 6, “But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion to look for a second.” (Hebrews 8:6-7). The writer then quotes verbatim Jeremiah 31:31-34 in Hebrews 8:8-12. Thus, it is obvious that the writer of Hebrews through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit equates the Then the writer wraps up the discussion of the covenant by saying in verse 13 of Chapter 8, ‘In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.” This verse raises the earlier questions in the issue – is the Sinai Covenant now abolished or overthrown and to be forgotten?Since Jesus inaugurates this new covenant in his life and ministry, which is fulfilled ultimately in his death, burial, and resurrection, we need to see what Jesus said about the old covenant. Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount said in Matthew 5:17-20: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heave and earth pass away, not an iota, or a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus in this passage clearly is connecting his ministry with the old covenant in that he will be the fulfillment of that covenant. Reading the old covenant (the Law and the Prophets) is not abolished, it is fulfilled in Jesus Christ.But what about Hebrews 8:13? The ESV translation says that the old covenant is obsolete. This at first glance seems to be synonymous with “abolished”. But I believe that this is not what the writer of Hebrews is saying. The writer is not saying that the old covenant is abolished, but that many aspects of the old covenant, heavily dependent on the sacrificial system, is now obsolete given the complete and victorious work of Christ on the cross.Can this new covenant be broken like the old one could? The language of the new covenant in Jeremiah is totally opposite the language of the Sinaitic covenant. This new covenant illustrates a loving God actually doing the action of creating the new covenant “within” the believer. No longer is the covenant externally focused on the obedience of a nation or chosen race. This covenant is forged within the individual believer. We must be careful however to make the distinction that the Old Testament believers were not saved because of their works or in obeying the Law to the letter. Legalism has never saved. Paul in Romans 4 makes clear that even before the Law was instituted on Mt. Sinai, the righteous were saved through faith. Justification has always been through faith alone by grace alone. The difference in the Sinaitic Covenant (the best I can see it right now), is that it encompassed both the remnant of Israel (those who truly believed) and also “nation” of Israel, even including those who were unregenerate. In the new covenant, there is no distinction. In the universal church, there is no such thing as a visible church and invisible church. Yes, there are some denominations that want to place this moniker on the church, but the new covenant will NOT be broken. Once you are regenerate, once you are justified, and as you are sanctified, you will persevere to the end. Yes we are subject to sin, but we will not break the covenant.

God Hates the Sin, but Loves the Sinner?

2009-07-20T09:07:00.003-05:00

In the continued effort to bring the posts from my old blog (moore4christ) over to this blog, below is a post I published in April of this year and was a submission that I made in a collaboration for Old Testament II. The question as posed by the professor is in red and then my response is in black:

The obvious theme of Psalm 2 is Yahweh’s use of “his anointed” (v. 2) to control rebellious nations. However, not all mentioned in this Psalm are pictured as rebellious and thus as objects of divine wrath. The Psalm closes on a positive note: “How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!” Clearly, the Psalmist believes that the wicked will experience God’s wrath, not his grace. On the other hand, those who bow before him will experience blessing. In light of the Psalmist’s presentation, evaluate the statement: “God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.”

I believe that we talked about this somewhat in an earlier collaboration for Old Testament II, but I am glad to see singular treatment using the 2nd Psalm as the context. I think the previous collaboration discussion was on the equality of God's love - the thought that God loves the entirety of humanity in the same way, equally. There is a sense that in an individualistic and largely democratic society that we live in today, that the thought of equality is certainly a major factor in our idea of freedom. The Declaration of Independence declares that all men are created equal. This has been the clarion call for all disenfranchised persons in the American tradition and it has also had somewhat of an impact on our view of God's approach to the sinner and sin. We run to John 3:16 and read, "For God so loved the world..." or I John 2:2, "He is the propitiation of our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world", and then say that God LOVES the world and LOVES the sinner. God LOVES you and me. When HE was on the cross YOU were on his mind (and in our minds, there is no qualification to that thought - no limitation). Therefore, God even LOVES the unregenerate sinner. But I cannot go that far. Ephesians 2:3 states that we are by nature children of wrath - all humanity. By nature, all humanity is subject to the wrath of God. This is a holy stance against the sinner! Yes, there is an effacacious condescendence by God through Christ to the world because of God's love for the world so that he might save the elect, but God still must stand in holiness against sin and thus the sinner. God hates sin - with wrath and judgment - and the nature of the sinner is SIN. Therefore, God hates the very nature of the sinner. But this is not an EMOTIONAL hatred that we usually attach to the word in human terms. WRATH is not an emotional response from God - it is a response of holiness and according to the sake and glory of HIS NAME. This HATRED is wrought out of the perfection of God's holiness. The only people that the phrase, "God hates the sin, but loves the sinner" would apply to is the regenerate believer - not the unbeliever.

The Beginning of Knowledge

2009-07-17T10:13:00.003-05:00

I am going to over the next couple of days be re-submitting some old posts from a previous blog onto this "Moore For Christ" blog so that all of my pastoral / devotional postings will be in the same place (there will be some exceptions that I will not post). This is from earlier this year and is a devotional thought from Proverbs 1:7 and 3:5-6

A couple of weeks ago, our church had a Scripture memory verse from Proverbs. I posited a second verse in addition to Proverbs 3:5-6. That verse was Proverbs 1:7, which reads:"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction." This is a very interesting verse and one that carries a TON of relevance to today's Christianity and every Christian's life. Also, since I have been studying the philosophy this week (still studying) up here at Louisville, KY at Southern Seminary, this verse is also extremely helpful for me.One of the main questions in philosophy is this:

Can you know anything?

What is truth?

Is it knowable?

This verse simply answers that question. Knowledge is only possible by belief. Saint Augustine famously said, 'You must believe something, before you can know something." True, lasting, purposeful, abundant, and sustaining knowledge begins at one place - with the fear of the Lord! Even though most of you do not have advanced degrees in any scholastic discipline, this does not mean that you lack the possession of knowledge. You actually have more knowledge than the pagan philosopher or the heathen mathematics or scientific genius. Why? Because, those disciplines operated outside of the fear of the God of the Bible, is useless and without purpose.

Remember these cross-references:

1 Corinthians 1:18-21: "For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.' where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe." ESV

1 Corinthians 13:2: "And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing." ESV

Fools - the wise of the world act as illustrated in the latter part of our focal verse.

They despise:

1. Wisdom: this wisdom is a spiritual, heavenly wisdom - the wisdom that comes from above. To contrast earthly wisdom and heavenly wisdom - read James 3:13-18.

2. Instruction: the wise of this world spurn instruction that comes from Scripture, which is the final authority for instruction on life. Wisdom from above is grounded in Scripture. Scripture is the depository for the source of all knowledge.

All knowledge and all the disciplines can find a starting point and a grounding in God's Holy Word. It is my earnest prayer that all members of Dresden First Baptist Church will be GROUNDED - ROOTED in the Word of God.Such is the beginning of knowledge.

Reminder on Bible Reading

2009-07-16T10:55:00.004-05:00

I want to encourage everyone to continue reading the Scriptures according to our Bible Reading Plan for 2009. As you can see, on the left side menu bar of this blog, I have this week's Bible Reading. You can read all sections of Scripture or pick any to read. It does not matter what you read in Scripture, but THAT you read. Remember, all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of god may be competent, equipped for every good work. (II Timothy 3:16 ESV)"

Many of you may have realized that we have left the Books of the Law (and for some, I suppose this is a relief) and have entered the books of History in our OT I readings. Also, we have moved from Wisdom literature in our OT II readings to Isaiah and the Major Prophets. Don't be intimidated by the prophets for some of the most glorious passages and promises about Christ Jesus and the faithfulness of God is found in this section of Scripture (Isaiah 6, 7, 40, 53, 60, 62, etc.). In the NT readings, we are still focusing on the gospel of Luke.

I pray God's richest blessings upon you in the reading of His Faithful Word!

Richard Baxter - How to know that you are Unconverted

2009-07-16T09:13:00.005-05:00

I have started reading Richard Baxter's masterpiece, The Christian Directory, and have been thoroughly enjoying it. I am reading it quite slowly trying to digest this mammoth volume. This book is about 800 quarto pages long. It will take a LONG time to read, but it is a gold mine!! Reading this last night, Baxter was discussing in his Christian Ethics on the conversion of the lost. On page 18 of Part I, Baxter describes the marks of the unconverted state. I want to share them with you. If you ever wanted to know if you are in the faith or not, this list is a great start to show you your true spiritual state - whether dead or alive.

Here are the words of Baxter:

Marks of an unconverted state:

1. If you are persecutors, or haters, or deriders of men, for being serious and diligent in the service of God, and fearful of sinning, and because they go not with the multitude to do evil, it is a certain sign that you are in a state of death: yea, if you love not such men, and desire not rather to be such yourselves, than to be the greatest of the ungodly.

2. If you love the world best, and set your affections most on things below, and mind most earthly things; nay, if you seek not first God's kingdom and the righteousness thereof; and if your hearts be not in heaven, and your affections set on the things that are above; and you prefer not your hopes of life eternal before all the pleasures and prosperity of this world, it is a certain sign that you are but worldly and ugodly men.

3. If your estimation, belief, and hopes, of everlasting life through Christ, be not such, as will prevail with you to deny yourselves, and forsake father, and mother, and the nearest friends; and house, and land, and life, and all that you have, for Christ, and for these hopes of a happiness hereafter, you are no true Christians, nor in a state of saving grace.

4. If you have not been converted, regenerated, and sanctified by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, making you spiritual, and causing you to mind the things of the Spirit above the things of the flesh. If this Spriti be not in you, and you walk not after it, but after the flesh; making provision for the flesh, to satisfy its desires, and preferring the pleasing of the flesh before the pleasing of God, it is certain that you are in a state of death.

5. If you have any known sin which you do not hate, and had not rather leave it than keep it, and do not pray, and strive, and watch against it, as far as you know and observe it; but rather excuse it, plead for it, desire it, and are loth to part with it, so that your will is habitually more for it than against it, it is a sign of an impenitent, unrenewed heart.

6. If you love not the word, as it is a light discovering your sin and duty, but only as it is a general truth, or as it reproveth others: if you love not the most searching preaching, and would not know how bad you are, and come not to the light, that your deeds may be manifest, it is a sign that you are not children of the light, but of the darkness.

7. If the laws of your Creator and Redeemer be not of greatest power and authority with you, and the will and word of God cannot do more with you, than the word or will of any man; and the threatenings and promises of God be not more prevalent with you, than the threats or promises of any men, it is a sign that you take not God for your God, but in heart are atheists and ungodly men.

8. If you have not, in a deliberate covenant or resolution, devoted and given up yourselves to God as your Father and felicity, to Jesus Christ as your only Saviour, and your Lord and King, and to be the Holy Ghost as your Sanctifier, to be made holy by him, desiring that your heart and life should be perfectly conformed to the will of God, and that you might know him, and love him, and enjoy him more; you are void of godliness and true Christianity; for this is the very covenant which you make in baptism..."

I don't know about you, but these signs or marks of the unconverted truly convicted me! Oh how I hate sin, but how I so often find myself not resting in the Spirit of God, but instead allowing myself to live as if I am unconverted! May these marks be blazened on my mind and in my heart that I may not sin against God and thus search out the Scriptures for the surpassing love that is found in Christ Jesus our Lord!

Matthew 11:28

2009-07-16T08:55:00.005-05:00

The scripture memory verse this week is Matthew 11:28, but I would like to quote the entire passage in this blog to give context (Matthew 11:25-30)

At that time Jesus declared, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light" [ESV]

What an amazing passage! The first section of this discourse is astonishing. Jesus glorifies the Father in His will that the Lord has hidden the kingdom of heaven from the wise and understanding and has revealed them to little children. In other words, Jesus is declaring that those who are wise in the world's eyes but are unrepentant and stubbornly refuse to accept the gospel. The little children however receive the gospel openly in simple faith and humility. Thus, we must emulate the little children in our faith, not the skeptic. We live in a society that exalts doubt and skepticism. But this "un-trusting" attitude towards God and his revelation, the Holy Bible, has caused more harm to the gospel than anything else today. We see denomination after denomination finding its effectiveness eroded by their rejection or manipulation of the gospel of Christ. Paul the apostle mentioned this tendency in Galatians 1:7-9 --> "not that there is another gospel, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. but even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have saide before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed." Strong words. God has shut out and hidden the truth from those who are wise and understanding according to the world's calculations. Jesus calls this hiding of truth from the wise and understanding God's GRACIOUS will. Jesus glorifies God in doing this. But those who humble themselves in confession before God and trust their lives to Him, they shall be saved! Salvation is found in humility and in faith, not in pride and in worldly wisdom.

The second section of this passage is equally astounding. My ESV study bible notes say this: "The first part of verse 27 reveals the profound divine self-consciousness of Jesus, as well as the supreme authority of the Father within the Trinity, by which he has delegated authority over "all things" to the Son. 'All things' probably refers to everything needed with respect to the carrying out of Christ's ministry of redemption, including the revelation of salvation to those whom he chooses to reveal the Father." Christ while incarnate had full authority on who he was going to reveal the Father to. He is perfect in his wisdom and authority! Jesus, both in his incarnate state and eternal state, shares an exclusive relationship with the Father, including a "direct and immediate knowledge of each other". Thus, this is the glorious truth of the Trinity. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are separate in personhood, yet united and one in substance - co-equal and co-eternal. God the Son and God the Father are separate in personhood, yet are always united in a direct and immediate knowledge of each other and in communication and relationship.

The final section is so reassuring! This divine triune God, who created the world and by him all things are held together, move, and have their being (including us), is a God of peace and love for those who come to Him. Christ Jesus calls for all who have a downtrodden spirit, a frustrated life, dreams that have been crushed, souls who feel that they have no purpose, those who have tried everything in life and still are unsatisfied with life, those who have looked to material things for sustenance and found them wanting, those who are worried about tomorrow, those who are completely and utterly overwhelmed by anxiety, to simply come and fall down at the cross and cast our burdens upon him and he will give us rest! As I write this, I feel my own burdens lifting - what a glorious knowledge, that I can find true rest and peace in the Lord Jesus Christ!

Christ then invites us to take his YOKE! This is in itself a burdensome object. The yoke was a wooden frame joining two oxen for pulling heavy loads, and is a metaphor for one person's subjection to another, and a common metaphor in Judaism for the law [ESV study notes]. The law under the Pharisees' influence had become a crushing burden, but the Pharisees truly believed that this burden of the law originated with God. However, Christ OBLITERATES this view!!!! Christ's burden / yoke of discipleship brings REST through simple commitment to Christ. We no longer have to focus on minute details of the law and try to figure out how to keep an unkeepable legalism. We only have to yield to Christ Jesus. Our salvation is now focused on ONE person, not HUNDREDS of rules. Remember what Bro. Don mentioned in his sermon Sunday, grace is a FREE GIFT OF GOD (Romans 3:24), made possible by the sacrificial atonement of Christ for sin. However, this Grace, although it is free, is NOT CHEAP. This grace COSTS MUCH - it cost the life of the SON OF GOD! And thus, in order to have this grace you must yield all of yourself to the LORDSHIP of Christ - "to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow HIM. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for Christ's sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of Christ and his words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and the holy angels." [Luke 9:23-26 ESV].

Oh the glorious grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the divine, amazing love that is found in our Triune God!

2009 - 2010 Church Year Approaching

2009-07-10T09:56:00.007-05:00

I have taken about a 10 day vacation from writing in the blog, but am back to tell you a little about Dresden First Baptist Church's 2009 - 2010 Theme. Our theme for the coming year will be: "Maximizing Church Membership".

Our church is in the midst of working on our plans over the coming weeks for the start of the new church year in September. No matter what our plans are, it will be involving the reclamation of a biblical view of church membership. Also involved will be a focus on Sunday School and starting new Sunday School units. If you, dear reader, are a member of our church, I encourage you to pray and think about Sunday School classes that we currently do not offer that would be good additions to the church program. I do know that the Sunday School Ministry is planning a Singles Class to start the first Sunday of September. Also included in this vision for a new vision is a bold thrust in our church for missions involvement and awareness. I will be working with the pastor to encourage our church to adopt an active, overseas missionary and communicate with that missionary on a regular basis. That way we will be praying for and communicating with an actual missionary. We hope to eventually start local church mission projects and also encourage individual volunteer mission trips. Maybe, in the near future, our church will commission a church member to full time, international missions.

I encourage each member of our church and others to pray for our church in the coming weeks as we plan for the new year. I ask the Lord's blessings on Dresden First Baptist Church

Sermon Tonight

2009-07-01T08:57:00.004-05:00

Tonight, I will have the privilege of preaching at DFBC during the Wednesday night Prayer Service. We will be continuing our study in I John, focusing tonight on I John 3:11-18. Here is the text for you to meditate on today:

"For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother's righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth."

These are stark and plain words - Christians know the love of Christ in their lives and they exhibit it to one another. Bottom line. We will be talking about love tonight.

Looking forward to seeing each of you!

God Bless

A New Denomination is Born

2009-06-30T23:12:00.004-05:00

I want to highlight something that happened last week as the Southern Baptists were meeting in Louisville, KY. In Texas, a new denomination was formed called the Anglican Church in North America. This is good news. The Episcopal Church USA, which has endorsed the ordination of openly homosexual priests and bishops and also has given in to the relativistic views that reject the exclusivity of Christ (see Gene Robinson's prayer at Obama's inauguration - praying to the "God of our many understandings"), has fallen under sharp criticism and rebuke from the greater Anglican Communion of the world. The most populous region of the Anglican Communion (or Episcopal Church or Church of England) is Africa. The African Anglican community is extremely conservative, evangelical, and has decried the decaying of gospel ministry in the Episcopal Church, USA. Also, many conservative churches of the Episcopal Church USA over the past few years have considered breaking away to form a new denomination based on the founding principles of the Church of England (the Book of Common Prayer and the Thirty-Nine Articles). These conservative churches petitioned to the Archbishop of Canterbury (Rowan Williams) a few years ago to help stop the slide into apostasy that was happening in the US. The Archbishop did nothing.

Last week, the conservative Anglican churches met in Texas and formally split with the Episcopal Church, USA, forming a new denomination.

Although I disagree strongly with many of the views of Anglicanism (such as baptism, church polity, church leadership, high church worship style, scripture and tradition, religious liberty and soul competency issues, etc.), evangelical Christians should welcome this development. The African Anglican community has already endorsed and associated with this new group as opposed to the Episcopal Church. We should welcome this development because it is a group of churches who have upheld the Gospel truth and have taken hold of the faith once for all delivered to the saints and are standing firm against the tide of cultural relativism by saying that Christ truly is the way, the truth, and the life and no one comes to the Father but by Him.

Here are a couple of articles that might help you understand the movement:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglican_Church_in_North_America

http://www.episcopal-life.org/79901_111236_ENG_HTM.htm

Thoughts on the Convention

2009-06-26T21:15:00.004-05:00

Here are some pictures from the convention this past week. The chapel picture on the top is from the Sesquicentennial (150th) Dedication of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. This was my first time at a chapel service at the seminary. The other two shots are pictures from our "best" seats at the convention on Tuesday afternoon.

What are my thoughts on the convention?

1. It was not as highly attended as I thought it was going to be. I have a book that I had to read for the seminary class that had on the cover of the book a picture from the 1988 SBC Annual Meeting in San Antonio, TX. In that picture, there is an entire stadium filled with SBC messengers (looks like well over 20,000 people). This convention only had a little over 8,000 messengers and it was in a convention hall at the Kentucky Expo Center in Louisville, KY.

2. There was not all that much controversy. This is not a bad thing. But, due to the preparation seminar that we had at the Seminary class on Saturday (6/20/2009), Dr. Russell Moore (Dean of Theology at Southern Seminary) mentioned what to expect and I left with the impression that there would be some debate on the floor especially with the Great Commission Resurgence and also about the possible disfellowship of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth, TX. As it turned out, the Broadway Baptist Church disfellowship recommendation by the Executive Committee passed without discussion and the Great Commission Resurgence was passed whole heartedly without much debate (it was the only "controversial issue).

3. There was one resolution that was most publicized in the media. It was a resolution on President Barack Obama. The resolution celebrated the fact that an African American was elected to the highest office in the United States. However, it also lamented the positions that the Obama administration was taking on the abortion issue and pro-gay rights. Here is the Baptist Press article about the resolution [http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=30759]. You will notice in the article that Dr. Roger "Sing" Oldham is in the picture with Danny Akin and Richard Land. Akin is the President of the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and was also chairman of the Resolutions Committee for this year's convention. Richard Land is the Chairman of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the SBC.

4. The Exhibit Hall of the SBC was absolutely amazing! There was an entire Lifeway Christian Store in the middle of the hall. Also there were unbelievable exhibits from every seminary and entity of the SBC and also all the Christian Colleges in the states. I am proud to announce that Union University probably had the best location in the entire hall, right at the entrance! Bonnie and I especially enjoyed the International Mission Board exhibit. There was a huge board that had a map of the entire world with indications of the percentage of evanglical Christians in each location. Each messenger had the opportunity to sign his or her name in a region of the world to pray for the missionary effot to reach that part of the world for Christ. I picked Russia, since Breanne Oldham (Dr. Sing Oldham's daughter and fellow classmate) is currently in that country as a journeyman missionary.

5. Bonnie and I attended the Union University Alumni dessert reception on Tuesday evening. It was a wonderful event. Dr. Dockery informed the guests that Union is having a record Freshman enrollment this year. Things are doing great for my alma mater!

6. I got to meet a bunch of new ministers my age throughout the country and also got to meet and "rub shoulders" with some of the leaders of the convention. It is neat to be walking around the exhibit hall and then turn around and there is R. Albert Mohler walking right by you, or Thom Rainer, Jerry Vines, Paige Patterson, Richard Land, etc. I also got to see some familiar faces. It was definitely great to see Brother Wayne and Linda Perkins and also Eddie Mallonee and his wife. We also saw Jim Barnhouse from Macks Grove Baptist Church.

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed the convention and am thankful that the church has allowed me to go. I look forward to the next time I will be able to go.

Tuesday at the Convention

2009-06-23T21:38:00.002-05:00

I am now at the hotel room after the Tuesday session of the Southern Baptist Convention. I am completely exhausted after a fourteen hour day at the convention hall. I will most likely not post until I am home in Weakley County, TN on Thursday evening.

I had a great time!

God Bless.

Monday at the Pastor's Conference

2009-06-22T21:20:00.003-05:00

Bonnie and I had a long day! There were three sessions of the Pastors' Conference today! Nonetheless, I must say that this was a wonderful day. There were a total of ten speakers at the conference today. I am not going to go into the detail that I did yesterday on the three that I listened to last night. Here is the list of the speakers that presented sermons for the day:

Monday Morning: What if we had the same love?

1. Mike Landry, Pastor of First Baptist Church Sarasota, FL.
Outline:
I. What does missions look like without love? Bottom Line: read the book of Jonah
II. How do we maintain missions and have "same love"?
A. View the Great Commission as a relational mission.
B. Know God Intimately
C. Value People

2. Ed Stetzer, President of Lifeway Research and Interim Pastor of Hendersonville First Baptist Church.
Outline: from Ephesians 4:1-8
Main Point: God has already made us one, we just need to live it out.
I. Walk Worthy
II. Display Right Attitudes
A. Humilty
B. Gentleness
C. Patience
D. Accepting in Love
III. Live the Unity God has already Created
IV. One in Christ

3. Francis Chan, Pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, California
Did not get much of an outline from Pastor Chan, but he did an amazing job. Francis is a native of Hong Kong, China and is a pastor in California. I enjoyed his genuine, no-nonsense approach.

4. Tom Eliff - did not get to listen to his sermon. Bonnie and I went to eat lunch.

Afternoon Session - What if...we were One in Spirit?

1. Michael Catt, Pastor of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, GA (the church that did Facing the Giants and Fireproof)
Michael did not have a full outline and he basically preached an encouragement sermon for young and old pastors alike. Good words.

2. Dennis Swanberg also spoke. He is a Christian Comedian and he was hilarious. He started off the bit by imitating Billy Graham and he sounded just like him! Swanberg has just written a book called, The Man Code.

3. Fred Luter, Pastor of Franklin Avenue Baptist Church in New Orleans. Fred Luter is an African American pastor of a Southern Baptist Church and he was the highlight of the afternoon. He was ELECTRIC!!! Here is his outline:
What happens when we wait on HIS spirit? - Acts 1:8
A. You Become a New Person
B. You have a New Purpose
C. You will have a New Power

4. Mike Huckabee: everyone knows who he is. He spoke mainly about the roles of the family, the pastor, and government. He made the basic point through his speech that we are not to be like Abimilech in Judges 9.

Monday Evening: What if...we were one in Purpose?

1. Alvin Reid, Professor of Evangelism at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.
Outline: Tipping Points (Acts 19:8-10)
I. Relationships
II. The Gospel
III. The Future
IV. Relating to Culture
V. Defining Success

2. David Platt, Pastor of the Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, AL.
David Platt, in my opinion, was by far the best preacher of the conference and he is only thirty years old and a pastor of a vibrant church in Alabama. David Platt told the conference that the one purpose for us is the GLORY OF GOD! His text was out of Hebrews 13:11-14. The major question that he offered was: Are we going to die in our religion, or are we going to die in our devotion? I simply stopped writing notes and sat down and listened to Platt preach the gospel. He really drove home the need for global missions awareness and the fact that the Gospel of Christ is on the march among the nations.

3. Johnny Hunt, Senior Pastor First Baptist Church in Woodstock, GA. Johnny Hunt is the current and presumed re-elected President of the Southern Baptist Convention. I did not take notes on his speech, but it basically was an exegesis of Malachi and was a stirring sermon on being dependent upon the LORD.

Overall, I truly enjoyed the Pastor's Conference. Tomorrow, I am looking forward to the first day of the actual Annual Meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention. Tomorrow morning, it has been announced to my Seminary class that we will be asked to join the leaders of the convention on the platform of the annual meeting of the SBC for us future pastors, pastoral staff, missionaries, and denominational leaders to be prayed over by the convention. Since the convention is at Louisville, KY Southern Seminary, its leadership and students are being spotlighted.

Another neat feature of my involvement in the SBC is that each of the students of the Southern Seminary students, including myself, will have to serve as microphone monitors for the convention business sessions. My session will be on Wednesday morning and will be manning microphone 5. This means that we have the responsibility of manning the microphones and operating a digital microphone computer box that will indicate to the chair of the convetion (Johnny Hunt) what the person at the microphone will be doing (making a motion, speaking for or against the motion, making an amendment, and making a point of order). This is the first year that the microphones will be digitally connected to the platform and the system is simple, yet complicated (sort of like touch-screen voting machines). I anticipate that it might get complicated.

Tomorrow starts the convention. The proceedings will be on live streaming video online at this address:

http://www.sbcannualmeeting.net/sbc09/sbcam.asp?cat=home

The recognition of seminary students should be at 9:00am EDT (that is 8:00AM central).

Sunday at the SBC Pastor's Conference

2009-06-21T21:14:00.003-05:00

The Southern Baptist Convention's Pastors' Conference is now underway! Starting this late afternoon at the Kentucky Expo Center by the Louisville Airport, Louisville Six Flags, and Churchill Downs. Bonnie and I arrived in time for the pre-conference concert. Brother Marshall should be excited to know that the soloist, Starla Harbin, started out the conference singing "Days of Elijah" and during the evening's worship, we sang, "When I think about the Lord". Bonnie and I felt like we were right at home.

This year's conference president is Ed Litton, Pastor of First Baptist Church of North Mobile, Alabama. The worship team also is from the North Mobile church and they did a fantastic job.

The speakers this evening were J.D. Greear of The Summit Church in Durham, NC, Mac Brunson, Pastor of First Baptist Church Jacksonville, FL, and Chuck Colson, founder of Prison Fellowship and prolific Christian author. All three of the speakers did an excellent job and I would like to outline their speeches.

Ed Litton started off the speaking with a "theme interpretation" on the motto for the Pastors' Conference, "What if". Dr. Litton gave the congregated messengers various convicting questions based around the motto. The questions that caught my attentions were:

What if we adjusted our thinking and sought out God for a greater vision?

What if we truly cast ourselves upon the Lord and not on the numbers?

What if we "opened up the silos" and quit storing up for ourselves and gave freely the gospel of Christ Jesus to those around us?

What if we gave up the stubborn problems that have plagued us.

The theme for this year's conference is Philippians 2:2 - "complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind." [ESV]

J.D. Greear preached from Matthew 23, where Jesus gave the seven woes to the Pharisees. Dr. Greear focused on the difference between religiosity and true gospel ministry. This cut me to the quick! He introduced the sermon by outlining the three tendencies of religiosity:

1. Religion tends to displace the gospel from God's people.

2. We tend to see the conflict in others in the past but we do not see that in ourselves in the present.

-the Pharisees loved missions.

-the Pharisees loved scripture

-the Pharisees loved doctrine

-the Pharisees loved disciplined obedience

-the Pharisees thought these proved that they were the people of God.

3. Religion makes us horribly ineffective at evangelism.

-the Pharisees were not effective on people who were not like them. But Jesus did. When Jesus called Peter to cast the net on the other side of the boat and Peter and the disciples-to-be were unable to bring in all the fish that they had caught, Jesus said, "from now on you will be catching men' (Luke 5:10). Jesus was saying, like you have caught the fish, so shall you catch men. Jesus drew people unto him.

The main outline of the sermon detailed six characteristics / ways that we are religious and how that displaces the gospel:

1. Religious people are obsessed with Recognition - they love honorary titles and really love the praise of people.

2. Religious people substitute religious rituals for a love for God. We can make a big deal of a set of conforming behaviors. We many times focus on what we do instead of knowing God. We must encounter God. We must have a white hot passion for God's glory - a thirst to know more of him.

3. Religious centered Christians elevate secondary traditions above the love of God. We can so easily place more emphasis on tradition than calling sinners to repentance.

4. Religious centered Christians elevate secondary traditions above love for others.

5. Pharisees are more aware of the sins of others than in their own life.

6. Pharisees always think that preachers and teachers are talking about someone else when talking about sin and short coming.

His concluding thoughts were to not use God for another agenda in our lives. Based on a less then gospel-centered ministry in many churches throughout the Southern Baptist Convention, many people get converted to the SBC and not to Christ. We must repent of our religion and our self-righteousness, and thinking that we are better than everyone else. One of the best lines of the conclusion was that Southern Baptists must not trade the deadness of liberalism for the deadness of traditionalism.

Mac Brunson came shortly thereafter to bring a message from I Peter 3:8-9. His sermon was not as clearly delineated as Greear's so my outline is not a clear. Brunson focused in his remarks on the responsibility of ministers and pastors to encourage and edify one another.

In his first point, Brunson outlined the five characteristics of how ministers and Christians should be in the Southern Baptist Convention. First, we are to be harmonious or same minded. God is not calling us to be clones, but are there are cardinal truths that we should all agree on and be like-minded. We ought to all agree on the Great Commission (this is a reference to the controversy over the document entitled, "The Great Commission Resurgence". Second, we are to be sympathetic, truly and honestly identifying with the felt hurts and needs of fellow ministers and Christians. Thirdly, we are to have a brotherly intention. Fourthly, we are to have a brotherly submissiveness and be humble in spirit. And finally, we are to have a tender heart. In this section of the message, Brunson highlighted a couple of illustrations. The first illustration was that of the satellite buffalo. Apparently, in nature there is always one buffalo in a wild herd that will always stay on the fringes of the herd, and not interact with the other buffalo. For the whole of its days, it will always be removed from the other buffalos and they always die a premature death due to the neglect of interaction with other bison. Brunson made the point that we are not to allow the pastors of our convention feel like the satellite buffalo. Secondly, Brunson mentioned a book that two very successful female ad execs wrote once they had built a company from the ground up. The title of the book was what these two women believed was the key to their whole success. The book was called, The Power of Nice.

In his second point, the exact wording of which I did not get, he focused on verse 8 of I Peter 3. He discussed a minister not returning evil for evil or insult for insult. We all have this emotional itch called the flesh and it always tempts us with the conviction that we always have to defend ourselves and our honor and return insult for insult. This is a natural reaction . But the Bible tells us that we don't have to. The best thing that Satan can do is to knock us off our game - off our rhythm.

One final illustration was that Dr. Brunson showed pictures of a church in Germany in which its foundations had wasted away until one day the entire church (save the front facade) collapsed. Instead of building back the church, the town decided to just repair the facade and not to build the actual church back up. Now, all that remains is a beautiful facade without any church attached. Brunson encouraged pastors to rest or take pride in a precious and beautiful facade of a church if the foundation is crumbling. We must have a firm foundation.

Chuck Colson came to speak at the end of the evening and his focus was on leadership. Just a copule of quick highlights:

-Pastors have the eternal destiny of souls in their hands. We must not take this responsibility lightly.

- [quoting Spurgeon] "we must tremble lest we misspeak the word of God"

-being a pastor is an awesome charge and we must approach the ministry with great humility

-not only are you called to preach, but you have been called to lead as a pastor.

-we are not to pander the people and tell them all that they want to hear, but we must preach the word of God and lead the people toward His glory.

Well, this was the conference for Sunday evening. Bonnie and I are looking forward to tomorrow. Bonnie will be attending the Pastor's Wives Institute during the morning, while I will remain with the other ministers for the continuance of the Pastors' Conference. The speakers slated for tomorrow include Mike Landry, Ed Stetzer, Francis Chan, and Tom Eliff in the morning. During the afternoon, Michael Catt, Fred Luter, Jr., and Mike Huckabee will speak. Finally, to conclude the conference that evening, Alvin Reid, David Platt, and Johnny Hunt (Hunt is the current and most likely to be re-elected President of the Southern Baptist Convention). Bonnie and I are looking forward to it! God bless...

In Louisville

2009-06-20T21:01:00.002-05:00

Bonnie and I arrived in Louisville for the Southern Baptist Annual Meeting and seminary class last night after leaving Martin in the early afternoon. This whole day (9:00am - 4:00pm) I have been in a lecture session with my 100 classmates with Dr. Russell Moore. Dr. Moore spent the day getting us all prepared for what an annual meeting usually looks like. He also outlined the origins of Baptists in the 17th Century England and also the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention in the United States in 1845 and the denominational distinctives that make Baptists unique from other denominational groups. We also studied the details and breakdown of the Southern Baptist Cooperative Program and also were introduced to some controversy that the Southern Baptist Convention is experiencing over the funding of convention agencies. At the end of the day, we covered the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention that started in 1979 (this convention marks the 30th Anniversary of that event).

The Pastor's Conference starts tomorrow evening. I will share my notes on this blog each night after the events of that day.

Looking for to it...

John 3:36

2009-06-17T06:32:00.003-05:00

This week's Scripture Memory Verse is John 3:36, which reads as follows:

"Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him."

This verse is similar in tone to John 3:16 with the emphasis on "whoever believes in the Son --> has eternal life". This phrase gives Christians three very important implications:

1. The word "whoever" as in John 3:16 gives the Christian the call, command, and conviction to spread the gospel. We all are to share the gospel with those we come in contact with. God has ordained Christians to be the means through which the most glorious good news is to be preached, taught, and spread. Sunday School teachers, never forget that you are to call people to repentance and faith everytime you teach from the word of God (this is not just for preachers). Christians, we are to be a confessing Christian to the world. We are not to keep our "Christianness" hidden from worldly view, but we are to confess Christ, and him crucified, before men. Matthew 5:16 states that we are to "let your shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." This "light" includes a confessing spirit that can't help but talk about Jesus, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. This verse that we are memorizing this week is placed within the context of the Sending of the Son of God. This verse provides the purpose. Christ came to save sinners. Bottom line. That is our purpose as well - to bring the gospel of Christ to a lost and dying world - for he is our only hope.

2. The word "has" in this verse gives us the bold assurance that the eternal life that we hope for is not just a future expectation but is already a present experience. This is the "already, not yet" language of Scripture. We are frail in our bodies and are so vulnerable to sin, death, and decay. Our life is but a vapor in the wind. Yet, through Christ, we have eternal life. This is a glorious hope that will not disappoint (see I Corinthians 15). Not only that, but this eternal life is a present reality, for we are no longer perishing, but are justified freely by the grace of God and are now set apart for sanctification - a life long pursuit of the holiness of God that only comes through the cross of salvation. Eternal life for the believer is a future hope that is assured along with a present reality that sustains and preserves the Christian through trial and tribulation. Rest in God's sustaining grace!

3. "Wrath of God remains on him" - this part of the verse echos the seriousness of John 3:3, which states, "unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God". Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the only way to eternal life. Believe in the Son - receive His free offer of salvation - and you have eternal life. Refuse to accept the Lordship, Kingship, absolute rule, and awesome and inconceivable grace of Christ, and you are perishing and the wrath of God remains upon you. The choice is stark and it is clear. Come to Jesus and live. Turn the other way and die.

This Wednesday's Message

2009-06-16T11:16:00.003-05:00

I will be leading the Wednesday night worship service this Wednesday night (06/17/2009) at Dresden First Baptist Church and am looking forward to the service! I hope that you will pray for this service. I know it is a Wednesday night and many people don't give it a second thought, but it is our opportunity as a local body of believers to come together and learn of the needs of our congregation and community and lift them up to God - it is a wonderful opportunity for the ministry of intercession!

This is what we are going to do. I would like for us to spend some time in corporate prayer on Wednesday night. We will be praying in the following categories:

1. Adoration

2. Confession

3. Thanksgiving

3. Supplication

This is the A.C.T.S. principle. And I would like for us to go through this prayer principle on Wednesday night. I will talk more about this then, just be thinking about this in your own prayer life.

Also, we will be continuing our study on 1 John tomorrow night. I will be preaching out of 1 John 3:4-10 and the title is "The Child of God and Sin". Here is the actual text from the English Standard Version:

4. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 5. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. 7. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9. No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. 10. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil; whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.

This is a very important text and one that can be perplexing and troubling for some, but GLORIOUS for those who truly understand what John is talking about here in the passage. I hope to see you tomorrow night!!!

Looking ahead to the Southern Baptist Convention

2009-06-15T10:31:00.003-05:00

I start off this week looking ahead to a very busy couple of days. I have to wrap everything up so that Bonnie and I can go to Louisville, KY on Friday to attend the Southern Baptist Convention. This week I am spending my free time reading and preparing for the class that I will take at Southern Seminary in conjunction with the annual meeting. Here are the books that I am reading:

Baptist Reformation by Jerry Sutton

Baptists and the Bible by Russ Bush and Tom Nettles

Uneasy in Babylon by Barry Hankins

A Hill on Which to Die by Judge Paul Pressler

The class, based on my reading and the required texts, appears to be a study on the Conservative Resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention, which began in 1979. Interestingly, this year's annual meeting marks the 30^th Anniversary of the 1979 SBC Annual Meeting in Houston, TX where Dr. Adrian Rogers was elected as president of the convention and marked the first time a conservative, inerrantist was elected to the Presidency. From that point to the present day, all of the elected presidents have held to the authority of Scripture.

I have just finished reading the Baptist Reformation and have been exposed to the details of the reason for the Conservative Resurgence and the truth surrounding the opposition espoused by the moderates and liberals of the convention. To say the least, reading that book has been eye-opening. I am in the process of reading the Baptists and the Bible, which is another great read. The thesis of this book is that Baptist history tells us that Baptists – from John Smyth and Roger Williams all the way to Herschel Hobbs – have believed in the full authority, trustworthiness, infallibility, and inerrancy of Scripture. It is only through the influence of the modernist theological movement with an emphasis on higher criticism in the mid-late 19^th Century that influenced many Protestant theologians (including Southern Baptists) to move away from a high view of Scripture. This has given me confidence and pride to know that Baptists have been traditionally a Bible believing faith. In this regard, the Conservative Resurgence was a needed corrective against the modernist tide.

Another milestone that Bonnie and I will get to participate in is the 150^th Anniversary of the founding of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, of which I am a student. I am proud to be a student at a seminary that has reclaimed its heritage as a bastion of conservative theological convictions. Under the leadership of Dr. R. Albert Mohler, the school has become one of the flagship seminaries in the United States, if not the world. It will be enjoyable to finally listen and watch in person speeches and comments made by Mohler and other faculty that I respect at this event.

I am enjoying my reading and looking forward to the next few days in studying the Southern Baptist Convention and witnessing it in action at the annual meeting.

Back to writing...

2009-06-11T09:16:00.002-05:00

I apologize for the absence on the blog. Please understand that I have been extremely busy since the first of May that has caused me to set my blog article writing on the top shelf and not pick it up again until today. Here is what I have been up to:

1. Finished up my Spring Semester at Southern Seminary by the middle of May. Had to write a paper for Missiology that I finished on May 10th, 2009.
2. Went to the Rotary District Conference in Franklin, TN on May 15-16th, 2009. Had a great time. The best thing about that event is that I am almost done with my year as Rotary President. I hand over the reins with pleasure to Todd Hampton on July 2, 2009 (only three weeks from today - 06/11/2009)!
3. When I got back from the Rotary District Conference I had two weeks to read four books for the History of the Baptists class. Plus, I had to start working on study guide worksheets for the class on these four books. The questions alone took up 15 pages! So, I had to plug away for two weeks trying to get through that in preparation for the class. All of my free time went to this project.
4. The class itself for History of the Baptists went from June 1 - June 5th, 2009 at Southern Seminary in Louisville, KY. I absoloutely loved the class. History is my favorite subject and learning about the heritage and legacy of the Baptist movement from 1608 to the present day was fascinating! Tough class though. Lot of hard work. I just finished the worksheets and mailed them in on June 9th, 2009 (Tuesday). I might write some blog posts about some of the most influential Baptists in our history from time to time.
5. Yesterday, I had the privilege of preaching at church during the Wednesday night prayer service. I preached on I John 2:28 - 3:3 continuing the exposition through the epistle. Our main discussion last night was on the subject of being confident that you are a child of God. I truly enjoyed studying that passage of scripture!

That brings me to today. I am in the midst of trying to get caught up with all the other aspects of my life that I had to put on hold to complete the History of the Baptists class, and therefore, I am starting up my blog writing again. It is good to be back!

Star Trek and Christianity

2009-05-09T23:53:00.006-05:00

Bonnie and I went to the Star Trek movie on Friday and it was a good movie. It is one of the best Star Trek movies I have seen. I must admit to everyone that I am a bit of a "trekkie" and did some "research" before the film came out. When I was a kid, Star Trek the Next Generation was out and I enjoyed watching that on TV each week. That TV series along with the franchise movies fed the sci-fi junkie in me. But as I have become more and more sensitive to worldview issues over the past couple of years, I noticed something different about Star Trek as I read about the franchise online on Wikipedia. I read about its development and the creator of the story line, Gene Roddenberry. In his Wikipedia article, this is what it says:

"Although Roddenberry was raised as a Southern Baptist, he did not embrace the faith; he viewed religion as the cause of many wars and suffering in human history. Roddenberry considered himself a humanist and an agnostic athiest. According to Brannon Braga, "In Gene Roddenberry’s imagining of the future [...] religion is completely gone. Not a single human being on Earth believes in any of the nonsense that has plagued our civilization for thousands of years. This was an important part of Roddenberry’s mythology. He, himself, was a secular humanist and made it well-known to writers of Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation that religion and superstition and mystical thinking were not to be part of his universe. On Roddenberry’s future Earth, everyone is an atheist. And that world is the better for it."

That is a powerful quote. In other words, one of the main reasons for creating the series in the 1960s was to project a sort of "utopian" society based on athiestic naturalism. Athiesm is, of course, the belief that there is no God. Naturalism is the belief that the Cosmos is all that there is and all that there ever will be and that every is determined by random cause and effect. All that can be known about the universe can only be done through scientific observation. Scientific naturalism has advanced (and succeeded in large degree) into convincing the world (at least the scientific and academic world) that macro-evolution as taught by Charles Darwin is correct and that everything that exists in the world and universe today is the result of billions of years of random naturalistic causation.

It appears that Gene Roddenberry and the other creators of the Star Trek franchise is attempting to produce a visual and theatric portrayal of what an athiestic, completely naturalistic, society would look like. According to their viewpoint the universe would be completely fine, in fact "better for it", without "any of the nonsense that has plagued humanity." That plague, in Roddenberry's viewpoint, would be religion - specifically Christianity. If you watch the television series through the lens of faith, you will notice that all of the characters and episodes of the series deal with athiestic altruism and scientific and naturalistically based fantasy.

We live in a society and in a time of a supercharged media and entertainment system that is able to bring movies to the big screen that have eye-popping special effects and dramatic storylines that captivate us and take hold of our attention in ways that have never occurred before with such power. Because of this, we must be so very careful on how such information is disseminated into our minds and into our families. We must educate ourselves and our families of the major worldviews and thought systems in the world and be able to recognize them when they surface in the mainstream media and entertainment industry. Not knowing the thought systems that compete against the Gospel will put yourself at risk of being dulled through special effects, dramatic sequences, and headlines into believing or assuming something that is contrary to the Word of God.

I am not saying that you should not go watch Star Trek. But I am encouraging all of you to be careful. There are too many individuals in the United States and throughout the world that devote too much energy into creating fantasy lives for themselves. Movies like Star Trek and Star Wars (both movies I adored as a child and still enjoy to this day) have created complete secondary realities for many people. They operate out of a worldview and moral ethic that is based on a science-fiction film or television series and not on the realities of this world. I have a personality that is attracted to science fiction and fantastical stories like Star Wars, Star Trek, and Lord of the Rings. If you are like me, you understand the attraction of losing yourself in another world - learning about all the facts, histories, cultures, and wars of this non-existent world. You get lost in it, and forget that it DOES NOT EXIST. But you escape into it, you are released from the anxieties of your life into another time and another place, yes even another galaxy.

But, I have been taught by the word of God, and I thank God for that!:

Proverbs 28:19: He who works his land will have abundant food, but the one who chases fantasies will have his fill of poverty.

Ecclesiastes 12:13: Now all has been heard; here is the conlusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments for this is the whole duty of man.

Isaiah 40:8: The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God stands forever.

Matthew 6:22-23: The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. if then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

I Corinthians 13:11-12: When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fullty, even as I am fully known.

Beware of fantasy and lay hold the Word of God

Sufficiency of the Atonement

2009-05-04T11:13:00.000-05:00

The following post is a forum contribution that I made in my Systematic Theology III course this semester on the sufficiency of the atonement. Enjoy and comment at your leisure!

From your notes, explain and evaluate James P. Boyce's statement, “The atoning work of Christ was not sufficient for the salvation of man.” [James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology, 367-68.]The Atoning Work of Christ is not sufficient for the Salvation of ManTaken at face value and out of context, this is a startling comment by J.P. Boyce, the founder of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.[1] The atoning work of Christ was effectual in that it, as Boyce puts it, “removed…all the obstacles in the way of God’s pardon of the sinner”. Without the atonement, salvation could not take place. In other words, the atonement was a work of Christ to God so that the righteous judgment of God could be atoned for at the cross instead of on the souls of humanity as a whole. The atonement declares the righteousness of God and the holiness of God. The atonement makes it possible for God to save the elect for the sake of His own glory and righteousness. As Boyce puts it, it is a “Godward” act. The atonement places humanity in a position to where they can now have a relationship with God. The atonement along with the resurrection of Christ is the Gospel’s power.Nonetheless, even if the atonement is essential for salvation, it is not completely sufficient for the salvation of the sinner. Individually and positionally speaking the sinner as a human being is still at enmity with God. If the atonement was all that was sufficient for the salvation of the unbeliever, then the atonement would have resulted in a universal salvation for all of humanity. Maybe this is what liberal theological thought would like to be the case, but it is simply not biblical. The atonement crashes down the barriers, tears the veil in two, grants access to God in a personal relationship, but it does not justify the sinner. The sinner is still a sinner. The sinner needs to hear the gospel, but because of the sinful nature in the unbeliever, that Gospel falls on deaf ears. This is the case, even though, as Boyce points out, the Gospel “has all the elements which should secure its acceptance.” This passage from Boyce’s Abstract of Systematic Theology is focused on the effectual calling of the elect, whereby God gives to those who are to be saved “such influences of the Spirit as will lead to their acceptance of the call.” However, as Dr. Moore mentioned in the lecture on this topic, even the effectual calling itself also does not save anyone. It is by the grace of God, through faith, that one is saved. This faith involves a knowledge of the Gospel truth, an assent that the gospel is the truth, and a trust in the person of Christ for salvation. As George E. Ladd questions, “Is the Kingdom of heaven to be entered merely by taking the name of Jesus upon one’s lips and making a verbal confession?”[2] Ladd answers that question by saying, “In Christ, the Kingdom now confronts us. The life of the Age to Come now stands before us. The One who shall tomorrow be the Judge of all men has already come into history. He faces us with one demand: decision.”[3] The Kingdom of God makes a demand for a decision. Yes, the atonement was necessary for salvation, but it is not sufficient. This decision is to be resolute, urgent, radical, costly, and eternal.[4] The decision points to all the work of God in the salvation experience, including Christ’s atonement over two millennia ago, but it is a crucial ingredient. The salvation experience is a glorious and mysterious working of God in the life of the believer. One must not over emphasize the importance of one particular aspect. Each phase of salvation has its place and its effect. When one experiences this phenomenon, the believer can only say, “Amazing Grace!”

[1] All quotations of James P. Boyce come from Abstract of Systematic Theology, p. 367-68 as referenced in the class lecture outline notes.

[2] George E. Ladd, The Gospel of the Kingdom: Scriptural Studies in the Kingdom of God (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans), 96.

[3] Ibid

[4] Ibid, 98-106.

The Holy Spirit and Inclusivism

2009-05-04T11:12:00.001-05:00

The following was a forum question in my Systematic Theology class at Southern Seminary and my response to the question. Feel free to comment and add to the discussion!

Since the Holy Spirit “blows where he wills” (John 3.8) discuss the implications of his work among non-Christian communities.

The idea that other people groups can encounter salvation apart from the Christian model through Jesus Christ is a very controversial issue. I would highly recommend the book 4 Views on Salvation in a Pluralistic World edited by Stan Gundry. In that work, the pluralist, inclusivist, and particularist views are laid out with the particularist view being represented by a moderate and conservative branch. I tend to (at this point) side with Alister McGrath in this work as a Particularist / Agnostic. The theme of Scripture from beginning to end is found in the person and work of Christ and the sovereignty of God. I cannot see through the biblical evidence a way to salvation except through the blood of Christ and His grace through faith. The Holy Spirit is the agency by which that salvation process is worked out in each believer. I enjoyed reading the specifics of this process in Ferguson's book and was enlightened as to the implications of the biblical record on the Spirit's work in salvation. It made me have a fresh look at the entire doctrine and the Spirit's work in my own life! With regards to the question posed here, Ferguson points out in his work that the role of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the Trinity are to glorify the other members of the Trinity. Therefore, the Spirit's work is found within the parameters of the glory of the Son and of the Father. The Spirit will not do anything that does not glorify the Son and the Father and vice versa. John Piper in his excellent book Desiring God says that the chief end of God is to Glorify God and enjoy himself forever. The Triune God's main task throughout eternity has been His glory for His name sake. That means that the Holy Spirit will work and act in concert with the Son and the Father. I don't see how salvation or a working of the Spirit can occur outside the preaching of Christ crucified and resurrected and of God the Father and His providential plan for humanity. Nonetheless, I am not God nor will ever consider myself knowledgable to understand the fullness of His mysteries - and the question of the eternal destiny of those who are "moral pagans" of this era or of antiquity is definitely a mystery! Therefore, I must claim that I am agnostic in that regard and defer to the sovereignty of God and his perfect plan for all the universe. Nonetheless, I must say that Jesus did say that "I am the way, the truth, and the life and no one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6). That passage (in the midst of Jesus' discussion of the Holy Spirit who was to come) along with the witness of scripture points on a Christocentric salvation experience. Anyone who feels that they can come to a salvation experience outside of Christ is "playing with fire". Although I am saying that I cannot be one hundred percent sure that moral individuals of other faiths will be condemned, I certainly would not want to "test" the Lord on that issue. I would much rather now "fall on my knees and confess Jesus as Lord and Savior" (Philippians 2:5-11) than as to wait until the day of Judgement and be forced to do it and then hope for an exception to the rule.

Fast Fact about Missions (10/40 Window)

2009-05-04T10:17:00.000-05:00

I have been studying a course on missions in seminary this semester and the statistics on the lostness of certain parts of the world are absolutely staggering. Here are some good numbers for you to think about:

1. 25% of the World's Population has never heard the gospel and have absolutely no access to the Gospel. That is over 1.5 billion people.

2. The 10/40 Window as pictured in the image on this post contains 60% of the world's population or 3.6 billion people and include 37 of the 50 least evangelized countries on the planet.

3. The three dominant religions in this region of the world (Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism) account for the following population:
a. 1.1 Billion Muslims
b. 1.0 Billion Hindus
c. 600 Million Buddhists

4. Although over 60% of the world's population live in this area of the world and a vast percentage are unreached by the Gospel, only 8% of evangelical missionaries work among them.

5. 82% of the poorest of the poor live in this area of the world.

6. Of the 2,161 people groups (or approx. 1.7 billion people in the 10/40 Window who have NO access to the gospel):
a. less than 10% have the New Testament translated into their language.
b. Less than 10% have the complete Bible translations in their language.
c. Less than 20% have the Jesus film in their language.

*these statistics were taken from lecture on the 10/40 Window

Introductory Post

2009-05-04T09:47:00.000-05:00

**This is my new blog page so that I can use my gmail account instead of the other one. If you would like to look at my posts from January - April 2009, please visit http://moore4christ.blogspot.com. This is a more stripped down version of this new blog.**

It is my prayer that this is the first of many, many posts / articles for the Moore for Christ Blog. I hope that everyone who visits and follows this blog will be enriched by its content and also blessed by the God and Saviour that this blog serves. I hope that all who follow this blog will begin to live More for Christ!

God's Richest Blessings upon you!