Gospel Meditation from John Calvin

Tullian Tchividjian (grandson of Billy Graham) reprints a beautiful portion of John Calvin's preface to Pierre Robert Olivétan’s French translation of the New Testament (1534). Tchividjian is the grandson of Billy Graham and the new pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, Ft. Lauderdale, FL.) I've reproduced it below

Without the gospel

everything is useless and vain;

without the gospel

we are not Christians;

without the gospel

all riches is poverty,
all wisdom folly before God;
strength is weakness,
and all the justice of man is under the condemnation of God.

But by the knowledge of the gospel we are made

children of God,
brothers of Jesus Christ,
fellow townsmen with the saints,
citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven,
heirs of God with Jesus Christ, by whom

the poor are made rich,
the weak strong,
the fools wise,
the sinner justified,
the desolate comforted,
the doubting sure,
and slaves free.

It is the power of God for the salvation of all those who believe.

It follows that every good thing we could think or desire is to be found in this same Jesus Christ alone.

For, he was

sold, to buy us back;
captive, to deliver us;
condemned, to absolve us;

he was

made a curse for our blessing,
[a] sin offering for our righteousness;
marred that we may be made fair;

he died for our life; so that by him

fury is made gentle,
wrath appeased,
darkness turned into light,
fear reassured,
despisal despised,
debt canceled,
labor lightened,
sadness made merry,
misfortune made fortunate,
difficulty easy,
disorder ordered,
division united,
ignominy ennobled,
rebellion subjected,
intimidation intimidated,
ambush uncovered,
assaults assailed,
force forced back,
combat combated,
war warred against,
vengeance avenged,
torment tormented,
damnation damned,
the abyss sunk into the abyss,
hell transfixed,
death dead,
mortality made immortal.

In short,

mercy has swallowed up all misery,
and goodness all misfortune.

For all these things which were to be the weapons of the devil in his battle against us, and the sting of death to pierce us, are turned for us into exercises which we can turn to our profit.

If we are able to boast with the apostle, saying, O hell, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting? it is because by the Spirit of Christ promised to the elect, we live no longer, but Christ lives in us; and we are by the same Spirit seated among those who are in heaven, so that for us the world is no more, even while our conversation is in it; but we are content in all things, whether country, place, condition, clothing, meat, and all such things.

And we are

comforted in tribulation,
joyful in sorrow,
glorying under vituperation,
abounding in poverty,
warmed in our nakedness,
patient amongst evils,
living in death.

This is what we should in short seek in the whole of Scripture: truly to know Jesus Christ, and the infinite riches that are comprised in him and are offered to us by him from God the Father.

Sunday Sermon Notes 7-26-09

Here are my sermon notes from today's sermon "God's Perplexity in Suffering." This is the third in the series of sermons entitled "God's GPS to Navigate through Suffering. Read here.

Tim Tebow

Sports Illustrated's cover story for 7-29-09 is "You Gotta Love Tim Tebow". Read it here.

Anna Graham Lotz on suffering

Preaching magazine, (May-June, 2004 Volume 19, Number 6) was devoted to the issue of pain and suffering. Anna Graham Lotz (daughter of Billy Graham) was interviewed. The following question was asked her and then her response:

What can we do to help people better deal with those issues of pain and suffering, and use them for God’s glory?

Absolutely. We in the church need to teach our people to know God and to know Him for themselves, as they read the Bible for themselves and they apply it to their lives and they live it out by experience. To spend time in prayer for themselves, not just going through their prayer list to get answers but in prayer to get to know God, so that they’re actually communicating.

We in the church need to make it our priority that every single person that’s in the church would develop a personal, one-on-one, growing relationship with the living God and to know Him. He is a God of love, He’s good, He’s kind, He wants your best. His will is good for you. When you’re suffering but you know God like that, you trust Him.

If you don’t know God like that—if you know God through hear-say, second hand information, what your pastor says, your Sunday school teacher says, what you read in a book, what somebody thought He might be like, what you’re parents said He might be like—then when you suffer you don’t really know Him and so you doubt. You’re not sure He’s good. You’re not sure He really loves you. You’re not sure that you can trust Him with this situation.”

Handy Festival in Florence

Oh, I love this week of the year.  No, it's not the beginning of football season in Alabama or even the beginning of fall practice.  It's Handy Festival Week in Florence which means jazz music flowing through the city.  And I love it.

Three years ago I was walking downtown one evening sticking my head in to several of the restaurants to hear the bands playing when I discovered Eric Essex at Rosie's.  What a discovery!!  This band from Birmingham is one of the best I've ever heard and I love to hear them.  

I was there again last night at Rosie's to hear them and plan to hear them several more times this week.  

Oh, I love this week of the year.

Sunday's Sermon Notes on GPS #2

Here are the sermon notes from yesterday.  The sermon is the second in the series "God's GPS to Navigate Through Suffering."  The message yesterday was "God's Permissiveness in Suffering."  See notes here.

A real "sinners'" prayer

This is a prayer in Robert Leighton’s commentary on 1 Peter. This is what I would call a real sinners prayer.

“Lord, I am justly under the sentence of death. If I fall under it, you are righteous, and I do know acknowledge this. But if it seems good to you to save the vilest, most wretched of sinners, and to show great mercy in pardoning such a great debt, the higher will be the glory of that mercy. However, I am resolved to wait until either you graciously receive me or absolutely reject me. If you do the latter, I do not have a word to say against it; but because you are gracious, I hope that you will yet have mercy on me.”

A Bit of Reflection

I'm sitting at home tonight listening to the thunder outside and seeing occasionally the lightening pierce the dark sky. I have been in from Wednesday night prayer meeting for about an hour and I'm just reflecting:

1. Reflecting on what a great body Jesus has put together at CrossRoads.
2. How open and obedient to the Spirit they are.
3. How caring and absolutely compassionate about caring for those who hurt and need assistance.
4. How awesome it is to have a front row seat to see God at work in His bride through the Holy Spirit to meet needs and speak a "unified" word of encouragement and sense of direction to what God is doing in our midst.

I know CrossRoads is not perfect, no church is. I am not and no one is. But perfection is never been the standard. It is availability and openness to letting God work through His vehicles.

You see, on Wednesday nights, we pray and just follow the sense of the Holy Spirit. Let me give you an example of what I'm referring from just what happened tonight.

I opened the service with 2-3 announcements and then updates on those in the church family that are hospitalized, deaths, etc. I then announced that I sensed tonight we would break off into small groups and pray since we had not done that in a while.

Then I asked if anyone had a Scripture that God had been speaking to them about that they would like to share as we started. You see, the first weekend in our new building we spent 26.5 hours of non-stop public and vocal reading of the Word of God that we called "Sanctifying the Sanctuary." It made such an impact on our congregation and immediately took us to a new height with God that we don't have a service that we don't honor God with a prolonged reading from His Word.

When I opened it up tonight, one came and then he prayed. Another came and she prayed. (You see we also practice on Wednesday night that the Word is not only to be read but use it as a means to pray it back to God or let it be our guide in praying for needs, concerns, issues, etc.). Another one was in line to read and pray before she could sit down. You get the picture. It went on like that for a solid hour. People just responding to the Spirit of God and their obedience caused others to be obedient. How sweet!!

No we never prayed in groups. God had other plans for tonight. And they were good - no great!!

Thank God for His Spirit.
Thank God for His Word.
Thank God for His Bride - the Body - CrossRoads Church.

Sunday's Sermon Notes - GPS #1

I began a new series of sermons this past Sunday.  The series is "God's GPS to Navigate Through Suffering" based out of Romans 8.  The sermon this past Sunday was "God's Problem with Suffering."  The notes are here.

Look at this video from Honduras

Bro. Bobby Gibson of Honduras sent this link for us to see about what is really happening in Honduras. Look at this video.

Check out this introduction to the new series of sermons

New Sermon Series Begins this Sunday

New

Sermon

Series beginning

this

Sunday

God's GPS to Navigate Through Suffering - Romans 8: 18-22

July 12: God's Problem with Suffering
July 19: God's Permissiveness in Suffering
July 26: God's Perplexity in Suffering
August 2: God's Purpose in Suffering, Part I
August 9: God's Purpose in Suffering, Part II
August 16: God's Provision in Suffering
August 23: God's Perspective in Suffering
August 30: God's Permitting Persecution of Saints
September 6: God's Picture of Suffering - Joe Eady speaking

Sunday Sermon Notes

Instead of sending you away from this site, I'm going to give you the brief outline from yesterday's sermon "Two Essentials of Government."

Government is the direction, control, management, rule of one’s conduct.

There are four levels of Biblically ordained government:

1. Individually
2. Family
3. Church
4. Society

In each level of government, there are two essentials:

1. Righteousness
2. Responsibility

In society, look at:

Righteousness

II Chronicles 9:8;  Psalm 89:14;  Proverbs 14:34;  16:12;  25:5.

Responsibility

1. To God
2. To each other as rulers of the government to do what is right.
3. To the people.

Mike Huckabee said, “The Wall Street collapse was not a money problem, it was a moral problem.”

In the Church:

Psalm 132:9 says that the priests should be clothed in righteousness.

The qualifications for elders and deacons in I Timothy 3 are mainly character related.

Responsibility:

1. To God
2. To the elders
3. To one another

In the family:

Righteousness needs to rule in the family.  If so, there will not be the issues of divorce that we see.

Responsibility:

1. To God
2. To each other (husband, wife, children)
3. To the next generation

Individually

Righteousness is the requirement for each one to rule himself well:

Psalm 15:2;  112:3

Proverbs 10:2;  11:4; 16:8;  21:3;  21:21

Responsibility

1. To God
2. To the family
3. To the church
4. To the society.

The whole problem with government in society, the church or the family is the issue of us individually.

Taking a few days break from computer

Sometime you just need to close the computer, forget about email, and may be even turn off the cell phone (I'll see), but I'm doing that for a few days.  So, I'll return Monday to the web.  Have a happy 4th.