Sermonizing Plainly

"In the midst of all this clamor for fine writing and florid style, the preacher should be a resolute man, and dare to be a plain writer . . . This determination will affect his whole sermonizing . . . It will appear in the composition and manner, in a stripping, flaying hatred of circumlocutions, and of all unnecessary ornament. The preacher whose head is right, and whose conscience is right, will soon come to possess a love for this plainness. He will not be able to read authors who do not understand themselves. He will be impatient with a public speaker who does not distinctly know what he is saying” (Shedd, Homiletics and Pastoral Theology, 68-69).

HT: Doug Wilson

The Manuscripts of the Elder President Edwards

A bit of biographical perspective from Tryon Edwards’ Introduction to Jonathan Edwards' Charity and Its Fruits:

PERHAPS no person ever lived who so habitually and carefully committed his thoughts, on almost every subject, to writing, as the elder President Edwards. His ordinary studies were pursued pen in hand, and with his notebooks before him; and he not only often stopped in his daily rides by the wayside, but frequently rose even at midnight to commit to paper any important thought that had occurred to him. 

As the result of this habit, his manuscripts are probably more thoroughly the record of the intellectual life of their author than those of any other individual who has a name in either the theological or literary world. These manuscripts are also very numerous. The seventeenth century was an age of voluminous authorship. The works of Bishop Hall amount to ten volumes octavo; Lightfoot's, to thirteen; Jeremy Taylor's, to fifteen; Dr. Goodwin's, to twenty; Owen's, to twenty-eight; while Baxter's would extend to some sixty volumes, or from thirty to forty thousand closely printed octavo pages. The manuscripts of Edwards, if all published, would be more voluminous than the works of any of these writers, if possibly the last be excepted. And these manuscripts have been carefully preserved and kept together; and about three years since were committed to the editor of this work, as sole permanent trustee, by all the then surviving grandchildren of their author.

—Jonathan Edwards, Ethical Writings (vol. 8 in the Works of Jonathan Edwards; ed. Paul Ramsey; New Haven: Yale University, 1989), 125.

To Take Notes, or Not To Take Notes

I heartily concur with this post on note-taking during the sermon.

Humanity 2.0: All in the Name of the Lord Jesus

Introduction

You know, there’s nothing quite like preaching your first sermon[1] right after the preaching of President Dr. Philip Ryken of the historic Tenth Presbyterian Church. But let’s plunge right in! I’m going to begin by reciting the text, obeying my text to let the word of Christ dwell in me richly. Please follow along in your Bibles, or you can just listen if you like. Now hear the voice of Heaven.

Colossians 3:12–17[2]

12 So, as the elect of God, holy and loved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and long-suffering,
13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a grievance against another; as the Lord forgave you, so you also must forgive.
14 And over all these put on love, which is the bond of perfection.
15 And let the peace of Christ hold sway in your hearts, to which indeed you were also called in one body. And be thankful.
16 Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly: in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with grace in your hearts.
17 And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father.

Prayer

God our heavenly Father, as your elect people, holy and loved, in the name of the Lord Jesus we ask your help to preach this word of Christ, and we ask your help to hear and embrace it in the light of the Spirit. Thank you for this heavenly word for the new humanity. Clothe us with it, we pray, and help us to wear it, for we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

By What Authority?

We live in a culture (don’t we?) that both despises authority and also incessantly, inescapably appeals to authority. About this constant appeal to authority: We see it in the news. We read of it in papers and periodicals and books. Even popular books, even blogs, can’t escape this.

For example, you’ve heard this sort of thing: “Dr. Do-Good, he asserts that a certain food has been shown to cause cancer.” And so we respond, and behave differently.  Or, “Professor Brains-on-Feet, she makes ground-breaking claims based on her extensive research in human development. And so, if you don’t want your kids to turn out neurotic, you need to consider what she’s published.” And so we change our practice.  Or, “The leading authority on thus and such had this to say about X and Y.” We could go on. I could give specific examples, I’m being very general. You know what I’m talking about. Authority. And authority with bearing on our behavior.

Well, we too, we Christians, appeal to authority (now don’t we?), an authority that has bearing on our behavior. The basic Christian confession is, “Jesus is Lord.” Jesus is Lord of all.

All in the Name of Jesus

In verse 1 of Colossians 3, the clause, “where Christ is seated at the right hand of God,” alludes to Ps. 110:1. Psalm 110 speaks of the messianic reign of a Davidic king, fulfilled in the resurrection and exaltation of the Lord Jesus. So, he’s seated at the right hand of God, the place of rule, the place of authority. He’s king!

This rule of King Jesus looms large in Colossians. The theme verses—recall verses 6-7 of chapter 2—these verses begin by referring to the Colossians’ believing embrace of Jesus as Lord of all. Verse 6 says: “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, so walk in him.” This verse, Colossians 2:6, functions as one bracket, and verse 17 of Colossians 3 as the other bracket of the whole section. Colossians 3:17 says: “Whatever you do . . . do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” So Colossians 2:6-3:17, bracketing the section with Jesus’ royal majesty, teaches us about the Lord Jesus, in whom “all the fullness of deity dwells bodily” (2:9), and “who is the head over all rule and authority” (2:10), because “God raised him from the dead" (2:12). And Colossians 2:6-3:17 also teaches us about living under Jesus’ rule and authority, walking a heavenly walk in union with him, the body taking orders and cues from her head—“all in the name of the Lord Jesus.”

Now, in this text, Colossians 3:17, we need to ask ourselves: what does “name,” the “name” of the Lord Jesus, signify?

We just named our daughter: Ariana Dalissa, which means “holy delight.” We wanted her name to have significance. However, most names today don’t mean much. But a name in the ancient world meant a great deal. A “name” said something about the person. It had significance. The “name” of the Lord Jesus, then—here in Colossians 3:17—signifies his person, namely, his authority and his character. So, doing all that we do in the name of the Lord Jesus means doing all in line with his authority—he is Lord of all—and in line with his character—as we seek to follow his example and walk as he walked, and wear the graces he wore.

Now, just before our text for tonight, in Col. 3:9-11, we see that for those who have died and risen with Christ the “old man” in Adam has been put off, and the “new man” in Christ, the second Adam, has been put on. The language is similar to Romans 13:14. Paul says there: “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”And Galatians 3:27: “For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” Paul is talking about a new man, a new humanity, in The Man, the Second Adam, a new humanity where—verse 11—“Christ is all, and in all!” So we’re talking about a new way of being human in Christ.

The Christian’s Christian Clothing

Turn now your attention with me to verses 12-14: “The Christian’s Christian Clothing.” This passage, together with verses 15-16, is communal. It’s about the Christian community, the one body of Christ, the “new humanity.”

The “then,” or “therefore,” of verse 12 links our paragraph with the last one and shows that there are implications for what Paul has just said. Given the new humanity undercurrent in verses 9-11; and given also the injunction of verse 17 to “do all in the name of the Lord Jesus,” what are we to do? We’re told: We are to “put on,” we are to wear something, like fine clothing. In other words, we’re commanded to get dressed. That’s the controlling metaphor. But before we get dressed, let’s first consider who’s being addressed, who this new humanity is, who you are, who we are.

Verse 12 addresses you, addresses us, as “God’s chosen ones,” or it could be translated, as “the elect of God.” Now this description—oh don’t miss it!—this description is so precious. Israel of old was God’s elect. And as Israel of old was called sovereignly and freely, so also “you were called.” Verse 15: “you were called in one body.” You were summoned to be joined to Jesus, to belong to Jesus’ body. And, the “elect of God” are also described as “holy” and “loved.” You are “holy” and “loved.”

Now to understand the power and preciousness of these appellations (what Kent Hughes calls “opulent appellations”[3]), consider the love language of Deut. 7:6-8, where these three concepts of election, holiness, and being loved come together so beautifully. I’ll read it. Deut. 7:6-8:

6 For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
7 It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples,
8 but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

Chosen. Holy. Loved. And so with these descriptions—chosen, holy, and loved—it’s clear: the Church is being understood as the new Israel in the second Adam, as a new humanity in Jesus.

Well, then, what does this new humanity look like? Well let’s look at the attire of this new humanity. What are we to “put on”? The five “graces” or virtues in verse 12 that we are to put on are all graces that Jesus himself bore in the days of his flesh. And I’d love to take a text for each one of these graces to show how Jesus himself wore these. But since we don’t have time for that, I simply commend it for your own personal study. For now, I’ll only summarize. What we’re being commanded to wear here are the graces of Christ: “put on the Lord Jesus,” be “clothed with Christ.” “Put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and long-suffering.” “Put on the Lord Jesus.” “Do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” That is, consistent with his character.

Well, moving on, since we see the “put on” imperative again in verse 14, we see the clothing metaphor continuing.  And that word, “above,” we should probably understand as “over,” like a coat, like an outer layer. So the layer of love is to be worn on the outside, as the supreme virtue. 

Now if you were to ask me, “What is love?” “How do I know what that article of clothing looks like to take it out of the Bible walk-in closet, and put it on?” I would not give you a philosophical definition. I would not give you a dictionary definition. I would not even direct you to the ten commandments. Here’s what I’d say, first. I’d first quote 1 Jn. 3:16: “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.” So, do you wonder what love is? Look to the cross. Look to Christ crucified—the supreme demonstration of the love of God. And that’s the love we’re to wear toward one another.

But there’s more: love, you see at the end of verse 14, it “is the bond of perfection.” Now to unpack this clause, we need to step back a little, to see the trinitarian shape of the passage. When Paul refers to God in his letters, as he does in verses 12 and 16 and 17 here, he’s almost always referring to the Father. In verse 17 it’s explicit. And the Son of God is mentioned in verses 13 and 17, as “Lord”; and in verses 15 and 16 as “Christ.” This is the one in whom “all the fullness of deity dwells bodily.”

Okay, you say, I see the Father, and I see the Son. But where do you see the Spirit? Look at verse 16. See the word “spiritual”? This refers, not to the nonphysical, but to what is produced by or in accord with the Spirit, capital S Holy Spirit.

But I also want to argue that he’s present in the love of verse 14. The Spirit is the one who produces love in us as we look to Christ in faith. “The fruit of the Spirit is love.” And the Spirit, as some of the best Christian theologians have argued (convincingly to my mind) is the love between the Father and the Son flowing back and forth as they express infinite delight and satisfaction in each other, binding them together in an eternal fellowship of unbreakable joy and affection.

So what we have expressed here, then, in this “bond of perfection,” I think, is an exhortation to put on the love that partakes of that infinite love in the Spirit between the Father and the Son, a love that has bound them together in perfect harmony and unity from all eternity and will bind them to all eternity. It’s an unbreakable love, the love of the Three-in-One and One-in-Three—divine love. And that love will, when it’s complete, bind us all together in the perfect harmony and unity of the trinitarian love of the Trinity, the God who is three every bit as much as he is one.

So that’s where we’re going, “Humanity 2.0” now, and just around the bend “Humanity 3.0,” swallowed up in the bond of perfection, in intratrinatarian love. Unbreakable. Inseparable. Unity in diversity, and diversity in unity. So, brothers and sisters, let’s bring some of that heaven down now, O family of God, loved by the triune God.

But now, as we seek to dress this way, we’re told how we must put up with one another as we live in community when we don’t always have the right clothes on. Someone shows up, as it were, at the banquet or feast way underdressed. So verse 13 says: “bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, whoever has a grievance against anyone.”

Now I love Paul’s realism here. I mean, look, we’re saved, but we’re still sinners, right? This “bearing with” means we sometimes simply have to put up with one another. That’s alright. Hang in there, and persist in love. Put on love. Wear it, like a garment, when you gather together. 

And we’re also going to sin against one another. And as those who’ve been forgiven so much so freely, we’re called upon to forgive, aren’t we? The pattern again is Christ: “as the Lord forgave you, so you also must forgive.” How did he forgive you? Look to the cross. There, at the cross, you stand freely forgiven. So as the Lord forgave you, forgive your brother, forgive your sister. Take those petty grievances in hand, hurl them behind your back, cast them deep down into the heart of the sea, banish them as far as the east is from the west.

Alright, so that’s the “Christian Community’s Christian Clothing,” “all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” Now, in verses 15-16, we have “The Body’s Body Language.” “The Body’s Body Language.”

The Body’s Christian Body Language

Now why do I put it that way? Well, this passage is about the corporate body of Christ. Verse 15: “you were called in one body.” Moreover, though you can’t see it in the English, all the pronoun references are plural. So there’s no Lone Ranger Christianity. Christianity is a corporate faith. You cannot be a disciple of Christ unless you are united with his people in one body.

Verses 15-16, then, are about “body life.” They’re also about our “body language.” I say “body language” because this all works out in the corporate body in bodily ways, through hands and feet acting and through mouths speaking and singing. And I say “body language” because of the body language Paul uses. For example, verse 15: “Let the peace of Christ rule in you hearts.” And in verse 16 it’s mouths doing teaching and admonishing and singing.

So this text is about our “body language.” And there are three main commands given for our body life and body language. First, “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.” Second, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.”And third, “Be thankful.”

The first command, “let the peace of Christ control your hearts," or "hold sway in your hearts.” This “peace of Christ” was bought by Jesus’ blood, Colossians 1:20. It is beautifully depicted in Ephesians chapter 2, where Christ himself is said to be “our peace”—the peace of the one new humanity made up of formerly  hostile human  factions. This is the peace that comes when sinners are reconciled to God through the cross of Christ, which peace then spreads into the relationships formed by that cross. To this peace “you were called in one body.” So let us, then, in the name of Jesus, pursue the peace he purchased. “Let the peace of Christ hold sway in your hearts.”

Now, second command, verse 16: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.” “The word of Christ,”what is this word of Christ? Put simply, it’s “the word of truth, the gospel, the grace of God,” Colossians 1:5-6.

You’ll see in the ESV (and virtually all English translations) the phrase “with thankfulness” at the end of verse 16. It’s a different word than the word translated “thankful” in verse 15 and the word translated “thankfulness” in verse 17. The word in verse 16 translated “thankfulness” (in most versions) is the same word almost always translated grace in Paul’s letters. And that’s how the King James takes it. And I think contextually, the King James is right. Paul has just said, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly,” so he is speaking about “grace in your hearts,” not thankfulness, but grace, the word of grace dwelling in you richly. So it’s the message of God’s grace come in Christ crucified, buried, raised, and exalted as Lord and Redeemer of all. So let that word—in the name of Jesus!—let that word dwell in you richly.

Notice now that this word of grace dwelling richly in the body works out in a mutual counseling ministry (verse 16)—“teaching and admonishing one another with all wisdom”; and, it works out in a mutual music ministry—“singing to God psalms and hymns and songs from the Spirit.” The Gospel should saturate all our gatherings—large and small, formal and informal. We should speak the Gospel to one another, we should sing the Gospel to one another. Why? That we might all be “deeply transformed by the power of the Gospel.”[4] No word, no transformation. So, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.

Third, and last, command, verse 15: “Be thankful.” Thankfulness is also urged in verse 17, and it’s a major pastoral concern in this letter. But just a brief word about this. Body life is messy. Isn’t it? It’s risky, it’s challenging at times. If you rub shoulders a lot with one another (and we should), then you’re likely to be rubbed the wrong way, right? And you’re likely to rub someone else the wrong way. So be thankful, and guard yourselves with gratitude. If you’re thankful, it’ll be hard to nurture bitterness, to envy, to covet, to slander. Thankfulness will put pettiness away. So be thankful, guard yourselves with gratitude, and our body’s body language will be full of life and love.

Christ Is All

So there you have it—“Humanity 2.0: All in the Name of the Lord Jesus.” Here are your Christian clothes, the clothes of Christ. Here is the body’s body language, the Word of grace and peace moving and directing our bodily life and worship. And here, in the new humanity, in the new way of being human—“Christ is all, and in all!” Here, “Christ is all, and in all!”

New Covenant Church, you are the elect of God; you are holy and loved. Since you have died and risen with Christ, and put off the “old man,” continue to put to death the deeds of that old man in Adam. And since you have put on the “new man,” the Lord Jesus, put on daily your Christian clothes, and wear them, letting Christ’s peace rule your hearts, and Christ’s Word dwell in you richly, guarding yourselves with gratitude, giving thanks to the Father through Christ. In a word, “Do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” Divine authority, with bearing on our behavior.

---

[1] This sermon was first preached at an evening service at New Covenant Church in Naperville, IL. And it is the manuscript I took with me, without any editing done for the printed page here. 

[2] Translation mine.

[3] Kent Hughes, Colossians and Philemon (Wheaton: Crossway, 1989), 101.

[4] This is from a portion of the vision statement of New Covenant Church, where this sermon was preached.

The Truest Devotion

"To desire my fellow creatures' good and to seek after it, to desire God's glory, and so to live as to promote it, is the truest of devotion."

—C. H. Spurgeon, "The Importunate Widow," in Miracles and Parables of Our Lord (vol. 3; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2003), 435.

A Changing Landscape

In John Piper's sermon this last Lord's Day, he spoke of how the moral landscape is different now from when he first became a pastor. Speaking of where we were in this land 33 years ago versus where we are now, he says:

It would have been unthinkable to suggest that anyone would seriously propose defining marriage as between two men or two women; and it would have been even more unthinkable that in a mere thirty years America would have lost its soul so profoundly that most Americans would approve of a definition of marriage that no society in the history of the world has ever embraced. And it would have been unthinkable that instead of rejecting the unreality of so-called same-sex marriage, the culture would begin to criminalize the naming of same-sex intercourse as sin — which it is.

And along with this tragic loss of our moral compass has come the increasing loss of freedoms and the increasing compulsion from government to conform to unbiblical views. Freedom of speech is disappearing as the secular consensus grows that our shame is our glory (Phil. 3:19), and that to use biblical language to describe sin is hateful and already in some places prosecuted as illegal. Freedom of worship is disappearing as metropolitan commissions and councils take the prerogative to prohibit worship spaces and activities. And along with the loss of freedoms to act in biblical ways, comes the governmental compulsion to act in unbiblical ways — to fund the killing of unborn children, to endorse the legitimacy of sinful behavior, and soon to participate in it (for example, if you are a military chaplain), and the compulsory normalizing of sin in public institutions that will probably force most biblical Christians out of the public schools.

How then shall we live? We must think soberly about our times and face the facts. We must not act like things are not all that bad, heads in the sand. And we must think about the way forward. Piper faces the facts and answers the how-then-shall-we-live question in this sermon.

Jesus Is Lord, So Caesar Is Not

Good post over at Between Two Worlds linking to a recent post by Doug Wilson on the lordship of Christ. Read everything you can by Wilson on politics and economics! And don't delay!

And related to this subject, here's a recent sermon by Wilson that deserves a wide hearing and response. It's a sermon addressed to the governor and legislature of Idaho.

May God raise up more prophetic preaching of this sort. What would happen if pulpits started preaching like they really believed the basic Christian confession that Jesus is Lord? We just might see some reform. Just maybe.

Father Hunger

Doug Wilson began a series called "Father Hunger" about a month ago. You can find the first in this series here. The series is proving thus far to be very instructive, and I would encourage fathers to give it a listen. Wilson is surely right in seeing "father hunger" as one of the great problems of our times.

MLJ Trust Major Announcement

Here is some really good news: Lloyd-Jones' preaching is now free for the world. God is good. And I am glad, and deeply grateful.

Christ Plus Nothing Equals Everything: Enough!

Today's New Covenant Church sermon was simply stellar. Pulling back the cosmic curtains with Col. 1:15-20, Pastor Andrew Fulton unveiled the glory of the Son of God in a sermon entitled Enough. My wife and I said to each other that it was one of the best Christmas sermons we've ever heard.

Like a master workman with great God-given skill, Andrew weaves the infinitely glorious Christology of Colossians into the twenty-first century fabric of fallen Naperville lives. Bringing the Word of God to bear upon our contemporary culture and concerns by bringing us face to face with Infinity incarnate, what can we do but respond with faith, joy, and worship? Christ plus nothing equals everything! Christ is all, and all is ours!

Emily and I feel so liberated and satisfied by the cosmic Christ of this preached word. You may listen to it at NCC's website. Enjoy. Marvel. Believe. Rest. And have a very Merry Christmas!

Grace and Mercy Grounded in Love

Yesterday's Lord's Day sermon on Eph. 2:1-10, preached by NCC pastor Andrew Fulton, provided liberating food for the dull duty-bound believer. More than that, though, good as that was for me, it also stirred me to contemplate more clearly the nature of grace and mercy in relation to love, which I've wondered at for years. I think the Lord has given me some light.

So what is the mercy of God, what is the grace of God, and what is the love of God? And how do grace, mercy, and love relate? This text—Eph. 2:4-5—brings these together plainly and brightly. First, I'll give definitions that I believe are governed by the context of this text. Then I'll try to bring them together.

So what is the mercy of God? Simply stated, mercy is God not giving us what we do deserve. This is the negative side, we might say. Born and dead in transgressions and sins (Eph. 2:1), God's mercy comes in and pities the suffering and misery of our condemnation and judgment under the Judge's just wrath. And God withholds exactly what we deserve. He does not condemn the guilty.

So then, what is the grace of God? Well, it is the positive side: grace is God giving us what we don't deserve. Grace gives us a free gift we didn't and can't earn. Grace gives lavish generosity to those who've been stubbornly and persistently stingy and sinful. It moves way beyond mercy.

Mercy says, "I will not sentence you to death, a death that is your due for rebelling against the law of the Lawgiver, for spitting in the face of your good and kind King, for worshiping (delighting in and desiring and loving) the creature and creation rather than (supremely delighting in and desiring and loving) the Creator—who is blessed forever! Amen!" (Rom. 1:25). So speaks Mercy. 


But Grace comes in, wonder of wonders, and says, "I will move beyond granting pardon. Wonderful as mercy is, I will do more. I will seat you in the heavenlies in my risen and exalted Son and make you a co-heir of all that is his (Eph. 2:6; cf. Rom. 8:17). The tripersonal God of infinite love and joy and sweetness will be your everlasting portion and treasure and enjoyment. I know you spit in my face. I know you disregarded my glory. And so I showed you stunning mercy. But that's not all. I also want to make you my son, with all the privileges and possessions of that status." So speaks Grace.


Well then, what is love, if it's not what's already been described? It is this: love is the infinite fountain-like heart of God that pours forth mercy and grace on greasy ingrates from all eternity and on into all eternity. "Because of the great love with which he loved us" (Eph. 2:4). Notice that love grounds the mercy that's gone before to deal with our condition in Eph. 2:1-3. And notice that love then also grounds the grace that lavishes upon us what follows in Eph. 2:5-7. Love is the bottom of all the free mercy and grace of God that comes to us through Christ in the gift of his Spirit. 


And this Holy Spirit is the love between the Father and the Son, now poured out through the risen and living Savior and Lord of all—on us—on dirty, grimy, slimy, unholy idolaters. This Spirit is the life of God given to us in union with the risen Son—we who were cold corrupting corpses in trespasses and sins. Now, because of grace and mercy, bottomed in eternal love, now we live with the very life of the risen Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. He made us alive with him—by grace you have been saved! (Eph. 2:5). O praise the glory of this great triune grace! (Eph. 1:6, 12, 14). This is the free, unfettered gift of God—so no boasting! (Eph. 2:8-9). Except of grace, glorious grace. God's grace.


So love is the bottom of this grace and mercy, the eternal love of the Father, Son, and Spirit (Eph. 1:4). But how may we know this love? What does it look like? I'm glad you asked, for I'm glad to tell you. It looks like this: "We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us" (1 Jn. 3:16); "God did not spare his own Son" (Rom. 8:32); "God gave his only unique Son" (Jn. 3:16); "Christ loved me and gave himself for me" (Gal. 2:20). Love looks like the cross. Love looks like Christ crucified. Love looks like the King killed. For you, and for me. 

Going Home

In 1856, Charles Spurgeon preached a sermon the Sunday before Christmas called "Going Home." In it he prepared his growing church to speak of Christ's salvation at Christmas gatherings through their testimonies of what God had done for them.

Spurgeon had become pastor of New Park Street Church in 1854. The church had 232 members. The membership rose to 4,000 by Christmas of 1856. So Spurgeon prepared the large number of new converts for returning home at Christmas.

Among many practical points of counsel, including "Christmas is suited for sharing the gospel with family and friends," "Don't expect sharing to be easy," and "Tell your story seriously, not flippantly," the most helpful for me was this: "Be alert for one-on-one opportunities to share your story." Spurgeon enlarges on this point:

Do not tell this story to your ungodly friends when they are all together, for they will laugh at you. Take them one by one, when you can get them alone, and begin to tell it to them, and they will hear you seriously. . . . You may be the means of bringing a man to Christ who has often heard the Word and only laughed at it, but who cannot resist a gentle admonition.

HT: Sovereign Grace Ministries' blog

What is Necessary for a Good Prayer

Martin Luther was a man who knew how to pray. And so it is good to listen to his counsel on this matter. It is especially good for those of us who, with undoubtedly virtually every last modern American, scarcely know what it means to be devoted to prayer.

What follows is from the introduction to a sermon Luther preached in 1519 called "On Rogationtide Prayer and Procession":

Two things are necessary so that a prayer is good and so that it is heard. First, we must have a promise or a pledge from God. We must reflect on this promise and remind God of it, and in that way be emboldened to pray with confidence. . . . No one obtains anything from God by his own virtue or the worthiness of his prayer, but solely by reason of the boundless mercy of God. . . . Second, it is necessary that we never doubt the promise of the truthful and faithful God. . . .

Sounds like 1 John 5:14-15. Now meditate on Mk. 11:24; Lk. 11:9-13; Jas. 1:5-8. And pray.

Sermon on Missions for Middle America

Now two Sundays ago, New Covenant Church Pastor Andrew Fulton preached on Rom. 15:14-21.  The sermon is titled Motivated by Mission.  I'm not sure I've ever heard a more stirring call to world missions.  It certainly was the most solid and salutary message on missions for Middle America that I've ever heard.  I highly commend it.  Not least for Napervillians!  But a word to the wise: have a listen when you're pride won't keep you from hearing aright.  Maybe the sovereign Spirit will be pleased to blow on you and fan into a flame a renewed or brand new passion for King Jesus' global cause and fame. 

Were one able to watch this sermon on video, I would also commend it as a model of both clear structure and flow in the sermon along with freedom in the pulpit from a manuscript.  Andrew, still a young man (thirty-one, if I'm not mistaken), possesses considerable gifts.  And one I appreciate most is his freedom in the pulpit.  That freedom produces a back and forth between hearer and listener that is, of course, much harder to achieve when one is tied to every word of a manuscript.  In the sermon God's Word is mediated through Andrew's personality in a way that connects that divine Word with people in the pew with relative ease.  Or so it seems.

The message begins with a jab at our all-too-often pathetic response to missionary letters—and then proceeds to commend the greatest missionary support letter ever written to stir us up!  And at least this sinner-turned-saint found his heart significantly stirred and corrected.  Yet again, under the ministry of that Word above all earthly powers!

(Concerning this jab: my wife and I recounted it back at home over a meal and found ourselves enjoying great big belly laughs—the kind that leave you on the floor.  Priceless satire.  And powerful.)

The Power and Pleasure of the Word in the Local Church

Something a bit unusual occurred last Sunday.  At New Covenant Church in Naperville, since our senior pastor Doug O'Donnell fell ill, and was therefore unable to preach, we shifted and did something that we've never done before.  Pastor Andrew Fulton led our corporate time ordinarily reserved for a sermon by reading 2 Peter right through and then opening up a time for impromptu congregational insights and applications (since no one who had a voice had prepared a sermon). 

It seems the Word simply read, pondered, and straightaway applied was felt powerfully and movingly by God's people.  A rich and sweet time!  Many rank and file believers spoke feelingly and stirringly in response to Peter's second epistle.  I confess that what many said greatly encouraged my faith, not least because it came from about a dozen brothers and sisters who ordinarily don't publicly encourage the body.  May that good Word, and the good words in response to it, continue to bear fruit and multiply among us--for the sake of the Name in our midst, in Naperville, and to the ends of the earth!

As a caveat, this is not said at all (how can I stress this enough?) in deprecation of the preached Word by specially endowed ministers of that Word that is above all earthly powers.  Nothing can replace that.  Nothing.  Whatever.  Ever.  My view of preaching, and its indispensibility for the life and health of the local and global Church, is as high I hope as anyone's.  Preaching is the corporate high point of every week.  Nevertheless, it should be duly noted with gratitude: God was pleased, it seems, to bless the simple reading of his Word and our simple, untrained and unprepared response to it.  Bless his holy name!

Father of Mercies

Doug Wilson's sermon four Sundays ago (8-23-9) on Col. 3:12-14, entitled Father of Mercies, was outstanding. The Word is applied with good biblical sense and wisdom. Very helpful stuff indeed, including to help one think through stewardship and economics. This one is worth listening to multiple times. Click on the title of this post for the link (N.B. Christ Church sermons are not available for free for very long; as new sermons get added, old ones get taken off.)

Greatness, Humility, Servanthood

Piper's sermon two Sunday's ago on greatness, humility, and servanthood is helpful and searching. Helpful, I say, because humility is so often misunderstood (and we all easily slip into this) in our man-centered day and culture. Searching, I say, because pride lurks within and, at every turn, there the old man is puffing himself up before God. To listen or watch, see Greatness, Humility, Servanthood.