The Plodding Preacher

Jesus and Alexander died at thirty-three, One died in Babylon and one on Calvary. One gained all for self, and one himself he gave. One conquered every throne, the other every grave. When died the Greek, forever fell his throne of swords, But Jesus died to live forever Lord of lords. Jesus and Alexander died at thirty-three. The Greek made all men slaves, the Jew made all men free. One built a throne on blood, the other built on love. The one was born of earth, the other from above. One won all this earth to lose all earth and Heaven. The other gave up all that all to him be given. The Greek forever died, the Jew forever lives. He loses all who gets and wins all things who gives. Charles Ross Weed

The following are wonderful suggestions by Jason Helopoulos on bringing our best to Sunday worship. Seize the Rest of the Week:   Practice family worship and secret worship throughout the week knowing that this will inform and encourage your experience in corporate worship. Be Boring:   Go to bed early on Saturday night. Friday nights can be filled with late-night activity, but Saturday nights should routinely be safeguarded. Sleepy heads make for drowsy worshippers. Right Attitude:   Cultivate a spirit of joy on Sunday mornings in your home. If this is the highlight of our week, then let’s act like it. Talk about how wonderful the day is going to be, wake the kids up with excitement, turn on good Christian music for the whole family to listen to, and put a smile on your face. Media Blackout:   Refrain from turning on the television, watching Netflix, or catching up on Facebook Sunday mornings. Our minds are so easily distracted. Safeguard your mental space. Plan Ahead:   Lay out

This is an excellent little article by Nathan Busenitz found HERE What caused the Reformation? Many people might answer that question by pointing to Martin Luther and his   95 Theses . But if you were to ask Luther himself, he would not point to himself or his own writings. Instead, he would give all the credit to God and His Word. Near the end of his life, Luther declared: “All I have done is put forth, preach and write the Word of God, and apart from this I have done nothing. . . . It is the Word that has done great things. . . . I have done nothing; the Word has done and achieved everything.” Elsewhere, he exclaimed: “By the Word the earth has been subdued; by the Word the Church has been saved; and by the Word also it shall be reestablished.” Noting Scripture’s foundational place in his own heart, Luther wrote: “No matter what happens, you should say: There is God’s Word. This is my rock and anchor. On it I rely, and it remains. Where it remains, I, too, remain; where

In discussing the supposed need for the Roman Catholic church to get with the times, Tony Jones says the following: "The error here is based on some old school Platonic metaphysics, there is some perfect, some   ideal, that is transcendent and unchanging. The problems are twofold — one pragmatic, one philosophical. First, the Catholic church has changed innumerable doctrines, and saying that it’s just a change in interpretation is semantics. Second, and more problematic, is the idea that there is some perfect, unchangeable ideal that emanates from an unchangeable God. But that’s not the God of the Bible, not the God of history, and not the church of history. God changes. Yes She does." How unbelievably ironic that Jones beats up on the Catholic church for not following the God of the Bible, when he obviously has no clue about the nature of the God of the Bible. And, "You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of yo

Yesterday for Reformation Sunday we looked at the truth that salvation is through CHRIST ALONE.  Here are five implications of that great truth. 1. When Christ died on the Cross, he completed the work of salvation. That’s why he cried out "It Is Finished" (John 19:30).   2. Saving faith is nothing less than total reliance on Christ alone, wholly apart from human works or human effort of any kind.   3. We may come directly to Christ without human mediators.   4. When Christ saves us, we are completely saved and eternally saved.   5. We must preach Christ and not self-improvement, because apart from Christ there is no hope of salvation.

I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen. Martin Luther

  Follow yoda ‏ @ CalvinistYoda Silly @ JoelOsteen Moses dead already was.

Today terror arrived in Canada.  It is tempting to give in to the fear that such an act of terror desires to inspire.  However, our confidence is not in a government, police force or army. ESV Psalm 2:1 Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? 2 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying, 3 "Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us." 4 He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision. (Psa 2:1-4 ESV)

Yesterday we talked about the fact that our struggle in not against flesh and blood but against Satan and his minions.  The question then arises as to how we can possibly wrestle against such foes.  Paul responds by encouraging us to put on the whole armour of God.  However, the thing that strikes me is how he finishes that section.  Having discussed the six pieces of armour Paul finishes by saying: 18 praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, 19 and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, (Eph 6:18-19 ESV) As we wear the armour, we must be praying "at all times" with "all prayers and supplication" with "all perseverance."  In order to be effective in this battle we must be constantly in prayer.  Yet we must not make the mistake that it is our prayers that make the

In our Sunday School this week our passage of study was Ephesians 6. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. (Eph 6:12 ESV) I think that this message is one that we forget too easily.  Our struggle is not against people - it is against the forces of the Devil.  The people who represent the "other side" in the battle are ultimately pawns of the Prince of Darkness.  They are people for whom Christ died.  They are people who can be liberated from the enemy's control through the power of the Gospel. The problem arises from the fact that we can't see this enemy.  Only his victims are visible to our earthly sight.  Hence, it becomes too easy to fight against abortionists or liberals or homosexuals or Muslims.  We wrestle against flesh and blood.  We pray for them.  We love them.  We preach the G

A goodbye isn’t painful unless you’re never going to say hello again.   Unknown

This is by David Powlison as part of a longer article found HERE . I'm on my own. No one looks out for me or protects me. I experience a continual sense of need. Nothing's quite right. I'm always restless. I'm easily frustrated and often disappointed. It's a jungle—I feel overwhelmed. It's a desert—I'm thirsty. My soul feels broken, twisted, and stuck. I can't fix myself. I stumble down some dark paths. Still, I insist: I want to do what I want, when I want, how I want. But life's confusing. Why don't things ever really work out? I'm haunted by emptiness and futility—shadows of death. I fear the big hurt and final loss. Death is waiting for me at the end of every road, but I'd rather not think about that. I spend my life protecting myself. Bad things can happen. I find no lasting comfort. I'm alone… facing everything that could hurt me. Are my friends really friends? Other people use me for their own ends. I can&#

If I status update with such insight, hilarity, godliness, or profundity, that I get a thousand retweets and likes, yet have not love, I’m a cellphone that won’t stop ringing, or a car alarm at 2 AM. If I understand every nuance of every complicated doctrine, including eschatology and predestination, and am a constant defender of orthodoxy, and if I am renowned for my ability to communicate truth with passion, but have not love, I’m nothing more than a first grader in the kingdom of God. If I am a fantastic worship leader, able to lead hundreds of people in passionate worship of God, yet have not love, my skills are worth jack. If I am a blog warrior, constantly on the attack against those who would distort the faith, yet have not love, I’m that yippy dog next door who won’t stop barking…even at 3 AM. If I live a life of radical sacrifice, crazy love, and wartime mentality, and sponsor lots of kids through Compassion International, and go on mission trips in “closed countries”,

As I was driving into work this morning I heard Warren Wiersbe on Back to the Bible talking about things God can't do.  At first blush that might sound like an invitation to the atheist's old chestnut, "Can God make a rock so big that He can't pick it up?" (By the way, no He can't.) Instead it is a reminder that we have a God whose character is perfect.  Here is the beginning of my list of things God's character will not permit Him to do.  Please send me others that I have missed. 1. God cannot do evil or be tempted by it.  James 1:13 2. God can't lie.  Hebrews 6:18 3. God can't get tired.  Isaiah 40:28 4. God can't change.  Malachi 3:6 5. God can't break His promise.  Psalm 89:34 6. God can't take on a job that is too hard for Him.  Jeremiah 32:17 7. God can't remember sins He has chosen to forget.  Isaiah 43:25 8. God can't stop loving His own.  Jeremiah 31:3 9. God can't learn anything new.  Psalm 147:4-5 10.

"Genuine, spiritual mourning for sin is the work of the Spirit of God. Repentance is too choice a flower to grow in natures garden. Pearls grow naturally in oysters, but penitence never shows itself in sinners except divine grace works it in them. If you have one particle of real hatred for sin, God must have given it to you, for human nature's thorns never produced a single fig. 'That which is born of the flesh is flesh.' True repentance has a distinct reference to the Savior. True sorrow for sin is eminently practical. No man may say he hates sin if he lives in it. Repentance makes us see the evil of sin, not merely as a theory but experimentally ~ as a burnt child dreads fire, we shall be as much afraid of it, as a man who has been stopped and robbed is afraid of that thief upon the highway; and we shall shun it ~ shun it in everything~ not in great things only, but in little things, as men shun little vipers and great snakes. True mourning for sin will make u

He who thanks but with the lips Thanks but in part; The full, the true Thanksgiving Comes from the heart. J. A. Shedd

By Kevin DeYoung Original HERE We won’t regret playing hide and seek with our children. We won’t regret turning off the t.v. and putting the phone away. We won’t regret that one night (or week, or even season of life) we let the kids get happy meals just so they would be happy and we could survive. We won’t regret singing the same hymns over and over until they became familiar enough to sing with the saints around a hospital bed. We won’t regret the time we spent hiding the word in our hearts. We won’t regret jumping in a pile of leaves every fall. We won’t regret overlooking a lot of little things that bother us about our spouses. We won’t regret kissing our spouse in front of the kids. We won’t regret going to bed with a messy house if that meant we had time to chase the kids around in the backyard. We won’t regret all the wasted time with friends. We won’t regret laughing often and laughing loudly. We won’t regret hugging our kids whenever they’ll let us.

“You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.”— G. K. Chesterton

It is the week leading up to Canadian Thanksgiving.  As a result, my mind is turning towards a thanksgiving message for this coming Sunday.  I am always glad for the chance that Thanksgiving brings to remind ourselves that we, as Christians, ought to be the most thankful people on the planet.  Truly, we are those for whom every day ought to be Thanksgiving. The last line of Colossians 2:7 has particularly caught my eye this year.  We who are in Christ are those who are "abounding in thanksgiving."  The Greek verb which we translate as abounding has the sense of something that is present in such quantities that there is "more than enough."  As I consider my own level of thankfulness, it would be a real stretch to suggest that there was more than enough of it in my life.  In all honesty, I would have to admit that my level of thankfulness is rather pathetic.  Yet the challenge is there - be thankful to the point of overflowing.  Maybe the answer is as simple as

To sustain the belief that there is no God, atheism has to demonstrate infinite knowledge, which is tantamount to saying, "I have infinite knowledge that there is no being in existence with infinite knowledge." Ravi Zacharias

An article by Erik Raymond - Read the original post HERE It is a common phrase spoken by Christians and wrestled with by pastors, “I don’t feel connected at church.” The pastoral burden is for all Christians to be thriving in and through the ministry. When we hear something like this we immediately go into “fix-it” mode. Often times we even attempt to construct some structure around the person to help them feel connected. But what if this didn’t help anyone? What if the problem wasn’t the ministry but the individual? What if the disconnection we feel is actually the consequence of selfishness?* Catering to selfishness will never cure selfishness, it only fortifies it. I find it fascinating that the church, on every level, as she applies the gospel, is self-denying. In fact, the lion’s share of the NT imperatives (commands) are calling us away from serving ourselves by serving others (i.e. Eph. 4-6). What follows is a list, some help for those who are aiming to feel connected a