Putting Christ Back into Christmas: FIve Christmas Sermon →

The birth of Jesus at the first Christmas was so important that it split history into B.C. and A.D. Wow! Yet so many of us get caught up in the celebration of his birth we overlook the person whose birthday it is. My hope is this short series of sermons will encourage all of us to make much of Christ at Christmas.

Christmas for some people is instead of a time of “good tidings of great joy” and “on earth peace, goodwill toward men,” Christmas for them is a time of great depression, when there are more suicides than any other time of the year. Let God encourage you through these mediations on Christ to renew your focus on Christ instead of your burdens.

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Different Dispensationalist's Views on the Ordinances

Both moderate and extreme types of ultradispensationalists reject the origin of the church on the Day of Pentecost. “They all hold that the church could not have begun at Pentecost, for the revelation of it was exclusively Pauline” (Radmacher, page 207). The moderates and extremes disagree as to when the church started and also they disagree concerning the church’s two ordinances. The movement is also known as the Grace Gospel Fellowship and the Grace Movement. Its literary organ is The Berean Searchlight.

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Should wine be used in the Lord's Supper?

After discussing the wine issue in the Bible, Norman Geisler came to this conclusion: “Therefore Christians ought not to drink wine, beer, or other alcoholic beverages for they are actually ‘strong drink’ and are forbidden in Scripture. Even ancient pagans did not drink what some Christians drink today” (A Christian Perspective on Wine-Drinking, page 51). If the Word of God forbids the drinking of wine then the wine cannot be used in the Lord’s Supper.

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Modern Slavery or Human Trafficking

There are more slaves today than at any other time. We call modern slavery human trafficking. Modern slavery is one of the fastest-growing crimes in the United States with North Carolina among the most affected states. In 2019, 266 cases of trafficking were reported to the National Human Trafficking Hotline, ranking North Carolina 11th among the 50 states in cases reported. According to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center, there is now an average of 78 sex trafficking cases every year in North Carolina, and Charlotte is the #1 city.

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Is There a Difference between Preaching and Teaching in the Pulpit?

There is an intermural debate among Christan preachers as to whether a pastor is preaching or teaching or a combination of both when he is in the pulpit.

R. C. Sproul in The Difference Between Preaching and Teaching (click to open), makes little distinction between preaching and teaching in the pulpit:

Typically, we distinguish between preaching and teaching. Preaching involves such things as exhortation, exposition, admonition, encouragement, and comfort, while teaching is the transfer of information and instruction in various areas of content. In practice, however, there is much overlap between the two. Preaching must communicate content and include teaching, and teaching people the things of God cannot be done in a neutral manner but must exhort them to heed and obey the Word of Christ. God’s people need both preaching and teaching.

Sproul acknowledges that the element of persuasion is essential to teaching. Teaching like preaching includes persuading the listeners “to heed and obey the Word of Christ.”

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Two Contrasting Hermeneutics

Allegorical Method of Interpretation

There are two conflicting methods of interpreting Scripture: The grammatical-historical method and the allegorical method. The grammatical-historical method is the method Roy Zuck is teaching in the book of our review “Basic Bible Interpretation.” This method interprets Scripture in the normal sense of language.

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Review of Bryan Chapell's Redemptive-Historical View of Preaching

This post is a review of “Redemptive-Historic View” by Bryan Chapell in Scott M. Gibson and Matthew D. Kim. Homiletics and Hermeneutics.

I agree with Byran Chapell when he warns that the redemptive-historical view of forcing Christ into every text has “been abused, in ways that are now obvious to us, by ancient allegorism that sought to make Jesus ‘magically’ appear in every Bible passage through exegetical acrobatics that stretched logic, imagination, and credulity.”[1] I appreciate Chapell’s candid admission.

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Who is your favorite theologian and why?

I was once asked “Who is your favorite theologian and why?” Here was my answer. 

I have different theologians that I like and use for different reasons. I like Charles C. Ryrie’s Basic Theology for my Bible Doctrine and Systematic Theology students. Ryrie remarks that he did not write Basic Theology for the professional theologian. I find little that I disagree with in Ryrie’s Basic Theology. I know he is not as deep as other theologians but that was not his purpose in Basic Theology. He revealed his scholarship in other writings. He also helps me in communicating doctrines to church members who also are not professional theologians.

Paul Enn’s The Moody Handbook of Theology is also good for my purposes but he covers Biblical, Historical, Systematic, Dogmatic, and Contemporary Theology, which cuts back on the Bible doctrine content.

S. H. Strong (1836 -1921) was the leading Baptist theologian for about one hundred years. Millard Erickson (1932-) replaced him as the premier Baptist theologian.

I also like and use Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology to add depth to Ryrie. I like his coverage of the attributes of God. He also has a good argument for baptism by immersion. I disagree with Grudem on a number of issues. Grudem has two editions to his Systematic Theology. He changed some of his views in the second edition.

I like to read Michael Horton’s Christian Faith for even more depth than Ryrie and Grudem. Horton in some of his writings has a strong defense of cessationism and actually refutes Grudem’s continuing gift of prophecy which is powerful coming from a Reformed theologian.

I like Mike Stallard’s journal articles on dispensationalism, eschatology, and theological method (click to open).

Recently I have been reading Matthew Barrett at Credomag.com (click to open). He is the Systematic Theologian at Mid-Western Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri. Barrett adds Historical Theology to Systematic Theology and addresses current issues in theology. Barrett in his podcast interviews contemporary theologians.

Coming back to Charles Ryrie, in his Dispensationalism in 1995, he gives a scholarly reply to progressive dispensationalism. In his Dispensationalism Today in 1965, he responded to Covenant Theology. Ryrie wrote 32 books which have sold over 1.5 million copies. His study Bible has sold 2.6 million copies. The Ryrie Study Bible, Balancing the Christian Life, and Basic Theology have been best sellers. I mention these facts to show the influence of Ryrie not only in Academia but among rank-and-file Christians who have benefited from his writings put on their level. Of course, he impacted Bible scholars by teaching Systematic theology and serving as dean of doctoral studies at Dallas Theological Seminary. His influence was broad and lasting.

 

The Book of Judges: We Need a Godly Leader

The book of Judges was written to justify David’s monarchy or kingship. The key verses are 17:6 and 21:25: “In those days there was no king in Israel and every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” This is more than a political statement. It is saying that life would be better under a godly king, like David, who would lead the nation in true worship. Then the people would do what was right in the eyes of the Lord.

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NEW Factual Data Sheet for "Mark"

The idea of “The Factual Data” sheet comes from reading that Warren W. Wiersbe’s homiletic teacher, Lloyd Perry who used a generic “Factual Data” sheet for sermon preparation. I have adapted “The Factual Data” sheet to the different genres (Narratives, Hebrew Poetry, the Epistles, and the Gospels) of Scripture instead of one-size-fits all approach

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"Punch a Pillow" not your Wife?

Jeremy Pierre and Deepak Reju in their book The Pastor and Counseling posed this counseling scenario: Let’s say a professional Christian counselor and a professional secular counselor advise your member to go into his bedroom and punch a pillow when his wife angers him. This seems reasonable. It’s certainly better than punching his wife, and the pillow is replaceable. If the professional Christian counselor has advised this, your member might assume that this is biblically-based advice. After all, it doesn’t seem unloving to others or dishonoring to God to treat a pillow viciously. A professional Christian counselor giving such pillow advice would likely cite Scripture to make his point, maybe showing how Jesus directed his anger appropriately by overturning the money changers’ tables and not striking the money-changers themselves. And this would seem reasonably biblical to your member (Jeremy Pierre, Jeremy, and Deepak Reju. The Pastor and Counseling (9Marks, pp. 123-124. Crossway. Kindle Edition).

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Is Suicide the Unpardonable Sin?

Morgan Lee, at Christianity Today interviewed Al Hsu, the InterVaristy Press senior editor shared this story: I was on a radio show recently where one caller said, “I’ve always believed that suicide automatically sends you to hell, and that has prevented me from killing myself. Now I’m confused because if you tell me that suicide doesn’t automatically send you to hell, doesn’t that let people off the hook?”

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Review of Two Sides of the Counseling Coin by Heath Lambert

Heath Lambert gives this analogy: Explaining the difference between nouthetic counseling and biblical counseling is a bit like asking whether a coin is heads or tails. A coin is both heads and tails. In talking about the heads side or the tails side of the coin, we are merely emphasizing different surfaces of one thing.

On October 8, 2012, Heath Lambert former executive director of ACBC (Association of Certified Biblical Counselors) formerly NANC (National Association of Nouthetic Counselors) now professor of counseling at SBTC contrasted and compared Nouthetic and Biblical Counseling at The Gospel Coalition.

The critics (click to open) of these two biblical models say the only difference is the spelling. But, Lambert will show there are major similarities and differences.

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What is saving faith?

In 1505, Martin Luther (1483-1546) was traveling by foot when he was struck to the ground by lightning. He cried out, “Save me, St. Anne, I will become a monk.” Luther ended his training as a lawyer and became a monk in Erfurt. He slept on a steel cot to merit salvation by works. He confessed his sins to his priest for three and four hours every day. He would get his absolution only on the way back to remember a sin he forgot to confess and would fall back into despair.

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Perseverance versus Preservation

Advocates of the doctrine of perseverance teach that the believer must persevere to the end in holiness of character, love for God and the brethren, and belief in the doctrines of Scripture.

On the other hand, proponents of the doctrine of preservation teach that God keeps the believer saved even if he does not persevere to the end of his Christian life in holiness, love, and truth. Not enduring to the end is not normal for believers but there are examples in Scripture of believers who walked not with God at the end in holiness, love, and truth.

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