It is important to start early in your planning. Six months in advance will give you time to start reading through the book and even having your devotions from the book from which you will be eventually preaching. This is the method of Jim Rose. Haddon W. Robinson features twelve preachers in Biblical Sermons. Robinson provides a sermon by each speaker. Next, Robinson gives his commentary on the sermon. Finally, Robinson interviews each speaker. The first question in the interview with Rose was: How long does it usually take you to prepare a message? Rose answered:
Read moreAm I the kind of friend I would want to be friends with?
I called a dear friend this week. I met this friend the first week of our college freshman year. He of late has had a difficult life. For some reason, I remembered a book I read years ago: How to Win Friends and Influence People. Why has this book been so popular? This book written by Dale Carnegie in 1936 has sold 30 million copies worldwide. It still sells 250,000 copies annually. The Library of Congress in 2013 ranked this best seller as the 7th most influential book in American history.[1] Why has this self-help book been so popular?
Warren Wiersbe answered: We need Proverbs “Because just about everybody has ‘people problems’ and wants to know how to solve them.”[2] God’s manual on developing people skills was written long before Carnegie’s best seller. God wrote Proverbs to sharpen our people's skills for his glory.
Read moreA Principle of Interpretation: Figures of Speech are to be interpreted in the normal sense of language
Jeffrey D. Arthurs (2007) states in his discussion of the apocalyptic genre in Revelation: Numbers are also highly symbolic in this genre. In Revelation there are seven letters, seals, trumpets, plagues, angels, and bowls. The foundation of the city is made of twelve precious stones, and twelve thousand servants of God from each tribe of Israel are sealed. Then later he asks these questions: Why would a biblical writer use potentially hermetic symbols? What is to be gained from fantasy that cannot be gained from realism? Visionary symbols are more than stylistic choices; they are powerful rhetoric[1]
This is implying the numbers in Revelation are fantasy and serve a purpose but are not literal.
Read moreIs the future millennium on earth "carnal?"
Augustine in his City of God refers to “Chiliasts” or the “Millenarians” as those who believe in a literal future 1000 years enjoyed by those who are raised in the first resurrection. Augustine rejects this view because the “Chiliasts” and “Millenarians” have carnal and not a spiritual view of the 1000 years: “They assert that those who then rise again shall enjoy the leisure of immoderate carnal banquets, furnished with an amount of meat and drink such as not only to shock the feeling of the temperate.”[2] Ryrie counters this false accusation: “Since when is the church only spiritual and the kingdom only carnal?”[3] In 1 Corinthians 3:3, Paul accused the church at Corinth of being “carnal.”
Read moreMust I Go, and Empty-Handed? Hymn Story and the Resurrection
Pastor Charles Luther in 1877 wrote the words to the hymn “Must I Go, and Empty Handed.” Before we discuss the story behind the hymn let’s consider the apostle Paul’s final application at the conclusion of his teaching on the resurrection of Christ in 1 Corinthians 15. Paul challenged us “be steadfast, immovable, always abound in the work of the Lord for you know that your labor is not in vain [without results] (15:58).” Our lives as Christians can have results if we serve our resurrected Lord faithfully. Or our lives can have no or little results if we serve unfaithfully. Paul draws this contrast when teaching on the future Judgement Seat of Christ where Christians will give an account of their service to the Lord. Some will “receive a reward (1 Cor. 3:14).” Their service was not in “vain” or without results. Others will “suffer loss” (3:15) and receive no reward or their lives will have been lived in “vain” with no rewards or crowns to cast at Jesus’ feet. We sometimes refer to this sad scene as entering heaven empty handed.
Read moreReplacement Theology
Replacement Theology, which is also called “fulfillment theology” and “supersessionism” is a hermeneutical issue. Replacement theology is a departure from a consistent grammatical-historical hermeneutic. Many reformed and covenant theologians who adhere to the allegorical method of interpretation of Scripture hold to Replacement theology. This is so because, to believe that in one form or another the New Testament Church has replaced Israel, Old Testament Scriptures must be allegorized.
Read moreProphets for Profit (Numbers 22-25)
J. Vernon McGee told of a preacher who came to his wife and said, “I’ve just gotten a call to the church in the next town. It’s a larger town. It’s a much better church. The people in it are more refined and cultured, and they do not cause the trouble they do here, and they’ve offered me a higher salary. I’m going upstairs and pray about this to see if it’s the Lord’s will for me to go.” His wife says, “Fine, I’ll go up and pray with you.” And he says, “Oh, my, no. You stay down here and pack up.”
Read moreThe Doctrine of Propitiation defends Penal Substitution (Part ten)
The Doctrine of Redemption defends Penal Substitution (Part nine)
Redemption is the price God paid to set free sinners in bondage in the slave market of sin (Ephesians 1:7; 1 Peter 1:18). Not only have sinners been redeemed from slavery to sin (Romans 6:17-22) but sinners have been redeemed and set free as prisoners who were on death row (Exodus 21:29-30).[1]
Read moreThe Doctrine of Justification defends Penal Substitution (Part eight)
Despite all sinners falling short of God’s glory, the sinner can be “justified” in Romans 3:24 or declared righteous. Justification in Romans means to declared righteous not to make righteous. This legal or forensic meaning is found in Deuteronomy 25:1. In this courtroom scene,[1] the guilty were to be declared guilty and the innocent were justified or declared righteous.
Read moreThe Doctrine of the Deity of Christ defends Penal Substitution (Part seven)
The “glory of God” in Romans 3:23 is the manifestation of His presence. In the Old Testament, God’s presence was the outward Shekinah glory. In the New Testament, God’s glory was manifested in Christ about whom John could testify, “we beheld his glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father” (John 1:14). Every sinner has fallen short of being Christ like. He is the standard against which every person must measure himself. Every believer is presently being changed into Christ image (Romans 8:28) and one day will perfectly “be changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Corinthian 3:18).
Read moreThe Doctrine of Sin defends Penal Substitution (Part six)
Charles Ryrie showed the sinfulness of sinners by explaining the imputation of Adam’s sin directly to sinners and the inheritance of sin indirectly from Adam through the parents of each succeeding generation. Ryrie explained the difference:
Imputed sin is transmitted directly from Adam to each individual in every generation. Since I was in Adam, Adam’s sin was imputed to me directly, not through my parents and their parents. Imputed sin is an immediate imputation (that is, directly, not through mediators between Adam and me). This contrasts with how the inherited sin nature is transmitted. It comes to me from my parents, and theirs from their parents, and so on back to Adam. Inherited sin is a mediate transmission since it comes through all the mediators of generations between Adam and me.[1]
Read moreThe Doctrine of Faith defends the Penal Substitution (Part five)
Walter Rauschenbusch, Father of the Social Gospel, casting what he referred to as “old theology” in a bad light stated: “Wherever doctrine becomes rigid and is the pre-eminent thing in religion, ‘faith’ means submission of the mind to the affirmations of dogma and theology, and acceptance of the plan of salvation and trust in the vicarious atonement of Christ.”[1] While Rauschenbusch declared that faith in the atonement was antiquated, Paul affirmed saving faith indispensably necessary for salvation: “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” (Romans 3:25). Propitiation is appropriated by faith in Christ based on Christ’s shed “blood” in 3:25. It is better to connect “blood” with “propitiation” rather than as the object of faith.[2]
Read moreThe Doctrine of Prophets defends Penal Substitution (Part four)
Christ referred to the law and the prophets concerning their witness to his death to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus: “And he said to them, O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:25-27). What did Jesus mean in Luke 24:27 that he expounded all the Scriptures concerning himself “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets”? In the follow-up statement in 24:44 Jesus explained that what he previously spoke from the Old Testament “the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms” was only what was “written about me.” Jesus probably preached the prophecies and the types from the Old Testament including Genesis 3:15, Psalm 22, and Isaiah 53 as well as the Passover Lamb in Exodus 12:5, the Rock that Moses struck in Exodus 17:6, and the Brazen serpent in Numbers 21:9. These anti-types are referred to in the New Testament in John 3:14-15, 1 Corinthians 5:7, and 1 Peter 1:19. Paul next in Romans three elaborated on the witness of the law and prophets to Christ’s death in Romans 3:21.
Read moreThe Doctrine of Imputation defends Penal Substitution (Part three)
Warren Wiersbe writes about the doctrine of imputation: Our English word ‘imputation’ comes from the Latin word which means ‘to reckon, or credit, to one’s account.’ When you go to the bank or the savings and loan association and deposit money, imputation takes place. They deposit that on your account, and they write it on your record …. Right in the middle of that word ‘impute’ you have p-u-t, righteousness put to our account.”[1] The doctrine of the imputed righteousness of God to believers supports the doctrine of penal substitution in Romans 3.
Read moreThe Doctrine of the Wrath of God defends Penal Substitution (Part two)
The wrath of God is really the sticking issue in the doctrine of penal substitution. Just as the wrath of God is denied by nonevangelicals and evangelicals in the eternal conscious suffering of the unsaved in the Lade of Fire, the wrath of God is rejected in the penal substitutionary death of Christ on the cross. We admit that the wrath of God is unpleasant to contemplate. But we mortals have no right to judge a doctrine in God’s Word inscribed there by means of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Read moreDoctrines that Defend Penal Substitutionary Atonement (Part one)
The doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement is the humbling truth that Christ bore our deserved wrath of God on the cross. Charles H. Spurgeon issued a warning in 1888 concerning the penal substitution: “If ever should come a wretched day when all our pulpits shall be full of modern thought, and the old doctrine of a substitutionary sacrifice shall be exploded, then will there remain no word of comfort for the guilty .... The gospel speaks through the propitiation for sin, and if it be denied, it speaketh no more.”[1]
Read moreThe Different Views of the Lord's Supper (Part Two)
What does the Lord’s Supper mean to you? When is the last time you obeyed Jesus’ instruction in regard to observing the Lord’s Supper, “This do in remembrance of me?” In the first post, we discussed the four views on the Lord’s Supper. This post will elaborate on the preferred Memorial View.
Read moreThe Different Views on the Lord’s Supper (Part One)
Have you experienced what baptism pictures, i.e., the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ for your salvation? Are you experiencing what the Lord’s Supper symbolizes i.e., confessed sins and fellowship with the Lord? When Christ commanded the church to observe two ordinances He gave us pictures of two important Christian realities. Baptism pictures union with Christ and the Lord’s Supper pictures communion with Christ. Just as the believing sinner is united to Christ in salvation once, so the believer is baptized once. Because fellowship or communion with Christ is repeated by the Christian so does the believer repeat the ordinance of Communion or the Lord’s Supper repeatedly.
Read moreThe Hound of Heaven
"The Hound of Heaven" was written by a young man named Francis Thompson over 100 years ago. “The Hound of Heaven” however, is still relevant. It was made into a movie. Songs have been written about the Hound of Heaven. There is a website: thehoundofheaven.com. Prominent Christian leaders and authors refer to the Hound of Heaven.
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