Mulligan Gospel?

And believe it or not preachers all across this country think that this man preaches the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Give me a break!


(HT) Extreme Theology

Judgment Sermon

If you didn't get the free mp3 download from a couple of weeks back at Grace To You titled Judgment on a Reprobate Society this is your second chance to Download It Now. This is a must listen sermon for any born again believer and a great tool to use on your lost friends. Very very powerful message!

"You may try to tell me that this is an intellectual thing, that God blesses homosexuals and all this stuff is hearts and flowers and wonderful relationships and filial friendships, and its all very beautiful and its all very David and Jonathan and so forth and so on, but the fact of the matter is you're nothing but evil, vile, Godless, apostate perverts." —John MacArthur

Believe and Obey

"Only he who believes is obedient, and only he who is obedient believes... "only those who believe obey" is what we say to that part of a believer's soul which obeys, and "only those who obey believe" is what we say to that part of the soul of the obedient which believes. If the first half of the proposition stands alone, the believer is exposed to the danger of cheap grace, which is another word for damnation. If the second half stands alone, the believer is exposed to the danger of salvation through works, which is also another word for damnation." —Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945)

Excerpt taken from The Cost Of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, SCM Press Ltd. published 1959, p. 63 & 68

Merry Christmas

Isaiah 9:6-7
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this.

Luke 2:9-14
And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Ignorance of Doctrine

"The substitution of so-called "practical" preaching for the doctrinal exposition which it has supplanted is the root cause of many of the evil maladies which now afflict the church of God. The reason why there is so little depth, so little intelligence, so little grasp of the fundamental verities of Christianity, is because so few believers have been established in the faith, through hearing expounded and through their own personal study of the doctrines of grace. While the soul is unestablished in the doctrine of the Divine Inspiration of the Scriptures—their full and verbal inspiration— there can be no firm foundation for faith to rest upon. While the soul is ignorant of the doctrine of Justification there can be no real and intelligent assurance of its acceptance in the Beloved. While the soul is unacquainted with the teaching of the Word upon Sanctification it is open to receive all the crudities and errors of the Perfectionists or "Holiness" people. While the soul knows not what Scripture has to say upon the doctrine of the New Birth there can be no proper grasp of the two natures in the believer, and ignorance here inevitably results in loss of peace and joy. And so we might go on right through the list of Christian doctrine. It is ignorance of doctrine that has rendered the professing church helpless to cope with the rising tide of infidelity. It is ignorance of doctrine which is mainly responsible for thousands of professing Christians being captivated by the numerous fallacies of the day. It is because the time has now arrived when the bulk of our churches "will not endure sound doctrine" (2 Tim. 4:3) that they so readily receive false doctrines." —A. W. Pink (1886–1952)

Quote taken from The Sovereignty of God by A. W. Pink, first published 1930 republished 1984 by Baker Books p. 213-214

Theology Alert

Just wanted to give a heads up to a newly found podcast that I have recently subscribed to and have found it to be very edifying. It is Theology Unplugged and it is brought to us by Reclaiming the Mind Ministries it is along the same format as The White Horse Inn but they stay mainly with theological issues. You can view their archives here or subscribe to the XML feed here and then there is this link just for iTunes users. Enjoy!

Suffering and Rejection

"To endure the cross is not a tragedy; it is the suffering which is the fruit of an exclusive allegiance to Jesus Christ. When it comes, it is not an accident, but a necessity. It is not the sort of suffering which is inseparable from this mortal life, but the suffering which is an essential part of the specifically Christian life. It is not suffering per se but suffering-and-rejection, and not rejection for any cause or conviction of our own, but rejection for the sake of Christ. If our Christianity has ceased to be serious about discipleship, if we have watered down the gospel into emotional uplift which makes no costly demands and which fails to distinguish between natural and Christian existence, then we cannot help regarding the cross as an ordinary everyday calamity, as one of the trials and tribulations of life. We have forgotten that the cross means rejection and shame as well as suffering... But this notion has ceased to be intelligible to a Christianity which can no longer see any difference between an ordinary human life and a life committed to Christ." —Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945)

Excerpt taken from The Cost Of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, SCM Press Ltd. published 1959, p. 88-89

Valiant for the Truth!

After reading Phil Johnson's post on How Can I Be Sure? and the many other post around the blog world on the topic of the Emergent Church and the battle over the "Truth War" and recently I heard an interview on Way of The Master Radio with Doug Pagitt and Doug refused to let Todd Friel quote Psalms and I wondered why he would do that, so I decided to do a search for the word "Truth" in the bible and found that Psalms is so full of truth claims (imagine that) which is exactly what Mr. Pagitt tries to avoid. In my search of the word "Truth" in scripture I have compiled a summery of my thoughts in line with what the bible reveals concerning truth, I hope and pray it sheds some light on the false notion that as Christians we must embrace ambiguity and reject absolute truth.

The God of the Bible is the "God of Truth" (Deuteronomy 32:4, Psalm 31:5, Isaiah 65:16), God "lives, in truth" (Jeremiah 4:2) and the Bible is called the "scripture of truth" and the "Word of truth" (Daniel 10:21, John 17:17, 2 Corinthians 6:7, Ephesians 1:13, James 1:18). Jerusalem is "called a city of truth" (Zechariah 8:3) the ten commandments are called "the law of truth" (Malachi 2:6) and God "desires truth in our inward parts" (Psalm 51:6), and the only way we can truly serve God is "in Spirit and in Truth" (John 4:23). We are reminded to continually walk before Him "in truth" with all our soul (1 Kings 2:4) and to "serve him in truth with all your heart" (1 Samuel 12:24). The man who wants to walk righteously before God must "speaketh the truth in his heart" (Psalm 15:2) and he wants to be "guided and taught in truth" (Psalm 25:5), and will "not conceal" the truth from others (Psalm 40:10), but will gladly "rejoiceth in the truth" (1 Corinthians 13:6).

But today within Christianity there are those who deny that there is even an absolute truth to be known but without truth there is no mercy for "mercy and truth are met together" (Psalm 85:10), they say that this is a new generation where truth is within each of us but "His truth endureth to all generations" (Psalm 100:5) and "endureth for ever" (Psalm 117:2). If no one can surely know truth then there is no actual right or wrong which is the basics of all laws and without laws there is only anarchy but God's "laws and commandments are truth" (Psalm 119:142,151, Malachi 2:6). Those who deny absolute truth also deny the Lord Jesus and call Him a liar for Christ said "I am the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6) and was "full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). Jesus taught "the way of God in truth" (Matthew 22:16, Mark 12:14) we are told that "the truth is in Jesus" (Ephesians 4:21). These same false teachers also deny the Holy Spirit for the Spirit is called "the Spirit of truth" (John 14:17, 15:26, 16:13, 1 John 4:6) and "the fruit of the Spirit is in truth" (Ephesians 5:9). We are to be "sanctified through the truth" (John 17:19) and we are to "speak the truth in love" (Ephesians 4:15) and we are to have our "loins girt about with truth" (Ephesians 6:14) and how can we do this unless we study so that we can "rightly dividing the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15), and we know that it is God's will that we "come unto the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:4) so that "the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32).

But those who maintain that we can't know truth are "false witness's and speak deceit" (Proverbs 12:17), they are "in err and devise evil" (Proverbs 14:22), they make mention of God "but not in truth, nor in righteousness" (Isaiah 48:1) they "obey not the voice of the Lord and truth is cut off from their mouth" (Jeremiah 7:28). "And they bend their tongues like their bow for lies: but they are not valiant for the truth upon the earth; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they know not me, saith the LORD" (Jeremiah 9:3). And "they will deceive his neighbour, and will not speak the truth" (Jeremiah 9:5) and their "father is the devil" (John 8:44) for they have "changed the truth of God into a lie" (Romans 1:25) and are "instructors of the foolish" (Romans 2:20) and they "hinder you that ye should not obey the truth" (Galatians 5:7) for they have "received not the love of the truth" (2 Thessalonians 2:10) and are "men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth" (1 Timothy 6:5). These same men have "turned away their ears from the truth" (2 Timothy 4:4, Titus 1:14) and are "ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth" (2 Timothy 3:7).

But these men have been led "captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ" (Colossians 2:8) and are "a child of the devil and an enemy of everything that is right!" and "full of all kinds of deceit and trickery" (Acts 13:10). So I pray that these men "will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will" (2 Timothy 2:26) otherwise they might be counted among those who "might be damned who believed not the truth" (2 Thessalonians 2:12) because the Lord will "judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth" (Psalm 96:13).

"There is one sure and infallible guide to truth, and therefore, one, and only one corrective for error, and that is the Word of God." —G. Campbell Morgan (1863-1945)

Christmas Linebacker

Come on, you know you have always dreamed of being a Christmas Linebacker!

(HT) Mister Anderson

Playing Men of God?

Below is an quote from a sermon that Paul Washer preached, don't know the name of the sermon, where it was preached nor do I have it in it's entirety, but I heard this clip on The Way of The Master Radio with Todd Friel that was aired December 13th you can download the full show here it sounds like a sermon jam but not sure about that. If you have any information about the actual sermon please let me know. Anyway this is Paul Washer's take on seeker-sensitive church's.

"If you are a lost unregenerate Hell bound church member, then you will need all sorts of things to motivate you for the Christian life, you'll need to go to a church where it's like a six-flags over Jesus, they have every sort of thing you can imagine to keep you entertained. They have program after program after program because they got to keep the machine going because the building cost a lot of money. And they gotta introduce and embrace every fad that comes down the pike, church growth this, church growth that, my goodness how did the apostle Paul ever start a church? You have to be sensitive to culture, this generation, that generation, the x-y-z generation, every generation and you have to know everything, NO! It's all a bunch of little boys trying to play men of God without the scripture is what it is and they've got to build something on something other than scripture because they don't have scripture nor the power of God." —Paul Washer

Come and Die

"When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." —Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945)

Running To The Light

For almost sixteen years me and my family sat under superficial biblical teaching that was driven by either programs or purpose all born out of a faulty theology that "had a form of Godliness", and it was very easy to run to the light that they were shining because it was a light that had been "put under a bushel", it was just enough of the true Light not to offend the eyes of my heart, it was like looking "through a glass darkly" but only worse, because I had been given sun glasses to wear and I gladly put them on. But now after a year long steady diet of sound biblical doctrine from a local expository preacher who's presentation of the Light is being "set on a candlestick", the scales have been removed from my darkened mind and now several things have become very apparent to me in my own life. First it is quite clear that my wicked heart is being exposed to more Light than ever before and this is proving to be a very painful process to endure, because the first reaction of my flesh is to run from the glaring Light that has "been shed abroad in my heart", or I want to try and hide my sin from the Light. These two gut reactions are not acceptable to a true Christian they both leave me wanting and defeated and neither reaction leaves me fulfilled but convicted in my spirit of some wrong doing. Second I am understanding more of what it means to press on, you see, I see myself for what I truly am and it's an ugly site to behold but I find that the Light is so attractive to me like never before and it's beauty is so desirable that I no longer want to hide my sins or flee, but I want to run to the Light so that there is no longer any more hiding places for my guilt and burden to remain. This is a very difficult time in my walk with Christ as I have found myself so unsuspectingly crushed by sins that I have never dealt with before and some that I have really never realized were hindering my walk and my witness.

So I pray that God will continue to expose me to more of the Light of His Word in hopes that my darkened heart will shine brighter and brighter with the love and truth of Jesus Christ all to His glory, please forgive me Lord and help me to kill my sin daily with more of Your Light. Amen

This Week in Blogdom

Joe Thorn leaves us with a great Packer quote on doctrine.

Tim Challies notified us of the White House Christmas Card.

CRN informs us of an article from Ankerberg Theological Research Institute concerning Islam.

Erik at the Irish Calvinist reminds us of a sermon by R. C. Sproul on justification.

Nathan Busenitz over at Pulpit Magazine gives us a great article on compromise.

Over at Team Pyro Phil Johnson reminds us that the Gospel Lite tastes great but it's less filling.

and finally Ingrid over at Slice of Laodicea informs us of a new book on a forgotten doctrine.

Showtime?

This morning as I prepare my heart for corporate worship with my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, I am reminded by this article of the type of worship services me and my wife have come out of recently and how important it is to join in a biblical worship service instead of the ever growing showtime religion that seems to be so popular today. Below is a quote from John MacArthur's article.

"Can the church fight apathy and materialism by feeding people's appetite for entertainment? Evidently many in the church believe the answer is yes, as church after church jumps on the show-business bandwagon. It is a troubling trend that is luring many otherwise orthodox churches away from biblical priorities.

Church buildings are being constructed like theatres. Instead of a pulpit, the focus is a stage. Some feature massive platforms that revolve or raise and lower, with colored lights and huge sound boards. Shepherds are giving way to media specialists, programming consultants, stage directors, special effects experts, and choreographers.

The idea is to give the audience what they want. Tailor the church service to whatever will draw a crowd. As a result, pastors are more like politicians than shepherds, looking to appeal to the public rather than leading and building the flock God gave them. The congregation is served a slick, professional show, where drama, pop music, and maybe a soft-sell sermon constitute the worship service. But the emphasis isn't on worship, it's on entertainment."

Excerpt taken from an article by John MacArthur titled "Gimme That Showtime Religion".

Quote of the Day

“We shall never be clearly persuaded, as we ought to be that our salvation flows from the wellspring of God’s free mercy until we come to know his eternal election, which illumines God’s grace by this contrast: that he does not indiscriminately adopt all into the hope of salvation but gives to some what he denies to others” —John Calvin (1509-1564)