Tag: Church

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

10 Things You Should Know about the Presence of God – J. Ryan Lister (Crossway)
Scripture is clear that all of life—and, principally, the gospel life—is about being in God’s relational presence.

Self-Control and the Power of Christ– David Mathis (DG)
True self-control is a gift from above, produced in and through us by the Holy Spirit. Until we own that it is received from outside ourselves, rather than whipped up from within, the effort we give to control our own selves will redound to our praise, rather than God’s. But we also need to note that self-control is not a gift we receive passively, but actively. We are not the source, but we are intimately involved. We open the gift and live it. Receiving the grace of self-control means taking it all the way in and then out into the actual exercise of the grace.

Things Christians Just Don’t Get To Do – Tim Challies
These are all things—just a few of the things—Christians don’t get to do. These are things we don’t get to do because they are associated with godlessness rather than godliness, with sin rather than salvation. In every case God has freed us by his gospel to a new and better way of living—a way of love, forgiveness, generosity, encouragement, community, submission, industry, purity, and freedom. We don’t get to do those things that would only ever harm us and the people around us.

Keeping Our Commitment – Jeremy Walker
Are you not part of the body? Are you not a living stone in that divinely-indwelt temple? Are you not covenanted together with those fellow saints to minister to them and to be ministered to by them? Are you not persuaded that in this service heaven will draw near to earth, that the Lord will speak, more or less powerfully, through the preaching of the Word? That you will genuinely and really render prayers and praises to the Most High God in your participation in the whole service? That heavenly manna will be there for you to eat? That this might be the morning or the evening when you might obtain an unusual blessing, or your friend, or your child, or your neighbour, attending with you, might be converted? That, if nothing else, you have said, more or less formally, that you will not forsake the assembling together of those saints to whom you have made a commitment to love them and to be loved by them?

Hope you have a great Lord’s Day with your local church in the presence of our great God!

Passion Points

On By BrianIn Idolatry, PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

Practical Suggestions for Cultivating Communion with God – Kelly Kapic (Crossway)
But interpersonal relationships are not “things” to be accomplished. They are more about “being” than “doing,” and they need attentiveness, mutual exchange, and care to flourish. Relationships cannot be life-giving sources of strength if we are not present in and to them. Communion with God is a deep need for every human, whether we acknowledge the need or not. Communion with God is how we were made to function, and it is ultimately about a loving and very present relationship with the triune Creator.

The Hidden Power in Every Idol – Tim Challies
If we worship the idol of the perfect body, the sweeping curves or the chiseled abs, we will become as vain and self-focused as the models in the magazines. If we worship the idol of money, we will become as greedy, selfish, and cut-throat as the worst wolf on Wall Street. If we worship athleticism, we will imitate superstar athletes in their arrogance, their moral depravity, their self-obsession. If we worship the idol of power we will mimic the flip-flopping, anything-goes, popularity-obsessed politician. On and on it goes.

5 Reasons Not to Waste Your Leisure Time– Jeff Robinson (TGC)
In today’s work force, some researchers have found the average work week for an American man is creeping beyond 50 hours. Thus, after a long and laborious work week, our finite bodies and minds often stand in need of refreshment. God set a pattern in the created order (evening/morning/end of the day) for six days, and then established a day of rest on the seventh.

Why the Local Church Really Matters – Tim Challies
As we prepare to worship God tomorrow, it may do us good to pause for just a few moments to consider the local church. What is the church? Why has God called us into these little communities? Does the local church really matter? It does! The local church is foundational to God’s plan for his people.

Hope you have a great Lord’s Day with your local church!

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

3 Motivations to Hate Sin – Erik Raymond
Until sin is actually hated for its odious and repulsive character we will not make true progress in godliness.

Kindness Changes Everything – Stephen Witmer (DG)
We open ourselves to the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit when we ask him to produce in us kind hearts that overflow through kind lips.

18 Prayers to Pray for Unbelievers – Tim Challies
A friend asked the question: How do I pray for unbelievers? How do I pray effectively? I trust that every Christian regularly prays for family or friends or colleagues or neighbors who do not yet know the Lord. And while we can and must pray for matters related to their lives and circumstances, the emphasis of our prayers must always be for their salvation. Here are some ways the Bible can guide our prayers.

Why We Desperately Need the Body of Christ – Paul David Tripp (Crossway)
Your walk with God is a community project. The isolated, separated, loner, Jesus-and-me religion that often marks modern church culture is not the religion that is described in the New Testament.

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points2 Comments

Here are some really good posts for your weekend reading:

Stop Having Quiet Times– David Powlison (TGC)
In the verbal actions of the psalms—rejoicing in who God is, asking for needed help, expressing heartfelt thanks—we’re talking to someone. It’s fair to say that having a “quiet time” is a misnomer. It’s more of an out loud, “noisy” time.  When you talk aloud you express the reality that you’re talking with someone else, not simply talking to yourself inside your own head.

Lay Aside the Weight of Irritability– Jon Bloom (DG)
Our irritability never has its roots in the soils of righteousness. It springs out of the soil of selfishness and springs up fast, like the sin-weed that it is. We get irritated or easily provoked, not when God’s righteousness or justice is scorned, but when something we want is being denied, delayed, or disrupted.

Gospel Weariness – Tim Challies
Trials do us good in at least one more way: Trials develop a gospel weariness, a weariness with this world….  Gospel weariness elevates our perspective from our feet to the horizon, from the trials of this world to the hope of the world to come. It stirs within us a holy longing to be done with this life and to enter into the life to come. It fixates on God’s promises, promises of deliverance, of restitution, of eternal peace. It is a weariness that rests on the promises of the gospel, that finds its hope in the God of the gospel. It does not wallow in despair but gazes with confidence to the future. It is a weariness that cries with the saints of all the ages, “Come, Lord Jesus!”

How My Parents Taught Me To Love The Church – Ricky Alcantar (TBC)
When you’ve had a busy weekend and you make it to church, your kids notice. When you rearrange athletic obligations to get to church, your kids notice. When you get in late from a trip Saturday night and make it to church, your kids notice. When you are willing to slog through traffic after work to make it to a small group meeting where the snacks aren’t amazing and the fellowship is a little forced but you do it anyway, your kids notice.

Hope you have a great Lord’s Day with your local church!

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

Remember, He Loves You– Joseph Tenney (DG)
Those of us whose lips are parched from sucking on the sands of idolatry, whose souls are shriveled from being hidden under the shadows of lesser loves, whose hearts long to drink full from his cup and be flooded with an inextinguishable light, we need only turn to Jesus. In Jesus, we experience the love that the Father has for us.

Four Questions for Obeying the First Commandment – Kevin DeYoung
What should we do in prayer? Try adoration, trust, invocation, and thanksgiving. What should we find in our corporate worship services? Plan for adoration, trust, invocation, and thanksgiving. What can we talk about with our friends in the car, our family at the dinner table, or our kids at bedtime? How about adoration, trust, invocation, and thanksgiving.

The Biggest Temple in Town – David Mathis (DG)
Sports and athletic competitions are good gifts from God, but we dare not go all-in without our eyes wide open. Not in this culture. Sport is one of the most alluring, and subtle, competitors for our heart’s deepest allegiance.

Why Sunday Should Be a Day of Rest – Nicholas Davis
Do we view Sunday as our own time, or is it God’s time? By attending church on Sunday, we show that we really belong to Christ. The question Christians ask should never be who am I? Instead, it should be whose am I? Since we belong to God, our time—and even a portion of the day—is not our own but instead belongs to another (God) and to others (our neighbors).

Hope you have a great Lord’s Day resting and worshiping our great God with your local church!

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

What to do When You Are in a Spiritual Dry Spell – Scott Slayton

On “Stranger Things” and Being a Big Prude – Tim Challies

The Evangelical Drug of Choice – Phillip Holmes (DG)

How Skipping Church Affects Our Children – Micah Anglo

Hope you have a great Lord’s Day with your local church!

Passion Points

On By BrianIn PASSION Points

Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:

13 Reasons You Are Precious To God – Mark Altrogge (TBC)

Scripture’s “Top Two” List – Ed Welch (CCEF)

Why Believers Must Avoid Immoral Joking – Chuck Lawless

7 Ways to Become a Better Sermon Listener – Christopher Ash (TGC)

Hope you have a great Lord’s challenged and encouraged by the preaching of God’s Word!

Four Ways to Participate in a Baptism Service

On By BrianIn Church Life

Our church baptized three of our young people yesterday.  What a glorious day it was!

Before we did the actual baptisms, I reminded everyone that we were all there to participate in the baptism service.  It was not just for the three being baptized, but we were to all participate in the baptism service.  So here are four ways to participate in your church’s next baptism service.

First, we are all there to celebrate God’s saving work in the lives of those being baptized.  By faith in Jesus Christ, their sins have been washed away.  They are now His disciples.  And they are standing before us to proclaim that reality in their lives.  That is worth celebrating!

Second, we are all there to witness their confession of faith and commitment to follow Christ.  As witnesses, we must then be committed as their church family to help them grow in their walk with the Lord.  We commit to teach, to encourage, to support, to pray for, to build up, to be the church family in which they can grow up in the Faith.

Third, we are all there to remember our own baptisms.  As we watch these new believers be baptized, we remember our public proclamation of faith through the waters of baptism.  We remember our own salvation through Jesus Christ, and our own commitment to live for Him.  And as we remember, we affirm our faith and desire to follow Christ.

Finally, we are all there to pray for any who do not know Christ as their Savior who may be observing the baptisms.  We cry out silently that God might be at work in people’s hearts convicting them of sin and the real offer of salvation in Jesus Christ.  This assumes of course that we are in fact saved.  If not, then we ought to prayerfully consider our own need of salvation, of receiving what those who are being baptized have received.

Don’t just be a spectator at your next baptism service.  Be an active participant as you celebrate, witness, remember, and pray.