Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:
“May I Go In There?” – Jared Wilson
5 Resurrection Realities That Reorient Our Evangelism – Steven Lee (TGC)
5 Reasons to Rejoice in Persecution – Tim Challies
Don’t Follow Your Heart – Jon Bloom (DG)
Hope you have a great Lord’s Day following your Lord who died and rose again so you might draw near to Him!
Here are some good (and challenging) posts for your weekend reading:
Rejoicing in Lament – Mike Wittmer
Answering “No” To One Of These Questions Will Kill Your Evangelism – Trevin Wax
How Memorization Feeds Your Imagination – Joe Carter (TGC)
What Do You Really Want Your Church To Be Known For? – Mark Altrgogge
Hope you have a great Lord’s Day celebrating your Savior with your local church!
– E. M. Bounds
Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:
Take a Break from the Chaos – David Mathis (DG)
You need a break from the chaos, from the noise and the crowds, more than you may think at first. You need the spiritual disciplines of silence and solitude.
John Macarthur on Helps and Hindrances to Joy – David Murray
In a sermon on Rejoice Always (1 Thess. 5:16), John Macarthur listed eight sources of joy and then six thieves of joy. I’ve summarized them…
Discipleship in the “Age of Authenticity” – Trevin Wax
The church’s response must be to proclaim a gospel that comes from outside ourselves – no matter how countercultural this may seem. When people in our culture discover how exhausting it is to try to be “true to themselves,” when looking further and further inward eventually shows them they haven’t the resources to transform their own lives, the church must be ready to break in with good news that life change isn’t mustered up from within but granted through grace from without. We are to challenge the narrative that happiness is found solely in self-expression. The biblical view of the self is that we are broken, twisted, and sinful. The self is something that needs redemption, not expression.
Spurgeon’s Three R’s: A Useful Method for Evangelism – Jeff Robinson (TGC)
But recently, in my regular reading of C. H. Spurgeon’s sermons, I have discovered an excellent and pithy approach to the gospel, one that is fully biblical and establishes both man’s universal dilemma and God’s antidote in Christ: Spurgeon’s “Three R’s”: ruin, redemption, and regeneration. I like Spurgeon’s outline for several reasons: it is simple, the alliteration makes it easy to remember, the biblical texts all surround the number three (another aid to memory for the throes of nerve-busting, face-to-face evangelism).
Hope you have a great Lord’s Day with your local church exalting our great God!
Here are some good posts for your weekend reading:
What Is Conscience? – Joe Carter (GC)
The Multifaceted Diamond of Christ’s Atoning Work – Trevin Wax
Arms Outstretched – Trevin Wax
Simple Evangelism in the Church – Jason Helopoulis
Hope you have a great Lord’s Day celebrating our Savior!
The opposition catches up with Paul in Acts 21, and a riot ensues. Paul is seized, dragged out of the temple, and beaten. The mob tries to kill him, but Paul is rescued by Roman soldiers. Battered, bruised, and bloody, he wants to speak to the hostile crowd. It doesn’t matter how he feels (read: lousy); he is ready to speak for the name of Jesus. It doesn’t matter that the crowd just tried to kill him; he wants to tell them about the Savior. In Acts 23, he is ready to speak to a hostile council testifying to his hope in the resurrection. In Acts 24-26, he is ready to speak the gospel before wicked pagan rulers. Later in Rome, he speaks to anyone who will listen.
Are you ready to speak?
No matter how you feel?
No matter who it is?
How intimidating they are?
How unlovely they may appear?
Are you ready to speak for Jesus?
The story of Saul’s spiritual transformation ought to remind us never to write anyone off as being beyond the love of Christ. We may do so with relatives whom we know have heard the Word for years without response, or a sinner who has gone to a crass level of depravity, or someone who has gone into a cult or is propagating false doctrine.
But Scripture is clear – God can reach anyone!
– R. Kent Hughes in Acts: The Church Afire
So let’s keep praying and keep looking for opportunities to share the good news!
O Lord,
may we each be full of the Spirit,
full of the gospel,
full of your compassion for people –
sinners who need a Savior.
May we each bear your touch today
and in days to come!
Please help us to be channels of your grace
to all those around us.
Thank you for your willingness to use us
to reach others.
– R. Kent Hughes
In Acts 4-5, we see the apostles taking risks for the gospel. In Acts 4, when Peter and John had been arrested, the Jewish leaders charged them not to speak any more about Jesus. Upon being further threatened and then released, the apostles convened a prayer meeting to pray for boldness to continue to speak of Jesus. And they continued to proclaim the gospel with boldness and power (4:31, 33). They took risks for the sake of the gospel and multitudes were being saved (5:14).
The chief priests driven by jealousy, arrested the apostles and put them in prison (5:17-18). God sent an angel to bring them out and command them to go into the temple and continue preaching the gospel. And so they did. They continued to take risks for the gospel. After finding the prison empty and the apostles in the temple, the chief priests arrested the apostles again. Standing before the Sanhedrin, the apostles began proclaiming the gospel to the very men who opposed them (5:30-32). They were again taking risks for the gospel. Indeed the Sanhedrin wanted to kill the apostles!
The advice of a Pharisee named Gamaliel saved their lives, but they were beaten for proclaiming the gospel before they were released. And what did they do? They continued to proclaim the gospel (5:42). They continued to risk everything for the sake of the gospel.
Which brings us to the question: What are we willing to risk for the sake of the gospel? Are we willing to risk it all? Risk our lives? Our wealth? Our comfort? Our jobs? Our popularity? Are we willing to risk ridicule and rejection? What are we willing to risk to make use of the opportunities God gives us to share the gospel? What are we willing to risk for the One who gave his life for us?
One of the main themes of Acts is witness. Jesus called the disciples to be his witnesses, and we trace that witness throughout the book. In the first five chapters, we see five characteristics of an effective witness which we should apply to our lives and churches today:
The witness of the early church showed these five characteristics, and multitudes were saved (5:14). May our witness look like this, and may God grant to us this year many who will be saved!
Brian J. Mikul 