This is the second part of three articles concerning studying difficult passages of the Bible. In order to be more complicated, I have divided part 2 into two articles. It was just too long of a selection. Today I am writing about the first two legs of Bible interpretation, and the last two tomorrow. Finally, the series will close with walking…
Category: <span>church</span>
This is part one of a three-part article about interpreting difficult passages in the Bible. These articles do not deal with the spiritual aspects of Bible interpretation (prayer, humility) or the technical part of interpretation (textual criticism, bibliology). Concerning the former, spiritual disciplines are assumed as being the priority; and about the latter, these articles are meant to be for…
To my church family: It is no accident that the name of our church is Grace Baptist Church. However, I think we all have the tendency to pull into the parking lot of the church several times a week where the sign telling us we are people of grace greets us, yet not to give a second thought to what it means that…
Almighty Father, you have sent your Son as the Prince of Peace[1] having made war with sin and our lawless hearts you have crucified the old man[2] that we might walk in newness of life.[3] Indeed, Father, the old is gone the new has come[4], and thus, being justified, we have peace with You, our holy God through our Lord…
This is Part 2 of the two part series on the difficulties and blessings of systematic exposition. You can read Part 1 here. “. . .So is it worth it? Should we abandon systematic, passage by passage, exposition of entire books of the Bible? Should we go to a topical approach of preaching? Or perhaps one popular method today is…
This is a two part post. Part 2 will be posted tomorrow. My target audience is my fellow pastors/preachers and those who would desire this office of “Overseer.” There are real difficulties in committing to preach systematically through entire books of the Bible in what we call passage by passage or verse by verse exposition. Part 1 will deal with…
In the “Western” world, we are success driven. This is not a bad thing of its own accord. We all want to be successful and we ought to desire success. No one wants to be a loser. But how we define success makes all the difference in this life and the life to come. When Jesus was teaching the Sermon…
*of course there are valid reasons why someone cannot go to church on any given Sunday (illness, out-of-town, work, etc.) that is not what is being addressed in this article. The intent of this article list is to deal with the avoidable excuses for not being faithful to attend your local church. You need to be around other Christians. “Let…
The phrase “derived authority” is a good way to explain pastoral authority, in that the authority pastors have, is derived first from the Scripture and second from the congregation who asks them to lead them. “Delegated authority” is a good way to explain deacon authority. In 1 Timothy 3, Paul instructs Timothy on the quality of men who should occupy…
What Do We Do Now? This morning, as I read the decision by our nation’s Supreme Court to declare gay marriage legal in all fifty states, the first thing that came to my mind was, “What do we do now?” There is a real fear over the continuation of religious freedoms that American churches have enjoyed for a long time…