Racial Issues in the Church

Surely you've heard by now about the Southern Baptist church in Mississippi? The one which refused to allow an African American couple to be married in the church building? In 2012!

Charles and Te’Andrea Wilson were told only one day before their previously announced and planned wedding that they’d have to be married somewhere else. FBC Crystal Springs would not be available. The pastor complied. According to the article, this mess was because of only a few apparently powerful people in the church.

I personally think this is awful. Deplorable. It was a sinful action by the church. The pastor can be seen as spineless. Or perhaps wise, in not wanting to make a national scene on the day before the wedding.

What should happen here now? To the church? The pastor? Anything?

Here's a link in case you missed this.

http://www.clarionledger.com/article/20120727/NEWS/120727008

Preaching for Revival

Rev. Al Baker,

In a day when many seem to be mitigating the preached Word of God, calling us to a neo-sacerdotalism (emphasizing the sacraments of the Lord’s Supper and baptism over against the efficacy of the preached Word of God)¹, we all the more need preachers who will preach for revival. How are we to do it? The church and her preacher have only two weapons — prayer and preaching. Nothing else will work. So, how do we preach for revival? First, the preacher and congregant alike must believe that revival is necessary and possible. Surprisingly, this is not even on the radar screen of many western believers. I will go further and say that the revival culture of Acts is normative, that this is always the benchmark of the church and anything short of it is dishonouring the One who gave himself for us. Second, we must pray with the intolerable burden of which I have so often spoken and written in the past. We can have revival in our day if we are willing to pay the price for it — if we are willing to pray, fast, and weep like Ezra (Ezra 10:1) and Nehemiah (Neh. 1:1-4); if we are in such anguish over the state of Christ’s church that we will pull the hair out of our heads and sit down appalled like Ezra (Ezra 9:1-3 ), that we will pull the hair from the heads of our brethren, like Nehemiah (Neh. 13:25); if we are willing to pray with deep humility, confessing and repenting of sin like Daniel (Dan. 9:1ff). Without this kind of sustained burden we have no reason to believe our prayers are effectual. We must pray prayers of supplication, intense passion (Dan. 9:3; Zech. 12:10). Third, as the preacher proclaims God’s Word he comes to his great calling hot with Christ, after hours of prayer, study, and meditation on the Word to be preached; after filling up his heart and mind with the glory of Christ, after feeling deeply and passionately the truths he will proclaim; after believing in the total sufficiency and efficacy of the preached Word through the Spirit’s anointing. He knows he must have the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit fall on his preaching. He knows his gifts, charisma, training, or experience will not bring revival fire. He labours in his preaching and every aspect of his pastoral ministry with the expectation of revival. This kind of preaching brings action. It demands a verdict. Preaching for revival affects the conscience, heart, and will. No one could listen to the Lord Jesus, the Apostle Paul, or Isaiah the prophet without being moved in heart, mind, and will. Some loved the message and embraced it fully. Others despised it and wanted to kill the purveyors of it. When the Holy Spirit falls upon such preachers and their preaching, then the devil and his minions are awakened from hell. They come after the preacher in many forms — discouragement, financial or health crises, sexual temptation, severe opposition from within the church leadership, hatred and disdain from the world. But with the Apostle Paul, the preacher and the congregation are able finally to say together, 'We have fought the good fight. We have finished the course. We have kept the faith. In the future there is laid up for us the crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge will award to us on that day, and not only to us, but also to all who have loved His appearing' (2 Tim. 4:7-8).

Read the rest here. Rev. Baker is an evangelist with Presbyterian Evangelistic Fellowship, and Director of the Alabama Church Planting Network. He planted (2003) and served as Pastor of Christ Community Presbyterian Church in Hartford, Connecticut, until December 2011.

Victorious To the Uttermost

John Calvin's commentary on the Psalms. Introduction to Psalm 2:

David boasts that his kingdom, though assailed by a vast multitude of powerful enemies, would, notwithstanding, be perpetual, because it was upheld by the hand and power of God. He adds, that in spite of his enemies, it would be extended even to the uttermost ends of the earth. And, therefore, he exhorts kings and other rulers to lay aside their pride, and receive, with submissive minds, the yoke laid upon them by God; as it would be vain for them to attempt to shake it off. All this was typical and contains a prophecy concerning the future kingdom of Christ.

From Psalm 2:


Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage,
and the ends of the earth your possession.
(Psalm 2:8 ESV)

Christ, it is true, besought his Father (John 17:5) to “glorify him with the glory which he had with him before the world was;” yet the more obvious meaning is, that the Father will deny nothing to his Son which relates to the extension of his kingdom to the uttermost ends of the earth. 

Love That Won't Let Go

George Matheson (1842-1906) of Scotland wrote several hymns during his lifetime. We sang one of them yesterday in worship, a hymn that was particularly timely for me.


This hymn, O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go (#708 in the Trinity Hymnal) has an interesting background.

Written on the evening of Matheson’s sister’s marriage. His whole family had went to the wedding and had left him alone. And he writes of something which had happened to him that caused immense mental anguish. There is a story of how years before, he had been engaged until his fiancé learned that he was going blind, and there was nothing the doctors could do, and she told him that she could not go through life with a blind man. He went blind while studying for the ministry, and his sister had been the one who had taken care of him all these years, but now she is gone. He had been a brilliant student, some say that if he hadn’t went blind he could have been the leader of the church of Scotland in his day. He had written a learned work on German theology and then wrote “The Growth of The Spirit of Christianity.” Louis Benson says this was a brilliant book but with some major mistakes in it. When some critics pointed out the mistakes and charged him with being an inaccurate student he was heartbroken. One of his friends wrote, “When he saw that for the purposes of scholarship his blindness was a fatal hindrance, he withdrew from the field – not without pangs, but finally.” So he turned to the pastoral ministry, and the Lord has richly blessed him, finally bringing him to a church where he regularly preached to over 1500 people each week. But he was only able to do this because of the care of his sister and now she was married and gone. Who will care for him, a blind man? Not only that, but his sister’s marriage brought fresh reminder of his own heartbreak, over his fiancé’s refusal to “go through life with a blind man.” It is the midst of this circumstance and intense sadness that the Lord gives him this hymn – written he says in 5 minutes! Looking back over his life, he once wrote that his was“an obstructed life, a circumscribed life… but a life of quenchless hopefulness, a life which has beaten persistently against the cage of circumstance, and which even at the time of abandoned work has said not “Good night” but “Good morning.” How could he maintain quenchless hopefulness in the midst of such circumstances and trials? His hymn gives us a clue. “I trace the rainbow in the rain, and feel the promise is not vain” The rainbow image is not for him “If the Lord gives you lemons make lemonade” but a picture of the Lord’s commitment! It is a picture of the battle bow that appears when the skies are darkening and threaten to open up and flood the world again in judgment. But then we see that the battle bow is turned not towards us – but toward the Lord Himself! (Source)

Here are the words.

1 O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

2 O Light that follow'st all my way,
I yield my flick'ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine's blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

3 O Joy that seekest me through pain
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.

4 O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life's glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

The Gift

J. C. Philpot (1802-1869) "was known as “The Seceder”. He resigned from the Church of England in 1835 and became a Strict & Particular Baptist. While with the Church of England he was a Fellow of Worchester College, Oxford. After becoming a Strict and Particular Baptist he became the Editor of the Gospel Standard magazine and served in that capacity for twenty years."


From his Meditations on Ephesians 1 & 2 comes this gem on ch. 2:8:


Now, by this grace or pure favor of God we are saved through faith, faith itself being the special gift of God; and thus the very medium by which we receive salvation, and become manifestly interested in it, is not of ourselves. The eye which sees salvation in the person and work of the Son of God, the ear which hears and receives the glad tidings, the hand which lays hold of and embraces the Savior in his atoning blood and justifying obedience, are all the special gift of God. Do we see Jesus and salvation in and through him? God has opened our eyes to see. Have we heard his blessed voice? God has given us ears to hear. Have we laid hold of him, and brought him into our heart in all his saving benefits and blessings? God gave us that faith by revealing his dear Son in us, and making him spiritually and experimentally known to our souls. Source.

Theology in Action

Rev. Al Baker is an evangelist with Presbyterian Evangelistic Fellowship, and Director of the Alabama Church Planting Network. He writes a weekly devotional Forget None of His Benefits. 


A recent devotional is based on the text, Get up. Let us go from here. (John 14:31).

Our strength is our weakness in the Reformed Church. We are very strong in our commitment to Reformed Theology, more specifically the so-called doctrines of grace (TULIP — total inability, unconditional election, limited or particular redemption, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of God with the saints). This is a very good thing, but our strength has become our weakness. I suggest that we are far too cerebral, far too content to sit in our favourite chair and read or discuss theology. What we need are the five practical points of Calvinism. And what are they?

First, we must make disciples of all the nations. This ought to be clear enough (Matt. 28:18-20, Acts 1:8). We are to evangelize the lost and we are to bring them to maturity in Christ (Col. 1:27-29). 

The second point of practical Calvinism is — you cannot make disciples of the nations. Why not? Because people are dead in their sins (Eph. 2:1-3)! They don’t seek for God. Their throats are open graves (Rom. 3:10ff). 

The third practical point of Calvinism — you must thirst. Ask God to give you an intolerable burden for the lost, for them to know the glory of God in the face of the Lord Jesus, to see him as the altogether lovely Saviour, to bow humbly before the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. 

The fourth practical point of Calvinism — you must pray. Because Jesus is worthy of the praise of all the nations, because people are unable to call upon Jesus in their own strength to be saved, because we must evangelize, then does this not drive us to pray for the Spirit’s unction, power, authority, and regenerating work to fall on people! 

The fifth practical point of Calvinism — you will shine. Like Moses on Mt. Sinai (2 Cor. 3:13), like Stephen before the Sanhedrin (Acts 6:15), like God’s covenant people receiving the Aaronic benediction (Num. 6:24-26) the glory of the Lord will be on your face.

Read the rest of the devotional as Rev. Baker fleshes these points out here. 

John 3:16 and the Word Kosmos

Jim McClarty gives a good explanation of the text.

HT: Timmy Brister