All Men Are Without Excuse

From The Virtuous Woman:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, Romans 1:18

Now and again, the Lord willing I get to share my faith with non-believers. Every time I get to witness it never goes according to plan as I get bombarded with unexpected questions I am not fully prepared to answer. In a way this is a good thing for me, because difficult questions always drive me to my bible. If I get stuck with a difficult question during witnessing, my desire to know more about God increases and God is so gracious to me because He always leads me to the knowledge of the truth through His Word. I learn more about the character and nature of God when I witness. When I share my faith with my fellow Africans, there is one question that pops up now and again," We never had the bible to begin with, our ancestors had their own beliefs, it is not their fault that they never heard the gospel. Why should they go to hell if they did not have the chance to hear the gospel and believe, is God not fair and just in sending them to hell?" To be honest I have wrestled with this question as a new believer, I never quite knew how to answer this one. But the more I think about this, the more I am taken back to my life as an unbeliever. I am one of those who actually never heard the gospel all my life prior to my conversion. Even though I was raised in a religious home and went to religious schools, the truth is I never heard the true gospel of Jesus Christ. All I knew was syncretic religion (false Christianity mixed with traditional cultural African beliefs), portrayed by the worst hypocrites. That is the religion I knew as a child which to be honest I hated then and still do today.
So when I think of those who say its not fair for God to send those who have not heard the gospel to hell, I look at my own life. Had I died 4 years ago, I would have gone straight to hell, even though I did not know that I could be forgiven through Christ. I did not know the glorious gospel yet I still would have gone straight to the pits of hell to be tortured for all eternity for my sins, and God would have been just in sending me to hell. I say this because the bible says so and I too can testify about this truth.

About eight years ago I lay in a hospital bed, tears rolled down my cheeks, I knew it would only be a matter of minutes before I would do something that would horrify and haunt me for the rest of my life. My heart was racing fast, I was in tears. Tears of confusion, tears of fear, tears of knowing that what was about to happen was evil. Before I knew it, still confused and in tears, I was whisked off to another room, and the next minute I woke up, guilt and pain filled my heart. I had just killed my first baby. My conscience condemned me, I was wrecked with guilt from that moment. I was not a believer, but suddenly all I could think of was that there could be a God who had seen all I had done. I was filled with shame. The fact that my baby had now died, I started thinking about death, to some degree I became convinced that there was an afterlife. If there was a good God I thought, then there must be a hell for people like me. The concept I had thought to be a myth all my life suddenly became a shocking and fearful reality. I developed a sudden fear of death. If there was a heaven, it became very obvious that I was not heading there, no way I could qualify. For the first time in my life I could not argue with the concept of Hell, it became apparent why I deserved Hell. To me this is clear evidence of what Paul described in Romans 2, my conscience bearing witness to the holiness of God, and the law written upon my heart accused me that I had violated the commandment not to kill, even though I had never heard the true gospel and was totally ignorant and without ability to comprehend the God of scripture. Romans 2:14 - 15 says- "For when the Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, are a law to themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them".

Most people who are not saved do not want to admit this truth, that they know in their hearts that they are condemned, because their consciences accuses them. Even those who have not heard the gospel know that they are wicked and vile, but many try to suppress that truth, especially hard hearted proud people like atheists, whom God has given up to their vile passions. Little do they realise they are storing up wrath for themselves in the day of judgement and it will be too late to repent. As for me I knew I was condemned years before God graciously saved me, even though I tried hard to suppress this truth by falsely comforting myself in that maybe I was wrong, there might not be a God after all. But this never got rid of my shame and guilt. Sadly I only knew part of the truth, that what I had done was wrong. I thought that was it for me. I did not know that there was a way in which I could be forgiven.I did not even realise how depraved or lost I was. The most shocking thing is I never sought God and did not even want to get saved, (John 6:44 )but God performed a supernatural work in my heart and raised dead bones to life, and behold 5 years later after I had an abortion, I was saved!

I am so grateful to God that he saved me. Now I know that no one goes to hell because they have never heard of Jesus, people go to hell because of their own wickedness against God.People love their sin and hate to be stopped, yes even people who are in the midst of pain and suffering still love their sin. And their conscience too bears witness, even when they have never read the bible. It breaks my heart when I see so called missionaries who go to Africa to feed the hungry first and then they say they will only preach the gospel when the people are well fed and happy, then the gospel will be relevant to them. People who think like this are not true Christians. The gospel of Jesus Christ is relevant to everyone on this planet regardless of circumstances, culture, race or religion. We are all sinners who deserve wrath, and God is just and fair, it is us who are unfair and wicked, Ezekiel 18:25-32.

Today when I look at the words of Jesus in Mathew 11:28 I am broken to tears. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. Not only did Christ pay for my sin on the cross, but today He also embraces and comforts me. Now I know that when God looks at me, He sees the righteousness of Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:21. And on Calvary God poured his wrath on His Son for the baby I killed, not only for the cold blooded murder of my baby, but for all things I have done wrong, all this so that today I can be declared not- guilty by God. Those of us who are truly saved can honestly say we do not deserve salvation. For by grace we are saved through faith, and that not of ourselves, it is the gift of God... lest anyone should boast, Ephesians 2:8-9.

We are no better off than those who perish without ever knowing of Christ. The only difference is that God who is rich in mercy chose to save us, even though we did nothing to contribute or impart to the grace we have received. Salvation is a gift no one deserves and those who perish without hearing the gospel deserve the wrath of God as much as we all do. No one is undeserving of hell. That is why as believers we have to be passionate about spreading the good news of forgiveness of sins to every creature, it is our only mission.

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John Piper - God is Dangerous Apart from Jesus Christ

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Now Is The Day For Salvation

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John Piper - Destroy This Temple, And In Three Days I Will Raise It Up

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Interview With D.A. Carson

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Tim Conway - No Confidence In The Flesh - Repost

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John 3:3 - You Must Be Born Again

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Is The Gospel Real Enough To You For You To Tell Someone?

Is the Gospel real enough to you, for you to tell someone? Or is your life all talk and no walk? James 4:17 - So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

To fail to share your faith is a sin, and it is also evidence that it is not real enough for you. If you truly believed what happened on that Cross, you would move. You would not sit and wait for others to move, you would move!



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Dr. Bruce Ware On Free-Will

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John Piper - You Must Suffer

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The Heavens Declare The Glory Of God!

Psalm 19:1 "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands."

From the Hubble Space Telescope:

Click each picture to see a larger view or click HERE to go to the original web page.


In January 2002, a dull star in an obscure constellation suddenly became 600,000 times more luminous than our Sun, temporarily making it the brightest star in our galaxy. The star, called V838 Monocerotis, has long since faded back to obscurity, but observations of a phenomenon called a "light echo" around the star have uncovered remarkable new features over the following years (this animation covers two years' time). The light echo is light from the earlier explosion echoing off dust surrounding the star. Light from the outburst traveled to the dust and then was reflected to Earth. Because of this indirect path, the light arrived at Earth months after light from the star that traveled directly from the star.


Also around 55 million light-years distant, we see here the colliding Antennae Galaxies (NGC 4038/NGC 4039) - a pair of interacting galaxies that lie in the constellation Corvus. The two spiral galaxies started to fuse together a few hundred million years ago making the Antenna galaxies the nearest and youngest example of a pair of colliding galaxies. Nearly half of the faint objects in the Antennae are young clusters containing tens of thousands of stars.


This image, taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), represents a small section of a larger mosaic - the sharpest view ever taken of the Orion Nebula - a picture book of star formation with massive young stars that are shaping the nebula and pillars of dense gas that may be the homes of budding stars. The bright glow at left is from M43, a small region being shaped by ultraviolet light from a massive young star. Astronomers call the region a miniature Orion Nebula because only one star is sculpting the landscape. The Orion Nebula has four such stars. The Orion Nebula is 1,500 light-years away, the nearest star-forming region to Earth.


This image of the ancient open star cluster NGC 6791 was taken in early 2008. Studying the dimmest stars in the cluster, astronomers uncovered three different age groups of stars. Two of the populations are burned-out stars called white dwarfs. One group of these low-wattage stellar remnants appears to be 6 billion years old, another appears to be 4 billion years old. The ages are problematically out of sync with those of the cluster's normal stars, which are 8 billion years old. Located 13,300 light-years away in the constellation Lyra, NGC 6791 is one of the oldest and largest open clusters known, containing roughly 10,000 stars. Also interesting to note are the numerous distant galaxies far beyond our Milky Way Galaxy that are visible between the crowded mass of stars.


This object is a billowing tower of cold gas and dust rising from a stellar nursery called the Eagle Nebula. 7,000 light-years distant from us, the soaring tower is 9.5 light-years or about 90 trillion kilometers tall. Stars in the Eagle Nebula are born in clouds of cold hydrogen gas that reside in chaotic neighbourhoods, where energy from young stars sculpts fantasy-like landscapes in the gas. The tower may be a giant incubator for those newborn stars. A torrent of ultraviolet light from a band of massive, hot, young stars [off the top of the image] is eroding the pillar. The column is silhouetted against the background glow of more distant gas. The bumps and fingers of material in the center of the tower are examples of stellar birthing areas. These regions may look small but they are roughly the size of our solar system. The blue colour at the top is from glowing oxygen, the red color in the lower region is from glowing hydrogen. This image was taken in November 2004 with the Advanced Camera for Surveys.


Part of the famous "Pillars of Creation" formation in the Eagle Nebula, this eerie, dark structure, resembling an imaginary sea serpent's head, is a column of cool molecular hydrogen gas (two atoms of hydrogen in each molecule) and dust that is an incubator for new stars. The stars are embedded inside finger-like protrusions extending from the top of the nebula. Each 'fingertip' is somewhat larger than our own solar system. The Eagle Nebula is 7,000 light-years distant from Earth.


Looking across 26,000 light-years of space toward the center of our Galaxy, Hubble captured this dense view of over 150,000 stars in February of 2004 while monitoring for any dips in brightness, or transits of orbiting planets. 16 candidate stars were found for closer scrutiny.



The Cat's Eye Nebula (NGC 6543), about 3,300 light-years distant, shows a bull's eye pattern of eleven or even more concentric rings, or shells, around the its center. Each "ring" is actually the edge of a spherical bubble seen projected onto the sky - that's why it appears bright along its outer edge. Observations suggest the star ejected its mass in a series of pulses at 1,500-year intervals. These convulsions created dust shells, each of which contain as much mass as all of the planets in our solar system combined (still only one percent of the Sun's mass). The view from Hubble is like seeing an onion cut in half, where each skin layer is discernible.

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You Can Not Be A Christian And Deny Christ's Virgin Birth

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John MacArthur - Total Depravity - The Sinner Neither Able Nor Willing

Part 1



Part 2



Part 3



Part 4



Part 5



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A Charge From David Wells

From New City Church:

Those who know me best know that theologian David Wells has had a huge impact on my thinking over the last 12 years when it comes to the church and our culture. He is, in my humble opinion, one of the most astute observers of present cultural trends in the church today. If you have not read his four books on the church and the modern world, you need to stop what you’re doing right now, go to a bookstore, and buy them: No Place for Truth, God in the Wasteland, Losing our Virtue, and Above all Er’thly Powers. In God in the Wasteland he delivers one of the most inspiring charges I have ever encountered. Read it and be moved:

“I want the Evangelical church to be the church. I want it to embody a vibrant spirituality. I want the church to be an alternative to post-modern culture, not a mere echo of it. I want a church that is bold to be different and unafraid to be faithful…a church that reflects an integral and undiminished confidence in the power of God’s word, a church that can find in the midst of our present cultural breakdown the opportunity to be God’s people in a world that has abandoned God. To be the church in this way, it is also going to have to find in the coming generation, leaders who exemplify this hope for its future and who will devote themselves to seeing it realized. To lead the church in the way that it needs to be led, they will have to rise above the internal politics of the evangelical world and refuse to accept the status quo where that no longer serves the vital interest of the Kingdom of God. They will have to decline to spend themselves in the building of their own private kingdoms and refuse to be intimidated into giving the church less and other than what it needs. Instead, they will have to begin to build afresh, in cogently biblical ways, among the decaying structures that now clutter the evangelical landscape. To succeed, they will have to be people of large vision, people of courage, people who have learned again what it means to live by the word of God, and, most importantly, what it means to live before the Holy God of that word.”

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The One Treasure Is Christ - Cameron's Testimony

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The Benefits of Adversity - My Grace is Sufficient for You

A great video from Doug Eaton...



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Paul Washer - The Narrow Way

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Paul Washer - Missions - Question and Answer Session

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D. A. Carson - Editorial

From Themelios:

D. A. Carson is research professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois.

The apostle Paul writes, "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind" (Rom 12:2). Elsewhere he tells the Corinthians, "We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ" (2 Cor 10:5).

Thinking differently from the "world" has been part of the Christian's responsibility and agenda from the beginning. The language Paul uses intimates that this independence of thought will not be easy. The assumption seems to be that the world has its own patterns, its own structured arguments, its own value systems. Because we Christians live in the world, the "default" reality is that we are likely to be shaped by these patterns, structures, and values, unless we consciously discern how and where they stand over against the gospel and all its entailments, and adopt radically different thinking. More: our response must not only be defensive (Rom 12:2), but offensive, aiming to "demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God," aiming to "take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ" (2 Cor 10:5).

Neither Scripture nor experience suggests that this will be an easy task. Transparently, one of the things needed is substantial discernment, since some things the world thinks are not intrinsically bad (in the Reformed heritage, this is commonly seen to be the fruit of "common grace"). More difficult yet, the challenges are not vanquished once, enabling us to coast. Until the end of the age, the "world" continues to exist, and it keeps launching its challenges from constantly changing angles. When Christians who had suffered through two centuries of waves of Roman persecution faced the stunning reality that the Emperor now declared himself to be a convert, they were faced with the temptation to re-think what political "victory" looked like, what structures controlling Christian influence in the corridors of power might achieve–and thus to re-think the nature of the kingdom. Doubtless Matt 20:20–28 seemed less relevant than reflections on the life and times of King David. Moreover, decisions of the same sort played out again and again, across centuries, until there was an imperial papacy, and beyond.

Choose your own historical examples. Probably the most difficult "patterns" of thought to identify as things to which we should not be "conformed" are those in any culture that the overwhelming majority in the culture think are pretty obvious, but which stand either tangentially skewed with respect to, or totally opposed to, the gospel. Most of us look back on the temptations toward ascetic and gnostic movements in the second and third centuries and marvel that so many people who called themselves Christians were taken in. But the most dangerous movements in any age are those that are so widely assumed that it is very hard to see them. It is easy to discern and denounce yesteryear's blind spots, and even feel vaguely superior because we are able to do so; it is far more difficult to discern our own. And to these big "world-viewish" structures of thought must be added the rippling recurrence of the many temptations to avarice, pride, sexual libertinism, and lust for power.

All this is the common reflection of Christians across the centuries. Certainly I have tried to think about these matters periodically throughout my adult life; most of us have. Recently, however, two things have forced me to probe them more than I have before.

(1) Writing the book Christ and Culture Revisited forced me to ponder a little more seriously the way Christians are simultaneously part of a culture and set over against it, how they are influenced by the culture for good and ill, and influence it in return, likewise for good and ill.

(2) Increasing reflection on the sheer speed, volume, and democratic openness of the Internet prompts guarded thanks for access to useful information, and sheer horror at the potential for abuse and corruption.

(a) One cannot help but be thankful for the way the Internet can disseminate vast quantities of useful information, how books and other sources once available only in the best libraries are now, for countless hundreds of millions of people, only a click away.

(b) Equally we ought to be thankful for the way independent voices on the Internet sometimes puncture the pretentious or plainly false claims of the major traditional media. Granted, as Lord Acton insisted, that all power corrupts, and that absolute power corrupts absolutely, one does not like to see too many news sources falling into too few hands. The Internet is gloriously irreverent to the major traditional media. I am not suggesting that Internet information is intrinsically more reliable than information disseminated on television or in newspapers and weekly journals; I'm merely saying that multiplication of sources of information is more likely to ensure freedom and truth than entrusting all the sources of information distribution into too few hands.

(c) But there are many downsides as well. The sleaze and trash on the net are stupefying. Porn, for example, was certainly not invented by the Internet, but the Internet makes it constantly accessible to everyone. Some reports say that more money is now spent in western countries on porn than on tobacco, alcohol, and hard drugs combined. What is this doing to human relationships, to marriages, to the gift of godly imagination?

(d) Because the Internet is spectacularly accessible, almost anyone can voice an opinion or make a claim. In this sense, it is the most "democratic" of the media. Occasionally this means that voices otherwise silenced, voices that should be heard, are indeed heard. Much more commonly, voices multiply that are ill-informed, opinionated, often pretentious and arrogant. A higher percentage of these voices were weeded out when the distribution was via print, radio, or television; by democratizing the delivery system, every voice can be published, and it becomes culturally unacceptable even to suggest that some voices are not worth publishing. This does nothing to enhance either discernment or self-discipline. As Michael Kinsley likes to ask, "How many blogs does the world need?"

(e) Much more interesting, and more difficult to predict, is the phenomenon called "groundswell" (see esp. Charline Li and Josh Bernoff, Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies [Boston: Harvard Business Press, 2008]). Opinions and responses coagulate and drive topics and evaluations in uncontrollable and largely unpredictable directions. This can foster openness; alternatively, what is perceived to be a cultural consensus on some matter or other may simply be wrong.

(f) The speed of the Internet is stunning. A few years ago I was attending a meeting of pastors, most of us with our laptops out taking notes during the complex discussions, when the chap next to me turned his screen to me and invited me to read what was there. About fifteen minutes earlier he had said something to the group. What he had said was summarized and sent by another member of the group to his associate back home. The associate blogged the information, and that blog was picked up by an RSS feed that brought the information to the blog of one of the assistants of the chap beside me. That assistant emailed his boss, and there was the question on the screen: "Did you really say that?" Amusing, even fun–but such speed is encouraging us to bash out responses before we've heard another side, before we've had time to evaluate, before we've pondered whether or not it is wise and godly to respond at all, before we've cooled down and been careful in our choice of words. When you set out to write a book, a good editor fosters such virtues, but most blogs pass through the hands of no editors, and graceful communication is not thereby enhanced.

(g) Scarcely less important than speed of access is the Internet's sheer intoxicating addictiveness—or, more broadly, we might be better to think of the intoxicating addictiveness of the entire digital world. Many are those who are never quiet, alone, and reflective, who never read material that demands reflection and imagination. The iPods provide the music, the phones constant access to friends, phones and computers tie us to news, video, YouTube, Facebook, and on and on. This is not to demonize tools that are so very useful. Rather, it is to point out the obvious: information does not necessarily spell knowledge, and knowledge does not necessarily spell wisdom, and the incessant demand for unending sensory input from the digital world (says he, as he writes this on a computer for an electronic theological journal) does not guarantee we make good choices. We have the potential to become world citizens, informed about every corner of the globe, but in many western countries the standards of geographical and cross-cultural awareness have seriously declined. We have access to spectacularly useful information, but most of us diddle around on ephemeral blogs and listen to music as enduring as a snowball in a blast furnace. Sometimes we just become burned out by the endless waves of bad news, and decide the best course is to turn the iPod volume up a bit.

One more example of a slightly different sort: In a recent fascicle of First Things, Joseph Bottum and Ryan T. Anderson write a fascinating essay titled "Stem Cells: A Political History." They carefully chart the way the story has been told by the media since 2001 when President Bush allowed the use of federal funds for embryonic stem-cell research. That's right, he allowed it; no president before him, including Clinton, had done so. Bush did restrict the use of federal funds to previously established stem-cell lines, largely because he was afraid of the dehumanizing effects of simply harvesting stem cells from embryos. Meanwhile, private companies could experiment as they wanted. The next six years stirred up a torrent of opprobrium. Bush was against science, people were not going to be cured if he continued to have his way, and so forth. The detailed documentation provided by Bottum and Anderson is captivating. Then, using mice, Shinya Yamanaka demonstrated that fully pluripotent stem cells could be created directly from adult cells. By November 2007, two independent teams published the results of their work showing that human pluripotent stem cells could be produced without using embryos, cloning, or human eggs. The story dropped away from the front pages of the media. Nor do these same media now report how the small but genuine advances made in stem-cell research—for instance, in MS, lupus, and scleroderma—at least in the US, have almost without exception sprung from work with adult stem cells. The "spin" on the story has shaped public opinion: conservatives oppose stem cell research, and liberals are for it. What Carl Trueman calls "the wages of spin" shape not only what we think is newsworthy, but our ethical reflection and our perception of what is for the public good.

These precise challenges never faced Paul, Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, and Turretin. But what does it mean not to let the world squeeze us into its mold in the opening decade of the twenty-first century?

I shall not here review the Christian resources God has kindly lavished on us to enable us not to conform to the pattern of this world. If we are to be transformed by the renewing of our mind, then we must be reading the Scriptures perennially, seeking to think God's thoughts after him, focusing on the gospel of God and pondering its implications in every domain of life. We need to hear competing voices of information from the world around us, use our time in the digital world wisely, and learn to shut that world down when it becomes more important to get up in the morning and answer emails than it does to get up and read the Bible and pray. We may also learn much from church history, where we observe fellow believers in other times and cultures learning the shape of faithfulness. We begin to detect how easily the "world" may squeeze us into its mold. We soon learn that adequate response is more than mere mental resolve, mere disciplined observance of the principle "garbage in, garbage out" (after all, we are what we think), though it is not less than that. The gospel is the power of God issuing in salvation. Empowered by the Holy Spirit and living in the shadow of the cross and resurrection, we find ourselves wanting to be conformed to the Lord Jesus, wanting to be as holy and as wise as pardoned sinners can be this side of the consummation.

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John MacArthur - 2 Corinthians 5:21

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What Is A True Disciple?

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John MacArthur: The Ugliness Of Christmas

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Most Important Paragraph For Piper

From theocentriblog:

"That is the most life changing paragraph outside the Bible I have ever read. It has shaped everything I have though, preached, written and done one way or another for the last 25 years”

Want to know what it is? See below:

“God is glorified within Himself these two ways: 1. By appearing... to Himself in His own perfect idea [of Himself], or in His Son, who is the brightness of His glory. 2. By enjoying and delighting in Himself, by flowing forth in infinite . . . delight towards Himself, or in his Holy Spirit...So God glorifies Himself toward the creatures also in two ways: 1. By appearing to... their understanding. 2. In communicating Himself to their hearts, and in their rejoicing and delighting in, and enjoying, the manifestations which He makes of Himself...God is glorified not only by His glory's being seen, but by its being rejoiced in. When those that see it delight in it, God is more glorified than if they only see it. His glory is then received by the whole soul, both by the understanding and by the heart. God made the world that He might communicate, and the creature receive, His glory; and that it might [be] received both by the mind and heart. He that testifies his idea of God's glory [doesn't] glorify God so much as he that testifies also his approbation of it and his delight in it [Jonathan Edwards, The Miscellanies, 13:495] from audio of Piper, “A God-Entranced Vision of All Things: Why We Need Jonathan Edwards 300 Years Later”).

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Lecrae, Flame and The Ambassador

Flame - "Go Buck"



The Ambassador - "Gimme Dat"



Lecrae - "Go Hard"



Lecrae - "Don't Waste Your Life"



Lecrae Featuring Trip Lee - "Jesus Muzik"



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Prince Of Peace

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John MacArthur - Hard To Believe

Part 1



Part 2



Part 3



Now compare the John MacArthur interview with this:


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John Piper - Unconditional Election And Counseling

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Being Thankful For Pain

From Tullian Tchividjian:

Many of us live in a country which has convinced us that the pursuit of happiness and comfort is our “inalienable right.” Therefore, when our comforts, conveniences, and cushions are threatened, we cry “foul.” This has seriously affected our understanding of what it means to give thanks and the types of things we are to be thankful for.

I love reading biographies. And one of the things I have discovered in reading them is that the greatest people in history have been just as thankful for their pains as they have been for their pleasures. They have given gratitude for their desperations as much as their deliverances; their grief as much as their glory.

Charles Spurgeon once said, “Health is a gift from God, but sickness is a gift greater still.” Throughout his time in this world, Spurgeon suffered with various physical ailments that eventually took his life prematurely. He longed to be well but he recognized the supreme value of being sick and he thanked God for it because it was his pain that caused him to desperately draw near to God.

Similarly, David Brainerd was a young missionary to American Indians who died in 1747 at 29 years old from tuberculosis. Toward the end of his struggle, he was on his deathbed coughing up blood and coming in and out of consciousness saying out loud, “Oh for Holiness! Oh, for more of God in my soul! Oh, this pleasing pain! It makes my soul press after God.”

The Puritans used to say that this life was the gymnasium, the dressing room, for the life to come and if suffering here and now better prepared them for the next world then it was welcomed.

To be thankful for our comforts only is to make an idol of this life. “God-sent afflictions”, says Maurice Roberts, “have a health-giving effect upon the soul” because they are the medicine used to purge the soul of self-centeredness and this world’s vanities. Pain, in other words, sharpens us, matures us, and gives us clear “eye-sight.” Pain transforms us like nothing else can. It turns us into “solid” people. Roberts continues, “Those who have been in the crucible have lost more of their scum.” All of this should cause us to be deeply thankful.

It has been said that pain is the second best thing because it leads us to the Best Thing (God). For, it is only when we come to the end of ourselves that we come to the beginning of God. And it is only when we come to the beginning of God that we come to the beginning of life.

The paradox of Christianity is that if you want to find your life, you must lose it (Matthew 10:39). In the world’s economy, life precedes death; In God’s economy, death precedes life. The cross always precedes the crown; desperation always precedes deliverance. The good news, however, the thing that should cause us to be both supremely thankful and hopeful, is this: when we lose our worldly comforts, we gain heavenly ones. Thank God!

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The Baptist Confession Of Faith Of 1689 - Rewritten In Modern English

From Founders Ministries:

CHAPTER 15 - REPENTANCE UNTO LIFE AND SALVATION

1. SOME of the elect are not converted until well on in life, having continued in the state in which they were born, and having followed after all kinds of evil cravings and pleasures. Then God's effectual call reaches them and He gives them repentance leading on to life eternal.

Titus 3:2-5.

2. There is not a man on earth who does good and is without sin; and the best of men, through the power and deceitfulness of their indwelling corruptions and the strength of temptation, may commit great sins hateful to God. Because of this, in the covenant of grace God has mercifully made provision that believers who so sin and fall shall be restored, through repentance, to salvation.

Eccles. 7:20; Luke 22:31,32.

3. The repentance that leads on to salvation is a gospel grace by means of which a person who is caused by the Holy Spirit to feel the manifold evils of sin is also caused by faith in Christ to humble himself on account of sin. This humiliation is characterized by godly sorrow, a detestation of the sin, and self-loathing. It is accompanied by prayer for pardon and strength of grace, and also by a purpose and endeavor, in the power supplied by the Spirit, to conduct himself in the sight of God with the consistency of life that pleases Him.

Ps. 119:6,128; Ezek. 36:31; Zech. 12:10; Acts 11:18; 2 Cor. 7:11.

4. Because we carry about with us (as Scripture tells us) a 'body of death' biased towards evil, repentance is to continue through the whole course of our lives. Hence it is every man's duty to repent of each particular sin of which he is conscious, and to do so with particular care.

Luke 19:8; 1 Tim 1:13,15.

5. In the covenant of grace God has made full provision for the preservation of believers in a state of salvation, so that, although even the smallest of sins deserves damnation, there is no sin so great that it will bring damnation to them that repent. This renders the constant preaching of repentance essential.

Isa. 1:16-18; Rom. 6:23.

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R.C. Sproul - Christ Is The Only Way

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The Martyrdom of Polycarp - A.D. 155

From OLD TRUTH:

Three days before he was apprehended, as he was praying at night, he fell asleep, and saw in a dream the pillow take fire under his head, and presently consumed. Waking thereupon, he forthwith related the vision to those about him, and prophesied that he should be burnt alive for Christ's sake. The pursuers having arrived late in the day found him gone to bed in the top room of the house.

Hearing that they were come, he came down, and spoke to them with a cheerful and pleasant countenance: so that they were wonder-struck, who, having never known the man before, now beheld his venerable age and the gravity and composure of his manner, and wondered why they should be so earnest for the apprehension of so old a man. He immediately ordered a table be laid for them, and exhorted them to eat heartily, and begged them to allow him one hour to pray without molestation; which being granted, he rose and began to pray, and was so full of the grace of God, that they who were present and heard his prayers were astonished, and many now felt sorry that so venerable and godly a man should be put to death.

When he was brought to the tribunal, there was a great tumult as soon as it was generally understood that Polycarp was apprehended. The proconsul asked him, if he were Polycarp. When he assented, the former counseled him to deny Christ, saying, 'Consider thyself, and have pity on thy own great age;' and many other such-like speeches which they are wont to make.

The proconsul then urged him, saying, 'Swear and I will release thee; - reproach Christ.'

Polycarp answered, 'Eighty and six years have I served him, and he never once wronged me; how then shall I blaspheme my King, Who hath saved me?'

The proconsul again urged him, 'Swear by the fortune of Caesar.'
Polycarp replied, 'Since you still vainly strive to make me swear by the fortune of Caesar, as you express it, affecting ignorance of my real character, hear me frankly declaring what I am -- I am a Christian - and if you desire to learn the Christian doctrine, assign me a day, and you shall hear.'

Hereupon the proconsul said, 'I have wild beasts; and I will expose you to them, unless you repent.'

'Call for them,' replied Poplycarp.

'I will tame thee with fire,' said the proconsul, 'since you despise the wild beasts, unless you repent.'

Then said Polycarp, 'You threaten me with fire, which burns for an hour, and is soon extinguished; but the fire of the future judgment, and of eternal punishment reserved for the ungodly, you are ignorant of. But why do you delay? Do whatever you please.'

The proconsul sent the herald to proclaim thrice in the middle of the Stadium, 'Polycarp hath professed himself a Christian.' Which words were no sooner spoken, but the whole multitude, both of Gentiles and Jews, dwelling at Smyrna, with outrageous fury shouted aloud, 'This is the doctor of Asia, the father of the Christians, and the subverter of our gods, who hath taught many not to sacrifice nor adore.'

They now called on Philip the asiarch, to let loose a lion against Polycarp. But he refused, alleging that he had closed his exhibition. They then unanimously shouted, that he should be burnt alive. For his vision must needs be accomplished - the vision which he had when he was praying, and saw his pillow burnt. The people immediately gathered wood and other dry matter from the workshops and baths.

When they would have fastened him to the stake, he said, 'Leave me as I am; for he who giveth me strength to sustain the fire, will enable me also, without your securing me with nails, to remain without flinching in the pile.' Upon which they bound him without nailing him. So he said thus: - 'O Father, I bless thee that thou hast counted me worthy to receive my portion among the martyrs.'

As soon as he had uttered the word 'Amen,' the officers lighted the fire. The flame, forming the appearance of an arch, as the sail of a vessel filled with wind, surrounded, as with a wall, the body of the martyr; which was in the midst, not as burning flesh, but as gold and silver refining in the furnace. We received also in our nostrils such a fragrance as proceeds from frankincense or some other precious perfume.

At length the wicked people, observing that his body could not be consumed with fire, ordered the confecter to approach, and to plunge his sword into his body. Upon this such a quantity of blood gushed out, that the fire was extinguished.

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Jeff Noblit - Your Works Are Filthy Rags

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Tim Conway - Prideful Men Will Go To Hell

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Tim Conway - Only One Way To Attain Righteousness

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When Grace Comes Home - Witness - Part 3 of 3

A dear sister in Christ sent my mom the book, "When Grace Comes Home" by Terry L. Johnson. My family just finished reading the book and we highly recommend it. It is God-centered, God honoring, Bible saturated, enriching and very edifying. You can purchase the book HERE.

3. Confidence in ordained means guards us from compromise. If you are convinced that only God can convert a sinner, that He does so through His gospel message, then you won’t be tempted to equivocate when the message is rejected. When the world responds to the gospel with complaints that it is ‘too hard’, or ‘too serious’, or ‘too negative’, which has always been the world’s response, the temptation to water-down the message can be enormous. Many ministries have been reduced to entertaining goats, as William Still calls it, rather than feeding sheep. ‘Let goats entertain goats,’ he says, ‘and let them do it in goatland.’

The Apostle Paul warned of this in his own day:

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires; and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths (2 Tim. 4:3, 4).

His answer? ‘Preach the word…reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction’ (2 Tim. 4:2). He said of his ministry:

…we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God (2 Cor. 4:2, NIV).

The conviction that God is sovereign does this for one. One looks to God and not human ingenuity. One is not tempted to make the gospel more palatable to worldlings. One knows that is unpalatable. This is expected. One knows that the unregenerate heart is hard. One knows that it cannot understand what we’re saying (1 Cor. 2:14). What are we to do then? Proclaim the gospel. It is the power of God. It is ‘living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword.’ (Heb. 4:12) One can trust God to work through His appointed means without manipulating the audience or the message. God encourages the Apostle Paul to continue in Corinth saying, ‘I have many people in this city’ (Acts 18:10). They were not yet converted, but they would be. The gospel itself would be the means of digging them out. I believe the same is true for us today. We don’t need to use psychological pressure. It doesn’t work anyway. We don’t need to tone down the message. We would weaken its effectiveness by doing so. What we need to do is depend upon the God-appointed means and get out of the way.

Sadly, the popularity of gimmicks in the churches reveals a lack of faith in the gospel. Behind the dog and pony shows is a lack of faith in the God who gave the gospel. When people again begin to believe in the sovereignty of God, I suspect a lot of these novelties will pass from the scene. The program of the churches will be scaled back and simplified. We will preach, pray, and watch the mighty hand of God at work.

Second, the doctrines of grace encourage and motivate the evangelist. Rather than destroying the incentive for evangelism, the doctrines of grace have often motivated the servants of Christ to proclaim the gospel in what have sometimes seemed impossible situations. Why? Because God can change anyone’s heart. If the ‘heart of the king’ is in the hand of the Lord, and He turns it where He wishes, and the king is the ultimate in personal sovereignty, always doing his own will (exactly the Proverb’s point), then God can turn anyone’s heart – the Apostle Paul’s – anybody’s (Prov. 21:1). This conviction has emboldened men to stand for the truth in the face of ridicule, violence, and death. It has given them confidence of success amidst hostility, apathy, and incomprehension at home and abroad. Here is the difference. The Arminian preaches with the vision of Christ meekly knocking at the door of the heart of the sinner. Jesus waits. The evangelist waits. Nothing can happen until the sovereign will of man allows God to help. A hard heart can look particularly hopeless in these circumstances. The Calvinist has a different image altogether. His Jesus is not passively waiting. He kicks the door down. There is no door that He cannot kick down. He can save anyone at anytime!

Over the centuries, the greatest Protestant evangelists and missionaries have been Calvinists. The sixteenth century Reformation itself, above all else, was a religious revival. Its leaders were more than theologians. They were primarily preachers of the gospel and evangelists. Yet, most of them were Augustinians. The great Puritan preachers of the seventeenth century were all Calvinists. John Bunyan was a Calvinist. The greatest evangelist who ever lived, George Whitfield, the star of the eighteenth century Evangelical Awakening, was a Calvinist. The other men of the ‘Great Awakening’ era, excepting the Wesleys (whom Packer, nevertheless, calls ‘confused Calvinists’), were Calvinists. We think of the Welshman Howell Harris, the American Presbyterians, Williams and Gilbert Tennant, the great Jonathan Edwards, Daniel Rowlands, and many others. In the nineteenth century, the English Baptist, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, and the saintly Scotsman, Robert Murray McCheyne, were Calvinists. Even in the twentieth century, admittedly not the most successful era for Biblical Calvinism, Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, and D. James Kennedy, author of the Evangelism Explosion, are both Calvinists.

As for missionaries, virtually to a man all of the founders of the modern missionary movement were Calvinists. One can begin with the father of modern missions, William Carey, and his fellow laborers among the Baptists. They were all Calvinists. The non-conformists, Robert Morrison, missionary to China, and Robert Moffat, missionary to Africa, were Calvinists. The leaders of the missions movement in the Church of England, Henry Venn, John Newton, Richard Cecil, and Thomas Scott, were all Calvinists. In Scotland, John Wilson, John Anderson, Alexander Duff, David Livingston, John G. Paton and the other pioneer missionaries were Calvinists. It is a remarkable thing, yet true. Rather than undermining evangelism and missions, Calvinism seems to promote it. Whitefield’s biographer, Dallimore, suggests that this was true of Whitfield for the very reasons we’re stating. He preached with confidence that God ‘is able to save the uttermost.’ He can change a human heart.

I have been ordained to the gospel ministry for over fifteen years now. There have been a number of people during those years about whom I have thought, ‘They’ll never be reached.’ Maybe you have been aware of such people in your own circle of ministry. You may have a gospel-hardened sibling or parent, child, or neighbor. You are tempted to think of them, ‘They’ll never be converted.’ You are tempted to give up on them.

Never give up. You may ask my wife: I never give up on people. Why? Not because I’m such a magnanimous person. I don’t give up because I believe in the sovereignty of God. God can save anyone. Jonathan Edwards once wrote a Narrative of Surprising Conversions. We’ve seen some surprises. We continue to witness, from the pulpit and the pew, week-in and week-out to hard hearts and hard heads because, if they are to be saved, it is the gospel which will do it.

Does Calvinism make a difference? Oh yes, it does. It forces us to depend upon God and not ourselves. It gives us confidence and hope in the task of gospel witness. And I am convinced that when revival comes, it will be these convictions which will lead the way.

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When Grace Comes Home - Witness - Part 2 of 3

A dear sister in Christ sent my mom the book, "When Grace Comes Home" by Terry L. Johnson. My family just finished reading the book and we highly recommend it. It is God-centered, God honoring, Bible saturated, enriching and very edifying. You can purchase the book HERE.

2. Confidence in ordained means guards us from the temptation to use coercive methods. A significant amount of today’s mass evangelism leans on psychological ploys in order to produce decisions. A great deal of attention is paid to the mood that is set at these meetings. The environment must be ‘non-threatening’, warm, and upbeat. Attractive music and attractive people are paraded to the microphones to help establish the proper setting for the message. Following the message, a decision is called for, and then encouraged by a mass movement of people forward, often inaugurated , by ‘counselors’. This herd movement is crucial in turning the will of the unconverted. Multiple stanzas of soft music such as ‘Just As I Am,’ are played, extending the time given to respond and the psychological pressure.

The problem freely admitted by those who are engaged in this kind of meeting (and the many, many churches that mimic this style in their weekly services) is that many of those who ‘decide for Christ’ soon fall away. The percentage that become true disciples of Christ is very, very low. Our explanation for the fallout rate is that many of the conversions are psychological only, responses to the various non-spiritual pressures being applied; i.e., the emotional (music), the social (the herd), and, depending on what message is given, the carnal (desire for ‘fire insurance’, solving of personal problems, etc.). The antidote is unadorned gospel preaching. The gospel itself, apart from its wrappings, is the ‘power of God unto salvation’ (Rom. 1:16). The Holy Spirit must persuade the heart and turn the will if a person is to be truly converted. Everything else is a counterfeit.

(Continued on next post...)

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When Grace Comes Home - Witness - Part 1 of 3

A dear sister in Christ sent my mom the book, "When Grace Comes Home" by Terry L. Johnson. My family just finished reading the book and we highly recommend it. It is God-centered, God honoring, Bible saturated, enriching and very edifying. You can purchase the book HERE.

My next few posts are excerpts from the chapter "Witness".

…..First, the doctrines of grace teach dependence upon God. What are we saying about a sinner? We are saying that he cannot convert himself, and we cannot convert him. The making of a Christian does not lie in the natural ability of the preacher or the listener. God must convert him. Because men are dead in sin and lovers of darkness, it takes a miracle to make a Christian, a miracle that only God can do. For us to be ‘successful’ in ministry, we must depend upon God to change hearts. If our theology said a little less than this, for example, that man is only sick and not dead, then we might not have to depend upon on God so much. We can give medicine to the sick. But we emphatically cannot raise the dead. We could persuade those who have the ability to repent and believe to turn to Christ. But we cannot argue a corpse out of its grave.

Okay, then how do we get God to do it? Answer: Through the ordained means. Preach the gospel, live the gospel, and pray. We could say more, especially about worship and the sacraments, but this is an adequate summary for now. If we will concentrate on these things, we will have a much greater likelihood of seeing a significant work of God than we would otherwise. Why? Because these are the means He has given to grow His church. Thus, this may be the crucial conviction for truly successful evangelism, and here’s why…..

1. Confidence in ordained means will guard us from distraction. Nearly every day I get in my mail an announcement of some new technique, some new program, some new method of growing the church. There are seminars galore. What do they teach? They teach you to work on a number of ‘common sense’ items which help your ministry. Work on appearances, they say. Be sure that your facilities are clean and neat. Work on organization. Borrow from methods of Wall Street and big business. Work on image. Let Madison Avenue ensure that you project the right image to the world. Work on your program. Have something for everyone, young and old, married and single, divorced and remarried, athletic and handicapped. Enormous energy is now being expended by the churches in these areas. This is how we can grow the church, it is thought.

Nothing is inherently wrong with any of this. The problem with it is that it is a tremendous distraction. If all the energy, thought, and time that is being put into these things (demographic surveys and all) were being put into proclamation and prayer, there is no doubt that the church would be ahead. It is scandalous when these external things are the focus in churches which give almost no time to prayer, and little time to preaching. These other activities are not irrelevant, but they come close to being irrelevant when measured by the gospel itself. It is the gospel which is the power of God. The ‘style’ of a church can be comically poor and God can still bless it. The Apostle Paul said of his preaching,

And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God…And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God (1 Cor. 2:1, 3, 4, 5).

He was content with weak methodology because its very weakness provided the black backdrop for the gospel diamond to sparkle more clearly. God’s power is ‘perfected in weakness’ (2 Cor. 12:9). When we are weak we are strong, because our work is more convincingly supernatural when human strength is absent. The faith of the Corinthians might have rested on ‘the wisdom of men,’ had the Apostle Paul preached with stylistic finesse. Because he didn’t, they saw not a clever man but a ‘demonstration of the Spirit and of power.’ When we concentrate on the simple, basic means and don’t worry about the glitter, people can’t say, ‘They were successful because of such and such a program or technique.’ They will, instead, conclude that God must be in it, and they will truly believe because their faith will not ‘rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.’ His message?

For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified (1 Cor. 2:2).

‘Christ crucified’ is the message that manifests the power of God. Because God is sovereign we should concentrate on proclaiming it and praying the power of God into it. God, in a moment of revival power, can do more than all our organizing and programming efforts can accomplish in a lifetime. Revivals are born in prayer meetings, not board rooms. This conviction will keep us focused and on track.

(Continued on next post...)

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The Christmas Gift That Lasts For Eternity

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It's All About Jesus

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Repentance

From THEOparadox:

Repentance is turning, not just FROM SIN, but also TO CHRIST. In repentance, we turn from "irresistible" sin to an irresistible Savior. We draw back from the fleeting pleasures of sin and run headlong into the eternal joys of Christ. He becomes the object of our pursuit, the Friend from Whom we cannot bear to be distant, the delight and satisfaction of our souls. As we were smitten with sin, and willing to give all for it, we are now smitten with HIM and willing to give all for this Wonderful One. He amazes us! Repentance leads us to Christ, not merely as the Substitute Who was punished in our place, but as the replacement for the sin that we formerly cherished. Every desire we have had for sin should rightly have been directed toward Him. Every enjoyment of earthly pleasure should have been an enjoyment of Him. All the love we have had for worldly things should have been love for Him. The self-importance with which we puffed ourselves up should have been ascribed to Him as glory and honor and worship. The proud confidence we have wasted on ourselves should have been dependence on His grace and faith in His goodness. All the service and submission we have given to sin should have been His. Rather than slavishly laboring for sin, we should have surrendered to His sovereign lordship. Repentance says these things.

By our sin, we have expressed a low view of Christ. Now, in repentance, we again see Him enthroned, glorious, exalted, worthy, attractive, beautiful, capable, wise, desirable and perfect. He is the SUBSTITUTE for the sinner and the REPLACEMENT for the sin. He captivates us!

We are not to begin repentance by replacing sin with good works. We are to begin by replacing our love for sin with love for Christ, and we are to replace our acts of sin with acts of devotion to Him. As you read these words, do you see in yourself a lack of zeal and devotion for Jesus Himself? Do you seem to fall short of this high view of Him? Dear friend, do not despair - simply fall before Him and tell Him what you lack. Tell Him you don't even know what you lack. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are in Him, and He will give you whatever you need. He will BE whatever you need!

As we come to Christ in this way, new desires are born in us. We begin to taste the goodness of God and sin becomes less appetizing (and eventually downright disgusting). As I Corinthians 1:30 declares, Christ "has become for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption . . ." and whatever else we may need. It is all in Him. Until this truth becomes real to us, our repentance remains incomplete. But once it is embraced, the embrace is forever! You'll find it in the arms of Jesus, as He becomes more to you than He ever was before.

- By Derek Ashton

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John Piper - Prosperity Gospel: All These Things Will be Added To You?

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Paul Washer - Are You A True Disciple?

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The Tabernacle: A Picture of Christ

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Leonard Ravenhill - The Value Of The Human Soul

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Arthur Pink Quote - Christmas

"Christmas is coming! Quite so; but what is "Christmas"?
Does not the very term itself denote its source-- "Christ-mass."
Thus it is of Romish origin, brought over from Paganism.
But, says someone, Christmas is the time when we commemorate
the Savior's birth. It is? And who authorized such commemoration?
Certainly God did not. The Redeemer bade His disciples "remember"
Him in His death, but there is not a word in Scripture, from
Genesis to Revelation, which tells us to celebrate His birth." - Arthur Pink

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John Piper - He Made Evil Commit Suicide

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John Piper - The Murder Of The Son Of God

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John MacArthur - What The Bible Says About Hell

Part 1



Part 2



Part 3



Part 4



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John 3:16 - James White and Jerry Vines

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C. H. Spurgeon Quote - Obedience

A man who is not obedient to God's commandments is evidently
not a true believer; for, although good works do not save us, yet,
being saved, believers are sure to produce good works.

Though the 'fruit' be not the 'root' of the tree, yet a well
rooted tree will, in its season, bring forth its fruits.

So, though the keeping of the commandments does not
make me a child of God, yet, being a child of God, I shall
be obedient to my heavenly Father.


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RC Sproul - Where Do You Stand Before God?

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