An older John Piper book "God Is The Gospel" (free download here) proved a valuable resource since our church service at Grace Bible Church was cancelled due to the snow.  What do you do when church is cancelled?  Simple. Gather your family and enjoy prayer and reading of the Bible together in your home. Yes, you can have church anywhere.

We focused on the following question that all of us may want to reflect on:

If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you have on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, and all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ was not there? ("God Is The Gospel", John Piper)

When you think about it this way, you start to understand that the most glorious part of the Gospel is God and not ourselves.  Yes, by the Christ dying, a way was made. But what often gets lost in translation is that the glory of the Gospel is the greatness of God, not us.  God is all satisfying.  Consider the following passage:

³And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing. ⁴In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. ⁵For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (2 Corinthians 4:3-6, ESV)

Paul refers to Satan in verse 4 (“the god of this world”) as indication of those who he blinds into disbelief of Christ. As we are inundated in this world with money, power, and pleasure, they are obstacles that coerce people to turn a blind eye to Christ.  When those become the cornerstone of our lives, we have made Satan our god and in doing so, perish as mentioned in verse 3.

Continuing, Paul make’s it obvious that the preaching of the Gospel was about God and not about him (2 Corinthians 4:5).  When we read or speak the Gospel, it’s not about us, what we’ve accomplished, our abilities, etc.  Rather, people need introduced to Christ not us.  It’s great to see the miracles that Christ may have done in our lives, from breaking addictions to healing.  However, we limit the Gospel, hence not preaching the real Gospel, when we present it and we are the focus or partial focus.

Finally, Paul shows that the splendor of the Gospel is “…the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6).  We should take from this a lesson in humbleness, and a reality check.  That when we speak the Gospel, we have to focus on God as the Gospel and not ourselves.

JS

“Schedules, meetings and business, oh my!” Like the cry chanted in the classic Wizard of Oz, this phrase can be easily adapted and applied to the busyness of our lives today of modern culture. We have been conditioned to believe that we have to have this new SUV or that oversized house or any number of material things that really do not matter at all in the big picture of God’s plan.

I’ll be the first to admit that there is nothing wrong with having nice things. If you are blessed with a job that allows you to afford such things and can do so without falling into idolatry, then have at it. However, more often than not, our eyes are focused on the wrong prize. Whether it’s the wife pleading for that bigger house, or the husband justifying overtime for that 55” LCD HDTV, our wants often become a stumbling block in our path to enjoying our reward.

What? A house on the hill or the latest big screen sounds like a pretty good reward to me. So what could there possibly be that is more of a reward than that? How about your children. One needs to look no further than the passage of Scripture below to see just how precious our children are:

3 Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward.  4 Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. 5 Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate. -Psalm 127:3-5

So many times we take our kids for granted. In some way that we’re entitled to them and allow the priority of them and their upbringing in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Eph. 6:4) to fade into our busy lifestyle after the preciousness factor of their infancy wears off. It seems the older they get, the more we fail to see their need for our guidance through this culture of pluralism and relativism. There’s two parts of this particular passage of Scripture that merit attention.

A Reward

First, in verse 3 we see that children are not only “…a heritage from the Lord”, but also that the “…fruit of the womb” is a reward. God is present in the creation of all humans (Psalm 139:13-18), regardless how we get here. Granted, God’s plan is for children to be conceived in marriage. But, for those conceived in other ways such as rape or illegitimacy, we may feel that they are not necessarily a blessing from God. However, our frail human feelings do no override God’s sovereignty in the child’s creation as mentioned by David. Thus, there is no such thing as illegitimate children, only illegitimate parents. God has a purpose and plan for everyone of us, regardless the way we are born. So with the aforementioned considerations, it is obvious that children are in fact a reward. And not just a reward, but a reward from the Creator of all!

What exists on earth that could compare to a reward from the Creator of all creation? We answer that question with every hour of overtime that keeps us from our children to make a lousy few more dollars. Some of us need to take our spouses and/or children by the hand and repent for how we have treated such a gift from a holy and righteous God with such disregard.

A Weapon

The second part that I’d like to look at are verses 4-5. Not only are our children a reward, but like “…arrows in the hand of a warrior”. That is, a way for us as Christians to shape the world in which we live and the future through them. They are not an obstacle, nuisance, or distraction. They are weapons. As an avid bow hunter, I can tell you that the spine and straightness of an arrow have everything in the world to do with how accurate and effective my bow will be.

The best way to reference the importance of our efforts in discipling and evangelizing our children can be given below, ironically the same way an arrow’s qualities are seen.

The heavier the arrow, the stiffer the spine (or flexibility) the more energy it is capable of storing. When an archer draws a bow back, the energy stored in the flexed limbs of the bow is called “potential energy”. When string is released, the energy is transferred to the arrow. The arrow’s ability to absorb and carry that energy, now known as “kinetic energy”, is based on its weight and stiffness.

Light arrows fly faster, but pack less energy and are deflected by unforeseen obstacles easier. Heavy, stiff arrows are more durable and pack more of punch when they hit their target. You can compare the lighter arrows to children flying around with little (if any) instruction or discipleship from so-called Christian parents. They will get pushed astray easily by obstacles thrown before them from culture from sex to drugs to you name it. However, it is the child whose parent’s take their responsibility to disciple and evangelize their child that God commands seriously, who will stand a better chance to press forth and persevere. Why? Simple. That child has a strong, Biblical foundation to consult and seek answers from, rather than a PlayStation3 or Xbox 360 when life gets tough. Their “potential energy” is gathered as their parents spend hours at home discipling and evangelizing them. The enemy has little to no chance, as their “kinetic energy” is realized as they make impact during life’s spiritual battles.

If we truly are to conform to God’s will and see children as He does, we will see them as a reward and a weapon. We will reap the unspeakable joy in delighting in His reward and launching our arrows towards the enemy with uncanny accuracy.

JS

Tim Tebow looks to be a winner yet again.  This time, the former Heisman Award winner will take on a new opponent.  Culture.  Fueled by liberal, feminist organizations such as the National Organization for Women (NOW), Women’s Media Center and others, a defense is mounting to keep him off the airwaves Super Bowl Sunday.

Culture (and even churches) has placed this day on such a pedestal, that nothing shall impede on its spotlight.  That anyone with the audacity to speak or do anything that may distract from the glory of beer commercials, racy web domain ads, or has-been music artists with modesty popping out, should be silenced and put away until after this sacred ritual is complete.

Focus on the Family has bought airtime during the Super Bowl to celebrate life.  The ad features Tim Tebow and his mother retelling the story of her pregnancy with him and a decision she made to have Tim, rather than terminate the pregnancy as suggested by doctors.  Pam had contracted amoebic dysentery while doing missionary work in the Philippines.  The medicines used to treat it threatened young Tebow in the womb.

(Click here if you can’t see video above)

This story has irony all around it.  I just wonder what is the most ironic of all?  Could it be the women’s rights groups who blatantly ignore mainstream commercials who downplay them in lieu of beer or other “manly” things just because they do so in a culturally acceptable humorous way?  Or how about the screams from the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Affairs (LGBT) group, despite the lifestyle they promote cannot conceive children?  Or the fact that because of families and the family unit, there will be groups gathered in large numbers to watch this game?

Despite confirmation that the term “abortion” is not mentioned (which is ok by me, I think the more accurate term is “infant homicide”) anywhere in the ad, these groups are livid.  Why would someone be so upset about someone celebrating life?  Perhaps this is a good barometer of exactly how much hatred culture has for the family unit as a whole and Christian living (2 Timothy 3:12).

I do not know Tim Tebow personally, nor do I claim to know his heart.  However, I can know him from afar, as can all of us, by his fruits.  Whether preaching in prisons while friends are on spring break, or taking missionary trips to the Philippines, I like the fruits that I see.  Those are the fruits that will be examined by the only One who matters (Matthew 7:19-21).  Let’s be glad someone with that type of fruit will be front and center among an orchard of rotten fruit on Super Bowl Sunday.

JS

I’m just a simple person, really.  I don’t find any benefit living in the grey, everything is pretty much black and white.  That has been a benefit to me by God’s grace in understanding Biblical principles and not falling victim to the postmodern “christianity” that has infected churches throughout the land.  You know the type. Churches that are so seeker-friendly that the Bible and sound teaching is tossed out the window to ensure that the seats are filled and the offering buckets are heavy.  Churches should be seeker-friendly, but they fail to understand that the seeker is God.  It is Him who is to be pleased and glorified.  Everything we do should be done for His glory and His glory alone.

When you consider the masses corrupted by this type of unbiblical teaching (a great explanation of the problem with churches here), the outcries of theodicy when natural disasters like the recent earthquake in Haiti occur become the norm.  Non-believers love to use this for ammunition as they load their guns of deceit and try to put holes in a believer’s faith.  It usually goes something like this…

“If your God is so good and so powerful, why does he allow bad things to happen like the earthquake in Haiti?  Can’t he stop them?”

Many of us will stop and stumble and open our mouths only to mutter something like Ralph Kramden in the episode of the Honeymooners where he gets caught with a suitcase of counterfeit money.  “Humada-Humada!” Truth be told, this question is only asked this way by a selfish person who has no concept of the sovereignty of God and that He “rules over all” (Psalm 103:19).

To ask the question that way, is to assume the supremacy of man and question as to why God will not put forth His mighty power to serve the almighty man.  Do you see how twisted that is?  It’s assuming that somehow, man in and of himself is deserving of something other than the wrath of God.  As shown in the video below, perhaps the right way to ask the question would be something like this…

“How can a holy and righteous God know what I did and thought and said on yesterday and not kill me in my sleep last night?”

That my friends is how to ask that question. And when you flip it around like that, you are recognizing the supremacy of Christ.  Take a look at the 5 minute clip below for the answer from one of the most authentic pastors today.

Click here if you cannot see the video above.

Hopefully this short clip has shown how foolish, and perhaps disingenuous folks are who ask such a question.

JS

One of the greatest of Biblically-sound, modern-day preachers was once asked, “Boy…can you be alone?” by a seasoned pastor as he was entering into a career of preaching. At first, he thought the inference to be referencing 2 Timothy 3:12. In other words, that his “being alone” would be caused by his choice to preach the Gospel. While that is true, as myself and fellow pastors can attest to, he was referring to being alone with God in prayer.

Crazily, a “lonely” woman in the midst of the hell that has been unleashed on Haiti in the form of an earthquake has discovered just that.  Ena Zizi was at a church meeting when she was trapped for over a week underneath rubble that used to be a church.  There was another who was there, but he fell silent.  At that point she continued to pray and wait.  Perhaps the most profound was her quote regarding the situation,

“I talked only to my boss, God,” she said. “I didn’t need any more humans.”

We would do well to take heed of her actions.  Too often, because of either poor pastoral counsel or an emphasis on someone’s “best life now”, the power and necessity of prayer (Philippians 4:6-7) are not only overlooked, but discounted.  Let us voluntarily be still and know God (Psalm 46:10) and take advice from the example of Christ and the early church (Mark 1:35; Acts 1:14; 2:42; 3:1; 4:23-31; 6:4; 13:1-3), rather than only use prayer as a last resort.

JS

Well as 2009 has passed on and 2010 is finally here, I thought it a good time to give the blog a new look for the year. Although I’m a diehard Google fan, its Blogger has a ways to go to catch up to Wordpress.  It wasn’t too bad moving all the posts over, just a bit time consuming.  But after some importing here and exporting there, viola!

My journey with Christ consumes me in life and much of my writings.  I have broken free of the Darwinian-based, age-segregated model of youth “ministry”.  Ironically (in terms of evolution) I have evolved to a youth ministry abolitionist. In addition, I have discovered what salvation is, and what salvation isn’t.

For sake of brevity, here’s an explanation of salvation in 2 minutes (notice nothing to do with 4 hoops to jump through and repeat)….

Click here if you can’t see video above…

2010 has thus far been off to a fast and furious start.  I’ve been voted in to a board of elders for a local church plant.  This looks to be exciting, as it is one of the few churches in North Central West Virginia founded on reformed theology.  Our influences include the likes of Paul Washer, Voddie Baucham, John Piper, and Mark Driscoll to name a few.

I hope to have more time to write and promote the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as that is all that matters.  Everything that flows well, flows from it.  This is gonna rock!

JS

Here is irrefutable proof that Santa is dead with scientific proof of the unfortunate account.  However, if Christmas was celebrated for the real reason (Luke 2:10-11), then this wouldn’t be such a big deal.  But, as with any secular idol, it will fail sooner or later.

(AP News Release) North Pole, Arctic Circle - There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist (except maybe in Japan) religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the population reference bureau).

At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to108 million homes, presuming there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming east to west (which seems logical).

This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get onto the next house.

Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but we’ll accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa’s sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second-3,000 times the speed of sound.

For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.

The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself.

On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the “flying” reindeer can pull 10 times the normal amount, the job can’t be done with eight or even nine of them-Santa would need 360,000 of them.

This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch). 600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance – this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft reentering the earth’s atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would adsorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.

Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 mps in .001 seconds, would be subjected to acceleration forces of 17,000 g’s. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo. Therefore, if Santa did exist, he’s dead now.

JS

The halls of the convention center rang with deafening silence as brother Paul Washer brought the Gospel as only he can. There were no catchy clichés or comforting ideas about how to receive your “best life now”.  No, the Gospel, the glorious, scandalous Gospel of Jesus Christ.  It was put in a manner that all in attendance could understand and began like this:

Your home-school education, nice clothes, and manners cannot save you. Flee to Christ!

He continued as the heavy, grievous Holy Spirit began to fill the room:

My desire is to strip you of every hope in the flesh, to shut you off from every hope whatsoever of somehow making yourself right with God by your own virtue and merit. If you repent of trying to clothe yourself in the filthy rags of your own righteousness and fall on Christ, He will save you. Then you will grow in Christ-likeness, and you will know His presence; this is the Gospel.

This is the way the Gospel was meant to be preached. Not the sugar-coated, safe, non-offensive gospel that pastors dish out either every Sunday either out of fear or for self-preservation of themselves and their churches.

Brother Paul also offered this sound advice…

Judge everything you do by this standard: is it really only for Him? If he took everything away and left you only with Him, would you still have joy unspeakable, because your hope is in Him?

Over 2,600 men, women and children were left in a wake, shaken to the core of our sinful soul in what ended in a somber, sobering revelation of just how messed up and how undeserving of His grace and mercy we really are.

Unlike the talking heads on TV or at mega-church circus revivals, there was no manipulative altar call ending or Biblically-ignorant reductions of salvation to 4 questions or any foolish prayers to repeat.  No, only a heartfelt proclamation that he would meet anyone afterwards and stay all night if necessary for those who wanted to deal with their sin and who had the Holy Spirit inside working on their hearts and drawing them to repentance.  He left us with these words…

Throw yourself on Christ, and you will not be disappointed.

JS

Well my mind is racing a thousand miles per second.  My body feels like all is in slow motion as the afternoon session with Paul Washer met with a rush of Starbucks. Between his anointing and the caffeine, let’s just say that I may have a sense of what an addict feels when they come off a high.

Holy smokes. Paul Washer just finished up a message on “Sufficiency of Scripture in Personal Evangelism” and completely destroyed the modern day 4 questions version of salvation.  His message was to the point and not only offered up a recognition of the problem, but a solution as well.

His scathing deliverance of the scriptures finished up in Romans 10.  He meticulously explained the context in which the book of Romans was written, and how the majority of so-called evangelical, Christian churches in the U.S. abuse and twist Romans 10:10 is twisted and ripped out of context and presented as a cheapened version of true salvation.

As with Voddie, I was able to chat with him after the message after waiting in a huge line. (There were so many people, that even the floor was covered with over 100+ folks after the seats filled long before he started.)

Paul and I conversed and I walked away with a few things.  1) I was finally able to thank him in person for his ministry and the work God has done in me through his preaching. 2) As Paul put it to me, “Man, you really married out of your league…” he said with a smile.  I know that I don’t deserve the wonderful wife I’ve been given.  It was a light-hearted moment that we both laughed. 3) Paul is also considering a church plant in WV.  He will be in the Fairmont area next week.  When I get my jaw off the floor, I’ll comment more.

He will be speaking again tonight, I can’t wait.

Wow. The National Center for Family Integrated Churches national “Sufficiency of Scripture 2009: Practically Applied to Church and Family” is playing out to be an incredible event. Last evening Jeff and I were treated to some incredible sessions. You can follow my thoughts “play-by-play” at http://twitter.com/gracebiblewv.

However, I needed no Starbucks to arise this a.m. as we headed out to the convention center.  Voddie Baucham was opening up with a message “Sufficiency of Scripture in Biblical Manhood”.  Boy I could hear the female pastors from area churches back home yelling from here.

While not popular, Voddie courageously took on evangelical feminism and egalitarianism that plague the church today.  Although theologically sound, he more importantly had the foundation of scripture and its sufficiency to stand on and refute the modern culture that has obliterated sound doctrine and teaching in the church.  He also took on government schools and the like and their hatred for Christianity and where it started and what we as Biblical families can do to counter it.  Incredible.  I can’t wait for his breakout session.

Next up, Jeff headed over to “SOS Applied to the Regulative Principle in Old Testament Worship”.  I meanwhile took in R.C. Sproul, Jr. and what was supposed to be “SOS in Biblical Inerrancy”.  However, through God’s provision, his topic changed to “SOS in Suffering” due to a recent tragedy in his church.  (More on this later in the SOS Recap).

Well, going to finish lunch here at the “Wok & Roll” and outrun Godzill-ra back to the convention center and sit in on Paul Washer’s “SOS in Personal Evangelism”.  Stay tuned for details!