“It’s about knowing the Lord I should expect.”

I was reading a parable to Fred, a 95 year old member of our congregation. I asked him if he understood what it was about. In his gentle farmer burr he said “It’s about knowing the Lord I should expect.” Words to live by! What do you expect when you open the Scriptures?

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Happy Friday

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Personality Types [repost]

Part of my ordination training involved doing the Myers-Briggs personality test.  Now I realise that this is not strictly mandated by the Pastoral Epistles, but on the other hand it was a good old giggle. (See mildly amusing prayers for the 16 personality types here.) I came out quite strongly as ENFP which means I’m an inveterate procrastinator, [...]

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Guidance

We’ve thought about the chief error in guidance – believing that our choices make us who we are.  That’s Pelagian/Erasmian/Enlightenment garbage.  But it infects everything. One way it plays out is by feeding a familiar false dichotomy: it’s the old boundary keeper versus tight-rope walker dilemma. The ‘boundary keeper’ believes God has set limits ‘out [...]

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Luke 10 Reloaded

From my local paper… .Puts a new spin on the payback He’ll give when He returns from His long journey (Luke 10:35). .

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Song of Songs aint just a sex manual – besides there aint no “just” to sex

“What assumptions about sex are behind the common opinion that the Song is only an erotic poem, only a celebration of human sexuality and marriage, full stop? Tremper Longman: “There is absolutely nothing in the Song of Songs itself that hints of a meaning different from the sexual meaning.” When commentators express such opinions, are [...]

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How righteous?

This righteous .

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Are we the baddies?

Get this.  Here’s Clark Pinnock as quoted by Mike Horton here: I cannot deny that most believers end their earthly lives imperfectly sanctified and far from complete.  I cannot deny the wisdom in possibly giving them an opportunity to close the gap and grow to maturity after death. Obviously, evangelicals have not thought this question [...]

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We are NOT the choices we have made

Look at this guy, solitary, upright, clear view to the horizon.  In fact he seems to stand between heaven and earth.  He is the Man, surveying all before him, standing on top of the world. And which way will he go?  It’s his call. He is the captain of his soul.  This is man at [...]

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Don’t give em what they want – Give em what they’ve never even imagined

Henry Ford is supposed to have said: “If I’d asked people what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.” .

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Happy Friday

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Zephaniah 2:4-3:8 – sermon

Audio here Ever since Genesis 3 we’ve had the sense that the world out there and our hearts in here are headed somewhere bad.  And it’s not going to end well. We’ve all got our doomsday stories. And in the popular imagination there’s nothing like a post-apocalyptic vision of a deserted city for grabbing our [...]

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Fig leaves and thorns [Thawed out Thursday]

These are not the outskirts of Eden.  ** Yet my defaut mode is to think exactly this.  I wake every morning with peace in the land, money in the bank, food in the cupboard.  I shower in clean drinking water, go to my rewarding job, drink coffee from the other side of the world.  I’ve lost [...]

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Good verses for the 5 solas?

I’m preaching through the five solas of the reformation in August.  We’re beginning with Christ alone. So it’s Christ alone Grace alone Faith alone Scripture alone God’s glory alone So for ten points and control of the next round – can you tell me what Scriptures I should use each week? And any other things [...]

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Now THAT’S how to motivate evangelism!

Source: “Now Betty, would you like to keep those salvations or will you trade them all for what’s in this box??” . Horrifimus maximus! .

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Evangelism seminar 2

Session 1 here Evangelism Session 2 . There are three subjects a preacher can speak on to really turn the guilt screws: Praying, Giving and Evangelism In the year 2000 Jehovah’s Witnesses spent 181 million hours witnessing door to door.  (It’s interesting that they compile such detailed statistics.  And that they publish them!)  A Jehovah’s [...]

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Evangelism seminar 1

Here’s the outline for the first of two seminars I ran on evangelism based in 1 Peter.  They were for a local church’s weekend away… . Evangelism Session 1 . Thought Experiment Think of an evangelist.  What are they like? Think of a person (or some people) who were significant in leading you to Christ?  [...]

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Gnostic Gnasties

Gail Dines writes soberingly of the misogyny of porn.  (ht Tim Chester) And here Doug Wilson speaks of how porn has ironically dampened men’s sexual interest in real women.  He concludes with this memorable line: Porn provides the kind of sex life that someone living in a Matrix pod could enjoy. Which is another reminder [...]

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