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Join us tonight for our first 5th Monday!

On every 5th Monday of the month we’re going to do something a little different : A whole night of singing worship together.

It’s a great night to invite friends—we’ll make sure the Gospel goes out in some way too for any who need to hear. Share this with everyone! See you tonight. ‪#‎5thMonday‬

Tonight we continued our study in practical spirituality, looking at an essential topic for anyone who wants to live the Christian life–How to resist temptation. Here are the notes:

First, a definition: What is temptation? A test where the test is an invitation to use the good things God has created to do evil. 

Why should we resist temptation? Why not just give in?
Because, to give in to temptation is to…

• …ignore God and act like he’s not there—it dishonors God.
• …hurt people and destroy things for the purpose of self-pleasure.
• …bring evil out of good.

How to Resist Temptation:

 and some things you need to do.

What to Know:

1. There is a tempter. (Matthew 4:3, 1 Thessalonians 3:5). So, this is personal.
2. You personally have inclinations that can be tempted. (James 1:12-16)
3. Temptation lies (Ephesians 4:22, Hebrew 3:13)
4. Temptation wars against your soul. (1 Peter 2:11)
5. It wants to bring you into slavery. (John 8:34)
6. Jesus was tempted too. So he understands. (Hebrews 4:15)
7. Jesus defeated temptation as a man. (Hebrews 4:14-16, Mt 4)
8. Jesus wants to help you when you’re tempted. (Hebrews 2:17-18)
9. There is a blessing in enduring temptation. (James 1:12, Mt 5:8)

What to do:

1. Be alert. Know your context and watch it. Know and watch yourself. (1 Thessalonians 5:5-8)
2. When you first smell temptation coming, pray. (Hebrews 4:16)
3. Rely the Spirit’s power to put to death these sinful deeds. (Romans 8:12-14) We rely on the power of the indwelling Spirit by praying—ask him to help you, in that moment, and rely on his help by doing the thing God commands.)
4. Remind yourself about what Scripture says about temptation.
   1. It lies. (1 Peter 2:11)
   2. It wars against my soul. (Ephesians 4:22) (it won’t bless me, it will break me. It will destroy others.)

The point here: Use the statements and promises of scripture to contradict the statements and promises of temptation.

5. Do what you can to get away from it.
   1. “Flee.” (2 Timothy 2:2). Like Joseph from Potiphar’s wife. Run away, regardless of the cost or embarrassment.
   2. “Abstain.” (1 Peter 2:11) (be distant from, avoid contact with)
   3. “Cut off.” (Matthew 18:8-9) Take any action necessary to get sources of sin out of your life. If something tempts you, and you give in to it, get rid of it, regardless of the cost.
   4. “Put off.” (Ephesians 4:21-24) Get it off you.
6. Look for the way of escape. (1 Corinthians 10:7-14)
   1. Notice it.
   2. Pray for help
   3. Then physically do what needs to be done. (walk away…turn your eyes…speak up…   do your duty…say the loving thing…click off…hold still…hold your tongue…)
7. Walk in the Spirit. (Galatians 5:16-21). Practice letting the desires of the Holy Spirit guide your life. This is a lifestyle.
8. Remember Jesus is with us by His Spirit always. (Ephesians 4:30) He sees and knows everything. If we want him to never leave us, we need to remember that he is with us when we’re being tempted. If we want him to hear the prayers we silently think in our heads, we must remember he hears all our thoughts, not just our “prayer” thoughts.

General Practical Thoughts:

1. Memorize scripture and use it during times of temptation. (i.e. Use verses to remind yourself—i.e. this temptation is lying, giving in will not produce the happiness it promises; this temptation wants to fight against me; this temptation will keep me from seeing God, this will grieve the Spirit, etc.)
2. Cultivate your vision of God. So you never want to lose it. (Matthew 5:8)
3. Diligently fulfill your duties. There’s almost always something in front of you that you need to be, or should be, or could be doing. Instead of just trying do nothing really and also trying to resist temptation, get busy doing what needs to be done.
4. Pursue good works. Above and beyond your basic life duties, what Good works are you pursuing in? A life full of active service to God stands a good chance of staying out of sin, because it is full of good things. David watched Bathsheba bathe because he wasn’t out doing what kings should be doing.
5. Avoid sparks. Your mind is made of tinder. Don’t get near things that set it on fire.
6. Stop at nothing to get rid of sin. Make war. Romans 8:13—put it to death.

Summing it up: Pray, trust, act, pray.

Smell the temptation coming. Pray for help. Then act on what ever you need to act on by physically making your body do the next non-sinful thing. Continue with a duty. Remove yourself from a bad situation. The result? You will have resisted the temptation, and no sinned. You must do this every time you are tempted. It may be 30 times in a day.

If you’re not currently a follower of Jesus:

Some thoughts…

• Everyone around us is living a life of totally discovering and giving in to their desires.
• That is our culture’s way of salvation. By giving in to all our desires we’re supposed to find life and happiness and beauty and freedom.
• Jesus preaches the opposite. Many of our desires are twisted, and will destroy us and hurt others if we give in to them. Jesus says that giving in to the twisted part of us will lead to death and misery and brokenness and slavery.
  (To see who might be right, there’s two important tests: 1. The Eye test—How’s everyone doing? How’s our world? Is this big party of giving in to every desire working? 2. The Eternal test—When Jesus comes, the verdict of God will reveal everything. Our witness to what that verdict will be is found in the pages of scripture. God has already told us what he’s going to say the. We can read it all now.
• And—Living this way will also make you guilty before God and incur his eternal judgment on you.
• Christ came to offer a better way.
• Since he died and suffered the punishment for all human evil, he now extends this offer to you:
  • Decide once and for all to turn away from living out desires God calls shameful.
  • Place your trust in Christ as your only hope for forgiveness and rescue.
  • Call on God to receive his Holy Spirit.

…Then begin a life of living righteously by God’s power.

A few weeks ago Justin Taylor shared  this phenomenal post which I wanted to share in full. I also watched the lecture below. Totally worth your time. Enjoy.

Does the Bible Support Slavery?
By Justin Taylor

What do you think is wrong with the following argument?

1. Bible translations talk of “slaves.”
2. In the OT no objection is made to having slaves.
3. In the NT Christians are not commanded to free their slaves but are told to submit.
4. Therefore, biblical texts approve of slavery.
5. We know that slavery is wrong.
6. Therefore, biblical texts approve of something that is wrong.

Remember that when evaluating an argument

• terms are either clear or unclear
• propositions are either true or false,
• arguments are either valid or invalid.

So if you disagree with argument above, you’d have to show that there is

• an ambiguous term,
• a false premise, or
• a logical fallacy (the conclusion does not follow from the premises).

In the lecture below, delivered on October 30, 2015, at Lanier Theological Library, Peter Williams gave a fascinating lecture responding to this argument. Dr. Williams (PhD, University of Cambridge) presides over Tyndale House in Cambridge (one of the finest theological libraries in the world for biblical scholarship) and is an affiliated lecturer at Cambridge University.

His thesis is that using the most common definition of slavery, the Bible does not support slavery.

To make his argument, he examines the key Old Testament and New Testament texts said to support slavery. Along the way, he looks at the biblical words commonly associated with slavery and how their translation has changed over time. He also looks at the logic of the Old Testament world and the way ancient societies were structured quite differently from ours.

The lecture below is under an hour, and then he takes Q&A for around 20 minutes:

• Does the Old Testament Endorse Slavery? An Overview
• Does the Old Testament Endorse Slavery? Examining Difficult Texts
• Why Is the New Testament Silent on Slavery—Or Is It?

With the weather, the church building is closed tonight, and all evening meetings are cancelled.

So no young adult fellowship tonight.

See you next week!

There’s no intrinsic right to be happy.

That’s the basic premise of this piece by C.S. Lewis. Worth the time. And the doodling is pretty impressive to.

Watch and ponder…

A hymn by Andrew Reed:

Holy Spirit, light divine,
Shine upon this heart of mine;
Chase the shades of night away,
Turn the darkness into day.

Let me see my Savior’s face,
Let me all His beauties trace;
Show those glorious truths to me
Which are only known to Thee.

Holy Spirit, power divine,
Cleanse this guilty heart of mine;
In Thy mercy pity me,
From sin’s bondage set me free.

Holy Spirit, joy divine
Cheer this saddened heart of mine;
Yield a sacred, settled peace,
Let it grow and still increase.

Holy Spirit, all divine,
Dwell within this heart of mine;
Cast down every idol throne,
Reign supreme, and reign alone.

Last night we continued our series on Practical Spirituality, looking at how someone can live out the Christian life. Here are the notes:

Last week we saw that the only way to truly be a follower of Jesus in our time is to have and live off of the power of God’s Holy Spirit. This allows you to learn and live out the teaching of the Apostles found in the scriptures. Today we want to ask a related question, which is, how do you actually live this Christian life. If you asked the Apostle Paul this question, it seems his short answer would have been, “Walk in the Spirit.” …so, what if you asked him, “well, how do you walk in the Spirit?”

First, let’s remember what Jesus taught. See John 14:12-18, 25-26; 16:5-7, and Acts 1:4-8. He spoke about the Spirit of God as someone who would come and actually live inside his followers. If we turn to the letters of Paul, we can see how this Apostle taught on this mysterious truth Jesus spoke about.

What the Apostles taught:

First, see Romans 8:3-14, 26-27. Based on this passage, if you asked Paul, “How do you walk in the Spirit?” Here’s what he’d say:

1. Have the Spirit. (v.9)
2. Set your mind on the things of the Spirit. (v.5) Develop a life-long habit of thinking about the things God says are important. Another way to say it—we learn what “the Spirit” is thinking. We find those things in the scriptures, we learn them with other believers, and we prove them out in our daily lives by acting on them and finding them to be true.
3. Use that new way of thinking to unlearn old patterns. (v.5-8) This is what Paul means by “the mind of the flesh” or the “carnal mind”—he means that way people think when they leave out God’s commands, and the way it guides their life. He says, those things cannot please God, since they won’t listen to him at all.
4. This leads to lives which are practically shaped (decisions, habits, qualities) by the things of the Spirit. (v.12-13)
5. Be led of the Spirit. (v.14) That is, actively follow where the Spirit is leading—based on the things you’re learning and the new way of thinking you now have. Be “led” like following an experienced climber up a mountain. “Rise up and follow.”
6. Pray, with the Spirit’s help. (v.26-27) Use prayer to overcome weakness in your thinking (you don’t know what to think) and living (you don’t what to do or how to do it). While you pray, consciously depend on the depend the fact that the Spirit is going to help you pray and pray for you. Pray “in the spirit.”

Next see Galatians 5:13-26. Notice this passage has a lot in common with the Romans 8 passage, but it adds a few important things as well. 

1. Identify what the “flesh” produces (v.19) and be informed about the difference between flesh and Spirit. Be able to identify them.
2. “Walk in the Spirit.” (v.16) Order your daily details based on what you know of the Spirit.
3. Now, see 3:1-6 & 13-14.This is active obedience, but not “works”—i.e. not working simply out with your own strength. It happens by “hearing” and “believing” God’s message, and then God “supplies” the Spirit to us moment by moment. Of course, hearing and believing include daily living it out.

Takeaways: How do we live the Christian life? By walking in the Spirit. How do we walk in the Spirit?

1. Develop a daily, lifelong habit of examining yourself and your life by what the word of God says. In this way, learn what the Spirit of God is all about.
2. This is new knowledge. Those things are the way the Spirit is leading. So daily rise up and be led of the Spirit by putting those things in to practice.
3. Through the day—pray for the Spirit’s wisdom and power. Ask God to help you know and have the power to do what God wants done.
4. At each juncture of your day, pray “Lord, guide my words here,” or, “Help me resist this temptation,” or, “Give me the power to forgive,”
5. Understand and remember that it is the Spirit of God, and not your own efforts, which produces spiritual things.
6. Since it is the Spirit who does gives the wisdom and the ability, expect spiritual victory.

And this is key… The scriptures indicate that you cannot live the Christian life without the power of the Holy Spirit. You can not follow Jesus or live out the things he says without first receiving the Holy Spirit, having him come and indwell you, and then learning to live off his moment-by-moment supply of life and power. This is how God designed it all.

Just before the new year I highlighted highlighted Mark Edwards’ thoughts on the passage of scripture in Mark chapter 9 which features Jesus teaching a distressed father about faith. A few verses after the one in that post, the disciples come to Jesus with a question about their own inability in the face of the challenge in the passage–specifically, the fact that they could not cast the demon out of the child the man had brought to them. The verse in question is Mark 9:28–

When He had come into the house, His disciples asked Him privately, “Why could we not cast it out?“

Here’s a nice meditation on this verse, also from James Edwards:

A recurrent theme in this passage is the inadequacy of the disciples in ministry with Jesus. Service in fellowship with Christ is characterized by constant awareness of the inadequacy of the servant. As this story illustrates, Jesus calls disciples to tasks beyond their abilities, and the fact that the tasks surpass their abilities is evidence that the ministry is Christ’s not theirs.

The inadequacy of disciples is not their fault, nor should it have the effect of impairing either their faith or fellowship with Christ.

Rather, inadequacy drives the disciples to prayer, which is God’s gift to them and another form of fellowship with Jesus as their Lord.

(The Gospel According to Mark, James Edwards, p.281)

Last week I highlighted the new book by Alex Chediak called Beating the College Debt Trap. Today I wanted to relay one more helpful section from the book. Here’s how Chediak sums up what he wants us to take away from his work:

Eight Takeaways You Don’t Want To Miss

1. A bachelor’s degree is one of several options that can lead to a rewarding career. Before sleepwalking into a four-year college, make sure an associate’s degree or enrolling in a trade school isn’t a better fit for your talents and interests.

2. Being an informed customer is the best way to avoid spending a fortune on your education. Student loans should be a last resort, preferably limited to the last year or two of college, when you know you’re in the right major and graduation is clearly in sight.

3. When considering colleges, stick with a budget–the way you would when shopping for anything else. Consider what it will cost you, not just for one year, but all the way through graduation. Research the college’s financial aid track record students in your income bracket. Look for value–financial aid generosity and instructional quality. Don’t pay a fortune for prestige.

4. The phrase “financial aid” is nebulous. It can refer to grants (needed-based gifts), scholarships (merit-based; you must work to maintain), work-study (a job that pays hourly), or loans (which you’ll have to repay with interest). That’s why collegedata.com is a great site. It breaks down financial aid by category. Net price (list price minus scholarships and grants) is what matters. Work-study is a great because what you earn doesn’t raise your expected family contribution for the next year.

5. Choose a major that’s consistent with your interests and talents, but be mindful of your earnings prospects, particularly if you take out loans.

6. It is possible to earn most of the money you’ll need for college while you’re in college. It requires working smart–leveraging your skills, taking on internships and other kinds of strategic employment, and minimizing your expenses through planning and discipline.

7. Start looking for a full-time job in advanced of graduation. Prioritize identity capital in your search. Network, research your industry, and communicate clearly–always speaking to the employer’s interests–on your resume, cover latter, and interview.

8. Watch for housing and food expense after you graduate. Free up enough cash to make your student loan payments on time. Build a reserve of short-term savings so that unexpected expenses don’t kick you into credit card debt. As soon as possible, start throwing extra money at your loans to get out of debt faster (and save money by paying less interest).

Tonight we began a teaching series looking at the practical ways Christians exercise their spiritual life. We began at the beginning–How does a Christian follow Jesus? Here is the outline:

1. What it meant for the first followers to “follow” Jesus:
See Mark 1:17 (“follow me and I will make you”), and Mark 3:14 (“be with him” and “be sent out”). For this first group of Jesus followers, following Jesus mean to:

1. join the group of people who were with Jesus
2. actually follow him
   1. be where he was
   2. make him, his activities, the center of their focus
3. listen to him teach
4. watch him do things
5. learn everything they could
6. be an apprentice, for the sake of carrying on his work (let him “make” them something)

2. Since we can’t follow Jesus this way, what does it mean for us?

See Matthew 28:18-20  (the apostles are told to teach Jesus’ commands) and Acts 2:42 (the first Christians “abode” in Apostles’ teaching.) So, for us following Jesus means:

1. Come to Trust Jesus – And find life (John 20:30-31)
2. Join the community—Get together with other Christians to learn the Apostle’s teaching.
   1. What did the apostles teach? They used the Old Testament to show how Jesus was the true messiah, they told the story of Jesus and what he taught, they taught the meaning of his life, death and resurrection, and showed how people could live out his teachings today.
   2. How do we know what they taught? We have they’re writings—it’s the New Testament.
3. Seek to let the commands of scripture (Christ in the Gospels, The NT Letters) shape your living—seek to learn the commands and put them in to practice on a daily basis (both individually (“my life”) and together (“our church”).
   1. Watch Jesus do things and listen to him teach (in the gospels) – get to know him!
   2. Hear the Apostles teach (in the letters and Gospels) what the teachings mean.
   3. Once you learn something–Find ways to live it out daily
4. Overall, seek to understand Gods heart—learn what’s important to God, learn what Jesus is doing in the world.
5. Continue, for the rest of your life, reading and learning what Jesus taught through what the Apostles wrote. Do this personally and in community with others. Seek to practically obey these teachings so that your life becomes one which is totally shaped by the things revealed in the Christian scriptures.

NOTE: This is very different than another way people typically have of pursuing God: using the bible to find inspiring verses for each day. I am arguing for people to also practice something much more systematic—like the deliberate, systematic way Jesus trained the disciples. Instead of only hoping for a daily inspiration, I am saying that I think the scriptures lead us to embark on a lifetime journey of deliberately, methodically learning what Jesus wants us to know and becoming who he wants us to be by daily adding small pieces to what we know. Day by day, year by year letting the commands of Scripture shape our life. This is a lifelong learning to learn, and a lifelong learning to live.

Three helpful questions:

• Do I read to be inspired, or to learn? —hopefully both! (it’s not one or the other, or one without the other)
• Do I go to church to be inspired or to learn? —hopefully both!
  
• While I wait for moments of inspiration, do I know how to be inspired by what I learn?

3. Receive and Rely on the Power of the Holy Spirit (Luke 24, Acts 2)

See Luke 24:44-49 (the promise of the Father) and Acts 1:8 (“receive power, then be witnesses”). This is the essential piece to making all of these live:

1. Depend on the Spirit as you read the Bible (Pray for understanding, talk to God often)
2. Depend on the Spirit Through the Day as you seek to put Jesus’ commands in to action
3. How? Ask (Luke 11:13), and believe the gospel as you obey (Galatians 3:2, 13-14)