Matt Chandler

If you've not been in the habit of using the internet to hear sermons by godly men, you should start. One of the men I've been greatly encouraged by is a brother called Matt Chandler. He serves as the lead pastor at the Village Church in the Dallas area. He's been gifted by God with a tremendous ability to exegete and proclaim the truths taught in Scripture. Chandler also happens to be about the same age as me.

Thanksgiving morning Matt had a seizure that caused him to fall and hit his head. After tests, the doctors found that he had a tumor on the right frontal lobe of his brain, which they removed apparently successfully last Friday. I have been blessed to share Matt's testimony with my children as we've been trying to help them to understand how God's people live in the midst of incredible trials. Julie and I have faced a temporary job loss this winter and we've made a real effort to praise our Lord through every bit of it and show complete reliance on Him for our needs. We hope this will serve as a teaching opportunity for our children, and Matt's circumstance and perspective has gone along really well. We continue to pray for Matt and his family and I wanted to share this video that he sent his church. Click here to watch the video.

God Bless

Technical Difficulties

I am sorry about the format on the previous post, Rock of Ages, but I've done all I can to fix it and can't. The verses to the song just won't line up right. I hope you can enjoy it anyway!

God Bless!

Rock of Ages

Augustus Toplady was born in England in 1740. He was raised by his mother as his father died a short while after he was born. He was an only child. He never got married. He had hardly any friends. But he was a great man of God. He spent a lot of time studying and worshipping. As an introverted person, I can understand his desire to be alone and alone with God as much as possible. I've been enjoying Chris Rice's version of Toplady's classic hymn "Rock of Ages;" look at these lyrics and worship your Lord!

 1. Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee;   

     let the water and the blood, from thy wounded side which flowed,   

     be of sin the double cure; save from wrath and make me pure.  

 2. Not the labors of my hands can fulfill thy law's commands;   

     could my zeal no respite know, could my tears forever flow,   

     all for sin could not atone; thou must save, and thou alone.   

 3. Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to the cross I cling;   

     naked, come to thee for dress; helpless, look to thee for grace;   

     foul, I to the fountain fly; wash me, Savior, or I die.   

 4. While I draw this fleeting breath, when mine eyes shall close in death,   

     when I soar to worlds unknown, see thee on thy judgment throne,   

     Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee.

Take that theology with you to church tomorrow!

Deacons

We've recently been dealing with the subject of church polity in our Lord's Day sermons, beginning with the subject of deacons. Church polity is a fancy way of saying church government, or how the local church is organized. I've admitted to the church that it has been a frustrating time recently. I've felt as if things were undone, I've felt as if there was little direction, and I've felt as if we as a group of believers weren't heading in any particular direction.

Now let me be clear, I don't mean individuals aren't making progress in their walk with the Lord. I believe the people of our church are genuine in their faith and they are genuinely pursuing Christ. In fact, I've suggested in the past that we should change the name of the church to something along the lines of "Church of the afflicted" because of the extreme trials that almost every family goes through when they come to our church. So I'm not saying they're not going in any particular direction, the Lord is making them more like Jesus Christ each day which is very encouraging.

What I am saying is that we aren't progressing as a church. I have been saying since I've been at BBC that we needed to move in the direction of multiple elders. I believe that is clearly the model for the local church as laid out in Scripture. So far we've not made any progress in that direction. It is my prayer that that will soon change.

The first step in that process, I believe, is to appoint a group of deacons to minister to the body of believers at BBC. The deacon is truly a minister of mercy and I can't wait to see what will happen if the church sets forth a group of men in the coming year. As I've studied the Scriptures regarding this ministry I've had my mind changed or challenged about some aspects of this ministry.

I think in the past I overreacted to the way that Southern Baptists have viewed the deacon ministry. I've often thought that Southern Baptists tend to look at deacons as junior elders. Now I haven't had my mind changed that that is not what a deacon is, but I do think there is a close connection between the eldership and the diaconate. In 1 Tim. 3 Paul spends the first seven verses telling Timothy what he should be looking for in an elder; he then says in v. 8 "Deacons likewise." There is clearly a connection between the two as Paul puts them together in this discussion of leaders' qualifications. In addition to that, we see that the qualifications for elders and deacons are strikingly similar with the main difference being that the elder "must be able to teach." While a deacon is not a junior elder, he is an important part of the ministry of the church.

I think I see in these two offices a real connection. I see the elder as serving the members the spiritual food that is critical for their spiritual formation. That's why the twelve called the church to put forth the seven in Acts 6 to deal with the problem that had arisen. The twelve said in v. 2 "It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables." So while the elder is focusing on prayer and the ministry of the word, the deacon is taking care of physical service that is also critical to the well-being of the people. It's really a neat picture and I look forward to seeing it play out more fully in our church.

I've been very convicted that I must focus more time and intensity on the prayer and study aspects of my ministry in order that I might teach well that which will feed the sheep what they need. So in order that I can do that and the needs of the church still be met, I've called our church to put forth a group of men that can assist me and can take from me anything that would distract me from my primary ministry which is prayer and the preaching of God's Word. I refuse to allow myself to be derailed from this. Now this certainly doesn't mean I can't do any acts of service to the church other than these; I think the Scriptures indicate I'd be wrong if I didn't. It just means that I need deacons to take on the majority of these responsibilities so that I can devote my time and energy to finding food for the sheep.

God Bless

Spurgeon

I made the mistake of picking up a Spurgeon sermon called "The minister's self-watch" dealing with 1 Timothy 4:16 which says "Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine." I don't understand why he had to preach in such a convicting way! In all reality, I long for the power in my preaching ministry that marked his. So I just thought I'd share a few quotes with anyone interested. It is a sermon that is well worth your time.

"It is true that the Lord, like Quintin Matsys in the story of the Antwerp well-cover, can work with the faultiest kind of instrumentality, as he does when he occasionally makes very foolish preaching to be useful in conversion; and he can even work without agents, as he does when he saves men without a preacher at all, applying the word directly by His Holy Spirit; but we cannot regard God's absolutely sovereign acts as a rule for our action. He may, in his own absoluteness, do as pleases Him best, but we must act as his plainer dispensations instruct us; and one of the facts which is clear enough is this, that the Lord usually adapts means to ends, from which the plain lesson is, that He shall be likely to accomplish most when we are in the best spiritual condition; or in other words, we shall usually do our Lord's work best when our gifts and graces are in good order, and we shall do worst when they are most out of trim."

"For the herald of the gospel to be spiritually out of order in his own proper person is, both to himself and to his work, a most serious calamity; and yet, my brethren, how easily is such an evil produced, and with what watchfulness must it be guarded against!"

"Moreover, when a preacher is poor in grace, any lasting good which may be the result of his ministry, will usually be feeble and utterly out of proportion with what might have been expected. Much sowing will be followed by little reaping; the interest upon the talents will be inappreciably small."

This is a great sermon! In it Spurgeon says some very challenging things that will likely convict any who is called to the ministry. The good thing is that the conviction is that gentle yet powerful nudging wrought by the Holy Spirit which causes God's people to seek Christ more closely.

God Bless

Careful, Dads

This week I'm preparing to deal with a text in Mark 6:14-29 which recounts the death of John the Baptist and the tragic life of Herod Antipas. I'm still early in my study but I've been thinking today about Herod Antipas' father Herod the Great. Herod the Great you'll remember was the king when Jesus was born. He was the one who was concerned enough at the birth of Jesus that he had all of the male babies in Bethlehem and the surrounding area under the age of two killed. We remember that an angel of the Lord had come to Joseph however and Jesus was in Egypt when this was happening.

Anyway, Herod the Great was a brutal character. Herod Antipas was also a brutal character. He fell in love with his brother's wife and got rid of his own so he could have her. This among other things shows that he followed right in his father's footsteps. Doesn't that seem to be the case with most men? It is a fearful thing that ungodly fathers more often than not produce ungodly sons.

There are some exceptions to this of course. I am reminded of Timothy who didn't have a believing father but was influenced by the faith of his mother and grandmother. How many times though have you heard a mother's heartbreak as her son who she's prayed for and poured her life into goes wayward. It is a sobering reminder of the influence that ungodly fathers have on their sons.

But the great news is that the opposite is true as well. When a daddy pursues the Lord, albeit poorly as we all do, God blesses those who follow behind him. This is what so much of my attention is being turned to these days. How can I pour my life and the Gospel into my children, and pour my life and the Gospel into men that can produce godly offspring. This is my calling. This is where I stand. This is where I believe the Church will see reformation!

Vision

"Where there is no vision, the people perish." Proverbs 29:18

Sometimes pastors get pooped! I recently heard of a website called poopedpastors.com. I thought that was a really funny name for a site. I'm a bi-vocational pastor and I have to confess I sometimes get pooped. I'm coming to the end of my "busy time" of the year at work and my body and mind are shot!

This week if the Lord wills we are planning on a trip to Iowa. My family, as you may know, is from Iowa. It's been quite some time since I've seen some of them. In addition to seeing family, we'll get to see some friends. In addition to seeing friends we are planning a trip across the state to a family integrated church. Overall it should be just what the doctor ordered for this pooped pastor.

One of the other things I'm seeking to do on our trip is to think again on my vision for our family and our church. Over the last several years God has changed my view of both of these critical aspects of my life. Every now and then I have to stop and ask myself again, what is my vision for our family and our church? The church we are hoping to attend is called Good Cheer Family Fellowship in Pleasant Hill IA. I'm really excited! They are the kind of church that ours is seeking to become. They believe as we do about family. They believe as we do about our Lord. They believe as we do about worship. They believe as we do.

It's not to say that only churches that believe and worship exactly like us are valuable. There are very few that do after all. It is to say however that every once in awhile it's nice to come together with people like you. I look forward to meeting the men of their church and listening to them talk about their walk with the Lord, their marriages, their children. I love to listen to the men of our church too by the way. What's so encouraging about the future of our church is we have godly men and women to listen to. We have such a neat group of people and I want to see them continue to thrive and thrive even more!

Yes, I'm looking forward to our trip this weekend. Yes, I'll miss the people of BBC. Yes, we'll pray that our van holds up! Don't be afraid to recharge sometimes, it gives you a chance to think about your vision.

God Bless