The Gospel in the Exodus.

Getting Out - Tim Keller - TGC 2011 from The Gospel Coalition on Vimeo.

So here it is.

As you know I am a guy who does and will speak my mind. I am not afraid to let you know what I think about some pastors. One thing that God has been doing in me for the past few months is helping me how more grace because with out that grace I would not be saved.

So why am I saying this? What am I about to say?

I am sorry if at anytime I have made you upset by something I have said. I feel as if I have become known not so much for my love for the gospel and for Jesus Christ but more for being angry about things. As a Christian I want to be known as a man who is saved by God's amazing and unbelievable grace.

I just wanted to let you all know what God has been doing.

His Heart.

A chapter in the bible that I read every year and I try more then once a year is John 17 the whole chapter. This is the "real Lord's prayer". I love how Christ knows that He is about to be betrayed by men and yet He prays for us.

I love to read 9-11 and how He prays for those who God has chosen to be with Him and then He prays for those who will hear from His own that they may Hear God's word and be saved as well. As you read this chapter I feel that you truly get the heart of Christ. He wants to glorify His father as His father has glorified Him and He prays for His children.

I can easily find myself overwhelmed by the love of Christ in this chapter and knowing that starting in chapter 18 Judas comes and it starts. But the great thing about all of this is that Christ says in verses 4 that He is finished. Yes He has to go all the way to death on the cross but my sins and yours were taken care of in the garden when Christ said He will drink the cup. May you take a few seconds this good Friday and be thankful for this prayer of our Saviour.

John Chapter 17

Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said: "Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, "as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. "I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do. "And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. "I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. "Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You. "For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received [them], and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me. "I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours. "And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them. "Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We [are] "While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. "But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves. "I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. "I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. "They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. "As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. "And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth."I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; "that they all may be one, as You, Father, [are] in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. "And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: "I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me. "Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. "O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare [it], that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.

By His Wounds

By His wounds we are healed. By His wounds we are saved. By His wounds we have life and life to the full. By His wounds the curtain was torn in two. By His wounds we are called God's Sons and Daughters. All of this and much more because of His Wounds.

Thinking

So here we are a few days away from the day that Judas betrays Christ. As we know and celebrate on Friday Jesus Christ went to the cross and died for the sins of Man. It is because of His sacrifice that we are free from sin and death. You may think to yourself "well ya a church is suppose to talk about this". One aspect of the death of Christ that we should think about is Judas. People blame him but we are all Judas. Thousands of years ago Christ died so that we can be free but yet everyday we fall to sin and we betray the grace of Christ. God does not want to see His children be separated from Him and his perfect love. So may you take some time this weekend and just think about how God loves you and fall in love with the one that loves you Jesus Christ. Also may this Sunday as we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour may it be a time for you to rejoice and celebrate as well that you are no longer dead to sin but alive in Christ.

Chosen?

Yesterday at Mosaic Eddie talked a little about this idea of predestination/elect. I thought that I would share just a short thought on this. A few years ago when I started to take a real hard look at what is called Reformed Theology this doctrine was a hard one to swallow at first. The main thought towards this that people do not like is the idea that if everything is predestined for us then all we are all God's little puppets. This is so wrong it is not even funny.

John Piper has a great sermon that clearly shows much more on this beautiful doctrine.

1 Peter 2:9-10

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

In this text Peter comes right out of the gate and says that we are the chosen race. This is such a amazing thought. God ,who is perfect and holy in every way you can think, turns to some and calls them a royal priesthood. This is a such a sign of love and grace and mercy. At first this is a hard pill to take but if you really sit back and think about how amazing this doctrine truly is you will bend your knees and be so thankful.

God turns to some and pulls them out of the crappy life that they where in because of sin and rescues them from hell. We are adopted into his holy family. We are because of God's grace now called God's people. This goes back to moses rescuing ,not all but some, of the Israelites from pharaoh. Look at what He did through those people and they where called the chosen race/people. This is us and I am so thankful for it. Yes again this can be hard to think about but it is called the doctrine of Grace because by God's grace we are saved and called into His holy family.

Watch the above sermon and if you have any questions please feel free to email me and we can chat about it.

What a great week.

So the last few days I have been at the Gospel Coalition in Chicago and let me tell you it was a great week hearing and seeing some very godly men preach and teach God's holy word. I have been thinking about how I could share everything and even some of my thoughts about this week with you and I really think that it would take me forever and you would most likely get very bored. So what I have done is below are some links to some blogger that I follow that have done some reflections and even posted notes up on there blogs. Also I have shared below a few links for the videos and/or audio of the sermons and talks. Recommendations would be to listen to Tim Kellers sermon (two words its amazing) and Mbewe sermons.

Mbewe: Jeremiah 23:1-8

Timothy Keller: Exodus 14

The rest of the media

Blogging Theologically: He has great sermon notes from every speaker.

So I hope that you enjoy these links. I was very blessed by what God spoke about through these men of God. May you be blessed jus as much. If I find more

Blame God.

A few years ago when I was a teenager I had a bumper sticker that said Blame Canada. As you may think this sticker got me in trouble many times with people from Canada. Even though I thought it was funny I ended up taking it off my 1989 white van ( I was pimping).

I feel that at times we use the thought of Blame God when bad things happen to us. When a family member dies or a major earth quake happens we blame God. But yet when good things happen then we take all the credit for it right? This is all so wrong it is not even funny. Why do bad things like someone getting cancer or losing there job or a husband or wife running out on there family happen? It is because of sin and not God. We have to take the heat for it. When God made us we were made perfectly in the image of Him. Adam and Eve took and ate the fruit and at that very moment sin entered in the world and us. Bad things happen because sin entered the world.

This means that we should not be blaming God for the bad things but take some of the blame ourselves and lay it at the cross of Christ. Today I spent a long time in prayer and meditation on who God is and I started to cry uncontrollably because of how great God is. I do not blame Him for anything. But instead I thank Him that even though I am sinner He brought me into His family to live a life for his kingdom. To me that is a humbling thought.

Some thoughts on Love Wins

The past few weeks or so I have been listening and reading what a lot of pastors are saying about Rob Bells new book Love Wins and I just want to let you know where I stand on this peace off work. First I want to say that over the years I have learned a lot from Rob Bell. I really think that the way he communicates is amazing. He can tell a story in ways that I could never. However, his theology and doctrine is so far out of wack it is not even funny. I have seen over the years Rob Bell fall further and further away from the true Gospel of Jesus Christ. Now as this new book has come out He truly has become and false teacher. I known that there are people who would say that I am judging him by saying that but I am only looking at what he teaches and testing it to the Word of God and it does not line up.

We do not know if someone goes to hell or heaven. It is not for us to judge that but God is the Judge. There is a real place called Hell Jesus himself preached about it and called people sons of hell. If there was not a place of punishment then I would say that God is not a father at all. God as our father does not want to send people to hell but if someone does not believe in him then they are punished. It is just like a father when there son or daughter does not obey him he punishes them. To me the God of the bible ,who is the God I serve, would not be that God if everyone was welcomed into heaven. Then tell me what is the point of Jesus on the Cross and being or sacrifice for our sins. This would be pointless.

This week I will be preaching on how we as Christians need to test everything to God's word before we let it influence us and so I say church do not let this false teacher and his other gospel influence you.

Rob Bell I will be praying for you but as for me and my house you are not aloud in it anymore.

Cross-centered Worship

I have heard worship leaders say that you should not focus so much on one thing in worship. I would strongly disagree. We need to always have cross centered worship. With out the cross you and I are nothing. with out the cross all of us are going to go to hell. We always need to be thankful for the cross and so that is why we need to always have cross centered worship.

Take time right now to thank God for the cross.

Hall Pass is trash.

Last night Kim and I went out on our weekly date night and I saw a preview for a movie called Hall Pass. I can not believe that I heard some Christian friends say that they can not wait to see this movie. This movie is trash and we as godly men and women should not see it.

Long story short it is a movie about two guys that get "hall passes" from there wives. A hall pass is a week off of being married and gives them the OK to hook up with other women and do what they want.

When I think about this movie it truly makes me sick. This is what the bible would call adultery. God does not take that as a joke. As a Christ follower you should not want to support a movie like this. Do not let impure thoughts into your heart. Instead of seeing trash and wasting your money on this just take a second to sit back and think " what would I think if a pastor in my church would get a Hall Pass ". Would you think it is funny then. Would you go pat him on the back and say way to go? No you wouldn't so why turn to Hollywood and do the same thing.

This is a toxic influence and should be avoided in every way it can be.

2 Timothy 2:22 Flee (run away) from youthful lusts but pursue righteousness, faith, love with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

It is more then a religious action.

So as I have been studying and reading 1 Corinthians 10 today I stopped at 14-22 and it has caused me to do some thinking.

Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say.The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.Consider the people of Israel: [fn] are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar?What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons.You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

Sadly in the church today most people come to the Lord's table a lot like the church in Corinth did. They come and take just because they have to. But the Lord's table is so much more than a religious act. But sadly most people do not get it.

I had a friend one time ask me why I take communion and at the time I really did not know and so he told me to go to the back of the line until I get it. Today I do not even think about coming to my Lord's table unless I have come in repentance an thankfulness. It is not just something you do in church but we should strive to come to the Lord's table humble and thankful and take it seriously because Christ does and so shall we.

The Prosperity Gospel is crap.

So I do not know about you but I am sick and tiered of churches in america preach a message like" you want a better car,job,etc well God will give it to so ask for it because you deserve it".

Ladies and gents we dont deserve anything but hell and wrath and God gives us mercy and grace and yet we have the guts to go to him and say thanks for the job that I have but I deserve a better one so give it to me. If you belive this crap you are fooling yourself. God wants you to be satisfied in him and him only not the junk of this world but Him. THe king of Kings, Lord of Lords. Our Saviour. NOT OUR STUFF BUT HIM.

Please if you believe in this prosperity gospel please fall to your knees and repent of the idolatry that you are in and run to cross of Christ and be made new.

More videos:

Video 1

Video 2

Short and sweet

So the other day I was looking at my twitter and saw a post from a youth pastor that said "didn't have time to finish my sermon tonight for youth so going to let the kids cut my hear instead". WOW really dude.

When I read this I got pretty upset. When I look at some of the old dead pastors that I read and some of the pastors today that I look up to they all put a high standard on preaching. They put writing there sermons up there before anything. Paul himself tells us to let the deacons worry about the other things so that you can put your time into teaching the truth rightly.

This is one of the things that I feel is wrong with youth ministry today. So many youth leaders just get by by playing games and feeding students pizza and not teaching God's word. I feel that if you do not have time to study God's word so that you can teach it then it is not effecting your own life so why should it effect others.

Well my rant is over now. You can go back to doing whatever you are doing.

Deal with it.

I was part of a church once where because of sin the church fell apart and is now at a slow death. One of the problems of what happened was that the elders just wanted to sweep the sin under the carpet instead of dealing with it. We do this all the time in our own life's as well. Lately I have heard and seen sin in myself and others like Idol worship, pride, greed and the list can go on and on.

We are called to go to the cross and deal with our sin. We are always going to be sinners but we are told to always stay close to God and repent and be humble. I was just reading today Romans 12:21 that tells us how to fight a good fight Paul writes " Do not be overcome by evil,but overcome evil with good". We feel at times that we are to weak to fight the sin that we deal with always but if you feel like that then you are not believing the words of Christ when he says in Matthew 28:18 that All Authority has been given to me. Christ live's in you so if He has the power then you have the power to fight and deal with your sin.

As I write this I want you to know that even though I am writing this I am not saying that I am perfect. Just as Paul says that all have fallen I have fallen but because of the cross we have hope and grace. Do not let sin run your life but put on Christ and do not fulfill the lusts of the flesh (Matthew6:1) but deal with it. Be strong my brothers and sisters.

Reaching the lost.

So today I went had coffee with a fellow pastor and I asked him a question that I am glad I asked. The question was" what are some ways he reaches out and shares the gospel with people?".

Wow we had a good talk and we came up with an idea for the next time we meet ,which is every other week, we are going to start going around to places like Denny's and so on and start sharing the gospel with people and being a part of peoples life's. We also talked about how we can do this on a regular basis.

Here are some ideas.

1) Ask your waitress right before you pray for your food how you could pray for her

2) Start working on sharing the gospel with people in 30 seconds.

3) When you go to Starbucks while you are waiting for your coffee talk to the people waiting around you about how is life for them. Don't act like you care but really care about them.

4)Bless someone with a cup of coffee and tell the person waiting on you to tell the next person in line that the coffee is free and so is God's Grace.

These are just some of the ways that I will be trying to share the gospel of Jesus Christ more. Go for it and try it. It is easier then you think.

The Weight we carry .

Over the past two years I have been able to feel the full weight of what a pastor carries on a regular basis. We are called to carry this weight but we are called to rely on Christ on a daily basis. Praise God that he is our strength.

Church stop playing and start being!

May God use this song to stir in you a heart for those who are hurting. A heart for those who do not know Him. A heart for those in africa that have no water. THose in africa who are being thrown into war. THose in your city who may not have a christmas this year because they don't have the money . STOP PLAYING CHURCH AND START BEING THE CHURCH.

The Cup

Every time you think about the cross you should never forget about the garden. The work of the cross was done before he went to the cross.

Reflect

So I woke up today feeling very sleepy and ready to go back to bed and I think it is so easy for pastors to say let's take a day off and rest. But then I started to think about some of the things that are happening in my ministry and I ,even though still sleepy, get pumped.

Last night two students came up to me and they both want to get baptized in the next two weeks. Also after talking with a bunch of the students I could tell that there is about to be a mini revival at the two schools that I serve. There are these two students that are ready to see everyone at there school to get saved. They are so focused on this that you can tell that it is driving them.

Also this Sunday I will be meeting with some people that are ready to see the future and pray for God to use us in a way that will give Him glory and that will change us and others. Even now as I sit in my office and think about this my legs are shacking because I get pumped when I think about what God is up to.

As a pastor I think it is easy for us to sit back and say this is all because of me and what I am doing. I was fighting that a little last night. It's called pride and for pastors it is a fight every day. But then I remember that I am only doing what I am because God has called me and so then all the glory goes back to him. So I just thought that I would let you know.