A few weeks ago, I was examined at the presbytery meeting of the Confederation of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC). The exam consisted of a written portion, and a three hour oral exam, all of it on the doctrinal issues surrounding the Auburn Avenue business. If you are a glutton for punishment, or if you are …
Hidden Assumptions About the DDT Truck
GRACE & PEACE “At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16: 11) Growing Dominion, Part 23 Let me begin with a story that, in the minds of some, may explain quite a bit. When I was a kid growing up in Annapolis, Maryland one of the features of life there was the …
Reformation Sunday 2004
INTRODUCTION: We are fast approaching the five hundredth anniversary of the glorious Reformation. The history of the Church is always tangled, and we can never approach it in a simplistic fashion. But with all such allowances made, the Reformation was a great work of the Holy Spirit, and we are right to remember and celebrate …
Gladness for Sackcloth/Psalm 30
Introduction: In this psalm we find another inspiring pattern for prayer—and it is the kind of prayer that can be offered up by a sinner. David offers up a petition here, and the need for the petition was created by his own spiritual carelessness. But we serve and worship a God who forgives. Text: I …
God of the Wineskins
Our heavenly Father, You are the God of both the wine and the wineskins. You order our affairs in ways that astonish us, and we are sometimes tempted to think that You have forgotten what You ought to be doing. Your wisdom transcends ours. Your thoughts are not our thoughts. Your ways are not our …
Objectively Submitting
The table before us is set by God Himself. He invites us to it, and as we sit down with Him (in the person of the Lord Jesus), He deals with us. We cannot prevent this, we cannot manipulate it, we cannot turn it to our own ends. This table means what God says it …
Diet Coke and Brownies
GRACE & PEACE “At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16 11) Growing Dominion, Part 22 We have to live up to what God has given us in Christ before we can go on to maturity. Another way of putting this is that we have to master our kindergarten and elementary school …
A Shepherd Lord/Psalm 23
This passage is one of the most famous of all scriptural passages, and rightly so. The only real problem with it is that people are so familiar with it that it is easy to assume too readily that you have grasped the full import of what is being said. But this psalm also has wonderful …
The God Who Dwells With Us
Our gracious Father and only-wise God, You have made a way for us to approach You through the kind name of Jesus Christ our Lord. We worship You now in and through Him, confident that You will receive our worship because we come to You through Christ the Lord Through Your Son, You are Immanuel, …
Partaking in the Covenant
The world is covenantal. This is because the God who Himself is eternally covenanted, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is the Creator of this world. He could not fashion a world in which He was not the God of it, and the heavens declare His glory. In other words, the universe must display the characteristics …