Jesus is the Word of God
I preached on Romans 8:31-39 last night. Audio here.
As a reflection on that same passage (and sermon), Emma wrote this post. It's what I should have said!
Some previous sermons of mine:
Romans 1-7 - Confidence in Life
Romans 8 - Confidence in Suffering
Doctrinal, declarative, devotional.
And best of all it avoids using three alliterative points.
Listen!
Paul Blackham's Men's Weekend Talks for City Evangelical Church, Leeds:
Beginning With Jesus
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Mike Reeves:
The Difference Jesus makes...
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Ben Myers
John's Gospel.
Go here and download the row of files second from bottom
1. The Word Made Flesh (John 1)
2. The Coming of the Light (John 9)
3. The Triumph of Life (John 11)
4. The Doorway to Eternity (John 17)
5. The Way of Discipleship (John 21)
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A recent LTS conference:
The importance of Adam in the Bible, the Church and the World:
Session 1: David Green: Adam in the Old Testament
Session 2: Lane Tipton: Adam in the New Testament
Session 3: Lane Tipton: Adam and Christ in Systematic Theology
Session 4: Stephen Lloyd: Adam, Where art thou?’
Session 5: Garry Williams: Adam in the Covenant of Works
Session 6: Steve Jeffery: Original Sin: Unbiblical, Unjust and Unreasonable?
Session 7: Michael McClenahan: Preaching Adam to Adam’s Race
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If we get God wrong, then we'll get our mission and our motivation wrong too.
If God is a needy Individual, mission will look a certain way.
But what if God is Father, eternally and outgoingly loving His Son by the Spirit...?
Thanks so much Dave Bish for putting on Tranformission on Saturday. We had a blast.
There is no other message that liberates - only the gospel of the Beloved Son. May this gospel speed forth and bring life throughout the land...
Main Session 1 - Mike Reeves
Main Session 2 - Mike Reeves
Peter Mead workshop: Adoption and the Bible
Dan Hames workshop: Adoption and church history
Glen Scrivener workshop: Adoption and Evangelism (slides and notes here)
Mike's main sessions were powerful, pastoral, mind-expanding and heart-warming as ever.
I'm very much looking forward to listening to the other workshops. Apparently I get a Gold Star for the audio quality of my sessions. Success! No doubt in other departments I have only a frowny face and a Must Try Harder.
Enjoy!
The Ninevites hear this prophet back from the dead.
They acknowledge that God is right to judge.
They bury themselves in the dust.
And they trust Jonah's God to bring them through to resurrection.
We too hear a word of judgement from God's Resurrected Prophet (Acts 17:30).
We too are buried in Him (Romans 6:3-5).
And we are brought out beyond condemnation (Romans 8:1).
Christians note: God does many miraculous things in the book of Jonah. At just the right time he appoints storms and fish and plants. It's almost magical. But there's one thing he refuses to do: He refuses to save Nineveh without a messenger. Faith comes by hearing (Romans 10:17).
It doesn't matter if you're a bad messenger (Jonah's sermon left much to be desired). It doesn't matter if you struggle with motivation (Jonah struggled with motivation). As those brought through judgement, we have a message that can save - no matter how rubbish we messengers are!
If you're lost, you don't need to find yourself. If you're lost and you find yourself you'll only find that you're lost. Which is no great find!
If you're lost what you need to find is home. When you're home, then you will be yourself.
The good news of Christianity is that Someone from Home has come to find us!
12 minute lunchbar talk for Exeter CU
based on Luke 15:1-10 (and Luke 3:21-22).
I met Dave K through blogging and it was a great privilege to preach at his wedding yesterday. True to form he wanted a law-gospel sermon on 1 Corinthians 13. Here's what I came up with
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...1 Corinthians 13... taps into your highest longing and your deepest fear.
Your highest longing is in verse 12. It’s that little phrase “face to face.” That’s your highest longing. In the words of Mumford and Sons – You were made to meet your Maker. And not to meet your Maker face to floor – to meet Him face to face. This speaks of intimacy, friendship, relationship, love. You were made for face to face with Jesus your Maker. That’s what this whole third paragraph is about – the future is face to face. In fact so was the past. The Bible says that before there WAS a world, there was face-to-face. Before there was a universe, there was Father, Son and Spirit “face to face” – united in love. Wind back the clock into the depths of eternity and you don’t find mere chemistry – you find community. That’s why the greatest things in life are a meeting of hearts and minds. That’s why relationships are so precious. That’s why we love weddings – we love face to face.
But every earthly experience of “face to face” is, in the words of verse 12 “a reflection in a mirror.” The old King James Version rendered it “seeing through a glass, darkly.” Every kiss you’ve ever wanted, every affirmation you’ve ever craved, every relationship you’ve ever pursued, every longing you’ve ever felt – it’s a reflection of the ultimate face to face. This wedding – is an incredible reflection of the real face to face – Jesus and His people, united in love. This reflects that – that’s why we love this so much.
Because our highest longing is love. Not just earthly reflections: face to face with Jesus our Maker. That’s the longing behind every other longing.
But this passage also tells you your deepest fear. Your deepest fear is in verse 2. It’s also a 3 word phrase. Look at the last three words of verse 2. That’s what terrifies you. It terrifies me. My deepest fear is that “I am nothing”. Your deepest fear is that you are nothing. You worry you don’t amount to anything, that you’re actually a nobody, you are pointless, you’re a zero, completely insignificant in the universe. That’s the voice that whispers to you at 2 in the morning. And it’s the fear that drives you to a relentless pursuit of performances and experiences and face-to-face relationships – some healthy, others unhealthy – but none of them dislodge the fear that you are nothing.
This passage explains your life. You’re made for face to face, you’re terrified that you’re nothing. And this passage can tell you how to answer your fears and fulfil your longing....
Here's a seminar that Emma and I ran recently for a group of 20s and 30s.
Unfortunately the recorder ran out almost as soon as Emma began to speak! Not to worry, soon we'll have a couple of different videos of Emma giving her testimony - I'll link as soon as we have them.
We began the seminar with perhaps the key verse on identity:
“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Matthew 10:39
We then kicked things off with my favourite 4 minutes of stand-up ever!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiUsfEkVRDY]
Death to the Me-Monster in Christ births a redeemed identity.
I speak a lot about Christ's baptism, His identity and our sharing in it. The stories of Jacob and Esau are very illuminating. And Luther nails it with this quote:
The Christian lives far above themselves in Christ through faith
and far beneath themselves in their neighbour through love.
The one place we don't live is in ourselves. No we find our lives by losing them in and for Jesus.