Excerpt from Sermon today on Psalm 19

May I take this image of the sun lighting up the world and relate it to our duty to be spiritual examples? The image reminds us that, as the sun is the light of the earth, you and I are to be the light of the world – the light of the people who are around us. According to David, the sun moves through the sky and shines upon us all because God wants to make Himself known. He has also made us the light of the world so that He might make Himself known. Are you as zealous for God to be made known to the people around you as God shows himself to be by giving us the sun? We all should be. The creation not only declares the glory of God but it reveals the zeal of God that all the world should know that glory. It is a reminder for us to carry the light of the knowledge of God to all the world, as the sun carries its light of the glory of God to all the world.

Wherever we may be, with whomever we may be, especially when we are with our families, we should be like the sun to them. We should always be ready to declare to them the glory of God which we have learned from our relationship with Him through Jesus Christ. And this does not have to be hard. You probably have heard St. Augustine's summary of living the Christian life: "Love God and do as you please." May I adapt that statement and say simply let yourself enjoy God and then be yourself. People all around you enjoy all kinds of things and are ready to tell you about the latest event, or experience they have had with what they enjoy: the latest game, the latest story they’ve heard, the latest tomato from their garden. It is only natural for us to share what we enjoy. Let your enjoyment of your walk with God naturally spill over in your conversation with your families – be a sun to them, declaring the glory of God in your life.

But how may we so enjoy our walk with God, that we will have things to tell people; that we will have something to spill over? Well, David is spilling over in this psalm with the glory of God which he is experiencing from the Word of God. Having spoken of how God reveals himself through creation, he now lays out in Psm. 19, in poetic language how God reveals himself to us in his Law. As he does so, he has six different titles for God’s law, each with its own characteristic, and with its own effect upon our lives. Let’s look at a few of them....

Now you see what I’m doing with these verses; I could go on, but for the sake of time, I’ll leave the rest to you. The main point of it all is that God reveals himself and he does so for a purpose. He wants the whole world to know his glory, so he shines the sun upon them. He wants you, his children, to know Him so that you may be whole, and so he shines the light of his glory in your heart as you hear his word. He wants you to know Him in His Word because it is only in knowing Him that you may be healed and delivered from your sin and that you may have eternal life.

Do you see how valuable the Bible is for you?

Evangelical/Reformed Anglican Yahoo Group

Reader: A couple of years ago, a few friends of mine initiated a Yahoo Group with the stated purpose:
This group is dedicated to compiling literary resources after the Evangelical tradition in the Anglican Church. Both printed and on-line entries are desired. All those interested in the nourishing of this tradition in the Anglican Communion are welcome to join.
The group has been inactive for sometime, but there's no reason that it cannot be revived. If you are interested in being a part of this group and part of its rejuvenation, then feel free to join.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evang_ang_lit/

Image: Bishop J. C. Ryle

Socialism Fills a Vacuum

Socialism, of any kind in any country, has proven to not alleviate any of socialism’s ideals. Nevertheless, socialism in this country has taken the moral high-ground in many minds because capitalism became secularized and the servant of greed. For many reasons, the Church – in both conservative and liberal forms - has failed to foster the biblical assumptions behind the ideal of private property, leaving the public square open to the ravages of sentimentalism and misinformation. Americans have turned away from biblical truth in preference to their idol of Mammon. They have thus sewn the seeds of the destruction of the foundation upon which their idol has stood. Hopefully, the pain of their loss will lead them to repentance and a return to a biblical world-view.

I recommend that everyone hear Greg Bahnsen's series on Economic Ethics, available here. It's going to take generations for us to correct our ignorance, so we better get started now.

Steve Wilkins on the Christian Calendar

Rev. Steve Wilkin's, Pastor of Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church, in Monroe, LA, gave a great lecture on the nature and importance of the Christian calendar this past April. He spoke at St. Mark Reformed Church in the Nashville area. You can hear the lecture, entitled "I've Got Rhythm: Getting in Sinc with Time" by going here.

Monday in Whitsun Week

SEND, we beseech thee, Almighty God, thy Holy Spirit into our hearts, that he may direct and rule us according to thy will, comfort us in all our afflictions, defend us from all error, and lead us into all truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with thee and the same Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, world without end. Amen.

Christ's Wisdom Displayed at Pentecost

Descent of the Holy Ghost (Pentecost), Durer, c. 1510 Woodcut, 12.7 x 9.6

An excerpt from my sermon yesterday:

Now Jesus established His kingdom in the hearts of those thousands gathered in Jerusalem on that Pentecost with the purpose that that kingdom should be spread throughout the world in the hearts of men everywhere. And as Jesus displayed His reign in the Pentecost event, He also displayed his wisdom in the circumstances of it – which He had engineered. In that this was to be the beginning of a world-wide spread of His kingdom, we see the practical wisdom of Jesus in setting things up so that this Pentecost would have its desired world-wide effect.

First, note the timing of the event. There was a distinct, symbolic timing to Pentecost. Pentecost was essentially a harvest celebration. The word pentecost is Greek for the number 50. The day was the fiftieth day after from the first Sunday after Passover and the first day of the wheat harvest. There was no better time in the Jewish calendar, as given in the law of Moses, for the harvest of the gospel age to begin. Peter’s sermon was the first stoke of the scythe in this harvest of love and salvation.

So we see Jesus’ wisdom in the timing of the event, Next, we see his wisdom in the practical circumstance of Pentecost. The law of Moses stated that the people were to assemble in Jerusalem for this feast. Due to the scattering of the Jewish people throughout the Roman empire, the result was that, at Pentecost, there were representatives of the Jewish people from all the provinces of Rome and beyond in the city on that day. These people already had made their plans for when they would be going back home. See the wisdom of God in this! Christ’s intention was for the news of His work and exaltation to go throughout the world and on this day, and the few days to follow, he equips thousands of messengers, who are all ready to start on the journey, to go throughout the Empire with the news of salvation in His name.

It is easy for us to think that the Church spread throughout the known world of that time by the efforts of the twelve apostles and Paul as they journeyed throughout the empire and beyond. But it did not. The growth of the kingdom of Christ did not begin with a small spark but an explosion. Thousands of people left Jerusalem within days of Pentecost to go throughout the world taking the name of salvation in Jesus’ name with them. Jesus knows how to accomplish the mission of his church! He has all the practical wisdom of how to get the job done, and we see it here displayed at Pentecost.

Indeed, consider another way His wisdom is displayed at Pentecost. Consider the practical means by which he gathers the pilgrims together to hear Peter. If it takes a miracle to do what needs to be done, God provides the miracle. God gives the disciples the ability to gain the hearing of the pilgrims by putting his praises on their lips in the native languages of the pilgrims. The pilgrims were absolutely flabbergasted! They were more than ready to hear Peter’s explanation of what they were witnessing.

We thus see Christ, in his masterful wisdom, engineering a world-changing event if there ever was one: unmistakably miraculous events combined with the proclamation of a world-changing message, entrusted to thousands of people zealous for the religion of their fathers, scattered throughout the Roman Empire. How brilliant!

Brothers and sisters, this same Jesus is our king today. Let us have great confidence in His wisdom to lead us in our duties as we seek to fulfill our mission to the world. Let us pray for His engineering of our circumstances that we may have those open doors to tell others of the wonders He has done for us, that, in lifting up Christ through word and deed, He may draw all men to Himself.

Image: http://happycatholic.blogspot.com/2009/05/novena-to-holy-spirit-day-4.html