Thursday, February 26, 2009

Some of God's Purposes in this Recession by John Piper

(Some of) God’s Purposes in This Recession

Now what are some of God’s purposes in this recession?

1. He intends for this recession to expose hidden sin and so bring us to repentance and cleansing.

2. He intends to wake us up to the constant and desperate condition of the developing world where there is always and only recession of the worst kind.

3. He intends to relocate the roots of our joy in his grace rather than in our goods, in his mercy rather than our money, in his worth rather than our wealth.

4. He intends to advance his saving mission in the world—the spread of the gospel and the growth of his church—precisely at a time when human resources are least able to support it. This is how he guards his glory.

5. He intends for the church to care for its hurting members and to grow in the gift of love.

Why Expositional Preaching is Particularly Glorifying to God

“George Whitefield believed in preaching and gave his life to it. By this preaching God did a mighty work of salvation on both sides of the Atlantic. His biographer, Arnold Dallimore, chronicled the astonishing effect that Whitefield’s preaching had in Britain and America in the eighteenth century. It came like rain on the parched land and made the desert spring forth with the flowers of righteousness. Dallimore lifted his eyes from the transformed wasteland of Whitefield’s time and expressed his longing that God would do this again. He cries out for a new generation of preachers like Whitefield. His words help me express what I long for in the coming generations of preachers in America and around the world. He said,

Yea…that we shall see the great Head of the Church once more . . . raise up unto Himself certain young men whom He may use in this glorious employ. And what manner of men will they be? Men mighty in the Scriptures, their lives dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty and holiness of God, and their minds and hearts aglow with the great truths of the doctrines of grace. They will be men who have learned what it is to die to self, to human aims and personal ambitions; men who are willing to be ‘fools for Christ’s sake’, who will bear reproach and falsehood, who will labor and suffer, and whose supreme desire will be, not to gain earth’s accolades, but to win the Master’s approbation when they appear before His awesome judgment seat. They will be men who will preach with broken hearts and tear-filled eyes, and upon whose ministries God will grant an extraordinary effusion of the Holy Spirit, and who will witness ‘signs and wonders following’ in the transformation of multitudes of human lives.1

Mighty in the Scriptures, aglow with the great truths of the doctrines of grace, dead to self, willing to labor and suffer, indifferent to the accolades of man, broken for sin, and dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty, and holiness of God. Dallimore, like Whitefield, believed that preaching is the heralding of God’s word from that kind of heart. Preaching is not conversation. Preaching is not discussion. Preaching is not casual talk about religious things. Preaching is not simply teaching. Preaching is the heralding of a message permeated by the sense of God’s greatness and majesty and holiness. The topic may be anything under the sun, but it is always brought into the blazing light of God’s greatness and majesty in his word. That was the way Whitefield preached.”

This is an excerpt from John Piper’s sermon at T4G 2006. I’ve listened to this 20 minute intro at least 8 times. I've received a lot of bad advice about preaching (what it is, should be, is not, etc. This sermon sheds great light on this matter).

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

What I am reading-

February Book List

Recently Finished:
Feed My Sheep: A Passionate Plea for Preaching by various authors.

Singing and Making Music by Paul Jones


Still Reading:
The Mischief of Sin by Thomas Watson
The Message of the Old Testament by Mark Dever
Numerous Commentaries on Revelation
God's Indwelling Presence: The Holy Spirit in the OT and the NT by James Hamilton Jr.

John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology edited by Burk Parsons.
After Darkness Light by various authors

Saturday, February 21, 2009

True Preaching

David Wells, in his new book The Courage to be Protestant:

“Preaching is not a conversation about some interesting ideas. It is not the moment in which postmoderns hear their own private message in the biblical words, one unique to each one who hears, and then go their own way. No! This is God speaking! He speaks through the stammering lips of the preacher where that preacher’s mind is on the text of Scripture and his heart is in the presence of God. God, as Luther puts it, lives in the preacher’s mouth.

This is the kind of preaching that issues a summons, which nourishes the soul, which draws the congregation into the very presence of God so that no matter what aspect of his character, his truth, his working in this world is in focus, we leave with awe, gratitude, encouragement, and sometimes a rebuke.
We have been in the very presence of God! This is what great preaching always does.”

(David Wells; The Courage to be Protestant; p 230)

Thursday, February 19, 2009

The Preacher of God's Word

Pastor Steve J. Lawson contributed the following chapter in the helpful new book John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion Doctrine & Doxology. This book provides fresh insights into the life and ministry of the "controversial" Reformation pastor.

Lawson points to 10 Distinguishing Marks of Calvin’s pulpit ministry.

1. Calvin’s preaching was biblical in substance.
2. Calvin’s preaching was sequential in its pattern.
3. Calvin’s preaching was direct in its message.
4. Calvin’s preaching was extemporaneous in its delivery.
5. Calvin’s preaching was exegetical in its approach.
6. Calvin’s preaching was accessible in its simplicity.
7. Calvin’s preaching was pastoral in its tone.
8. Calvin’s preaching was polemic in its defense of the truth.
9. Calvin’s preaching was passionate in its outreach.
10. Calvin’s preaching was doxological in its conclusion.

In the words of Calvin himself, “A rule is prescribed to all God’s servants that they bring not their own inventions, but simply deliver from hand to hand, what they have received from God.”

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Goals for every Pastor

Should A Pastor Set Goals?

Yes! Derek Prime and Alistair Begg suggest that every pastor should set the following six goals:

to feed the flock (John 21:15-17)
to proclaim the whole will of God (
Acts 20:27)
to present everyone perfect in Christ (
Colossians 1:28-29)
to prepare God’s people for works of service (
Ephesians 4:12)
to equip God’s people to be fisher’s of men (
2 Timothy 4:5)
to keep watch over oneself until the task is complete (
1 Timothy 4:16)

(Above: from their book “Being A Pastor”, chapter 3)

Monday, February 16, 2009

The Primacy of Preaching

In his chapter The Primacy of Preaching from the book Feed My Sheep Dr. Al Mohler has written, “Evangelical pastors commonly state that biblical preaching is the hallmark of their calling. Nevertheless, a careful observer might come to a very different conclusion. The priority of preaching is simply not evident in far too many churches.

We must affirm with Luther that the preaching of the Word is the first essential mark of the church. Luther believed so strongly in the centrality of preaching that he stated, ‘Now, wherever you hear or see this Word preached, believed, professed, and lived, do no doubt that the true ecclesia sancta catholica (Christian, holy people) must be there….And even were no other sign than this alone, it would still suffice to prove that a Christian, holy people must exist there, for God’s Word cannot be without God’s people and, conversely, God’s people cannot be without God’s Word.’”

Before he died the great Bible expositor James Montgomery Boice wrote, “I do not think it is too much to say that preaching really is an essential means perhaps even the most important means, of grace. If that is the case, then we should be very careful in our Christian lives to expose ourselves to the best teaching and attend the best churches available.”

2 Timothy 3:13-4:5; John 21:15-17; Col. 1:25-29; Romans 10:17; 1 Peter 1:23, 2:2; 1 Timothy 4:13-18; Ezra 7:10; Neh. 8.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Attacks on Biblical Womanhood

Media's Clamor Over True Woman `08 is Anti-Woman
Article by Jeff Robinson; February 9, 2009

The mainstream news media has discovered-with a vengeance, emphasis on vengeance-True Woman `08 nearly four months after the Revive Our Hearts women's conference took place. Last week, Gender Blog interacted with an article published by Religion Dispatches that typified TW as a "counter-cultural movement," but one that should be taken seriously.

More recently, Bonnie Erbe, a blogger on U.S. News and World Report's website, employs a far more pointed and acerbic tone in her assessment of TW, calling it the "anti-woman's movement." Erbe's tone is predictably, but disturbingly for a venue that pitches itself as a "news" magazine, facetious and condescending.

"Anti-women women have existed since time immemorial. Another way of putting it is, women have been smart enough for decades to make their living telling other women to stay home: witness Phyllis Schlafly (and her Eagle Forum), Beverly LaHaye (and her Concerned Women for America), and so on."

"Why don't men form groups to campaign against other men? Am I missing something? If any of you out there know of such a group, please post about it. Women don't need to form a movement to stay home, make babies and submit to their husbands. That's what most women did until a few decades ago. If there are those who want to continue on that path, fine! Just do it. But women have not always been allowed to work, or work in meaningful, high-paying jobs. That's why the women's movement was formed."

Erbe saves her best vitriol for the last sentence:
"Meanwhile, can we set up a new gender for so-called True Women, so normal women don't have to share anything in common with them?"

There are myriad ironies in here; Erbe, ostensibly a feminist, employs a highly abusive tone toward the women of True Women. The very thing she would presumably decry with gusto-the verbal abuse of women-she perpetrates because, in Erbe's mind, the women of TW do not fit the narrow feminist presuppositions that compose "true womanhood." Erbe is essentially calling the women of TW-and stay at home moms everywhere, which, for every irascible, left-wing feminist "news" commentator, there are probably tens of millions-fools and buffoons. This is nothing less than anti-woman slander.

By God's grace, the average woman in America-whether elite feminist journalists, who tend to inhabit small circles, are aware of it or not-follows God's design for women: most dress like women, most have female interests, most look like women, most have children, many work in the home and take care of their families and many work in jobs such as nursing that employ a woman's unique and wonderful gifts. Thankfully, Erbe's brand of mocking, bitter feminism-one that calls for relegating conservative women to a "third gender"- represents the views of a small but vociferous minority among our country's female citizenry. We pray that God's grace will open their eyes to see the ineffable beauty of a Gospel-entranced true womanhood.

Original Post Taken From http://www.cbmw.org/Blog/Posts/Medias-Clamor-Over-True-Woman-08-is-Anti-Woman

Happy Valentine's Day from the Kolstad family











You know you live in the Midwest when you actually get excited about a February day in the 40's. The kids loved jumping in the snow puddles as you can see!