10 Spurgeon Quotes for Wounded Christians
Ten quotes with their contexts, forged on the anvil of Spurgeon’s own affliction.
Spurgeon revealed the struggle of the Christian trying to praise God in the dark: It is easy to sing when we can read the notes by daylight; but he is the skilful singer who can sing when there is not a ray of light by which to read,— who sings from his heart, and not... Continue Reading
Why Will You Stay Away?
Approach the Holy of Holies, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Throne of Grace with confidence. Because of Jesus Christ, this is where you belong.
Do not let Satan encourage you to keep your distance. He is the Accuser who began in the Garden telling lies about the compassion of God. Listen not to him. Ignore his empty accusations. Open your Bible and hear the voice of God calling you to come near and repent. God foreordains our sin. There... Continue Reading
What Does “Give Us this Day Our Daily Bread” Mean?
Obviously Jesus was not telling His disciples to pray only for bread
“This petition of the Lord’s Prayer, then, teaches us to come to God in a spirit of humble dependence, asking Him to provide what we need and to sustain us from day to day. We are not given license to ask for great riches, but we are encouraged to make our needs known to Him,... Continue Reading
When God Graciously Makes You Miserable
This inner turmoil is His doing, and He’s doing it because He cares for me
I’ll bet that some of you consider that a preposterous idea—a God of love would never be so “mean.” You may think I’m crediting God with Satan’s work. However, the Bible tells us of a man who experienced a similar misery of the soul—a misery that he, an inspired biblical writer, described as divine discipline. I... Continue Reading
What Is Distinctive About Preaching, And How Does It Differ From Other Ministries of the Word? (Part 1)
What is distinctive about the Sunday sermon is that it is addressed to the church
“The Sunday sermon is therefore the moment in the week when the people of God together meet the word of God and and so the role of preachers of God’s word to God’s people is one of immense worth and unique importance. In our weekly sermon God’s people gather around God and hear him speak to them through... Continue Reading
When the Saints Go Marching In
What’s wrong with reserving the title saint for only a select few Christians?
This is how Scripture can declare all believers to be saints in the here and now. What is true of Jesus is true of all those unite to Him by faith. When believers come to understand that their sainthood is founded on the sufficiency of the work of Jesus Christ, they learn that the ups... Continue Reading
Reformed Pentecostals
As one who professes Jesus Christ, you too must rely on the work of the Spirit from womb to tomb.
Search the Scriptures to see his work. Do not be afraid to drink deeply of and profess joyfully the Spirit’s work. Do not let other’s errors of fixation on the Spirit’s work lead you to become a theoretical professor of the Spirit’s work. Search the Scriptures and find joy in the Holy Spirit, the Lord... Continue Reading
Ignoring Spiritual Conflict on the Battlefield of the Christian Life
As Christians we should not allow weird strains of Christianity to put what the Bible says about spiritual conflict out of our thoughts and prayers.
The Christian life is a war and Christ is our Captain. On the battlefield are many dangers flying toward us: We can fall prey to our own sin, to the opposition of the world on one side or the temptation of the world on the other, we can be led astray by false teaching. All... Continue Reading
Sexual Identity: Homosexuality, an Ontological Impossibility
To claim that homosexual orientation is benign or neutral is an ontologically impossible position.
Vital to understanding sanctification is the relationship between the indicative and imperative. The indicative describes what God has done in Christ for us and is the ground of the imperative to be what we are in Christ. In other words, we are becoming in Christ what we already are in Christ… if sexual orientation is... Continue Reading
Spiritual Disciplines and the Sinkhole Syndrome
Pursue the Lord with a relentless, lifelong, obstacle-defying passion. Resolve never to let your daily life keep you from Jesus daily.
Never be deceived by the temptation to think that with the increasing spiritual maturity you expect to come with age, the less you will need to feast your soul on Christ through the Bible and prayer. What Jesus prayed in John 17:17 for all His followers—“Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth”—applies to us all... Continue Reading