Controvercial Bible Study Begins

I begins a 5 week series on the "Last Days." Everyone receives my book and study guide, "Why I'm an Amillennialist." I will cover issues dealing with the antichrist, another kingdom age, rebuilding the temple of God, the tribulation, the resurrection and rapture of the church, the second coming of Christ, the final judgment and the new heaven and new earth. Begins Sunday night. 6-8 pm. Child care available.

Why We Preach Expositionally

This is a good reason why we use the expositional preaching style here at PRBC.

God’s Word gives clear primacy to exposition.

• Many preachers and pastors today question whether the Bible really gives us any reason to think that expositional preaching is the best way to preach.
• But the prophetic nature of preaching and the performative nature of God’s Word reveal exposition to be best suited to unleashing the power of the text.

Exposition is primary because preaching is prophetic.

• To say that preaching is prophetic is not to say that it is either predictive or ecstatic utterance – preachers are ambassadors, not prognosticators; and their source of revelation is God’s mediated written word, not His immediate verbal word. It is rather to say that preaching is about receiving God’s word and communicating it to God’s people in a way that is faithful to God’s intention.
• Preaching is prophetic because it conveys God’s Word to God’s people. Exposition best handles the prophetic nature of preaching because the expositional sermon is unique for taking the point of the passage as the point of the message. It is therefore the best way to remain faithful to the content and intent of God’s Word in any given text.

A Positive Example: Nehemiah 8:7-8

• …the Levites explained the law to the people while the people remained in their place. They read from the book, from the Law of God, translating to give the sense so that they understood the reading(Nehemiah 8:7-8).
• The content of their preaching is God’s revelation, not their own ideas. So their preaching is prophetic – they receive God’s word and give it to the people.
• The method of their preaching is to explain the meaning and significance of a portion of God’s Word to God’s people. This is the heart of expositional preaching.
• The effect of their preaching is that the people understand and obey. This is the goal of expositional preaching – that the people hear and heed the Word of God.

A Negative Example: Jeremiah 23:16,18, 21-22

• Thus says the Lord of hosts, “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who are prophesying to you. They are leading you into futility; They speak a vision of their own imagination, Not from the mouth of the Lord. But who has stood in the counsel of the Lord, that he should see and hear His word? Who has given heed to His word and listened? I did not send these prophets, but they ran. I did not speak to them, but they prophesied. But if they had stood in My council, then they would have announced My words to My people, and would have turned them back from their evil way and from the evil of their deeds” (Jer 23:16, 18, 21-22).
• The content of their preaching is from their own imagination. Speaking primarily from our own anecdotes and illustrations displeases God. Expositional preaching disciplines us to constrain our words to the parameters of God’s Word.
• The method of their preaching involves a refusal to stand in God’s council to hear and obey His word. An expositor’s first task is to stand in God’s counsel by bowing under God’s Word.
• The effect of their preaching fails to turn God’s people back to God’s ways, but rather lead them into futility. An expositor’s goal is to speak God’s Word to God’s people so that they will walk in God’s ways.

Exposition is primary because God’s Word is performative.

• God’s Word performs what it prescribes. It is its own power for accomplishing itself. If this is so, then exposition is primary because it best unleashes the performative intention of God’s Word on the lives and hearts of God’s people.
• When God speaks,His very word actually creates the reality that it commands. Six times in Genesis 1 we read: God said and it was so (1:6, 9, 11, 14, 24, 29-30).
• As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it (Isa 55:10-12).
• Look up the following verses. What is God’s Word doing, or able to do? John 17:17; Acts 12:24; 19:20; 1Thess 2:13; Heb 4:12; James 1:18, 21; 1Peter 1:23-25.

Taken from
www.9marks.org

Fasting and Prayer

Acts 13:1-2 Now there were at Antioch, in the church that was there, prophets and teachers: Barnabas, and Simeon who was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2 While they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said



Notice that these five men were corporately fasting and praying. They were seeking God's will. Then God spoke. Prayer and fasting is what we, the church, should be doing. These men were "ministering to the Lord and fasting." It seems to be a forgotten discipline in our day. Why?

Alarming circumstances brought Jehoshaphat to proclaim a fast for all Judah (2 Chron. 20:3).

Look what Esther did.
Esther 4:15-16 15 Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, 16 "Go, assemble all the Jews who are found in Susa, and fast for me; do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my maidens also will fast in the same way. And thus I will go in to the king, which is not according to the law; and if I perish, I perish."

Jesus launched His ministry with fasting.

Fasting and prayer deepens our desire for God and His will. I believe fasting quiets the flesh so we can focus on God and the things of the Spirit. As we so humble ourselves before a holy God, the Holy Spirit deepens our love and hunger for God...for the lost...and for His church.
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" (Matt. 5:6).

Worth the listen and viewing

I Will follow Him

The Impossible Gospel

This is the first paragraph of my new book. The proceeds from the sale of this book will go to those who will attend Pathways in January, to help with the cost of this 12 week class. Want a copy? Call me at 805-226-9670, or leave a comment with your name and address, or go to Amazon.com. $10.00



What I'm about to say will be impossible for you or any human being to understand. But I think I need to qualify this statement. Let me state the premise of this book. Scriptural truth is impossible for the fallen human mind to comprehend or understand (1 Cor. 1:18). By one's own intellect, human beings cannot grasp the truths contained in Scripture. Not only will you not understand, you will think it foolishness to varying degrees. Why? Scripture truth, the Bible, which would also include the gospel, can only be understood by the human mind and intellect through the miraculous work, and intervention of the God's Holy Spirit. It's foolishness to the unbeliever. If this is true, it has profound implications for us and to the church in our era....theo-logical implications.

The Holy Spirit's Love

It's interesting what Salvation does in a persons life. When the Spirit enters a life many things begin to happen. What Donna and I experienced was our old friends eventually did not desire our company at the their "parties" any longer...fine by us. Even stranger for me were the people who I thought were strange (church goers), all of a sudden were not strange. I liked them...I loved them. It's amazing what the Holy Spirit does in that respect.

The same thing happened to the apostle Paul. Those he hated, those he was trying to destroy, after the Spirit entered into him, he loved. It happened within three days. "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren" (1 John 3:14). The fruit of the Spirit is love (Gal. 5:22). Love is powerful. It's Christ's love in us. It overlooks a multitude of sins...doesn't seek it's own way...it's kind (1 Cor. 13). May we let the love of Christ control us (2 Cor. 5:14).