Matthew 16:1-4 March 23, 2022 PM.

The last time we encountered the Pharisees and company

was at the beginning of chapter 15, where they were

criticizing the Lord’s disciples for not washing their hands

before eating. In their way of thinking, this caused

ceremonial defilement. The Lord corrected two errors in

their thinking. First, eating with unwashed hands does

not cause defilement; rather, defilement comes from a

person’s inner nature. Second, they placed more weight

on their traditions than they did on the words of God,

with the effect that they voided God’s word.

Now they come with another test. Hard-hearted unbelief is shown here in the lives of the

Pharisees and Sadducees. We must make sure that we do

not have any scraps of that kind of attitude in our hearts.

There is a lesson not just in avoiding the example of the

Pharisees, but more positively in how the Lord answers

their inquiry. He rebukes them for being focused on the

wrong things. How often we too are wrongly focused—

not on the things of Jesus, but on the things of the world.

Various March 20, PM 2022.

We started tonight's service with a question and answer session led by Pastor Matt. Additionally, we continue our study on Answering Islamic Objections to Christianity, where Pastor Matt was inspired to respond to some material covered in chapter 14 of Nabeel Qureshi, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus. As this is the main source material for these notes, there may be variant Islamic beliefs that are not covered here. He is also drawing on personal experience speaking with Muslims. What do we conclude? The Christian can successfully answer Islamic objections to Christianity, including to the Bible and to the person and work of Christ. We can do so by careful attention to the context of words, and to the theology of the person of Christ.

Philippians 3:4-11, Part 1 March 20, AM 2022.

Christ died on a cross and bore in His own body our sins that He might

bring us to God (1 Peter 2:24, 3:18). This destroys all other

righteousness-seeking programs in the sight of God.

Christianity is not a righteousness-earning system. We are talking

about Paul’s highest desire, a total change in his thinking from his

prior legalism. Now his life is animated and directed toward Christ,

the person of the God-man. He wants to fully know Christ—

resurrection power, sufferings, righteousness, etc. Is Christ your

highest prize, deepest desire?

Various March 20, SS 2022.

Pastor Matt was inspired to respond to some material covered in chapter 14 of

Nabeel Qureshi, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus. As this is the main

source material for these notes, there may be variant Islamic

beliefs that are not covered here. He is also drawing on personal

experience speaking with Muslims. What do we conclude? The Christian can successfully answer Islamic objections to

Christianity, including to the Bible and to the person and work of Christ. We can do so by careful attention to the context of words,

and to the theology of the person of Christ.

Matthew 15:29-39 March 16, 2022 PM.

Miracles authenticate Jesus as a messenger of God,

and more than that, as the Son of God. How can we be

sure?

Look at John 5:18-46. The Lord claims equality with the

Father, is able to give life, is responsible for all judgment

(Acts 17:30-31), and will raise the dead. These are

functions of God, not man. Beyond that, Jesus calls them

to hear the testimony of witnesses to his claims: John the

Baptist, the greater witness of His miraculous works; the

Father who testified of Jesus (remember His voice from

heaven?), and the Scriptures of Moses and the prophets

of old. We could also add the angels from Luke 2:11, and

the New Testament Scriptures. Their cumulative

testimony of these witnesses make it clear Who we are

reading about here: the Son of God.

Various March 13, 2022 PM.

What are we to make of the fact that the word disciple does

not appear in the epistles? Not much. The narrative form

of the gospels and Acts lends itself to the use of that

noun for Christians. The epistles are written to disciples

and do not have to say the word for the target audience

to be understood. Disciples look like the kind of people

described in the gospels.

Philippians 3:1-3 March 13, 2022 AM.

Check yourself out against verse 3 again. Make sure you have the

right focus, and your boasting is in the Lord and not in your own

fleshly accomplishments. Make sure that you are in fact serving

God. Are you wary of bad doctrine that would oppose the true

gospel (v. 2)? And finally (v. 1), are you rejoicing in the Lord no

matter what your circumstances might be?

Various March 13, 2022 SS.

In this message Pastor Matt hosts a questions and answers session, including the following: 1) If God is loving, how could he command the

Israelites to wipe out whole cities of Canaanites during the conquest of Joshua? 2) What would have happened if Adam and Eve had made a fruit pie with the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil and eaten both? 3) When does a Christian get their resurrected body?

Matthew 15:21-28 // Mark 7:24-30 March 9, 2022 PM.

A casual reading of this passage could raise some wrong and even

blasphemous ideas, especially in our overly sensitive culture. For

example: Was the Lord rude and unkind when he initially ignored

the lady? Was he mean or racist to speak about throwing crumbs

to dogs? Did the woman really have faith or was she just clever in

how she replied to the Lord?

Part of the problem is that the text does not tell us background

information on the woman. But it tells us enough that we can

figure out something about her. Another problem is that we were

not there nor did we live in the culture at the time, so we cannot

definitively say what would be offensive or not in this kind of

situation. The woman was a Gentile, but she had great faith. Thank the Lord

that He receives Gentiles as well as Jews. Faith is the basis of that

acceptance—not ethnicity or any other “human” characteristic!

Various March 6, 2022 PM.

The Bible is clear about the character and behavior of

disciples. What are we to make of the fact that the word disciple does

not appear in the epistles? Not much. The narrative form

of the gospels and Acts lends itself to the use of that

noun for Christians. The epistles are written to disciples

and do not have to say the word for the target audience

to be understood. Disciples look like the kind of people

described in the gospels.