Gospel Doctrine

So now what? That's pretty much what the crowds asked Peter after his sermon on Pentecost. Convicted by the Gospel--remember, that means they were convicted by Good News--crowds came under conviction of sin and couldn't help but ask, "What should we do?" "Repent, believe and be baptized," was Peter's simple answer.

What about you? Are you a follower of Jesus Christ? What does it mean for you to "believe"? You know, according to God's Word in James 2.19, "even the demons believe." So surely they're something more to God's gift of faith than merely knowing some information about Jesus.

"I am the Alpha and Omega." The Lord has us covered from start to finish. He hasn't left His children without the power, knowledge, or resources to grow in their knowledge and love of Jesus. In fact, it is these very means that become the greatest joys for His followers on this side of seeing Him face-to-face.

Are you availing yourself to the means of grace God has provided to restore and sustain your faith? Do you know what those are? This week we wrap up what was originally intended to be five-, but is now six-sermon series on Gospel Doctrines.

Today's passage:

3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, -2 Peter 1.3 (esv)

What makes the Gospel glorious? God does. Not just who He is, but how He has manifested "who He is" among us: the death, burial and resurrection of His Son for our sin. All praise and glory is due Him!

So then, what's the connection between His manifestation of Love displayed before us, and His manifestation of Love displayed through us? Answer: His Spirit made alive in us! Not as though it is an insignificant matter, but there is more to the Gospel than forgiveness. Were God to just wipe our slate clean of past sins, it wouldn't be but a few seconds until we needed cleaning again. Enter His Spirit!

Christ came--not to further enslave us with even more debt, the debt of "owing God" for all He has done for us, but--to set us free from our debts and divinely enable us to love as we ought to, in fact, to love as He loves. Is that how you love?

Join us today for the final sermon in the Gospel Doctrine series and see why, the Gospel really does begin and end with God. To Him be the glory in the church now and forever more!

Today's passage:

7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.13 By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. 16 So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. 17 By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. 19 We love because he first loved us. 20 If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. 21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. -1 John 4.7-21 (esv)

In the last three weeks of our Gospel Doctrine series we have:

1) met the I Am who is sovereign and supremely good above all, who has always been and ever will be;

2) learned that the I Am created us to behold Him, and, in beholding Him, to find our joy in Him, and, in finding our joy in Him, to glorify Him;

3) seen how far we have fallen in sin from God's intended design, how we are broken people, now only able to turn to human-dug broken cisterns in search for soul-satisfaction that will never be found apart from God.

What a devastating plight. But O what hope there is in such awareness and such an acknowledgement. God is merciful and just. He has made a way through His Son for lost sons and daughters to be brought to Him again. This is the day of salvation!

May God grant us salvation and sustenance through Christ the Lord as together we look into the life of a fellow sinner, King David, "a man after God's own heart." He too was a broken man; in fact, David was an adulterer and a murderer. Who among us would let such a wretch off the hook of divine justice? "No not one." But One did, and--praise the Lord--He still does today! Otherwise, there would be no hope for any of us.

But how can such a "free pass" for David be counted righteous on God's behalf? How can God simply "pass over" his sin without violating His own holiness? How can He do what any human judge would be thrown from the bench for doing? Is God truly righteous? Is He truly a just God?

Where is your hope before the Almighty, the great I Am? Grab a copy of God's Word and be silenced in humility and brought to rejoicing today through this week's Gospel Doctrine of forgiveness purchased by the blood of God's Lamb.

Today's passage:

51:1 Have mercy on me, O God,according to your steadfast love;according to your abundant mercyblot out my transgressions.2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,and cleanse me from my sin!3 For I know my transgressions,and my sin is ever before me.4 Against you, you only, have I sinnedand done what is evil in your sight,so that you may be justified in your wordsand blameless in your judgment.5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,and in sin did my mother conceive me.6 Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.8 Let me hear joy and gladness;let the bones that you have broken rejoice.9 Hide your face from my sins,and blot out all my iniquities.10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,and renew a right spirit within me.11 Cast me not away from your presence,and take not your Holy Spirit from me.12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,and uphold me with a willing spirit.13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,and sinners will return to you.14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,O God of my salvation,and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.15 O Lord, open my lips,and my mouth will declare your praise.16 For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.18 Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;build up the walls of Jerusalem;19 then will you delight in right sacrifices,in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;then bulls will be offered on your altar. -Psalm 51 (esv)

It's devastatingly true that, despite our human condition of sin, so few humans have even heard of it; and, if they do, they're quick to dismiss it as "a religious crutch for the ignorant who lack the mental capacity to come to grips with the harsh reality of evolution."

However, the apostle Paul was clear in Romans 6 that every human on the planet is born a slave to sin, serving master satan, without God, without hope in this world. That is unless the Light of the World breaks in and sets the captive free!

So how does satan rule this world? Where did he get such authority? And what do we make of the fact that, rather than feeling enslaved or dominated by an evil master, so many feel right at home under his government, fat and happy, with a remote in each hand.

Answers to these and so many other questions are provided for us in this third of five Gospel Doctrines, as we look into many passages in God's Word, with special emphasis in Ephesians 2.1-3.

Today's passage:

2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. -Ephesians 2.1-3 (esv)

Why does anything exist? Chances are, most of you know the reason. Don't discount that knowledge, my friend. Knowing all exists for the glory of God provides a view of the world that answers so many questions. Perhaps as you survey the canvas of human sin, the knowledge that all things are supposedly made for His glory produces more doubts and questions that you care to admit? "Is all this sin, sickness, disease, destruction and death really supposed to be glorifying God? How does that work?" Glad you asked!

As we saw last week, our lives are built on what we believe. Join us this week for a very important look into God's Word. By grace, may He answer our tough questions, granting us the Truth upon which to stand in hope until we see Him face to face... in Glory!

Today's passage:

43:1 But now thus says the Lord,he who created you, O Jacob,he who formed you, O Israel:“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;I have called you by name, you are mine.2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,and the flame shall not consume you.3 For I am the Lord your God,the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.I give Egypt as your ransom,Cush and Seba in exchange for you.4 Because you are precious in my eyes,and honored, and I love you,I give men in return for you,peoples in exchange for your life.5 Fear not, for I am with you;I will bring your offspring from the east,and from the west I will gather you.6 I will say to the north, Give up,and to the south, Do not withhold;bring my sons from afarand my daughters from the end of the earth,7 everyone who is called by my name,whom I created for my glory,whom I formed and made.”3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. -Isaiah 43.1-7, Ephesians 1.3-6 (esv)

Where would you begin the Gospel? Where would anything have to begin, for that matter? As we begin our exploration of the Biblical doctrines that uphold the Good News of the Scripture, there is no better place to begin than where Moses began his relationship with the Most High, with the simple question: "Who are you?"

We've an enemy lurking. According to Jesus, satan seeks to steal, kill and destroy. He's been a liar, deceiver and thief from the beginning. If he can rob your joy in Jesus, he can silence your proclamation of the Gospel. Fleeting is our joy when it is not built on the solidarity of God's Word. What are you staking your hope in?

"Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks," Jesus said. Does the Gospel permeate your heart and mind? Do you find yourself sharing hope in God with strangers, family and friends? Is the Good News a regular part of your thinking, speaking, praying, loving and living? Or perhaps you are fearful or shameful of the Gospel? Could the problem simply be that you know so little of it?

Our hope in this series is--by God's grace--to fill up on Biblical certainty, Scriptural Truth, God's Word, in order that we would stand upon the rock-solidarity of Jesus Christ, and live in the generosity and joy that honors and glorifies our faithful Father.

I'd say we have a lot of work to do. Won't you join us?

(This series is being paralleled over the next five weeks in our Restore families. It's been nearly two years since we last went through Sustain 101. As always but now especially, you're invited to one of our Restore families during the course of this study, and beyond.)

Today's passage:

13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I am has sent me to you.’” 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. -Exodus 3.13-15 (esv)