Podcast Archives - Town Creek Baptist Church

2/11/24

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The post 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

2/4/24

The post 1 Corinthians 14 appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

1/28/24

Up to this point in our study of First Corinthians, the Corinthian Christians arrogantly boasted about many things. By letter, they were a self-centered group.

Paul initially addressed the Church using opposite or the negative connotations of what love does not do and what love is not.

Through the Holy Spirit Paul attempted to focus the Church on living a God-centered life focused on love.

God revealed to the Church that actions or sacrifices without love amount to very little in His economy. Love is premium.

God’s love will cause a Christian to assist others, focus on their needs, and offer help with no thought of repayment or recognition.

No Christian of any age has a right to boast about salvation because salvation is the undeserved gracious gift of God. Noone is able to take credit for it but God. Ephesians 2:8-10; Romans 3:27-28

Paul encouraged the Corinthian Christians to be forward looking and forward living until the absolute completeness in Christ comes. Because of a person’s love relationship with Jesus we shall be complete! This earthly experience of God’s divine love gives Christians a taste of His perfect grace and glory. Hebrews 2:3,4

Christians of all ages have access to God through a love relationship with Jesus Christ. This relationship is limited in understanding and knowledge but shall be made complete in glory.

God acknowledged that all Christians have three gifts that are tied exclusively together, namely faith, hope, and love. Faith, hope, and love are the three gifts that will be ours throughout all eternity.

The post Enduring Faith, Hope, and Love (1 Corinthians 13:1-13) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

1/21/24

Fact Check: If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body, it is.

Fact Check: If the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body, it is.

Fact Check: If the whole body were an eye, there would be no sense of hearing.

Fact Check: If the whole body were an ear, there would be no sense of smell.

Fact Check: As to the makeup of the body, God has placed and arranged each part just as He was pleased. God decided.

Fact Check: Paul was inspired by the Holy Spirit to demonstrate his point by using our God-designed human body as a picture of the unity of Believers within the body of Christ. Christian unity comes with Christian maturity. John 17:11; 21-23; Romans 15:5-6

Fact Check: The Church is responsible to care for It’s members. If one member suffers, then the body suffers. If one member is honored, all members rejoice with it. Striving for unity, brings honor to Jesus, the Head of the Church. Ephesians 4:15

Fact Check: Believer’s collectively are Christ’s body, and individually members of it, each of us with our own special purpose and function.

Fact Check: God appointed and placed in the Church: first apostles, (chosen by Christ), second prophets, (those who foretell the future, those who speak a new message from God to the people), third teachers, then those who work miracles, then those with the gifts of healings, the helpers, the administrators, and speakers in various kinds of unknown tongues.

Fact Check: No matter the gift received by God, each Believer must exercise and put as preeminence, unselfish love.

The post Fact Check: All Members of the Body are Useful (1 Corinthians 12:14-31) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

1/14/24

God is the God of boundless diversities. God gives diversities of gifts, but there is no competition between the gifts given. One Spirit, one body, multiple gifts. Eph. 4:4–6; 11-12; Rom. 12:6–8; 1 Pet. 4:10-11

Paul clarified that the spiritual illumination and the enabling of the Holy Spirit was given individually to each Christian but was for the common good of all the Church. The Christian is given the spiritual gift, he or she does not choose it.

The gifts given to the Church at Corinth can be categorized into three groups:

Paul compared the Corinthian Church to that of the human body. Though they all were different and had differing gives, they all had their place and their purpose within the Body for the common good of all.

At conversion, every believer is baptized (spiritually transformed—united together) by the Holy Spirit into the one body of Christ.

Just as the created human body proclaims the sovereignty of God, so the Church of God using Her God-given spiritual gifts brings honor to Her Creator.

God constructed and arranged the parts in the body just as He willed with the best balance of function. When we exercise our gifts we please God.

Are you truly a member of the Body of Christ?

Are you exercising your giftedness today?

Have you asked God to use you according to His will?

The post All for One and One for All (1 Corinthians 12:1-30) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

1/7/24

Those within the Corinthian Church who exercised their sinful behavior displeased God.

The Corinthians had so distorted worship, Paul told them they were not even celebrating the Lord’s Supper when they came together.

The divisions within the Church were obvious. Some within the Church were grossly self-centered in worship and some did attempt to make worship God-centered. Some were getting drunk at Church. The poor were left with no food to eat.

Paul delivered the instructions how to observe the Lord’s Supper to the Church at Corinth in the same order as God revealed them to him.

Paul taught that the Lord’s Supper was ordained by God as an ordinance to remember the death and resurrection of Christ.

During the night, just prior to His betrayal, Jesus took a piece of bread and gave thanks and said, “This is (represents) My body, which is offered as a sacrifice for you. Do this in affectionate remembrance of Me.”

In the same way, after supper He took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant ratified and established in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in affectionate remembrance of Me.”

Every time Christians eat the bread and drink the cup, we are proclaiming the fact of the Lord’s death until He comes again.

Paul warned the Church, “whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in a way that is unworthy of Him will be guilty of profaning and sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.

A person must prayerfully examine himself and his relationship to Christ, and only when he has done so should he eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without solemn reverence and heartfelt gratitude for the sacrifice of Christ, eats and drinks a judgment on himself if he does not recognize the body of Christ.

The post The Body and The Blood (1 Corinthians 11:17-34) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

12/31/23

The Corinthian Church struggled with division and disunity. Paul credited this struggle, in part, to their sinful pride and their going beyond what God had commanded them.

The Apostle Paul instructed the Corinthian Believer’s to imitate him as he imitated Christ. This was true for Believer’s in Paul’s lifetime and remains one of the most direct ways of disciple-making today.

Paul commended the Corinthian Church for their continued fellowship with him and for keeping the ordinances, such as baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

Paul continued to answer the questions the Church sent him. (1 Corinthians 7:1a) We have his Holy Spirit inspired answers but not the original Church questions.

The ultimate principle of Paul’s writing is for the Church to submit to God-given authority and order in this life.

Christ is the Head and authority over every man, and man is the head of woman, and God (the Father) is the Head of Christ. Paul did not assert the inequality of male and female any more than he asserted the inequality of Father and Son.

There was an accepted order in the Church at Corinth regarding head coverings. If a man prophesied or prayed with his head covered, he dishonored his Head, (Christ). Likewise, if a woman prophesied or prayed with her head uncovered, she dishonored her head (man – commentators suggest her husband).

Men and women must treat each other in such a way as to reflect the picture God intended. (Ephesians 5:33). The man is to take his headship seriously, just as is the woman. Ironically, the angels, who are also under authority, are present in our worship services and observe the behavior of men and women.

Though cultures and methods change, gender roles within the Church do not. Gender is binary – masculine and feminine. Why? Humans were part of God’s plan and exist solely because of His creative action. Genesis 1:26,27

Men and women are different but are mutually interdependent. Men must not twist God’s order and take on the roles and appearances of women, nor should women take on the headship and responsibility roles and appearances of men. Honoring God should be our highest priority.

The post Covering the Coverings (1 Corinthians 11:1-16) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

12/24/23

The post Christmas Eve Message (John 1) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

12/17/23

The Good News was delivered specifically to and specifically in the City of David on a specific day. God through His prophets made His specific plans known Micah 4:8, 5:2. Immanuel specifically visited His people with His specific Kingdom purpose.

Joseph and his promised, pregnant wife Miriam traveled about 90 miles from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, to register for their government census, because he was a descendant of King David.

While in Bethlehem, Miriam gave birth to Jesus in a specific place. Scholars believe it was in the Migdal Eder the tower of the flock. She wrapped her first-born Son in specific strips of cloths and laid Him in a specific stone manger.

A specific angel assigned by God appeared to specific shepherds who were keeping watch over the specific flocks during a specific night with the specific good news.

The shepherds received the good news but experienced needless fear.

The angel instructed the shepherds not to be afraid and announced that the Joy which was promised from old had come.

The good news was that the Savior, Jesus Christ the Lord, had been born in the City of David.

The angel told the shepherds they would find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a food trough.

After the announcement, the brightly lit skies exploded with praise from Heaven’s angelic army.

Angelic praise: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among men with whom He is well-pleased.”

The angels went back to Heaven. The shepherds knew this was a special God-message and went straight to Bethlehem to see this Jesus.

The shepherds found Joseph, Mary, and Jesus exactly as the angels foretold. This caused the shepherds to glorify and praise God for all they had heard and seen.

The post The Specific Good News Revealed (Luke 2:4-21) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.

12/3/23

He wants none to be offended.  There is no glory brought to God when a Christian exercises freedoms and it harms a weaker brother, sister, or unbeliever.

The post For Conscience Sake (1 Corinthians 10:21-33) appeared first on Town Creek Baptist Church.