TruthTalks Archives - Truth Is The Word

Talking about Revival!

A million people are expected to attend the “It’s Time” prayer gathering event happening in South Africa soon. So, next week we are going to be writing, and talking about this and we would love to have YOUR thoughts on it which we can address in the question and answer session of the TruthTalks podcast.

Please CLICK HERE  and answer some questions for us – it would be great if we could pick up on your responses in our next Q&A.

* Are you planning on going to the “It’s Time” event?

* What is your motivation fro going or not going?

* What are your expectations?

This week we are listening to two teachings Dr. Christopher Peppler gave from Isaiah 61 concerning Revival.  In the first teaching, he also asks if we believe you will see revival in OUR day. He uses the Hebrides and the local Kwazisabantu revivals as interesting case studies.

Listen to part one of the Revival Revisited message part 1 below.

 

 

 

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Talking about what we hold dearest in our hearts…

The full title of this post is “The importance of staying true to Core Values” and in this podcast Dr Christopher Peppler goes into more detail about that and then he and I get into an interesting discussion about this, both:

* In your own self, and how to judge whether you are drifting from your personal core values, and also

* In your church, how the church family can do this and what to do if you have a drifting of, or opposing view to the church values

In this conversation we refer to a diagram (a pyramid) representing core values which I have added to this post too in case you missed the first post on Core Values. As always, feedback appreciated!

 

 

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This sermon is all about how we interpret things demonstrated with music, and it’s role in the bible and how the music in OUR lives sounds.

In this sermon Dr. Christopher Peppler reads from Psalm 139, using this as an example of showing us the difference between how when we internalise this, or any other verse and how we can interpret verses in either a major or minor key. He also demonstrates, using his “beater to better” guitar project, how something that other’s can’t see any value in, can be raised to be a thing of beauty and great music.

Some of us come into our lives:

* with imperfections,

* great but we get beaten up by life

But, for all of us…

…when Jesus breathes new life into us, we are in the hands of a Master Craftsman and He will transform us.

Listen to the sermon (under the images of the “beater to better” project). Incidentally, the guitar found a new owner who cherishes it, even knowing it’s former condition… like Jesus does with us.

 

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Ai-sh, can it be true? Yes, yes it can! Maybe even in our lifetime!

Last week we posted a sobering article on Artificial Intelligence and how it could impact us on many different levels. If you missed that post don’t worry, you will get a summary of sorts at the beginning of this audio file, otherwise,  you can find it HERE or simply navigate to http://www.truthistheword.com/ai-sh-can-it-be-true/.  In this follow-up audio TruthTalk, Dr. Christopher Peppler talks about the post and goes over some of the details he didn’t include. After that, there is a question and answer session by his daughter (yours truly) where I try to ask the kind of questions I hope I’m not the only one asking. I try to catch him off-balance and often ask incredibly stupid questions (I realise in hindsight after he’s answered them), but it helps me understand some of these bigger concepts and I do hope it assists you too.

So, if you like your food for thought taken aurally (and not orally) then simply click on the link below to listen now. We love getting your comments, so if you do have one, please comment at the bottom of this post, email us HERE, or post on our Facebook page which is https://www.facebook.com/truthistheword/.

 

Here is the TruthTalk:

 

 

 

 

 

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But why did this have to happen? Where was God?

Dr Christopher Peppler talks about the distressing events we face in everyday life and how to handle them. Chris looks at questions like “why do bad things happen to good people?” and “why didn’t God intervene?” Listen to this sermon preached at the Village Church on the 26th of June 2016 to hear answers to these, and other important questions that we may, on occasions, ask ourselves. Jesus answers these questions in John 13-16 and we are taken through those verses as well as how we are expected to cope with suffering and evil in this world and how to find peace in it all.

You can listen to this TruthTalk Sermon  here:

 

To listen to other sermons by Dr Christopher Peppler, go to http://www.truthistheword.com/my-sermons/

God Bless you!

 

 

Lent is upon us… well, it’s upon those who observe lent.

The word Lent originally meant ‘lengthen’, as in the daylight hours of Spring, but in the more traditional Christian world, it has come to signify the 40 days of preparation for Easter. The main idea is that Christians should examine their lives, repent of sin, and attempt to present themselves as pleasing to God. One of the main ways they try to achieve this is by fasting.

In Old Testament times good Israelites fasted for several different reasons, but the most common reason was to demonstrate their grief and anguish of heart. When someone died, the family would fast as a way of evidencing their grief. When the nation disobeyed God and the people then realised their error they would fast to demonstrate their repentance. However, the religious leaders gradually replaced this fasting-from-the-heart with an ostentatious style of fasting designed to demonstrate their personal piety. So, the Pharisees of Jesus’ day would fast on one or two days a week to show others just how ‘holy’ they were, and they made sure everyone knew that they were fasting. Jesus addressed this religious pride and hypocrisy when He said, “When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matthew 6:16–18).

When today’s Christians wish to justify why they fast, say for Lent, they often quote this passage because Jesus said “When you fast” and not “if you fast” and was thus endorsing the practice for His followers… so they say. However his teaching was part of the well-known Sermon on the Mount, and although His disciples were present Jesus was addressing a large crowd of traditional Jewish folk (Matthew 7:29). They understood the why and how of fasting.

To take Jesus’ acknowledgement of the practice of fasting in this passage as an endoresemnt for the ongoing practice of fasting is really biting off more than we should be chewing.

Matthew 9:14-17 records how on another occasion Jesus addressed the issue of fasting: ‘Then the disciples of John came to him [Jesus], saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch tears away from the garment, and a worse tear is made. Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.”’ Once again this is commonly used to support the idea that today’s believers should fast because did not Jesus, the groom, leave us to go back to heaven? But do we not believe then that Jesus is with us now in spirit? I would have thought that the more obvious way of understanding this passage was to take the comparison between John the Baptist’s Old Testament followers and Jesus’ disciples as a rejection, and not an endorsement, of Christian fasting.

I have sometimes fasted from all foods for up to a week, but in my later years have come to realise that fasting, other than for health reasons, is problematic on a number of grounds:

* First is the lack of any reasonable biblical endorse...

On Sunday 2th Feb 2017 I preached on a very important topic, the difference between Knowledge and knowing.

Many people who attend churches throughout the world have the terrible misconception that the essence of Christianity is knowing, doing, and committing the will. However, Jesus said, “You must be born again” and this re-creative miracle is a work of the Holy Spirit, by virtue of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

 

Listen to the sermon here, or download it from www.truthistheword.com

 

Why do church members think that they can, or should, ask their pastors for counselling? Why do pastors think that they are equipped or mandated to provide counselling?

A retired pastor I know used to spend an average of 16 hours a week counselling. The man who took over from him when he retired is experiencing the same sort of counselling load. Why?

Why spend so much time ‘counselling’ when there are so many other functions that need a leader’s focus and priority, like leading, preaching, teaching, and praying.

I have difficulty justifying the current role of Pastor (with a capital ‘P’) because I just do not see it in the New Testament church or in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, the head of the church. Ask a Pastor how he spends his time and you will find that his days are filled with administration, meetings, weddings, funerals, baby blessings, more meetings, preaching, and yet more meetings… and counselling.

In 2002 Frank Viola and George Barna wrote a controversial book titled ‘Pagan Christianity?’ In their chapter dealing with the Pastor’s role they write; ‘There is not a single verse in the entire New Testament that supports the existence of the modern-day pastor! He simply did not exist in the early church.’ Now if Pastors, as we know them today, did not exist in the early church, and their role is not even hinted at in the New Testament, then why do they dominate local church culture throughout the world? However, this article is not about the Pastor’s role in general, but about one of his or her main functions… counselling.

Church members queue up to seek these things from their local church oracle called The Pastor: “Pastor, should I take this job offer or stay where I am?“, and, “Pastor, my husband drinks and is having an affair, what should I do?” The ‘pastor’ either groans inwardly while offering up the plea, “What am I supposed to say Lord”, or he puffs himself out and pontificates. However, what appropriate education has our Pastor received that qualifies him as an ‘expert’ advice-giver? Perhaps a course in Nouthetic counselling, or a couple of days training in Theophostic prayer ministry, or a 12 credit course from his seminary? Many of today’s pastors are young and inexperienced, have yet to raise their own families, and most have never had to deal with the harsh realities of business life. Yet people expect counsel from them, and they in turn feel obliged to provide it.

Surely, we can see that there is something very wrong with the picture I am presenting. Perhaps I have it all wrong, but then I do have 30 years of pastoral leadership experience and the scars that go with this.

Here is what I think:

ALL mature Christians should be available to others to help and comfort, and to pray with those who are confused or in emotional pain.

Teachers within the Body of Christ, and that includes the ubiquitous ‘Pastors’, should teach what the Bible sets out as principles for living, point those in need to Jesus, and pray for the infilling presence of the Holy Spirit in their lives and situations. However, sometimes people are traumatised by the problems that confront them and need what I would call crisis counselling. But in my book, this form of counselling should seldom stretch beyond three sessions altogether and can and should be conducted by ANY mature, biblically literate, Jesus-centred, and Spirit-filled believer. Other than genuine crisis situations, most genuine disciples of Jesus know what they should or should not do and it doesn’t really help them to have a Pastor reinforce what they already know or refuse to ‘know’.

Now, consider the unfortunate Pastor who has to soak up hours and hours of bad news, negative emotion and angst… almost every day! Is it any wonder that more Pastors fall into sin, burn out,

Chaos reigned in parliament before the South African president’s latest state of the nation address.

The Chief Whip of the opposition rose to state why his party could not remain to listen to the president, but the ruling party benches drowned him out with a loud and angry chorus of “racist”. Is this an acceptable expression or is it a form of hate speech?

Just weeks ago a crowd of gay activists gathered outside the largest church in Soweto to protest a recent sermon censoring homosexuality. Was such a sermon ‘hate speech’, or was the protest an attempt to curtail religious liberty?

Gay ‘rights’ are a contentious issue in many countries around the world but in South Africa activists are gaining traction and attention by aligning themselves as victims of hate speech. Two things appear to me to have sponsored the current emphasis on ‘hate speech’:

* A number of racially prejudicial remarks in the social media, and,

* The ruling party’s opportunism in using this as an election campaign theme.

What then are gay rights, hate speech, and freedom of religion and expression, and how do these function together? I am neither a lawyer nor a lawmaker but as a Christian thought-leader, I do have opinions on these important issues.

In 2013 the Freedom of Expression Institute published ‘Hate speech and freedom of expression’ and I am drawing on this as a primary source for this article. Our Constitution with its Bill of Rights is the foundation for all rights and freedoms in South Africa. In 2000 parliament passed the ‘equality bill’ and there are two other concerning draconian bills nearing finalisation, but all such acts of parliament must conform to the provisions of the national constitution.

So what does the constitution state concerning these matters?

It states that Freedom of Expression cannot extend to expressions that enlist, among other things, ‘advocacy of hatred that is based on race, ethnicity, gender or religion and that constitutes incitement to cause harm’. The two parts of this are advocacy of hatred and incitement to cause harm. In terms of this, preaching against the practice of homosexuality surely cannot be anything other than a form of free expression. Section 15 of the Bill of Rights protects freedom of conscience, religion, thought, belief, or opinion. Therefore, a preacher is within his rights to state what he believes the Bible teaches and to voice his opinion based on this belief. But, it is one thing to preach on a biblical interpretation of a practice and quite another to make damaging statements concerning the individuals or groups that are deemed to violate the preacher’s beliefs.

At present I know of no officially accepted definition of hate speech but the following serves well: ’speech or expression which is capable of instilling or inciting hatred of, or prejudice towards, a person or group of people on a specified ground including race, nationality, ethnicity, country of origin, ethno-religious identity, religion, sexuality, gender identity or gender.’ Once again, the key phrase is ’speech or expression which is capable of instilling or inciting hatred of, or prejudice towards, a person or group of people’.

Surely we, as Christians, can and should separate our strongly held opinions of what we consider to be unbiblical practices from derogatory, insulting and demeaning personal or group references?

The national constitution also gives us the right to freedom of association and so we can stipulate membership criteria of our church associations and so on, based on our biblical beliefs and not on our prejudice against individuals.

Jesus said, “Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council…” (

Can something that gives us life and health also cause us harm? Sadly, yes.

Take water for example. H2O is necessary to sustain life but too much of it, too fast, can cause hyponatremia, or ‘water intoxication’, a very unpleasant condition that can be fatal. A similar condition, but of the spirit, can result from too much ‘grace’.

Grace is to the spirit what water is to the body. It is God’s grace that gives us spiritual life, and it is His grace that preserves that life for eternity. We are all familiar with the catchy definitions of grace like, ‘God’s riches at Christ’s expense’ and ‘unmerited favour’, but any way we define it, it comes down to one thing – grace is God reaching out in love and mercy to the undeserving. Now how could we have too much of that?

Not too long ago a new, yet old, doctrine became popular in parts of the church, and it did not take long for its critics to give it a name, ‘hyper-grace’. On the face of it, hyper-grace seems to be an overdose of grace, but it’s a little more complicated than that.

The foundational teachings of hyper-grace are, more or less, as follows:

* When we are saved by faith in Christ Jesus, we become one with Him, and as a result become blameless and ‘perfect’ in the Father’s eyes.

* Jesus paid for all sins when He died on the cross, and ‘all’ means past, present and future sins. Confession of sin is therefore inappropriate and an offence to God who has already dealt with all our sins. Because of this, the Holy Spirit will never convict us of sin.

* Because He sees only Jesus in us, God the Father cannot ever be angry with us and will not punish us or even hold us accountable for any ‘sinful’ behaviour. How can He if He has already forgiven us and even wiped our present and future transgressions from His memory?

* The Christian life should be effortless because God does it all and we just receive grace upon grace.

To believe all this, and at the same time confess that the Bible is inspired and authoritative, requires considerable mental gymnastics.

Paul’s writings are complex and sometimes convoluted and therefore provide wiggle-room for those who want to slip through the cracks and ‘spin’ the scriptural message in favour of their teachings. However, Jesus’ teachings are in many ways clearer and so the Gospels are seldom referenced by hyper-grace teachers.  And as for the Old Testament, well that’s just ‘law my brother’. Paul, of course, teaches extensively on sin, confession, repentance, and restitution. However, the hyper-grace guys write all that off as applying only to some mythical gnostic influence in the early church which doesn’t apply to us nowadays. Sigh!

I don’t think we can have too much biblical grace, but a myopic focus on a redefined grace can do us great harm. It’s not too much water than can kill us, it’s what too much water does to vital chemicals in our brains that causes us such great harm. Too much water flushes out salt and sodium from our system and this can cause a weird drunkenness of mind leading to coma and even death.

Just consider what gets flushed out if we imbibe the hyper-grace I have described:

* We would have to ignore the biblical teachings on conviction, repentance, confession, and restitution. We would select which texts to believe and which texts to discard as irrelevant.

* We would reject the conviction of the Holy Spirit as a false voice to rebuke rather than obey.

* We would ‘rest’ in our salvation with little or no attempt to work in partnership with the Holy Spirit in becoming more like Jesus in this lifetime.

* A sin committed would become an ‘oops, thank heaven I am already forgiven’ rather than a cause of repentance and confession.

* Making things right with those we have sinned against would seem pointless in the light of our great relief that God does not even remember the offence, so why should I?