Reasons to Memorize Scripture

"Reasons to Memorize Scripture"
by Vermon Pierre, Lead Pastor

Following from Eddie's post on how to memorize Scripture, here are some good points from John Piper on why to memorize Scripture.

1. Conformity to Christ - Bible memorization has the effect of making our gaze on Jesus steadier and clearer.

2. Daily Triumph over Sin - As sin lures the body into sinful action, we call to mind a Christ-revealing word of Scripture and slay the temptation with the superior worth and beauty of Christ over what sin offers.

3. Daily Triumph over Satan - When Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness he recited Scripture from memory and put Satan to flight.

4. Comfort and Counsel for People You Love - When the heart full of God's love can draw on the mind full of God's word, timely blessings flow from the mouth.

5. Communicating the Gospel to Unbelievers - Actual verses of the Bible have their own penetrating power. And when they come from our heart, as well as from the Book, the witness is given that they are precious enough to learn.

6. Communion with God in the Enjoyment of His Person and Ways - The way we commune with (that is, fellowship with) God is by meditating on his attributes and expressing to him our thanks and admiration and love, and seeking his help to live a life that reflects the value of these attributes.

Thoughts on the Music from 5/23/10

Thoughts on the Music from 5/23/10
by Alden Powers, Director of Music @RCC

Ahh! It’s nice to play some electric guitar for the Lord again! With Karla our bass player out on maternity leave for the last two months, I’ve been picking up the bass duties with Joey supplying the guitar. I do enjoy grooving along on the bass, and Joey’s been a great addition to the worship team, but it is definitely A LOT easier to lead worship from the guitar. With the electric I am free to do more riffs and explore more sounds.

Praise God that Karla has a beautiful, healthy baby girl and now she is ready to serve again! Praise God that He has given us another guitar player in Joey and praise God that we can now be more flexible with our instrumentation!

“Father of Lights”

We began our worship by praising God for being such a great God. He loves us and delights in His children. He supplies us with every good and perfect gift. He is eternal and unchanging. For many of us, we tend to spend our week thinking that our problems and our sins are greater than God. Singing a song like this helps us to re-focus our attention on the awesome God we have.

“The Father’s Love”

Every good and perfect gift comes from the Father, and there is no greater gift than His Son Jesus Christ. We come together and sing praises to the Father because we are now called Children of God through faith in His Son. What great assurance we have of our salvation! This is a great song from Sovereign Grace’s CD Sons and Daughters.

“Praise God”

We continued to praise God with two well-known hymns done a different way. Our arrangement of “The Doxology” is taken from several sources. The original verse has been a mainstay in traditional Lutheran liturgies for generations. Bob Kauflin wrote the other verses we sang in 2000. Our bass player Karla Miller wrote the bridge of the song in 2008.

“What a Friend We Have in Jesus”

Christ is our creator and redeemer. He is also our closest friend. I definitely try to avoid songs that imply “Jesus is my homeboy” theology, but we do know from scripture that Jesus calls us friends (John 15:15) and that God knows us better than anyone else. We cannot be ashamed to bring EVERYTHING to the Lord in our prayers.

Just because we sing a song once doesn’t mean we can’t sing it again; I have not found any biblical commands to do this. So after we sang the verses to “What a Friend” we simply went back and sang the bridge to “Praise God”, as well as the original verse. Reprising songs gives us a chance to further reflect on the truths we are singing about. Sometimes after singing a different song, the words we sing on the reprise have a stronger meaning.

“Give Me Jesus”

After the sermon we responded to the preached word with a very pretty song by Fernando Ortega (aren’t all his songs pretty?). Jesus isn’t someone we connect with on Sunday. We need Him morning, noon, night, when we are alone and when we die.

“Blessed Are the Sons of God”

This is an original arrangement that the RCC worship team has worked up over time. John-Mark’s sermon was about the importance of Church community. I thought this might be a good song to respond to this with. In hindsight, it might have been better to sing this during the first singing set. It might have fit better. Thanks be to God that we have 52 Sundays a year to improve our worship experience!

10 Tips for Memorizing Scripture

"10 Tips for Memorizing Scripture"
by Eddie Cross, Roosevelt's Web Site Coordinator


In light of our new monthly memory verses, here is a short list of tips that can help those of you who are either looking to participate or are working through your own memorization schedule.

1. Find a memorization partner

Talk to people in your home group and see if anyone would be interested in joining you. Check-in with one another once a week and review where you are and what you have learned about the scripture you are working on. By offering our insights and keeping tabs on another, we grow relationships and build accountability.

2. Break-up the verse into segments

It is much easier to memorize verses in portions, rather than trying to absorb the entire passage once. Consider the following verse:

2 Timothy 2:2 and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. (ESV)

 Slice up the sentence into pieces that seem natural to you (it is important to include the reference, either at the beginning, the end, or both). Here is what works for me:

2 Timothy 2:2

and what you have heard from me

in the presence of many witnesses

entrust to faithful men

who will be able to teach others also.
2 Timothy 2:2

 Once this is done, work on one piece at a time.

3. Recall as often as possible

This tip is related to the one above it. Once you split the verse in question into manageable chunks and are ready to begin with the first part, try not to read it repeatedly. Instead, read it once, then try to recall what you just read, saying it out loud or in your head. You will find that the more you use your recollection rather than your reading skills, the more accurately you will be able to recall the verse later – it works to cement the verse into your long-term memory. Picture the words being branded into your brain, deeper and more striking after each repetition.

4. Memorize to a beat

This is a useful method that many people don’t consider. I thought it may be hard to explain this tip by text alone, so click here for a verbal explanation.

5. Write the verse down

Perhaps this one is for those of you who were disciplined as a child by being assigned a particular statement to write out a certain number of times to teach you your lesson. Exciting debates about disciplinary methods aside, this process works quite well for some (less “green”) people. Essentially, you simply write out the verse over and over again on a sheet of paper. I personally prefer the above strategies, but try it yourself and see if it aids in your mission of memorization.

6. Schedule time to practice

It does not have to be very long, but five to fifteen minutes should suffice, depending on the amount you are attempting to memorize at any given time. Whatever number of minutes you decide to allocate, stick with it – ‘em verses ain’t gonna memorize themselves! Prime times are while you wait for your coffee to brew every morning; before or after your daily Bible reading; when you sit down for lunch; heading to the parking lot a few minutes early before waiting to pick up your kids from a daily activity; as you lay in bed when you wake up/are going to sleep, etc. I have even heard of people who have written their verse on a card, placed the card in a plastic bag, then hung the bag in the shower so they could fit their practice into their busy daily schedule. This leads us to our next tip...

7. Carry your verses with you

Whether by flash card, smart phone, iPod, tablet PC, mini-chalk board, elaborate tattoo…just be sure to transfer your verses onto something mobile that you can pull out and use to practice if and when you stumble upon some down time. For example, I ride the bus or light rail fairly regularly, affording me ample time to sneak in a few practice sessions once in awhile. I am confident you can use your creative genius to imagine situations in your own life that may arise which would give you the same opportunity.

8. Study the content of the verse

Let’s say you are choosing to memorize one verse a week. Choose a day or two, preferably near the beginning of the week, and set aside time to study and meditate upon the meaning of the scripture you have chosen. Use various resources – commentaries, Study Bible notes, sermons, prayer, the opinion of a wandering neighborhood kid – to supplement your memorization and enhance your meditations. John Piper’s website has a wonderful resource library with a scripture index that allows you to query for any sermon, conference message, article, book, poem or study guide associated with any given passage of scripture.

9. Review past verses

O, 'tis sad when wisdom is lost with the passage of time! Does it not seem as though it should otherwise, that we grow in wisdom and knowledge as time progresses? Once you are all memory experts, do not allow thyself to slip into the sins of pride and slothfulness! On top of the time you schedule to memorize your new chosen verses, be sure to consistently revisit past choices. Keep a master list of all the scripture you have memorized, then during a separate time, simply go down the list and practice each verse. There is no need to go down the entire list in one sitting - the idea is that you stay familiar with what you have already worked through.

10. Apply the verse to everyday circumstances

Keep things practical; do not fall into the trap of separating your memorization from your sanctification or the edification of The Body. If you are memorizing a verse concerning anger, recall it to mind when you experiencing a bout of frustration. If a friend is seeking counsel on how to talk to her coworkers about the Gospel, share the Gospel-centric verse you memorized a few weeks ago. If you are walking through nature and witnessing the beauty of His creation, pray a verse about His glory in creation that you worked on 3 months ago. You get the idea.

What are some other tips that have helped you in the past? 
Please, comment below and share your experiences.

Reflections on the Music from 5/16/10

Reflections on the Music from 5/16/10
by Alden Powers, Worship Leader @Roosevelt Community Church

As I mentioned in last week’s blog, the music I pick for the opening set tries to follow a progression from acknowledging our sinfulness and need of salvation, being assured of our salvation and praising God for our salvation. To this end, here are the songs I picked and why.

“More Like You”

Lincoln Brewster’s song “More Like You” sets the worshipper in the right mindset. Using Isaiah 55:9: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts”; we acknowledge that we are sinful and God is Holy. Until we admit this, we can never truly worship God because we will have a wrong idea of who God is. God is the supreme, righteous, holy, wrathful, loving and eternal God and we are his fallen creation. We need to be more like Him, and not the other way around which our sinful nature tempts us to feel.

“You Are Good”

So if we are to be more like God, then what is God like? God is good … … ALL THE TIME. He is never changing and his mercy endures forever. Israel Houghton’s song “You Are Good” is a great song to sing about this.

“Those Who Trust”

Now we begin the “assurance” part of our singing. As Psalm 125 tells us, those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, they cannot be moved. When we put our faith in the Lord Jesus and now live for Him, then we will be unmovable and eternal like our great God.

Reading

I then read a passage from Mark Dever’s book The Gospel and Personal Evangelism. The passage in mind is a great reminder of what exactly this good news is that we celebrate and proclaim to the world. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to grow in their evangelistic skills.

“Forever Blessed be the Lord”

This is an arrangement of an old hymn done by Park Slope Church. It’s on an album called Kingsborough Hymns Vol. 1. Now that we have assurance that we stand forgiven because of the righteous sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we rejoice and sing “Allelujah! Allelujah! His shall be the praise!"

“Jesus Draw Me Close”

I love to sing this song after communion. It’s a great song we can sing to help us now recommit our lives to worshiping and obeying Jesus Christ.,which is what is called of us after partaking in the Lord’s Table.

The Unquenchable Flame: Discovering the Heart of the Reformation

The Unquenchable Flame: Discovering the Heart of the Reformation by Michael Reeves
A Review by Dennae Pierre

The Unquenchable Flame by Michael Reeves gives us a glimpse into a world where “justification by faith alone” was a truth that had been "hidden" from the Christian world for a long time. It reminds us there was a time when hundreds of years passed in which believers had little direct access to the Bible and were often at the mercy of a priest to explain God’s living word to them.

This work reminds us that Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Tyndale, Knox, and many others spent their lives and often died for the Reformation. They did so because they knew that central to the heart of the gospel is the fact that we can only be justified (be made right with God) through the blood of Christ Jesus. They ached for people to know that they could not merit God’s favor through works and good deeds.

A basic understanding of the Reformation should drive each of us into God’s word with greater fervor. As a Puritan once said,

“Lord, whatsoever thou dost to us, take not thy Bible from us; kill our children, burn our houses, destroy our goods; only spare us thy Bible, only take not away thy Bible.”

This statement may sound extreme in a Christian culture where we all have multiple Bibles in our home yet still “struggle” to find the time or the desire to read God’s word but, as Reeves explains “for the Puritan, the Bible was the most valuable thing this world affords.” How I pray that would be true for me as well!

I just finished reading this book and enjoyed every paragraph. If you love history, especially church history, you will enjoy this book. If you don’t like to read and especially do not like history, I still think you will enjoy this book because Reeves uses words to paint such a vivid picture of the Reformation.

Roosevelt Worship Matters

Roosevelt Worship Matters
by Alden Powers, Music Director @Roosevelt Community Church

When I was asked to contribute to the blog, I wasn’t really sure how I could contribute. I’m not much of a blogger. I try to spend as little time on the internet as possible. I’ll check email, glance at my Facebook, check email again, maybe back to Facebook, read a Bob Kauflin blog and call it a day. Maybe when I’m really bored I’ll actually check my Myspace page (does anyone actually do that anymore?)!

So I thought this blog would be a great place to share some of my thoughts about the music ministry at Roosevelt Community Church. My plan is to share insights into the songs we do from week to week during Sunday Worship. Hopefully I can share with you the biblical and theological reasons for singing the songs that we sing. So this week, I’d like to share with you some of my philosophy on why I lead worship the way I do.

With all of our Sunday services, my goal is to:

“magnify the greatness of God in Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit by skillfully combining God’s word with music. Thereby motivating the gathered church to proclaim the Gospel, to cherish God’s presence and to live for God’s glory.” (Quote by Bob Kauflin).

Whenever we come together as the gathered church, we are called to proclaim the greatness of God and worship Him for who He is, and what He accomplished on the cross through His son Jesus Christ. Doing this can take many different forms and look different from week to week. We can do this with any style of music, and I think we should do this with as many different styles as possible (Col 3:16).

RCC’s style seems to be contemporary choruses, traditional hymns done in a modern way, quasi-country and some gospel and rap. While it’s important to be diverse because God’s kingdom is diverse, I try to stay within genres that I feel our worship team can do reasonably well. We have been blessed with musicians from all different backgrounds and styles that love the Lord more than the music that they play.

However, we can’t all be good at everything. We stay away from classical or traditional styles because we don’t have those kinds of people in our church that can play that well (i.e., an organist). We also don’t sing in Spanish for the same reason. With our limited instrumentation it’s difficult to do Gospel all the time. Gospel tends to sound best with a large band and lots of singers. Because we are limited in stage size, it’s difficult to have a large group or a choir.

God has given us what we have and it is important to be faithful with that. God does not need our voices or instruments to glorify Himself, but he does enjoy our worship and I praise Him for that.

We also want to be diverse with the content of the songs we sing. There are many great hymns that are very theologically rich. There are also many contemporary songs out there now that are rich in this way too. There are also very simple songs that allow us to rejoice in the Lord without thinking too much about the words. I think it’s good to have a balance of both.

I think it’s important to sing songs with a lot of theology because we can learn from them. Sometimes it’s easier to remember a song than scripture or the sermon. However, too much of these kinds of songs can be overload. They tend to be hard to learn and if we sing too many of them then the congregation spends too much time thinking about the words and not entering into God’s presence.

The simple songs are a good antidote for the more theological songs because they give us a chance to simply rejoice in the Lord and sing His praise from the depth of our hearts. But if we get into the habit of singing too many simple songs, then we miss a valuable opportunity to learn about the character of God.

I always avoid choosing songs that are theologically vague or inaccurate. Sadly, there are many songs being sung in the church today that are like this. “Jesus is My Boyfriend” songs are unacceptable at RCC. If a song sounds like they took a love song and replaced “baby” with “Jesus” then we won’t sing it.

For the opening set of singing, we try to follow some kind of progression from acknowledging our sinfulness, being assured of our salvation and rejoicing in our Lord for the Gospel. This can be accomplished several different ways. We might do this with one or two songs that emphasize one of each category. We might do one of these with a scripture reading. Sometimes one song might cover all three. We also try to frame these songs within the context of that week’s sermon text. Sometimes this is easier to do than other times. But in any event, the goal of the first set is to come into God’s presence and Worship Him. We are called to do this regardless of the sermon topic.

We usually reserve the singing we do after the sermon to respond to the sermon we just heard. In scripture, we see numerous examples of God’s people worshipping after hearing the word of God (Neh 8). I don’t think it’s enough to hear a sermon and just go home. We should respond to what we have heard and worship God for the message that His word is delivering to our particular church community at this particular time.

If you want to learn more about worship, I recommend visiting worshipmatters.com. There are tons and tons of great articles about all aspects of worship and leading worship.

Basic Sermon Recap: “How to Save the World” John 12:44-50

In John 12:44-50 Jesus claims that he has come to save the world. This invites several questions. What is this salvation and why do we need it? How is Jesus the key to us getting this salvation? What will happen if we don't get this salvation from Jesus? Let's consider these questions in turn.

What is this salvation and why do we need it? The answer to this question comes to us via a metaphor Jesus uses. He describes himself as being light that comes to help those who are in darkness come out of darkness (v.46). Jesus is saying then that people are in effect living their lives in darkness and they need him if they are to find their way out. This is a critical point, and one that's hard for many to realize about themselves. We are too ruled by our senses, by what we see or feel. Thus, it is hard for us to imagine anything different beyond what we've come to already experience. This is why we must pay careful attention to the words of Jesus and ask ourselves, "Could this be possible?"

Jesus tells us for instance in John 10 that he has come so that people might have life and have it abundantly. We should ask ourselves then, is it possible for us to have abundant life, that is, a life with everlasting meaning and purpose? The problem we have is that we've accepted lives with vague meaning and purpose. Indeed, the most basic and important question in the universe is "why am I here?" But for this most crucial question we are content to say, "I'm not sure," or even, "It doesn't matter, I'm just here." Here is evidence of our darkness! Nowhere else in life would we accept non answers like this. When it comes to things like figuring out what's wrong with our cars or figuring out why we're sick, we want answers and demand answers. Yet for the basic question about human existence we remain in darkness. Jesus however cries out to us that it doesn't have to be this way. He has come to give meaning and purpose to our lives. He has come into our darkness so we can be led out and live in the light.

What makes Jesus the key to this salvation? Jesus is the key because Jesus is God (v.44-45). Jesus was not some regular dude. Far too many people believe in a Jesus far short of the actual Jesus. They believe in a Jesus who is nice and good, but nothing more. He never confronts and is content to passively commune with us. He is the equivalent of an overly nice kindergarten teacher. Frankly, he is the kind of Jesus who couldn't save himself out of a parked convertible, much less save other people.

Clearly, this will not work. A people trapped in darkness need nobody less than a God to come in and free them out of that darkness. And this is who Jesus is and what he does – he is God himself acting to save us.

What will happen if we don't get this salvation? If we don't accept Jesus, we will be condemning ourselves to our darkness. At some point, the words of Jesus will come back on us and judge us (v.48). We will realize then that we were hearing not any man's words but God's words. And we rejected them. This means that we rejected God, which means that we will have judged ourselves. At the end, either we will have lives that have been firmly established on the message of Jesus, like a house on a rock, or will have lives established on other things, like a house on sand, with the message of Jesus serving merely as decorations in our lives rather than as the firm foundation of our lives. Lives that are like the house on the rock will last forever before God. Lives that are like the house on the sand will eventually crumble and be destroyed.

This is the future judgment. So if that is the judgment for then, the time to be saved is now. Now is the time to believe and be saved. And if you are saved, then now is also the time to celebrate and praise God because of Jesus. Jesus was who he said was, did what he said he would do, and now lives and rules from heaven because he was who he was and did what he did. That means you are saved now and will be saved then.

Being saved now means living within the light of Jesus. This means being able to see our world with ever growing understanding and being able to live your life with ever growing purpose and joy. You live a life now that will only grow in richness and meaning and depth, a life that will never end but will last forever.

This is the salvation we've been given. Let us take hold of it, cherish it, thank God for it, and celebrate Jesus because of it.

Check out these lyrics from a song called "Jesus is Alive" by shai linne (from the album called "The Atonement"). They are a great way to speak and affirm the truths of our salvation.  

Through faith in Christ, we've been saved from hell
Because He's risen, it means we'll be raised as well
In glorified bodies fit for the new earth
For now, we participate in the new birth
The universal reality of the true church
With resurrection power, watch the Spirit do work!
United with Christ, we reside in His light
Abide in His might, keep in stride as we fight
The pride in our life, the lies and the spite 
 
We strive to be wise as He guides through the night
He'll chide and He'll slice- recognize that He's right
His brightness inside lights our eyes and it's tight
(He) decided to die to wash white all our strife
His life was the price to delight in His wife
He told death "sike" just to rise like a kite
All eyes on the Christ- let's prize Him tonight  
 
For the full version of this sermon download the mp3 from our website.

Basic Recap of Sunday’s Sermon: “Roadblocks to Believing in Jesus” John 12:37-43

Why don't people believe in Jesus? There are two reasons given in John 12:37-43. First, people do not believe in Jesus because God's sovereign righteous judgment has come upon them (John 12:37-43). The rejection of Jesus comes in fulfillment of ancient prophecy (cf Isa 53:1). And this ancient prophecy speaks of God intentionally blinding the eyes and hardening the hearts of unbelievers. And that's exactly what is happening with Jesus here. One of the things God did through Jesus was to essentially seal people in their unbelief as part of his righteous and sovereign judgment upon them (note v.39, "Therefore they could not believe").

The fact that God does this troubles many people. There tend to be two major objections. The first is that it is unfair for God to this. However, to say it's unfair is to assume that God is doing this to innocent people. However, our passage notes that people still did not believe in Jesus even after he did signs before them (v.37). The people should have believed in Jesus even without signs. Being Jews they had over the course of their history a special relationship with God and been given many special revelations of him. Jesus was the high point of God's revelation to his people. But they rejected Jesus, and continued to reject him even with the extra grace of signs being given to them. Thus, God's judgment upon them was fair and just, in keeping with continued rebellion against him.

The second major objection is that God is violating people's free will. In answer to this we should ask why this should be God's concern? If God is a holy and righteous judge, then his judgments are holy and righteous. Asking, "what about free will" is the equivalent of a guy on death row eating his last meal and asking, "What about my dessert? It's not fair for me not to get a dessert!" The guy on death row has been judged and tried and now faces execution because of his crimes. What's fair isn't him getting a dessert, what's fair is him being executed, anything beyond that is grace. Thus, the real issue for us in this matter is whether or not those who reject Jesus can be held responsible for their rejection of Jesus. And the Bible's answer is yes – we can be held responsible. There is some mystery to this, but one example is helpful. Imagine your 5 year old daughter is sitting in her room. She's been rude and doesn't care that she has been rude. In her anger and stubbornness she sits in her room refusing to come out. However, as her parent you are punishing her and have locked her in her room in order to discipline her. This means that she couldn't leave the room even if she wanted. However, she does not, so your punishment coincides with her willful rejection.

This illustration is imperfect, but it is an attempt to get at a biblical truth, namely, that God is righteous and just because he sovereignly judges and condemns guilty sinners in accordance with their willing rejection of him. What we see in our passage is the ultimate culmination of his judgment. God is patient, but he is no pushover. He will judge, and when he judges there will be no escape. This should serve as a huge warning to us then. God will sovereignly judge those who continue to defy him by their sin and he will do so by allowing them to fall deeper and eventually permanently into their sin. Hardened, stubborn unbelief is part of God's perfectly righteous and fair judgment upon human beings. As the New Testament scholar Herman Ridderbos writes, "[God] abandons unbelieving people to themselves, thus confirming them in their evil."

This is the first reason people don't believe in Jesus according to our passage. But a second reason people don't believe, that comes as a kind of subcategory to the first reason, is because any belief that they do have is compromised by a stronger commitment to things other than Jesus (John 12:42-43). There are some who may appear to believe in Jesus. But it is not a deeply rooted belief. It is superficial belief, shown by how little impact their belief has upon their lives. It's a belief in Jesus, but only up to a point. This was the case with the religious authorities mentioned in our passage. They loved the glory of man – the comfort of being accepted by their peers in the synagogue – more than the glory that comes from God – the comfort of being accepted by God because of faith in Jesus. Their real commitment was to their social status rather than to their heavenly status

The very nature of who Jesus claims to be demands a total reorientation of your life. It means a change in habits and choices. It means sacrifice and loss so that you can gain something much greater. Unfortunately, for many people this is all a bit too much. As Jesus tells us in the parable of the sower, there are some for whom "the cares of the world" will eventually rise up and choke out the word of Christ within them.

These are all very stiff challenges to belief in Jesus. In view of these, we might ask then how can anyone believe and be saved? To answer that we look to Ephesians 2:8, which says, "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God." God's grace to save us is a gift from him, along with the faith to take hold of that grace. The message of the cross is inherently foolish and silly. It is a ridiculous notion, one that we are naturally predisposed to dismiss. That's why we need God to give us this gift of grace and faith if we are to have any hope of understanding this message and believing in it. And fortunately, we have a God who likes to give this gift. We have a God who is patient in judging and abundant in loving and showing grace and mercy to sinners like us.

Practically speaking, this is what makes our prayers matter. No one prays for God to give people only enough insight into the gospel so that they can then decide for themselves if they want to believe. No, we pray that God would snatch people out of the fires of hell, jumpstart their hearts, breathe life into their souls, and plant them firmly in his kingdom! We are right to pray like this and we must pray like this if people are to be saved.

This also is what makes witnessing matter. We must tell people about this message, because we know that God has the power and the will to plant this message into people's hearts if we are willing to them this message.

This also is what makes us know that our faith is real. If our faith depended on our feelings, we would spend parts of every day worried that we have perhaps fallen out of God's kingdom. But our faith is not from ourselves, it is a gift given to us by God, which means it is not dependent on us but on God. And since God is strong and reliable, eternal and unchanging, we can trust that as long as we depend on him our faith will also stay strong, reliable, eternal and unchanging.

For the full version of this sermon download the mp3 from our website.

Basic Recap of Sunday’s Sermon: “Look Up at Jesus” John 12:27-36

We praise certain people because of what they do, with the expectation that they will do even great things for which we will give them more praise. So for instance, a star athlete will get glorified and become even more glorified by society as he does further athletic feats. When Jesus entered into Jerusalem he came with much fanfare and attention. People were already praising him and expecting him to do great things. Jesus however doesn't accommodate those expectations. Instead he challenges their notion of what it will mean for him to be glorified. Indeed, Jesus' concern was not to gain glory from the crowd but to make sure that glory would be given to God. And stunningly, this would happen through his death on the cross.

The passage begins with Jesus looking ahead to what was in store with him at the cross and being understandably anxious but also committed to this purpose for the sake of God's glory (v.27-28). He then unpacks for us exactly how God is glorified in and through his death. First, the cross is shown to be glorious because it brings judgment (v.31). While the world would think that they were judging Jesus, in fact they would be judged by God through Jesus. Second, the cross is shown to be glorious because it means that Satan's unstoppable reign over the world has ended. The death of Jesus meant to the end of Satan's dominion over the world. No longer could Satan keep human hearts enslaved. He must step aside every time anyone looks to Jesus and puts their faith in him and what he accomplished on the cross. Third and lastly, the cross is shown to be glorious because it means all kinds of people will be drawn to Jesus and in him find life and hope. Jesus was lifted up to death on a cross, but this in turn was but a stepping stone to Jesus being enthroned in heaven at the right hand of God (cf Philippians 2:8-9). In so doing Jesus would make it possible for people of all types – no matter the race or background or social status – to be drawn together around Jesus. The cross strips away all pretensions and illusions, puts you there before Jesus, and says, "Look what he did for you. Now live for God through what he did!"

The crowd gathered around Jesus as he said these things unfortunately did not understand what he was saying or simply did not want to understand because they were too tied to their preconceived notions about what kind of person the Messiah should be. Nevertheless, Jesus presses them to believe in him, while they have the time. This remains true today. Jesus is presented before us and we have two choices. We can step closer to him and let his light flood into our lives so that we can see and understand life as we should, being transformed by this encounter so that we are forever connected to that light as "sons of light" (v. 36). Or we can step back from him, retreating further into the darkness and remain confined to the old ways in which we've been living our lives, forever wandering in darkness. These are the choices, and today is the day to make your choice and live forever by it.

Basic Recap of Sunday’s Sermon: “Here Comes the King” John 11:45-12:19

The attention on Jesus only grows in the wake of his raising Lazarus from the dead. It all culminates with the arrival of Jesus into Jerusalem amid shouts from gathered crowds proclaiming him to be the king of Israel. Jesus clearly had some authority to him. He was every much a king. Indeed, he was the king that God promised to send to the world back in the Old Testament. However, not everyone rightly understood what it meant for Jesus to be king nor responded to him as they should. In John 11:45-12:19 we can note three different episodes involving three different reactions to Jesus and his kingship.

The first episode is found in John 11:45-57 and involves the religious authorities of that day. They saw Jesus as someone to resist and kill as soon as possible. Jesus was a threat to their established position. The temple and the nation belonged to them (v.48 – "The Romans will come and take away our place and our nation") and there was no way they would let Jesus threaten this. This is a basic human tendency – to view our lives as if they are completely our own, and to then get upset and hostile if our sense of control over our lives gets threatened in any way. We operate our days like mini kings believing we have the right to rule over them as we see fit, and woe to anyone that challenges any part of our rule in any given day.

Jesus comes in order to rule our lives. He has the right to do so by his very nature. However, he secures his rule first by giving up his life for the sake of his subjects. He is a king unlike any we could imagine.

The second episode is found in John 12:1-11 and involves Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus. She saw Jesus as someone to worship and serve. In the midst of a banquet honoring Jesus Mary uses a pound of extremely expensive perfume to anoint the feet of Jesus and then wipes his feet with her hair. All those gathered there were shocked by her act. It was improper for a woman to let down her hair in public back then, and what made it even worse was that she seemingly wasted this perfume on Jesus' feet.

Jesus however recognizes and affirms what Mary does. It was an extravagant but completely appropriate way to honor Jesus. Jesus is a king worthy of such absolute devotion. And again in this episode we see the unique nature of his kingship, for Jesus connects what Mary does to his upcoming death and burial (see John 12:7). What we are reminded of is that Jesus comes as a king who first seeks to serve us by giving up his life for us.

The third episode is found in John 12:12-19 and it involves the Passover crowds in Jerusalem. They saw Jesus as someone who would set them free from their enemies and prosper their nation. As Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey huge crowds gathered to meet him and praise him. Their praises showed their expectations - they believed Jesus was the promised Messianic king who would lead the Jewish nation in a successful revolt against the Roman empire and would reestablish the Jewish nation on the world scene. Jesus for them was all about power. Indeed, for many people, life is about gaining more power and control over life. The goal in life is always to get more. And Christianity sadly is often presented like this – become a Christian and you'll be able to get for yourself a better life.

Jesus however undercuts all this, simply by riding into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey. This act was a fulfillment of prophecies found in Zechariah 9. They speak of a king who comes humble and mounted on a donkey who will cut down chariots and warhorses and bring salvation and peace to the nations. So the crowds were right to acknowledge Jesus as a king. However, he came not to be their political warrior king. He came to be a savior king, who would battle sin and death and give up his life so that by his sacrifice we might find peace and salvation.

All of these episodes give us different ways to respond to Jesus. There is though only one real response to Jesus. It's a response initially modeled by Mary and a response that becomes especially necessary for us as we look back and see who he really was and all of what he did. It comes down to this – Jesus is king, and he is a king who we must respond to in faith and humble devotion. This humble devotion means committing ourselves to Jesus and serving him by giving up our lives for others like he did. The only real cure for us would be kings futilely trying to rule over and gain more control over our lives is to give up our meager kingdoms to God and submit ourselves to his appointed king, Jesus Christ. This is the only way we can be set free to serve others and so experience the full blessings and riches of his divine kingdom.