Honor the Holy Spirit!

Written By: John - Jun• 17•13

FBC’s journey through the Gospel of John has led us to chapter 14 and I think many are beginning to understand why John is often referred to as the Apostle who had the most to say about the Holy Spirit.  It is amazing how much Jesus taught about the Helper who was to come in the closing hours of His earthly life.  I closed the sermon by reminding us that we must not quench or grieve the Holy Spirit; rather, we should seek to Honor the Holy Spirit.

The thought came from JI Packer who said, “Honoring the Holy Spirit is a crucial task in Christian discipleship today.  ‘Honor the Holy Spirit!’ was Evan Robert’s constant cry from pulpit after pulpit in the Welsh revival of 1904.  Honoring the Holy Spirit has, I believe, been the secret of ever revival movement in Christendom from the start, whether or not the actual words have been used.  Believers honor the Holy Spirit when they give Him His way in their lives and when His ministry of exalting Christ and convincing of sin, sinking them even lower and raising Christ even higher in their estimate, goes on unhindered and unquenched.  The records of all fruitful times in the church’s past confirm this…”

How will you honor the Holy Spirit today?  First of all—don’t grieve or quench Him.  Before you watch, listen, speak, or act remember that He is with you.  Don’t do the things that will grieve or quench Him.  Second, do the things that please Him.  I remember hearing someone say, “If you do the dos you won’t have time to do the don’ts!”  There is a lot of truth to that!  Honor Him by walking in Him today.

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Are You Filled With The Holy Spirit?

Written By: John - Jun• 13•13

My study of John 14 has led me to some rather deep waters in terms of the work of the Holy Spirit.  Outside of the commentaries I’ve used throughout the series I have poured myself into three books—JI Packer’s Keep In Step With The Spirit, Sinclair Ferguson’s The Holy Spirit, and John Owen’s work, The Holy Spirit.  If you are interested in a deeper understanding of the Third Person of the Trinity I would highly recommend all three books.

Throughout my life I’ve heard a lot of things about the Holy Spirit, the filling of the Holy Spirit, and the baptism of the Holy Spirit.  I don’t have the time or the space to deal with all three of those things, but I do want to talk about the filling of the Holy Spirit for a moment.

When you study the events of Pentecost and the life of the early church in the rest of the New Testament you find that “the expectation that the Spirit’s full ministry to Christians would begin at conversion…”  JI Packer said, “We may confidently say that since nine o’clock on that momentous morning the Holy Spirit has been active to fulfill in one way or another to all Jesus’ followers the full ministry that Jesus foretold in John 14-16 and that the whole New Testament celebrates; and so He is today.”  (page 75)

In Romans 8:9 we are clearly told that if we do not have the Holy Spirit we are not saved.  He indwells everyone the moment they are born again and that is always true of all followers of Jesus Christ.  The only reason that we find the early disciples experiencing a two stage filling is that they were believers before the day of Pentecost and that situation will never again be repeated.   There are a few other two-stage fillings in the book of Acts, but notice that they were a part of the Gospel spreading to the nations and that after that event we do not find it happening again.

I find it extremely interesting that on the day of Pentecost the disciples, who were filled with the Spirit, preached to the nations.  Luke said they asked, “Brothers, what shall we do?”  Peter responded, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”  Luke went on to say, “So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.”  The crowd believed in Jesus and the Spirit indwelled them.  That is the NT pattern for all believers.

Packer said, “A person receives the Spirit by receiving Christ, not in any other way, and the idea that one can have the Spirit and be ‘spiritual’ apart from personal encounter with the risen Lord is a damaging error.”  He went on to say, “No, the question we should ask instead, both of ourselves and of each other, is, ‘Does the Holy Spirit have you?’  Does He have all of you are only some parts of you?…” (pages 77-78)

Throughout the book of Acts the primary evidence of being filled with the Holy Spirit was a bold witness for Christ. Many will tell you that the evidence of being filled is speaking in tongues, but that is not based on the teaching of God’s Word.  Look at the day of Pentecost…it is true that the disciples “were filled with the Spirit and began to speak in tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance,” but we are never told that the crowd spoke in tongues.  We are simply told that the Holy Spirit gave the disciples the gift of tongues, which was a language gift and not an ecstatic utterance gift, and the people heard them in their own language.   I think the miracle was the hearing more than the speaking, but let’s consider the rest of the book of Acts.

Do you know how many times we find people speaking in tongues outside of Acts 2?  If you listen to some people you would think it would be throughout the entire book, but we find it exactly two more times.  In Acts 10:46 when the Holy Spirit fell upon the Gentiles and in Acts 19:6 when Paul met the disciples of John who had believed John’s message, but had not heard of the Holy Spirit.  Outside of 1 Corinthians 13 and 14 that is all that we hear of the gift of tongues and I do not think anyone would set the Corinthians as the ideal church model.

I’m not trying to build a case for the existence of tongues or the cessation of tongues in this blog.  Many godly men have differing opinions on that subject but I do want to make a clear case for this one thing—the Holy Spirit indwells you the moment you are saved and the filling of the Holy Spirit is not you getting more of Him; rather, it is the Holy Spirit getting more of you as you repent of your sin and learn to walk in obedience.

So I would ask you—does the Holy Spirit have all of you?  Are you walking in Him or in the flesh?  The Spirit who indwells us transforms us and we will see more about that this Sunday.  I hope you’ll join us as we continue to make our way through John’s Gospel.

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What I Want On My Tombstone!

Written By: John - Jun• 11•13

I drove by a cemetery the other day and started thinking about what I would want written on my tombstone.  I love walking through the old cemeteries because they seemed to put more thought into what they wrote about their loved one.

I think the saddest epitaph I’ve read was “She died of a lonely heart.”  The most patriotic epitaph is one I see over and over again—Unknown Soldier.  Not long ago I read one, “He died as he lived…A Christian.”  I like that, but I think I would like these words to be written, but ever more I’d like them to be true…He lived for and is now in God’s Glory.  (While you’re at it…put it on a tombstone shaped like a cross!)  What about you?  What would you like written on yours?

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A Few Thoughts On Expository Preaching

Written By: John - Jun• 10•13

It wasn’t long after God called me to preach that someone gave me a set of cassette tapes with different preachers preaching through the Word of God.  At the time I was living in Boaz, AL and commuting to Jacksonville State University.  I made the hour long drive and back five days a week and on most days I listened to two sermons a day.  I will forever be thankful to Glenda Fields for giving me those tapes because as I listened to the men preaching I listened to what I would soon learn was Expository Preaching.

I left JSU for Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.  I will have to admit…I heard a lot about Expository Preaching, but I didn’t actually hear a lot of Expository Preaching.  After graduating from Seminary I found myself going to conferences headlined by the men dubbed the “Princes of Expository Preaching,” and read their commentaries and books, but for the most part it would seem that expository preaching was nothing more than coming up with an alliterated outline of the passage and skimming over the top of the text.

I will never forget the moment I realized that I was often spending more hours in the thesaurus trying to find words that stated with the same letter than I was spending in the actual text.  At that moment I walked away from alliteration and decided to preach the text, the whole text, and nothing but the text.

There are many people who influenced me.  I am most thankful for John MacArthur…I lived in Alabama and he lived in California, but his faithfulness to the text molded me more than any other living pastor.  I am also thankful for the Puritans.  I find myself reading them more and more and sometimes wonder why you would want to read any living writer when you can feast on their work!

I’m not trying to say that I am on the level with these men…I am so far from their level that I can just barely catch a glimpse of them over the horizon, but each week I open my Bible and pick up with the next verse—the one after the one I ended with on the last Sunday.  I have determined to preach the Word book by book, chapter by chapter, verse by verse, word by word, and when necessary jot by jot.  I’m not perfect, I miss more than I get, but I dig and try to give the people who gather to hear me preach a word from the Letters of Heaven.

As I look back on it I have already shared some of my greatest influences, but the more I study the life of Ezra the more I find myself wanting to be like him.  In Ezra 7:10 we find these words, “For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the LORD and to do it, and to teach His statutes and rules in Israel.”  I also love the way we find him carrying that out in Nehemiah 8.  We find him reading the Law to the people and then in Nehemiah 8:8 we find these words about the Levites, “They read from the book of the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.” 

I love that because it captures what I think is the true essence of Expository Preaching…it is reading the Word of God clearly and giving the sense of the passage so that the listeners can understand what they are hearing.  That’s what I try to do each week and I wonder what might happen in the Southern Baptist Convention if every pastor did the same thing.

Years ago a friend of mine was in a meeting with several pastors from our convention.  They were talking about what they were preaching at the moment and over and over again the main topic was the movie The Da Vinci Code.  What?!!  The movie was bad enough…I can’t imagine wasting my time preaching on it!!  Somewhere along the line many in our convention have bought into the Gospel of Pragmatism.  It would seem that if it works we should do it, but there are many things that work that the Church should not be doing.

I could get a huge crowd next Sunday if I wanted to do it…I could put out a sign, advertise a Keg Party with Jimmy Buffett music and fill up the place, but what would we have to do to keep the crowd?  What would be the next thing?  Not long ago a friend posted a video of a pastor riding a zip line through his half empty church.  I remember seeing that same pastor on TV with huge crowds, but the crowds were gone and the pastor was riding a zip line in the Sanctuary.  I wanted to just scream—Preach the Word.

I’m not the pastor of thousands, but I could not be happier than I am being the pastor of the great FBC of Pell City.  I hope we will grow, but I will not sell out to accomplish that goal.  There are many great pastors of very large churches who faithfully preach the Word of God and I am thankful for them.  Today, as you are reading this blog, I will be in Houston, TX for the Southern Baptist Convention.  I will hear pastor after pastor introduced, as being the man who took his church from 100 to 10,000 members and those men will be paraded before us as the experts and the ones to follow.  Many of them are, but I do not believe that the size of one’s church automatically determines whom we should follow.  I’d rather hear from the man who has faithfully preached the Word of God week after week to 10 people in a community of 100 than from the man who has the biggest dog and pony show and has 1,000 in a community of 10,000,000.  The reality is simple for me—just give me a man who will open up the Word of God and show me how to know the God of the Bible from the very Words He gave us.  Nothing more and nothing less—just give me a Word from God.

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God the Spirit

Written By: John - Jun• 07•13

O LORD GOD,

I pray not so much for graces as for the Spirit Himself,

Because I feel His absence, and act by my own spirit in everything.

Give me not weak desires but the power of His presence,

For this is the surest way to have all His graces,

And when I have the seal I have the impression also;

He can heal, help, quicken, humble suddenly and easily,

Can work grace and life effectually,

And being eternal He can give grace eternally.

Save me from great hindrances,

From being content with a little measure of the Spirit,

From thinking Thou wilt not give me more.

When I feel my lack of Him, light up my life and faith,

For when I lose Thee I am either in the dark and cannot see Thee,

Or Satan and my natural abilities content me with a little light,

So that I seek no further for the Spirit of life.

Teach me then what to do.

Should I merely humble myself and not stir up my heart?

Should I meditate and use all means to bring Him near,

Not being contented by one means,

But trusting Him to give me a blessing by the use of all,

Depending only upon, and waiting always for, Thy light, by use of means?

Is it a duty or an error to pray

And look for the fullness of the Spirit in me?

Am I mistaken in feeling I am empty of the Spirit

Because I do not sense His presence within,

When all the time I am most empty

     And could be more full by faith in Christ?

Was the fullness of the Spirit in the Apostles chiefly a power,

Giving the substance outside themselves in Christ,

In Whom was their life and joy?

Teach me to find and know fullness of the Spirit only in Jesus.

(Valley of Vision, pages 52-53)

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“Spiritus Sanctus”

Written By: John - Jun• 06•13

I’ve spent several hours this week studying John 14:15-17 with especial attention to what Jesus said about the Holy Spirit.  I can’t wait to preach that text this Sunday, but I thought it might draw our hearts close to the text by sharing a prayer from Valley of Vision.  The title of the prayer is Spiritus Sanctus.

O HOLY SPIRIT,

As the sun is full of light, the ocean is full of water, Heaven full of glory, so may my heart be full of Thee.

Vain are all divine purposes of love and the redemption wrought by Jesus except Thou work within, regenerating by Thy power, giving me eyes to see Jesus, showing me the realities of the unseen world.

Give me Thyself without measure, as an unimpaired fountain, as inexhaustible riches.

I bewail my coldness, poverty, emptiness, imperfect vision, languid service, prayerless prayers, praiseless praises.

Suffer me not to grieve or resist Thee.

Come as power, to expel every rebel lust, to reign supreme and keep me Thine;

Come as Teacher, leading me in all truth, filling me with all understanding;

Come as love, that I may adore the Father, and love Him as my all;

Come as joy, to dwell in me, move in me, animate me;

Come as light, illuminating the Scripture, molding me in its laws;

Come as sanctifier, body, soul, and spirit wholly Thine;

Come as helper, with strength to bless and keep, directing my every step; come as beautifier, bringing order out of confusion, loveliness out of chaos.

Magnify to me Thy glory by bring magnified in me, and make me redolent of Thy fragrance. (page 50-51)

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Serving for Beauty and not Duty

Written By: John - Jun• 04•13

In Colossians 2:18-23 Paul deals with Legalism, Mysticism, and Asceticism and shows the danger of all three and then gives the answer—GRACE.  He said, “If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations…” I love the way R Kent Hughes deals with the problem of legalism in his commentary on Colossians.

He said legalism will spawn both pride and judgmentalism.  “Judgmentalism is miserable for the judge and the judging, because it shrivels their souls.”  I really resonated with his points about legalism.

  • First, legalism is intrinsically joyless.
  • Second, legalism demands uniformity.
  • Third, Legalism produces surface faith.

Over the years I’ve watched legalistic people and those three things always come out—their judgmental attitude made them miserable and instead of experiencing the joy of Christ and living in that joy they were not only miserable—they wanted everyone else to be miserable.

Joylessness always breeds a desire for uniformity.  Joyful people want others to experience their joy and legalistic people are not content until everyone is as miserable as they are.  They won’t say it quite like that—they will put it in much more “religious” terms, but legalistic people are not content until everyone believes exactly like they believe, dresses like they dress, thinks like they think, and acts like they act.

The final point is one of great contention among those who are legalistic.  They would tell you that their legalistic works prove their maturity, but like the Pharisees they will knock you down with the log protruding from their eye trying to get the speck out of yours.   It’s like the girl who was in my class during my student teaching semester.  She was from the Holiness movement and told me that she had not sinned since she got saved.  I was amazed at that statement and reminded her that I knew she cheated on her test and her homework…she said, “Oh, the Bible doesn’t say you can’t cheat on my test…”

Having been saved, being saved, and security in your future salvation are not based on what you do—it is based on what Jesus did.  Christianity is all about the accomplished work of Christ.  There are things that you must do, but you will do them out of a love for Christ.  In other words you do it because of the beauty of Jesus and not out of a sense of duty.  Beauty not Duty is the essence of living out our faith!

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Praying in Jesus’ Name

Written By: John - Jun• 03•13

Yesterday we continued our journey through John’s Gospel and camped out in John 14:12-14.  In those very familiar verses Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.” (ESV)  In the midst of the sermon I asked, ‘What does it mean to pray in Jesus’ name?’ and then said:

Let me start by telling you what it does not mean—

It is not a magic phrase that connects your prayer with the Heavenly Supply Line.

It is not an end all statement that makes all of our prayers immediately within the realm of God’s will.

It is not the missing part of a prayer formula.

Praying in Jesus’ name is praying for all for which His name stands.

Praying in Jesus’ name is asking for the sake of His name.

Praying in Jesus’ name is praying prayers that are consistent with His revealed nature.

Praying in Jesus’ name is the only way we can hope to approach the Throne Room of Heaven.

Praying in Jesus’ name is pleading the merits of Jesus’ accomplished work.

Praying in Jesus’ name is prayer that seeks God’s glory.

Praying in Jesus’ name is prayer that seeks the fame of God and not personal fame.

Praying in Jesus’ name is praying for the sake of God’s glory.

Praying in Jesus’ name is an automatic confession of His worthiness and of our unworthiness.

Praying in Jesus’ name is not, God give me what I want; rather, it is God make me what You want me to be.

Praying in Jesus’ name is not, God fulfill my desires; rather, it is God fulfill Your purpose in me.

Praying in Jesus’ name is not God my will be done; rather, it is God, Thy will be done.

That’s a far cry from, “God give me a Mercedes and oh yea, abracadabra, in Jesus’ name I pray, Amen!”

 

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Hitting the Nail on the Head!

Written By: John - May• 31•13

I saw the following video on Denny Burk’s video…I hope you laugh as much as I did and men…I think you can all identify with this one!

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“I got nothing I asked for, but everything that I hoped for.”

Written By: John - May• 29•13

I found the following letter, attributed to a Civil War soldier, in Brian Chapell’s book Praying Backwards.

I asked God for strength, that I might achieve.

I was made weak that I might humbly learn to obey.

I asked for health, that I might do greater things.

I was given infirmity, that I might do better things.

I asked for riches, that I might be happy.

I was given poverty, that I might be wise.

I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men.

I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God.

I asked for all things that I might enjoy life.

I was given life, that I might enjoy all things.

I got nothing that I asked for, but everything that I hoped for.

Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.

I among all men am most richly blessed.

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