Armor of God – Ephesians 6:10-20

Our pastor will conclude the Fall series on the spiritual Armor of God this Sunday, including exploring what “praying in the Spirit” means. Here are key points from the first part of that teaching in case some would like to have the quotes and bible references “in print.”

Armor of God – Ephesians 6:10-20

Alert in Prayer – v 18

MAIN IDEA – Since Christ has called us to the spiritual army of God, we should remain alert, praying in the Spirit.

Why do we need to hear this? Although there are numerous other paradigms the Bible presents for the Christian life, one we most easily forget is that of spiritual warfare. We don’t actively remember that we are in a “spiritual combat zone” and this renders us less effective in prayer.

Prayer as Warfare

“The armor God provides for us must never be thought of mechanically, still less magically. The danger, the temptation, is to feel that as long as we put on this armor, there is no more to be done. All is well…the armor will in and of itself protect us, so having put it on, we can relax, and put watching aside…But that is the exact opposite of the true position….Every single piece, excellent though it is in itself, will not suffice us, and will not avail us, unless always and at all times we are in a living relationship to God and receiving strength and power from Him.” Lloyd-Jones

“Our blessed Lord, when He was here in the flesh, was engaged in the same conflict. He was ‘tempted in all points like as we are’. The devil assailed him, and all these powers were used against Him. And the very fact that we are Christians means that we are inevitably involved in this fight and conflict. Nothing is more fatal than to start in the Christian life with the notion that now we are Christians we have finished with all our difficulties and problems. That is far from being the truth. Indeed, it is almost the antithesis of the truth. The New Testament rather gives the impression that because we are Christians, we must expect attacks upon us in a way that we have never known or realized before. But, thank God, we are not only told that we have to wrestle and fight in this way, we are also told how we can be enabled to do so successfully.” Lloyd-Jones

Aware in Prayer

  • Mark 14:34-38
  • 1 Peter 5:8 – Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary, the Devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Resist him, Stand firm in your faith.”
  • Acts 20:31 – “I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; And from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them. Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every one with tears.”
  • 1 Cor 16:13, – “Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.”
  • Rev 3:2-3 – “You have the reputation of being alive, but are dead. Wake up, and strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your works complete in the sight of my God. Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you.”
  • Col 4:2 – “Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.”

Armor of God: Helmet of Salvation – Ephesians 6:17

Here are some key ideas our pastor shared in his sermon on Sunday. We know some wanted to see the longer quotes for personal consideration in more detail.

Since Christ has called us to the spiritual army of God, we should take up the Helmet of Salvation.

Why do we need to hear this? –

  • Self-salvation – when we can only receive it as a gift
  • Cheap Salvation – failing to live in full pursuit of holy obedience to our God
  • Insecure Salvation  – not secure in the saving love of God so fearful

“We may say that nothing is more important than for us to learn what we may call the tenses of salvation – past, present, and future. The Christian is a man who has been saved. He is justified by faith….He will never come into condemnation…He is delivered also from the dominion of Satan. He is already free…But then the Christian is a man who is being saved. He is not perfect, there is a work going on in him. But then also salvation has a future tense. The Christian has yet to experience final salvation. There is a day coming when he will be absolutely perfect…So you can describe the tenses thus: the past is justification, the present is sanctification, the future is glorification.” Lloyd Jones

SALVATION – PAST – ISAIAH 59

WE can look back on our salvation accomplished by the only perfectly armored one, Jesus Christ

SALVATION – PRESENT – Psalm 73

Referencing the Christians in the book of Hebrews – “they were weary, they were tired, they were persecuted, they were tempted; everything seemed to be against them, and they had got into a condition in which they were tempted by the devil to quit, to give it all up, to back out of the whole campaign, and to return to their former position.” Lloyd Jones

2 Peter 3 – Critics “said in effect: you Christians have said that the Lord is coming back, and that he will conquer his enemies and set up his kingdom, but where is the promise of his coming? Everything remains as it has been since the foundation of the world…You have made a mistake, you have believed a lie, your doctrine is not true. You might as well give it up because it has proved to be false.” Lloyd Jones.

To us today, the enemy says “that evangelist to whom you listened, and who urged you to become a Christian, told you that all your troubles would end, that you would walk down the road with a light step, that you would be in a new world, and that all would go well with you. But has it turned out to be like that? Are you not encompassed by trials and troubles and problems? Are you not finding yourself in a very weary, tiring campaign? Indeed, do things seem to be worse than they were before you became a Christian; is not the fight hotter and are not you being attacked as you have never been attacked before? So much for this Christianity of yours; it offered you so much, what is it really giving you in practice?” Lloyd Jones.

SALVATION – FUTURE – 2 Cor 4:6

Mat 24. Mark 13. Luke 21 – Referring to the end times Jesus speaks…

“But then he tells them about the end, and of how, when they think that everything is hopeless, and they are about to give way to despair, suddenly they shall see the Son of man coming, riding upon the clouds of heaven, King of Kings, Lord of Lord. That is what is meant here by the helmet of salvation. When the enemy tells you to give up and to give in, that you are hopeless, that you are losing, your answer is – the hope! The hope of glory! The hope of his coming!” Lloyd Jones

1 Peter 5:10

 

Heidelberg Catechism

Q1 –  What is your only comfort in life and death? That I am not my own, but belong both body and soul, in life and in death, to my faithful savior Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood, he has set me free from all the power of the devil. He preserves me in such a way, that without the will of my heavenly father, not a hair can fall from my head; indeed, all things must work together for my salvation. Therefore, by his Holy Spirit, he also assures me of eternal life and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live for him.

Q2 – What do you need to know in order to live and die in the joy of this comfort? First, how great my sins and misery are; second, how I am delivered from all my sins and misery; third, how I am to be thankful to God for such deliverance

Q6 – Did God then, create man, so wicked and perverse? No, on the contrary, God created man good and in his image, that is, in true righteousness and holiness, so that he might rightly know God, his creator, heartily love him, and live with him in eternal blessedness to praise and glorify him.

Q7 – From where, then, did man’s depraved nature come? From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in Paradise, for there our nature, became so corrupt that we are all conceived and born in sin.

Q8 – But are we so corrupted that we are totally unable to do any good and inclined to all evil? Yes, unless we are regenerated by the spirit of God.

Q10 – Will God allows such disobedience and apostasy to go unpunished? Certainly not. He is terribly displeased with our original sin as well as our actual sins. Therefore, he will punish them by just judgment, both now and eternally, as he has declared: cursed be everyone who does not abide by all the things written in the book of the law, and do them.

Q12 – Since, according to God’s righteous judgment, we deserve temporal and eternal punishment, how can we escape this punishment and be again received into favor? God demands that His justice be satisfied. Therefore, full payment must be made either by ourselves or by another.

Q13 – Can we ourselves make this payment? Certainly not. On the contrary, we daily increase our debt.

Q15 – What kind of mediator and deliver must we seek? One who is a true and righteous man, and yet more powerful than all creatures; that is, one who is at the same time true God.

Q16 – Why must he be a true and righteous man? He must be a true man because the justice of God requires that the same human nature which has sinned should pay for sin. He must be a righteous man because one who himself is a sinner cannot pay for others.

Q17 – Why must he at the same time be true God? He must be true God, so that by the power of his divine nature, he might bear in his human nature, the burden of God’s wrath, and might obtain for us and restore to us righteousness, and life.

Q18 – Who is that mediator who at the same time is true God, and a true and righteous man? Our Lord Jesus Christ, whom God made our wisdom our righteousness and justification and redemption.

Q20 – Are all men, then, saved by Christ just as they perish through Adam? No. Only those are saved to buy a true faith or grafted into Christ and accept all his benefits.

Pastoral Renewal

Dear Cross Creek Church,

I hope you all and your family are all doing well this summer. Our family has continued to lift up our beloved church body in our prayers regularly while we have been engaged in this wonderful season of Pastoral Renewal. We trust the Lord has been growing our church body in rich ways during our absence.

I look forward to thanking you all in person for the gift of this sabbatical, as we return to worship July 28, and I resume preaching August 4. Many times Patience and I have looked at each other and said “the timing could not have been better” for this blessing. On August 4 we look forward to a church-wide Sunday school gathering, where we can share more specifically and also hear from you all, ways you have grown, while we have been out of pocket. But here is a quick summary, by way of update.

End of May and beginning of June, our graduation trip with all four boys was filled with adventure, memories and rest. In mid-June, my twins assisted me in a pavilion construction project, as a time of connection and collaboration, before they depart the home for college. This was also a way for me to “rest” from my normal work by pursuing a creative project with a different set of skills than I normally use!

At the end of June, Patience and I escorted Chalmers to his “induction” at the U.S. Air Force Academy. The five days of “orientation,” parent activities, and drop-off was emotional all-the-way-around, but such a blessing for us both to have time to cherish that sendoff.

Early in July, just Patience and I enjoyed several days with some good friends from out of town who we have known since before we were married and are also in church ministry out-of-state. Then we headed to St. Louis for a visit with some long-time mentor couples we know, and a visit to some of our ole stomping ground from the first seven years of our marriage.

We also embraced the different role of attending, rather than leading, in various churches in Colorado, St. Louis, and locally, both PCA and other denominations. What a joy to see Lord’s kingdom going forth in just this small sampling of churches, faithfully worshipping, evangelizing, praying, studying, growing and serving!

Thanks so much, church family, for giving me and the family the space you did. While I have missed the fellowship of regular texts and calls with you, and will look forward to resuming that connection, I thank you all for giving us that “communication” space. Hope to see you Sunday!


Colorado

Air Force Dropoff

St. Louis

 

August 6 Church Vision Meeting

Join us for a Church Vision Meeting on August 6 at 9:30-10:15 am (during Adult Sunday School time)

 

Video Transcript: 
Well, hey, Cross Creek Church family. So glad to be able to catch up with you in this little video announcement. A great end of summer that I’m sure we’re all enjoying and much to give thanks to the Lord for over the last few months in the life of our church. We’ve had a number of new visitors that have been coming to our church over the quiet weeks of the summer. We had a great Summer Nights season with wonderful help and service from our life groups, pouring into the young ones in our church and many friends and family that came to visit and to hear about the Lord and relationship with him. We had the biggest group ever that went to our RYM, reformed Youth Ministry conference at the beach for our middle schoolers earlier in June.

And a recent high school retreat, as well, with a good number of kids having a chance to grow in community and grow with each other and the Lord during that time. So, it’s been a great summer season. I hope your household is enjoying the favor of the Lord, and it’s a time in the next few weeks to reengage with a new season of ministry for our church.

I want to mention, in particular, August 6th. I know some will be getting back in town, but many will also already be back and in the groove. We’re going to do a special Sunday school gathering for our adults and look at the church vision that the Lord has given to us. We have an opportunity there to look back at the last couple of years, see how God has blessed us with new ministries like Awana and Mother’s Morning Out, with new staff that the Lord has brought, and also through the Twelve – Called by Him, Called for Him campaign to purchase the facility that we have and to see the renovations here. So we want to just remind everybody of where we’ve been the last few years and also look ahead to the next couple of years as we plan and pray and envision where the Lord would take us. His work through us and his work in us. So we hope you’ll join us for that day. It’ll be a Q&A time as well for those that have questions. We’d love to hear more about where we believe the Lord’s taking us in the years that are upcoming. August 6th, again, combined Sunday school time and Room 4, 9:30 is our regular Sunday school time.

If you’re new to our church family, we’d love to have you start in with coming to Sunday school. And the week after that, August 13th will be our main kickoff for our new season of ministry, with the kids moving up to their new class level, and a special new adult Sunday school series.

We’ll be running new classes beginning for all the other age groups in Sunday school, and of course Life Groups resuming soon after. And men’s and women’s small groups as well. Beginning a new series preaching in the book of Deuteronomy on August 13th. So join us August 6th for that special adult Sunday school vision, strategic discussion time, and we hope to see everybody as well on August 13th.

Personal “Take-Outs” From A Three Day Fast

Personal “Take-Outs” From A Three Day Fast – January 2023

[Written by Dr. Chris Peters]

As I type in these thoughts, I have questioned myself about the propriety of sharing them. After all, Jesus cautions us strenuously in Matthew 6 about fasting so others will see us and even urges specific concealment of our fasting. So it seems a bit wrong to talk to a friend or even family member about my particular fasting, let alone to publish about it.

Matthew 6 and Motives

But, unless I, and others more godly and knowledgeable than me, need correction on the matter, it seems Jesus’s concern was false motives for fasting and helping us protect against pride in religious disciplines. As Piper explains in his book “Hunger for God,” the people of God, both Old Testament and New Testament, participated in corporate fasts together. So each would know generally that others were fasting (Acts 13). More to the point, we would not discourage someone from urging other believers to see the benefits of the spiritual discipline of prayer or the practice of generous giving, which are treated in the same manner in Matthew 6. To the contrary, we expect pastors to lead in prayer, and in giving, and to urge congregations to the benefits of those responses to the Gospel. Yet, we tend to put fasting in another category.

Latent Hypocrisy

At any rate, I’m sure there is always some hypocrisy in me, whether I were to write about more acceptable subjects like prayer, or even giving. Such is the case to some degree with fasting as well, but as far as I’ve searched the matter in my heart, I write this for the benefit of others who are on the journey of fasting or might consider adding this “means of grace” to their spiritual growth pathway. In this manner, hopefully these thoughts are not aimed in the least at me “wanting to be seen by men” and therefore already having my “reward”.

My Fasting Journey

Perhaps it will further help to confess out of the gate that I’m not much of a fasting person. I did not really learn about fasting as a spiritual practice for believers until my college years and I don’t think I practiced it at all until seminary in my mid-twenties, despite several invitations earlier by my church. In seminary, I read Piper’s book and began to fast regularly one day a week, but only for a season of about a year or two. At the same time, only from the encouragement by some ministry partners serving with college students did I try a fast for 3 days (thanks, Jeff McCord). I found that greatly rewarding but when I went on staff for another church in my first ordained role, I don’t believe it was as common a practice for that body of believers, or others around me at the time, and I don’t recall doing much on my own to pursue it.

When my wife and I began praying seriously about a call to plant a church, I believe I pursued some more seasons of three-day fasts, and was likely further encouraged to do so through the prayer emphasis of Al Baker, in his role as Alabama Church Planting Network Coordinator. As our new church began we called for fasting around some key events including capital campaigns, missions endeavors, and other large decisions or special ministries. Perhaps twice a year, we pursue these fasts and have used Donald Whitney’s material on fasting as a guide. I’m thankful for church leaders who have always encouraged this and many times joined in the fast with me.

More recently, my wife and I have been reading Piper’s book together. She has grown tremendously in recent years in a heart for prayer, so it has been good to combine that passion from her with my fasting burden, and have some seasons together as a couple, outside of any called church fast.

Lots to Learn, Maybe a Little to Share

So I would not say I’m much of a fasting person. In that sense, I’m a product of my time and culture where it seems the spiritual practice even among seriously minded Bible-believing Protestant Christians in “the West” is not widely or deeply practiced. So I suspect I may have fasted more than some in our time, but probably greatly less than most serious believers around the world today, or in other branches of Christianity, and certainly throughout Christian history. So hopefully all of that introduction will dissuade any from feeling Matthew 6 is violated by anything I write below, and you will read this as just “one beggar trying to tell other beggars where to find bread.” – pun/metaphor fully intended!

Why at Three-Day Food Fast?

What I found interesting during a recent fast (really 2 ¾ day since it began after dinner Thursday and ended at lunch Sunday) as part of our church Missions Month, was slowing down to follow some of the “seasons” of such a fast – Or as I’ve tried to put in cleverly, the “take-outs” of the fast. I’m sure some key lessons could be gained when participating in just one day of fasting, and I bet there would have been more to share had I carried the fast further. Oh, and when I write of fasting, I’m talking about not eating any solid food and enjoying minimal liquid nourishment – coffee, a little bit of Gatorade in water, maybe some chicken broth. I understand people can fast in other ways, and children or those in poor health may need to modify, but I don’t think we get the full benefit the Lord intends from food fasting, without actually fasting from food.

Although I do not detail it here, prayer and fasting go hand in hand. Maybe I’ll write another blog after my next fast about prayer lessons. A benefit of fasting is the time we all normally spend eating each day can be allocated to special prayer, or prayer walks alone or with others. What I write below are lessons learned, not a full schedule of time spent in the fast.

Beginning the Fast

Every time I have called our church to fast or done any personal fast, I have experienced some kind of discouragement to pursue it as the starting point approached. “Mandatory” life events shift, or some illness comes along, or something, which threatens to derail the plan. I think anyone pursuing any fast should be prepared to encounter some barrier and be prepared to move past it. The devil does not want us to fast, any more than he wants us to pray or give.

My experience has also been that instead of joyfully anticipating how I will grow in the Lord during the fast, I often have a bit of dread as the actual start approaches. At that moment, the benefits of deferred gratification don’t seem at all worth it, the promises of Scripture seem rather irrelevant, and the end of the fast seems a long way off.

Key Take-Outs

Lunchtime First Fast Day

In some ways, this is the toughest “craving” time of the fast because even though energy levels are still good physically and mentally you may feel fine, the body wants its usual intake and it is noticeable. I also think it is pretty common later in the afternoon to feel some headaches.

For me this is the point where I have fresh cognizance of how “programmed” my body is for food intake and the first chance to look to the Lord for help. It is also a chance to remember our various bodily desires do not have to rule us and with God’s help internal drives that seem very strong can be tamed. Many others have written on this topic and how fasting provides a “practice field” for learning through hunger to surrender in many areas – anger, substance addiction, sexual lust, over-eating, worry, and other “impulses” do not have to rule us.

Bedtime First Fast Day

This holds true for the second evening as well, but a new dynamic that the Lord impressed on me recently was compassion for the millions who go to bed hungry all the time and who don’t have an immediate way out of it. This compassionate impulse merged with greater thankfulness for God’s provision – all 48 years of my life, 365 days of the year, I have always had access to however much food I would need, and healthy, safe food. I especially thought of children like the ones I have seen on mission trips to various Third World cities, who must scrape together sustenance and probably have the exact reverse experience I have had…they hardly know one night in 365 days of the year when they do not go to sleep with hunger pains, and have not ability to be confident in future food provision.

Depleted Second Fast Day

One of the reasons I have preferred in recent years to do occasional fasts for 2-3 days rather than more regular one day fasting is the spiritual benefit of what happens after the first day hunger pains fade. Generally by the time a 3 day fast is set to end I am looking forward to eating (see below) but I’m actually not hungry in the typical sense. I guess the way to put it is that by day two, the body is not seeking food to fill the hunger pangs, it is depleted and not maintaining energy or mental focus. At least in my case, on a one day fast, I never reach the point where my stomach is not really seeking food, but on day two and three I’m keenly aware that I am in a weakened state. There is a difference between feeling hungry and experiencing body and brain weakness. One is more in the realm of desire and the other in function or capacity.

When you get very drained going on a short prayer walk with your spouse, or can’t compose a thought for a work task like you would normally, and maybe even get a bit light headed if you bend over to get something or stand up from a chair quickly, you are not “hungry” but rather “depleted.”

I’m sure a lot of spiritual lessons could be taken from this but for me it is typically a time to realize that the only reason I’m alive at all is because God made me and sustained me. He could remove the sunlight and quickly we would all have no life because of no plant food. He could hold back his daily hand of mercy and some illness could not just make the price of eggs go a little high, but wipe out every animal. He could remove the oxygen from the air and our demise would be even faster.

More specifically, you and I can’t accomplish our tasks as mothers and fathers, as students at school, as employees in the workplace, if the physical engine known as our metabolism does not run. And our minds can’t work well either. This is a great reminder, just as a sabbath day each week teaches us that God is ultimate provider, not our ability to work.

And in many ways, this is the most humbling time of the fast, where I sense God is really helping me take a sledge hammer to that core sin that drives all other sin…my pride…self sufficiency…and giving me a special chance to root myself more deeply in core dependency upon Him.

As Christians in a society where our (very beneficial) capitalist system has allowed great material wealth, such that even the moderately poor among us lives like the upper class of old and in a country where our physical protection is secured by the most formidable military might known to man, and at a time when human innovation through technology and medicine allow us knowledge, connection and restoration not even dreamed of in past eras, and where we have rebelliously gone so far as to turn the rainbow symbol of God’s kind mercy for justly deserved flood of judgement into a cultural juggernaut championing human self-re-identification – we need humbling, and we need it badly – if we hope to be lifted up by the Lord.

Eternal Hope and Anticipating the End of the Fast

Regardless of how long a fast that an individual or group might choose, at some point the planned fast concludes. In my recent fast I was intrigued how refreshed I was to hit the afternoon of my second fast day, knowing that I was just one evening and one morning away from enjoying a meal.

In recent years I have had a general deepening focus on the new heavens and the earth. The writings of C.S. Lewis in “The Space Trilogy” and “Great Divorce,” as well as Randy Alcorn’s book, “Heaven,” have blessed greatly. But fasting with an eye toward eternity is a special experience because it reminds us that a key part of the Christian life is the “already and the not yet.” We see close friends in marriage turmoil, we see young people take their own lives and others running to gender modification to find an identity the Lord has already provided, and of course many with chronic pain, and all of us with recurring sin patterns that offend the Lord and affect others but also just leave us discouraged in this life (Romans 7).

Nearing the end of a fast gives fresh perspective on the joy of waiting and the blessing of anticipating. As with other aspects of fasting, we are essentially creating an “artificial” suffering, in which we can strengthen spiritual muscles for daily living and crisis moments. Just as knowing that meal is coming in 18 hours helps empower to the finish line of the fast, so too, the hope we have of heaven in all our spiritual journey.

Thankfulness When the Fast is Complete

In some ways the few moments before one takes a bite of food to end a fast is a mixed bag. Recently, I found I was both absolutely ready to eat and also a bit sad that the season of purposeful personal growth and empowered prayer was ending. I was both thankful for the special connection to the Lord I had received, and for the material provision to refresh my weary body. As a physical being, God designed me to run on food, and to enjoy the tasting of it and fellowship around the table with family or friends. What a joy that He provides something much higher than the enjoyment and provision of food, and He also provides the enjoyment and provision of food!

I hope in some way these “take-outs” from one short season of fasting will bless others as they decide to fast or seek out the Lord in their fast. Perhaps we can inspire one another to move from the most well-fed and least fasting Christians in history, to the most God-fed and more deliberate fasting believers.

Knowing Christ and Making Him Known

The theme for this year’s Missions Month is “Knowing Christ and Making Him Known”, and the theme applies to our missionary partners globally and locally – and also to all of us as believers in Jesus. 

Our Scriptural theme this year is taken from Isaiah 6. When Isaiah had been saved by faith “your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for”, he responded to the call of God to go and proclaim the Gospel message by saying “Here I am! Send me”. Similarly in Matthew 4:19, Jesus calls to brothers Simon and Andrew saying, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men”. Those who are called by the Savior are transformed and respond to the call to make him known! 

Os Guinness referred to the same thematic idea by using the words “Primary Calling” and “Secondary Callings”. Our Primary Calling is to Christ (to faith, to fellowship with Him, to The Kingdom, to eternal life, and to holy living). And our call to Christ works itself out in Secondary Callings – to human family, church, community, and our vocational work. These secondary callings flow from the primary calling. As ambassadors of Christ, we make Him known in the various spheres of our callings. 

The questions for us and our missionary partners, therefore, are:

  • How is your relationship with Christ? Are you daily surrendered to Him for His glory alone?
  • Is His life, which flows through us, resulting in fruit for the Kingdom?

“By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples”.
– John 15:8

May this Missions Month conference be a time when we all grow in knowing Christ and making Him known.

Pastor
Reverend Chris Peters, Ph.D. (with help from my Ghost Writer, Paul Johnson)

 


Missions Month 2023:

Comforting Hearts, Teaching Minds

[Written by Dr. Chris Peters]

On Sunday, December 11, one of our church elders, Brian Gross, will guide us in our combined adult Sunday School discipleship class. He will walk through in detail, the reason for Christian confessions of faith and catechisms, why they have historically been used by nearly all denominations of believers, and how they can play a vital role in spiritual growth for us today.

I hope we will have to bring in extra chairs for that gathering in Room 4, which will be an excellent complement to this blog about our plan for churchwide daily devotional growth in 2023. In the more recent past we have used Starr Meade’s book (with a blue cover) on the Westminster Catechism. This year, we will engage with her book on the Heidelberg Catechism. Find it online here. Both come from the historic Reformed Christian framework. It is certainly notable to see how detached from our Christian heritage we are as believers, when the knee-jerk reaction most of us have to the word “catechism” is either suspicion or ambivalence, rather than interest and confidence.

I realize both Brian and I have our work cut out for us to make the case. For my part, I simply want to ask a few questions… with no requirement to make a digital show of hands! ha

  1. Who was chomping at the bit at the end of 2021 when our church shared the Read Thru the Bible plan for 2022? Probably not many of us. Who dove into it for at least part of the year, and maybe all of it, and found growth in God’s Word that you would not have enjoyed otherwise?
  2. Who thinks selecting our own personally preferred method of spiritual growth or devotional reading each year might involve some “selection bias” and actually leave us missing the challenge and encouragement of spiritual truths we might not normally seek ourselves?
  3. Who thinks our contemporary church, including pastors like me, and other leaders and authors, might have on cultural blinders and therefore we could benefit from voices from another era (the 1500-1600s for instance)? The “clean sea breeze,” as CS Lewis described reading from other centuries than our own?
  4. Which moms and dads in our church would love to have a resource you can keep by the dinner table and easily pick up 1, 3 or 7 nights a week, as time allows, and know that you will have meaningful discussion material to guide your children? Or have an $11.45 tool you can put in your child’s hand, of reading age, and challenge that child to read on their own one catechism question a week and one paragraph of commentary per day?
  5. Who wants to have a richer Sunday worship experience, not just buoyed by the general daily prayer and devotional pursuits of our congregation members, but even better, united by reading during Sunday worship one catechism question and answer each week, as a sort of churchwide spiritual theme for the week?

One might call all of those questions “loaded,” or “leading” and indeed they are. I’ll close with this, the Gospel is a message of grace from top to bottom. We are not saved by our daily reading pace or content or accomplishment… but we grow spiritually by means of grace and all believers should want to “Glorify God and Enjoy Him Forever” (that’s a catechism question answer! Sneaky!). When we pursue the means of grace and help direct our family to do the same, we will grow.

You will hear me and others announce in the coming weeks plenty of times the Comforting Hearts, Teaching Minds book. We know it will be tough in the midst of the busy Christmas and New Year’s season to remember to prepare to start this journey in January.

Would you take the following simple steps:

  1. If you are married, talk to your spouse about a plan as individuals or together to participate in this journey in the new year? And if you have kiddos, to talk with them about how you want them to participate?
  2. Would you get the book (and however many additional copies are needed for your household)? For the cost of one meal out, you can help your family learn to be spiritual self-feeders all year long.
  3. Would you pick up a copy of the schedule for the readings and make a note on whatever calendar system you use for your life planning, to begin the journey January 1? (actually Jan 2 cause that is our first Sunday)

A Season of Growth and Flourishing For Cross Creek Church

[Written by Dr. Chris Peters]

What a difference two years makes! As we enter into what seems to be a new season of growth and flourishing for our church body, I think it is valuable to reflect. In doing so, we realize that the Lord is in our midst in every season, and working His purposes even when, to us, things may look bleak and lean.

  • Two years ago we did not really know whether to plan any “Fall kickoff” ministries because we did not even know what ministry amidst Covid would look like.
  • This year, we are delighted to see a full worship space on Sundays, a great lineup of groups where all in our church can connect, and multiple missions/service initiatives having significant kingdom impact.
  • Two years ago we were sharing a church building, at the kind invitation of a sister church, but not able to renovate or improve the facility for it to most effectively serve the gospel ministries of our church.
  • This year, many in our congregation made planned giving commitments for our “Twelve – Called by Him, Called for Him” building purchase and renovation initiative. As those contributions are received, we have already renovated almost all of the church interior flooring and walls, upgraded our technology/security infrastructure, refinished and repainted the exterior, recoated the parking lot, improved the water flow around our site, and will very soon install a new playground.
  • Two years ago we were forced to learn to love each other and show grace to each other across varying viewpoints on matters of physical health, and it sure wasn’t easy at times.
  • This year, we are able to translate the unity amidst diversity that the Gospel provides into celebratory weekly worship and a purposeful pursuit of our church vision.

 Over the next few weeks, we can pray for one another to:

  • Engage meaningfully in personal and family devotionals, perhaps joining in on or resuming the Read-Thru-The-Bible plan, and also growing in truth through our weekly sermon series in Isaiah.
  • Commit to our Sunday morning pathways for discipleship in Sunday school as a great blessing to young and old who “put themselves in the way of God’s grace.”
  • Connect for the first time, or more deeply in Christian community through our Life Groups and also the joy of fellowship at our Men’s and Women’s ministries gatherings.
  • Serve dependently, trusting God to provide gifting and strength for us to all play our part in the spiritual family of our local church.
  • Invite those around us who need the love and truth of Christ into our homes, into relationship, and into the ministries of our church, with the ultimate hope for revival to come, such that many are spiritually saved and even our culture is transformed.

Salt and Light – For the Sanctity of Life

[Written by Dr. Chris Peters]

“You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

-Matthew 5:13-16


For those interested in why our church and denomination have historically been, and presently remain, thoroughly pro-life, here are just a few blog posts from The Gospel Coalition. These posts cover the issue from numerous perspectives for thoughtful consideration. For a more extended written treatment, Randy Alcorn’s book, Why Pro-Life? is also helpful. As always, our pastor and church elders would be more than happy to talk about the spiritual importance of these matters.

Why I’m Thankful for the Biblical Commitment of Our Denomination: On the Eve of General Assembly 2022 in Birmingham, AL

[Written by Dr. Chris Peters]

Blessed in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA)

As our city of Birmingham prepares to host the General Assembly of the PCA, the annual gathering of pastors and elders, I’m thankful for our denomination. I have been an ordained “teaching elder” in the Presbyterian Church in America for almost 20 years. I’m definitely encouraged to see other Biblically focused denominations in our nation and around the world, and I know we in the PCA certainly have issues we regularly seek to work through, but I’ve been greatly blessed by those who have gone before me and by my brothers and sisters in the denomination currently. 

Why be “denominational”?

Before talking about some reasons for my thankfulness, I probably should answer a question some may ask in our “non-denominational” era. While I understand the impetus for both pastors and church members to seek such an unaffiliated church, I have always felt I needed the accountability and the structure of a committed network of churches. At the end of the day, every “non-denominational” church must decide what it believes about debated biblical matters and church practices – who to baptize and when, what type of leadership structure, what theological framework, and so forth. Denominations at their best are simply groups of churches and church leaders who have agreement on these matters. I value both the agreed theological framework and the connectional life of the PCA. Furthermore, knowing my weakness and the ways I have seen other church leaders stumble, I’m concerned whenever I see pastors live outside of accountable networks of peers.

Lean Not On Your Own Understanding

One of the things I love about our particular affiliation is our consistent commitment to the Bible as the “only infallible rule for faith and practice.” In the 20 years I have been in the PCA, and for that matter, in the 27 years prior to that, I have seen that manmade culture blows wherever it will,usually with devastating consequences. Proverbs 3:5-6 provided a central message of conviction and encouragement for me in my conversion – “Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.” A central step of my coming to faith in Christ was realizing not just that I did things that were wrong to others, but that I offended God with the things I did and did not do, and that the very framework I had in my mind for living was prone to be out of alignment with the flourishing path of God’s revealed commands. As one both morally and mentally out of alignment, I was so thankful to realize God’s grace to me through the atoning work of Christ, and hopefully continue to grow in that gratitude every day.

Fruitful “Study Committee Reports”

In light of this, I’m regularly refreshed by a denomination where “Study Committees” assess pressing matters, seeking to acknowledge Him and follow his direction from a Biblical framework. We in the PCA can undoubtedly be too cognitive, and maybe to some seem overly precise, but as I read the Scriptures, God is quite interested in how His people and His church will live out His will. We should never prescribe where He has been silent, but we also should not fail to speak where He has done so if we hope to be a people of God who glorify Him as He has designed and as we seek to be salt and light in this needy world.

To that end, I would commend to anyone, the “Position Papers” as they were more commonly called in the past, or just “Study Committee Reports” as we seem to prefer to call them today, from over 4 decades of our history. You can see the list of them all here. These are non-binding but, when received by the General Assembly, certainly to be understood as a valid expression of denominational views at the time of publishing. 

Presently our denomination is greatly focused on matters of sexuality, and specifically homosexuality. I am thankful for a denomination that proclaims God’s free grace to those who have repented of sexual sin (heterosexual or homosexual), and by faith alone have received the righteousness of Christ. I praise God, that although glorifying God with my own sexuality remains a daily journey of sanctification for me and I have a far from perfect track record, I can know God’s plan for fidelity in heart, mind and action. As a student of history, I know that we live in a very particular moment in a particular American societal framework, and that people in other times, and presently in other places were not perfect in their understanding of God’s design for sexual flourishing. Nevertheless, we have made decisions as churches and as a society going back to the 1960s and 70s, to ignore Jesus’s challenge to recognize the lustful look as adultery, to abandon the idea that God has a purpose in sexuality within a lifelong committed marriage of one man and one woman, and more recently to reject God’s design for sex to be an activity of a male and a female, rather than any other formulations. To any open to insight from the Lord on these matters, I would commend these Biblically based studies on the topic (2021 Report and 1980 Report), and also Kevin DeYoung’s book. Or for more general understanding of the comprehensive message of the Bible about sexuality, Paul David Tripp’s book. Whatever the outworking of this summer’s General Assembly on the specific matters before us, I’m glad for where we have planted our feet so far, as we speak the truth in love, pointing in all matters of sexuality to God’s good plan of flourishing, and warning about both the temporal and eternal impact of ignoring that plan.

Indeed, as I have considered the more recent study report on sexuality, it has reminded me of many other areas addressed by these helpful study reports, all of which give such rich grounding for the life of believers in an age where both truth and identity are re-invented annually, where down is up and up is down. If you are interested, here are some of those topics and why I’m thankful for the PCA caring enough to speak to them:

Creation

Nearly all the applications of Biblical truth to the matters of Christian living and impact as salt and light in our society, flow from the vital reality that we, as people, and our environment, the universe, are the handiwork of the Sovereign, Righteous, and Loving God. While we make room for varied perspectives on the length of those creation days, we robustly affirm that all is from God, was created of nothing, that humanity, male and female, is in God’s image, and that Adam and Eve were real people in a real place.

Male and Female Complementarian Flourishing

The PCA also clearly affirms there are two sexes, male and female, though not ignorant of the tiny percentage of people born with some deformity that confuses the physical distinction. The distinction between male and female is not something we define or “identify” for ourselves but is how God defines us, and can be seen across much of animal creation. Although across cultures and time, and allowing for a scope of distinctions in the particular individual manifestation of maleness or femaleness, the Bible prescribes human flourishing best achieved when we recognize the equal value of men and women, while at the same time acknowledging a different role each will generally play. Notably, in the church, men are called to loving wise leadership authority in the ordained role of elder, and the servant role of deacon, and in the household, men are called to the same, as they sacrificially shepherd their family, and their wife respects and follows his direction, in all matters Biblically sound. If we did not see the tremendous value and great blessing of holding strongly and vocally to a complementarian view in the past – over against merely egalitarian perspective of men’s and women’s roles at church and home – the current absurd confusion in our culture over such matters should help us desire clarity.

Race

Although the PCA is a predominantly “Anglo” denomination, the fact that we are not “all white” or “all black” and also have always included a large number of Korean churches, and more recently a growing number of Latino congregations, means that based on raw percentages we are more ethnically diverse than most American denominations, even though we desire to more readily reflect the ethnic diversity of our nation. In addition to consistently affirming the image of God in all human beings, we have most recently aimed to repent of any sins of omission as well as commission regarding the Civil Rights Movement, while at the same time guarding against more contemporary views of race which seem likely to move us backward, as Thaddeus Williams seeks to address in his book Confronting Injustice without Compromising Truth.

Divorce

We recognize that “redefining” marriage is not merely an issue of the 21st century concerning homosexual partnerships, but that marriage as a life-long covenant relationship between one male and one female has been a target of the Enemy since our fall into sin. The Bible certainly offers valid reasons for which a marriage may be ended, and God is gracious to forgive any past decisions we may make. But the purpose of every married couple should be not only to remain in that bond, but also to live life both “face to face” and “arm and arm,” as sinners, but with purpose toward each other and the world. There are a variety of threats to the sanctity of marriage, including adultery and abandonment, as well as abuse and lack of forgiveness, but undoubtedly the proliferation of pornography, and media content laced with such imagery, has undercut the core intimate bond.

Preventing Abuse

We have also aimed for our churches to adopt policies of child protection to make our churches as safe as reasonably possible for young ones. Although not yet adopted by our General Assembly, we will consider this year a full study report on this topic, as well as other forms of abuse, in general.

Sanctity of Life

Last, but certainly not least, as we see the shifting waves of our society, I’m grateful we are a denomination seeking to uphold the sanctity of human life comprehensively – organizing women’s care centers, promoting chastity outside of marriage as God’s good design, advocating adoption as the right pathway in the case of mother/parents who are unable or undesiring to keep and raise their child, and working toward the end of abortion. Simultaneously we extend to men and women who have pursued abortion, the same free grace and forgiveness that Jesus offers to all, whatever choices any may make against His good commands, and we foster groups for abortion healing.

Many of these same topics are also addressed by articles found on The Gospel Coalition website in more contemporary and specific formulation. The site is not aligned with any particular denomination but seeks to share Biblical perspectives on matters for the church and culture.

For all the reasons and a host more, I’m thankful for the PCA, and all others of like-minded conviction on these vital matters. I’m hopeful, as we move forward, we will continue to “lean not on our own understanding” and “trust in the Lord” every step of the way.