Fruit Cove Baptist Church


Pastor Tim's Blog

Repentance

In his book The Way of a Worshiper,  the author gives the following definition of repentance:

Repentance is not a once-in-a- lifetime commitment.  It’s not simply an apology with a promise to do better. 

Repentance is a whole new  lifestyle.

Repentance is a determination to change the way we live – to stop, turn around, and head in a new direction.

Repentance is cooperating with God in the transformation of our character.

Repentance is a heart posture that is reflected in the choices we make.

Repentance is an act of worship.

Repentance is not something that happens once at our conversion to new life in Christ.  It is a mindset, a determination, to continue to turn from sin and to turn toward God from this point on until Christ comes back or we die.  Repentance is an act of worship, according to the above definition.

But, like worship itself, it is an action that never ends.

 

 

The Bible still calls it sin

June 26, 2015 will go into the history books as the day America changed. For those who celebrate same-sex marriage, it was a day of celebration. For the opponents of same sex relationships, it was a day America took another downward turn morally. While no one seemed really surprised by the SCOTUS ruling, I have heard and read some things that seem to point to despair among believers and supporters of traditional marriage.
So for them, I write the following. Here are some things the Supreme Court could not change on Friday:

(1) God rule is still sovereign. He is still in control. He did not find the ruling Friday to be a surprise. He is not Twittering His opinion today. God still rules and reigns. “God is on His throne…He is seated in the heavenly places.” (Psalm 11:4) God has not lost control of the universe. He still turns the hearts of kings and leaders in the way He wants them to go. God is sovereign. He rules. He reigns. He is still the King.
A.W. Tozer said “What we think about God is the most important thing about us.” Remember that God still rules.

(2) God’s Word still stands. It has not changed. “Heaven and earth will pass away. My Word shall not pass away” Jesus reminds us. The Word of God says that homosexual behavior is wrong. It is wrong. Always. Whether in a “loving, monogamous relationship,” a pseudo-“marriage” or a random encounter. It is wrong. It’s not wrong to love anybody. You can love whoever you want to love. But you can’t have sex with anybody you want to. That’s sin, whether hetero-or homosexual, whether you are living with another person in a same sex or even a heterosexual relationship and having sex with them outside of Biblically defined marriage…It is wrong. The Bible still calls it sin.

(3) God’s opinion still wins. God’s opinion plus nothing=a majority. God’s opinion on the subject must be the one we consult. God does not change. He is the same “yesterday, today, and forever.” God’s opinion… God’s definition of marriage did not change Friday. It never has. It never will. Jesus said “from the beginning God made them male and female….” And marriage was created with that in mind. (Matthew 19). The SCOTUS did not invent marriage. Government can’t reinvent marriage in its essence. They cannot change marriage. They cannot define marriage. They cannot control our teaching about marriage. And the majority of people deciding they like something doesn’t mean their opinion wins. God’s kingdom is not a democracy.

(4) God’s mission still continues There is nothing new happening in this ruling… nothing different in our culture regarding the homosexual agenda… that the church has not had to face before. (1 Corinthians 6:9-12) We are not worse off than we’ve ever been. Many of the letters written making up our New Testament were written to help the church deal with a fallen culture. Homosexuality is just a symptom of the illness. The illness itself is simply sin. “All have sinned….” A Puritan writer said “The seeds of every sin are within the heart of every person.” There are no new sins. And sin always leads to the same outcome unless we are redeemed: Death.

This ruling should spur us on to “love and good works,” to intensify our efforts to see the world won for Jesus, and to remind us clearly that the time is at hand and the coming of Christ is drawing near. We must redouble our efforts to preach the Gospel to the nations….

No matter what the culture does.

How Shall We Then Live

More than half a century ago, Christian philosopher and author Francis Shaeffer released a groundbreaking book entitled How Shall We Then Live?  By tracing through history, philosophy, theology, and the arts Dr. Shaeffer outlined the rise and the ultimate demise of Western civilization.  Much of what he predicted has already come to pass, and some things that have come to pass he could never have predicted.  What is at stake in our day is as critical as what was at stake in the first centuries of Christian thought. In the earliest years and through the Reformation, Christian writers and thinkers were concerned primarily with one subject:  Who is Jesus?  What does it mean to be ‘virgin born’?  What does it mean to be “one with God”?  What is the Trinity?  How is Jesus both God and man?

Today, the subject has turned from that of seeking out the nature of Christ to something else of great importance:  What is man?  How is humankind to be defined?  Are we created, or accidental?  Does life begin at conception, before conception, or after birth?  What happens when a person dies?  What defines Biblical personhood?  Can we arbitrarily decide we were “assigned” the wrong sex at birth, and take steps rightfully to correct the “mistake?”  What constitutes marriage?  Can two same-sex people become married in a Biblical sense?

All of these questions demand a thoughtful, articulate, Biblical, and definitive response.  We are long past the day when we can say, “Go ask the preacher” or “because I said so”.  We must give loving, yet correct answers to instruct our children how to live in Western civilization as it is declining around us.  And we must define from Scripture what these things mean, whether or not the Supreme Court or any other entity agree with our definitions.

To paraphrase Dr. Shaeffer, “how shall we now live?”  Living lovingly yet as those who stand for truth in our culture has never been harder.  It is certainly more difficult than it was in 1950, 60, or 70.  But we must stand unapologetically upon the Word of God which never changes (“My Word will not pass away”) and yet address a confused and broken world with truth spoken in love.   How shall we then live?

Like Jesus.

Just like Jesus.

Thank you Dad

After my recent trip home to the land of my birth and raisin’, I was missing my father.  Always do when I go home.  He went home now 13 years ago this month.  But the sights, smells, and memories of home bring him back to me during those trips.  After I returned to Florida, my brother Mark posted the following on Facebook:

You never know what you do or say will mean to someone’s life. Here is EXHIBIT A for TODAY:
A gentleman visited me in my office today and shared how my dad’s influence changed his life. He worked with DAD at Wheeler Williams Hardware and his life, at the time, wasn’t where it should be. DAD talked with him, shared with him and even took him and his wife to a REDS GAME. Those talks, that influence, those acts of kindness eventually manifested itself when he came under conviction. He said while we all have to live our own lives, he wanted to model his after DAD if he could. Today he’s a preacher in the area and influencing lives himself. His wish is that DAD could see him today and see how his influence impacted him. He said he’d wanted to come by and tell me that story for years. He was downtown today and decided to stop in and see me. What a blessing!!! Thank you GARY SALYERS.

It made me profoundly proud, again, to have had a father who lived what he believed and who wasn’t ashamed of the Gospel.  He lived it, sang it, spoke it, and practiced it everywhere he went.  I did not know about the story Mark told, though I worked with the young man spoken of in the article.  I would have referred to him at the time as a “lost cause.”  But that’s where Dad was at his best.  After all, he raised me.

And I want to be just like him.

Dad, Father's Day, fathers

Baptism for Believers

A number of years ago I attempted to baptize a five-year-old. Big mistake. Big. The parents, though zealous for their son to follow Christ (which I appreciated) underestimated his ability to “get” what baptism really meant (which I failed to stand up for).

That won’t happen again.

Attempting to baptize this young man turned into something of a fiasco. And unfortunately it was a fiasco that EVERYONE could see, since it happened in our elevated baptistery. We took everything into account but one: How do you make a five-year-old enter the water when he doesn’t want to? Oh, I could have manhandled him and picked him up. I was five or six times his size and weight. So then what? Carry a screaming child into the water and dunk him beneath it with the church looking on?

So, we let him win. But actually, we all won. That child was too close for comfort to being an infant, and very likely far too young to have trusted Christ or to have need to do so. Certainly he could not understand the implication of baptism. And besides all that, we don’t do infant baptism…

…do we?

According to seminary president Jason Allen, we do something worse. In recent demographics studying the Southern Baptist Convention, our baptisms (translate that “growth” statistics) were slipping in every area, every age demographic…but one. Can you guess which one?

Five and below.

I studied with a seminary professor named Findley Edge who was a stalwart advocate for a regenerate church membership, meaning, let’s make sure the person has really become a follower of Christ before we baptize them. He believed that a person shouldn’t be baptized until they were at least 13! Now while I disagreed with my respected prof, I think he was trying to correct what has become a real problem for our Southern Baptist tribe. We reject infant baptism (credo-baptism for you budding theologians out there). We reject the denominational positions that would practice such a thing. But what we are doing in baptizing children without instructing and ascertaining the truth of their conversion to genuine, life-transforming faith in Christ is nothing short of sacrilege. And ultimately, it is a fatal error for our church and mission to place in membership and, ultimately, into leadership those who have never known true faith in Christ.

It is wrong, we believe, to baptize an infant inferring that one day they will become a Christian. It is far worse, Dr. Allen contends, to baptize a child believing they HAVE become one. This is a much needed word, and a needed corrective for churches in our day, Baptist or otherwise. I can only speak to my tribe. And what I need to say loudly and clearly is….

This must stop.

http://jasonkallen.com/tag/baptism

baptism

Holy Places

The Bible is filled with images and geography of specific locations where people met with God.  Where God changed their path, their life. Think Moses at the burning bush in the Midian desert or Abraham on Mt. Moriah where Isaac was laid on an altar.  Often, when a person met God a physical structure was erected to remember it. You may have such a place or places in your life. The church where you were married. The pool of water where you were baptized.  The chair you sat in the night an invitation was given and you were saved.
Holy spaces…holy places.

Last week, I encountered one of mine.  Over the past week I have logged 2000 miles in a pick-up truck and have toured West Virginia through our Florida missions partnership from north to south. On Friday evening, I was given an address off an exit near Charleston, the capital of the state. As I drove deeper into an impoverished neighborhood, I came around a corner to the address I had been given.  The church that stood there contained a holy place in my life.  Not the sanctuary or even the multipurpose gym.  Not the lovely lush green hillside.
The basement.

In 1977 Pam and I were still newlyweds and we were traveling with a Christian band called Decision led by Bill Traylor. We had been invited to do a weekend revival at a church in Charleston. I really never paid much attention to the name. And when we got there, it was just a basement in the middle of…nowhere. The church didn’t have the money to build the rest of the facility.  So we parked the motor home we traveled in, unloaded our equipment onto a makeshift stage and that night began a series of three days of concerts. After we finished playing Saturday night, a leader in the church asked Bill who would be preaching Sunday morning.  Bill informed them that we were a musical group and did not have a preacher with us.  After the conversation, Bill walked over to me and said, “You’re the preacher in the morning.”  “ME? Preach?  In a church??  Don’t think so!”

But after some conversation, I relented and the next morning, I stood behind a small wooden podium on a makeshift stage in the basement of North Charleston Baptist Church… and I preached.  I could not for the life of me tell you what I said!  When I finished, two women came up to me (separately) and said, “Are you a preacher?”  “No, I’m just the drummer.”  “Well, “ the first replied, “God is calling you to preach.”  A second woman said roughly the same thing. God is calling you.  To ministry.  To preach!  Their words did not leave me.  And one year later, I surrendered to the call to preach.

As the men who gathered there Friday night were enjoying their meal I stood staring at a line on the floor where the front of the platform…and the pulpit stood.  All that’s left on the floor is a line marking where the stage used to be. But it was in that place that a line was crossed.  Seeing it Friday night brought the memories of 1977 flooding back….remembering.

Because holy places do that.

Aubrey Thompson’s Testimony to God’s Love

On October 16, 2013, Aubrey Thompson was critically injured in an automobile accident. His story and the way God worked to bring healing to him touched our community in an incredible way. Soon, his story had encircled the world as people prayed and interceded on his behalf. In this video, Aubrey and his family tell his story – a testimony to God’s love, healing power and grace in each of their lives.

Aubrey Thompson from Fruit Cove Baptist Church on Vimeo.

Congratulations! Class of 2015

As we prepare to send our graduates out onto college campuses, into missionary or military service, into marriage and parenting and the reality of making a living and making a life, we do so with a mixture of tears and joy, fear and relief, confidence and questions.

Rest assured they feel the same emotional blend as you. Though their next few weeks will be filled with parties, gifts, well-wishes and celebrating;  they too have fears, anxieties, uncertainty and questions.

My prayer as a pastor is that those questions and uncertainties are not spiritual ones. My hope is that we have adequately prepared a foundation for them that will not shake under the assault of questions from unbelieving professors and friends. That they will remember the lessons and models of godly friends and teachers, mentors and parents. That they will not forget the “rock from which they were formed.”

And when the party decorations congratulating the graduating class of 2015 have been thrown away, pray that they will never lose touch with their roots as they begin to fly. That they will never lose touch with the family and church body that loves them.

And that, having done all, they will stand.

Amy Carmichael

Amy Carmichael, praying for the girls of an orphanage she operated in India, offered the following words:

Dear God, make them good soldiers of Jesus Christ. Let them never turn back in the day of battle. Let them be winners and helpers of souls; let them live not to be ministered to but to minister. Make them loyal; let them set loyalty high above all things. Make them doers, not just talkers. Let them enjoy hard work and choose hard things rather than easy. Make them trustworthy, make them wise for it is written: God takes no pleasure in fools. Let them pass from dependence upon us to dependence on Thee. Let them never come under the dominion of earthly things; keep them free. Let them grow up healthy, happy, friendly, and seeking to make others happy. Give them eyes to see the beauty of the world, and hearts to worship its Creator. May them walk, Lord, in the light of your countenance. And for ourselves we ask, that we might never weaken. God is my strong salvation. We ask that we might train them to say that word, and live that life, and pour themselves out for others, unhindered by self78.
How we need these words to live again today in our children, that they may “pour themselves out for others, unhindered by self.”

And so may we do the same!

 

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