Toby J. Sumpter's Blog, page 31

The Fire of Obedience

We follow an order of worship, a liturgy, but this is because we believe that all churches, even non-liturgical churches have a liturgy, an order of worship. The question is only whether the order of worship has been thought out carefully, seeking to be obedient to the principles found in Scripture or not. Likewise, we prepare our prayers beforehand, seeking to be careful and thoughtful about what we say to the Lord. Some people believe that planning things out is less meaningful, but nobody ever thought that at a wedding or a presidential inauguration or the coronation of a king. If a man composes a poem for his love, does she think he means it less because he spent so much time preparing it? And besides, the idea that we can have good things to say when we just wing it, is full of humanistic hubris. We are not gods; we are just people.

Every church actually uses precomposed words for their prayers; they just put music to many of them. That’s what songs and hymns are: precomposed prayers. And Jesus gave us a particular prayer to pray, that we call the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus warned us not to allow set prayers to become vain repetitions, but that has a lot more to do with our hearts than it does the exact words we say. 

But this leads to the point of this exhortation. We do believe in planning out our worship; we do believe in preparing our words beforehand. But this is not because we believe that we can somehow manipulate God and force Him to show up here. We are like Elijah on Mt. Carmel. We set up the altar in the way that God commands, we arrange the wood in the way that God commands, and we put the sacrifice on the wood in the way that God commands. That is all our preparation, all our planning, all of our liturgy. But then we must cry out to God for fire.

We do not measure that fire by earthly standards or fleshly standards. It need not be loud or chaotic or ecstatic or full of tears. The Spirit primarily shows up in Scripture to empower people to obey. It opens the eyes and the ears of people to see God in His holiness and perfection, to see their sin for all of its filth and shame, and to see Jesus in all of His provision for us, so that our hearts are turned to Him in love and obedience. How will we know if the fire falls? You will see new obedience in your lives. 

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The Lord Our Lawgiver

“For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; he will save us” (Is. 33:22).

This was one of the verses frequently cited by the founders of our nation, and it needs to have a significant comeback in popularity, even if only by those who call themselves Christians. It is cited as one biblical source for the three branches of our government. If God is the chief judge, the chief legislator, and the chief executive, then it follows that we would want civil servants responsible to represent us in carrying out those duties under Him.

Furthermore, since men are prone to corruption, what can be perfectly united in God should be separated powers in men. And to the extent that men assume the prerogative to unite them, to legislate from the bench, to rule by executive order, they are effectively asserting a sort of divine status. They are falsely claiming that they can wield that power without corruption. But we have read the Lord of the Rings, and we always remember the lessons we learned there.

But there also needs to be a serious discussion of the punch line conclusion of this verse. If the Lord is our Savior, then this verse maintains that He must also be our chief judge, our chief legislator, and our chief executive. And the corollary is also true: if He is not our chief judge, chief legislator, and chief executive, then He is not our Savior, in any meaningful way. You can say that Jesus is your Savior, Jesus is Lord, but if that does not mean that the courts, legislative houses, governors, and presidents must answer to Him directly and personally, then Jesus may be your lucky rabbit’s foot, your genie in a bottle, but He is not your Savior and you are lost in your sins.

The Jesus that saves does so because He has been given all authority in heaven and on earth. But a therapeutic Jesus who just wants to make you feel better, is an idol. A business guru Jesus who just wants to help you network better is an idol. The emotional Zen Jesus who just wants you to have a kickin’ worship experience is an an idol. These are the Baals of our day, the fake substitutes for the real Savior. But the Real Savior is judge, lawgiver, and king. He is Lord over all. If Baal is Lord, then by all means, serve him, but if Christ is Lord, then serve Him.

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Arise & Walk

“For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mt. 26:28). When Jesus gave us this meal, He invited us to see in it the forgiveness of our sins. But Christ did not die merely so that you would carry on in your sins but always have a get-out-of-jail-free card. Jesus died so that your sins might be eradicated. When Jesus healed the lame man, He said, “But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith he to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house. And he arose, and departed to his house” (Mt. 9:8-7). 

This means that the forgiveness of Christ does not leave you in your sin. If you come to church and say the words please forgive me, and then walk out of here and carry on in exactly the same manner, you were not forgiven. And the reason is that you did not really want to be forgiven. This doesn’t mean that you can never commit the same sin twice. When you have been truly forgiven, you certainly can stumble into the same sin again, but it will be after a period of freedom, or it will be through a different line of attack. But many Christians play games with God. They say the words, but they do not really mean them. They want fake forgiveness not real repentance. 

But your forgiveness was purchased by the sufferings of Christ. He paid for your sins. He was mocked, scourged, spat on, and a crown of thorns was hammered onto His head, so that your sin might be crucified in Him and you might take up your bed and walk away in holiness. 

That is what is on offer here. If you think about how deep a grip some sins seem to have on you, you should realize that Christian repentance is not possible for us to do on our own. “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil” (Jer. 13:23). But that is what is on offer here – not mechanically, not superstitiously, but truly and spiritually, by faith in Jesus Christ alone. Do you want to change? Then come, eat and drink, asking Jesus for the power to change. Do you want the power to walk in obedience? He is the One with the power to say, take up your bed and walk. 

So, come in faith, and come and welcome to Jesus Christ. 

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Know Him in His Creation

One of the things that weekly communion proclaims is that this world was made so that we might know God. If God is pleased to minister uniquely through this ordinary bread and wine, He is also pleased to minister to us through all His ordinary gifts. If He is uniquely present here at this table, then He is present at all of our tables all the time. 

God did not create the world to be a distraction from Him. God created the world so that we might know Him and walk with Him. This world is the place where God determined to reveal Himself to us, to dwell with us. Every rock, every star, every animal, every drop of water, every color, taste, and sound – they were all made by Jesus, and He made it all so that we might know Him, so that we might be in fellowship with Him. 

The Westminster Shorter Catechism famously says that the chief end of man – what we were made for, is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. How do we do that? By glorifying God and enjoying Him in all of His gifts. The central gift is Himself in Jesus Christ. And He gives us that gift here every week, as we believe in Him. But this table is training for the whole world. What is on this table? Ordinary bread and ordinary wine. And what is it for? It is the gift of God that you might taste and see the love of God in Jesus, the grace of God in Jesus, the mercy and kindness of God in Jesus. Christ Himself is here. 

Now look for Christ everywhere. Look at the people sitting next to you: do you see Christ in them? Do they belong to Jesus? Then He dwells in them. And He is everywhere. He did not make this world to hide from you. He made it so that you might find Him everywhere. And as you give gifts, and hang lights, and bake cookies, and sing carols, see Him there, hear Him there, taste Him there. He is good. Of course you should not go beyond your means, but neither may you feel bad for lavish gifts. Christ is a lavish gift. And when you give generously, you are giving Him. He is here. He is Immanuel, God with us.  

So Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ. 

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No Good Thing Lacking

“Glad tidings of great joy” – we hear those words every year, and it can be tempting to let them roll off of us. Or maybe to think that they are talking about generic holiday cheer: days off from school and work — that’s “glad tidings of great joy.” Or perhaps you think of all the Christmas lights, and good food and gifts and family – all the trappings. But make no mistake. We decorate and rest and gather and feast with friends and family because the glad tidings of great joy are far more than that. 

Have you ever waited for something for a long time? Have you waited for a new job? Have you waited for a spouse? Have you waited for a child? Perhaps you know that feeling of finally hearing the good news of its arrival. Or perhaps you are still waiting. 

The angel’s message was centuries old, thousands of years old. People had been waiting for generations, passing on the hope to their children and grand children and going to their graves still clinging to the promise, still waiting. In a garden long ago, God promised a young brokenhearted couple that a descendant of theirs would one day reverse the curse of sin and death. And then began the wait: children were born and died, families and nations grew, and rose and fell. But the promise was repeated again and again, and often to the childless and barren, to those who knew what it was to wait and long.

The genealogies, the lists of names in the Bible, those are lists of the people that God remembered. They are lists of promises kept. Children born, a line of promise preserved. And so the birth of Jesus is the fulfillment of that great promise, but it is also the great and final “yes” to all of God’s promises. The birth of Jesus is the sure word that all things will be put right, that death will be swallowed up forever, and no good thing will be lacking. 

Do you hear that? Every longing heart, every disappointment, every regret will be answered in Jesus and in His Kingdom, in this life and in the life to come. We decorate because God has come in the flesh, and He is putting all things right. We celebrate and sing and feast because God has kept His promises and He will withhold no good thing from His people, in this life and in the life to come. He will personally fill every empty hand and every longing heart to overflowing.

Glad tidings of great joy indeed. 

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In the Middle of the Conquest

This table is God’s covenantal promise to be with us. But that promise to be with us, to go with us means that He intends to use us for great good as we trust in Him. Jesus died and rose again in order to make all things new. And He poured out His Spirit on His people who trust in Him, so that He might work through them. This is what God has been doing for the last 2,000 years. He has been working through ordinary men and women and children who trust in Him. Some had long lives, some had short lives. Some of them we know about; most of them we’ve never heard of. Some of them accomplished great things; all them did good things like honor their parents, raise children, love their wives, respect their husbands, work hard all day every day, tell the truth, confess sin, forgive one another. 

Our job is to be faithful, and God promises to bless it. Our lives are seed meant to go into the ground and then become exceedingly fruitful, 30, 60, and 100 fold. And this is how God has determined to fill this world with the knowledge of the Lord as waters cover the sea. Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father, and He must reign, Scripture says, until all of His enemies have been put beneath His feet, and the last enemy will be death itself. Jesus said, that if He was lifted up on the cross, He would draw all men to Himself. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that through Him the world might be saved. 

And having conquered sin and death and the devil, Jesus rose from the dead and sent His disciples into all the world to disciple the nations, to teach every city, every nation to serve and obey King Jesus in everything. And this Table is God’s solemn covenant with us that He has begun that great work and He will continue it until it is finished. We are in the middle of the conquest of the land, and the charge is to be strong and courageous. Don’t lose hope now. Jesus has been conquering the world for the last 2000 years. The darkness is on the run. The Light has come. 

So Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ. 

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John Locke & the Screaming Meemies (or Building Monuments to Dead Prophets)

Introduction
Jesus famously castigated the Pharisees for building the monuments to the prophets their fathers’ had killed. While claiming that they would not have participated in their persecution, Jesus says that they effectively pronounce their own complicit guilt by how fastidious they are about the decorations on their tombs (Mt. 23:29-31). 

A Theonomic Example
We need not accuse anyone of the exact hypocrisy, while still pointing out parallel tendencies in human nature. As a race, we often write hagiographies of those we would have had significant disagreements with, with those we would have opposed in the flesh. I’ve often wondered this in my presbyterian and reformed world. For example, there’s been a significant squeamishness to the notion of “theonomy,” which is a term meant to describe the ongoing authority of God’s law over all of life. As it happens, something of a resurgence of the term and related theology happened in the late 70s and 80s, and there was no doubt some unhelpful things said and done in the name of theonomy, understandably giving some people what can only be described as the screaming meemies, and a moment of silence for all of that. But as the great Voddie Baucham has recently said, in so many words: everybody is a theonomist now.

Look, we can dither about the details, but the question simply comes down to: is all of God’s word, interpreted rightly, thoroughly authoritative over all of life? You might not want to be associated with some rogue Bible studies that talked about stoning teenagers who had gone out and gotten tattoos. But the fact of the matter is that some of those 80’s tattoos were pretty awful. But I digress… What I was trying to say is that the authors of the Westminster Confession and the Founders of this American project would look to many moderns like the same sort of raving theonomists, judging by the legislation they actually passed into law. And yet many Westminsterian types stand there all sober-faced and pretend that “general equity thereof” simply means “the vague flatulent sensation thereof.” And while that may be rather Lutheran of me to say, if you actually examine the laws they passed in colonial America it was straight up theonomy. They took the laws of the Old Covenant and did their best to apply the moral principles found in them to their new 17th century context in light of the gospel of Christ. Some of it was admittedly very cringe-worthy, but I would take their Sunday school attempts at actually applying God’s word to the civil realm every day of the week over our current clown show which apparently consists of taking shots of vodka and playing pin the tail on the Scrabble Catan, and that’s just the “conservatives” in some places. Everybody wants to praise the pilgrims (as we should) for Thanksgiving and the Constitution, but even “conservatives” start getting nervous when we start talking about outlawing drag queens, sodomy, and no-fault divorce.

A National Review Example
For example, Joseph Loconte warns in a recent National Review article that ironically, modern Left and Right often seem to share the common ground of willingness for the unlimited power of government to achieve their goals, inevitably resulting in a Leviathan state, an omnicompetent totalitarian regime that “offers security and prosperity at the expense of freedom.” Loconte argues that the liberal project arose as a Christian corrective to the abuses of Christendom, personified best by John Locke, thus answering those on the Left who want to ignore the Christian roots of classical liberalism but also warning some on the Right that may want to jettison classical liberalism for some kind of pre-modern ecclesiocracy.

Now count me among those who want to preserve classic, Lockean liberalism and eschew Popes and mixing different governmental jurisdictions — I mean that’s the modern application of mixing different kinds of fabrics, right? But the question I have for Loconte or any of my friends of a similar persuasion is: Who gets to decide what is the appropriate limits of power for governments? What is the standard by which we will measure whether Left or Right are in fact calling upon the “unlimited power of government” to achieve their goals? Locke would argue rightly that the “law of nature and nature’s God” establishes norms of morality, tolerance, and political power. God’s Word, God’s law determines what limits are to be placed on ecclesiastical power, familial authority, and civil government. 

If God’s Word says that families have authority over education, healthcare decisions, and welfare, and it does, then it is not appealing to the “unlimited power of government” to require the civil government to abandon all attempts to usurp family government in those areas. If God’s Word says that it is the civil government’s central duty to protect life and property through the prompt punishment of evil-doers, then it is not an appeal to an omnicompentent state to insist that the government execute murderers, suppress sexual perversion, and require a system of biblical restitution.

Loconte accuses the Christian right of a “murky” agenda leaning towards a renewal of the Spanish Inquisition, a “Leviathan wearing the robes of a priest,” exercising raw executive power to vanquish the enemies of conservatism. And I’m certainly against all such cross dressing, but his central defense for his claim seems to be what he calls an “uncritical embrace” of Trump. But Loconte’s summary of Lockean principles of “equality, natural rights, and religious freedom” all based on the “application of the golden rule” hovers in its own murky soup of ambiguity with hungry bureaucratic mosquitoes buzzing all over the thing. What I mean is that far too many conservatives are satisfied with using vague, idealistic terminology that’s wide enough to drive most of the Leftist agenda through.

Maybe I’m being a little hard on Mr. Loconte, and maybe we’re closer than I fear, but let us run a little thought experiment, shall we? Given what Loconte says about the Lockean spirit permeating the early American project, wouldn’t that spirit be well represented by the 17th and 18th century colonial constitutions and criminal codes? Everybody good with just cutting and pasting and going back to those idyllic Lockean days of yore?

For example, Connecticut’s 1639 constitution read in part: “That the Scriptures hold forth a perfect rule for the direction and government of all men in duties which they are to perform to God and men, as well in families and commonwealths as in matters of the church… in all public offices which concern civil order, — as the choice of magistrates and officers, making and repealing laws, dividing allotments of inheritance, and all things of like nature, — they would all be governed by those rules which the Scripture held forth to them…” There’s no Leviathan done up in priestly robes here, right? Just asking (for a friend).

Let the Prophet Speak
It’s all fine and good to bring out the quotes that tickle the ears of moderns, with vague words like “equality, natural rights, and religious freedom,” but what did the author of those words have in mind? I suspect something far closer to theonomy and Christendom than many conservatives at National Review are willing to admit. Just as one quick example to give some conservatives the creeping fantods, let us hear from our hero John Locke, who, speaking of the curses given by God in the Fall, writes: “God, in this text, gives not, that I see, any authority to Adam over Eve, or to men over their wives, but only foretells what should be the woman’s lot, how by his providence he would order it so, that she should be subject to her husband, as we see that generally the laws of mankind and customs of nations have ordered it so; and there is, I grant, a foundation in nature for it” (First Treatise on Government, 35).

Now quite apart from the exact exegesis of a much studied text, Mr. Equality and Natural Rights Himself says that there is a foundation in nature for a wife to be subject to her husband, as ordered by God’s providence and reflected in the laws of mankind and customs of nations. I’ll just leave that there. Ok, I can’t help myself: would lobbying for civil laws that recognize that providential ordering by God, a man and a woman in the covenant of marriage, with a woman naturally subject to her husband, would that be an example of the Right wielding “unlimited power of government” and a Leviathan in a surplice?

Or let me ask Loconte and others of similar persuasion another question: would Locke have supported a ban on public displays of indecency, pride parades, drag queen story hours, sodomy, and the like? I cannot imagine Locke disagreeing with such a ban. I cannot imagine Lockean Christians opposing such a ban until about 15 minutes ago, right around the time the Gospel Coalition formed. 

In fact, Locke tips his hand on the matter when answering one fellow who claimed fathers have absolute authority over children, including selling or castrating their children, to which Locke replied that he may as well add murdering and cannibalizing them, and “if this proves a right to do so, we may, by the same argument, justify adultery, incest, and sodomy, for there are examples of these too, both ancient and modern; sins, which I suppose have their principal aggravation from this, that they cross the main intention of nature which willeth the increase of mankind, and the continuation of the species in the highest perfection, and the distinction of families, with the security of the marriage bed, as necessary thereunto” (First Treatise on Government, 43).

Now, it’s clear that Locke is primarily exposing his opponent’s faulty reasoning, but he does so arguing reductio ad absurdum, reducing his opponent’s faulty reasoning to absurdity. If a father has absolute power over life and death over his children because such a thing has been practiced in other cultures and civilizations, you may as well also argue for cannibalism and sodomy which are utterly repugnant to morality and nature as self-destroying practices. And if it is love of neighbor and the golden rule which causes civil magistrates to restrain and punish those who would murder or eat their own children, then it is by the same standard love of neighbor to refuse to allow grown men in dresses to groom our young children for unnatural and destructive sins. And to my point: John Locke would clearly understand the suppression of sexual immorality, as defined by the Bible, within a civil magistrate’s purview, and nothing approaching a totalitarian Leviathan in a pope hat.

No Neutrality
What happened? Until only very recently, Christians were completely comfortable with the civil code reflecting Biblical morality. What happened was that a bunch of Christians bought the lie that some of that morality is purely “religious” and unique to the Christian religion, and therefore, it was necessary for the public square to embrace some other standard, some other neutral or semi-neutral common ground. Why? Because it would be wrong for civil government to force Christian morality on anyone.

But what is this neutral or semi-neutral common ground that you speak of? Where did it come from and what are its rules and standards? If it isn’t Jesus Christ, then it cannot be fixed and objective. And this tells you really all that you need to know. The play to get Christians to come away from Scripture as the standard for all of life, including civil criminal codes, is only a ploy to get power. And the accusation that Christians are only becoming like their liberal adversaries by insisting on “the laws of nature and nature’s God” is like accusing a math teacher of bullying because he marked an incorrect addition problem wrong. They don’t care about bullying; they are trying to destroy mathematics.

Now to be clear, I cannot actually tell from the article what Loconte means by his warning. The only specific thing he points to are a couple of medieval Catholics lamenting the loss of Papal totalitarianism and then a claim of uncritical embrace of Trump. But given the vagueness, at the very least Loconte has left a bunch of fuel for the Leftists to use against old school Lockean Puritans who simply want to require the government to do what the Bible says it must do which is to punish those who would castrate their children, encourage sodomy openly, and redefine marriage as anything other than a man and a woman in covenant union.

It is true that we must not require what God does not require, and I have no interest in going back to the high middle ages where the bloated Leviathan was an obese church, drunk on power. I’m a Protestant. But what Locke and Rutherford and others articulated was truly a Biblically-limited Christendom, a Protestant Christendom, and therefore a Christendom under Christ, not under any other human government. Under Christ, there is a plurality of governments as the original constitution of Connecticut recognized in the family, church, and state, and they are limited by the Word of God. When those governments are fully functioning, they check the power of one another, as they submit to the assignments given to them by the “laws of nature and nature’s God.” This was the vision of the covenantors, the Calvinists and Puritans who largely founded and settled our nation. Biblical Christian politics is the only structure that actually makes room for minority opinions, dissidents, and requires true Christian tolerance.

Conclusion
I suspect that Loconte would be leery of Michael Flynn’s recent call for a single recognized religion in America, but if we understand that not to be a single denomination, but simply trinitarian Christianity – Apostles’ Creed Christianity, then Michael Flynn is absolutely correct. And Locke and the Founding Fathers would have agreed. You cannot appeal to the golden rule and then say that the golden rule doesn’t have any authority. You cannot appeal to “the laws of nature and of nature’s God,” and then say that you have no idea if such a Being actually exists. That’s incoherent. 

We need not go back to the Spanish Inquisition to return to an explicitly Christian republic, as our Founding Fathers intended. And when we do, there is nothing remotely similar between that project and liberal fascism. The gospel makes room for unbelievers, for other religions to exist, but it also suppresses idolatry and self-destroying sins and crimes. And it does that because it is committed to protecting individuals and their property even if they are not nearly as zealous for their personal freedoms as they ought to be. But that is what the golden rule actually does. It actually resists the evil desires of other people where God’s Word insists that we must. This is truly loving our neighbor. If you want the golden rule to actually, well, rule, then you must have Christ as King. But if you will not have Christ, then eventually you will not have the golden rule at all.  

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Advent, Church Calendar, Traditions, and Faith

This is the third Sunday of Advent, and as you have noticed, some of the elements of our liturgy have shifted to reflect that. Our opening greeting, our creed, as well as the hymns. Some of you may be following some advent readings or traditions in your homes as well. 

It is right and good that we should seek to orient our lives to the gospel. Telling time from the birth of Christ to the life of Christ to the suffering and death of Christ to the resurrection and ascension of Christ is what the church calendar is for. But we want personal faith and obedience to be the horse that pulls the trailer of these kinds of traditions. We do not want these traditions to be what pulls our faith and obedience because that horse of tradition can’t pull the trailer of faith.

So one of the key questions you should ask is whether your advent/Christmas traditions are building fellowship and joy in Christ or not. It’s relatively easy to point out that your tradition means really good stuff. “We light this candle on the third Sunday of Advent because it reminds us that Mary and Joseph didn’t have electricity.” Ok, maybe not that. 

But it’s perilously easy to assume that what you think your tradition is doing must be doing it because that’s what you were told it would do. Maybe you saw some super-involved homeschool mom on youtube talking about their family’s Christmas traditions and how it just brings them all together. And maybe it does – for them. But you can’t just cut and paste these things and then when your family feels like its getting dragged down the road, tell them to just hold on: this is what Christmas is all about.

So the point is to keep your priorities straight. Keep Jesus central. Keep the Word central. Make sure you’re staying in fellowship as a family and really enjoying walking together in the Light, in the joy of the Lord. Traditions are real gifts from the Lord, and understood rightly, they’re just ways we enjoy loving God and one another and remembering to do so. If your family traditions do that, then keep doing them. But don’t let traditions become nooses or distractions. We are free in Christ—free to love Him and one another. 

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Only Christ

One of the temptations of sinful men and women is to try to make deals with God. This is a great folly on a number of levels: we are not in any position to make deals with the God of the universe. And even if we could saunter up to His throne, we would have nothing to barter with. All that we have is filthy rags. And God possesses all things. There is nothing that we could offer that God does not already have in full abundance. 

And yet we are still sinful fools, and we think that because we are feeling good, God must be happy with us, and if we are feeling bad, it must be because God is not happy with us. We offer God some tiny shred of obedience and think that means He owes us a good day, a good month, a good year. But God does not owe us anything. 

The only thing that God accepts is Christ. But in Christ, God is overflowing with blessing and kindness. And so it is here at this table. You cannot do anything here to earn God’s favor. This is no bargaining table. This is a table of sheer grace. Everything here is free. The forgiveness is free. The blessing is free. But if you come to offer anything in exchange for this free gift, it will evaporate in your hands, in your mouths. The only way to keep this gift is to bring nothing at all. The only way to keep this gift is to know that there is nothing you could bring. 

And this remains true even when you have been walking with Christ for many years. The only way up in Christ is down. The only way to greatness in the Kingdom is humility. This is not a mind game where you try to think of ways you aren’t worthy in order to get God to say you actually are worthy. That’s the temptation to deal-making trying to sneak back in. But there are no deals. There are no bargains. There is only Christ and His free grace.

So Come and welcome to Jesus Christ. 

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Jesus Plants New Churches

As we begin taking steps to be established as new church, we have to be clear that planting new churches is something that Jesus does by the working of His Spirit. People do not plant new churches. 

People can start political parties and business and social clubs, but the Church is not an ordinary human endeavor. The Church is made up of ordinary humans, but they are ordinary humans who have been made new by the preaching of the gospel and the work of the Spirit. That same Spirit that gives new life to individual people is the One who knits people together into communities called churches. And the stitches He uses are Word and Sacrament, prayers and praise. 

But this same reality is at work here at this table. This is ordinary bread and wine that God promises to work through. He promises to be present here by His Spirit, feeding us with the life of Christ. In same way, we actually believe God has been present since the Call to Worship at the beginning of the service. We gather to do ordinary things like pray and sing and hear the Bible read and explained and then share this bread and wine, but God is the One at work doing extraordinary things through these ordinary things. 

The primary thing we are instructed to do is believe that. Trust in Christ, that He who began a good work in us will continue that good work. But with eyes of faith look for the evidences of that good work. Was there something in one of the hymns or psalms that spoke directly to your situation? Was there something in one of the Scripture readings or the sermon? Or was it in a conversation before or after the service? That’s the Holy Spirit knitting us together. Christ is the Gardner, and He is planting this Church. His Spirit is the one pulling the threads of our lives together through the gospel, through this bread and wine, through the water of baptism, through the prayers and psalms and fellowship. 

So Come and welcome to Jesus Christ. 

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