Some Ways You Can Pray For Your Elders.

We Beg You, Church-Member, Pray For Your Elders!

Geoffrey R. Kirkland,   Christ Fellowship Bible Church 

 

 
The Christian has no more powerful weapon that is constantly available to him than the glorious privilege of prayer. Intercessory prayer proves to be the greatest -- and at the same time, the hardest -- blessing that Christians have for one another! We can and must minister biblical truth to each other. Yes we must encourage. And sure we must reprove and confront when needed. But how frequently do we read of Paul begging believers: “pray for us” (1 Thess 5:25; 2 Thess 3:1; cf. Heb 13:18). Faithful shepherds would resonate with this simple plea to every church-member, “Brethren: pray for us!” How, you ask? Pray for your elders in the following suggested ways.

Know The Lord!
Pray for your elders to know the Lord. Simply: more than anything else in the world, pray that they would know God -- deeply. Pray that God would enlarge their understanding, deepen their convictions, widen their grasp, and tighten their adherence to God’s glory and character. Pray for your shepherds to know God in such a way that they experientially long to be with God in communion. Pray that their service is not rote or heartless. But pray that their ministerial work flows from a warm heart of devotion to Christ that all springs from a deep, tender, ever-growing knowledge of God!

Know the Word!
Pray for your elders to know the Word. Our guidebook is Scripture. Our foundation upon which we build all of life and ministry is the sufficient and clear Word of God. Nothing is as fixed as God’s Word. Nothing is as unchangeable as His Truth. In an age of opposition to divine authority and in a world drowning in rebellion against God’s clear directives, your elders covet and need your intercessory prayer. Pray for their courage to stand upon Scripture in the face of any and all opposition. Pray for their theological precision and robust grip of the biblical gospel so that Satan does not sway them away from the priorities. Pray for them to know and feed on the Word!

Know the Flock!
Pray for your elders to know the flock. Remember what Solomon charged his son: know well the condition of your flocks (Prov 27:23). Your elders have much to do including prayer, study of the Word, and administrative details. But remember: pastoral work is shepherding work. Ministerial work is people work. Pastors engage in soul-care. Pray for daily strength, divine power, sustaining energy, grace-given endurance, and joy-filled hearts. Intercede often for your ministers as their work often goes unnoticed, and at times, unappreciated. Pray for the Lord to minister to their hearts as they minister to the hearts of the saints. Pray for God to guard them from ‘pastoral burnout’ and from overworking to the neglect of their primary ministry -- his own wife and children. Pray that they would know needs, attend to them, and balance his time and duties well.

Know the Danger!
Pray for your elders to know the danger. Dangerous times are those in which we live! The god of this world is plunging many with him to perdition! And how he loves to distract the saints, distort the gospel, defile the leaders, destroy the gospel’s reputation and disrupt godly fellowship. Pray frequently and fervently for God to protect your congregation! Pray for your leaders in this! Pray that they would know and see the danger as a watchman of old was to observe a danger on the horizon and cry out to prevent harm from striking. Pray that God’s leaders would have insight and discernment to protect the flock preventatively instead of reactively after the danger has pierced through. Pray much and often for this is vital to the church’s health!

Know the Power!
Pray for your elders to know the power. Any faithful shepherd would honestly affirm his own weakness and inadequacy in himself to do pastoral work. So pray for him and with him to have and know the power of God! Consider calling your pastor and praying with and for him to have the power of God in his prayer time, in his sermon preparation time, in his preaching, and in his pastoral work. Pray for him to know the power of God and to see glimpses of God’s grace revealed as he marvels at how God works in and through him for the advance of the gospel and for the fame of Christ’s Name! Pray for him to experience the power of God while he heralds the gospel. Pray for him to see converts as he evangelizes and calls sinners to repent and believe. Pray for him to know power in the counseling room as he seeks to help believers put off sin and put on holiness. Pray for him and with him to have divine power in his work!

Know the Joy!
Pray for your elders to know the joy. Fullness of joy, the happinesses of joy, the delightfulness of joy and the otherworldliness of joy! Yes, pray for your shepherd-elders to have the divine glory of joy strike deep in their souls. Pray that even when hospital visits are needed, when struggling saints need reproof, when bad doctrine must be confronted, and when busyness creeps in that the joy of the Lord would refresh them, sustain them, gladden them, and enlarge their hearts. Pray for these shepherds to drink of the river of God’s delights -- daily. Pray for your elders to do their work not out of sheer duty but out of joyful wonder at God’s grace and call and glory! Pray for the joy of your elders to permeate through the flock so that Christian joy would characterize your local church congregation. Pray much and often for the God of joy to grant joy to your leaders!

 

 

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Children Are Like Arrows!

ARROWS.
Geoffrey R. Kirkland
Christ Fellowship Bible Church


Psalm 127:3—4  
Behold, children are a gift of the LORD,  The fruit of the womb is a reward.
LIKE ARROWS in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one’s youth.


Children, like arrows, are sharp, powerful & can accomplish great things! An arrow, carefully and diligently sharpened, can accomplish powerful results if shot rightly, powerfully, accurately, and precisely. Let us remember that our children, in a similar way, can accomplish great tasks and effect tremendous results if we would sharpen them diligently and in biblically.

Children, like arrows & unlike a sword, can go where the warrior cannot go (v.4)!  Parents must remember that our children can go to places in the world, in the region, in the city that we ourselves are unable to go. Just as an arrow that flies from the hand of the warrior goes swiftly to a location where the warrior himself cannot go, so our children can accomplish great things far and wide!

Children, like arrows, are to be offensive weapons to fight battles that are afar off & coming (v.4)!  Arrows in the hand of a warrior are never defensive weapons. Never does a mighty man sharpen an arrow just to hide it in his quiver. Rather, he readies his arrows and his mind so that when danger approaches, he stands ready to engage in combat. In a similar way, even now there may be battles that are afar off and over the horizon, but give it time and the combat will draw near. Let us prepare our children for battle!

Children, like arrows, must be deployed by God who knows how to use them best (v.4)!  Ultimately, the arrow is in the power and under the prerogative of the mighty warrior. The arrow does not pick and choose and aim and fire itself. Rather, the warrior lets it go. Ultimately, we as parents aren’t ‘Ultimate Warriors’, God is! God must deploy them for He knows how to use our arrows best.

Children, like arrows, must be straightened to be powerful thru discipline (v.4)!  A warrior preparing for combat straightens his arrows so that there are no rough patches on the shaft. It must be strong, powerful, able to penetrate, and certainly not flimsy. Likewise, we must straighten, fortify, and establish our children to be powerful and resolute through discipline and fervent instruction.

Children, like arrows, must be sharpened thru instruction, teaching (v.4)!  A warrior could pick the most sturdy instrument for the arrow but if the head is dull, it will accomplish no good. Let us sharpen our children, like arrows, constantly, fervently, intentionally, biblically, and theologically so that they are sharp in their knowledge of God, His ways, His Word, and how to live for His glory!

Children, like arrows, must be aimed/directed for the future thru sharing the faith, vision, future, truth, gospel (v.4)!  If a mighty man of war does not put himself in a ready position for battle with his arsenal readily available and his arrows at his disposal for future battle he is a warrior that is soon to perish. Let us direct our children toward Christ and prepare them for the long-haul to serve Him as we proclaim the essentials of faith, the ultimate passion for God’s glory and the necessity of a life of integrity.

Children, like arrows, should be aware of how powerful they are & the effect they can have (for the Master's use) (v.4)!  Arrows can kill. They can penetrate deep below the skin and can kill the enemy or, if wrongly utilized, can harm oneself or a friend. Let children understand that they are powerful beings made in God’s image and yet they can have such a mighty and powerful impact for the Master’s use. Let us employ them and send them as powerful instruments in the Redeemer’s hands!

Children, like arrows, must be aimed at the bullseye (salvation of their souls) thru constant evangelization with grace-driven, Christ-exalting urgency!  No matter how skilled and professional a warrior may be, if he aims at nothing, he’s sure to hit it. O let parents learn this truth! We must aim and direct our children to hit the bulls-eye. The bulls-eye of childrearing is the gospel of Jesus Christ. We want our children to know the gospel, comprehend the gospel, believe this gospel, surrender their lives to obey this gospel, follow Jesus Christ, and live confidently and courageously for Him regardless of the cost and even to the point of death.

Children, like arrows, must be let go & leave the bow (home) (v.4)!  No front-line warrior would ever attend vigilantly to his arrows in the home and then refuse to release the arrow in the demanding moments of warfare. In similar way, parents must prepare to release and send them!

Children, like arrows, once shot in warfare cannot be retrieved -- so make every moment count! (v.4)!  In combat, warriors never would cross into enemy territory to retrieve the already-shot arrows. Once fired, they’re gone. Parents must redeem the time, making the most of every opportunity to point our children to Christ and to lovingly urge them to surrender to Him! Let us daily teach, faithfully model, and woo them to Christ!

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Equipping Men of the Church to Be Shepherds At Home!

 

EQUIPPING THE MEN TO BE SHEPHERDS AT HOME
Taking the men's morning study & turning it into a marital discipleship-relationship.
Christ Fellowship Bible Church

Geoffrey R. Kirkland

How can we encourage, equip & exhort the Christ Fellowship Bible Church men to shepherd, nurture, instruct & pastor their wives at home? How can we as men follow the command of our Savior and give ourselves up for our wives and sanctify them by washing them in the Word? After all, this is what Jesus our Savior does for us? So how can we emulate our Savior and practically implement this in our own marriages? Here are some super practical suggestions.

1. PAY ATTENTION CAREFULLY. (LISTEN!)
You cannot give to your wife what you don’t possess. You cannot impart knowledge to her that you do not have. So, men, as you come on Friday mornings, pay attention, focus, fight distractions and listen carefully so as to understand the teaching and meaning of God’s Word. Let it sink into your mind, heart, affections, and indeed, your whole being.

2. TAKE NOTES AS NEEDED.  (REMEMBER!)
Some people benefit from taking notes and jotting down memorable points. Others find great help by taking copious notes so they can review them later on and rehearse the entire study to themselves. Whatever way is best for you, the goal is to remember what you studied, what you learned, and what God used to teach and convict you so you can disseminate that to your wife.

3. THINK IMPLEMENTATION.   (APPLY!)
As the men’s study progresses, always be thinking and asking yourself, ‘how must I apply what I’m learning/reading from the Word of God?’ Never be happy in hearing the Word only; always be a doer. If God’s Word doesn’t make you better, then it’s all for naught. So when you attend and listen, be humble, be willing to be convicted, broken, exposed, and molded into Christ’s image by God’s Spirit through the study of the Word of God. Apply to your heart first.

4. PRIORITIZE THE DISCUSSION.  (SCHEDULE!)
Every man lives a busy life. We must schedule and prioritize appointments. If men don’t schedule certain activities, it’ll get crowded out or forgotten altogether. So, men, schedule a discussion with your wife. It must be priority. We are called by God to sanctify our wives and wash them in the Word. It’s not optional! We must prioritize this discussion. Make it happen. It’s as important as a meeting with your top client. There, you may have a follow-up review with a boss; but remember, on the final day, you’ll stand before God Himself and give account to your faithfulness. So prioritize this. Schedule this. Make it happen. Yes, it is really that important.

5. SHARE PERSONAL TRUTHS LEARNED.  (HONESTY!)
When you have that precious time talking with your wife, honestly share with her what you’ve learned. Tell her what the discussion was about. Inform her of the Scriptures you covered (even read the verses with her!). Share what you learned, doctrines that God reminded you of, insights that other men shared, and ways in which the Spirit of God convicted and challenged you. Not only is this helpful to wash your God-graced companion and help-mate in the Word and apply the Word to her heart and life, but it builds an emotional bond as you honestly and humbly share what you are learning. What a model of leadership! What exemplary husbanding!

6. TRUST THE POWER OF THE WORD.  (CONFIDENCE!)
In pastoring a congregation at large or pastoring one’s family at home, the shepherd must trust the power of the Word to do its work. The Word works in those who believe. So men must have confidence in God’s power to work through His word to sanctify your wife as you shepherd her in the Truth. Trust God’s Word to work in her life, in your marriage, in your relationship, and in her love for, respect for, submission to and affection for you. Men, lead and trust!

 

 

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50 Practical Reasons For You To Thank God.

50 Reasons For You To Thank God.

Geoffrey R. Kirkland

 1 Thessalonians 5.18 -- 'in everything give thanks...'

Thank God ….

1. for life and breath physically. 

2. for eternal life and salvation spiritually. 

3. for the necessities of clean water & food.

4. for the Word of God in your own language.

5. for the glorious Triune, eternal, unrivaled God.

6. for the everlasting love and perfections of the Father.

7. for the undeserved grace & atoning work of Jesus.

8. for the regenerating, particular, comforting love of the Spirit. 

9. for the fact that you shall never experience God’s judgment — ever!

10. for your shelter and protection.

11. for your health and ability to live and move. 

12. for your family physically. 

13. for your family spiritually. 

14. for the gift of your local church.

15. for the guarantee that Christ will grow & protect His Church.

16. for the involvement you have in your church family.

17. for the relationships you have in the Body of Christ.

18. for your conscience — God’s inner preacher of right & wrong.

19. for the many promises of God that are all “YES” in Christ!

20. for a bed to sleep on comfortably.

21. for clothing to cover you appropriately. 

22. for the happy blessings of life that make you laugh.

23. for the promise of eternal life in heaven with Christ.

24. for your escape of eternal hellfire under God’s wrath.

25. for your clear mission to make disciples and help them grow in Christ.

26. for your eyes to see the beauties of God’s creation.

27. for your ears to hear the word of God preached.

28. for your hands to serve and work diligently for God’s glory.

29. for your nose to smell the wonders of God’s creative works.

30. for your tongue to taste what God has given.

31. for the triumph of Jesus Christ over Satan and all His minions. 

32. for the disarming and sure-doom of Satan by Christ’s power.

33. for the casting of all of your sins on Jesus Christ.

34. for the marriage-bond and covenant-union you have “IN CHRIST JESUS”.

35. for the divine guarantee that you shall be “glorified” and shall see Jesus.

36. for your marriage.

37. for your children.

38. for your extended family.

39. for the soon-coming of Jesus Christ to seize us to meet Jesus in the clouds.

40. for the return of Jesus Christ in power & glory to judge all unbelievers.

41. for the future kingdom of Christ to reign righteously on the earth.

42. for the new heavens and the new earth to dwell in forevermore with God.

43. for authorities that God has put in place.

44. for joy that God gives in a confused world.

45. for hope that is firm and secure and anchored in Christ’s character.

46. for missionaries who take the gospel to the lost to see them saved.

47. for evangelists who live to proclaim the saving gospel of Jesus Christ.

48. for shepherd-elders who preach the Word and defend the Truth.

49. for the wondrous privilege of prayer that is always available thru Christ.

50. for the gift of the prayer meeting with the assembly of the redeemed. 

 

Psalm 103.2 -- 'bless the LORD O my soul and forget none of His benefits...'

Psalm 116.12 -- 'What shall I render to the LORD for all His benefits toward me?'

 

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Compelling Reasons To Start Your Day Early With God.

 COMPELLING REASONS TO START YOUR DAY EARLY WITH GOD.
Meet with God before you meet with men.
Geoffrey R. Kirkland

God’s Word provides a daily prayer for God’s people: “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love that we may rejoice and be glad all our days” (Psalm 90;14).  Moses prayed those words that may provide a fitting early-morning prayer to God for all of us. George Mueller once said: “I want to encourage all Christians to get into the habit of rising early to meet with God.”  The morning time, more than any other time, provides the best occasion to orient your heart and mind to God and His Word at the very outset of a new day. Abraham rose early to meet with God (Gen 19:27). Moses rose early and built an altar to Yahweh (Ex 24:4). Even the Servant-Song speaks of the Messiah as one who morning by morning is awakened and is taught (Isaiah 50:4).

In this brief write-up, I want to give a pastoral plea for you to start your day with God. I want to provide some practical and compelling reasons for you to begin your days early with God before you go to email, social media, and news. I will provide seven pastoral pleas and I will word them in the negative for greater impact.


If you don’t begin your day early and with God, then...
1. You fill your mind with the world before divine truth.  — You do not want your mind to sit idle from the early morning waiting for the things of this world to fill it. If you do not proactively and diligently fill your heart with divine truth, the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes, and the pride of life will not wait long before they will occupy your thoughts. Strive to fill your mind with Truth before the word seeps in.
2. You give an easy opportunities for anxieties to birth, fester and grow. —  If you do not start your day with God early and preeminently, then the cares of this world and the worries of your heart will quickly take root and occupy your thoughts. You don’t want the anxieties of this world to begin in seed form early in the morning, fester all day, and then grow into mind-consuming troubles. Rather, fill yourself full with the character & beauty of God.
3. You go against Psalm 119:147: seek the Lord early. — The psalmist made it his goal to rise early and cry for help. If you don’t come to God early, the world will come to you swiftly. If you don’t fill your heart with divine Truth then the world will fill you full with its lies, its temptations, its cravings, and its desires. Seek the Lord early and wait for His Words by eagerly, diligently, and passionately pursuing Him in His Word.
4. You contradict the example of Christ who woke early and went to seek God early.  — Even your own Savior, the blessed God-Man, rose early in the morning while it was still dark to get away and be alone with God in prayer. Strive to emulate your Savior.  If the perfect Son of God needed morning prayer and anchoring His heart with the Father, so must you and I also!
5. You miss the way to filter and discern what you see of the world thru the word (if you meet the world before meeting the Word).  — It is the Word of God, which is the sword of the Spirit, which provides us an all-sufficient tool to wield off the temptations of the Evil one and His flaming arrows. If you don’t spend time in the Word first and in prayer, then you don’t have the proper filter in place by which you can sift through all the things that will bombard you in a given day. God’s Word gives you the lens through which you must test everything. Indeed, you are to abstain from every appearance of evil and hold fast to that which is good.
6. You will find it harder to focus and linger in heart and mind because of distractions. — If you try to put off having your time with God until later in the day, you will soon find it much more difficult to focus because of the many distractions that come from any number of instrumental means. Your phone may ding, the email may arrive, the calendar alert may sound, your thoughts may plague you, that meeting agenda will come to your mind that you have to prepare for. And on it goes. But if you start your day with God, you can take every thought captive later on throughout the day having rested your heart and soul on the steady Sovereignty of your heavenly Father.
7. You’ll be unfit to meet with men without having met with God first. — You will be much better suited and prepared to meet with men only after you have met with God. But until you have met with God, you are not be able nor equipped to meet with men. Commune with men less and more with God. Communing with Christ will guard your thoughts, your words, your reactions and responses, your actions and practices, and your daily conduct.


Seek to emulate the wise example of Robert Murray M’Cheyne. On February 23, 1834, the 20-year-old McCheyne wrote in his journal, “Rose early to seek God and found him whom my soul loveth. Who would not rise early to meet such company?”


To conclude, pastor Scott Hubbard provides a wise word:
"Nevertheless, the testimony of God’s people in Scripture and church history suggests that morning is, far and away, the best time for most of us to meet with God. Before the day’s tasks demand to be done, before the headlines bring the world into our living rooms, before our phones beg for our attention, and before the air around us starts humming with activity, we desperately need to hear from God. We need the first voice of the day to be his."

 

**Download the PDF article here

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Go and Compel Sinners To Come In!

GO AND COMPEL SINNERS TO COME IN! 

Geoffrey R. Kirkland

Pastor, Christ Fellowship Bible Church 

The Scripture: 
LUKE 14:23
ἔξελθε εἰς τὰς ὁδοὺς καὶ φραγμοὺς καὶ ἀνάγκασον εἰσελθεῖν, ἵνα γεμισθῇ μου ὁ οἶκος·
“Go out into the highways and the hedges and compel them to come in so that my house may be filled.”

 

 

As I reflect on the duty and joyful privilege of man-fishing, I find it helpful to reflect and pray on the sweetness of Christ and the joy of calling sinners to flee from the wrath to come by looking to Christ the Lamb who bore divine judgment in the stead of hopeless sinners who repent and believe in Him. 

 

I.  the plan / the pursuit / the passion
1. GO OUT! - ἔξελθε- GO OUT / depart/ leave! “Go Out” / point from which you depart.
2. COMPEL! -  ἀνάγκασον- Compel! Force! Plead! Beg! Woo!  Draw!  To Necessitate; to Compel; To Drive To.  It is a very strong verb that demands compulsion, begging, wooing, entreating, pleadings.


II. the purpose!
    *God says: so that my house my be full!

====

For me, personally, here are some of my goals & ambitions as I seek to proclaim Christ:

• I make it a personal goal to share the gospel daily (a child, a gas-station, a stranger, giving out a tract, a server at a restaurant, a student, someone waiting for a bus, etc.).
• I try to make an outing of evangelism/soul-winning each week.
• I want to explain the gospel and compel sinners to respond in repentance + faith.
• I want to give them a tract; follow-up; a website; my email.
• I offer them to get together and open the Bible and talk about these things.
• I willingly pray with them if they’ll allow me at the end of the conversation.
• I greedily want souls to know Christ, rest in His efficacious cross-work & have eternal life.
• I want Christ the Lord to receive the full reward of His labors. I know that He will. So my confidence in the absolute sovereignty of God encourages me and instills confidence as I go out and labor for converts.
• I believe with all my heart that God’s Word (preached, in written tract form, or verbalized in a conversation) shall never ever return void. He will use it in accomplishing and in the outworking of His sovereignly ordained decrees. 
• I personally believe there's something vitally important as a shepherd and leader to exemplify soul-winning for the believers I shepherd in the local church. I often take church folks out with me for evangelism so we can do it together and reflect on it together and sharpen each other. 
  

 

2 Corinthians 5:20-6:1 -- Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. And working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain.

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The Resurrection Of Jesus Christ

The Resurrection of Jesus Christ: the Guarantee, the Glory & the Assurance.
Geoffrey R. Kirkland
Christ Fellowship Bible Church

It is of first importance, the Apostle Paul said. The resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ from the dead proves to be the bedrock doctrine of the Christian faith. One cannot read the Book of Acts without noting the constant theme of the Apostle’s proclamation, namely,  the resurrection of the crucified One and salvation that comes only through His Name.

This article provides some gleanings on the importance on the resurrection of Jesus Christ.


The Resurrection is the GUARANTEE of our life.
When Jesus Christ rose up from the dead, He guaranteed that all His people will in fact live eternally through Him. In Christ’s resurrection, all His people live. His bodily resurrection certifies His peoples’ future resurrection. Christ’s resurrection in glory assures His peoples’ resurrection in glory. The new body of Christ provides the template for the new bodies that God’s people will receive in glory. The resurrection of Christ guarantees our life -- only in Him

The Resurrection is the SATISFACTION of Christ’s atonement.
Infinite wrath came down upon the divine Son of God when He bore the curse of the Father’s wrath at Calvary. He became sin for His people and propitiated the Father’s righteous anger against sin. Thus, when the Father raised His Son from the dead, it proved that the Father was truly satisfied with the Son’s propitiatory work. Wrath has been appeased. Salvation has been won. The reality of the resurrection shows the sureness of the Father’s satisfaction of His Beloved Son’s atoning work for His elect.

The Resurrection is the TRIUMPH over all death.
Satan is the father of lies and the god of this age. He is the prince of darkness and the one who holds the power of death. Indeed, when Christ was raised from the dead, it presents the triumph of Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory and the Prince of Life, over all powers of death and darkness. Indeed, Christ defeated the Evil One at Calvary. Fulfilling prophetic words even from Genesis 3, Christ bruised Satan himself on the head and gave him the fatal blow when he defeated death and conquered all evil when He displayed His power in the resurrection.

The Resurrection is the FULFILLMENT of biblical prophecy.
One thousand years before the Lord Jesus came into the world in human flesh, King David prophesied that the Lord would faithfully preserve and watch over His special one and not allow His chosen one to see decay. Even Isaiah the prophet made clear that the suffering Servant who would die as a substitutionary sacrifice for His people will prolong his days through the resurrection. Thus, that Jesus rose from the dead fulfills the glorious and sure Word of Jehovah who prophesied centuries ahead of time that Messiah would rise triumphantly from the dead!

The Resurrection is the SEAL of future glorification.
What will our future bodies be like in glory? How sure can we be that we will inherit eternal life? The resurrection of the Lord Christ provides the seal and certifying mark that we will be with Christ and that we will be made like Christ in His glorified form. His resurrection provides the confident certainty that we will be resurrected in a body that resembles His glorified body.

The Resurrection is the HEART of true hope.
All who have received the new birth by the sovereign grace of God alone are those who have hope -- a sure hope that comes through the substitutionary death and the resurrection life of Jesus Christ. It is a living and interceding Savior who reigns in heaven as He sits at the Father’s right hand that instills hope to the child of God.

The Resurrection is the UNIQUENESS of biblical Christianity.
One may scan the history books and travel the world today and count the innumerable religions and ways of life that will bring one great happiness and peace. But every founder and religious figure in the religion has one thing in common -- they’re all dead and they’ve all decayed. They’ve passed and they’re gone. But Jesus Christ is alive. This is the exclusive and distinguishing mark of biblical Christianity. Life can only be found in the living God. Victory over death can only be granted through One who Himself proved He triumphed over this great monster. Christ alone has done it and this is the unique, essential, foundational, and proclaimed message of Christianity.

The Resurrection is the COMFORT for our eschatology.
When loved ones die, the Apostle Paul exhorts believers to not grieve as the pagans do who have no hope. Rather, true believers have an indomitable comfort that springs from the resurrection life and soon-coming return of our Risen and living Lord, Jesus Christ.  Believers know that Jesus intercedes right now, at this very moment, in heaven for His own sheep and that He will return again to catch His people up in the clouds to be with Him forever. And believers ought to comfort one another with these words. It is the death of Christ and the resurrection of Christ that guarantees this future, eschatological hope which plants great comfort deep into the hearts of believers -- even when undergoing great suffering in life.

*Download the PDF article here.

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The PRAISEWORTHINESS of God.

THE PRAISEWORTHINESS OF GOD. 

Geoffrey R. Kirkland

Christ Fellowship Bible Church

I will call upon the LORD who is "WORTHY TO BE PRAISED" (1 Samuel 22.4)!  God is worthy, infinitely worthy of all honor and praise!  The praiseworthiness of God speaks of the full honor and deserved worship given to our exclusive and preeminent God. God is to be praised! 

In heaven, the saints sing worthy is the Lamb to take the book for He was slain and purchased men for God with His blood (Revelation 5.9). They continue singing: “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing” (Revelation 5.12). 

This kind of thinking should saturate the thoughts of God’s people. Our hearts should well up with bubbling praise and honor to our God who gives innumerable reasons to bless Him. All day, every day, throughout the day, whatever happens each day should not alter our praises of the Lord for He remains the same, unchanging, perfect, good and sovereign. Perhaps this is why the common refrain thunders forth so often in the Bible:  “Hallelujah" - Praise the LORD (see, e.g., Psalm 117:1-2; 135.1, 3, 21).

God is exceedingly praiseworthy because of His character, His actions, His creation, and His salvation.  Contemplate your God and praise Him for His infinite beauties of His character. His being, His attributes, His personhood, His glories, and His excellencies deserve the highest praises from His creatures.  Let your study of God lead to doxology and worship of your God.   Second, contemplate your God and praise Him for His actions in history, toward Israel, toward all nations, and toward you and me. Think of the greatness of His works as you survey biblical revelation. From His provisions, to His deliverances, to His electing people to work out His plans, to His sustaining of His people, we have plenteous reasons to stand stunned before our God and praise Him with a cheerful heart.  Third, contemplate your God and praise Him for His creation. He made all things with His spoken Word. Nothing rebels when God gives the sovereign word. His decrees stand fast. When God spoke, it was done. And also, contemplate your God and praise Him for His salvation. Think of the mercy of God that pitied you as a child of wrath, running headlong toward eternal hell, and He lovingly, particularly, sufficiently, and powerfully snatched you from the fire and saved you! There was nothing in you to merit this kind of rescuing love. But it was His kindness!  Praise be to the Lord!  It’s why David said “I will sing praise to your Name, O most High" (Psalm 9.2)

Today, let your heart well up with genuine and honest worship to your Savior as you say with the psalmist: “I will sing to the LORD as long as I live, I will sing praise to my God while I have my being" (Psalm 104.33; 146.2). And amazingly, this is not something that only you and I must do today for this praising God is something that God Himself jealously and passionately does! His own very glory He will not give to another (Isaiah 48.11). We must praise God because He deserves it, and in response to His actions, and because God Himself is passionately committed to His own honor and excellency, but we must also praise God as the goal and purpose of all that He does!  Let us praise God for all things, especially our salvation in Christ our Beloved Savior, and let us live to the praise of the glory of His grace (Ephesians 1.6).

 

 

**To read more from this blog-series on the Attributes of God, go here. 

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