Discipleship | A People for His Name

A People for His Name: Ministry Summary for 2016

December 31, 2016

My ministry this year was greatly blessed by my beginning this year by reading the entire Bible in 59 days! I also made it through the NT this year a second time and read much of the Bible in Spanish.

This year was an especially fruitful year for me in ministering the Bible because I had two new teaching opportunities. I also had many other opportunities to minister, especially in teaching, music ministry, and writing on my blog.

Preaching, Teaching, and Scripture Reading

I had two preaching opportunities this year: prayer meeting at my church, Mount Calvary Baptist in Greenville, SC, and a Sunday morning service in a church in Georgia. Although I had already preached both these messages before elsewhere, preaching them again allowed me to improve both messages substantially.

Two new opportunities to minister were given to me this year in teaching at my church: teaching a combined adult Sunday school class and teaching a 16-week adult Sunday school class in the fall. In addition, I taught Sunday school once at a church in Georgia.

I did the Scripture reading for two morning services at my church. For the first time, I also read Scripture for a morning service in my church’s Spanish ministry.

Music Ministry

I ministered with other instrumentalists in one opener for a service and in two offertories. I accompanied various people singing specials in our Spanish ministry four times this year.

Online, I was able to teach guitar to a developing guitarist overseas who has made encouraging progress in preparing himself for using the guitar for ministry. My teaching guitar this year also included instructing a few students personally.

I also sang with a group of men for a special in our Spanish ministry. I wrote one new Spanish hymn for children this year, “Dios es siempre bueno!”

Other Ministry

Regular participation in neighborhood evangelism this summer and in Spanish evangelism at various times throughout the year afforded me many opportunities to minister Scripture to both believers and unbelievers. I also worked in registration for our annual Neighborhood Bible School.

In our Spanish ministry, I prayed for and took the offering several times. For our Men’s Ministry, I wrote one article for the manual and attended all of our prayer breakfasts.

Tutoring a Seminary student in New Testament Greek for several months this summer provided me with a good opportunity to teach elementary Greek again. By regular participation in two discussion groups on Facebook, I was able to give God’s truths numerous times to lost people and saved people.

I gave a brief devotional at the beginning of the workday nearly every Tuesday this year. I also frequently shared Scriptural truths with my coworkers.

I posted on my blog 77 times in 2016, counting this post. The majority of my posts shared biblical truths that God has given me over the years in my own study of Scripture, which has been the major focus of my blog from the beginning.

I praise the Lord for His goodness and faithfulness to me in allowing me to minister so abundantly in 2016!

In Ministry, Mount Calvary Baptist Music Ministry, Mount Calvary Baptist Pulpit, Music, Preaching, Spanish, Sunday School

Beware Espousing Any Unbiblical Notions about Practitioners of Magic or the Occult

December 30, 2016

God made clear to His people that they were forbidden from having any contact with or participation in magic or in occult practices:

Deu 18:9 When thou art come into the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations.

¹⁰ There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch,

¹¹ Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer.

¹² For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.

¹³ Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God.

¹⁴ For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the LORD thy God hath not suffered thee so to do.

As believers, we must understand that the Bible never teaches that there is such a thing as a good fairy, witch, wizard, or any other supposedly good practitioner of supernatural arts involving magic or occult practices. All Christians, including especially Christians who immerse themselves in fictitious materials that are filled with such unbiblical notions, must diligently guard their minds so that they do not unwittingly espouse any such unbiblical views as legitimate.

In Discipleship, Interpretation, Theology

What Being Under Grace Does Not Mean for Christian Morality

December 27, 2016

Deuteronomy 22 and 1 Corinthians 5 both address a specific divine prohibition for the morality of believers:

Deu 22:30 A man shall not take his father’s wife, nor discover his father’s skirt.

1Co 5:1 It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.

A comparison of these passages shows that God’s moral requirement for today’s believers who are under grace is no different than what is was for believers in Him who were under the Law—a man must not have intimate relations with his father’s wife! God’s moral standard for His people concerning this prohibition has not changed at all.

In fact, this comparison shows that even Gentiles who live in the age of grace know not to practice such fornication. Christians who assert that being under grace means that such sexual prohibitions in the Law no longer apply to God’s people have a wrong understanding of what being under grace means for Christian morality.

In Discipleship, Interpretation, Theology

Profiting from the Emphasis in Scripture on Sexual Sinfulness

December 10, 2016

Abundant content in Scripture about sexual sinfulness signals an area of human sinfulness that the Spirit has highlighted for our profit. At least 46 of the 66 books of the Bible have such content.

In the OT, at least 26 of the 39 books provide divine revelation concerning sexual sinfulness.

Gen. 19:5-9; 19:32ff; 34:2, 31; 35:22; 38:15, 21f, 24; 39:7, 12, 14; 49:4
Exod. 20:14; 22:16
Lev. 15:24; 18:22f; 19:29; 20:5, 10, 12f, 15, 18, 20; 21:7, 9, 14
Num. 5:13; 25:1
Deut. 5:18; 22:21ff, 25, 28f; 23:17f; 28:30
Jos. 2:1; 6:17, 22, 25
Jdg. 11:1; 16:1; 19:2, 22, 25
1 Sam. 2:22
2 Sam. 11:4; 12:11; 13:11, 14
1 Ki. 3:16; 14:24; 15:12; 22:46
2 Ki. 23:7
1 Chron. 5:1
Job 24:15
Ps. 50:18
Prov. 2:16-19; 5:3, 20; 6:23, 26, 32; 7:5-27; 20:16; 23:27; 27:13; 29:3; 30:20
Isa. 13:16; 23:15f
Jer. 3:1, 3; 5:7; 7:9; 9:2; 13:27; 23:10, 14; 29:23
Lam. 5:11
Ezek. 16:31ff; 23:44f
Hos. 1:2; 2:2, 4f; 3:1, 3; 4:2, 11, 14, 18
Joel 3:3
Amos 2:7; 7:17
Mic. 1:7
Hab. 2:15-16
Zech. 14:2
Mal. 3:5

Twenty of the 27 NT books have content concerning sexual sinfulness; this profound NT emphasis against this category of human sinfulness informs us as NT Christians that earnestly contending for the faith will always include addressing these sins with the same directness, earnestness, forcefulness, sobriety, and repetition that the Spirit does.

Matt. 5:27f, 32; 15:19; 19:9, 18; 21:31f
Mk. 7:21f; 10:11f, 19
Lk. 15:30; 16:18; 18:11, 20
Jn. 4:17-18; 8:3f, 41
Acts 15:20, 29; 21:25
Rom. 1:29; 2:22; 7:3; 13:9
1 Co. 5:1, 9ff; 6:9, 13, 15f, 18; 7:2; 10:8
2 Co. 12:21
Gal. 5:19
Eph. 4:19; 5:3, 5
Col. 3:5
1 Thess. 4:3
1 Tim. 1:10
2 Tim. 2:22
Heb. 11:31; 12:16; 13:4;
Jas. 2:11, 25; 4:4
1 Pet. 4:3
2 Pet. 2:14
Jude 1:4, 7
Rev. 2:14, 20ff; 9:21; 21:8; 22:15

In Discipleship, Theology

Evidence That Birds Produce Music and Not Just Make Noise!

December 4, 2016

Scripture says that God created birds before He made Adam and Eve. Scripture also says that birds do not just make noise; they sing (cf. Zeph. 2:14). Although we do not need scientific research to prove that the Bible is true, articles such as this one provide confirmation of what Scripture teaches.

http://christiannews.net/2016/11/14/scientists-discover-musical-complexity-in-birds-that-utterly-defies-evolutionary-predictions/

In Music

“Beatboxing,” Exodus 32, and the CCM Debate

November 28, 2016

Various proponents of CCM have dismissed passages such as Exodus 32 from being relevant to the CCM debate for differing reasons, including because there is no mention of musical instruments in the passage. I believe that factoring the ability of humans to mimic percussion instruments vocally, as in the contemporary practice of beatboxing,¹ substantively changes the discussion of Exodus 32 and many other passages in Scripture that have often been debated in discussions about musical styles and their propriety in Christian worship.

¹ Wikipedia explains beatboxing as follows:

Beatboxing (also beat boxing or b-boxing) is a form of vocal percussion primarily involving the art of mimicking drum machines using one’s mouth, lips, tongue, and voice. It may also involve vocal imitation of turntablism, and other musical instruments. Beatboxing today is connected with hip-hop culture, often referred to as “the fifth element” of hip-hop, although it is not limited to hip-hop music.^[1][2] The term “beatboxing” is sometimes used to refer to vocal percussion in general (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beatboxing; accessed 11/28/16; 9:53 pm).

In CCM

A Wonderful Testimony That is Worth Hearing!

November 26, 2016

A wonderful testimony that honors God and proclaims a message that everyone needs to hear concerning a vital issue.

In Testimony

Blessed Be Our Father Who Fulfills All His Promises!

November 25, 2016

I did not grow up in a Christian family and had little acquaintance with the things of the Bible as a child and as a teenager. I had heard the name Jesus but mostly it was when people used it as an expletive.

From watching movies like the Robe and Ben Hur in my childhood years, I did see a moving presentation of the Crucifixion of Jesus and remember being distinctly and at the time inexplicably moved by viewing those scenes, even though I was not saved until many years after seeing those movies.

It was not until I was in college that I was exposed in any continuing way to some things from the Bible. When I would regularly visit a Catholic Newman center on the campus of Western Illinois University, I did not follow much of what was said in the homilies given in those services, but I distinctly remember being strangely moved when we would sing the Model Prayer that Jesus taught His disciples to pray.

I also visited a few churches with friends during those years, but I do not remember anything about what was preached in those churches. My exposure to Bible truth in my college years also included a movie about Christianity that I saw with some Christian friends.

Having had a habit for many years of browsing in bookstores, I encountered in a Christian bookstore some books about the New Age movement that warned that some of the things that I was involved in at the time were of demonic origin. I bought those books, and God used them to speak to me although I was not a believer yet.

God continued to work in my life by directing me to the religion section of the Public Library in Cookeville. From the hundreds of books in that section, He led me to read several that gave me a good overview of the story of the Bible.

God then directed me to some apologetics books in a Christian bookstore in Cookeville. Those books presented me for the first time in my life with the objective historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

About the same time, someone put a tract on my windshield that I read the day that it was put there. Through my praying through the suggested prayers in the back of the apologetics books and at the end of the tract, God saved me!

I am confident that the person who put that tract on my windshield prayed for God to use that tract to reach someone with His truth. God answered that person’s prayers by using my reading of that tract as part of how He brought me to saving faith in His Son.

Soon after I was saved, I wanted to go to church but had no idea about what church to go to out of the dozens of church names that I saw in the phone book for Cookeville. I prayed, and God directed someone to come up to me at work and invite me to his church.

The person who did so did not know that I had been recently saved. God answered my prayer by leading me through him to the only truly independent fundamental Baptist church in Cookeville!

Many years after I was saved, I learned that I had been born in a missionary hospital run by Canadian Presbyterian missionaries in a small town in India. Those missionary doctors and nurses prayed over every baby that was born in that hospital.

Until I am with the Lord, I will not know for sure what they prayed for when I was born. It is entirely possible that they prayed for me to be saved one day, and if they did, God has answered their prayers!

Whether anyone else prayed directly for my salvation, Scripture reveals that Jesus of Nazareth, the incarnate Son of God, prayed for me to the Father (John 17:20-26). I praise our Heavenly Father for giving me to His Son in answer to His prayers and in fulfillment of His glorious promise to His Christ:

“Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession” (Ps. 2:8).

Having been saved by the Father’s fulfilling His promise to His Son, may we all be used by Him to reach many others who will also be saved in fulfillment of the Father’s glorious promise to His Son that He would give Him the heathen for His inheritance. Knowing these things, let us all be diligent to pray and share the gospel of God concerning His Son to people in the power of His promised Spirit whom His Son has given us in fulfillment of the Father’s promise (Luke 24:49; Acts 2:33).

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who is faithful to keep all His promises to His Son and to everyone and everything else, including every living creature (Gen. 9:9-17). “Even so, come, Lord Jesus (Rev. 22:20).

In Ministry, Testimony, Theology

Ephesians 5:25 and A Proper Christian Mindset

November 22, 2016

Having a proper Christian mindset includes living by the glorious truth of Christ’s loving me and giving Himself for me:

Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

As important as believing that Christ loved me and gave Himself for me as an individual Christian is, having a proper Christian mindset requires that I also give full importance to a closely related truth:

Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;

Paul teaches in this verse that Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for it.

As an individual Christian, I am part of the Church, but I am not the totality of the Church. Ephesians 5:25, therefore, teaches me that Christ loved an entity that includes me but is far bigger than I am. It teaches me that Christ died for something that is far bigger than I am as an individual Christian.

Because Christ loves the Church and because He gave Himself for it, I must always be mindful to treat those who are His Church in light of these glorious realities.

In Discipleship, Interpretation, Theology

“O Lord, While We Confess the Worth”

November 12, 2016

I recently found two excellent hymns to use for engaging in gospel self-talk through believer’s baptism: Baptismal Hymn and O Lord, While We Confess the Worth. Written by Mary B. Peters, O Lord While We Confess the Worth sets forth truths that are worth meditating on individually and ministering to one another corporately!

O Lord, While We Confess the Worth

O Lord, while we confess the worth
Of this, the outward seal,
Do Thou, the truths here-in set forth,
To ev-‘ry heart reveal.

Death to the world we here avow,
Death to each fleshly lust;
Newness of life our calling now,
A risen Lord our trust.

And we, O Lord, who now partake
Of resurrection life,
With ev-‘ry sin, for Thy dear sake,
Would be at constant strife.

Baptized into the Father’s name,
We’d walk as sons of God;
Baptized in Thine, we own Thy claim,
As ransomed by Thy blood.

Baptized into the Holy Ghost,
We’d keep His temple pure;
And make Thy grace our only boast,
And by Thy strength endure.

In Discipleship, Music, Sunday School

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