Gospel Living

And when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. 18  And he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, 19  since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) 20  And he said, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. 21  For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, 22  coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. 23  All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” A sign in front of a small church here in Georgia made the bold proclamation—“Alcohol is a demon.”  There’s no doubt that alcohol has been instrumental in the destruction of many families and lives, used for demonic purposes in other words, but it’s not an actual demon!  There’...

And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! 10  For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 11  But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban” ’ (that is, given to God)— 12  then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, 13  thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.” Sometimes one group of Christians will charge a second group of following “the traditions of men” if that second group believes a theological point that the first rejects.  It may be that the charge is valid.  Too often, however, that first group misapplies what Jesus actually addressed. Until this point in the chapter, we’ve seen that Jesus and the disciples didn’t follow the Pharisaic custom of rit...

Law and Grace: A Grace Church Elder Panel on Navigating Legal Matters by Hohn Cho & Carlos Chung & George Crawford What are churches to do in light of an increasingly litigious society, homosexuality threats of legal action, employment disputes, and the ever-present question of child safety? Audio: MP3

Sorry for the late post.  We were having technical difficulties. This text opens up again the question of traditionalism. We will see that Jesus is not violating God's law, but these man-made regulations that have grown up over time around Scripture.   Is a kind of legalism that has no love for God nor neighbor.  This false religiosity is what Jesus will reveal and counter.   So today, we will first note the traditionalism of the legalists, and second, we will note the testimony of the Lord. Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lm0SD8t_Xyw Audio: http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=49172140468 Notes PDF: http://playpdf.sa-media.com/media/49172140468/49172140468.pdf Sermon Notes The Lord vs. Traditionalism | Mark 2:23–28 Shaun Marksbury | Morning Service | 2 April, 2017 I. Introduction Last week, we talked about traditionalism, and began thinking about some of the thoughts on Sabbatarian laws.  One commentary says, “...

13  And he went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired, and they came to him. Mark highlights a very unpopular topic—the sovereignty of our Lord to choose who He will.  Autonomous free will—the ability for man to do what he wants when he wants without divine interference—is an idol.  Movies and television burst with stories of those beating fate and paving their own paths in life.  Even some Christians bristle at the idea of God making choices for our lives.  Sinful human beings find more comfort in God’s lack of control because it grants them freedom to pursue their passions. Unfortunately, Scripture presents a God creating the world and immediately saying, “Thou shalt not.”  It tells of God judging sin time after time, condemning mankind under sin.  To say this another way, it’s honest with us, and we need to come to terms with it. Even so, the message of Scripture is doom and gloom, but hope in the gospel.  ...

Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. 2  And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. 3  And he said to the man with the withered hand, “Come here.” 4  And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. 5  And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. 6  The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. Jesus faithfully returns to the synagogue on the Sabbath, and a man with perhaps a physical handicap from birth sits there.  It’s possible that the Pharisees brought this man to the synagogue, setting up a trap for the Lord—as the text states that they sought opportunity to accuse the Lord.  Even so, we gain a...

28  So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.” Remember the Pharisees’ sanctimonious question in verse 25.  They turn and interject—“Look!”—and accuse (in the form of a question) the disciples of breaking the holy commandment (v. 24).  While some Pharisees seem to have honest inquiries for the Lord (cf. Jn 3:1–2), these, with the previous ones about dining with sinners (v. 16) and fasting (v. 18), amount to a systematic attack upon the Lord from their perch on high.  They form a line of reasoning that lead most of them to reject Jesus as their Messiah. The Law (nor Sabbath-keeping) can’t bring life.   Our Lord highlights how they misread and misuse the Law.  They believed they were holy because they fasted twice a week (Lk 18:12), tithed even the leaves on spice plants (Mt 23:23), and avoided all appearances of working on the Sabbath.  Indeed, the Law is holy (Rm 7:12), but because of the sin within us, it produces death (v. 13).  Th...

23  One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24  And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25  And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: 26  how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” 27  And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. We rarely experience any real concern of finding a snack with convenience stores and fast food on every corner.  While sampling the fruit at the supermarket would be theft, God allowed travelers to eat the growing produce in the fields, as long as they weren’t using tools and filling bags (Dt 23:24–25). ...

21  No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. 22  And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins. Jesus explains why religious motions provide no lasting help for the individual by following up His discussion on fasting.  His two parables demonstrate that one cannot simply add fasting or ritual or ceremony to a sinful life to make it whole.  While it may appear to work for a while, the end result is worse than the first.  In doing so, He reveals an important aspect of His ministry. Jesus didn’t come to simply sew new laws on our unregenerate lives .  Even the heavens wear out like a garment (Ps 102:26), and Scripture reveals that our hearts are “desperately sick” (Jer 17:9).  Jesus says in Matthew 15:19, “For out of t...

This was a message to the adult Sunday School class at Old Plank Road Baptist Church, Jacksonville FL, on December 30, 2012.  Thank you once again for having us come and fellowship with you! e are having a wonderful time back in Jacksonville.  We’ve lived in California since 2005, and, of course, our Florida family is the one thing that we miss the most.  I was asked recently to sum up my time out there in lessons learned.  The main thing I’ve gleaned   from the professors and pastors at the Master’s College and Seminary is a deeper reverence for God’s Word.  That sounds strange, because I went out there in part because I already had a love for Scripture and wanted to learn more.  Even so, I know now that I was not truly and fully explaining God’s Word to people when I taught. Understand, teachers of God's Word can love the Bible but not reflect that love when it comes to some of their interpretations.  For instance, perhaps...

A key element of biblical teaching that's absent from our churches today is expositional teaching on the Law, the Torah . Possibly one of the causes of this want of the “whole council of God” is that of the false dichotomy—shall we preach Christ and His New Covenant, or shall we commit our preaching to that which has passed away? In other words, the either-or proposition erroneously leads our churches to decide between preaching Law or Gospel.  This dichotomy is false in that it ignores the Law’s inspired profit to us even today (2 Tim 3:16–17) and that it fails to divine part of God’s intent in the Law—to lead His people to the glories of the Gospel. Without the Law, the good news has no meaning.  Consider this from Bridges: [The Law’s] cognizance of every thought, imagination, desire, word, and work, and its uncompromising demand of absolute and uninterrupted obedience, upon pain of its everlasting penalty—convince the heart of its guilt, defilement, and wretchedn...

Here are my final two parts to the series on how Christians should read and apply the Old Testament.  If you haven't read/listened to the first part, it is commanded that you do so now . Some words of caution before beginning: as this was to originally be a two-part series, there are only notes for two parts.  Also, there was a problem recording the third and final part, resulting in a longer re-recording of the session with a small reduction in audio quality. Notes for Parts 2 and 3 ( PDF ) Audio for Part 2 ( MP3, 36:19 ) Audio for Part 3 ( MP3, 51:02 )

Here is the first part of a message series I delivered at church.  How do we as NT believers read and apply the Law and the rest of the OT? Both in my notes and in the audio, I reference this being a two-part series.  However, a change in the service schedule coupled with my inability to trim down the material (you know I can be long-winded) turned this into a three-parter. The first part was delivered November 28. Audio (MP3, 1 hr) Notes (PDF)