Pastor's Blog (Page 4)
What is Prayer? (Part 1)
The Westminster Shorter Catechism asks and answers the question, “What is prayer?” in Q. 98. “Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to His will, in the name of Christ, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgment of His mercies.” (See Ps. 10:17; 62:8; Matt. 7:7-8; 1 Jn. 5:14; Jn. 16:23-24; Ps. 32:5-6; Dan. 9:4-19; 1 Jn. 1:9; Ps. 103:1-5; Ps. 136; Phil. 4:6-7). Prayer is the active response of the believing heart…
Joy in Heaven
“I say to you that…there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who need no repentance…there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents” (Luke 15:7, 10). A Presbyterian pastor named Benjamin Morgan Palmer was known as “the pastor of New Orleans” because of his faithful ministry to the sick during the yellow fever epidemics in that city in 1858, 1867, and 1878. He…
The LORD Reigns
“The LORD reigns, He is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed, He has girded Himself with strength. Surely the world is established, so that it cannot be moved. Your throne is established from of old; You are from everlasting” (Ps. 93:1-2). One of the most prominent themes in the Psalms is that of the sovereignty of God over all things. Not only is it true that God rules over all things for His own glory, but for the believer…
The LORD Surrounds His People
“Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides forever. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the LORD surrounds His people from this time forth and forever” (Ps. 125:1-2). In the Old Covenant, Mount Zion was the place God chose to reveal Himself. It was on Mount Zion that Jerusalem, the city of God, was established. It was on Mount Zion that God’s anointed king, David, had his throne. It was on Mount…
God’s Promise of a Seed
“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (Gen. 3:15). The Bible teaches us that every form of suffering is a result of the sin of our first parents, Adam and Eve. God had created man “in His own image…male and female He created them” (Gen. 1:26). He blessed the man and the woman He made and gave them dominion…
A City Which Cannot Be Shaken
A City Which Cannot Be Shaken The letter to the Hebrews was written to believers who were only able to gather for worship with great difficulty in a time of great earthly distress. They were being called to follow Jesus by going outside the camp, leaving the familiar patterns and comforting routines of temple worship in order to bear the reproach of Christ, who suffered outside the gate of Jerusalem as a sin offering for His people (Heb. 13:12-13). We…
The LORD Our God is With Us
Many of you know that the hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” written by Martin Luther, is based on Psalm 46. I sang Psalm 46 with several members of our extended family and the family of another OPC minister this past Saturday evening. What a comfort that Psalm was to my soul as the Lord reminded me by His Spirit that God does not and cannot change. He is the unfailing refuge and the sovereign, saving strength of His…
You Are Worthy, O Lord
In the book of Revelation, the Lord Jesus is pictured in symbolic language as a Lamb upon the throne, the only one worthy to open the scrolls of God’s judgments upon a world that will not honor and obey His Son. This book of Revelation, to which there is a special promise of blessing attached to those who hear what is written (Rev. 1:3)–is designed by God to be the comforting conclusion to His inscrupturated Word. When we understand that the…
O Lord, We Have Sinned
A fellow OPC minister wrote a sobering letter to his congregation this week, in which he reminded the people of God that the global health crisis we are suffering from is the hand of Almighty God. We are tempted to look around at times like this and ask the question, “Who is to blame?” Government? Shadow government? China? Donald Trump? The Democrats? State and local officials? The CDC? The Federal Reserve? And on and on and on…The answer in every…
God is Our Refuge and Strength
Our family sang Psalm 90 together this morning in family worship. It’s a prayer that begins with these words of faith: “Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever You had formed the earth and the world. Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God” (Ps. 90:1-2). In the same psalm, we’re reminded of the brevity and the fragility of human life. We’re reminded that God is executing His judgments upon the…
Fear Not, Little Flock!
When the world around us is gripped by fear and anxiety, we have a unique opportunity to bear witness to the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. I was reminded of this as I read an article about Charles Spurgeon’s ministry during an outbreak of infectious disease in 1854. Spurgeon wrote of those days, “All day, and sometimes all night long, I went about from house to house, and saw men and women dying, and, oh, how glad they…
Living Sacrifices
What follows is a devotional I presented before a congregational meeting on January 24, 2020. The text is Romans 12:1-21. The book of Romans is Paul’s summary of the Gospel of God and its implications. Paul follows a pattern in Romans that he uses in his other epistles: the “imperatives” of the Christian life flow out of the “indicatives” of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For that reason, Paul sets forth the glory of Christ in His Person and Work,…