Posts Tagged ‘mercy’
The Westminster Creed
Posted: April 13, 2015 in Ancient Faith, Biblical, Calling, catholic, Charismatic, Christian, Church, Church History, Covenant, Covenant theology, Evangelical, Evangelism, John Calvin, Liturgical, Ministry, Orthodox, orthodoxy, Preaching, Presbyterian, Protestant, Reformed, Renaissance, Repentance, Sacramental, sanctification, Scriptural, Teaching, universalTags: belief, creed, faith, Father, forgiveness, God, Godhead, Holy Spirit, Holy Trinity, hope, Jesus Christ, love, mercy, misery, pleasure, remission of sins, sin, Son, Westminster
The Westminster Creed
I believe man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever;
I believe God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His being,
wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth;
I believe there is but one true and living God;
that there are three persons in the Godhead:
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost;
and that these three are one God,
the same in substance, equal in power and glory;
I believe God has foreordained whatever comes to pass;
that God made all things of nothing,
by the word of His power, in the space of six days, and all very good;
and that God preserves and governs all His creatures and all their actions.
I believe our first parents, though created in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness,
sinned against God, by eating the forbidden fruit;
and that their fall brought mankind into an estate of sin and misery;
I believe God determined, out of His mere good pleasure,
to deliver His elect out of the estate of sin and misery,
and to bring them into an estate of salvation by a Redeemer;
I believe the only Redeemer of God’s elect is the Lord Jesus Christ,
Who, being the eternal Son of God, became man,
and so was, and continues to be,
God and man in two distinct natures, and one person, forever;
I believe Christ, as our Redeemer,
executes the office of a prophet, of a priest, and of a king.
I believe Christ as our Redeemer underwent the miseries of this life,
the wrath of God, the cursed death of the cross, and burial;
He rose again from the dead on the third day, ascended up into heaven,
sits at the right hand of God, the Father,
and is coming to judge the world at the last day.
I believe we are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ,
by the effectual application of it to us by his Holy Spirit;
I believe God requires of us faith in Jesus Christ,
and repentance unto life to escape the wrath and curse of God due to us for sin;
I believe by His free grace we are effectually called, justified, and sanctified,
and gathered into the visible church, out of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation;
I believe that we also are given in this life such accompanying benefits
as assurance of God’s love, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Ghost,
increase of grace, and perseverance therein to the end;
that at death, we are made perfect in holiness, and immediately pass into glory;
and our bodies, being still united in Christ, rest in their graves, till the resurrection;
and at the resurrection, we shall be raised up in glory,
we shall openly be acknowledged and acquitted in the day of judgment,
and made perfectly blessed in the full enjoying of God to all eternity.
~ adapted from the 17th century Westminster Shorter Catechism
5 Crucial Questions…. by Tom Short
Posted: February 3, 2015 in Biblical, Books, catholic, Charismatic, Christian, Church, Church History, Covenant, Covenant theology, Evangelical, Evangelism, life, Liturgical, Ministry, Orthodox, Pentecostal, Reformed, Renaissance, Repentance, Sacramental, sanctification, Scriptural, universalTags: compassion, faith, Father, forgiveness, God, Grace, Holy Spirit, hope, love, mercy, repentance, Salvation, sin, Son
My New Covenant Relationship With God
Posted: July 7, 2014 in Biblical, catholic, Charismatic, Christian, Church, Church History, Covenant, Covenant theology, Evangelical, Evangelism, life, Liturgical, Ministry, Orthodox, Pentecostal, Reformed, Renaissance, Repentance, Sacramental, sanctification, Scriptural, universalTags: Body of Christ, Church, covenant, covenant of grace, covenant of redemption, faith, Father, friend, God, Grace, Holy Spirit, kindness, Lord, love, mercy, ministry, redeemer, repentance, Salvation, Savior, Son
My New Covenant Relationship with God
I believe that entrance into the Kingdom of God is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone. My call to ministry is one based upon God’s faithfulness to fulfill His revealed purpose in my life. I had no ability to acquire salvation on my own. His loving grace granted me repentance and faith. God enabled me to make the choice of trusting in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. He transformed me into a new creation in Christ Jesus, and now His sanctifying grace is making me holy in my daily life.
The Holy Spirit baptized me into the Body of Christ, the Church, of which I am a member. Now, I am a member of the Community of Jesus Christ. God created a community of worship, dedication, and faith in the time of the Old Covenant. Now, the community has changed with the coming of the new and better covenant. Within this community of the Kingdom, I am able to view my calling more clearly. It means that being a “covenant person” of a covenant people (the Church); Called to a mission along with many others, and equipped by God through the Holy Spirit as an apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, and teacher, I pursue the Missio Dei.
Therefore, I can speak with conviction along with the Apostle Paul when he said in 2 Corinthians 3:6, “ He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant – not of the letter but of the Spirit, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” Therefore, I see that those members of the Community of Faith are ministers unto each other, the world, and unto God.
My call and the call of His Church (Matthew 25:35-45) is to minister unto a world that is lost. We are to be beacons of light to those who are blind in darkness. We are to be workers of justice and freedom for the oppressed and captive. We are to demonstrate to the poor the power of His greatness and His faithfulness from which we hope, and to proclaim the Gospel and His Kingdom!
Faith in the Valley
Posted: November 19, 2012 in Charismatic, Christian, Church, Evangelical, Liturgical, Orthodox, Pentecostal, Reformed, Renaissance, Repentance, SacramentalTags: compassion, faith, God, Holy Spirit, hope, Jesus Christ, love, mercy, Salvation
When I lived in an Arizona valley where Phoenix is lying, the surround vistas are awe inspiring. The plants are so green, the cactus thrives, and you can see for miles (when there is no pollution alert). In the spring, if you want to call it that, the air can be crisp and cold. The evening dew bursts forth and slaps your face with the fresh scent of the moist ground. Then, when the first 100 degree day hits, the green desert starts to turn yellow, and withers to brown. Everything, including humans look for shade and relief from the heat of the sun.
When things get hot for us, when things start to wither around us and turn bad where do we go for relief? For the Christian, we turn to God and have faith in Him. Why is that? The reason for that is because even if we have family, friends, or co-workers to share our problems with, we still must have faith in God. If you think about it closely, we don’t have family, we don’t have friends, all we have is our faith, and all we have is our God.
Is there a lesson here? The lesson is that who we have a relationship with, what we have or don’t have has no bearing on our faith in God or in our relationship with Him. Life can beat us down hard, and we have to deal with it the best way we can. It will either make us stronger by faith in God and trusting in Him to care for us, or it will take us down into the pits of despair because we allow it to dominate and control us. Sometimes we try to be noble, and handle everything on our own. We all have to deal with life in our own way, behind our own eyes, from which no one else can see or experience. Growing strong out of these lessons is the only way to go. There is no other way to go, except down into the depths of weakness and self indulgence. Faith in God will keep us out of the grim depths of despair.
The Word of God teaches that we should give thanks for everything. I learned something this weekend about thanksgiving. We shouldn’t thank God for the bad situation happening to us, but we should thank God for Him being there with us through it all….giving us the strength and hope to carry on. We must thank God for Who He Is and all of what He has done for us, mostly for sending His Son Jesus Christ to be our Savior! I do not believe God bestows upon us tragedies, disasters, or illness or calamity. But He is there when it happens and is there when it is over, and is there when we are healing from it. He is our source of strength, vitality and healing.
Andre Crouch wrote in his most famous and moving song about trusting God, “Through it all, through it all…..I’ve learned to trust in Jesus, I’ve learned to trust in God.”
Through it all….He gives us faith, hope, and love. He bestows upon us His mercy, His compassion, His grace and His love. He gives us salvation…His salvation…maybe in mystery but it is salvation none the less.
Don’t Worry, Jesus also Had Unbelieving Family Members
Posted: May 25, 2012 in Charismatic, Christian, Church, Evangelical, Liturgical, Pentecostal, Reformed, Renaissance, Repentance, SacramentalTags: deliverance, doubt, family, God, Grace, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, love, mercy, prayer, repentance, resistance, Salvation, unbelief
Do you, like me, have family members who do not believe in Jesus? If so, we are in good company. So did Jesus. And I think this is meant to give us hope.
According to the Apostle John, “not even his brothers believed in him” (John 7:5). That’s incredible. Those who had lived with Jesus for 30 years really did not know him. Not one of Jesus’ brothers is mentioned as a disciple during his pre-crucifixion ministry. But after his resurrection and ascension, there they are in the upper room worshiping him as God (Acts 1:14).
Why didn’t they believe? And what made them change?
The Bible doesn’t answer the first question. But I’ll bet it was difficult to have Jesus for a brother.
First, Jesus would have been without peer in intellect and wisdom. He was astounding temple rabbis by age 12 (Luke 2:42, 47). A sinful, fallen, gifted sibling can be a hard act to follow. Imagine a perfect, gifted sibling.
Second, Jesus’ consistent and extraordinary moral character must have made him odd and unnerving to be around. His siblings would have grown increasingly self-conscious around him, aware of their own sinful, self-obsessed motives and behavior, while noting that Jesus didn’t seem to exhibit any himself. For sinners, that could be hard to live with.
Third, Jesus was deeply and uniquely loved by Mary and Joseph. How could they not have treated him differently? They knew he was the Lord. Imagine their extraordinary trust in and deference to Jesus as he grew older. No doubt the siblings would have perceived a dimension to the relationship between the oldest child and their parents that was different from what they experienced.
And when swapping family stories it would have been hard to match a star appearing at your brother’s birth.
Jesus out-classed his siblings in every category. How could anyone with an active sin nature not resent being eclipsed by such a phenom-brother? Familiarity breeds contempt when pride rules the heart.
More pain than we know must have been behind Jesus’ words, “a prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household” (Matthew 13:57).
So as we assess the role our weak, stumbling witness plays in our family members’ unbelief, let’s remember Jesus — not even a perfect witness guarantees that loved ones will see and embrace the gospel. We must humble ourselves and repent when we sin. But let’s remember that the god of this world and indwelling sin is what blinds the minds of unbelievers (2 Corinthians 4:4).
The story of Jesus’ brothers can actually give us hope for our loved ones. At the time his brothers claimed that Jesus was “out of his mind” (Mark 3:21), it must have appeared very unlikely that they would ever become his disciples. But eventually they did! And not only followers, but leaders and martyrs in the early church.
The God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” shone in their hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of their brother, Jesus (2 Corinthians 4:6).
So take heart! Don’t give up praying for unbelieving family members. Don’t take their resistance as the final word. They may yet believe, and be used significantly in the kingdom!
And while they resist, or if they have died apparently unbelieving, we can trust them to the Judge of all the earth who will be perfectly just (Genesis 18:25). Jesus does not promise that every parent, sibling, or child of a Christian will believe, but does painfully promise that some families will divide over him (Matthew 10:34-39). We can trust him when it happens.
It is moving to hear James refer to his brother as “our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory” (James 2:1). Can you imagine what this phrase meant for James? The Lord of glory had once slept beside him, ate at his dinner table, played with his friends, spoke to him like a brother, endured his unbelief, paid the debt of his sin, and then brought him to faith.
It may have taken 20-30 years of faithful, prayerful witness by the Son of God, but the miracle occurred: his brothers believed. May the Lord of glory grant the same grace to our beloved unbelievers.
~ John Bloom
In The Hands of the Refiner 