Saturday, March 10, 2007

Shepherd's Conference - Day Three

I can’t believe how quickly these past three days have gone by. From a worldly point of view, this must seem like a death sentence – to be confined in a large room with no windows for over a hour, listening to a man speak on the greatness of God and to do this four or more times in a day! Well, if this is punishment, what a blessed one it is.

This morning’s message was delivered by Mark Dever of Capitol Hills Baptist Church in our nation’s Capitol. Mark’s message was given from the first six chapters of Daniel. So often we view the book of Daniel as a picture of a man’s faithfulness to God, in spite of his circumstances and how God blessed him for it. While it is true that Daniel was faithful and that God did continue to reward him throughout his life – the real message of Daniel is not about the faithfulness of him as a man. Rather, the message of Daniel is What God does with the Faithful – namely that God is and gives us Himself as our only means of hope in all times of life; that there is then a message of hope to be proclaimed as ultimately this is not a hopeless world – there is hope in Christ; and finally that believers must know that in this world we will face opposition. Fallen man is hostile to the Gospel and will always be so. We live in days that “seem” hospitable to Christianity, but even now laws of intolerance toward Christianity are circulating in the U.S. Congress. It is only a matter of time when it will be illegal to speak out against homosexuality, or to condemn another religion as false. It has already happened in other places in the world and most of Christianity, on a global speaking, is already under opposition. Are we prepared? This reality is not grim, but great, as we know that God wins – He will defeat all opposition. In a word, this was a message of POWER.

The next session was a Q & A time with Mark Dever, Steve Lawson, Al Mohler, Ligon Duncan and John MacArthur. Pastor John asked the men a number of questions concerning the church in general as well as more personal matters (like how these men spend their relaxing time). Truly the most prolific and well read of these men is Al Mohler who reads approximately 7-10 books a week. The man is a walking library. As Pastor John likes to say, “I am glad this man is on our side.” One question asked is what these men see as the most problematic issue coming down the pike for the church. These men think that issues of the definition of along with the sanctity of marriage and the greater acceptance of homosexuality is going to cause major problems for the church as our culture, rather than the church, will be determining the meaning of marriage and sexuality.

Lunch consisted of hot dogs and chips – nothing fancy, but filled the void and then we prepared ourselves for a seminar with Phil Johnson, who spoke on how true Arminian Theology (which denies the doctrines of grace in favor of exalting the free will of man) really and logically presupposes the doctrines of grace. For example, whenever a person who believes that the will of man is free enough to choice God on his own and yet prays for God’s sovereign intervention to change the heart or open the eyes of a particular unbeliever, that Arminian has effectively become a Calvinist, believing that apart from the intervention of God, that unbeliever will not believe. Phil Johnson used the simple text of 1 John 4:19 – “we love, because He first loved us” as that which demonstrates man’s need for God to initiate and bring about our salvation. I will include his outline, which I firmly believe could be applied to other passages to prove that even those who claim to deny the doctrines of grace actually presuppose them.

1. 1 John 4:19 presents the perverseness of our fallen state
This text indicates that there was a time that we did not love God. There is nothing more depraved than a heart that does not love God.

2. 1 John 4:19 presents the priority of God’s electing choice
This text indicates that He loved us first, not due to “foreseen” faith; not because God saw that we would first love Him, so then He determined to then love us. God choose us and loved us independently of anything we did or did not do.

3. 1 John 4:19 presents the particularity of God’s saving work.
God has done something special on behalf of believers that He has obviously not done for all. He loves particular people with a greater love than His general love for mankind.

4. 1 John 4:19 presents the power of God’s loving deliverance
That we love God at all is the result of God’s effectually loving us. He has delivered us from self-love and love of the world and enabled us to love Him.

5. 1 John 4:19 presents the perfection of God’s redemptive plan
God’s perfect love for us (1 John 4:17-18) is the only guarantee that we will one day perfectly love Him.

There is so much more to this, but this is just a sampling.

You will never guess what happened for dinner. No, we did not eat at the mysterious Italian restaurant. We were again invited to join the Texas group to go to a posh place up in the foothills called the “Odyssey”. This place was far more upscale. We sat down, our table overlooking the entire San Fernando Valley, and were given the menu. The first thing that caught my attention was the fresh Australian lobster tail – at a mere $43. Ouch! I looked for something manageable – Prime Rib for $29. Then, to my relief (and Jase too) there was an early bird special that consisted in Prime Rib, Salad Bar, and dessert all for $18. That’s what all ordered (with one exception for one Salmon). It was great and I actually got to buy my own meal. Notice that I said I – not Jase. One of men paid for the meal with his credit card and then we all owed him $22, but Jase had only one penny to his name (which I had given him earlier in the day). He had no cash. So Jase is still looking for someone who will allow him to pay for his meal.

The evening meeting was truly a spiritual extravaganza consisting of wonderful corporate singing, choirs, small ensembles and then the preaching of the Word by Dr. MacArthur, who challenged us from Luke 18:9-14 – the Pharisee and the Publican. He brought wonderful insight and exhortation. Honestly, I am simply too tired to try to explain it any more than that. It was a blessed week.

Jase and I found out that there were no meetings planned for Saturday this year – this was so that men that needed to get home could without missing anything and that men who wanted an opportunity to sight see would be able. So, tomorrow Jase and I are planning to visit the Nixon Library down in Yorba Linda as well as see some of the other sites.

We are missing our families and our church. We will truly miss the familiar worship with our fellowship, but are looking forward to worshiping at Grace Community. May we all continue to long for God’s glory.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Pastor Ed

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