Summer Kick Off Recap

We had a good turnout for the summer kick-off last night.  It was good to see several new highschool grads join us!  We enjoyed burgers & fellowship and I shared a brief introduction to the summer study on parables.  As a way to continue the parable theme, I gave away a copy of John MacArthur's book "A Tale of Two Sons," which is about one of the most well-known parables in our Bible - the prodigal son.  Drew Savary was our winner!
For the rest of you, I want to commend Pastor MacArthur's sermon series on this parable (from which the book is derived).  You can listen or download the 3-part series here for free.  I can assure you that this will be one of those sermon series that you'll always remember.  Consider MacArthur's description of the parable:

Of all Jesus’ parables, this one is the most richly detailed, powerfully dramatic, and intensely personal. It’s full of emotion—ranging from sadness, to triumph, to a sense of shock, and finally to an unsettling wish for more closure. The characters are familiar, so it’s easy for people to identify with the prodigal, to feel the father’s grief, and yet still (in some degree) sympathize with the elder brother—all at the same time. The story is memorable on many levels, not the least of which is the gritty imagery Jesus invokes. The description of the prodigal as so desperately hungry he was willing to eat husks scavenged from swine food, for instance, graphically depicts his youthful dissolution in a way that was unspeakably revolting to His Jewish audience.
Read more here.

I'll be posting more links, quotes & articles related to the parables & other helpful topics all summer, so come back often.  In fact, the best way to keep up with the blog is to subscribe by email.  It's easy, spam free and you'll only get emails when the blog is updated.  Click here to subscribe.

Fall Book Study

This fall we will be going through Gary Friesen's book, Decision Making and the Will of God. You can find out more about the author and sample the first two chapters of this book at his website, gfriesen.net.

It'd be ideal to secure your own copy of this book for our study, but even if you don't, you'll still benefit greatly from the weekly teaching.

Also, remember that the first Thursday of each month will be a special, off-site fellowship night. We'll announce the location each month.

Sale at Sovereign Grace Books & Music

Check it out.

Books on Sovereignty, Evangelism & Evil in the World

Tuesday night we heard a great message on the Sovereignty of God from our teaching pastor Lance Quinn. You can go here to listen*. It's part 3 of the "Truth for Life - Loved By God" series. After the message, Pastor Lance answered a question dealing with the issues of God's sovereignty, evangelism and the origin of evil in the world. He recommended several resources that address these issues and we've linked them below

• Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God, J.I. Packer
• The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God, D.A. Carson
• How Long, O Lord? , D.A. Carson
• The Grand Demonstration, Jay Adams
• If God Already Knows, Why Pray? Douglas Kelley

*The Sermon audio may not be up until later in the week.

Feature Feed: Tim Challies

If you haven't heard the name Tim Challies by now, you're probably still using dial-up or you just don't travel the cyberworld that much. Tim has established himself (unintentionally) over the past few years as "The World's Most Famous Christian Blogger" (at least according to the Pyros). He is in high demand all over the country to be the official "Live Blogger" of a who's who list of evangelical conferences. And, his name is virtually synonymous with DISCERNMENT... in fact he actually wrote the book on it... really.

Titled "The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment", Tim's book has gained much attention and would be a great read for anyone. We've heard our own pastor Lance commend & quote from this book as he concluded a Romans sermon on discerning false teachers, it's even being considered as a book study for the men of our church in the fall.

Tim has a sound mind & level head about him that makes him wise as well as winsome. Nancy Leigh DeMoss has just concluded recording a series on discernment prompted by her reading Tim's book and has often commented of how fond she is of Tim & his biblical perspective on many issues.

Tim's blog is devoted primarily to doing book reviews - the guy must be some kind of bionic speed reader for all the reviews he cranks out! (Be sure to check out his review of the best selling book, "The Shack") He also has a feature called "A-La-Carte" from which I modeled our own "2.22 Week Links." Tim has his thumb on the evangelical internet pulse. He's also a web designer by trade.

So pick up the book here, or at least watch the blog feed in the sidebar and familiarize yourself with Tim Challies.

Worship Matters

"The Great God values not the service of men, if the heart be not in it: The Lord sees and judges the heart; He has no regard to outward forms of worship, if there be no inward adoration, if no devout affection be employed therein. it is therefore a matter of inifinte importance, to have the whole heart engaged steadfastly for God."

Isaac Watts, Discourses on the Love of God. Taken from Bob Kauflin, Worship Matters.

I've Wasted It

For me as a boy, one of the most gripping illustrations my fiery father used was the story of a man converted in old age. The
church had prayed for this man for decades. He was hard and resistant. But this time, for some reason, he showed up when my father was preaching. At the end of the service, during a hymn, to everyone’s amazement he came and took my father’s hand.
They sat down together on the front pew of the church as the
people were dismissed. God opened his heart to the Gospel of Christ, and he was saved from his sins and given eternal life. But that did not stop him from sobbing and saying, as the tears ran down his wrinkled face—and what an impact it made on me to hear my father say this through his own tears—“I’ve wasted it! I’ve wasted it!”
~Don't Waste Your Life, John Piper

Does your life seem like a blur? Do you feel like you're not making the most out of the resources God has given you? This Tuesday night we'll be addressing the topics of time & money in our study on relationships. How does your use of time & money reflect your relationship with God? With others? In preparation for our study, you might want to be ready 2 Corinthians 8 & 9 and Ephesians 5:15-21.

To encourage you to think about these two areas in our lives that we most often steward poorly, we want to invite you out Tuesday at 6:30. As a supplement to your study, we'll be giving away 3 CD copies of an interview that John Piper did on FamilyLife several years ago. These interviews are based on the topic of Piper's book, Don't Waste Your Life. Many of you have already read this book, but if you haven't, you can read the book online here. Did you know that Desiring God also has a DWYL podcast? Listen and/or read the DWYL blog here.

Hope to see you Tuesday.

An Indestructible Relationship

If you weren't at 2.22 Tuesday night you missed a great message from the first two chapters of Job. Pastor Jeff showed us how Job’s indestructible relationship with God manifested itself in two faith-filled expressions, found in Job 1:20-22 & Job 2:9-10.

As part of his message, he quoted from John Piper's poem "The Misery of Job and the Mercy of God". This poem - published also in a book is available as a free online pdf file.

The Desiring God website says this of the book:

Job lost everything: his wealth, his health, and his ten children. All swept away in one satanic storm. Reduced to a heap of flesh, ashes, and tears—rebuked by friends and jeered by strangers—righteous Job wrestled over the purpose and presence of God in the midst of unbearable pain.
In this book, John Piper recounts the story of Job in beautiful, compassionate poetry and revels in God's sovereign and surprisingly joyful purposes in allowing exquisite suffering in the lives of his saints. A deeply moving book, especially for those experiencing great suffering and loss.

Piper is as much a poet as he is a preacher, so you're bound to enjoy this work - which was recently reviewed here (ht:Abraham Piper). We'll have Jeff's sermon audio available on our podcast later today.

Mercy

Tuesday night, April 1st, we considered the topic of mercy as we continued our study on relationships. I just finished reading & wanted to recommend a book to you that I think exemplifies true mercy.

When Invisible Children Sing is a true story of Dr. Chi Huang & his short time with the street children of Bolivia. After four years of Harvard Med School, Chi - a Christian - only needed a few classes to graduate. Instead, he asked & was granted a one year sabbatical. For the first half of that year, he studied the Old & New Testaments. Then, he wanted to serve - anywhere - as long as it was in a poor & pitiful place. The street children in Bolivia were a perfect fit for Chi's desires. Ninety percent of street children in Bolivia are drug addicts and the sexual activity among them leads to disease, abortion and further poverty.

Chi walked - literally - among these children for months treating their diseases, bandaging their wounds, medicating their illnesses - but most importantly - he was there to be there, for the kids. Kids who daily solicit for drugs, sex or money simply wanted from Chi his attention. And he gave it.

Telling the stories of five individual children and mentioning many more, Chi Huang presents his life experiences in manageable bits of story, written cleverly and jumping steadily from one night on the street to another days later. At times he takes the reader back to his own childhood and his experiences being a smart and unpopular student, a highly talented tennis player, and a typical bratty brother to his younger sister until her untimely death from Leukemia when he was a teenager.

Chi's mission of mercy is one to be admired. Serving the poorest of the poor - the weakest of the weak - in the streets and sewers of a poverty stricken city, should give us all a renewed desire to show mercy to all. This is an easy yet compelling read & I highly recommend securing a copy for yourself. Or, you can borrow mine!

You can buy the book at amazon and read more about the ongoing ministry started by Dr. Chi here.

Last night's message will be available as a podcast soon - but in the meantime, you can download the 21.5 MB file by clicking here.

Forgiveness

Many thanks to Michael Hamline for teaching on the subject of forgiveness this week. He took us through the parable of the unforgiving servant found in Matthew 18:21-35 as we continued our series on Relationships.

As you continue to think about forgiveness, I want to briefly list a couple of helpful books that might interest you. I've just listed them below without any hyperlinks, but you can go to any of the trusted book suppliers listed at the bottom of the sidebar to purchase a copy.

Forgiveness, John MacArthur



Choosing Forgiveness, Nancy Leigh DeMoss



The Healing Power of Forgiveness, Ray Pritchard



From Forgiven to Forgiving, Jay Adams



You might also check out some of these online sermons & articles on forgiveness at Monergism.com.

Guest Blogger: Beth Riley

Beth Riley has been reading the book "Relationships" along with our Tuesday night study on the same topic. She's been blogging about it on her own blog, and I asked her to share some thoughts with us.


No Options!

“We know we are less than human when we are alone.”

There are two extremes on the pendulum of relationship; isolation and immersion. The Isolationist says, “I want to be safe” and the immersionist says, “I need you in order to live (17).”
It is interesting how my views fall in the pendulum. For example, I definitely fear vulnerability with people. I cleave at times to self preservation instead of reaching out to the individual. Then, at other times, I think my life is pitiful because my dear friends from the past are not here, and I overlook the dear friendships that are being built here.

They go on to explain relationship interactions between two types of people.

-the frustrated relationship; one isolationist, who feels smothered, and one immersionist, who feels rejected.

-the emeshed relationship, two immersionist;so dependent on each other, that they can be easily hurt when the other does not meet their needs

-the isolated relationship; two isolationist;complicated because their desires for safety and independence collides with the longing for relationship.

“While relationships are not inherently dangerous, the expectations we bring to them can be (19).” In the words of Miah (from Princess Diaries) “Shut up”! I am disappointed in relationships normally because the other person does not meet the expectations I have imposed upon them. How silly, and yet I see this continually surfacing in my relationships. *hint prayer request

8 implications to enrich your community (relationships)

1. God is the only properly functioning community in the universe (21).
2. The Trinity is the only adequate model for human community (22)
3. People made in God's likeness were made for community (22).
4. God has a 2-fold purpose for human community: personal growth and witness to the world (23).
5. Sin's self-centeredness cuts us off from God and others(23).
6. True human community only arise out of communion with God (23).
7. Christ's resolve confirms the commitment made by the Father, Son, and Spirit before the creation of the world (24).
8. God will dwell in community with his people so that they can know community with one another

In conclusion, I don't want to give everything away in the chapter because there is rich truth found in the content of the above point.

All John Piper Books $5.00 !!!!!!!!

From Desiring God Ministries:

Every book in our store will be $5 on June 27-28, Wednesday and Thursday next week.
No limits, so spread the word.
(This sale is online only.)

Thanks to Gary for this HT.

Guys & Gals Summer Bible Study

Girl's Study - "The 10 Greatest Struggles of Your Life" by Colin Smith

Meet each week at Rachel Shaver's house at 7PM unless otherwise noted.
Contact Rachel for details at rachel.shaver@alumni.cedarville.edu or Beth Riley: bth_riley@yahoo.com
You don't need a book if this is your first time to attend.

Facebook RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=2600576001

Guy's Study - "Desiring God" by John Piper

The first meeting will be in Conway - this Thursday, June 14th at the San Fransisco Bread Factory on Hwy 64.
Email Rob Molden rhmoldeniii@yahoo.com or Peter Witkowski pawitkowski@ualr.edu for details.
They will alternate venues - Conway one week, then Little Rock the next.
You don't have to have a book for this first meeting.

Facebook RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=2413234206

2.22 Week Links - Book-O-Rama

When I was a kid, during the summer my mom would take my sister and I to the Grant County Library to listen to story time. We'd also participate in the book club, where we'd commit to reading a list of books during the summer.

This week's links are all related to books - for our un-official summer reading club. Who knows, maybe we can all sit on the floor Indian style and have Pastor Jeff read us a story...

Tim Challies highlights four new books from Reformation Trust, featuring R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur & former BCLR pastor Steve Lawson. Be sure to check out the rest of Tim's incredible site for the discerning reader.

John Hendryx lists his "Top Ten Books on Piety, Sanctification, Spiritual Growth" over at Reformation Theology. (HT: Taylor)

Non-Fiction - Al Mohler makes his summer reading recommendations for your leisure reading. (HT: Challies)

Crossway Books has some compelling titles coming out this summer and fall. Here's a list - you can discern which ones are compelling!

I don't wanna read! - Before you say that, consider some thoughts from C.J. Mahaney, Al Mohler and John MacArthur.

What are you reading this summer? Leave a comment below & let us know.

The Hunter and the Quarry

"We are the hunters. They are the quarry. It is for men to strike out into the forest and look. It is for women to crack the twigs and stir the leaves so we know where to find them."

This was a quote read by C.J. Mahaney at the recent Na conference, from the book "Doing Things Right in Matters of the Heart" by John Ensor. This illustrative quote caught the attention of those of us in attendance, and has since become sort of an "inside joke" among us (look for t-shirts soon!).

Well, if you're interested in finding out more about this book, Tim Challies - THE "discerning reader" has done us a service by reviewing this book on his blog. You can read his full review here.

Now, it's not just guys who've been reading this book...the girls over at Girl Talk (Carolyn Mahaney & daughters) will be reading this book in their new & upcoming Book Club.