January, 2006

Conversation Joined

January 19, 2006

My first exposure to this blog came this morning when my friend Justin Taylor chastised me for only posting a brief comment after Mark Dever’s opening post (see Jan 2, "A New Conversation"). Well, since I have been in L.A. and didn’t even know our blog had started, I made my way to Mark’s post where I came across my supposed response which reads, "This is great stuff!!!" Mischief is obviously present and active from the outset, my friends, for I didn’t post that comment!  Please don’t misunderstand – I DO think Mark’s post was great stuff but I didn’t post that comment.  Ah, but I suspect I know who did!  And you don’t have to be charismatic or a continuationist in order to discern this. You just have to know Mark Dever!  Knowing my reluctance to participate in this blog (I’d rather just read it!), I am sure my friend has done this to provoke my participation.  Again, please don’t misunderstand.  I am very excited about this conversation and this blog.  I plan on visiting this blog each day and numerous times throughout the day because these guys have plenty to say and I have much to learn.  I’m just not sure how much I have to say in this conversation, although I can be our go-to guy when it comes to all collegiate and professional sports (Al and Mark are particularly useless in these arenas.  Remind me to describe the experience of watching the USC-Texas national championship game with these two guys!). So I am very excited about listening in on this conversation.  But given the option of either posting myself or having my good friend Mark post for me, I’ll opt for the former.  Even though I don’t play in their league I will join this conversation with these 3 men I deeply love and respect.  I am honored to be numbered among them as their friend.  I am humbled to be included with them in this conversation.  Tomorrow I will tell you why I am so excited about the Together for the Gospel Conference.

Together for What?

January 18, 2006

I think the title of this conference says it all — "Together for the Gospel."  I am incredibly thankful for my friendship with Mark Dever, Ligon Duncan, and C J Mahaney.  In recent years, I have come to a new and deeper understanding of what these friends mean to me.  It may well be that reaching middle age has something to do with this realization, for I have come to prize most highly those friendships that can last a lifetime.

Yet, I am confident that something deeper and more important is at work here.  The friendship that binds us together is a friendship that is rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Here we have found our shared redemption, our shared identity, our shared calling, our shared commission, and our shared passion.  Of course, this means that we also share concerns about how the Gospel is being misunderstood and misconstrued in our postmodern times.  We are together . . .  in and for the Gospel.

I can’t wait to join with our friends John MacArthur, John Piper, and R C Sproul at the T4G conference in April.  We hope to see pastors from all over the country here to be together with us . . . for the Gospel.

May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  [Romans 15:5-6]

Ephesians and T4G

January 9, 2006

Mark, thanks for starting the conversation. I’ve been preaching through the book of Ephesians here at First Pres. in Jackson for about six months (with a break here and there), and we are now in chapter 3. What you say in your post is so right and so Pauline (biblical!) and so under-appreciated by Christians in our time, country and culture. I’ll post a few quotes on this, soon, to emphasize some of the points you make.

A New Conversation

January 2, 2006

Christ loved the church, we read in Ephesians 5.  We read in Acts 20 that God gave His own blood for the church.  He founded it (Matt. 16).  He identifies with it (Acts 9).  In the end of the Bible, we even see that He presents the church as His own bride (Rev. 20).  It is good and right–if we love the Lord Jesus–to love His bride.  This blog is a conversation between four friends (and maybe some more) who have been called, in various ways, to serve the Lord by serving His bride.  We hope that it’s an encouragement to you in your own life and calling.

This is also what the conference in April is about.  We understand that God builds His church through His Word.  Each one of us in this conversation has experienced God’s powerful Spirit through His preached Word.  We are excited to think more about this together, and to do that along with John MacArthur, John Piper, R C Sproul and other pastors and church leaders who are able to make it to Louisville in April.  I’m looking forward to it.  Maybe in a later post, I’ll talk about how this all got started.