I had a fantastic weekend listening to the man I am officially nicknaming “the Gentle Prophet.” If you are intrigued as to what a non-freaky modern day prophetic ministry could look like, this video sermon is well worth a watch:

Download options at Hearing the Holy Spirit for Yourself – Keith Hazel.

The Reformed, Charismatic & Missional conference, put on by Acts29 and Newfrontiers was a great success this year.  The speakers for the weekend included Terry Virgo, Jeff Vanderstelt and Eliot Grudem.  Confluence author Bryan Mowrey got a chance to sit down with each of these leaders and ask some questions a lot of people have been asking.

In this video, Bryan speaks with Terry Virgo about roadblocks he has hit in helping people fully embrace charismatic gifts in life and leadership .

Thanks to http://www.confluenceblog.com/

Terry Virgo is continuing to share his series of video interviews with his son. Today I share here another video which addresses Terry’s view of the Bible. Here is an extract from his words about things we must preach boldly and clearly:

Present God in his person and character. Present Jesus without any disguise. We need the authentic Jesus. The fact that he is God and man. Be very clear about the trinity and these unchanging realities about God. People say he didn’t actually rise from the dead, we so no, he actually,physically rose from the dead. Once we have nailed things like the resurrection, other things fall into place. It is vital for us to hold onto big issues like how you become a Christian, who God is, there are huge themes that there is no room for any kind of debate about. Certainly there will be some things that are more open to question, and tentative attitudes are appropriate. It is for us to humble ourselves we don’t want to come across in an authoritarian way over things that are less clear. But the major issue is that we stand by the Bible, and most Christian issues really are very clear indeed and we are not going to be tentative with them.

Terry then goes on to explain why, for him, the outpouring of the Spirit to empower believers is not a peripheral or marginal issue, but is a main thing, and that he is a charismatic because of what he reads in the Bible. The interview concludes, “If it could be demonstrated to me that that is not biblical, I would have to rethink and review, because to me the Bible is the final word”

Terry’s teaching on grace has radically changed thousands of Christian’s lives. In this video he argues that many who claim to love the doctrines of grace have never truly heard it in their heart. When you have watched this, go and visit his website and listen to him preach on grace. It could change everything for you.

from Watch on Vimeo.

It seems these days that being Reformed and Charismatic is all the rage these days. I have recently posted video from Matt Chandler on this theme, as well as Sam Storms, and Wayne Grudem. Here is a great short interview with Terry Virgo on this subject.

Watch on Vimeo.

During my holiday this week, these videos will be published on autopilot. The interviewer is my friend Brian Mowrey, make sure you go subscribe to his blog, as well as Terry Virgo‘s right away! These videos were mentioned at the recent TOAM event and complement much of what was said there very well.

Watch on Vimeo.

This is the second session of the recent leadership conference ran at Jubilee. There is also a fantastic Q and A session is also available. My notes follow the video:

watch on vimeo

2 Tim 2

When Chandler was proposed to the Village as a prospective pastor, he was (and still is) a Charismatic complementarian Calvinist with no college degree. So wasn’t expecting to get the job.

There’s a way that seems right to man that ends in death. He showed them the Bible way, and found that they wanted that.

Pursue righteousness.We all need to put sin to death. What stirs you up towards God?  Pay attention to our hearts and minds. Dig into the feelings of your heart and thoughts of your mind and let God do business.

Pursue faith Organizers cannot be allowed to run the church. The “priests” and “prophets” must run the church with help from the “kings”. God will often ask you to jump of a cliff before he gives you the parachute.

Pursue love. Are you still growing in your compassion? Peace is not as peaceful as it sounds. Biggest problem in pastoral ministry is cowardice. Confront the problems early on. Trust others don’t isolate yourself. Are you pretending that you are the one man in the history of Christendom that hasn’t the need to be challenged?

Despite a staff of 100, Chandler keeps open relationships with them. He believes that the benefits of doing life together outweigh the risks of being betrayed.

Use a scalpel not a club. Don’t be quarrelsome. Be respectful and kind.

People don’t know as much as you think they know. Explain it well, teach it to them. Attack the world view by teaching.

Patiently endure evil. Sinners when confronted on their sin will almost always lash out at the people who are trying to help them.

Pursue Gentleness.

Practical applications to shepherd people to truth

1. Give them texts to read. Bible is better than theological books, as good as they are.
2. Go after the heart not the mind.
3. Listen to them not looking for a chance to respond
4. Be patient. Sanctification is a dirt path not a superhighway.

Once we are digging in the bible I’m not worried any more. Some doctrines he said he knew they were right before I liked them. If it took you years to get it, how dumb are you to demand they love it immediately.

Work diligently and passionately concerning your own spiritual life.

Your people will mirror you. That should terrify you and push you into the Lord.

Engage people as individuals and lead them into all God has for us in the Scriptures.

A very dapper looking Terry Virgo shows that as a young charismatic he was very much already reformed. This idea that reformed charismatics are a “new breed” is shown to be wrong by this video from Downs Bible Week alone. Now if only someone could find me some video of my dear departed friend and mentor Henry Tyler, or at least an audio recording. I still miss him sometimes, but thank God for the deposit he left behind in so many lives.

Watch Terry Virgo at Downs on Vimeo (works with iPhone, etc)

This quote from Doctor Martyn Lloyd-Jones is taken from his Ephesians series of sermons which I keep going back to. He challenges those who settle for a purely intellectual dimension to their Christian faith. Like so much of what he said it is if anything MORE relevant to us today than it was when he said it:

It is possible for a believer who . . . sincerely recognizes the Bible as his sole authority, and desires to submit himself wholeheartedly to its evident meaning—it is still possible for such a man to go astray by becoming purely theoretical in his attitude towards this precious knowledge. It can happen to all, but I emphasize again that it is the particular danger of those who have keen minds, and who desire to understand and to grow in knowledge. The devil knowing us as he does, always suits the particular form of temptation to our exact mentality. At this point I am not referring to people who do not read the Scriptures, or indeed little else, and who say, ‘I am interested in nothing but my experience’. The devil does not trouble such people in this way, but to those who truly long to grow and develop, he comes and says, ‘Of course, you are quite right; what you need, and what everyone else needs, is more and more of this knowledge’. But he presses the thought so far that in the end they get into a condition in which their whole relationship to truth is purely theoretical and academic. And this involves the terrible danger of becoming more concerned about, and more interested in, our intellectual knowledge of Christian truth than in our knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself; and if the devil with all his wiles can beguile us into this condition he is more than satisfied. In other words, it is the failure to realize that the ultimate end of all knowledge is to bring us to a knowledge of the Person Himself. We are not to stop at knowledge concerning Him, precious though that is, and vital.

John Piper’s website has many places where he reveals a charismatic or as some call it continuationist perspective. Earlier in the week he argued that even in the New Testament the gifts of the Spirit were non-authoritative and inferior to the Apostles teaching:

The apostles viewed their teaching as from God in an authoritative, inerrant way. All of the spiritual gifts are from God in a non-authoritative, non-inerrant way, and therefore always subordinate to the inspired word of God. READ MORE

If you are interested in more from Piper on this, he also posted a while back a sermon on signs and wonders in the 1990s and fascinatingly back in the 1980s took a “charismatic quotient” of his church.

Justin Taylor has served us well by putting together a fantastic post explaining how Piper responded to God’s call to the pastorate 30 years ago today. There are a number of links in the post that are all worth following.

My friend Marcus Honeysett has been talking about the gap that still remains in places between the “reformed” and the “charismatic” wings of the church. This gap is one that I have in some ways been very aware of all my life, and yet, having grown up in a family of churches that combines both emphases, I have never really understood why some people are adamant that the two must never meet. Marcus speaks of the tendency of some Reformed Charismatics to simply withdraw and get on with building churches, but argues that we have an important part to play in the wider church:

Here is the thing: I know a lot of people who are charismatics who want to strongly identify themselves with the very core of evangelicalism, by their doctrinal convictions and their mission-mindedness. We are Christ-centred, cross-centred, scripture-centred, grace-centred, faith-centred. Passionate to build churches to the glory of God. Not only so, but among some of these friends I number preachers and other Bible handlers of an astonishing degree of gifting: exegetically good, powerful in application and full of the Holy Spirit . . .

I think that biblical charismatics have a terrific role to play right at the very heart of evangelicalism – energising, showing how to build and plant churches, demonstrating what the best preaching and most inspirational Bible teaching can be like. I’m not happy to answer by withdrawing and just getting on with it. READ MORE

Andrew is a dear friend of mine and leads Newlife Church Toronto. He blogs at In Christ. Andrew has an interesting story in that he was principal of Toronto Baptist Seminary when the “Toronto blessing” hit. Circumstances seemed to conspire to force him into making a choice between his reformed heritage and a charismatic experience. He refused to make that choice and in this guest post explains his passion for building a different kind of church:

I was once visiting a church and the pastor announced, “We’re not going to have a sermon today because we want to just hand the whole meeting over to the Holy Spirit and see his power”. This immediately felt wrong to me, and I started trying to think through why.

For one thing, if the preaching is from the Scriptures, then it is “Holy Spirit” truth. So it is not a choice between “Word” and “Spirit” but “Spirit” and “Spirit”.

But then I read Acts 14:3, “So they remained for a long time, speaking boldly for the Lord, who bore witness to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands.”

Terry is currently in the USA with Mark Driscoll’s home church. He has actually been in the USA for most of the time since Together On A Mission. He was there when a sudden explosion of interest in his sermon on prayer happened. By the way, if you watched that video but never made it to the second part, you can see both parts easily on vimeo.

He has found time to post his own perceptions of the conference and videos of the first and second of his talk on his blog. The videos each include a brief extra introduction filmed in his study. I am sure he will post talk 3 soon.

Joe Day, one of the Mars Hill’s worship pastors has posted two tweets about Terry’s talks while in Mars Hill:

Terry Virgo is awesome. Preaching justification and righteousness and continuing in the deep love of Christ. And…he bounces up & down like Gordon Ramsey when he gets fired up.

I have a lot more posts about Terry Virgo elsewhere on the blog and have interviewed him previously.

In 2009 Newfrontiers is starting a Belfast Church — the eleventh largest city in the UK. The church plant website went live recently, and they have already opened a Belfast Church plant Facebook group.

The emerging vision for the church plant is:

1. To see a Christ-centered church planted in Belfast city, on a mission seeking a transformed city.

2. To be a church that reflects the growing diversity of Belfast.
3. To see multiple thriving congregations established across Belfast.
4. To plant churches in all five cities in Northern Ireland.
5. To plant churches in every major town in Northern Ireland.
6. To raise up indigenous leaders and church planters.

David Capener would love to hear from you if you are interested in being part of the Belfast plant or know of anyone who might be. The growing team would also really value your prayers.

Please pray for . . .

• More to gather with a heart for Belfast.
• House sales!
• For our meetings with local church leaders from across the community.
• Worship leaders.
• The favor of the city especially among the business community.
• Musicians with a heart for church planting.
• Those with a heart for church planting to gather with a vision to plant out across NI.
• A student worker.
• Those moving to Belfast who are looking for work.

One of the passions of this blog is to do everything I can to promote the growth of reformed charismatic churches. I have spoken already about the drive to plant Newfrontiers churches in the top 100 cities of America, and highlighted a plant in Chicago.

Today, in an update to news discussed during the prayer meeting in Brighton, I can report that two European church plants now have websites — Emmanuel Church, Greenwich and the Amsterdam church plant. If you are interested in joining either of these churches, they are both being led by friends of mine who I highly commend.

These new churches are part of a new drive to see international churches planted in the major cities of Europe. Due to the EU, there are now many people who move between the main cities of our countries for work. Many of them do not speak the language of their host country very well at all. Most speak English, so these English-speaking churches will be a quick way for Newfrontiers to expand into many areas of the European continent, although obviously always with a view to also blessing the native populations of these great cities. Please pray for this exciting drive as many of the European nations have even fewer evangelical churches than the UK.

On the 24th of August, I preached a sermon at Jubilee during our summer series on some famous psalms. I took Psalm 121, which served as a starting point for me to share some of the most important planks of my personal doctrinal framework—a framework that has sustained me through hard times.

As blogging around here at least begins to return to normal—if there is such a thing at adrianwarnock.com—I thought I’d share both the audio to download and a condensed version of the message below. You can also listen right here:

Christians should be characterized by hope, and as a result, should live in such a way that brings up questions in other’s minds. “In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect . . .” (1 Peter 3:15).

The question is, how do we obtain such a hope and how do we live in the good of it?

Hope requires a biblical outlook — You will not find real hope anywhere else, other than in the Bible, where we find help to live, help to rescue us, help to have hope.

Hope requires a lifted head — we must first be lowered, and God graciously sends trouble our way to teach us we cannot help ourselves.

Despair of self. Self-help is no help at all. Our solution is not found on earth. It’s found in heaven. Many people expect that their problem is based around what they’re experiencing. And they say something like this, “If only I could find a husband or a wife, then I’d be okay.” Or, “If only I had a different husband or wife, then I’d be okay.” Or, “If only God changed him, then I’d be okay.” Or, “Perhaps I need a new job, then I’d be okay.” “I need to be healed, then I’d be okay.” All of those things are secondary—our help comes from heaven. Our help comes from God. For you to have hope, you have to lift your head. You have to look up. And there’s something about the body language involved in doing that—looking up and praying with your head raised to God, saying, “Help me!”

Many people think Christianity is “Do this! Do that!” Rules. “If I just try harder, I can please God.” None of that counts for anything. There is nothing you can do to make God happy with you in your own strength—nothing! You really are helpless. You really are hopeless. You’re weak, I’m weak. We’re all the same. Don’t we say it sometimes? “I just couldn’t help myself.” Have you ever said that? “I’m so sorry for what I just did to you to hurt you, to upset you. I just couldn’t help myself,” you say. There’s never a truer word said than that. 

“The preacher’s work is to throw sinners down in utter helplessness that they may be compelled to look up to Him who alone can help them” (Spurgeon).

Hope requires a God who is in control — a God who really is in control and a God who can therefore help us. It’s very important that we understand that. Help comes from God, not from other people. Others can help you a bit, but the way in which they’ll help you is simply this: by pointing you to God and by strengthening you in God.

For example, in 1 Samuel 23:16 — “Jonathan strengthened David’s hand in God.”

Any leader will let you down because he is not God. He can’t be there all the time. You’ll try and ring him one day and his phone will be switched off or engaged. You’ll find that God’s phone is never switched off.

But it must be the right sort of God who we can believe in. Some people just say, “Well, I believe in God. Isn’t that enough?” No, we need to understand some things about God. It’s no good, for example, if God is as clueless as the rest of us, is it really? And some people believe in a God like that. But it’s not true. God is the God of all comfort. “He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others who are suffering afflictions with the comfort with which we ourselves have been comforted by God.” ( 1 Corinthians 1)

This is God’s description of himself in Isaiah 46: “I am God.” And YOU are not, by the way. He is, but you’re not. And neither am I. “I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like me. Declaring the end from the beginning.” In other words, he knows the end of time from the very beginning of time. He knows everything that will ever happen. “And from ancient times, things not yet done, saying this, “My counsel shall stand and I will accomplish all my purposes. I have spoken and I will bring it to pass. I have purposed and I will do it.”

That’s the God we worship. There are some people who say that God is surprised by things. They say, well, you know, there are some things that are unknowable and that until something happens, even God doesn’t know what will happen. I’m sorry. That’s not the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible knows the end from the beginning. He’s not surprised by anything. And it’s so important because when you’re counseling somebody, you have to bring them to that God, not to some kind of weak God who is surprised. I once heard of a situation—this is a true story apparently, and I think I read it in a book somewhere. (If anyone remembers the reference for this, I would appreciate knowing that.) A lovely young lady married a guy who was also a Christian (they were both Christians). Everything looked fine. And then after a while this guy basically did the dirty on her and went off with somebody else and the relationship broke up and they got divorced. And this woman’s pastor (shame on him) said this: “Well, when God guided you to that marriage, he had no more idea than you did what would happen. He was as surprised and as shocked and as hurt and as disappointed as you by what happened.” Now that might seem cute, but it doesn’t give me any hope. Does it give you hope? If God was like that, I think I’d rather not be a Christian. No, God is not like that. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows what will happen. He will accomplish all his purposes. There is no plan B with God.

God is NOT surprised by anything!

Hope requires a God who is loving — he’s the God who cares for you. If God was all-sovereign and all-powerful and all-knowing, but actually was a bit of an evil, capricious God who hated you, then well, the world would not be a very good place, would it?

But the Bible is very clear. It says that God is love (1 John 4:16).

Romans 5:8 says, “But God shows his love for us in this; that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” So if Jesus died for us, if he would come from heaven to earth, live as a man, the great invincible God becoming a little baby and then living as a man, and then dying a cruel death in our place that we might know God, do you not think that this demonstrates that he loves us?

Paul makes this argument in Romans 8:32 when he says, “He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” If we’re coming to God and say, “Oh, well, God, you know. I’m not sure if you really love me or not,” we’re making God into a liar and we’re just despising the cross. Jesus loved us enough to die for us. That should be enough to give us hope. Hope that this sovereign God is for you, and that this God is in control and knows the future; that he will make sure things map out for your good.

Romans 8 continues: “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good” (verse 28). So if you love God, God will work out everything for your good.

He keeps you. He will not let your foot be moved. It says “He keeps you” six times in this psalm. He’s your keeper. He’s your watchman. He watches over you. He doesn’t sleep.

Hope requires a God-centered gospel — some people say, “Well, you know, God is lucky to have me.” There is a sense in which God is knocking at the door. But people can say it sometimes as though Jesus is the needy one; as if he’s a bit lonely and he needs another worshipper or feels insecure or needs a relationship or needs his ego boosted a bit.  No, God isn’t like that. God is the eternal one who out of his self-sufficiency and his joy of being eternally one with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, eternally a community, lavishes love on us through grace. Through unmerited favor. Through his all-sufficiency.

There are five aspects of the gospel that I think give us a stable foundation. It says in this psalm that God keeps our foot from being moved. It also says in another psalm that God put our foot on a rock. People sometimes call these five points the five points of Calvinism. I would rather just say they’re the five points of a stable view of the gospel, which enables us to have hope. Sometimes people use these points under the acronym TULIP. So if you like acronyms, you can use TULIP to help you remember them.

But sometimes our Christianity is like another flower. I don’t know if, in other countries, people do this, but English children very often find a nice daisy in the lawn, pick it, and usually thinking about a boyfriend or girlfriend, they remove one petal at a time. “He loves me, he loves me not, he loves me, he loves me not, he loves me, he loves me not. Oh no! He loves me not!”

Some of us approach God like that — if I’m doing well, God loves me. If I’ve just sinned, he doesn’t love me anymore. If I make a commitment to him and follow him, then he’ll love me. But if I backslide, then he won’t love me anymore and I won’t be a Christian anymore. I don’t believe that gives us a stable foundation for hope. So what are these five points? I’ll go through them quite quickly.

T — Total Depravity of Man
Now most people actually have very little problem believing this. I think there are very few Christians who don’t believe this. There are a few who say, “Oh no, people are basically good.” But I don’t think any of them are parents. I’ve got a 16 month old child. We don’t have to train him to hit his brother and sister; to steal from his brother and sister; to scream if we give his brother and sister something and don’t give it to him. And he has already learned how to bite. He’s 16 months! But people say that human beings are born good. They’re not born good. They’re born with a sinful nature. We are born with a bias towards sin, as the Puritans used to say. So basically, if you don’t believe in the total depravity of man, if you don’t believe that we have a sinful nature, then I would suggest that you borrow a two year old for an hour. That’s all you need.

But let’s look at the Scriptures. The Scripture is what we stand on. The Scripture is very clear about this in Ephesians 2: “And you were dead in trespasses and sins . . .” Dead people can’t help themselves. If we’re dead without Christ, we need him to make us alive.

U — Unconditional Election
In other words, God chooses us; we don’t choose him. Ephesians 1:4—he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him. John 15:16—You did not choose me (says Jesus) but I chose you. Terry Virgo likes to say he imagines somebody in the congregation saying, “Hang on. But haven’t I got a free will?” And Terry says this, “Yeah, but God’s is freer.” The truth is this: actually we do have a free will, but we all freely choose to reject God. It’s only as God intervenes and woos us and changes our hearts and sends out his grace on us that we actually can be saved.

L — Limited Atonement
This is one that causes a bit of controversy and a lot of disagreement, but it’s mostly about a misunderstanding. I think all Christians will agree with two things about this. The first is this—that everything that Jesus did on the cross, the good of it, the full goodness of it, the eternal value of it, only gets applied to those who are Christians. Obviously, in order to benefit from Jesus’s death, you need to be a Christian, so in that sense it is a limited atonement. It is especially for the believer. It is especially for us. Jesus said this, “He laid down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). There’s a sense in which the death of Jesus was specific to certain individuals.

The second thing that we all can agree on is this: that actually Jesus’ death does have some benefit to everybody, and that the offer of the gospel is available to everybody as well. And it’s an honest gospel that says that if you are willing to repent of your sins and follow God, then you will be saved. So I think we need to be very careful in what we say about this. 1 Timothy 4:10 to me, sums this up, “We have set our hope on the living God who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe.” So the very fact that the world is sustained at all and that Jesus didn’t just wipe it out the second that somebody first sinned is because of Jesus’s death. So everybody lives in the good of the cross all the time actually, and the offer of the gospel is a genuine offer to everybody, but the full benefits of the cross are only ever applied to those who are truly saved. I think sometimes this one is expressed in a way in which I would not agree.

I — Irresistible Grace
Jesus said “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:44). When God sets his mind on you, when God sets his grace on you, your resistance is futile. You can run, but you can’t hide. And there may be some of you reading this who have been running. You’ve been fighting. And God is saying, “Stop fighting. I’m here. Now is the time to surrender.”

P — Perseverance of the Saints
I prefer to state it in this way: the persistence of God. “And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:39-50).

Now, we all know people who appeared to be Christians and drifted away. The thing is this—it is appointed for man to die once and after that comes judgment (Hebrews 9:27). I believe the balance of Scripture is very clear on this, that there are actually three possible verdicts on that day.

The first verdict is this—You’re not a Christian; you never were a Christian, and that means an eternity without God. It means hell. We do believe in hell. That’s one verdict. The second verdict is what I call a “well done” Christian. What I mean is this. When God looks at you and says, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You’ve followed me. You’ve served me. I’m pleased with what you’ve done.” And that’s what I pray for each of us. The third possible verdict is one that I call the “skin of the teeth” Christian. 1 Corinthians 3 talks about it like this: “As one saved through fire.” All your good works get burned up, but somehow, because of God’s grace, you somehow scrape in.

Now I would say that the difference between the slightly “scraping in” Christian and the person who is not a Christian at all is not one that we can sometimes easily discern. And that’s why we need to make sure really, brothers and sisters, that we are following after God. Because we don’t want to be those who miss it.

So, for those who have appeared to backslide, it may be that they were never Christians. It may be that actually they will be among that “skin of the teeth” brigade, or it may be actually—and this is what we should pray—that God will bring them back because God is in the business of restoring people. God is in the business of bringing people back, people we thought would never ever do it. And God says, “No. I will do it. I will do it. I will bring them back. I will complete the work I started.” And that’s the way to pray. Say, “God, you promised that you would complete the work that you started. I remember what you did in that person . . .”

Hebrews 3:14 actually says something interesting about this idea of perseverance. Because it really isn’t just the idea of “once saved, always saved” in a very simplistic way. You think if you go forward at a crusade that’s it. No! What it’s saying is that we’re expecting God to preserve our faith and keep us until the end. It says this in Hebrews 3:14—For we have come to share in Christ (and that’s the past tense—it has happened to us in the past) if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.” So we should expect that God will sustain us to the end, and at the end of our lives, to be able to look back on a lifetime of trusting God.

I don’t want any of us to drift away. Please don’t play fast and loose with God because he’s not mocked. It is appointed once for man to die and afterwards to face judgment.

Hope requires eternal security, but it is not passive — we don’t just say, “Oh well. I’m okay now. Let me sit back and put my feet up and coast to heaven.” 2 Peter 1:3—His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him, who called us by his own glory and goodness. Therefore my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. But if you do these things, you will never fall. And you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.” Why not aim for a rich welcome?

Hope also requires a resurrection — Paul puts it this way in 1 Corinthians 15:19 where he says, “If in this life only we have hoped in Christ we are of all people most to be pitied.” Because actually, eventually it will seem as if God has let us down because we’ll die and evil will, in fact, touch us. Well, the truth is this, eternally these words are always true— God will keep our lives. God will keep evil from ultimately harming us. There is a glorious day coming. Jesus promised, “In this world you will have trouble.” I don’t see very many people naming and claiming that promise! And Jesus does keep his promises. But he also said this: “Take heart. I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

So we need to know this—death is coming. We can’t stop it. We can fight it and we can try to delay it, but we must remember that the timing is ultimately in God’s hands. But it’s also okay to walk in faith and obedience, trying to follow God faithfully, because actually, even under the New Testament, God does sometimes terminate somebody’s life early. Look at Ananias and Sapphira. We can pray for healing, and rightly so when someone gets sick. We can eat in a healthy manner. We can try to keep that weight down. We can stop smoking. It’s like playing Russian roulette with your life. Three holes, one bullet—a “one in three” chance of dying early—not a good idea. We can exercise. We can see doctors. But the point is this. Our hope goes beyond the grave because death is coming, even if we do all those things.

One day we will see him face-to-face. And what does that say? It tells me that we will still have a face. It’s not that we’re going to be some sort of ethereal spirit floating in heaven. We will know each other. We will be able to recognize each other. We have a hope that goes beyond the grave, And we will meet our departed brothers and sisters again one day. We will see them. And together we will see God.

Notice this: it says that he will keep our life, and he will also keep our going out and coming in. To me, that’s a physical thing. You don’t go out and come in if you’re a spirit floating ethereally, not even knowing if you’re you. You will be you. Hope requires that there is a resurrection. Hope requires that there is eternal security, and that God will keep us, but it’s not passive in that knowledge. Hope requires that God sends his gospel. Hope requires a God who is loving. Hope requires a God who is in control. Hope requires a lifted head. Hope requires a biblical outlook.

Hope requires an alert God. It requires a God who is keeping us and a God who is not sleeping. God never sleeps so that you can sleep. He’s watching over you. When you’re in the desert and you’re worried about wild animals coming to eat you, one of you needs to stay awake. You don’t all need to stay awake. You just need one to stay awake. One that’s trustworthy. God would say this to you—”I am trustworthy. Cast your anxieties on me. Don’t you realize that I care for you, and that I don’t sleep so that you can sleep?”

God doesn’t sleep when somebody dies. He doesn’t sleep when somebody gets news that they may die. And he doesn’t sleep when somebody gets news that someone they love may die. He’s never asleep. He is aware of all those things and he can meet you in all those settings. He is your keeper. He will protect you through all those things.

God wasn’t sleeping when your name came up in the tally in heaven as to who’s going to get married and who’s not, and how we’re going to sort that out. You weren’t one he missed. He’s controlling your life. He is guiding your steps. And he will guide you, either to the perfect mate or to actually feeling content in the midst of your situation.

We think we can hide our sin from God. We’re fools. We think the darkness will hide it. Maybe we think that if we come out at night we can do certain things that no one else will see, and therefore sometimes God won’t see. But he never sleeps. He doesn’t slumber. He sees everything you’ve ever done, everything you’ve ever said, and everything you’ve ever thought.

He didn’t see all these things with a view to condemning you, saying you’re useless, and telling you deserve hell (although that’s true). He did it so that you might be forgiven. And he wants to highlight that to you right now. Your sin is worse than you think it is. But this is also true—God is better than you think he is, and he’s more gracious than you think he is. He chose David, an adulterer and a murderer, and said, “This is a man after my own heart.”

God can take the shame that you feel, the hurt you may feel, the dirtiness you feel. Jesus carried our shame on the cross that you might be full of hope, that you might be able to stand firm before God, aware of him, and fully in love with Jesus, fully secure in hope.

The 8th post popular post on my blog at the moment is the summary of my interview with Wayne Grudem.

At number 7 is my post defining “What is a Reformed Charismatic?” Don’t miss two closely related posts — “Wanted – 1000 Reformed Charismatic Churches” and “I Don’t Want Balance, I Want It All.”

Driscoll had a fascinating and substantial video interview with the Sydney Anglicans which I just had to draw to your attention.

Intriguingly they are happy to describe him as “Apostle to the generation wired“!

The fact that he can be well received by both Newfrontiers and the Sydney Anglicans says a lot about the ministry of this man.

No. 3 in the list of top 100 US cities being targeted by Newfrontiers is Chicago. I got a facebook message this week asking me if I knew of a Church there for a student visiting. Incidentally, do feel free to be my friend, join my blog network or even share and comment on my posts over at facebook

I was thrilled to be able to find that there is a newfrontiers church in Chicago. Not just any church either, judging by the website but one that has a clear vision of what they are trying to do judging by the following extract from their website which turned my head.

Yes, we’re unashamedly Christian but don’t freak out and click for something else. Let us tell you our story.

We’re a community of everyday people who want to explore what it means to be a Christ follower in our everyday lives. We’re real. Our faith is real. Our lives are gritty. We don’t have all the answers but we’re not afraid to work it out together – rooted in God’s word. that’s what it’s all about!

We’re a community, a part of the global village. we’re talking deep dish pizza, hummus and pita breads, home baked lasagna, beans and burritos, hot dawgs and sauce. We eat Sunday dinner together as often as we can. We email and call each other during the week to stay in touch and when things aren’t crazy busy we even hook up for a cup of coffee. We celebrate birthdays, go bowling, prepare meals for people in need, play Scrabble, watch movies, housesit, baby-sit, pack boxes when someone’s moving house, and share our lives together. It’s tough building community in the city but we believe Christianity is all about it.

We don’t believe in fairy tales. We believe Jesus Christ really lived and walked this earth and chose to die for our sins. That’s right, we see ourselves as sinners in need of his grace. We’re talking repentance, hope, freedom, healing, grace, joy, truth, and most importantly love. So real. So refreshing.

We launched Fusion in East Rogers Park, Chicago, Il, in February 2006 but people travel from all over Chicagoland to be a part of our urban family – and friends and family visit us from different nations too. Sure, we’re small. We’re new. We’re learning. We make mistakes. We say we’re sorry. We reach out. We don’t have a target market, anyone is welcome. We don’t have all the answers. We’re everyday people. And we’re plugged into Newfrontiers, a family of more than 500 churches in over 50 nations across the globe.

We come just as we are – that’s what Jesus is all about. We are unafraid to challenge stuff and, we live out our lives based on God’s word. Yes, we believe its the inspired word of God. We don’t pretend! We don’t tell you what you want to hear. We are Christ followers and Christ seekers – together, on a mission. Everyday people exploring the true essence of Christianity and what it means in our everyday lives to be a Christ follower. READ MORE from this Chicago church.