Category Archives: Exhortation

Ordinary, Yet Spirit-Filled

On this Lord’s Day we remember that great day of Pentecost, where God graciously poured out His Spirit on the Church and anointed Peter to proclaim the gospel to the nations gathered in Jerusalem. 

And the question I want to consider this morning is this: What follows Pentecost? What does it look like to live a Spirit-filled life? Does it involve seeking out new Pentecost-like experiences, or is there something else we should be doing? 

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Ascended with Christ

In our Lord’s incarnation, God and man were forever united.

As the Creeds confess – the second Person of the Trinity, the Son eternally begotten of the Father, came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit and of the virgin Mary.

Our God was made man. 

He took on flesh, and in that flesh he was crucified, died, and was buried. In that same body, He was resurrected and glorified, and on this day we celebrate His ascension into Heaven. 

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Die Before You Die

This exhortation was given at King’s Cross Church (Moscow, ID) on May 7, AD 2023.

There once was a faithful preacher who ministered for thirty years in a small Missouri town. Over the course of his ministry, he submitted to the local paper about three hundred Letters to the Editor. As he neared the end of his life, suffering from pancreatic cancer, he wrote one final farewell to his town which said this: “Indeed, the one great thing in life is to be ready to die. It is simple, but big.” 

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Missional Families

This exhortation was given at King’s Cross Church (Moscow, ID) on March 12, AD 2023.

In a community like ours with a strong emphasis on the family, one of our temptations is to become insular

By insular, I mean that either in our own families themselves, or in our own circle of friends, we can become primarily inward facing — neglecting outreach to others.

The solution to this is not to abandon our God-given duties toward our spouse and children. Nor is it to neglect God’s gift of sweet fellowship with close friends. Rather, it’s to invite people in to the life of our families. It’s to practice hospitality – a missional hospitality directed toward those you don’t know all that well yet – whether they are a new family in our church or your unbelieving neighbors. 

This hospitality is not one that interrupts our family time – but instead becomes a routine part of it.

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Tradition is Inevitable

As part of the one, holy, catholic church, we hold to the creeds formulated by the early church and confessed through the ages. This is why each Sunday we recite the Apostles Creed, which reminds us of the fundamentals of our faith. And as a Reformed church, our elders subscribe to the confessions developed by faithful men following the Reformation. But why do we bother with these traditional documents? Why isn’t the Bible alone enough?

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Do the Word

This exhortation was given at King’s Cross Church (Moscow, ID) on January 22, AD 2023.

You have all you need to obey God today. If you have been born again and own a Bible – you have all the information you need to walk in His ways today.

James tells us in his Epistle that we have received the implanted Word of God which is able to save our souls. But then he gives this warning: “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

In an age where access to the Word and biblical resources abound, this temptation to hear the Word but not do the Word is very real.

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Two Great Interests in Christ

This exhortation was given at King’s Cross Church (Moscow, ID) on January 8, AD 2023.

Everybody has to do something with Christ. Every single person, when confronted with Jesus of Nazareth, must do something about Him. 

The Wise Men had a great interest in Christ. Following a star they traveled from afar in order to fall down before Him in worship. They eagerly sought Him out in order to humbly lay gifts at His feet, and His presence made them “rejoice with exceedingly great joy” (Mt. 2:10). 

Herod the Great also had a great interest in Christ. But he was a liar and did not truly desire to worship Him. Rather the news of this rival king greatly troubled him, and he needed to destroy him. 

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Prepare the Way of the Lord

This exhortation was given at King’s Cross Church (Moscow, ID) on December 18, AD 2022.

Before the coming of our Lord, God sent John the Baptist, to ready His people for the great arrival of their Messiah. He was a forerunner, a herald whose cry of repentance was to prepare the Bride to meet her Bridegroom.

As it was written in the Book of Isaiah,

“The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
Prepare the way of the Lord,
Make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled,

And every mountain and hill shall be made low,
And the crooked shall become straight,
And the rough places shall become level ways,

and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

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