2008 Truth & Life Conference

Just a quick entry to say Thank you, Thank you, Thank you. As a result of your prayers, God truly blessed the seminar I gave at the Truth & Life Conference last week at The Master's College.

I spoke on "How to Fail at Life and Ministry" with the thesis that the bad reputation many doctrinally sound, Bible believing circles have for being cold, unloving, elitist, confrontational, disrespectful and self-righteous is directly tied to God's reputation in this world.

MANY are flooding away from our circles for other religions and cults, the New Age and occult as well as more liberal forms of Christianity either in mainline churches or the emergent movement / conversation, not because of prolonged exposure to God's Word, but because of interaction they've had with us.

By the way, the biblical way of talking about giving God a good name, a good reputation is a very common saying in our circles. Giving God a good name with our lives is EXACTLY the same as saying I'm living for the glory of God.

So, if our reputation is bad because of us (and not because of our message), we're not glorifying Him no matter how theologically rich we are, how much we love the Bible, how much we love preaching, the gospel and the local church. If you're still not convinced that God cares about our reputation, read Romans 2:24. In short, it is not optional for those who love the Word of the Spirit most to go above and beyond to demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit most.

We'll see what the fall out ends up being on a message like that (especially when the podcast goes online), but as of now I've received nothing but positive feedback from everyone, and pray that God will use it to give us a better reputation since nothing less than His glory is on the line.

Compass on Ustream.tv

For a couple months now our church has been live streaming our weekend services here. They're also there to watch after the fact if you don't watch the life stream. When you watch, let me know what you think.

Archaeology Supports Bible...AGAIN!!!

Thanks to BTW for posting on a find in Jerusalem, read about it here, a family seal from the first temple period with a name with a family name found in Nehemiah 7:55.

Does it say the name and then "as written in the Bible"? No, but it does show it was a name used at the time, like the Bible says, and it does not contradict the Bible in anyway, but rather the find further supports it's historicity and accuracy.

2008 Truth & Life Conference

Here's the website outlining the seminars at the Truth & Life Conference--ugh!

Please, please, please pray for me about this, that I'd be clear, accurate, passionate, pursuasive and practical, bringing just the right message in the right way for the spiritual benefit of the TMC students who attend. Thank you.

Spurgeon on Humility

Here's a sermon by Charles Spurgeon on our ever present and constantly opposing enemy, pride, and our always necessary and always wanted friend, humility. I was reading C.J. Mahaney's book Humility yesterday and he mentioned this sermon, but the online footnote he gave in the book no longer exists.

I'm reading a lot on this topic, not only because I want to be humble, but because I'm giving a seminar on it at this year's Truth and Life Conference at The Master's College. If you think of it, PLEASE pray for me about this. I feel completely out of my league as a speaker for a conference like this one, and completely out of my league on the topic of humility. Also, aside from your prayers, any resources would be helpful too.