Category Archives: Exposition

The Place of Unbelief in the Plan of God (Part 1)

May 15, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Today’s message from John 12:35-43 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

I summarized the message this way:

The causes behind Israel’s persistent rejection of Jesus challenge us to believe in Him as the Messiah. We’ve looked at two so far – prophetic prediction from Isa. 53:1 and sovereign preterition from Isa. 6:10.

Then I gave three applications from the doctrine of reprobation, the first for the unbeliever and the next two for the believer:

  1. Believe the gospel eagerly seizing the opportunity involved.
  2. Share the gospel confidently remembering the gravity involved (see 2 Corinthians 2:14-17).
  3. Glory in the gospel humbly acknowledging the sovereignty involved (see Romans 9:17-24). A complete glorying in the gospel in light of God’s sovereignty consists of two aspects of the doctrine of predestination – acknowledging His grace in election with untempered gratitude AND His justice in reprobation with tempered grief.

[33] Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! [34] “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” [35] “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?” [36] For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

(Romans 11:33-36 ESV)

On Fry Pans & the Fire

May 9, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , 2 Comments

In my message on Genesis 16 yesterday, I failed to mention this quote by Donald Grey Barnhouse:

If we seek to change our circumstances, we will jump from the frying pan into the fire. We must be triumphant exactly where we are. It is not a change of climate we need, but a change of heart. The flesh wants to run away, but God wants to demonstrate His power exactly where we have known our greatest chagrin. Life’s disappointments are frequently His appointments.

I meant to read that during point three, God’s prescription for us, that often involves our pressing into a difficult situation rather than running from it, particularly in some divinely appointed authority structure.

Oh for grace to be triumphant right where we are.

Strength from the God of Keen Senses

May 8, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , Leave a comment

Today’s message from Genesis 16 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

Charles Spurgeon made this comment about the grace of God that pursued Hagar through the angel of the Lord:

I think I see her there, her eyes red with weeping, her spirit broken down with the hunger of her journey, sitting a while and refreshed a moment, and resolved not to stoop and never to go back—and then, again, shuddering at the darkness that lay before her and afraid to go on. It was in such a state as that that God met with her! To all intents and purposes she was a friendless, outcast woman. She had left the only tents where she could claim a shelter. She had gone into the wilderness—no father, no mother, no brother, no sister to care for her. She turned her back upon those who had any interest in her and now she was left alone—alone, alone in a desert land without an eye to pity or a hand to help! It was then, under those peculiar circumstances of trial and of sin commingled, that God met with her.

When you least expect it, when you least deserve it, the God of keen senses will find you and give you strength.

Seeing & Savoring the Savior’s Superior Sacrifice

April 22, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , , 1 Comment

Today’s Good Friday message from Hebrews 10:11-14 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

Here’s how I summarized the theme and aim of the sermon:

In vv. 11-14 he puts the capstone on this argument. He drives it home with full force. Let me put it into the form of a theme: Because Jesus made a superior sacrifice for sins in every way we should not return to our old ways but persevere in holding fast the confession of our hope in the gospel of Jesus. I want to show you from the text four things that make the sacrifice of Jesus superior in every way, especially to Old Covenant Judaism, but essentially to every other religion or system of dealing with the human dilemma. My aim is that we will do anything but shrink back from our faith in the face of trouble rather even joyfully accept the plunder of our property (10:34) if necessary because of these things – His power in the sacrifice, His place after the sacrifice, His plan since the sacrifice, and His perfection by the sacrifice.

All hail to King Jesus who gave His body an offering for sin once for all and who now waits until all His enemies are brought under the footstool of His feet.

The Glory of God in the Lifted Up Christ (Part One)

April 18, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , 4 Comments

Sunday’s message from John 12:27-33 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

I summarized the first three points of the passage this way:

The glory of God went on stunning display in the lifted up Christ, in the passion of His suffering, the prayer of His heart, and the pleasure of His Father to glorify His name. The last two points – in the profit of His crowd and the purpose of His death – will have to wait until next time. Can you remain unmoved by the passion and prayer of Jesus crowned by the Father’s pleasure? Though agonized by the prospect and tempted to abort, yet He kept His appointment with the hour. Believe in the One whom the Father so relentlessly and continuously glorifies, the lifted up Son, Jesus the Christ.

Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift that buoys us through temptation with His unlimited resources as our great High Priest and in and through whom we enjoy the Father’s delight and pleasure.

A Greek Guide to Getting Close to Jesus (Part Two)

April 3, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , Leave a comment

Today’s message from John 20:20-26 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

Here’s how I summed things up:

Following the Greeks’ lead will bring us closer to Jesus and faith in Him – similar focused intentions, personal connections, and altered perceptions – He came for the world, Jew and Gentile alike, and He saved us through His sacrificial death for its sins and that only. Satan didn’t win the battle with Christ’s death; God did by raising and glorifying His Son.

May the Lord give us grace to seek Jesus and draw close to Him with rightly framed perceptions about Himself as the Messiah!

A Greek Guide to Getting Close to Jesus (Part One)

March 27, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

Today’s message from John 12:20-26 is now on the website. You can listen to the audio here.

My synopsis of the text was as follows:

The Spirit of God working through John wants us to go with the Greeks. He would have us express the same desire – we would see Jesus. He means for us to take our cue from them. He wants us to believe in Jesus in light of their example, as He does with everything else He shows us in the gospel from the signs Jesus did to the things He said (John 20:30-31).

Let me put it in the form of a theme as always. Follow the Greeks’ lead in seeking Jesus toward believing in Him as the Messiah. You will need four things from their example if you want to get somewhere close in proximity that their search brought them: deliberately focused intentions for Jesus, directly engaged connections to Jesus, dramatically altered perceptions of Jesus, and decidedly shared affections with Jesus.

I mentioned a link to an interview with Mark Dever of  9 Marks called Culture of Discipling that gives some great principles for doing the second of these things from the Greeks’ example. I highly recommend it. You can listen to that audio program here.

May this be a week where we draw closer to Jesus and help others do the same!

Hope in the Haze of the Mundane

March 14, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , Leave a comment


Sunday’s message from Zechariah 1:18-21 is now on the website. You can listen to the audio here.

Reflecting on the four craftsmen of this passage, Matthew Henry wrote:

Which way soever the church is threatened with mischief, and opposition given to its interests, God can find out ways and means to check the force, to restrain the wrath, and make it turn to his praise.

Lift up your eyes and see the justice of God in the glory of His Son.

A Triumphal Entry of a Different Kind (Part 1)

March 6, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , Leave a comment

This morning’s message from John 12:12-19 is now on the website. You can listen to the audio here.

The theme and outline for this two-part series on the triumphal entry are as follows:

The distinctly unique aspects of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem call for our belief in Him as the Messiah, God’s Son.

  • He embraced Messianic acclaim
  • He realized Messianic expectations
  • He performed Messianic works
  • He fulfilled Messianic purpose.

We considered only the first in part one.

John MacArthur made this insight about the significance of Jesus’ hour coming to pass at the same time as Passover:

Jesus did it in His own time and forced the whole issue, brought about the whole thing in order that it might happen exactly on the Passover day, fitting that when all the other lambs were being sacrificed, the One true Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world would be sacrificed on the very same day that all the rest of the sacrifices were going on. So Jesus was not at the mercy of the plots of men, but rather was bringing about the forcing of the issue of His own death so that it would happen on a day when He planned it and God planned it before the world began, not when the Jewish leaders decided it would happen.

His coming into Jerusalem precipitated the crisis of His death in God’s appointed time. That’s why He so openly and freely embraced the Messianic acclaim offered Him along the road toward Jerusalem when every time before He had refused the same.

Hail to the Lamb who was slain from before the foundation of the world!

Faith’s Ultimate Display (Part Two)

February 27, 2011 By in Exposition Tags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

Today’s message from John 12:1-11 is now on the web. You can listen to the audio here.

Here’s how I closed the sermon:

So, do we get it? Compared to Mary we have so much more to go on this side of the cross! If we do get it, if we understand the truth of what Jesus has done and it grips us such that we believe in Him as the Messiah, our Savior, it will lead to commitment marked like hers with even extravagant devotion – intensely personal, financially sacrificial, extremely deferential, publically unconventional, and spiritually insightful attachment.

Oswald Chambers, in My Utmost for His Highest, said this:

There is only one relationship that matters, and that is your personal relationship to a personal Redeemer and Lord. Let everything else go, but maintain that at all costs, and God will fulfill His purpose through your life. One individual life may be of priceless value to God’s purpose, and yours may be that life.

Let everything else go, but maintain your personal relationship to Jesus at all costs.