Revival messages on the church

Sunday I began preaching a series of meetings at a small church in the next county. I am attempting to do the same basic thing I mentioned here once before, preaching to the people about what the church should be on the ground that a true work of renewal begins with the people of God. I have so far preached on the same texts I mentioned before:

1 Tim 3:14-16- on the nature of the church
Eph 4- on the necessity of every
member supplying
Heb 3:12-4:16- on the responsibility of members to exhort
(encourage & rebuke) one another every day as a key to our perseverance.

My intention is to preach on 1 Cor 5 tonight on church discipline as the logical outcome of Eph 4 and Heb 3-4. This is how we show that we truly do love one another and that we love the glory of God. I have also stressed to the people that one of their primary fields of evangelism in this area will be people who profess faith but demonstrate by their life and lack of concern for the things of God that they do not know God (Titus 1:16).

I will hope to post in the next few days some other encouraging things I have seen during these meetings.

What Is a Healthy Church Member

What is a Healthy Church Member?
By Thabiti Anyabwile
(Crossway, 2008), hb., 127 pp.

I received my copy of this book last Friday and read it over the weekend. It is excellent! I plan to buy several copies of this book to give away. This book will be immensely helpful to individuals and churches.

Anyabwile takes each of the 9 Marks (from Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, or the latest edition of this book, What is a Healthy Church?) and applies them to church members. He then adds a chapter on prayer. Whereas Dever’s book addressed what the church as a whole should look like, this book asks how individual members can pursue these goals? This is then an excellent complement to the Dever books.

The Chapters are (and you can browse the chapters by following the links):
1. A Healthy Church Member Is an Expositional Listener

2. A Healthy Church Member Is a Biblical Theologian

3. A Healthy Church Member Is Gospel Saturated

4. A Healthy Church Member Is Genuinely Converted

5. A Healthy Church Member Is a Biblical Evangelist

6. A Healthy Church Member Is a Committed Member

7. A Healthy Church Member Seeks Discipline

8. A Healthy Church Member Is a Growing Disciple

9. A Healthy Church Member Is a Humble Follower

10. A Healthy Church Member Is a Prayer Warrior

This is another great tool in helping people see where and how we need to change. It is profound but simply and clearly communicated. Give copies to your church members and fellow pastors.

Church: The Glory and the Shame

Said one demon to another:

“One of our great allies at present is the church itself. Do not misunderstand me. I do not mean the Church as we see her spread out through all time and space and rooted in eternity, terrible as an army with banners. That, I confess, is a spectacle which makes our boldest tempters uneasy. But fortunately it is quite invisible to these humans.”
(from C. S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters, cited in Alan Jacobs, The Narnian, 217)

Brothers, surely one of our tasks is to help our people see the church as she is in Christ- ‘terrible as an army’- and to lead that church in living up to what Christ has made her. It is sadly too often the case that the church today is a great ally of the Devil. The point of the labor for the purity of the church is to see this change. The church will either be the greatest hindrance to the advance of the Kingdom or the greatest tool for its advancement. That is one reason why the work of reformation in local assemblies is so valuable.

Every church would do well to ask the question: With what we do and how we conduct ourselves are we an ally of the Devil or an instrument in the hand of the Mighty God?

2008 Founders Conference

The 2008 Founders Conference will meet this June in Owasso, OK focusing on church planting and revitalization. The title is Lengthening the Cords and Strengthening the Stakes: Renewing and Planting Local Churches and features Ed Stetzer, Voddie Baucham, Andy Davis, Tom Nettles, Don Whitney, Ted Christman, and Phil Newton.

The conference website talks about how gimmicks can mask the lack of health in a church and that we should instead seek the God-ordained means of church renewal. This echoes a key theme of mine- using God-given means rather than humanly devised gimmicks.

From the conference website:

The 2008 National Founders Conference will explore the place, necessity, and some of the God-ordained means for church renewal and church planting under the theme, “Lengthening the Cords and Strengthening the Stakes: Renewing and Planting Local Churches.” The conference theme has arisen out of the many questions conference organizers have fielded regarding local church reformation and planting new churches. These themes go hand-in-hand, revealing the desire for healthy, vibrant, and reproducing churches. Conference speakers bring a wealth of experience and expertise in both the strengthening and lengthening of the church.

I will not be able to attend myself, but I wanted to pass on word for any that might be able to go.