Judgment

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Are your people starving for good music during worship...

What sort of music do you have leading the souls of your church in worship? Years ago, I noticed we worship God with crescendos about God's grace and how happy it makes us. Not to disparage grace, but only cheap grace: if you don't sing and preach God's judgment, the souls in your congregation don't have a clue about grace no matter how much you blather on about it and they sing about it. Preach the Ten Commandments and have your choir sing this anthem. Grace will become a reality in the hearts of the souls under your care.

We did and I promise you, it works. God is no liar and our worship shouldn't lie, either.


On the death of truth: a lament...

All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight, But the LORD weighs the motives. (Proverbs 16:2)

Recently, we've had several posts calling out Liam Goligher and Carl Trueman for misquoting Calvin. David Talcott's post explained why reformed men want to claim Calvin for their side. To the contrary, as Dr. Talcott gently warned readers, "Calvin thought sex meant something in civil society." This is the heart of the issue.

Sadly, the point is lost on reformed men today. Dr. Talcott's kind assumption that reformed men care about truth is wrong. What Reformed men keep track of isn't truth, but spin, relationships, and outward appearances. What else could account for the refusal of men like Goligher and Trueman to correct their blatant falsehoods? What else could account for the hostile response of other reformed men to these men being called out for their deception?

Truth matters. When Goligher and Trueman feed their readers a lie, it tarnishes their own reputations among the godly. Beyond that, their lie slanders a man who cannot defend himself. If he were alive, he could file charges against them, but John Calvin died some time ago...


Donald Trump and Evangelicals...

A loved one passed along a link to this Washington Post piece attacking the "Evangelicals" who gave Donald Trump his victory in South Carolina's primary. The writer is Joseph Loconte, a history prof at Cru's King's College in Manhattan. The noteworthy thing is not where Loconte draws his salary, but that his piece ran in the Post.

Inside the Beltway, there's not one man, woman, or child of privilege who is not gnashing his teeth at the prospect of Donald Trump sitting in the White House, and they can't disguise their hatred for the voters who are threatening to put him there. Sitting in traffic waiting for President Obama's motorcade to pass has been a joy these past seven years, presenting one more opportunity for self-congratulation over the triumph of the college educated over cigarette-smoking, gun-toting, Bible-reading trash. Sitting in traffic waiting for President Trump's motorcade to pass would be beyond infuriating. It would drive the pols and their K Street pimps to gnash their teeth and drop-kick their iPhones.

Now as I've made clear, I'm no fan of The Donald. I consider him the perfect expression of the wicked man described by Psalm 73. As I wrote some weeks back, "Sorry, you who like Mr. Trump. I can't imagine any man who is a worse candidate for President, including Bernie Sanders. And I believe it is a Christian witness to say so." So now, I find abhorent those who put President Obama in the White House and have their fondest hopes set on putting Hillary Clinton there also, yet I do not have the slightest sympathy for Joe Loconte's attack upon the Southern Christians who voted for Trump. It strikes me as traitorous to the Church.

Loconte's approach to getting an oped piece in the Post was to draw an analogy between Pope Leo kneeling before Charlemagne back in A.D. 900 and Evangelicals voting for Trump eleven-hundred and sixteen years later. According to Loconte's narrative... 


43rd Anniversary of Roe v. Wade: the justices will soon answer for this before the Judge of all the earth...

Forty-three years ago, on January 22, 1973, the laws of forty-six states prohibiting the murder of unborn children were declared unconstitutional by the wicked and cruel justices then sitting on the Supreme Court of these United States. Their decision, Roe v. Wade, was conniving and deceitful, rendering them the laughingstock of the legal profession. We would have to go back to the Court's Dred Scott decision to find an opinion as naked in its ambition to promote injustice and oppression.

Once again this year in its Obergefell v. Rhodes decision, the Supreme Court has shown itself vigilant in its promotion of wickedness, this time not so much the wickedness of bloodshed (although there is that, also, in Obergefell). Rather, our Supreme Court is now vigilant in its promotion of the wickedness of the sexual perversions of homosexuality and effeminacy which God explicitly warned all men against when he burned up Sodom and Gomorrah so notoriously. The justices of the Supreme Court know very well that, because of the slaughter of the unborn and the effeminacy and androgyny they have promoted across our culture, they will be judged by God. They will not escape the bar of God.

Mourning the loss through surgical abortion of at least 60,000,000 helpless babies across our nation since 1973, here is a memorial for them in the form of a sermon preached publicly to the civil magistrates working in Indiana's State House...


Dear Paul Tripp...

Dear Paul,

I was surprised that you wrote to tell us how we should view the end of Tullian Tchividjian's marriage. But since you addressed us publicly on your web site, I thought I'd write back and publicly say a few things that have occurred to me as well.

I must confess that for many years I confused you with your brother Tedd, never being quite sure which of you was the one doing or saying what. Sorry. I know it can sting. Perhaps it's the mustaches... (For years, for us it was the bow ties.)

More recently, I've been clear on the distinction. Tedd wrote the book my mother commended to me years ago, Shepherding a Child's Heart. Tedd was the pastor my friend Stephen Baker trained under. You're the PCA Tripp who's done the counseling for years. So I think I've got you straight, and my appreciation for your family's ministry is real. Moreover, there are people in the church I pastor who remember you from the Alliance church you attended in the 1950s and 60s. 

It's recently struck me that we've lived for years as each other's kind of reverse doppelganger, swooping back and forth across the same landscape like ships doomed to pass in the night. For instance, the church I pastor is attended by a daughter of the pastor who led the church you attended throughout your childhood, and even the granddaughter of that man's predecessor, pastor of that church when you were born. You were a kid together with people I'm approaching senior citizenship with. 

You were born and raised in Toledo, moving to Philadelphia as an adult. I was born in Philadelphia (with ties to Tenth Presbyterian) and moved to Toledo when I was thirty.

You went to college at Columbia Bible College. I went to college at Macalester. You went to Reformed Episcopal Seminary. I went to Gordon-Conwell. You were at Tenth under Jim Boice. I interned at Fullerton Ev. Free under Chuck Swindoll. Your name is Paul David and mine David Jeremy.

I could go on... You wear glasses today like those I wore in my college years. It was the punk rock era; I cut my hair short and found the frames of my dreams at an optical shop that sold safety glasses to industry...


Ashley Madison and the Apostle Paul's "gospel"...

...on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus.  - Romans 2:16

They say pornography has been the engine driving technological advances the past few decades, starting with the VCR and DVD, but continuing to the present with the latest video codecs of pornography sites. Add to this the superficiality of tweets (esp. from Christians) and the extreme narcissism, vanity, and deception at the heart of FB, and it's easy to understand why believers would view technology as only evil.

But yes, there are good things about the internet, and one that may not be mentioned very often. Among the infinite number of Scripture's warnings, that one about "every idle word" makes me tremble. You too?

But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. (Matthew 12:36)

Incomprehensible, isn't it; that our Lord keeps track, not just of every hair on our head (comforting), but every thoughtless word? And this is where the internet is helpful...


Independence Day...

If you’re a Christian and a patriot mourning this week over the unjust weights and balances of our nation’s highest law court, now’s a good time to remember there is one kingdom that will be left standing after all others fall. 

Take comfort this Independence Day in the inevitable, the irrepressible, the inexorable, the indomitable, and the interminable rule of Christ promised us in Psalm 2 (versified for singing by some of our Clearnote musicians).

Listen and be wise…

With thanks to Phil, Jake, Nathan, and Nate

[Download the audio free at Noisetrade]


Obergefell v. Hodges: to Hell with these United States of America...

The Supreme Court of these United States just issued their decision, Obergefell v. Hodges, repudiating the rule of law under the U.S. Constitution, but also the laws condemning sodomy across all human history. Our august justices simply adore men lying with men and women with women—what do nature and nature's God have to do with it? Wee Five all decked out in our black robes peering down from our great eminence and seeing the rebellious hearts of slugs and moles living in places like Mississippi, South Carolina, Oklahoma, and Indiana...


An antidote to AC/DC's highway to Hell...

Songs of death, Hell, and judgment used to be common. Some from the Colonial times are astounding in their directness. It was not only Jonathan Edwards who preached of Hell; the hymnody did, also. We live in an decadent age, though, and church music demonstrates that decay has corrupted our songs, also, and not just the songs of the Devil explicitly so like Imagine, Sympathy for the Devil, and Highway to Hell. Where is any mention of Hell or the Devil equivalent to Luther's "and tho this world with devils filled" and "the prince of darkness grim" in the CCM industry today?

The classically trained musicians who lead our Clearnote Church worship wrote an antidote and here it is. Spread it far and wide. Download it and get your sons singing it while they draw pictures or shoot their slingshots at the rabbits and squirrels.


America, the beautiful...

Here are Calvin's comments on God's statement of Genesis 15:16:  "the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full." Very helpful.

* * *

The reason here given is deemed absurd, as seeming to imply that the sons of Abram could not otherwise be saved, than by the destruction of others.

I answer, that we must with modesty and humility yield to the secret counsel of God. Since he had given that land (of Canaan) to the Amorites, to be inhabited by them in perpetuity, he intimates, that he will not, without just cause, transfer the possession of it to others; as if he would say, "I grant the dominion of this land to thy seed without injury to any one. The land, at present, is occupied by its lawful possessors, to whom I delivered it. Until, therefore, they shall have deserved, by their sins, to be rightfully expelled, the dominion of it sill not come to thy posterity."

Thus God teaches him that the land must be evacuated, in order that it may lie open to new inhabitants. And this passage is remarkable, as showing, that the abodes of men are so distributed in the world, that the Lord will preserve quiet people, each in their several stations, till they cast themselves out by their own wickedness. For by polluting the place of their habitation, they...


Bloomberg won't be knock-knock-knocking on Heaven's door...

Therefore pride is their necklace; The garment of violence covers them. Their eye bulges from fatness; The imaginations of their heart run riot.  - Psalms 73:6, 7


Homosexualist marriage, death, and compassion...

Think with a Christian mind. When a lesbian in a homosexualist marriage is facing death due to Stage IV ovarian cancer, one of two things is true: either now is the time to release her from the oppression of residents of the state of Indiana so she and her partner in this "loving relationship" may approach her death in peace; or now is the time to warn her that, if she defies God to her very end, upon death she will certainly face God's wrath and eternal damnation. Death is the great purifier of thoughts. The choices are clear. The Holy Spirit has spoken: "it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment" (Hebrews 9:27).

Which side of this choice shows compassion for this immortal soul? The attorneys and judges who use this lesbian's impending death to express their own hatred and defiance of God? Or the citizens of the state of Indiana who call their civil magistrates to condemn the evil of lesbianism and warn those who practice it, particularly at the time of their death?

Who has compassion...


Peter Hitchens talks about how he came to faith...

A short interview filled with wisdom. The pride of intellectuals. The difficulty of backing down from public positions. The burning horror of the memory of one's past wickedness, leading others astray. And the fear of God.

The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, That one may avoid the snares of death. (Proverbs 14:27)

The Church is starving for want of pastors who preach the fear of God; who proclaim original sin, the Law, death, judgment, and Hell. God's grace to a man begins with the man being scared.


The death of the conscience...

Check out this transcript. It's funny, but very sad. As the perverts at Indiana University's "McKenzie Institute (sic, she meant Kinsey Institute)" see it, Peru, Indiana is way out west of Bloomington in hicksville where people can't read or write; where they hunt and eat animals and smoke.

Anyhow, some assistant prof seeking tenure at Indiana University has done a study concluding that men who watch pornography end up supporting sodomite and lesbian marriage. Stunning, isn't it?

I wonder, is the moral of the story...


On the fortieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade's bloody slaughter...

(TB: On the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade, I post this sermon preached yesterday, Sunday January 27, 2013, at Clearnote Church, Bloomington.)

* * *

The Lord'€™s Throne Is in Heaven

(For the choir director; a psalm of David.) In the LORD I take refuge; how can you say to my soul, "Flee as a bird to your mountain; for, behold, the wicked bend the bow, they make ready their arrow upon the string to shoot in darkness at the upright in heart. If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" The LORD is in His holy temple; the LORD'€™S throne is in heaven; His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates. Upon the wicked He will rain snares; fire and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup. For the LORD is righteous, He loves righteousness; the upright will behold His face. (Psalm 11:1-7)

Forty years ago this past Tuesday, on January 22nd, 1973, the Supreme Court of these United States issued its infamous ruling, Roe v. Wade, in which the Court declared that a mother's intentional killing of her unborn child was a fundamental right guaranteed under our Constitution. Since that ruling, it has been a commonplace to observe that Roe v. Wade, the Court's repeal of the laws prohibiting abortion on the books of all fifty states, was simply the exercise of raw judicial power with a legal justification based upon a mist and a vapor--€”or as the Court itself might put it, emanations from penumbras.

Our Supreme Court: intentionally conniving at murder...

Since 1973, no one has made a name for himself defending Roe. v. Wade’s history, biology, ethics, logic, or justice; and only a few have been foolish enough to claim this ruling will stand the test of time...


Man, the master of destruction...

God's created order won't be violated forever. Traditions come and go, but, if patriarchy is woven through creation as Scripture indicates, the pendulum will one day turn. And when it does, it will destroy every feminist altar in its path, revealing father-rule to be every bit the law of creation that gravity is.

The question isn't whether the pendulum will turn, the real question is what the world will look like when it does. And that is a frightening thing to consider....

In a recent column, New York Times columnist David Brooks reflects the prevailing wisdom of Western society on manhood:

Forty years ago, men and women adhered to certain ideologies, what it meant to be a man or a woman. Young women today... are more like clean slates, having abandoned both feminist and prefeminist preconceptions. Men still adhere to the masculinity rules, which limits their vision and their movement.

Everywhere, the story is the same: men are losers in the modern interconnected world; men no longer wear the pants in the family economy; hookup culture is female empowerment; women don't need men like men need women; fatherhood is overrated, children really only need mothers....

Yet even as it's accepted that masculinity is a waning force in the West, our organs of influence and power are being forced to adapt to the resurgent patriarchy of fundamentalist Islam.


The firestorm is not over...

At 7:08 ET on this 31st day of July, 2012, the leading text on the Google news page is from ABC News: "The firestorm ignited last week after Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy said that those who support gay marriage are 'inviting God's judgment on our nation,' is not over."

Indeed, the firestorm is not over, but it's not the firestorm ABC News is fulminating over.

The people of these United States call evil good and good evil. We have hands covered with the blood of our own and our neighbors' unborn babies and elderly parents. Our conferences and megachurches multiply offerings and mission trips. Yet there is no fear of God in our Land.

In just such a time, the prophet Isaiah bore this message...


The God of Glory thunders (w/audio)...

Those of you who, with me, wish you could have been there to hear the big bang of David's recent post, "Happiness on the Fourth of July," have to watch this video from a recent Texas Ranger's game. God thundered from heaven and the men on the field dropped to the ground or ran for the dugouts. Minnesota Twin Denard Span tweeted...


What happens when you attack an idol?

You know, wherever the apostle Paul went, there was a revival or riot. Everywhere I go, they serve tea. - an Anglican cleric

What happens when you attack an idol?

On Friday, April 13th, the college ministry of Clearnote Church sponsored a lecture series on the Bloomington campus of Indiana University called Sexual by Design. Indiana University is a notorious party school in one of the most gay-friendly towns in America. It's also the home of Alfred Kinsey and the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction.

So we invited Pastor Doug Wilson to Bloomington to address God's design for sexuality on campus. We wanted him to join us in our attack on the idols of our community and to aid us in the work of seeing souls saved from eternal destruction. As you can see from the sneak peeks above, chaos ensued.

Doug spoke to a hostile crowd of 350-400 people...


Missional, Gospel-centered music...

Here's a video of Hiding Place being sung in suport of missional preaching before and after the song. (TB, w/thanks to Nate and Phil)