Here is one of those balloon-popping questions that tend to reduce swelling in the head: “So, how are your quiet times going lately? How has your private prayer and meditation on Scripture been?” Among many Christians it seems that what was once assumed has now become optional. In the name...
6. Catechise to keep core doctrines central. Catechisms are not only a hedge against heresy; they are also a wedge that opens the mind to truth, the great truths, the main truths of the Bible. What God has made most central and repeated in His Word is what we want...
John MacArthur writes (in endorsing a catechism book), “One of the most urgent tasks facing the contemporary church is that of teaching doctrine, not only to the future, but to present generations.” J.I. Packer has said that the greatest challenge for the 21st century Church is to recatechise and disciple...
John Calvin once wrote: “Believe me…the Church of God will never preserve itself without a Catechism, for it is like the seed to keep the good grain from dying out, and using it to multiply from age to age. Wherefore, if you desire to build a work of continuance to...
The ‘Big Five’ Criteria for Evaluating Preaching Why is it that some sermons can meet all of the criteria on a typical evaluation (crit’) sheet in a preaching class or homiletics lab, and yet they are boring and ineffective? And why is it that some of the greatest preachers and...
Evaluating sermons has been a favourite pastime of Christians for centuries. Yet despite all our experience, it is still rare to find those who are good at biblically critiquing a sermon – whether their own sermon, or another’s. We are so easily sidetracked by the peripheral concerns over the preacher’s...
“The fear of man brings a snare, But whoever trusts in the LORD shall be safe” (Prov. 29:25) II. Faith In God is the Security You Seek Notice the fear of man is laid parallel to trusting God. In other words – the fear of man is really faith in man...
“The fear of man brings a snare, But whoever trusts in the LORD shall be safe” (Prov. 29:25) What I want us to do is to take this in two halves. First, we are going to understand the meaning of man-pleasing from God’s point of view, and second, we are going...
Before us today is a matter which seems to have each one of us in its cross-hairs. I doubt that anyone can consider the matter of man-pleasing, or the fear of man and feel that he or she is exempt from this sin. Indeed, the fear of man comes in so many...
“Jude, a bond-servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, To those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ: Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you. Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write...