This week, our L3 journals covered Romans 10:5-17, where Paul explains how people come to a saving faith in Jesus Christ. In this passage, we hear more about what it means to believe in Christ, how any of us have come to believe in Christ, and why it is important that we tell the world about what Jesus has done. These are some very critical teachings, and we need to pay close attention because our response will have an eternal effect and consequence.

First, Paul reminds us that the righteousness we need is that which is "based on faith (Rom 10:6 ESV)." We are not made righteous to God by anything that we can do for ourselves. It is only through the work of Christ that we are saved and made right with God. Paul explained this fully in Romans 3 through 5.

Next, in Romans 10:9-13, Paul gives us a portrait of that kind of faith by which God makes us righteous - confession and belief. For "if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved (Rom 10:9-10 ESV)." These two aspects are tied together in our faith, as we will see.

Confession means agreeing with God about something. In this case, we are agreeing with God that "Jesus is Lord (Rom. 10:9 ESV)." Jesus is Master, King, Ruler, Authority, and Lord over creation. We confess the truth of who He is when we truly believe it. Those things that we sincerely believe are also the things that we will proclaim to others. 

Belief (the same word that Scripture uses for "faith" in the original languages) means complete trust and dependence on something or someone. Here, Paul says we need to believe "that God raised [Jesus] from the dead (Rom 10:9 ESV)." Jesus is alive! The tomb is empty, and Jesus has conquered sin and death. He is the victor. We completely depend on what He has done, and trust that He has done this. We were dead, and now we are live together with Him because of His resurrection.

Paul continues to explain how this is connected with our salvation, quoting from Joel 2:32: "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." We call on the Lord to save us when we recognize that we cannot save ourselves - when we realize that we are helpless without Him. It is essentially a "crying out" for help. When we confess and believe the truth about Christ, we trust that He is able, and therefore we will call out to Him to save us and do what we cannot do. Paul also states here that "Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame (Rom. 10:11 ESV)." He will not disappoint those who have trusted in Him. Whoever calls out to Him will be rescued, not from their own works, but from trusting in the one who is able. He never fails, and He always keeps His word.

In Romans 10:14-17, Paul then shares why it is so urgent for us to share the news about Christ. Here is his argument (my paraphrase):

• How can someone call on Him if they do not believe in Him?
• How can someone believe in Him if they haven't heard about Him?
• How can someone hear about Him unless someone else tells them about Him?
• How can someone be told about Him unless someone is sent to tell them?

If we reverse this, and put the the ideas into statements rather than questions, the logic of the argument is more clear:

• We are sent to tell people about Jesus.
• When we tell people about Jesus, they can hear about Jesus.
• When people hear about Jesus, they have the opportunity to believe in Him.
• When people believe in Jesus, they will call on Him to save them.

Here, the urgency is clear. How will anyone hear about what Jesus has done, unless we tell them about it? We have been sent, as His Church, to tell our world the good news of Christ, and if we don't do it, people may not hear about Him. If they don't hear about Him, they don't have the opportunity to believe in Him. If they do not believe in Him, they will not call on Him to save them.

The bottom line? We need to tell people about Jesus. You and I have contact with people that may never have another friend who is believer. We may be the only person to ever tell them about Jesus. If we don't do it, who will? As Pastor Joe often says, "There is no Plan B." We need to be the ones who tell our friends and family the truth about Jesus. It doesn't need to be fancy or formal. Just share with them like you would share anything else that is incredibly important. Just tell them what Jesus has done, and how you have been changed because of it.

We are sent. Let's tell our world about what Jesus has done, that they may come to trust in Him and call on Him as their Savior!

This week our L3 Journal reading plan takes us through a passage of scripture that can be difficult to understand and potentially difficult to swallow.

Romans 9:13 - "As it is written, 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'"

Romans 9:17 "For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, 'For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.'"

Romans 9:21-22 - "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show His wrath and to make known His power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction..."

These verses trigger all the churchy buzzwords of election, foreknowledge, predestination, hardening and will; however, we will be best served framing the argument as Paul, the author of Romans, frames it.  The question does not revolve around salvation history, but it revolves around God.

What do we believe about God?

When the question first comes up about choice, Paul responds with verse 14: "What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means!"

For Paul, the argument begins not with fairness, but with whether or not God is just.  We would absolutely affirm the righteousness of God.

Exodus 34:6-7 - "The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, 'The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and fourth generation.'"

Romans 3:24-26 - "and are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in His divine forbearance He had passed over former sins. It was to show His righteousness at the present time, so that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus."

These passages illustrate the holiness of God who does not overlook sin, but has provided a way out for sinners through the cross of Jesus Christ. To this point there is probably very little confusion, but the point we need to take away is huge.  God is a holy (set apart), righteous, just God who exemplifies all of these attributes in every action, judgment, and revelation.  Every movement of our God toward man in human history exemplifies His justice, His righteousness, and His holiness.

The question then becomes, how do we explain the tension that we feel when we look at passages of Scripture that we would view as unjust (remember the claim Paul is refuting in Romans 9:14)?

To answer this question is in many ways to not answer the question. Isaiah 55:8-9: "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."  The reality is that when we feel tension in Scripture, we must rely on the truths about God that we know.  We know that God is good.  We know that He is holy, righteous, and just.  We know that His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts.

A.W. Tozer says it this way in his highly recommended work, The Knowledge of the Holy, "What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us." In other words in will define how we view the world, the Scriptures and God's actions.  We must believe rightly about God and that will help us when the Scriptures cause tension.

What do we believe about the sinfulness of man?

Well, this section is much shorter.

Romans 3:10 - "as it is written: 'None is righteous, no, not one...'"

Romans 3:23 - "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God..."

Romans 6:23 - "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

So, when it comes to how we stand before a holy God, every human is guilty and deserving of the ultimate penalty of death and separation from God.

How does all this fit together to help me understand what is going on in Romans 9:11-23?

We now have a clear lens to look through.  God is holy, righteous, and just in every action.  Humanity is wickedly depraved and sinful, deserving of death.  God's ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts.

It is impossible for humanity to earn salvation.  That is clear in Romans 9:15-16: "For He says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.'" So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. Our salvation, the fact that our eyes have been opened to see Jesus, has nothing to do with our goodness, but on the mercy and compassion of God alone. To this end, when it comes to salvation, God is seen as just and the justifier of all who believe, and is seen as lovely.

But what about the rest? What about those whose hearts have been hardened? What about those who are unable to resist his will (verse 19) and are vessels of wrath prepared for destruction and dishonorable use? There is not a great answer except to quote Paul in Romans 9:20, "But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, 'Why have you made me like this?'"

His ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts. In the end it really does not do any good to look at the Potter and say that He made a mistake. God is at work to make His power known (verse 9:22) and to "make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which He has prepared beforehand for glory." His eternal purposes might not make sense in our 21st-century American culture of fairness, but to be fair, He tells us as much when He says as the heavens are high above the earth so is the difference between His ways and thoughts and ours.

So what do I do with this?

If you have been made to see Jesus and trust in His name and work, you owe Him everything.  From the depths of gratitude for being a vessel of mercy to the heights of obedience in proclaiming His truth to a world who desperately needs Him.

People mistake the doctrine of divine election as an excuse to be selfish with the gospel.  This, however, could not be further from the call of God on our lives.  Eventually Paul gets to Romans 10:13-15, "For 'everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in Him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!'"

His ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts.  Here again is tension. Salvation is the work of God, but He includes human responsibility not only in the believing, but also in the sending.  If you are a child of God, who has been blessed with the free gift of salvation that we could not earn, it is our divine obligation to advance the kingdom of God by making disciples of Jesus Christ.

Brian Tryhus
FBC Family Pastor

"But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it--the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith." (Romans 3:21-25a)

This week in our L3 journals, we have been reading through Romans 3 and 4, which together serve as one of the clearest explanations of salvation and justification. These two chapters are preceded by Paul's thorough discussion on sin in chapters one and two. In those first chapters, we see that we all stood condemned under God's righteous wrath against sin, because we have all sinned. This was our hopeless status before God, and where we would have remained if God had not stepped in to alter the course of our lives.

In chapter three and following, we find the solution that God provided for our reconciliation with God. We find that the way for us to "patch things up" with God is not by anything of our own doing--not by "works of the law." It is only by God's doing that we can have a reconciled relationship to Him. It is only because He was so gracious and loving that He sent His Son to be a sacrifice in our place, as a "propitiation by his blood." This word, "propitiation" (Greek, hilasterion) is the word that I would like to focus on today.

The occurrence of this word here in Romans 3:25 is the only time it appears in Paul's writings. The only other use of the word in this form is in Hebrews 9:5, where it is translated as "the mercy seat." This alternate translation of this word gives us some insight into its meaning. By the usage of this word in Scripture, a link is made between the function of Jesus in His death and the mercy seat from the ark of the covenant.

The mercy seat was essentially the cover for the ark of the covenant (the Hebrew word literally means, "cover"), which contained the two tablets of the ten commandments, Aaron's budding rod, a jar of manna, and the first Torah scroll written by Moses. This cover (see an artist's rendition above) consisted mainly of two angels with their wings spread out toward one another and covering their heads. The place where these wings came together was called the mercy seat, and this is where God dwelt when His people were bringing their offerings and sacrifices to Him.

The ark was kept in the Holy of Holies, which was the innermost section of the tabernacle and eventually the temple in Jerusalem. This section of the tabernacle and the temple could only be entered on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), and then only by the High Priest. This priest would take the blood from the sacrificial bull and enter the Holy of Holies to sprinkle the blood onto the mercy seat to make atonement for himself, for his family, for the other priests, and for the people of God. The High Priest did this each year to satisfy the righteous wrath of God against sin.

 As Romans 3:25-26 points out, God would not be just if He did not punish sin. In order to be a righteous judge, sin must be dealt with and punished; Jesus bore that punishment in our place, as the perfect sacrifice (superseding bulls and goats) for our redemption. These verses say that God was basically being patient with humanity, and not punishing our sin. Instead, He was deferring punishment of those sins until Jesus would bear them once for all. He could not let them go without punishment forever, and that was never the plan.

As the book of Hebrews says, the blood of bulls and goats was not sufficient to completely cleanse humanity from their sin nor to satisfy the wrath of God. Jesus' sacrifice, however, was sufficient. No other sacrifice is needed now. Jesus is enough. Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sin, reconciling us with God by His blood. He did what we could not do, which was to satisfy the righteous wrath of God.

Truly, "justification means this miracle: that Christ takes our place and we take his" (Emil Brunner, Mediator, p. 524). This is the beauty of this word, "propitiation." In our place, He bore our condemnation, taking the punishment of God's wrath against sin. In place of condemnation, Jesus accounts His righteousness to us. This is all a free gift received only by trusting and believing in what He has accomplished for us. The mercy seat and the Day of Atonement of the Old Covenant has been replaced by Jesus--our atoning sacrifice--and the righteous wrath of God is satisfied with His precious blood, that of the spotless Lamb of God.

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship Arts Pastor

This week in our L3 journals, we have been reading through the first few chapters of Romans, and came across one of the foundational verses for Paul's entire case for the gospel through this letter, Romans 1:17. In this verse, Paul quotes from Habakkuk 2:4: "The righteous shall live by faith." In this post, I just want to help clarify a few things, which will help us as we set out on our journey through the book of Romans.

In the previous verse, Paul had just finished saying that the gospel is "the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes," and then continues in this verse by saying, "for in it (the gospel) the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith." What Paul means in these statements is that the gospel message reveals God's righteousness, which has always been through faith (the unusual phrase "from faith for faith" or "from faith to faith" is most often interpreted as meaning "faith from beginning to end" or "faith from start to finish"), is the power of God for our salvation. The message of Jesus Christ's life, death, and resurrection reveals the righteousness of God, and is our means for salvation.

Paul then quotes the verse from Habakkuk that we mentioned earlier, "The righteous shall live by faith." There is another way to translate this from the original language, and it is often mentioned in the footnotes of our Bibles: "The one who by faith is righteous shall live." This verse says that life (i.e. salvation and eternal life) belongs to those who are righteous by faith. These are the ones who have been declared righteous by God through our trusting in Him.

What does Paul accomplish by bringing this verse into the discussion? He proves his previous statement. God's way for us to be saved has always been through faith in His work on our behalf. His plan was never for us to think that we could save ourselves by being good enough or by working our way into His good graces. It has always been by trusting in God's righteousness and mercy.

Christ was the perfect fulfillment of God's plan from the beginning. While many religious leaders from the time of exile through the first century had corrupted this message and lost sight of the true way of salvation, God had always intended for His people to be redeemed by trusting and believing in His work on their behalf. In this way, as Paul will soon tell us, God is the one who gets the credit and glory for our salvation; not us.

In these two small verses of Romans 1:16-17, we find the theme that Paul will emphasize throughout his letter to the church in Rome. Salvation is, and has always been, through trusting in the Lord - in His work on our behalf, in His righteousness, in His goodness. In Christ's life, death, and resurrection, it is now clearer than ever. As a result, Jesus Christ is the one who is worthy of all praise and honor and glory. He is the one who has saved us. He is the only one is deserving of our worship.

As it has been written, "The righteous shall live by faith."

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship & Arts Pastor

JOHN 16:5-15 - So Close, Yet So Far Away

This past weekend, Joe taught from John 14 about how the Spirit is our help from God to love and obey Christ. The Spirit empowers us to live a life of worship that honors our Savior. Our response are either to be led by the Spirit, to ignore the Spirit, or to deny the Spirit. This week in our L3 readings, one of the passages we read was in John 16, where Jesus continues to teach about the Holy Spirit, who would come to the disciples after His death.

The Advantage

In this passage, Jesus goes so far as to say, "It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you (John 16:7)". He is telling His disciples that it is better for Him to leave them than it would be if He had stayed in the flesh. Why is that? How could it be better for Him to go away? I can only imagine the questions that the disciples had to be feeling after having spent three solid years physically walking with Jesus. It had to feel, in a way, like He was abandoning them. However, that couldn't be further from the truth.

God With Us

In his book The Problem Of Pain, C.S. Lewis wrote something that has always stuck with me in regards to the distance and nearness of God. He says this: "God is both further from us, and nearer to us, than any other being" (The Problem Of Pain, p. 33). In the context of this quotation, Lewis is discussing the relationship between the Creator and the creature. As the Creator, God is very different than His creation. He is infinite, we are finite. He is omnipresent, we are in one place at a time. He is perfect, we are sinful. In these ways (and many others), God is very far from us. 

However, Lewis also speaks of how near God is to us (also called His "immanence"), in that He supplies every breath that we breathe, and any powers we have in this life are supplied by His endless power and energy. This divine nearness is further amplified by the Spirit's presence with us when we are in Christ. He is truly God with us. Before Christ's death and resurrection the Spirit was only given positionally to those who were leading God's people (kings, prophets, and priests). But, because Christ died in our place for our sins, we stand before God in Christ's perfect righteousness, and therefore His Spirit can dwell in us. Everyone who trusts in Christ has the Spirit.

In the Spirit, God is nearer to us than would be possible in any other way. This is why it was better for Christ to "go away," because rather than having only His physical presence in the flesh, we have His Spirit dwelling in us every moment of every day, empowering us to live a life that loves and obeys Christ, giving Him the glory He deserves as our Savior!

The Bottom Line

With the Spirit dwelling in us, we can follow His leading to love, honor, and exalt Jesus. We have God's continual presence in our lives, teaching us, transforming us, and making us holy. This work will be completed when we finally see Jesus face to face. Praise God for the gift of the Spirit, and may we never take His presence with us for granted.

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship Arts Pastor

John 7:37-39 and the Water from the Rock

This week in our L3 journals, we read about something Jesus said on the last day of the Feast of Booths. He said, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink" (Jn. 7:37). He continued, "Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, 'Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water'" (Jn. 7:38). What is not readily obvious to us here is that Jesus is referring to a particular narrative from the book of Exodus, and it will help us understand the work of the Spirit in believers.

The Feast of Booths

The Feast of Booths is a celebration of God's protection and provision in the wilderness after the Hebrew people crossed the Red Sea. They would set up "booths," which were shelters built from branches, to remember God's protection and shelter; then they would take a pitcher of water out of the Pool of Siloam and pour it out to remember God's provision of water from the rock. In Exodus 17:1-7, we find that God's people were thirsty and began complaining against God and against Moses (as they often did in the wilderness), and they looked back favorably upon their time of slavery in Egypt. They accused God and Moses of bringing them out into the wilderness to kill them. When Moses prayed to the Lord for help and for guidance, God told him to go ahead of the people with the elders, and to strike a rock at Horeb. When Moses did this, water came flowing from the rock. This was a miracle of God's provision.

A Different Story

Later, in Numbers 20:2-13, we see a similar, but different, scene. God's people were thirsty yet again, and again they were complaining against God and against Moses. This time, however, God told Moses "to tell the rock before their eyes to yield its water" (Ex. 20:8) Instead, Moses chided the people and struck the rock twice with his staff, and the water came out. God counted this as sin, and it is the reason Moses was not allowed to enter the Promised Land with God's people.

Why was this an issue? Why was this a sin? Well, on the Sinai peninsula and the surrounding areas, rain seeps down through the rocky plateaus and mountainous regions, and forms mineral deposits on the sides of the rock. Bedouin people, even today, can find these deposits, knock them off of the rock, and drinkable water will come out.

The first time God told Moses to strike the rock, He was teaching Moses how to find water for the people. The teaching was the miracle then. In this second occurrence, Moses speaking to the rock was supposed to be the miracle God was going to perform. God was going to get the glory that way, because it wasn't something Moses could do. Instead, Moses settled for his own, lesser glory, and took the credit for himself by making a show of it. This is why it was a sin before God. Moses knew that striking the rock would produce water, so he did it his way. He wanted the glory for himself in that moment. God responded to Moses' actions by saying, "Because you did not believe in me, to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them" (Ex. 20:12). Moses did not trust God to do what He said He would do.

The Work of The Spirit

This idea translates to the work of God that Jesus is speaking about in John 7. Whoever believes in Jesus will have "rivers of living water" flowing from his heart. If we believe in Him, He will give us the Holy Spirit, and our hearts will be changed, and we will have "living water" (the outflow of the Spirit's work in and through us) to share with those around us. We will be conduits of God's blessing to others, as we share His love and mercy, which was shown to us through the cross of Christ.

Notice, however, that John clarifies: the Spirit is only given to those who believe in Jesus. Not everyone has the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament, we see the Spirit coming and going from certain "anointed" people (usually kings and prophets), such as Saul and David. Now because of Christ, the Spirit comes and remains with those who believe in Him. When we are in Christ, we have the Spirit, and the miraculous work of God in us. This is not something that can be manufactured or faked before God. He knows what is really happening within us. He knows if we truly believe, or if we are putting on a show. He can see it by what is flowing from our lives.

The Bottom Line

The real question for each of us is this: what is flowing from our lives? Is it the living water of Christ, or something else? Do we truly believe in the saving work of Jesus on the cross in our place for our sins, and giving Him all the glory for our salvation? Or are we faking it, and still attempting to make it into His favor by our good works, and really taking the credit for ourselves inside? Which is it? We cannot have it both ways.

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship Arts Pastor

John 4:1-45

(Jacob's well from John 4 - in a Greek Orthodox church building that has been built around the site)

In our L3 journals this past week, we read John 2 through John 4. In John 4, we read of Jesus' encounter with a Samaritan women at Jacob's well, on the outskirts of Sychar. As Joe shared this weekend, Jesus, exhausted from His journey and the noonday heat, began the conversation by asking her for a drink, then spoke of the "living water" that only He could offer, and then launched into telling the woman her own life story. When she realized that Jesus was a "prophet" (which, at the least, meant that she knew He was 'gifted'), she began to discuss the differences in the theology of the Samaritans and the Jews, specifically in reference to the place of worship.

The History

Around 400 B.C., the Samaritans built a rival temple on Mt. Gerizim (see the location in relation to Sychar on the map below, and read Deuteronomy 11:29-30 and 27:2-7, 12 for context), which was destroyed in the 2nd century B.C. by Hasmonean leader John Hyrcanus of Judea as their empire expanded north. This only served to increase the mutual animosity between the Jews and Samaritans. Despite the destruction of their temple, the Samaritans continued to worship on Mt. Gerizim. 

(The well is located near Sychar, along the road north from Jerusalem to Galilee)

No Mountain Necessary

When the Samaritan woman raises this subject, Jesus responds by telling her, "the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father" (Jn. 4:21). In other words, the previously assigned locations for worship will soon be superseded by a better way for those who worship the Father. Then, Jesus speaks of the nature of divine revelation in the two people groups: the Samaritans only believed that the first five books of the Old Testament (aka the Pentateuch - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy) were divinely-inspired Scripture, while the Jews held the entire Old Testament (the Tanakh) was divinely-inspired. In John 4:22 Jesus tells the woman that the Samaritans worship what they "do not know" (i.e. they are "outside the stream of God's revelation" [D.A. Carson - The Pillar New Testament Commentary on John, 223]). Inversely, He tells her that the Jews worship what they know, "for salvation is from the Jews" (Jn. 4:22). He is saying here that Jews know the person and work of God because they have believe all of God's revelation in Scripture, and know that the Messiah (thus, salvation) will come from the Jewish line and according to the prophecy of the entire Old Testament.

The New And Living Way

Then, in John 4:23-24, Jesus once again shows how this way of worship is superseded by a better way. he says to her, "But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." What is Jesus saying here about worship? He is saying that a new era has dawned with His own coming. He is saying that "this worship can take place only in and through Him; He is the true temple" (Carson, 224) (remember Jn. 2:19-22). Jesus is the turning point between the old way and the new way. He is the cause and the means for true worship.

To worship "in spirit and truth" is not dependent on a location, but on a person, Jesus Christ. John 4:24 says that "God is spirit"--invisible, not limited to a specific place, divine, and somewhat unknowable "unless He chooses to reveal Himself" (Carson, 225)--and therefore He must be worshiped in a manner that goes beyond physical things and comes from the depths of one's being. Tied to this is the idea of worshiping in "truth." The idea of truth is connected to God's Self-Revelation and Self-Expression in Jesus. Jesus is the Truth. Jesus is the Word of God. Both of these ideas ("spirit" and "truth") share one preposition in the original Greek ("in"), and are inseparable. We cannot have one without the other. So it is that "unless they are born from above, unless they are born of the Spirit, they cannot see the kingdom of God, they cannot worship God truly" (Carson, 225).

The Bottom Line

"The worshipers whom God seeks worship Him out of the fullness of the supernatural life they enjoy ("in spirit"), and on the basis of God's incarnate Self-Expression, Christ Jesus Himself, through whom God's person and will are finally and ultimately disclosed ('in truth'); and these two characteristics form one matrix, indivisible" (Carson, 225-226). True worship of God is only made possible by the person and work of Jesus Christ, the "Truth" who reveals to us who God (being "spirit") truly is. True worship encompasses all of who we are as His people, redeemed and born-again because of His death and resurrection.

May we worship the Father in spirit and truth each and every day from here to eternity!

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship & Arts Pastor

This week in our L3 journal, we read through the end of the Gospel of Matthew. In this portion of Matthew's Gospel, we find what is often called, the "Passion Week," where Jesus experiences the difficult journey to the cross for our redemption. In chapter 27:27-44, we see the focal point of the entire gospel message - the crucifixion of Jesus.

Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters, and they gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and puta scarlet robe on him, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him and led him away to crucify him.
As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. They compelled this man to carry his cross. And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull), they offered him wine to drink, mixed with gall, but when he tasted it, he would not drink it. And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. Then they sat down and kept watch over him there. And over his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.” Then two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way. (Mt. 27:27-44 ESV)

The phrase that I highlighted here is what sticks out to me most from this passage today, and this is why: what the chief priests, scribes, and elders were saying in their mocking of Jesus was more true than they knew. Jesus could not both save us and save himself at the same time. In order for any of us to be rescued from our sin and from death, Jesus had to die. There was no other way for us to be rescued. The penalty for our sin could only be removed by the death of the perfect Man (aka "The Spotless Lamb"). Any other sacrifice would have been insufficient. God's righteous wrath against sin was poured out completely on Jesus in our place. He was condemned for our sin, despite His perfect innocence. If He came down from that cross and saved Himself the suffering, He could not have saved us. He stayed on the cross because of His great love for us, and His perfect obedience to the Father. This was the only way, and He would see it through, so that we could be redeemed.

When we choose to place our faith and trust in Jesus' finished work on the cross, where He took the penalty for our sin, we receive His gift of salvation. We can either choose to depend on our own goodness to attempt to earn heaven, but in so doing we also choose to bear the wrath for sin on our own. Or we can trust that Jesus paid it all, recognizing that we have nothing to offer God, and are completely dependent on His gracious gift of salvation through the cross. Truly, "there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

Praise the mighty name of Jesus Christ, because He endured the cross and the wrath for sin in our place, and did not save Himself. May we each examine ourselves and know how truly desperate we were/are for His saving work on the cross. There was no other way for us to be saved. "He saved others; he cannot save himself."

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship & Arts Pastor

This week in our L3, we have been reading through Psalms 120-132. In these Psalms, we find songs of prayer for deliverance (120, 129, 130), songs of confidence in God's providence and power (121, 124, 125 - the Psalm from which the song "Those Who Trust" was written, 127, 132), songs of celebration (122, 126), a cry for mercy (123), a song of wisdom (128), and a song of peace (131). In your Bible, you may see a heading over each of these Psalms: "A Song of Ascents." These were songs that the people of Israel sang as they ascended the hill on which Jerusalem was situated, "the mountain of the Lord" (Isaiah 30:29 ESV).

My favorite of these Psalms is 130. In this Psalm, we see the Psalmist mourning his sin and guilt, and his resulting desperation for God's mercy. We can also see the teaching of a righteousness given by faith. The beginning of this Psalm is where each of us truly begin our relationship with God - we need to recognize the depth of our sin, and our desperation for God's mercy. Self-help is not an option for our redemption. God must do it. Verse 3 shows the gravity of the situation, recognizing that if God decides to count all of our transgressions against us, we don't have a chance! It is only because of His grace and mercy that we have hope.

In verse 4, we also get a clearer picture of what "the fear of the Lord" looks like. Notice that forgiveness is the cause of the Psalmist's "fear" of God. If the Psalmist's relationship with God were like that of a slave or servant to a master, this "servile fear would have been diminished, not increased, by forgiveness" (Derek Kidner, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries: Psalms, 482). Instead, "fear" in the Old Testament "means reverence and implies relationship" (Kidner, 482).

Through the rest of the Psalm, the Psalmist speaks of his hope in the Lord and his word. He speaks of God's "steadfast love" and "plentiful redemption" (v. 7). And then there is the bottom line: God "will redeem Israel from all his iniquities." Notice who is the one doing the redeeming and forgiving. It is God. Not us. Not the Psalmist. He is well aware that he cannot rescue himself from his sin. The Psalmist must to turn to God and trust in Him to forgive us through His mercy, His steadfast love, and His plentiful redemption, even though the Psalmist was not yet aware of the means of this ultimate forgiveness (Jesus Christ).

This Psalm takes us through the journey that we all must walk, from desperation and guilt in our sin to hope, forgiveness, and redemption in Jesus Christ, our Redeemer.

To think on this Psalm further, listen to this recording of a piece from composer John Rutter's Requiem, entitled "Out of the Deep," which comes almost verbatim from Psalm 130:

Out of the Deep

About a decade ago, this song made me take a close look at Psalm 130, and helped me to see its beauty and value for us today. Enjoy!

May we each recognize our desperate need for mercy, forgiveness, and redemption from our deep sin. We have no hope without Christ! May we each remember and thank Him for His work on the cross to rescue us and to wash away our sin.

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship & Arts Pastor

In nearly every one of Paul’s letters to the churches (Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus Philippi, Colossae, Thessalonica), there are some recurring themes. The most significant of these themes is that of justification by faith alone in Jesus Christ. In the last two letters we have read together in our L3 journal, Galatians and Ephesians, we see this theme very clearly.

In Galatians 2:16, Paul writes, “yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified” (ESV). To be “justified” is a legal term meaning “to be declared righteousness,” and basically communicates the idea of “right-standing” with God (Leon Morris, The Atonement, p. 187). Paul goes on in chapter 3 to discuss Abraham (this passage is very similar to Romans 3:21 - 5:11), and how God made a covenant promise to him through faith, without any law. "The law," Paul writes, “came 430 years afterward,” and “does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.” Basically, if the promise was given without any law, then the law that came 430 years later does not change the promise. The original promise still stands. The law was given to teach people what true righteousness looks like and what was God's standard for righteousness.

Paul is saying here that a right-standing and relationship with God cannot come by working for it. It always came by believing and trusting Him. Before Christ, true Judaism was looking forward in faith and trust in God’s ultimate provision of salvation through the Savior (the people that Jesus was most harsh with in the Gospels were the ones who were trying to establish a their right-standing and relationship with God based on their own merit, like the Pharisees).

Today, we are on the other side of that ultimate provision in Jesus Christ, and the message is clear: we cannot save ourselves, nor can we have right-standing with God based on our own work. We need Jesus Christ’s perfect life, death, and resurrection in order to have a relationship with God. This is what Paul is saying here: no one has right-standing with God because of their own good works. It is only by God’s grace that we are made right with God. We are all incapable of fulfilling the righteous requirements of the law, and we have all come up short when measured by its standards, so we are hopeless on our own (see also Rom. 3:23). Trusting in Jesus’ work on our behalf is the only way for us to be justified.

In Ephesians 2, Paul says it this way (my paraphrase), “You were dead in your sin. You did not keep the law, even if you tried. You disobeyed God. Despite all of this, God, because He is rich in mercy and loves us so much, that He made us alive together with Christ. It is only by His grace that you are alive. It is not because of anything you have done. You can’t take any credit for this. It is only by His undeserved gift of salvation through Jesus Christ that you have life.”

We do not deserve God’s forgiveness, His love, or His grace and mercy. Rather, we deserve His wrath for our sin. That is where our lives were heading without Christ, because we could not fulfill the law, despite our best efforts. He is our only hope. He is our salvation. He is the one who declares us righteous through His death in our place, for our sins, on the cross. He is the one who gives us right-standing and a relationship with God. The way to have this new life? TRUST HIM- not yourself or anything you have done. Trust what He has done for you. Trust that it is enough. Believe that there is nothing you can do to make it a better deal for God. You cannot make yourself look any better in the sight of God. Jesus has already done all the work and been perfect in your place. His promise is the only way for you to be justified. His grace is our only hope. Let us never forget that our salvation is not of our own doing in any way. We didn’t save ourselves, and we don’t keep ourselves saved. It is only by the grace of God that we are saved and have the promise of eternal life with Him. This thought runs through all of Paul’s letters in some way, and is the crux of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

In the Son,

Bill Horn
FBC Worship & Arts Pastor