Cheezy Christian T-Shirts Do More Harm Than Good

I appreciate the zeal of the people who make cheezy Christian t-shirts, but I believe they are doing more harm to the gospel than good. I pray that the Lord will take their zeal and direct it in Christ exalting ways. I don't believe all Christian t-shirts are bad, just most of them. Here are a couple examples of fear mongering.

Atheism Described Perfectly

Creation Museum

The youth group and I took a visit to the Creation museum over the weekend. In the picture to the left is one of my favorite students, Connor Deford. He got attacked by a camel at the petting zoo. If you know Connor, this stuff happens to him wherever he goes. I have been wanting to visit this place for some time now. I have heard a lot about the museum, some good things and some bad things. I didn't know what to expect. After visiting this place I was blown away. It was amazing. I could not believe how well it was put together and how informative it was. I was especially surprised how clear and boldly the gospel was preached and shared throughout the whole museum. From the beginning to the end, Christ was preached. It was awesome. The museum had many exhibits that detailed God's good creation, the fall of man into sin, total depravity of man in society today, God's redemption of man in Christ alone, the authority of Scripture, the evidence against evolution, ect. They even had an exhibit for Martin Luther (one of my hero's). It truly was breathtaking to see. I absolutely loved it and am very thankful for Answers in Genesis and Ken Ham, who speared the creation of the Creation Museum. So if you haven't checked it out, make some plans this summer and go and visit the Creation Museum, I promise that you won't be disappointed

Tree Huggers Remind me of Jonah 4

When I think of Jonah whining about the vine after God killed it, this picture comes to my mind. Enjoy

Praise God for Lecrae and Flame - Christ exalting rap

Don't Waste Your Life Video

The Gospel

I have a godly jealousy right now. One of my good friends is at a conference in Chicago called the Gospel Coalition. I wish I was there, but I trust God that He didn't want me there. I actually missed it because of youth group on Wednesday. I couldn't go to a conference and hear about the gospel while the Lord has given me a gracious task of proclaiming the gospel to kids that I love very dearly. Plus, I would miss my wife and would miss seeing my youth group kids. So I decided to write about the gospel.

The Gospel is the joyous declaration that God is redeeming the world through Christ (Matt 1:21; Luke 1:68; Eph 1:7; Col 1:20), and that he calls everyone everywhere to repent from sin and trust Jesus Christ for salvation (Mark 1:15; Acts 2:38; 17:30).

Each of us has sinned against God (Rom 3:23), breaking his law and rebelling against his rule, and the penalty for our sin is death and hell (Rom 6:23). But because he loves us, God sent his Son Jesus (John 3:16; Eph 2:4; 1 John 4:10) to live for his people's sake the perfect, obedient life God requires (Rom 8:4; 1 Cor 1:30; Heb 4:15) and to die in their place for their sin (Isa 53:5; Mat 20:28; 26:28; Mark 10:45; 14:24; Luke 22:20; John 11:50-51; Rom 3:24-25; 4:25; 1 Cor 15:3; 2 Cor 5:21; Eph 5:2Heb 10:14; 1 Pet 3:18). On the third day, He rose bodily from the grave (Mat 28:6) and now reigns in heaven (Luke 22:69; 24:51; Heb 8:1), offering forgiveness (Eph 1:7), righteousness (Rom 5:19), resurrection (Rom 8:11), and eternal blessedness in God's presence (Rev 22:4) to everyone who repents of sin and trusts solely in Him for salvation.

That's the gospel, o' what glorious news!!!

What Piper Thinks About Poopy Brownies

Poopy Brownies

Anybody like brownies? I love brownies. A warm brownie with a glass of milk is the ideal dessert. Now imagine that you have a huge, warm, delicous brownie in front of you. Would you eat it? Probably, right? But what if you found out that when the brownies were made that a little poop was added to the mixture. Would anybody want that? I gurantee that nobody would eat it. It is a poopy brownie and the only good place for it is in the garbage. Poopy brownies are being served in to many churches today. It comes in the form of the prosperity gospel. I have nothing but hatred and anger for the prosperity gospel. What the prosperity gospel says that if you tithe, God will bless and give you more money and you will be rich. It teaches "Biblical principles" but centers around money. Most of the leaders of the prosperity gospel are greedy liars that bring reproach upon the name of Christ. I can't stand that people actually preach this lie, and they emphasis it above Christ, the King, who is to blessed forever. The whole ministry is based around money and the leaders of it live lavish lifestyles and most of them get caught stealing the church's money or some other public sin. The prosperity gospel is also being exported from this country into Africa and Asia at alarming rates. It is a false gospel and we need to take a stand against it. Listen to what 1 Timothy 6:3-10 says, If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain. Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

The full scope of Biblical revelation clearly shows that God's top priority is not about making us rich and comfortable, but about exalting Christ. So I encourage you to take a stand against the prosperity gospel and the ludicrous claims that it makes. For it is not the true gospel, but a false one.

Dirty or Clean?

When I was a freshman in college I worked as a "slave laborer" for a guy in my church. We installed an in-ground pool in his backyard. It was some of the hardest and dangerous work I have ever done in my life and I got paid $7 an hour. The project was a catastrophe and everything that could have gone wrong went wrong. I will never forget one of the hardest days of work. We had just finished digging the entire ground out for the pool and it measured about 40 feet long, 20 feet wide, and 13 feet deep. It was the middle of the summer, so it was extremely hot and dry. Right after we had finished digging out the pool it started to rain, so we put a huge cover over the hole and finished for the day. The next morning when we went back to work we discovered that the cover over the hole had blown away sometime during the storm and that the hole was filled with muddy water about 2 feet high. Since the water was so muddy we could not pump it out, it had to be hauled out in buckets. That was my job for the day. From 7 am till 7 pm I had to haul out the muddy water in 5 gallon buckets. It was one of the hottest days of the year. I was covered in mud from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. It was in every crevice of my body and since it was so hot the mud dried on my skin and started to layer on me. After we had finished I was so dirty that I could not get into my car or go into my boss' house to shower. So my boss decided to hose me off with water in his front yard as I stood there in my underwear getting squirted with cold water. Finally after alot of the mud came off I went home to shower again because I was not completely clean. I showered for about 30 minutes scrubbing myself with soap and trying to get all the mud off of me. After I had finished I would get out and about 5or 10 minutes later I would discover mud on some part of my body. Either behind my ear, under my knee, inbetween my toes. I showered countless times trying to get completely clean but it was to no avail, I always felt dirty. This is how some of us are with our relationship with the Lord. When we sin we feel dirty and unclean. Sometimes no matter what we do, we just feel spiritual dirty. We try everything to "get clean," we try to act good, we try to pray hard, but we still feel dirty. When this happens we have lost sight of the gospel. Christ has redeemed us and has cleansed us completely of all sin, past, present, and future. Listen to Titus 3:4-5: But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. And 1 John 1:9: If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Remember that there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. If we are in Christ we are clean. Our eyes need to be on Jesus Christ and His completed work on the cross! That is the only answer for curing a spiritually dirty heart: CHRIST

Romans - Does It Get Any Better?

Does it get any better than the book of Romans, I think not. I love the book of Romans. Over the last week I have been trying to immerse myself in this fantastic letter. It covers almost every aspect of our faith. The more I read it the more I realize that I don't know very much. It is filled with amazing truths and there are countless diamonds of Biblical revelation to be found in every page. I exhort you to read the book of Romans and then to read it again and then to read it again...

Everyone Worships Differently

So I came to my hometown for Easter to visit my family (South suburbs of Chicago). I went to church with my family and was pleasantly surprised. The worship at their church is amazing. Everyone is praising the Lord, people are lifting up their hands and shouting to God. It was a welcome surprise that got me thinking: everyone worships the Lord differently. At Brookside Church (my home church) we don't shout and only a few people lift their hands, but guess what, God is being lifted high and worshipped with our songs of praise. At my parents church everyone is shouting and lifting their hands. Whats the difference? Everyone praises and worships God differently. For me personally, I don't shout alot and lift my hands a ton, but I love God and want to praise His Name forever. But for those of you who do, do it to the Lord and make sure He gets the praise. Remember the Scriptures: Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father (Col 3:17). I love this verse because worship isn't just what we do on Sunday mornings but it is our lives. It's not about whether we lift hands high or don't its about walking with Christ and doing everything for His glory, including how we praise His Name. Don't ever forget what Jesus said in Matthew 15:7-9,
You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you: `THIS PEOPLE HONORS ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEART IS FAR AWAY FROM ME. 'BUT IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME,
TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN.' God wants our hearts not just our outward actions. So when you praise and worship God, in whatever way you do, do it to the Lord.

Good Friday - Where is Jesus?

So I just sat through another Good Friday service with really high expectations. (I am not saying at what church I was at) I was prepared to reflect on the death of my Lord with His people at church. I thought that we were going to have a somber time meditating on the death of Jesus Christ. Guess what, that didn't happen. I listened to a sermon that didn't even mention the name of Jesus Christ. Jesus wasn't talked about until we partook of the Lord's Supper (on a side note, communion was great). Does this raise red flags for anybody? It does for me. I think it shows the state of the pulpit today. Whenever the Word of God is preached it has to be centered around the Person of Jesus Christ, for that is what the Bible is about. It is God's self-revelation of Himself through His Son Jesus Christ. Every sermon must show us Jesus! Plus, today is Good Friday, so it should be centered around the suffering and death of our Lord.

The Supremacy of Christ - What Life has to be About

This is my first post. If you are bored enough to read what I have to think you will find that it is all going to be about the Gospel. Christ is King and is Supreme over everything. We need to live in the knowledge of that everyday.

Supremacy of Christ - What Life has to be About