First Presbyterian Church of Baton Rouge

We’ve drunk a lot of darkness in our days. But it’s not too late. Never too late as long as you are here in this present moment. The dungeon flares with light. The cell doors are open. The death sentence has been commuted. A land of everlasting light and life awaits. Will you arise and follow Jesus this very hour? With whatever he is showing you of yourself, will you take it out of the dark and in...

Jesus tells Nicodemus he must be born again. He says it twice so that Nicodemus won’t miss it, “Truly, truly.” "Pay attention mighty ruler of the Jews, because if you are not born again, you will not enter, you will not see, you cannot be a part of the kingdom of God." Nicodemus did not like Jesus’ words. Rather than crying out in joy over the possibility of becoming something new, he cries out in...

The temple court can be so clogged with the day-to-day trading that there is no room for prayer and worship. The marketplace is so loud we don’t hear the cries of the little ones. Get these things outta here! The new temple has been established. The body of Jesus is the temple. We are joined to him, we become living stones in his temple, growing and fitted together in love.  

When the wine failed, Jesus turned the old water into exquisite new wine. The party was saved. But of course, much more was going. Jesus came into the world changing everything around him. With the wedding at Cana, Jesus launched the great days of his ministry, cleansing sin and overcoming disease. But those days were just the beginning. For our bridegroom, our host, the Lord Jesus himself, has mo...

Christ has come to redeem your toil and striving because now all that you do is done in service to him. Only when we bow to Christ as Lord and master can we work with purpose. Why? Because our purpose is not in what we accomplish but in the God who has conquered. Christ’s advent redeems the fact that nothing seems new under the sun because he has actually made—and will finally make—all things new....

The story of Ruth is a Christmas story. Blessed be the LORD I Am, who has not left you this day without a redeemer. He will be to you’re a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age. Into Naomi’s life of famine, loss, grief and bitterness, God sent a redeemer. She was no longer to identify her life as left without. God began to restore her with the love of Ruth. Then he sent a redeemer in Bo...

Jesus has already established the grounds for redeeming us. He became our kinsman in the flesh. He shed his blood in an offering for our sin. He rose still joined to our humanity. He created reconciliation between God and man. He is the redeemer who has given his life for us. Now everything depends on the question, “Will I give my life to Christ?” Perhaps for the first time. Perhaps after a long s...

We are but gleaners after scraps, if the truth be known. But when we come to shelter under the wings of the God of Israel, we discover the startling transformation. He does not give us scraps. He gives us himself. For his very nature is steadfast love and kindness. The echoes of the Christmas story in Ruth resound all around us. Boaz acts like Joseph, protecting and providing for a vulnerable woma...

Jesus is no stranger to anything you are going through. He has been all the way to the far, foreign country of our lives. He did not turn back from us then. He does not turn away from us now. He still wants to go with you every step of the way. He still clings to you. He will not be shaken off. He will not be dissuaded. He will not stop loving you. He has already paid the ultimate price, getting s...

This week, as you sit down to a Thanksgiving feast, give thanks above all that you have received the faith once for all delivered, the truth upon which eternal lives can be built. Give thanks for all God has brought you through. Give thanks that the season of your suffering will not endure forever, maybe not even for much longer. The Father, Son and Spirit himself has undertaken to restore you, co...

Peter calls for the disciples to “Shepherd the flock of God.” The church was being persecuted. They needed Godly wisdom and strength and encouragement. Peter’s instruction to the elders was to “Shepherd the flock of God” What does that mean?

We’re going to go through suffering. It may be bodily pain. It may be mental illness. It may be financial setbacks. It may be losing friends because we stand for Christ and the truth of his Word. It may be discrimination at work because of the gospel to which we hold. Whatever the source, we are not to be surprised. This is to be expected. Life is hard, and the way of the Christian harder still. B...

Broken, lost, distorted, venomous sinners like us have come to believe in Jesus and made new. How does that happen? Because Christ Jesus who descended to death for us, keeps doing it. He goes down into the dead hearts and brings us to life. Heart by heart he enters those he saves. Christ has to restore even my ruined capacity to choose him. He has to restore my will in order for my will freely to...

Live as those who are free. Live as servants of God. Endure suffering by entrusting yourself to the God who judges justly. Remember that to this you have been called, because Christ suffered for us, leaving us a pattern of love to follow.

On your own, you were lost, isolated. In Christ, you are a treasured possession. You have been called out of darkness into his marvelous light. So that . . . So that you can now proclaim his excellencies with affection and joy. There’s no going back to the cave. My name is Lazarus, and I live!

Your being remade into Christ, being called as living stones of the New Temple, priests to God offering spiritual sacrifices, is all of grace. Let that truth sink in and bring humility and compassion for the lost. For those who perhaps have rejected Christ, or even just have desired to sit on the fence and live a good enough life to get into heaven, know this. The Lord is just as able to save you...

So this is who we are: a spiritual temple built of living stones upon the cornerstone of Christ. Our gathering, our faithfulness comprise the church which the world will see. We are joined to him and one another. When we gather, the music soars and the praises rise. When we disperse, we do not lose our connection. We go out still as living stones, part of the temple of Christ, declaring the news o...

If you are in Christ, he has planted an imperishable seed in you. A new life grows in you. You’ve been born anew into the person you were meant to be. Only Jesus can do that for us. But if you are in Christ, the work of peeling old scales remains. There are things we need to strive to strip: malice, slander, hypocrisy, deceit and envy. For we have been made new for a purpose: to love one another e...

We are the captives. And we are the captors. Our sinful choices have delivered us into permanent bondage to our sinful nature. We’ve enslaved ourselves! But we do not have the power to free ourselves. So God foresaw a plan before the world was made. A man sinned and brought the human race to ruin. A man would have to free the human race. A man would have to arise to break the generational captivit...

Though for a little while, you suffer trials. But the suffering is brief in light of eternity we will spend with Christ. Trials, suffering, and hardships are like gold in the refiner’s fire becoming purified. Your faith is proved genuine, and this brings praise, honor, and glory to Jesus.

In just a few words, Peter expresses the huge paradox of the Christian life. “In this you greatly rejoice, you exult, even though now for a little while you have been grieved with the heaviness of trials.” Rejoice. Grieve. Leaping up with joy. Bowing down with the heaviness of suffering. Both at once. He sounds just like Paul who told the Corinthian church that we are “sorrowful yet always rejoici...

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. It’s easy to miss what’s going on here. Something happened to Jesus in this world of dust and swiftly passing time. God the Father raised the crucified and buried Jesus to new life. Jesus got up from the dea...