I'll Be Honest

We must not give a ready-made Christian position. If we do, what will happen to the young Christian when he encounters something not ‘on the list’? If the guidance we give becomes dictation, it is no longer guidance, and that does despite to the Holy Spirit and to the man’s own personality. Is it right to advise a young Christian against a thing though he does not see it? If he acts on your dictum...

Christ gives us four examples that reveal our constant tendency to be watching out for ourselves and our self-interest. We are often in the defensive attitude and looking for insults and injuries that are done against us. Often the slightest disturbance can affect us. Yet Jesus calls us not to retaliate but to go the second mile and give to the one who begs from you. As we live out Matthew 5:38-42...

How should a believer handle subjective feelings in the Christian life? What role, if any, do feelings and affections matter in our salvation and affirming the validity of our Christianity? Tonight we will consider what the Bible says about this topic of our feelings and emotions. 0:00 - Introduction 5:06 - Is Bill Bright's illustration entirely right? 8:43 - Colossians 3.10 9:56 - Where are you a...

Are you part of a church that puts a major priority on prayer as the Scriptures do? If so, what is your level of commitment to the corporate prayer meeting? Consider these twenty Scriptures about corporate prayer in the New Testament Church: Mark 11:17, Luke 11:1, Luke 9:28-29, Matthew 26:36-41, Acts 1:14, Acts 1:24, Acts 2:42, Acts 3:1, Acts 4:24-31, Acts 6:4-6, Acts 8:14-15, Acts 12:5,12, Acts 1...

Jesus Christ forbids us from swearing and taking oaths in the well-known Sermon on the Mount. But the Bible also seems to permit and allow swearing in other places, both in the Old and New Testament. God, Himself is even listed as one of the Persons who swears. How can we reconcile this area of tension and come to a proper understanding of Jesus' words in the Sermon on the Mount? 0:00 - Logo intro...

The Pharisees had a skewed view of marriage and divorce. They taught that you could divorce your wife for any reason as long as you give her a certificate of divorce. Jesus exposes their skewed teaching and declares the truth about marriage and divorce. In this sermon, Pastor Tim shows that marriage is a unity of a man and woman that God has brought together, and no man should separate. It is a se...

Do you trust the Lord even when you have no feelings? We need to remember that God often withdraws His sensible presence from us to test and purify our faith. Will you still follow the Lord even when you don't "feel" Him with you? In this excerpt, Paul Washer considers a truth from Isaiah 50.

Jesus compares this war on lust with someone cutting off their own limb or gouging out their own eye. We must deal drastically with sin; this is the good fight of faith. But how are we able to defeat such a Goliath? Well, just like David defeated Goliath, we conquer lust by relying on the Lord as our help. We put to death lust by the Spirit of God! Outline: 0:00 - Reading text Matthew 5.27-30. 1:3...

Preachers will often study and preach on the very issues that they are wrestling through in their own souls. They wrestle with God's Word to find clarity and Biblical truth to help them on these matters. Needs such as what are some ways that we can grow in grace in the Christian life? What are the pillars that we need to have firmly rooted in our souls to make progress in our heavenly pilgrimage?

Upon Jesus' discourse in the Sermon on the Mount, He begins to deal with further issues of the heart, the first being 'murder in the heart.' Jesus does not hold back in the slightest when dealing with unrighteous anger and hatred. Four times Jesus warns of hell as the appropriate punishment for such a heart crime. As Christians, we are to avoid at all costs a slanderous and gossiping spirit and st...

An essential characteristic of someone who wants to follow Jesus Christ and call themselves a Christian is meekness. When we think of meekness, it truly is a rare quality in this world. Meekness is a death blow to self and to our pride. Meekness is forgiving those who hurt us. In short, meekness is being like the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Christian life is full of paradoxes; one, in particular, is that our lives are full of joy but also full of mourning. Even though we have the joy of Christ and the hope of heaven, yet there are still many things in this life that cause us to mourn. One thing that specifically causes us to mourn is our own remaining sin. These two realities may not seem to go together to the carnal mind, but we...

Before we can properly understand the Sermon on the Mount, we must understand the beatitudes; and in particular, we need to understand the first beatitude: poor in spirit. Poverty of spirit is the soil in which all the other beatitudes grow. It's the first truth that must be believed in order to open the door for other spiritual truths. Most importantly, being poor in spirit is the characteristic...

Our lives as Christians should be full of activity, but we need the sober reminder that we desperately need God to be the One empowering our activity. Our activity can imperceptibly become something that originates and is carried out by us. But the Bible from start to finish is all about God being the One empowering and carrying out His activity. In all of your labor, is God the One ultimately at...

The Lord consistently brings us to a place where human resources are insufficient. We realize we cannot, but Christ can, and in our inability, we must team up with Christ's ability, and something will happen.

We're living in very strange and difficult times; times that are going to test the genuineness of our faith. We don't know exactly what God is doing and we don't know how these times are going to end. But one thing we must know is that Christ is worthy of our trust in these providential times that we're living.

When the Bible describes the Devil, one of the chief attributes it gives to him is his power. Christian, remember that in your spiritual battle that you're not facing a lightweight. We're facing the one who the Bible actually calls, "the god of this world." But as powerful as he is, we must also remember that the One who's with us is far more powerful.

Can you wrongly put someone under church discipline? If yes, and you do so, what is the way to undo that?

How should Christians view the speed limit? Is it a sin to go over it? Is what is enforced by the government the de facto law?

1. Let the glory of God govern your marriage. 2. Let the will of God unfold and guide your home. 3. Let the Spirit of God fill and empower your marriage. 4. Let the Word of God dwell richly in your hearts and in your home. 5. Let the Gospel of God's grace fuel your marriage and your life. 6. Let the people of God be your family. This excerpt was taken from the end of a message Mack shared at a wed...

If we want to draw near to God, we can learn some very helpful realities from David in Psalm 86 now how to boldly approach God.

If we would draw near to God, we must first know God. We can only know who God is and what God is like from what He's revealed to us in His Word.

To what degree do you experience soul thirst for God? You don't have to give a thirsty person a list of steps on how to find water, they are looking for it. The Bible says to draw near to God, and you don't have to convince a thirsty person to draw near to water; in the same way, the Christian draws near to God because they thirst for Him. God has made this world full of shadows that represent spi...

Some of the questions dealt with tonight: 1. My question is a two-part one. The first part is would you encourage single parents who believe they are called to overseas missions to go? The second part is how would you encourage them? I ask because I am a single mother missionary. When the Lord first put the call in my soul I researched the idea of single parent missionary and honestly found nothin...

“I cheated on an exam when I was lost, what should I do about it?” It is far more difficult to live with a defiled conscience than to live with whatever consequences you might face for clearing your conscience. Those who are newly saved often find themselves now sensitive to sins from their past and God will give them the grace to deal with that which is appropriate to expose.