Rose City Baptist Church

“Even in these passages of terrible judgment, we are reminded that, while God’s character is revealed in both justice and mercy, he delights in showing mercy and compassion. Eight times in the Old Testament Yahweh is announced and introduced as in Psalm 86:15: ...a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness…He is not quick to wrath, quick to judgment…...

“This passage also calls us to remember the past grace of God.  We can ensure proper relationship with God and avoid his condemnations by remembering; remembering, and not forgetting, what God has done for us. This is the purpose for many of the songs we sing, as we recall to each other, and to ourselves, the goodness of God expressed throughout the ages to his church. Our need and God’s power and...

“God’s explanation of his commitment to continue the covenant beyond the judgment is both passionate and profound: the unique holy quality of his deity. His disposition and behaviour distinguish themselves from what would be the normal human pattern. He is God, and not a man — so he has the ability to decide when and how to exact just punishment in his fierce anger.  Despite his terrible wrath, he...

“Church, those who genuinely belong to God are ‘created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them’.  All genuine people of God are created to be the fruitful extension of Jesus’ life and ministry, commissioned to bear the fruit of love. Jesus is the true vine.  He is God’s promise fulfilled to Israel.  For a long time it looked like Israel was cut o...

“Jesus paid a high price for us. He owns us, we are his. That’s what rights we have. We have the right to be his…”

“And God keeps his promises: his promises to correct his people, to bring repentance, and to liberate those whom he loves. His promise also to judge Babylon for their wickedness. His promise to bring from Eve seed that will crush the head of the serpent…His promise to raise up the Son of David, an anointed king, who will conquer the nations. A promise to send a King who will suffer and die in our...

Tune in to listen to Pastor Leighton’s short Christmas message adjoining the Christmas Program this year, regaling us of the simplicity and meekness of the King of Kings coming to be with us in the incarnation of Christ.

“These are the attributes that we are called to grow into, as the Spirit of God is daily renovating our lives. Paul tells us to embrace forgiveness in all things, and most importantly to put on love…at first glance, these things sound great. And they are the types of scriptures we like to get printed on our coffee cups. But when we actually try to live out love and forgiveness - particularly to pe...

“Now the piece you need to know, the block that’s missing in all this is that, besides denying the resurrection and angel and spirit, the Sadducees only believed that the books of Moses were authoritative, so just the Torah. Meaning they only looked to Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy as scripture!…Christian, herein lies one of the biggest threats to the modern church. The dropp...

We were fortunate enough to hear from Reverend Andrew Chambers this morning, a friend of Pastor Josh’s who pastors the Blackfalds Faith Community Church. Tune in to here as he preaches the Gospel to us from the book of 1 Kings that morning.

“Many think they know God, but do not because their knowledge is derived from human opinions and is not informed by the whole counsel of God’s word…So what is our application today?  We have not (to my knowledge) bowed to a golden calf or applied to Egypt or Assyria for political gain…God is gracious to us church. He does not allow other things to fulfill the desire that we have for him who is the...

“Israel was in danger of losing - and indeed had lost their unique identity as God’s people…The inhabitants of the land are characterized by infighting, foolishly seeking foreign help, priestly plots, negligent leadership and false repentance. These have left Yahweh with no recourse but to announce the advent of his judgement - but he does so with great pain and no joy…At many times, and in many w...

“…For God to say ‘I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings,’ is not to say that he no longer required obedience in the sacrifice and burnt offerings of the old covenant, but that those things had become distorted when they replaced knowledge of God and the real practice of ḥesed - the steadfast love of God. Without this relational aspect of their...

“Our passage today is found right in the middle of this week in Jerusalem. Having been put in their place by the parable of the wicked tenants, the elites now send wave upon wave of their most intelligent representatives, their most adept thinkers to defeat Jesus in his understanding of the law. Mark chapter 3 tells us they just really wanna kill him, but I think it shows their pride and arrogance...

“This is our second foray into the section we visit this morning in Hosea 4:1-5:7.  Last time we ended with v.4:9, like people, like priest, which for Israel was a disaster - as we saw and will continue to see in our passage - but for those adopted as God’s people under the new covenant, like people, like priest is a great and eternal hope! Because our Great and High Priest is Christ Jesus himself...

“Here’s the crassest way I can put it: the rulers could no longer make money at the temple if John’s giving forgiveness away for free. The temple was already a pile of rubble, the custodians just didn’t know it yet…The old covenant systems had to be fully dismantled, because the coming Messiah would be bringing such a radically different covenant, that no structure from before could stand. And thi...

"...Like people, like priest, is the ancient version of the modern Western Saying: like father, like son or like mother, like daughter.  It is a very important piece here, because the priesthood are a subset of the corrupt people and vice versa. Both the priesthood and the people are estranged from God and both will incur the same judgment. And it is not as though the priests were more corrupt tha...

“The tree advertised life and fruit, but it had none. The temple advertised life and fruit to a dead and hopeless world, but it had none either. And I’ve done the same.  You and I have done the same. In fact, the mainstay, the call sign, the common thread linking all lukewarm Christianity that I have ever seen (or perpetrated), practices this same crooked theology; saying I know what I’m doing is...

“Don’t miss the impact of this story: an adulterous woman — a prostitute, is married to this prophet. And then she has children outside of this marriage, which he calls ‘Not Loved’ and ‘Not Mine’. And everyone looking at this story, this real life situation, would think ‘there is no more tragic family circumstance imaginable’…And yet, the loyal love of God, working in his servant Hosea, creates on...

“God will foil the plans and decisions of his wayward people. This doesn’t mean he takes away our ability to freely choose him, but he will keep his own from the disastrous direction they are headed in, and he will win his bride…How do I know that I belong to God? Not because I’m just such a great guy, not because I’m such a spiritually mature person. But because everytime I would fall away God sa...

“By comparing Israel’s sinful behaviour with the vile behaviour of an immoral and adulterous wife, Hosea reminds his audience, then and now, of both the seriousness of sin and its effects, and of the amazing greatness of God’s mercy and love…Unfaithfulness to God in Israel and the church cannot be ignored. Either people are believers and are faithful to their covenant commitments to God, or they a...

“Humility is not somehow detached from the pursuit of righteousness. Humility does not seek to avoid the offence of the gospel…Genuine humility puts others before themselves while still submitting to God’s word…Genuine humility is deference to God, which in turn causes a deference towards others…”

“Mark is keen to show, almost word for word, that absolutely everything went according to plan. That everything occurred just as Jesus said it would. Ever, always in Mark, Jesus is shown to be in control of every situation, he is always the authority in the room, he is always in command of what happens around him. It’s one of Mark’s big themes that grows throughout his book, guiding his readers to...

“Rose City, we need to change the framing of this book. We are not Habakkuk complaining about the unrighteous people…we are the unrighteous people he is complaining about…”

“Another way I see domineering leadership enter the church is when church elders try to force the change they wish to see in people rather than to teach the word, set an example with the way they live their own lives, and then give time for the gospel to do its work. We can be very sincere in our desire for holiness in the church and to see people changed, but if we try to accomplish the sanctific...