Intersected

From 15 Types of Suffering

1. Adamic Suffering – Because Adam is our first father, representative, and head, when he sinned all of us were implicated; we inherited a sin nature (Rom. 5:12–21) and were born into a fallen world (Rom. 8:18–23), so there is some suffering that is simply the result of being part of Adam’s race.
2. Punishment Suffering – God judges unbelievers and punishes them for sin.
3. Consequential Suffering – Suffering is reaped because of foolish decisions.
4. Demonic Suffering – Because Satan is alive and at work in the world, he and the demons in his service cause very real suffering.
5. Victim Suffering – This is the pain endured by someone who has not sinned but rather has been sinned against.
6. Collective Suffering – This is what happens by virtue of being part of a people who are suffering.
7. Apocalyptic Suffering – This is increased suffering that signals the end of this age.
8. Disciplinary Suffering – God chastens believers in order to mature them.
9. Vicarious Suffering – Servants of God suffer because the ungodly oppose them.
10. Empathetic Suffering – This is the suffering that comes when someone we love is hurting.
11. Testimonial Suffering – This is suffering that tests and proves a believer’s faith, thereby confirming to them they are true believers, strengthening fellow Christians, and serving as an evangelistic testimony to unbelievers.
12. Revelation Suffering – Some suffering is a demonstration of the gospel so that a deeper appreciation and understanding of Jesus Christ occurs.
13. Doxological Suffering – This suffering is not because of sin, but rather is to teach a lesson about God so that worship of him would increase.
14. Preventative Suffering – Sometimes suffering warns us of greater suffering that will happen if we do not heed the warnings God is giving us.
15. Mysterious Suffering – There is suffering that we simply do not know the details about because God, in his providence, has chosen not to reveal them to us; as Scripture says, we know in part.

From Why do we suffer?

In closing, for those who are suffering, Jesus is a God whom you can speak to, run to, and walk with. Unlike any other false god offered by any other religion, Jesus did not sit back in his heavenly ease and give us mere counsel for our suffering from a safe distance. Instead, he entered into human history to identify with us. He was tempted. He was rejected by his family. He was poor and homeless. He was abandoned by his friends. He was betrayed by his disciple. He was falsely accused by his enemies. He was falsely tried and condemned. He was beaten beyond recognition. He bled, suffered, and died in shame. And he lives today as a sympathetic high priest who gives grace to the hurting and promises justice to the unrepentant. He has gone to prepare a place for us and he left God the Spirit as our Comforter until he returns.

On that day, the blood of evildoers will fill the streets and Jesus in all his glory will be revealed—the sun and moon will shrink in his presence—and his kingdom will be established in glory over all. On that day our faith will be sight. On that day he will work out all things for the good of those who love him. On that day he will use even that which was intended for evil for good. On that day all our questions will be answered and all our hopes realized. On that day he will wipe every tear from our eyes and we who belong to him will rejoice. Until then, we rejoice in him and that day, until we see him on that day.

1. Choose your text
   1. It is best to rely on expository book studies for the steady diet of your people, because this ensures they will get “the whole counsel of God.”
   2. However, the following may be occasions for special sermons:
      1. Special calendar occasions: Christmas, Easter, etc.
      2. Special external circumstances which are in the public mind.
      3. Special needs discerned by the preacher or others.
      4. Truths which have specially inspired the preacher.
   3. Keep a notebook to scribble down ideas for sermons, insights, burdens, illustrations, etc. Record them immediately wherever they come to mind, because you will usually forget them later.
2. Meditate on the text
   1. Whenever possible, plan out texts weeks or months in advance. This gives the benefit of “subconscious incubation”.
   2. Concentrated “incubation” should begin at least one week before preaching. It should involve the following:
      1. Read, re-read, and re-re-read the text.
      2. Be sure you understand what it means. Do your own interpretive work. Don’t use commentaries until you have formulated specific interpretive questions which you have been unable to answer, or until you have completed your interpretive work.
      3. Brood longer over how it applies to your people, to the culture, to you, etc.
      4. Pray for God to illuminate the text, especially its application.
      5. Scribble down notes of thoughts, ideas, etc.
      6. Solicit the insights of others through tapes, talking with other preachers, etc.
3. Isolate the dominant thought (This is the purpose of section II.)
   1. Your sermon should convey only one major message. All of the details of your sermon should be marshaled to help your people grasp that message and feel its power.
   2. You should be able to express the dominant thought in one short, clear, vivid sentence.
4. Arrange your material to serve the dominant thought
   1. Chisel and shape your material. Ruthlessly discard all material which is irrelevant to the dominant thought. Subordinate the remaining material to the dominant thought by using that material to illuminate and reinforce the dominant thought.
   2. Your sermon structure should be suited to the text, not artificially imposed. Avoid structure which is too clever, prominent or complex.
   3. Decide on your method of preaching for this text: argumentation, faceting, categorizing, analogy, etc.
   4. Carefully choose words that are precise, simple, clear, vivid and honest. Write out the key sections, phrases, and sentences to help you in your word choice. Stick to short declarative and interrogative sentences with few, if any, subordinate clauses.
   5. Come up with illustrations and examples which will explain and convict. Employ a wide variety: figures of speech, images, retelling biblical stories in contemporary language, inventing fresh parables, retelling true historical and/or biographical events, etc. Keep a file of these, especially if they do not come easily to you. Avoid making illustrations and examples so prominent that they detract from the dominant thought. Also, avoid applying them inappropriately or overusing them.
5. Add the introduction and conclusion
   1. The introduction should not be elaborate, but enough to arouse their curiosity, wet their appetites and introduce the dominant thought. This can be done by a variety of means: explaining the setting of the passage, story, current event or issue, etc.
   2. The conclusion should not merely recapitulate your sermon–it should apply it. Obviously, you should be applying all along, but you should keep something for the end which will prevail upon your people to take action. “No summons, no sermon.” Preach though the head to the heart (i.e. the will). The goal of the sermon should be to “storm the citadel of the will and capture it for Jesus Christ.” What do you want them to do? Employ a variety of methods to do this:
      1. Argument: anticipate objections and refute them
      2. Admonition: warn of the consequences of disobedience
      3. Indirect Conviction: arouse moral indignation and then turn it on them (Nathan with David)
      4. Pleading: apply the gentle pressure of God’s love, concern for their well-being, and the needs of others
      5. Vision: paint a picture of what is possible through obedience to God in this area
6. Write dowm and pray over your message
   1. Writing out your sermon forces you to think straight and sufficiently. It exposes lazy thinking and cures it. After you are thoroughly familiar with your outline, reduce it to small notes.
   2. Pray the God will enable you to “so possess the message that the message possesses you.

Great idea, with eternal value. From Jonathan Dodson via Boundless.org

Why Fight Clubs?

Word began to spread. Our worship leader started a new Fight Club with two other guys. Soon after that women started forming clubs: simple groups of two or three people of the same gender who meet regularly to help one another beat the flesh and believe in the promises of God.

Three rules of Fight Club

1. Know your sin
2. Fight your sin
3. Trust your Savior

How does a Fight Club Work?

Fight Clubs are small, simple, biblical, reproducible and missional. No more than two or three people to a group. If the group grows beyond three, it is important that the newest member only participate a couple of times to get the idea and then start a new group. This retains the intimacy and trust built in the initial group, while also fostering reproduction — more Fight Clubs! Fight Clubs are simple and biblical in their content, following a progression of Text-Theology-Life.

• Text: A Fight Club agrees to focus on a common biblical text. Each person in the Fight Club commits to devotionally read the same chapter from a book of the Bible each week. For example, your group could read through Colossians in four weeks. As you read, make a point of asking the Holy Spirit to draw your attention to whatever He wants you to know. The Spirit may be prompting you repent of a sin, rejoice in a promise or meditate on an insight. Each week when you get together, make the text your initial focus.
• Theology: Work through the verses in community, trying to follow the flow of the author. From there, try to understand the central theological message of the chapter. Be sure you ask the question: “How does the person and work of Jesus inform this text?” Strive to be Christ-centered, not application-centered. Jesus is sufficient for our failures and strong for our successes.
• Life: This is followed by bringing in your personal struggles and successes from your devotional reading. Be sure to allow plenty of time for this. Share your lives; promote godly accountability and faithful prayer. Finally, be sure to share the names of people whom you are trying to bless with the gospel. Pray as a group, asking God to help you trust His promises, as well as asking Him to give unbelievers the same gift of faith.

Fight Clubs are simple, biblical and missional, following the pattern of Text-Theology-Life. They avoid legalism by promoting a Christ-centered reading of the Scriptures. They avoid license by taking seriously the fight of faith against the flesh. Best of all, they promote lasting joy in Jesus.

Justin Buzzard quotes from Called to the Ministry
, a book that I started, but put down, thinking it a little dry. Based on these quotes, I was very, very wrong.

“Every gift you have received, then, is a calling of the Spirit…Indeed, you ought not even to be content with the gifts that you have, but covet more. God’s giving and calling are dynamically related…Your desire to serve God more fully might be the foretaste of richer gifts equipping you for that service. It is quite possible to overestimate the gifts you have; it is quite impossible to over-supplicate the gifts you need.”

“Seizing God-given opportunity counts for much in the fulfillment of your calling…What opportunities do you perceive? The first doors are in the room where you are. The Lord has given you a certain set of present circumstances…Here you must begin; indeed here you must be willing to remain until other doors of opportunity are perceived and opened. The surest way to miss future opportunities is to ignore present ones.”

“If this survey of the function of the minister has not given you pause [this is from page 60 of the book], please abandon all thought of becoming a minister. If it has, be encouraged. To the degree that you are overwhelmed you show a willingness to take the ministry seriously.”

“To miss your calling, follow this three-point program: assume that it begins in the future, decide that you don’t know what it is, and sit down to wait for the Lord’s call.
No, he has already called you–to be a Christian. Fulfill that call with all your heart and you will learn in his time what ministry is yours.”

“No Spiritual Inventory Test can measure your gifts and capacities in Christ’s service. Such a test may help you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think; it may reveal unsuspected abilities and strengths. But Christ’s own test is not the S.I.T.; it is administered only in action. We might call it the Service in Fellowship Test. As you labor with other Christians, hidden gifts are brought to light and new gifts are received.”

“You learn to know yourself only as you learn to know Christ. Self-knowledge cannot be an end in itself. Paul never cries with Socrates, ‘Know thyself!’ Rather he says, ‘That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming conformed unto his death; if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.’ ‘For to me to live is Christ’ is the text of Paul’s life.”

“Yet the calling of Christ’s kingdom not only separates a man from the world, it also sends him to the world…The ‘Come!’ of Christ separates us from the world to his name; the ‘Go!’ of Christ sends us to the world in his name.”

“The purpose of your life must be the purpose of Christ’s death.”

“…the calling of an individual in the church of Christ is determined by the gifts Christ has given him, by the ‘measure’ of the Spirit he has received…Your personal calling as a Christian is the outworking of the measure of the gift of God’s grace that has been given to you…the Lord deals to each man a measure of faith. These gifts must be exercised, and in their exercise the calling of the Christian is determined.”

“Good stewardship requires a man to ’stir up’ the gift of God that is in him (2 Tim 1:6), as Paul charged Timothy.”

“You cannot bring your gifts to mature function apart from the mutual ministries of Christ’s church. Therefore no Christian can determine his calling in isolation from the throbbing organism in which he is called.”

“…God gives richer graces as his steward is faithful. You do not now have all the gifts you will have when the full demands of the ministry fall upon you…All that we have, God has given; all that we need, God will give.”

“Calling to the ministry and love of the Bible go together.”

“Don’t demand an answer today. You cannot program a computer to calculate your potential for Christ’s ministry. You must live out the answer…The call to stewardship is found in stewardship. To the servant who is faithful in the little the Lord entrusts much. The fruit bearing branch is pruned for greater fruitfulness.”

From Jonathan Dodson, pastor of Austin City Life, on holy hypocrisy

Ministers are noteworthy of their calling. All preachers are vulnerable to the charge of hypocrisy. In fact, the more faithful preachers are to the Word of God in their preaching, the more liable they are to the charge of hypocrisy. Why? Because the more faithful people are to the Word of God, the higher the message is that they will preach. The higher the message, the further they will be from obeying it themselves. ~ R.C. Sproul, The Holiness of God

Are you teetering closely to the edge of holy hypocrisy or are your sermons doable bits of moral advice? Are we pressing into the Word of God to encounter his holiness and grandeur or finessing deliveries to impress men with our personal insights? We have to ask ourselves, are we preaching higher and higher messages that threaten our discipleship with the promise of sanctifying joy or are we preaching lower messages that promote a numbing nominalism?

Luke
——-
2:29-32 p
2:37 p f
2:2 f
5:16 p
5:33-35 f
6:12-13 p
9:18 p
11:1-4 p