First Southern Blog

Lest I think that on vacation (August 4-15) God will “give me break” too, it didn’t happen.  I ended up doing an “attitude check” while at the house of parents-in-law.  I had to do the “attitude check” because I ended up getting sick the second week of vacation (a cold).  But it wasn’t just a little “summer” cold…man, it was harsh.  And, my whole family got it too (except for my beautiful wife).

So, the attitude?  Why the heck am I getting sick on vacation?  Normally, my wife graciously and lovingly with such submission reminds me of the things I preach!  :)  But this time, it was my sister.  She came to Chris’ parents house August 11 for dinner.  As I was telling her about how I was getting sick (that night my throat began to hurt like crazy), she said to me, “Suffer well.”  Yes, suffer well.  That’s exactly what John Piper has spoken about on different occasions (here, and here, most recently; also here).  So, what became my theme the rest of the week?  Suffer well.

But then I thought this should be my theme every time I get sick, face affliction or tribulation.  I must learn to suffer well, which I don’t do.  I can be such a wimp!  The “funny” part of this whole situation is this: the Sunday we were gone, I preached at the church my in-laws are members of — First Baptist Community Church of Los Gatos.  And guess what I preached on?  Psalm 44!  Thank you, O God, for keeping me humble!

BTW: if you are looking for a good, Bible-teaching church to attend in San Jose, check out First Baptist.  Not bad…for a GARBC church ;)  But, I’m not so sure about their outreach pastor…

Oh wait, that’s my father-in-law!  he, he.

Our Men’s Conference on August 2 was such a blessing!  We had the privilege of having James White, of Alpha and Omega Ministries, come out and do the bulk of our speaking on Defining the Gospel and Declaring the Gospel.  He even took some time to answer some questions!  We were very thankful that widely known Dr. White took time to speak at our conference.

I spoke on Displaying the Gospel, focusing most of the time seeing the importance of saving faith and imputed righteousness, and Randy Hafner, from Village Park Baptist, gave us the very practical part of the Gospel where God does His sanctifying work in us because of the glorious Gospel!  For all the messages, click here.

The exciting part was how we doubled in size from last year.  We had about 24-26 men last year; this year we had 54!  Wow, that was definitely thrilling.  And the food…mmm, one of the best highlights!  Matias did an excellent job with the food (as always)!  But not just with the food, the whole setup — from the small breakfast items, to the lunch, to dessert…the best, hands down!  Thanks, Matias!  We got feed spiritually and physically! 

It was also great to see men from a bunch of other churches.  We had men from Village Park Baptist, Verde Baptist Church, The Garden, Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church, First Southern Baptist of Camp Verde, Master’s Bible Church, Pilgrims Trail Bible Fellowship, Hope Community Church, First Assembly, Calvary Baptist Church of Tempe, Pine Baptist, and from us, First Southern, Cottonwood.  It was encouraging to see men from different churches come together for the Gospel and be exhorted to be leaders in their homes and the churches God has placed them.

Please be praying for Randy and I as we will be thinking about the theme and our key speaker for next year’s conference.  If you would like to give us some feedback from this year’s conference, just email us on the website (in the “Contact” section) and title your comment with “Men’s Conference.”

“If there’s anything in life that we should be passionate about, it’s the gospel. And I don’t mean passionate about sharing it with others. I mean passionate about thinking about it, dwelling on it, rejoicing in it, allowing it to color the way we look at the world. Only one thing can be of first importance to each of us. And only the gospel ought to be.”      C.J. Mahaney

I need to get ready for tonight’s service, especially since we have 2 people being baptized tonight!!  :)  But, I wanted to give readers some more of Thomas Brooks to chew on from his book “Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices”.  Enjoy!

Another device of Satan to draw us into sin:

“Device 3: By extenuating and lessening of sin.  Ah!  saith Satan, it is but a little pride, a little worldliness, a little uncleanness, a little drunkenness, etc.

Remedy (I).  First, Solemnly consider, That those sins which we are apt to account small, have brought upon men the greatest wrath of God.

Remedy (2). Seriously to consider, That the giving way to a less sin makes way for the committing of a greater.

Remedy (4) .  The fourth remedy against this device of Satan, is seriously to consider, That there is great danger, yea, many times most danger, in the smallest sins.” (from pages 38-41).

More later!

Ok, I’m finally back.  After a wild week with 400 youth for the Youth Summer Camp Trip, Ransomed, in Glorieta, NM, the Men’s Conference on August 2, leaving for vacation on August 4, and then returning August 15, I’m back in the saddle again!  I will blog more about the individual events later on.  Whew!

I am enjoying the book for this month’s Puritan Reading Challenge — Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices by Thomas Brooks. I wanted to share a bit of the book with our readers as we are coming to the end of the month. i will give key quotes later in August. Brooks presents the many devices of Satan, and then encourages his readers with remedies for the devil’s devices. This section is from pages 29-34…

Device 1: [Satan] present[s] the bait and hide[s] the hook [of sin]

Remedy 1: Keep at the greatest distance from sin, and from playing with the golden bait that Satan holds forth to catch you….Sin is a plague, yea, the greatest and most infectious plague in the world.

Remedy 2: That sin is but a bitter sweet. So doth sin; it may please a little at first, but it will pain the soul with a witness at last…

Remedy 3: That sin will usher in the greatest and the saddest losses that can be upon our souls.

Remedy 4: That sin is of a very deceitful and bewitching nature…It will kiss the soul, and pretend fair to the soul, and yet betray the soul for ever…So a man bewitched with sin had rather lose God, Christ, heaven, and his own soul than part with his sin.

We had the joy of extending a blessing to a sister in Christ this past Wednesday night.  Instead of having our prayer meeting at First Southern meeting location, we met at Roberta Maple’s house.  Since her radiation treatment for her cancer, she has been unable to attend any church services (Anne, you know what that’s like), and she asked if some of us would come over.

We all arrived at about five till 6.  We came inside, situated the chairs for seating, and planted ourselves.  Roberta was helped into her living room by her husband Dave, and he gently placed her in her comfortable recliner.

We sang two songs together a cappella: Great Is Thy Faithfulness and To God Be the Glory.  Then, I taught three ways that we as Christians can have assurance of our salvation (confession of sin, hearing God’s Word, and focusing on the cross).  Then, after we briefly went through our prayer sheet adding a few requests and praises, we prayed together.  It’s always so encouraging to hear the prayers of God’s people.  We ended our time singing The Old Rugged Cross.  Afterwards, everyone gave Roberta a hug and some words of encouragement.  She was so thankful that we came over.

Thank you to everyone for being a part of it!

Here are some more posts from the 9Marks blog site regarding the 9Marks Workshop in South Africa.

Click here, here, and for the final thought (which I thought was sad), click here.

Take a look at this prayer.  It’s called “The Seeker’s Prayer.”  It will knock the socks off you…

The Seeker’s Prayer

Dear God, whom I hate with all my being precisely because you hate and threaten me with hell, I hate this punishment perhaps even more than I hate you. Or, maybe I should say that I love my comfort even more than I hate you. For that reason I am asking a favor of you. I want you to make me love you, whom I hate even when I ask this and even more because I have to ask this. I am being frank with you because I know it is no use to be otherwise. You know even better than I how much I hate you and that I love only myself. It is no use for me to pretend to be sincere. I most certainly do not love you and do not want to love you. I hate the thought of loving you but that is what I’m asking because I love myself. If you can answer this ‘prayer’ I guess the gift of gratitude will come with it and then I will be able to do what I would not think of doing now—thank you for making me love you whom I hate. Amen.

Matt Schmucker and Jonathan Leeman are doing a 9Marks Pastors Conference in South Africa, and they are blogging about their trip on the 9marks blog.  I thought I’d share with you the comments given by Matt Schmucker and Jonathan Leeman; their statements about these pastors and the state of the church in South Africa is quite moving.  The posts are not in any kind of order, so I had to post them separately.  Just click on these links: here, then here, here, here, here, here, here, here

Enjoy!