VideoAudio
Delivered on April 28, 2019 in Edgerton, MN at First Reformed Church
VideoAudio
Sermon given at First Reformed Church on April 21, 2019 in Edgerton, MN.
Sermon given on April 18, 2019 at First Reformed Church in Edgerton, MN.
Sermon delivered in Edgerton, MN on April 14, 2019 at First Reformed Church
 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist. Watch yourselves, so that you may not lose what we have worked for, but may win a full reward. Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever greets him takes part in his wicked works. 2 John 7-11
A few days ago I watched a hockey game. I haven’t viewed many games during the 2018-2019 season because following a team a time zone behind you is problematic. So many of the games end after my bedtime. With the regular season coming to a close, I discovered that the NHL streaming service was free for the last few games. Despite an 8:00 PM start time, I logged on to watch the Colorado Avalanche play the Winnipeg Jets. Despite the Avalanche going down by two quick goals in the first period, I kept watching. Much to my enjoyment, the team from Colorado brought the game to a tie in the middle of the third period. To my dismay, with the game tied late in the final period, the Avalanche took a bad penalty. They got caught with too many men on the ice. As a result, the Jets would have one extra player on the ice for a power play during the final moments of the third period. The Avalanche penalty killing team played like I have never seen them play before. They were diving in front of every shot. The crowd went wild with every blocked shot. Every time the penalty killing team would sling the puck the length of the ice to keep the other team from attacking the net the fervor of the crowd grew. When the final seconds ticked off the clock, the crowd was roaring and the Colorado players were celebrating. All of his excitement about a tie that would send the game to overtime? There is a significant detail I left out of in my telling about this game. In this 81st game of an 82 game season the team and fans knew they could secure a spot in the playoffs with 1 playoff point, which you get if you lose in overtime. Obviously, they would prefer the two points given for a victory, but they didn’t need them. Knowing what was at stake, the players selling out on every play and the crowd cheering wildly makes sense. They put it all on the line because they knew what the end reward was. As we look at the passage from 2 John, we see that we are to be on guard for those who would deceive us and turn us from the true teaching of who Jesus is and what he has done. 2 John speaks forcefully. If someone denies who Jesus is, they not only deny Jesus but they also deny God the Father. They do not have God. The book of 2 John talks about this in an emphatic way for a reason. Salvation is at stake. Jesus in his incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension solves a very specific problem. Sin has separated us from God and to have access to him we need a savior. A savior who won the victory over sin, death, and hell in flesh like ours. It is because this teaching is essential to the faith that 2 John tells us to keep false teaching out. If we get Jesus wrong, then we do not have God. This what is at stake for us. We must be on guard from false teaching regarding Jesus. Checking our doctrine against scripture and doing everything in our power to be faithful in our teaching of Jesus. He is what matters, and he is to be what we center our faith on. What a blessing it is to have a reminder of this truth in the coming weeks. As we remember the triumphal entry on Palm Sunday, we remember that Christ entered the city not to lead a political revolt but to suffer for the sins of his covenant people. On Good Friday we see that saving work on display as God the Son bears the wrath of God for our sin. On Easter, we celebrate the victory over sin, death, hell, and the devil in the glorious resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. These events help us understand what is at stake. May we, as the people of God, boldly defend this truth and celebrate the faithful proclamation of the truth of Jesus Christ. VideoAudio
Sermon from Lord's Day Worship on April 7, 2019 at First Reformed Church in Edgerton, MN
 Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them. Such a high priest truly meets our need—one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens. Hebrews 7:25-26
My wife’s sister and her husband moved to a small town in Kansas this past summer. The seven hours between us and the fact I work every weekend means our trip to visit them for Thanksgiving was our first time visiting their new home. Roughly two-thirds of the trip I could navigate from memory. Most of it is the path I have taken to visit my in-laws for the past 23 years. Despite my familiarity with much of the route, I fired up the GPS app on my phone as soon as we got into the car after the Thanksgiving church service. I enjoy what the GPS app offers. Even when I know where I am going it provides useful information for me. A small speed limit sign informs me of how fast I can drive in that specific location. It provides a very accurate arrival time to give me a good answer when my children ask “How much longer?”. It can also route me around busy traffic if I am driving in a congested area. All of these are great features but a GPS app has one feature central to its existence. It has to get me to my destination. After seven hours in the car this past Thanksgiving, the GPS app failed to do that for me. We arrived in the small Kansas town our family lives in and the app informed us we were at our destination. It was on our left but the only thing on our left was a street to turn down. Like many small, rural town streets this street was not well lit. At all. While the light level of the street was above normal because of the Christmas lights that were put up early, it was still very dark. We had trouble seeing house numbers, but we discovered the street name did not match with the street address my sister-in-law had given me. We changed course and returned to the correct street. Appropriate to the day on which we were travelling, we were thankful we had seen pictures of the home we were looking for. Through the darkness we could identify not only the home we were looking for, but also the vehicles matching the ones our family owned. The generality of the directions provided to us by the GPS was good enough to get us close but we needed specificity to get to our destination. The seven-hour return trip home offered me the opportunity to think about what we had experienced. This caused me to reflect on the truth of who God is. We often hear people talking about God and often the description of who God is gets us close to who he is. There is an understanding of God’s nature and we see he is a good and loving God. There is also often a good understanding of God’s law and what he requires of us. These are all good things but many times these descriptions of God do not get us to our destination. They do not get us to Jesus Christ and his saving work through his perfect life, death, resurrection, and ascension on our behalf. Talk about God, if it does not lead us to the saving work of Christ, does not get us where we need to be. This distinction is important because it is how we are saved. Salvation is delivered to us by grace alone through faith alone on account of Christ alone. It is the work of Jesus for us that informs us of God’s nature. Can we understand the law of God without the cross? It is there where we see just how serious God is about his law. Breaking it requires a price be paid. At the cross we see this price is paid for us by the wrath of God being poured out on someone who did not violate the law. Jesus did this for you. We also truly understand the love of God at the cross. The price paid for our sin at the cross was not merely done to satisfy the anger and wrath of God. It was also to show his love for his people. We trust in this good news and we are saved. It is a sure and certain promise. We are brought to faith through our hearing of the gospel by the power of God the Holy Spirit. This faith is our destination, and it is this gospel of Jesus Christ directing us to exactly where we need to be. The Word of God is not vague like the directions I received from my GPS app on the evening of Thanksgiving. When it speaks about who God is it does not lead you down darkly lit streets wondering which place is the correct one. All of scripture points to salvation through Jesus Christ and this is why we are faithful to proclaim Christ and him crucified. It leads us to the God who is. The God who reveals himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit does not lead us to a vague destination. His Word leads us to himself. VideoAudio
Sermon is from Lord's Day Worship on March 24, 2019 at First Reformed Church in Edgerton, MN
Sermon delivered on March 18, 2019 in Edgerton, MN at First Reformed Church
|
Archives
July 2019
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed