SHREVEPORT GRACE CHURCH

2970 Baird Rd., Shreveport, LA 71118

CHRIST ALONE-SCRIPTURE ALONE-GRACE ALONE

JULY 9, 2006

OPPORTUNITIES FOR WORSHIP

SUNDAY

WEDNESDAY

7:00 PM- Mid-week Service

Nursery care available for all services for ages 4 and younger.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Ken Wimer, Pastor- ( (318) 687-4943

PO Box 5028, Shreveport, LA 71135

E-MAIL : pastor@shrevegrace.org

WEB SITE: http://www.shrevegrace.org Updated weekly with audio messages now available on-line.

CALL TO WORSHIP

(Tune: # 236- ‘Amazing Grace’)

e bless the Prophet of the Lord,

That comes with truth and grace;

Jesus, thy Spirit and thy Word

Shall lead us in Thy ways

We reverence our High Priest above,

Who offered up His blood,

And lives to carry on His love,

By pleading with our God.

We honor our exalted King;

How sweet are His commands!

He guards our souls from hell and sin

By His Almighty hands.

Hosanna to His glorious name,

Who keeps by different ways!

His mercies lay a sovereign claim

To our immortal praise.

JUSTIFIED BY THE OBEDIENCE AND BLOOD OF CHRIST

he word justify is never used in a physical sense for producing any real change in men, but in a forensic sense, and stands opposed, not to a state of impurity and unholiness, but to a state of condemnation; It is a law term, and used of judicial affairs, transacted in a court of judicature; (Deut.25:1; Prov. 17:15; Isa. 5:22; and Matt. 12:37) where justification stands opposed to condemnation. This is the sense of the word whenever it is used in the doctrine under consideration; so in Job 9: 2, 3, and 25:4; so by David in Psalms 143:2; and in Paul’s epistles, where the doctrine of justification is treated of, respect is had to courts of judicature, and to a judicial process in them. Men are represented as sinners, charged with sin, and pronounced guilty before God, and are subject to condemnation and death; when, according to this evangelic doctrine, they are justified by the obedience and blood of Christ, cleared of all charges, acquitted and absolved, and freed from condemnation and death, and adjudged to eternal life. (See Romans 3:9:9, 19; 5: 16, 18, 19; 8:1, 33, 34; Gal. 2:16, 17 and Titus 3:7.)                                                                                                                                                                                                                           JOHN GILL

YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN

                                    “Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God, “John 3:3

hen Christ told Nicodemus “ye must be born again,” He was not giving him something to do in order to have forgiveness of sins or to be justified before God!  Rather, He was telling him what the Spirit must do in him in order for him to renounce his self-righteous, works grounded religion, and truly ‘see’ (perceive and know) the kingdom of God- John 3:3,8. As is true of any sinner (depraved, blind, and dead in sin), unless the Holy Spirit reveals to us the deep things of God, we cannot know the things of God in truth, 1 Corinthians 1:9-14.   What is the answer to any who may ask, “How can I know whether I am the Lord’s and whether God has chosen me unto salvation and Christ died for me?” YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN!  We do not enter into a relationship with God in our experience through mere intellectual reasoning, but it does require the revelation of Christ, by His Word and Gospel, to the heart, and that is possible only after the Spirit of God has made us alive unto God, and given faith to believe on Christ in truth, Ephesians 1:13. 

Up until the time of regeneration, even those who are the elect of God the Father and redeemed and justified by Christ’s blood, are said to be lost.  That does not mean that they are under the wrath of God or that until they believe God’s looks on them as ungodly.  To believe that is to deny what Christ accomplished at Calvary in putting away their sin and drinking the cup of God’s wrath dry for His people in His death.  If they are lost, it is not that God has lost them, but that THEY are lost, being yet unregenerate, and without the Spirit of God, and therefore rebels and wicked IN THEIR MINDS- Colossians 1:21.  Therefore, it requires that in time, the Spirit of God be given them to turn their otherwise rebellious hearts to Christ, and to learn of the righteousness of God fulfilled in His obedience unto death, and cause them to submit to the ONE righteousness of God imputed once for all in Christ, Romans 4:6.

In Romans 10:3, 4 we read, “Christ is the end (fulfillment) of the law to everyone that believeth.” That does not mean that our believing is what fulfills the law and brings satisfaction to God, but rather that all who believe are brought by God’s grace to see, know,  rest in submission to Christ as the ONE who fulfilled the LAW and JUSTICE of God on their behalf in His obedience unto death. 

KEN WIMER

A SOUL GIVEN UP TO SIN

t is the greatest judgment in the world to be left to sin. O unhappy man--when God leaves you to yourself, and does not resist you in your sins! Woe, woe to him at whose sins God winks at. When God lets the way to hell be a smooth and pleasant way--that is hell on this side of hell, and a dreadful sign of God's indignation against a man; a token of his rejection, and that God does not intend good unto him.

That is a sad word, "Ephraim is joined to idols--let him alone!" (Hosea 4:17) Ephraim will be unteachable and incorrigible; he has made a match with sin--and he shall have his bellyful of it! And that is a terrible saying, "So I gave them up unto their own hearts' lusts, and they walked in their own counsels." (Psalm 81:12). A soul given up to sin is a soul ripe for hell--a soul hastening to destruction!

Ah Lord! This mercy I humbly beg--that whatever You give me up to, You will not give me up to the ways of my own heart! If You will give me up to be afflicted, or tempted, or reproached--I will patiently sit down, and say, ‘It is the Lord, let Him do with me what seems good in His own eyes.’ Do anything with me and lay what burden You will upon me--but do not give me up to the ways of my own heart!

THOMAS BROOKS

A DISTINCT DIFFERENCE!

vangelic justification is not the work of the Spirit of God on the heart of the sinner, implanting life in, and quickening the soul; but is the work of God as a judge on a throne of justice, deciding on, and adjudging one to life, according to law and justice.  It is not the infusing of righteousness, nor a purging out of the inward evils of the heart; but is the pronouncing of one’s justification with reference to the charge preferred against him.  I wish the reader to understand distinctly that justification is an external act of God as a judge, acting in a court of justice, on the case of the sinner, and is not the internal work of the Spirit on the heart.                                           

                                                                                                                                                                                                                 WILSON THOMPSON

NOTES

·         CLEANING SCHEDULE: Wimers (6/26-7/9)

·         NURSERY SCHEDULE:  Pam Atchison/Sandra McWherter