SHREVEPORT GRACE CHURCH
2970 Baird Rd., Shreveport, LA 71118
CHRIST ALONE - SCRIPTURE ALONE - GRACE ALONE
May 4, 2008
SUNDAY
Scripture Reading/Prayer: Psalm 97 (Mike)
Call to Worship: ‘Sweet The Name of Christ Must Be’
Scripture Reading/Prayer: 1 Thessalonians 5 (David)
Hymn: # 258- ‘He Hideth My Soul’
Message: A CURSE AND A BLESSING- Isaiah 3:1-11
Hymn: # 256- ‘It is Well with My Soul’
Hymn: # 351- ‘Near the Cross’
Scripture Reading/Prayer: Job 14 (Jim Pennywell)
Hymn: # 235- ‘Pass Me Not’
Message: EXHORTATION TO OBEDIENCE - Deuteronomy 6
Hymn: # 340- ‘Nearer, Still Nearer’
WEDNESDAY
7:00 PM - Mid-week meeting
Nursery care available during all services; for ages 4 and younger.
Ken Wimer, Pastor- ( (318) 687-4943
E-mail: pastor@shrevegrace.org
Web Site: http://www.shrevegrace.org
Audio Messages Available On-Line; Updated weekly
Radio Broadcast: 9:00 AM (CST) Sunday on KWKH;
AM Radio 1130, Shreveport, LA area or LIVE streaming at http://www.kwkhonline.com/common/gap_streamer.php
Call To Worship
(Tune: #393- ‘Take My Life’)
1 – Sweet the name of Christ must be,
From and to eternity;
For it pleased the Father well,
Fulness all in Christ should dwell (Repeat)
2 – Jesus is the name, and Christ;
He my Surety is, and Priest;
He has saved my soul from sin,
And I stand complete in Him (Repeat)
3 – Head o’er all is Christ to me,
And I shall His glory see;
Therefore in his name I’ll trust,
And of him will make my boast (Repeat)
THE SONS OF GOD MADE MANIFEST
|
W |
e were observing that none can tell who the Lord's people are till God the Spirit makes them manifest. The Lord knows who they are: "Having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that are his." "Yes," say some, "He knows them when they begin to turn to him, when they accept the offers and proffers of salvation, and take hold of his grace; he knows them then." My friends, that is not God's way of working. He knows his sheep before he gives them eternal life; he says, "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand." In God's religion, life is the first thing given. The poor sinner is dead in trespasses and sins. The Lord Jesus Christ is a "quickening spirit;" and he has "power over all flesh, to give eternal life to as many as the Father gave him." And in regeneration, the Holy Spirit makes no mistake. As a Spirit of knowledge, he knows who the Lord's covenant people are; and when the set time to favour Zion comes, he arrests them in the conscience. Saul was one of these vessels of mercy; and Zacchaeus also was a monument of grace; and therefore, at the appointed moment, the Lord the Spirit quickened them into spiritual life. There are not any whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life but what the blessed Spirit either has regenerated, or will in due time regenerate and begin the good work of grace in their precious souls, and carry it on in the face of every opposition from within and from without, from sin, men and devils. It is a good doctrine, my friends. Where God begins the work, he will surely carry it on and finish it till at last he lands the soul safe in immortal glory. John Kershaw, 1845
PURE RELIGION
“Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.” James 1:27
|
T |
hose of us who have been taught the free grace of God in Christ tend to think of the term ‘religion’ in a negative sense, i.e. works salvation. Perhaps it is because, the majority of religion today teaches the necessity of works as a condition either to gain or maintain salvation, which is completely contrary to the religion, or body of truth pertaining to the worship of God, as taught in His inspired word.
‘Pure religion (acts of worship) and undefiled before God,’ is only possible by the grace of God. It is only by His electing grace that any may be called the children of God. It is only because of His redeeming grace, by the blood and righteousness of the Lord Jesus, that any are declared holy before God. It is by His regenerating grace that a sinner is made alive and brought to the Lord Jesus in faith, and caused to live out that grace in love for Christ and His glory, I Peter 1:2. Therefore, it is not that the grace of God is opposed to works as an evidence of that grace, but grace stands opposed to works as a condition, criteria, or obligation in order to earn that grace. The grace of God cannot be earned or bought. It is the gift of God in, by, and through the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work at Calvary alone, Romans 11:5, 6.
Why then does the apostle James single out visiting the fatherless and widows and keeping oneself unspotted from the world? Is it not possible for someone to do these things from a motive of pure works and not grace? Absolutely! However, the point is, while someone may, through a motive of wanting to earn salvation, give himself to a life of helping the helpless, and living by self imposed rules of morality in the world, and still be lost, yet, one cannot, as the subject of God’s free grace, be unmoved by that grace to help the fatherless and widows, nor continue to follow after the course of this lost world. We care for the fatherless and the widows because we know what God the Father has done for us through His Son, as Boaz did for Naomi and Ruth, as their Kinsman-Redeemer. We keep ourselves unspotted from the world, because Christ has delivered us from this world’s curse of sin, by His shed blood and imputed righteousness. Why then would we subject ourselves again to its rules, principles, and system of beliefs, having been called out by His Spirit to Christ? Why would we ever desire to be servants of sin, and this fallen world system, or false worship again, having been made once for all by Christ, servants of HIS imputed righteousness? Rom. 6: 10-14. Ken Wimer
THE ONLY HOPE OF SALVATION
|
O |
ur Lord and His apostles were careful to place significant emphasis on the perfect satisfaction He would offer to God on behalf of all those He represented. “For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of ALL (every elect sinner given to Him in the everlasting covenant of grace) which He (God the Father) hath given Me (Christ the Son) I SHOULD LOSE NOTHING, but should raise it up again at the last day,” (Jn. 6:38, 39). On another occasion Christ said: “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth His life FOR THE SHEEP.”(Jn.10:11) It doesn’t say He gave His life indiscriminately for all men without exception, but that He gave His life specifically for HIS SHEEP. Peter put it this way: “Forasmuch as ye know that ye WERE NOT REDEEMED with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ (the exclusive payment for our salvation), as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.”(I Pet.1:18, 19)
If you don’t think these truths are important, it shows you have no real understanding of who Christ is or what He actually accomplished. In other words you don’t see the infinite value of Christ’s finished work at Calvary, which reveals that at the present you are in a state of lostness. You might be thinking: “How can you make that kind of a judgment, you don’t know my heart!” The answer is that your words reveal the hope of your salvation, and the hope of your salvation reveals the ‘god’ you are relying on for your salvation. Notice Paul’s definition of lostness: “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved (If he is praying for their salvation, obviously they are in a state of lostness).”(Rom.10:1) Now here is what it is to be LOST-“For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they BEING IGNORANT OF GOD’S RIGHTEOUSNESS (that righteousness which ALONE has enabled God to be both a Just God and a Savior), and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.”(Rom.10:2,3) One thing we must point out is that any who are ignorant of the righteousness Christ, established by His perfect life and obedient death at Calvary, will always be busy trying to establish one of their own.
God’s redeemed children will in time be brought to see all they possess by virtue of their oneness with the Lord Jesus Christ-“And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”(Jer.31:34) And all those who are brought to know Him, KNOW HIM AS THE ONLY HOPE OF THEIR SALVATION, I Timothy 1:1. Richard Warmack