STIRRINGS AT BETHESDA

A Weekly Publication of Bethesda Baptist Church

February 10, 2014

 

Recent Prayer Requests

* Elijah Mueller, that the present treatment will be successful
* Alicia as she is nearing her due date
* Alicia’s mother
* Brida, recovering from a fall
* Brenda Koelling
* Meghan Bartner
* Zachary Mueller
* Cynthia Wordlaw, need for a kidney
* Dennis fighting kidney failure
* Marilynn Norvell
* Debbie, recovering from foot surgery
* Prayer for the conversions of the lost, especially those in our community
* Our church and need for revival

Upcoming Activities

1.  Ladies “Valentine Creation” Fellowship, Tuesday, 6:30 p.m. at the Walkers
2.  Business Meeting, Wednesday, 7 p.m.
3.  Valentine’s Day Fondue Party, Saturday, 5 p.m.
4.  Sunday school, Sunday, 9:15 a.m.
5. Worship Service, Sunday, 10:30 a.m.
6. Discipleship Training, January Bible Study, Sunday, 5 p.m.

Making Valentines

RESCHEDULED:  The ladies will meet at the Walkers on TUESDAY evening, February 11,  at 6:30 p.m. day to make some valentines for residents of a local retirement center.  Debbie will have salad available.  Please give her a call (636-233-2685) to see what you might bring.

January Bible Study

There are two weeks remaining in our January Bible Study.  Yet, it is NEVER too late to join a study of God’s Word.  Come on out this Sunday evening at 5 p.m. as we continue our look at Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians!

Valentine’s Day Fondue Party

Remember, our Valentine’s Day Fondue Party is THIS  Saturday, February 15 at 5 p.m.  Come and join us for this fun time of fellowship.  We share some food and play some games.  If you did not sign up to bring anything, give Karla or Debbie a call to find out what you might bring to share in our celebration.

Let’s celebrate the love Christ has for us and the brotherly love we have for one another!

“This I know, that when I personally enter Heaven I shall forever admire and adore the everlasting love which brought me there.  Yes, we will all glorify and admire our Savior for what He was worked in us by His infinite Grace.”
Charles Haddon Spurgeon

This Sunday’s Message…  “Worthy of His Calling” from 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12

Sermon Extras

“To live apart from God is death,
Tis good his face to seek,
My refuge is the living God,
His praise I long to speak.”

Too many in our modern world, the thought of a place of forever punishment is not possible.  Those who do not believe in God simply believe death is “the end of the line”.  Even some who believe in God (with or without the Bible) find it difficult to believe God would punish someone for eternity.  They dismiss Hell, preferring the thought of annihilation, a simple end of all existence.

But God’s ways are not our ways and Paul makes this clear in verse 9.  Concerning those who know not God and those who do not obey the Gospel (verse 8), Paul writes, “They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction”.  The original reads “Such ones will suffer punishment, age destruction”.

“Punishment” means punishment from the point of a dispassionate judge.  It is a just penalty given by an impartial and equitable judge who upholds the law over any emotion.  This is the type of punishment we expect from the true, righteous judge, the Lord Jesus.

And what is the just punishment for an act against the law of God?  Any such act is not simply against the law but against the lawgiver, an eternal and infinite being.  A just punishment must be an eternal and infinite one.  So Paul refers to this punishment as “age destruction”.

“Destruction” does not mean annihilation.  Rather it refers to a separation from God and the loss of everything worthwhile in life.  This corresponds to what Paul later writes in verse 9 when describing this eternal destruction.

“Age” is a word sometimes translated eternal.  This destruction is destruction for the age.  What age is that?  As I read Scripture, I see two ages:  “this present evil age” and “the age to come” (see Matthew 12:32).  In our text, Christ has been revealed, the “age to come” is now visibly here.  And so, the destruction those who do not trust Christ will experience is for the “age to come”, i.e., for eternity.

Praise God, those who have been delivered from “this present evil age” (Galatians 1:4) are already living in “the age to come”.  We will not share in the fate of those who receive a punishment of eternal destruction.  Our penalty has been taken by the Lord Himself!

“We will rest from affliction, persecution, tribulation.  We will rest from pain, illness, death.  We will rest from poverty, humiliation, labor.  We will rest from the world, the flesh, and the devil.  We will rest from sin.”

Pastor’s Postscript

I close with a lengthier column than usual.  Two different magazines had articles on subjects which interest me and I found “tidbits” in each of them I wanted to share with you.

First, I love chess though I rarely get to play.  In the most recent edition of the “Chess Life” magazine, there is an article entitled “Spiritual Pursuit or Worldly Success?”.  Actually it is a book review of a new chess novel (yes, they exist!), “Lisa”.

The article’s title caught my eye so I quickly scanned the review.  Nothing entices me to read the reviewed book but I found the reviewer’s summary of the book intriguing.

“… there is a difference between buying into ‘the lower world’ unaware of any other world, and deciding to re-engage after having known the higher world.’”

I see in this summary great spiritual truth.  The contrast is between two individuals.  The first is the one who seeks success in ‘the lower world’.  I envision those individuals being the lost who are only living for what this world may provide.  They live for the “here and now”.  The second individual is the person who has trusted Christ; they know the “higher world”, the spiritual world, the world yet to come.  Having been converted by Christ, they must now live as a Spirit-filled person in this “lower world”.  They must “re-engage” this world as the summary says.

Are you living in “the lower world”, lost, concerned only for the here and now?  If so I call on you to repent of your sins and trust Christ today.

Or, have you found Christ and been saved by His blood?  Then I call on you to “re-engage” this lower world in all of its aspects with the knowledge you have of Jesus.  Share Him with those you meet.  Live for Him each and every day!

Second, for more than 35 years I have been a student and lover of the Protestant Reformation period of history.  The events of that era still resonate in Christianity today.  While reading “Table Talk” magazine this week, I came across an article by Dr. James R. White entitled “The Reformation Isn’t Over”.  Certainly this is not a new concept in ecclesiology.  Ever since the Reformation, Christian writes have discussed the subject and referred to it with the Latin phrase, semper reformanda (“always reforming”).  But the article was well written and I wanted to share with you a brief portion of it.

“The Reformation fought a battle that each and every generation is called to fight simply because each and every generation is made up of the fallen sons and daughters of Adam, and hence there will always be those who seek to detract from the singular glory of God in the gospel through the addition of man’s authority, man’s merit, man’s sovereignty.  … the church always reforming, always seeking to hear more clearly, walk more closely, to her Lord?”

Certainly those are my hopes for Bethesda Baptist Church.  I hope they are yours as well.

May our Lord truly bless you this week.