Zach Hodskins, born without the lower half of his left arm, recruited by Florida Gators 2013

Encouraging story about this young man finding faith in God and overcoming many obstacles.

My Hope with Billy Graham videos

Powerful testimonial videos have been made that can be shared with others to watch.

BreakPoint Daily: Beauty, Truth, and Operatic Boy Bands

Got to read today’s Breakpoint and came across the video referenced.

I cannot understand Latin, but the lyrics include: “Pious Lord Jesus, give them rest. Pious Lord Jesus give them everlasting rest. Pious Jesus, who takes away the sins of the world, give them rest. Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, give them everlasting rest.”

Kalam Cosmological Argument

Made by Reasonable Faith
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/kalam?src=email

Commission My Soul by Citipointe Live

I was reminded of this song that we sang at Gracepoint Summer Rally in June.  This was on the heels of us beginning our Gracepoint Los Angeles UCLA church plant.

Lyrics:
Verse 1:
You bled with one desire
In all to bring new life
To a shattered humanity
Death now overcome
Forgiving all and one
You’ve redeemed all humanity

Verse 2:
Abandon all to be
Your voice, your hands, your feet
My life a living sacrifice
Spirit empower me
To set the captives free
My life is an offering

Pre Chorus:
With all our lives we now stand
Declaring loud
Jesus is God who saves

Chorus:
Commission my soul
With a fire uncontrollable
For this great cause
To save the lost
Open my eyes
To the reason I’m alive oh’ Lord
I’m ready now
I’ll follow You

Bridge:
Open the heavens wide
Open the heavens wide
Open the heavens wide
Pour out your spirit on us

Meredith Andrews – Not For A Moment (After All) – Live

This is the song Kay Warren referred to in her sharing at Saddleback last Sunday.

“Not For A Moment (After All)”

[Verse 1]
You were reaching through the storm
Walking on the water
Even when I could not see
In the middle of it all
When I thought You were a thousand miles away
Not for a moment did You forsake me
Not for a moment did You forsake me

[Chorus]
After all You are constant
After all You are only good
After all You are sovereign
Not for a moment will You forsake me
Not for a moment will You forsake me

[Verse 2]
You were singing in the dark
Whispering Your promise
Even when I could not hear
I was held in Your arms
Carried for a thousand miles to show
Not for a moment did You forsake me

[Chorus]

And every step every breath you are there
Every tear every cry every prayer
In my hurt at my worst
When my world falls down
Not for a moment will You forsake me
Even in the dark
Even when it’s hard
You will never leave me
After all

[Chorus]
Not for a moment will You forsake me

How We’re Getting Through – Rick and Kay Warren (7/28/2013)

This past Sunday the 28th, Rick and Kay spoke of the past 16 weeks and their experience through Matthews passing in a sermon called How We’re Getting Through, and we hope there are lessons in this sermon that can be shared in your own church. Please download the transcript, mp3, and sermon outline for free here. (click on ‘parts’ tab)

You can also watch a video of this sermon here.

Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart, J.D. Greear

Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart

J.D. Greear

 

Pg. 5 The mark, however, of someone who is saved is that they maintain their confession of faith until the end of their lives.

– a posture of repentance and faith that you begin in a moment and maintain for the rest of your life

 

Pg. 6 Luke 8:13

– the enemy… loves to keep truly saved believers unsure of their salvation because he knows that if he does they’ll never experience the freedom, joy, and confidence that God wants them to have.  But he also loves to keep those on their way to hell deluded into thinking they are on their way to heaven, their consciences immunized from Jesus’ pleas to repent.

 

Pg. 7 “belief” means acknowledging that God told the truth about Jesus, namely that He is Lord and that He has finished forever the work of salvation.

 

Repentance means “acting” on that belief.

 

Pg. 8 apart from repentance there is no salvation.

– repentance and faith are postures you take toward the finished work of Christ

– …don’t make the mistake of equating that prayer with the posture

 

Pg. 9 God fusing Himself to the believer at salvation is what the church fathers called theosis (translated divination), whereby Christ literally unites His Spirit with ours (1 Corinthians 12:13, Galatians 2:20).

 

Pg. 12 …you prayed a prayer, but you have yet to submit to Him as Lord of your life.

 

Pg. 13 He changes, encourages, and motivates us not by the uncertainty of fear, but by the security of love.  That is one of the things that makes the gospel absolutely distinct from all other religious messages in the world.

– …your spiritual life will really never take off until you have the assurance of salvation.  Until you know that you are His and He is yours, your obedience will be limited.

 

Pg. 14 It is only through assurance of love that we find the strength to endure all manner of opposition, doubt, and trial.

 

Pg. 16 There are points you can never pass spiritually until you are confident that Jesus will support the full weight of your soul.  There are sacrifices you’ll never make and commands you’ll never obey unless you are convinced of their eternal value.

– you’ll never have the courage to embrace the cross until you have the confidence that you own the resurrection

 

Pg. 17 one of the reasons why paul was unmoved by suffering and persecution was that he was certain of where he stood with God.

– when you’re not assured of God’s love for you, your motivations for obedience will become corrupted.

– only the gospel and the assurance it yields creates a passion for the right in our hearts, because only the gospel goes deep enough to actually change the warped nature of our hearts.

 

Pg. 22 Bunyan replied, “If people really see that Christ has removed the fear of punishment from them by taking it into Himself, they won’t do whatever they want, they’ll do whatever He wants.”

– the gospel of grace creates in us the desire to obey

 

Pg. 24 1 John 5:10-12

John identified two components of assurance:

1. Belief in a testimony about eternal life
2. Evidences of eternal life at work in us

 

Pg. 27 More literal translations of John 3:36 render the two categories of that verse “he who believes” and “he who does not obey.” The interchange of “believe” and “obey” is helpful – it shows us that belief and obedience are, in a way, synonmys.

 

Pg. 30 The word propitiation means that a claim has been satisfied (literally, “wrath has been absorbed”).

 

Pg. 35 Jesus, who deserved commendation, received condemnation instead, we who deserve condemnation can receive His commendation.

 

Pg. 40 Biblical belief, or “faith,” includes a volitional aspect as well.

– repentance is belief in action

– Repentance and belief are, biblically speaking, parts of the same whole.

 

Faith is belief in action

– faith starts with mental assent, but if this mental assent does not lead to obedience, it is not yet “faith”

 

Conversion is not completing a ritual, it is commencing a relationship

 

Pg. 43 The posture begins at a moment, but it persists for a lifetime

 

Pg. 48 There is only one posture ever appropriate to Christ:  surrendered to His Lordship, and believing that He did what He said He did

 

Pg. 54 As C.S. Lewis famously said, “We don’t come to Him as bad people trying to become good people; we come as rebels to lay down our arms.”

 

Pg. 56 Repentance means recognizing that Jesus is Lord

– it seems that every day God uncovers some new area in my life that He does not yet control

 

Pg. 59 We must be particularly careful to clarify confession and repentance, because confession can feel purifying

– biblical repentance is not merely a request for exoneration; it is a change of heart about our sin

 

Pg. 60 repentance is not securing a pardon before God so that we can go on sinning with impunity; it is a choice to submit to God and to seek ceasing from sin entirely.

 

Pg. 61 following Jesus means submitting to Him in all areas at all times regardless of whether you agree with what He says or not

 

Pg. 64 repentance is acknowledging that Jesus is Lord of everything as a matter of who He is

– it means you do the things He says

 

Pg. 67 Christians continue to struggle with sin, often unsuccessfully, for the rest of their lives.  The struggle is proof of their new nature.

– no category exists in the Gospels for those who “receive Jesus” as Savior but not Lord.  But thankfully—mercifully—there is a huge space for those who struggle and backslide.

 

Pg. 68 Following Jesus is about walking with Him.  Walking with Him is about loving Him, serving Him, and pursuing His justice and mercy on earth.

 

Pg. 72 So the good news for me is that I don’t have to repent perfectly, because He did so for me.

 

Pg. 73 It simply takes off of us the weight of feeling like we have to repent perfectly in a way that earns His approval.  Jesus earned it.  Believe that and submit to it.

 

Pg. 84 The only time we can conclude that God’s Spirit is no longer striving with someone is when they are dead.  Until then, we have the responsibility to pray and they have the opportunity to repent.

 

Pg. 85 You have the opportunity and obligation, right now, to repent.  If you obey that command, God will save you.

 

Pg. 86-87 The full doctrine of “eternal security” is that once we are saved, we will always be saved, and that those who are saved will persevere in their faith to the end.  It is true that “once saved, always saved’; but it is also true that “once saved, forever following.”

 

Pg. 87 Salvation is a posture of repentance and faith toward Christ that you adopt at your conversion and maintain for a lifetime.  If you permanently abandon that posture later in life, your faith was likely not saving faith.

 

Pg. 102 If Jesus Christ is really in you, then you will show evidences of that by loving what, and whom, He loves and seeking whom and what He seeks.

 

Pg. 103 So hear this clearly:  Believers can and do struggle with just about any kind of sinful lust.

 

Pg. 106 The bible time and time again reminds us that no one is immune from doubt, spiritual apathy, and severe temptation.

– perhaps God lets his stains struggle that way so that their faith will remain in his grace and not in their righteousness.

 

Pg. 107 In your moment of weakness and doubt, re-believe the gospel.

– “To progress,” Martin Luther said, “is always to begin again.”

 

Stop Asking Jesus into your heart – Assured Study Guide

The Next Chuck Colson?, Breakpoint article (8/5/2013)

http://www.breakpoint.org/bpcommentaries/entry/13/22992

I appreciated this challenge and well-written article, to think that I too am the next Chuck Colson!

Matthew West – Hello, My Name is