I was reading the first section of John Owen’s “A Display of Arminianism” the other day. Very powerful and a reminder to those who would exalt the man-made idol of “free will”. Here is a small sample of text in Part 1:

“The soul of man, by reason of the corruption of nature, is not only darkened (Ephesians 4:18Ephesians 4:18; John 1:5; 1John 1:5; 1 Corinthians 2:14Corinthians 2:14) with a mist of ignorance, whereby he is disenabled for the comprehending of divine truth, but is also armed with prejudice and opposition against some parts thereof,[xiii][1][xiv] which are either most above or most contrary to some false principles which he hath framed unto himself. As a desire of self-sufficiency was the first cause of this infirmity, so a conceit thereof is that wherewith he still languisheth; nothing doth he more contend for than an independency of any supreme power, which might either help, hinder, or control him in his actions. This is that bitter root from whence have sprung all those heresies[xv][2][xvi] and wretched contentions which have troubled the church, concerning the power of man in working his own happiness, and his exemption from the over-ruling providence of Almighty God. All which wrangling disputes of carnal reason against the word of God come at last to this head, Whether the first, and chiefest part, in disposing of things in this world, ought to be ascribed to God or man? Men for the most part have vindicated this pre-eminence unto themselves,[xvii][3][xviii] by exclamations that so it must be, or else that God is unjust, and his ways unequal. Never did any men, “postquam Christiana gens esse caepit,” more eagerly endeavor the erecting of this Babel than the Arminians, the modern blinded patrons of human self-sufficiency; all whose innovations in the received doctrine of the reformed churches aim at and tend to one of these two ends:—

To exempt themselves from God’s jurisdiction,—to free themselves from the supreme dominion of his all-ruling providence; not to live and move in him, but to have an absolute independent power in all their actions, so that the event of all things wherein they have any interest might have a considerable relation to nothing but chance, contingency, and their own wills;—a most nefarious, sacrilegious attempt! To this end,—First, They deny the eternity and unchangeableness of God’s decrees; for these being established, they fear they should be kept within bounds from doing any thing but what his counsel hath determined should be done. If the purposes of the Strength of Israel be eternal and immutable, their idol free-will must be limited, their independency prejudiced; wherefore they choose rather to affirm that his decrees are temporary and changeable, yea, that he doth really change them according to the several mutations he sees in us: which, how wild a conceit it is, how contrary to the pure nature of God, how destructive to his attributes, I shall show in the second chapter.”

Here’s a great clip from someone I do not agree with on everything (Mark Driscoll), who explains election simply and powerfully:

This week, we began to implement one contemporary worship song in the service. Today, it was Mighty Is Our God. I played the guitar and led the singing. I’m not a believer in the regulatory principle, so this wasn’t an exegetical problem for me, but I have not resolved all the philsophical issues in my mind as of yet.  I have been doing some reading and see that some of the objection stems from "what I am used to" rather than "thus saith the Lord…." Must music be theological to honor God? God gave us emotions so can’t they play a legitimate role in worship music? Certainly, worship wars are not what God intended. Today I preached on unity from Philippians 2:1-2Philippians 2:1-2. The text teaches unity, but not uniformity - there is a difference. Please pray as we seek to widen our variety, for God’s glory. Any comments welcome.

I ran into a good radio broadcast from "Iron Sharpens Iron" on the subject of appropriate music in church. As a Pastor, it is always important to hold to Biblical guidelines regarding music. You may download the MP3 here.Listen in to help us measure what Biblical music is and what it isn’t.

I’ve begun reading "The Courage To Be Protestant" by David Wells, which is highly recommended on the blogosphere. He takes the reader through a historical and analytical journey through evangelicalism and how it has lost its way. In my opinion, it’s a "must read". I am up to page 76 out of 248. Mr. Wells gives a broad overview yet still deals with specifics. Very well done and I look forward to getting through it. It is a good read for this Pastor’s soul.

Lot’s of stuff going on. The potential of several new visitors, our church sign will be arriving any day now….MIDI hymns being sorted, loaded, and tested into our keyboard so that we can have accompaniment during worship…not to mention working full-time…… How many hours are there in a day again??? Please pray that I would keep the preaching central this week as the temptation is putting a lot of GOOD things ahead of what is BEST and ESSENTIAL….God’s Word. Also, the book “The Courage To be Protestant” came in today…I read one page. I am taking Friday off so that will help immensely. Please pray that al would go smoothly and He would be glorified.

In pondering the condition of current fads and trends in evangelicalism today, I have been of the opinion that there have got to be Christians out there who have gotten disillusioned and have subsequently become impoverished from the modern-day pragmatism and heavily man-centered preaching that comes out of pulpits week after week. Here in New England it is especially an issue. It has been my prayer that there would be a multitude of Christians who are looking for expository preaching, which they can find at New Beginnings. We have seen some individuals begin to express interest in our church because of this very issue. Please pray that this may bear fruit and that a revival of Biblical preaching would catch New England aflame again.. Sola Deo Gloria!

After several weeks of tinkering, we finally have video sermons on the church web site. We’re using a cheap Aiptek IS-DV that I picked up on Ebay for $40.00, used.

Here is the message from today, where I have just begun an exposition in Philippians:

I hav been considering lately the plight of Christendom today. Contemplating it too long undoubtedly causes great “fainting fits” (as Spurgeon called it) for the Pastor today who attempts to teach & preach the great truths of God’s Word without admixture. Especially when it comes to desiring to grow a church numerically WITHOUT utiliizing the popular, unbiblical methods of doing so. The pressure on the Pastor these days to endorse these methods is intense indeed. There is a new book that has taken he blogosphere by storm, called “The Courage To Be Protestant” by David Wells. I’ve been meaning to order it for a few weeks now, and now I have broken down and have just laced the order on Amazon.com. I’ll try and blog my impressions while reading it. In the meantime, let’s all of us (especially Pastors) be in prayer for one another as we deal with these intrusions.