WHAT DOES BAPTISM MEAN?

The Bible presents baptism as an outward sign of faith in Jesus Christ alone for salvation. Christian baptism is an act of obedience to the command of Jesus, declaring the believer’s faith in and identification with their crucified, buried, and risen Savior. Baptism is a visible sermon of the gospel of Jesus Christ, identifying the Christian with his death, burial, and resurrection. Baptism does not save and is not “necessary” for salvation. (Matt. 28:19–20; Rom. 6:1–11; 1 Cor. 12:13; Col. 2:12).

Never a part of a church?

Burned by church?

Skeptic? Irreligious? Prodigal?

We are a new church starting this fall for you. We love Jesus and we love Benbrook. No matter your background you are welcome to join us. We have space for you and your doubts, wounds, and frustrations. Jesus has grace for you. (Read that last sentence again slowly)

We desire to have a culture of “one-anothering throughout our church. Where we don’t have a church with biblical counseling but a church of biblical counseling when one–anothering is normative in our church life.”1 This happens in the life of Grace Benbrook primarily through Community Groups, which is a place where people learn how to follow Jesus and love one another because of how He has loved us. We are not a church with groups but a church of groups. 

I was 28 when I became the pastor of Highland Village First Baptist Church (now known as The Village Church). I had had a rough go early on in my church experience, and at that time I was not fully out of my “disenchanted with the local church” phase.

In all honesty, I wasn’t sure at the time that church membership was biblical. Despite that, the Spirit had made it all too clear that I was going to be pastoring this small church in the suburbs of Dallas. That was one of the many ironies of my life in those days.

In a previous post we discussed the balance of honesty, urgency, and joy in our evangelism. In this post we will give five specific suggestions on how we should evangelize. 

How should we evangelize? There is a certain balance that we want to strive for in our evangelism, a balance of honesty and urgency and joy. Too often we have only one, or at best, two, of these aspects rather than all three. The balance is important. These three together most appropriately represent the gospel. 

HONESTY

First, we tell people with honesty that if they repent and believe, they will be saved. But they will need to repent, and it will be costly. We must be accurate in what we say, not holding any important parts back that seem to us awkward or off-putting. 

A GOSPEL EXPLANATION

Our Creator God is holy, just, and loving. We are his people, made in his image. Though we were once in fellowship with God and loved by him, we are now cut off from him. That separation of God and his people started with a rebellion by our ancestors. At root, the rebellion was our choice not to believe God and to attempt to make ourselves God instead. That treasonous rebellion failed, and the judgment was eternal death. Horribly, the sin of rebellion is passed on from generation to generation as a curse: all people inherit both the sin and the judgment. Our sin nature makes it impossible for anyone to earn his way back to God. 

Nothing is more important for us than to know what forgiveness is as well as what it isn’t. So what I propose in this study is to look first at five myths about forgiveness; that is to say, five lies many of us have embraced about what it means to forgive another person. Then I will turn to five truths about forgiveness, or five essential elements apart from which true forgiveness will never take place.

After we discussed forgiveness yesterday the Holy Spirit may convict you that it’s time to forgive someone who has sinned against you or you will in the future. The following forgiveness prayer can be used as a template to guide you in your own prayer to God. You may adapt this one, or read it as your own prayer, filling in the specific offense and name of the one you are forgiving.

In Western culture, individualism is like a windshield or a pair of glasses. We’re so used to “seeing through” it that we don’t even see it. We need some help to recognize how our self-centeredness actually manifests itself. Below are some indicators of individualism, some ways it may express itself based on who you are and how you’re wired.