An argument for baptizing children who profess faith?

In my bible reading this morning, God spoke these words from Deuteronomy 21:

¹⁸ “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father or mother and doesn’t listen to them even after they discipline him, ¹⁹ his father and mother must take hold of him and bring him to the elders of his city, to the gate of his hometown. ²⁰ They will say to the elders of his city, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious; he doesn’t obey us. He’s a glutton and a drunkard.’ ²¹ Then all the men of his city will stone him to death. You must purge the evil from you, and all Israel will hear and be afraid.

As far as I understand Capitol Hill Baptist Church’s statement on baptizing children, you should wait for their faith to be tested as adults (in general) before you baptize them. Vern Poythress calls this rigorism and recommends credo baptists to baptize them as soon as they profess faith. D. A. Carson has a different stance (hear this audio link starting at 22:33 with Mark Dever weighing in) that entails a personal interview with a child/teen asking easy and curve ball questions. Bethlehem Baptist Church waits at least until age 11 and has thought through the issue quite a bit.

One of my big reasons for waiting is the practice of church discipline on a child who disobeys the parents regularly but has been baptized and is a church member. Do we excommunicate a 10 year old? So my stance has been to wait until the young person is treated as an adult, which may be as early as 13 years old. But the reading this morning presses me to say that if they are young and consistently rebellious, yes, you do excommunicate them (Matt 18.17) which is the New Covenant parallel to the Old Covenant of stoning someone to death because it cuts them off from the covenant community. So maybe Poythress push towards us credo baptists is correct.

30 Suggestions for Theological Students and Young Theologians

Reblogged from KINGDOMVIEW:

In response to the question "what advice would you offer to theological students and young theologians as they face a lifetime of theological work?", John Frame gives the following 30 (!) point answer:

1. Consider that you might not really be called to theological work. James 3:1 tells us that not many of us should become teachers and that teachers will be judged more strictly.

Read more… 1,631 more words

I love this and need to come back to it often as a pastor. I also need to keep this in mind if I go back to school for another theological degree.

Domestic Violence

Why don’t domestic violence abuse victims leave?

1. Fear that the abuse will will get worse.
2. Fear that their friends or family would turn against them and not believe them.
3. A desire for the children to grow up with both parents.
4. Worry about being able to support oneself and their children financially.
5. They erroneously believe that they are to blame.
6. They are ashamed to admit that they are being abused.
7. They hope the situation will improve.

Why are some men violent with women and/or children?

1. They feel sincerely sorry and think that this is enough to change.
2. They have seen violence in their home growing up.
3. They were victims of violence and abuse
4. They refuse to get help and think they can handle the problem on their own.

Why Should I come to my Church’s Sunday Gathering Early?

I suggest church members come to their Sunday gathering at least 15 minutes early. I would make it more than a suggestion for church leaders (pastor-elders and deacons/deaconesses). There are several reasons why one should be enthusiastic and resolved to come to the Sunday gathering early.

1. You have considered how to stir some others to love and good works (Hebrews 10:24-25) and you are so excited you can’t wait to get started. This is the text on why we gather weekly as a church, “And let us be consider one another in order to promote love and good works, not staying away from our meetings, as some habitually do, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day drawing near.” You come to encourage each other as the judgment/deliverance day of Jesus Christ’s second coming gets closer. The verse commands us to “consider one another.” So if you’ve been praying, thinking, and considering who God is telling you promote love and good works in and who to encourage, and you’re thinking about how you will do it, then you will be excited to accomplish what you’ve considered. So come early, eager and enthusiastic to engage people God has prepared you to engage!

2. The beginning of the gathering, namely the greeting, announcements, call to worship, and prayer of praise are not useless components of the gathering. God speaks through his Word. The call to worship is God speaking to us. The verse we read that morning sets our hearts to seek him and if you don’t hear it you lose out on that word from God calling you with the rest of the congregation to enjoy him. The prayer of praise is our response to that Word and sets our hearts to celebrate the greatness of who he is in a unique prayer each week. The announcements are for your benefit, not the announcers benefit.

3. Visitors who come on time may feel isolated or awkward. But if you’re there you can help them feel welcomed and engaged. You can set them at ease, point to Jesus, initiate a friendship, and bring someone along the path of gospel growth whether they need to convert, commit, grow, or go as a disciple-maker.

4. You won’t have to scramble for a seat in the middle or front when all the back row seats are taken. At CrossView there are many who sit in the back in the beginning and must be exhorted to move closer to the front to care for their neighbors who come later. If you come later and CrossViewers and other attendees don’t move to make room for you in the back, you have to find a seat nearer to the front or middle which may draw uncomfortable attention.

5. It encourages the leaders. Not only the pastor-elders, but the song leader, the gathering leader, and the others who are there on time and feel a significant ownership and investment in their local church. I’m not saying come on time only for them, but it does encourage them and isn’t that one of the reasons for the Sunday gathering as the day of Christ’s coming draws near (Hebrews 10:25)?

6. You won’t be frazzled and your heart can be more in tune with what God is going to be saying to you when you’re not feeling rushed. I hate coming in late and having my mind in 3 different places as verses are read, prayers are prayed, and songs are sung. I can’t maximally receive what God is communicating to me through the gathering and I want to receive it all! Coming early leaving time to pray and repent in the car (for impatience and other sins on the way to the gathering) prepares me and my family to receive all God wants us to receive that morning. It also disciples my kids in a healthy direction.

"Temptation and Sin Begin" - Genesis 3.1-7 - Sermon mp3 audio

Reblogged from CrossView Church LA:

DOWNLOAD THE MP3 AUDIO MESSAGE HERE  (preached on 4/14/13)

MAIN POINT: Temptation has 1 goal and at least 9 pathways to lead you there.

1. Satan wants you to sin (v. 1)
2. Questioning God’s Word leads you to sin (v. 1)
3. Distorting God’s Word leads you to sin (vv. 2-3)
4. Claims that contradict God’s Word leads you to sin (v. 4)

Read more… 160 more words

My sermon from last Sunday

Really Big List of Kindle Deals – Expiring Soon (by Tim Challies)

List by Tim Challies

Christian Living

• Alistair Begg, The Hand of God ($4.99)
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I am Unlimited? Kobe, Homosexuality, Racism, God, Limits, and our Happiness

From the Sprint commercial claiming that because we’re unlimited we have the right to unlimited data on our phones. The commercial says, “The miraculous is everywhere, in our homes, in our minds. We can share every second in data dressed as pixels. A billion roaming photo journalists uploading the human experience and it is spectacular. So why would you cap that?” My iPhone 5 can see every point of view. Every panorama. The entire gallery of humanity. I need to upload all of it. I need… no I have the right to be unlimited. Only Sprint offers truly unlimited data for iPhone 5.”

Whether it’s Kobe vowing to return to the NBA playing at an elite level, battles over the acceptance of homosexuality in our culture, or the racist’s justification for seeing his ethnicity superior to another’s, the human idea is older than the first humans born to Adam and Eve. It’s the idea that I have no limits and can do whatever I want. I have the right to whatever I want. I have no limits.

But this isn’t true. Limits exist. Kobe’s achilles has torn and will take at least 6 months to recover. Homosexuality disagrees and disobeys the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ according to the Bible (I’m not saying it will not be accepted in our culture but that it cannot erase the limitation the bible declares it to have). All humans from all ethnicities are just as human as any other human from a particular ethnicity. These are realities. Thus, they are limits. We can declare otherwise, we can even insist on our right to our declaration, but it doesn’t always change reality. It doesn’t change at least some limits.

Besides, limits can be good, can’t they? I’m glad my wife is morally limited to be faithful to me and I to her. I’m glad God limits me to teach and serve my children, not bully or exasperate them. I’m glad God tells me to obey the law and I’m glad everyone driving around me follows some limits like driving on the correct side of the road, obeying the limits placed on them by traffic lights, honoring lines on the road, and keeping within some proximity to the speed limit. I’m glad there are limits on people stealing and murdering. I’m glad there are some limits. The point is, we’re not unlimited. We don’t have the right to whatever we want and we don’t have the right to be unlimited!

Only God is unlimited and it is good that he is. It is also good that we are not. For in finding out where the true and false limits really are is the key to real freedom and happiness. Jesus said, “You will know the truth and the truth shall set you free.”