We are winding down our current series “Passion: It Wasn’t the Nails” with messages this week and then next. On April 13th I will preach on a Palm Sunday text to help set things up for our Holy Week services. This Sunday we will look at what John records about the actual crucifixion of Jesus. There has been a lot recorded about the brutality of Roman crucifixion. Many of you have watched Mel Gibson’s movie, The Passion of the Christ, where that history is described in gut wrenching visual reality. While that sells movies, because we tend to gravitate toward the sensational, that is not in the record of the Gospels.
Sometimes an author can say more by what they don’t say than by what they actually do say, and John is definitely doing that in chapter 19. John uses one word to describe the method of Jesus execution: Crucifixion! People living during the writing of John’s Gospel would have a far better understanding of crucifixion than most of us would because it was still very much a part of the culture. They likely would have seen a crucifixion in person. However, I believe John desires to make a point with what he doesn’t say about it. The focus of Christ’s passion was not on the cruelty of his execution; many people were executed in a similar way during the Roman Empire. The focus is on the mission of Christ being fulfilled. Yes, fulfilled through His death, but even more through the resurrection. The gospel writers are careful to not leave Jesus on the cross, but to see it as part of what was needed for Jesus to defeat death, Satan and sin through the resurrection. Join me this Sunday as we consider Christ’s passion to fulfill scripture.

C.S. Lewis has famously said of Jesus, “Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse.” There is no middle ground when it comes to who Jesus is. In this week’s text, the trial of Jesus in the courtyard of Pilate continues, and we see Pilate struggling through this very question.
The identity of Jesus is unique in the universe and difficult to grasp at times. Jesus is fully God and fully man, all at the same time. The theological term for it is The Hypostatic Union. More heresies of the church have arisen out of trying to explain the two natures of Jesus. One extreme heresy would deny that Jesus ever had a material, physical body. Another one says that Jesus only temporarily occupied His physical body. And yet others will deny the divinity of Jesus, espousing he only had the “spirit” of Jesus in a similar way to an Old Testament Prophet. In order for our salvation to be complete in Christ, Jesus has to be fully divine and fully human at the same time. The divine is needed to overcome and atone for the sin we have – only God can do that. Yet, that savior needed to be one of us so he could face the frailties of our human existence for us.
In John 19 Pilate tries to show to the Jewish leaders that Jesus is just a man. He flogs Jesus, makes a crown for Jesus out of thorns and puts a robe on him as the soldiers all mockingly call Jesus the King of the Jews. What Pilate doesn’t understand is that the frailty of Jesus’ humanity is all part of what was required for Him to do His work of salvation. The book of Hebrews describes Jesus as a High Priest that is “well acquainted with our sorrows.” That sorrow is on full display in the Passion of Jesus. Do you sometimes feel as though no one understands the sorrow you are going through? Jesus passionately understands the human experiences you and I have. In John’s Gospel, the author uses the term “Son of God” as a unique term to identify the fullness of who Jesus is. Fully God and fully man. Join me this Sunday as we explore the nature of Jesus that makes Him the Son of God and the savior of mankind.

Is there absolute truth? That is a question mankind has struggled with since the beginning of humanity. The encounter between Satan and Eve in Genesis 3 posed the idea that God had not been completely truthful with them, and that they could live a better life by discovering their own truth. In our passage this Sunday, not only is Jesus on trial, but truth itself is on trial. Jesus’ trial shifts from the religious leaders to the secular justice of Rome’s Pilate. Pilate first asks the Jewish leaders what are the charges they have against Jesus: they have none. Then Pilate turns to Jesus and asks Him, “What is it you have done?” After describing the nature of His Kingdom, Jesus responds to Pilate’s question with the reason He came into the world. Jesus came to testify to the truth, the absolute truth as found in the Father.
When sin entered the world, it did many things against the character and nature of God, but none is more drastic than sin’s assault on the absolute truth that is found in the very nature of God. In His redemptive act, Jesus makes the point that who He is and what He does is a full revelation of the absolute truth of God. It was the passion of Christ to testify about the truth that took Him to the cross. Join me on Sunday as we look at the trial of Jesus and seek to answer the question, “What is Truth.”

In our current sermon series, we are going through John 18 & 19 covering the events leading up to and including the crucifixion, death and burial of Jesus. Passion: It Wasn’t the Nails. The nails are not what put Jesus on the Cross, nor did they keep Him there. It was the passion of Christ alone that took him to the cross.
This Sunday we will consider Jesus as the solidary figure in the Passion account. The focus comes down hard on Peter for his denial of Jesus, but let’s remember, Peter was the only one to follow Jesus back into the city for the trial. Everyone else fled for their lives. Peter may be the only one to speak words of denial, but the rest denied Jesus with their actions. One of the reasons I love John’s Gospel is because he uses stylistic devices the other gospel writers do not use. In this passage we see the three denials of Peter are broken up with the word “meanwhile,” to set his denial in the context of the interrogation of Jesus. Jesus was looking for a witness to speak either for or against him, yet there was no one – not even Peter who was just yards away. Jesus was all alone – he is the One Solitary Life! What he came to do, only He could do, and no one could help him or even share in what he did to fulfill the Father’s mission. That is the point of John’s depiction of Jesus’ trial and Peter’s denial. HOWEVER – Peter’s account of failure is used later in the story of Christ to show God’s love through restoration and the mission he calls all of us to engage in. Join me this Sunday as we consider the passion of Christ as the One Solitary Man.

Sunday we start a new sermon series from John 18 & 19: Passion – It Wasn’t the Nails. This series will take us all the way to Easter week covering the events of Jesus’ arrest, trial, crucifixion and death. Over the last year I have been preaching through the Gospel of John and this series, together with the few weeks following Easter, will conclude our journey through that book.
This Sunday as we look at the arrest of Jesus in John 18, you will see an unusual confidence that Jesus has in the midst of a very stressful situation; his arrest and impending execution. A term that is used to describe the events surrounding Jesus’ crucifixion is “The Passion of the Christ.” Mel Gibson’s movie about the crucifixion has that very name. Why is this called “The Passion of the Christ?” The simple answer is because this is the very thing Jesus came to earth to do, and now that it has finally arrived, Jesus enters into it with great passion as he seeks to fulfill the will of the Father and mission he came for.
From a human perspective it would appear that the events of John 18 & 19 caught God and Jesus off guard. That they were surprised and ambushed by the enemy. That when Jesus was crucified, the nails and the hammer that drove them into his flesh were what put him and kept him on the cross. In this series we will see it wasn’t the nails that kept him there – it was his passion; a passion that is fueled by the love of God for all sinners throughout human history. Join me for this new sermon series as it conveyed the exciting conclusion to the Gospel of John.

This Sunday we will wrap up our six-week Kingdom Economics sermon series by considering the returns good stewardship brings. I remind you that stewardship is not just what we do with our financial resources, it is the stewardship of our lives that includes money as well as our time, our abilities and the relationships we invest in. As we conclude this series, I want you to see what the return for your investment is. The return is not seen in a growing bank account either for the individual or for the church, but the number of lives that are reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Every other philosophy about how to invest the resources of your life will always be based on how much of a return will come personally to you. That is not how Kingdom Economics works. Biblical stewardship is for the growth of God’s Kingdom through the number of lives reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ. In essence, Kingdom Economics calls us to invest for the benefit of others. However, there is a side story to Kingdom Economics we all need to see and consider. The greatest joy and blessing in life does not come from using our resources for our benefit and pleasure. The greatest joy for the believer comes from seeing what God will do to transform lives for eternity when we practice biblical stewardship.
This week I will invite you to make a commitment to practice biblical stewardship as taught throughout Kingdom Economics. Click the link below or use the paper forms at the Welcome Table after service to make your response.

To this point in our sermon series, Kingdom Economics, we have considered some general stewardship principles from scripture. This Sunday we are going to consider stewardship on a more personal level as it relates to the local church.
While there are many different denominations in Christendom who deal with finances very differently from each other, we are a Baptist church that functions in the congregational system of church operations. The ecclesiology (big word for how a church operates) of congregational churches is under the Lordship of Christ and through the activity of the church body. Our church operates as an autonomous, self-governing entity. The church members, led by the Holy Spirit, are the decision makers of our church, and when it comes to finances, we are responsible for the income and expenses of the church. The church members decide what the church budget should be to operate the church and therefore, it is the congregation of the church that we depend on to give generously so we can reach our budget goals for the ministry to be fulfilled. There are no outside streams of income to the church. This Sunday, look around at the people attending the same service as you and understand that it is by the generosity of those people, together with you, that our ministry is funded.
Sunday, I intend to share some of the ministry we can do because people like you, under the Lordship of Christ, give proportionally and systematically to this church. Through the offering and the acts of service by people in our church we are fulfilling an Act 1:8 strategy for mission: local to global. Most of our budget goes to the ministry we have right here on Pleasure Island and the surrounding area. We also share in ministry across our state and in missions all over our nation as we support the North American Mission Board. In obedience to Scripture, we are also engaged in supporting missions to the other nations of the world through the International Mission Board. At this time, we are especially focused on the Bengali people around the world, in south Asia and with the help of Russell Abraham in places like New York City. That kind of mission can only be accomplished with the generous financial support of the people that make up the congregation of this congregational church. Join me this Sunday as we lay a biblical foundation for our personal stewardship and the local church.

For most people, generosity is not a natural inclination. We have inherited that attitude because part of our fallen human nature strives to live independent of God’s grace and instinctively assume a defensive posture when it comes to our survival. Generosity, with no expectation of repayment, works against being fully prepared for the worst case scenario. We wonder “how much will be enough?” If I give something away, will that mean that I will miss out on something I may need later on in life? This attitude is rooted in a basic human independence that has missed the supernatural way in which God provides for all our needs: GRACE. In Charles Dickens “A Christmas Carol”, Scrooge is a perfect example of how that attitude can lead to a very dark place. Scrooge followed that line of thinking to the point of total isolation for society, deep seeded anger and a hopeless future. It is also a dangerous attitude for a believer to have because it will stifle the generosity God calls us to exercise in our stewardship.

Why is it that generosity is not a problem for some people and yet for others, the thought of being generous brings on a life crisis? What is the factor that moves people to be generous? There is one word that answers those questions: GRACE! Generous people operate in the knowledge and belief that they have received the grace of God, which frees them to be generous with what God has given them. Sunday we are going to look at the example of the early church in Acts 4 where people began to practice generosity with the church and to the community. Like Scrooge, they experienced grace in a profound way and as a result their attitude about possessions was changed. Where before grace they were tight fisted with their money; they became radically generous. Join me Sunday morning as we consider this formula of Kingdom Economics: Stewardship + GRACE = Generosity.

Last Sunday was the start to Kingdom Economics; a six-week sermon series on biblical stewardship. When I use the word “economics” I’m not referring to financial economics but am using that word to describe the values, principles and systems that we live by as stewards in the kingdom of God. Stewardship in God’s kingdom is not relegated to one specific area of life but permeates every aspect of a disciple’s life. Sunday we will consider “The Stewardship of Life.” If we believe God owns everything (last week’s teaching) and all we have is from God, it is only logical to conclude our very lives belong to God. And if our lives belong to God we need to be good stewards of all that we do with our lives. From Matthew 25, the parable of the talents, we see principles that a good steward will follow as they manage the resources from the master. From 1 Corinthians 4 we know that a steward is to be found faithful. Matthew 25 answers the question, “What does it mean to be a faithful steward?” Join me Sunday as we consider stewardship as a way of life that encompasses all we are and do.

As part of this series, I’m inviting everyone who considers themselves to be part of Kure Beach FBC to make a commitment for this sermon series. Here is a link to that commitment card or you can fill out a paper version at service this Sunday. One of the commitments is to be in attendance for or to watch all 6 messages in this series. Click Here to watch last week’s teaching.

It is difficult, even for the best of us, to remember all the things we need to remember. It seems that the more things we are engaged with, the more there is to remember, increasing the chances of forgetting something. That is why most of us use devices of some kind to help us remember the important things. We have a list of important contacts with a phone number. We either use the same password for all our computer / smart phone things or we use some kind of a password storage system in the event we forget one. We use calendars to keep track of appointments, obligations and other important events like birthdays. Most of us have some form of a To-Do-List so we are productive with our time. If something is important it is worth remembering so we make an effort to find a way to remember.
There is one thing Satan wants the Christian to forget: that we are forgiven. Does that ever happen to you? You know you have made a commitment to Christ at some point in the past and believe Christ has forgiven you of your sins; past, present and future. However, there are times that the Devil tries to convince you that you are not really forgiven, or we fall into living as though we are not forgiven by God’s grace; that we have to work to make our own atonement. God wants the Christian to remember you are freely forgiven by His grace through Jesus Christ. God has given us something to help us remember we are forgiven: Communion. Communion is not just an empty tradition or ceremony. I actually don’t think communion was ceremonial in its original use. Rather, it was relational and part of a normal gathering of people. Join me this Sunday as we celebrate the communion we have with God, because we are forgiven.