Bulletin Edition August 2018

Perfect, complete, without blemish, holy, blameless, spotless; these are just a few of the words the scriptures uses to describe Gods saints. We do not feel that we are any of these things in ourselves, but this is what God says about us. Do we believe what we see in ourselves or what God says about us? God describes us with these glorious words because of what our Lord Jesus Christ accomplished for us by his holy sinless life and his sacrificial death for us on the cross. God’s word describes us as what we are in Christ. Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.
Pastor Don Bell

The original does not copy a counterfeit. As the original which Christ has created in his righteousness and governs by his gospel, our all-powerful Head keeps his church from copying the corrupt practices of the many man-made corporations in this world who counterfeit themselves as churches of God.

It Pleased the Lord Through Preaching
Acts 12: 25, 13: 1-3
In this text, we have the account of how the Lord faithfully sent forth Barnabas and Saul to the Gentile world. God has an elect people whom he has determined to save OUT OF all corners and people of this world in Christ Jesus. (Genesis 22: 17, 18 Christ the Seed-Gal. 3: 16; Galatians 3:8, 9.)

This gospel of Christ the Seed was preached unto Abraham and this same gospel shall be preached to all God’s elect scattered throughout the entire world. God uses his church to do so. The very wisdom of God which chose his people in Christ, the very wisdom which accomplished the work whereby mercy and peace have met in harmony in Christ our Substitute, is the same wisdom of God which chose that the instrument he would use to proclaim his gospel would be his church in this world.

The believer–who is perfectly complete in Christ to enter glory right now–remains in this world because God choose to use saved sinners to carry his gospel to his elect and save them through the gospel of our glorified Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 1:21.)

Just as the work of election, of redemption, and of regeneration is the work of our triune God even so the work of raising and equipping his witnesses is the work of our Lord. God’s ambassadors’ are called of God; God gives his saints a heart to recognize his messengers and to support them in God’s work; God separates them to the work he would have them to do; God’s messengers are filled and led by the Spirit of God. Thus they go forth preaching the gospel of Christ and him crucified.
Clay Curtis.

“Behold My Servant”
Isaiah 42:1-3

Behold him with the eye of faith. To behold him is to trust him. Behold him with an admiring heart. To behold the Lord Jesus Christ as he is revealed in the Scriptures is to admire him. Behold him whatever your need is. Whatever your soul needs you will obtain as you behold the Son of God. Behold him with grateful memory. “Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift!” As all God’s saints in the Old Testament beheld him in expectation, let us now behold him in holy remembrance.
BEHOLD CHRIST’S GREAT HUMILIATION. Though our Savior is himself the Son of God, in every way equal to the Father, he took on him the form of a servant and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (Phil.2:5-8).He came into this world to do his Father’s will. As our covenant Head and Representative he voluntarily subjected himself to the will, work, and law of his Father to save his people (Heb. 10:5-14). In doing so, he both saved us and gave us an example to follow. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” God calls his Son, “mine Elect.” God the Father saw his Son as the only one suitable for and able to perform the work of redemption and chose him to do it. The humanity of Christ was chosen,ordained, and sanctified by God the Father for the purpose of saving his people.The words, “whom I uphold,” might be translated, “upon whom I lean.” The triune God placed complete confidence in the God-man as the Surety and Savior of all the elect. Christ alone is the One of whom God says, “in him my soul delighteth.”He is delighted with Christ from eternity (Prov. 8:24-30), in his life of obedience (Matt. 3:17;17:5), and in his sacrifice (Eph. 5:2). And he is delighted with us in Christ (Eph.1:6;I Pet. 2:5).
BEHOLD THE WORK CHRIST CAME TO PERFORM. “He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.” The word “judgment” means “righteousness”.Christ came into this world to bring righteousness and salvation to God’s elect scattered among the nations of the world. He has done this by magnifying and honoring the law (v. 21). By his obedience to the law he magnified it. By his death he satisfied the penalty of the law for his people and made it honorable, so that God might be both just and the Justifier of chosen sinners. Even now Christ brings forth judgment (righteousness and salvation) to his elect by the preaching of the gospel (Rom. 1:15-17).
Don Fortner

The Final Judgment Will Strip Us
Joe Terrell
Judgment is a stripping process in which the outward form is removed to reveal the inward reality. In the judgment, many are stripped of their fair appearance in the flesh in order that the wretched, shriveled, rebellious inner man of the spirit might be seen for what it is. In their lives, they had spent a great deal of effort beautifying the flesh in order to hide the ugliness of the spirit; but judgment shall make the reality known.
In the similar way, there are many who are possessed of a beautiful inner man, a regenerated spirit that is like its Creator, the Lord Jesus. But, for all their lives here, that nature has been hindered, suppressed and frustrated by an ugly flesh that will not cooperate. But judgment shall remove that wretched flesh, and reveal the beauty of the work of God in the inner man, as it is written, “The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.” (Romans 8:19)
Judgment will not change anyone: it will merely reveal what they are. Are you ready to be revealed?

CHRIST SHALL NOT FAIL
Isaiah 42:4
Tom Harding
“He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law” (Isaiah 42:4).

To you who believe the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, this is one of the most precious promises in all scripture (2 Peter 1:4). The Lord Jesus Christ has been appointed by Almighty God and sent in the fullness of time (Gal.4:4) to accomplish all our salvation (John 17:4). The success of His work is guaranteed by the decree of God (Acts 2:23; Isa. 46:9-12).
It is sad but true, every sinner has miserably failed to honor God and produce a righteousness that would satisfy Him, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). However, this gives us all the more reason to rejoice and trust our Great Saviour, Surety that cannot fail (Heb.7:25). Although He met with fierce opposition (John 19:15) and had great difficulties to overcome (Heb. 4:15), He always went about doing the will and work of God with perfection and without fail (John 4:34).
This leads us to consider what work did He undertake as the Saviour and Surety of His covenant people, in which He did not fail? Think about these things!
1). He did not fail, to fulfill every type, picture, prophecy and promise recorded in the Old Testament scriptures. “Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me” (John 5:39; Luke 24: 25-27,44-46). What God promised in the covenant of grace our Lord Jesus Christ perfectly fulfilled (Rom.4:21).
2). He did not fail, to honor, magnify and exalt the holy law of God for His covenant people, (Isa. 42:21). “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Matt. 5:17). He established a perfect righteousness for His people and sovereignly and freely imputes it unto them (Rom. 4: 4-8; Isa.61:10).
3). He did not fail, to make complete and eternal atonement for the sin of His covenant people, “but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Heb. 2:17; 9:26). The Good Shepherd gave His life as the sacrifice for the sin of His sheep (Jn. 10:15; 1 Peter 3:18).
4). He shall not fail, to justify, redeem, sanctify, call and glorify all His covenant people. “Whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified” (Rom. 8:30).

Our very hope of salvation and joy of eternal life is based upon the unfailing, perfect, eternal and complete work of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who cannot fail (John 17:1-5)!

HOW DID PETER DEAL WITH CONTENTION?
Acts 11: 1-25

First, Peter declares to his brethren what God the Holy Spirit did in his own heart (Acts 11: 4-12.) Notice, Peter does not defend himself; that would have only caused more strife between him and his brethren. Nor does Peter argue with his brethren over his actions before the law because that would have only continued to point his brethren to the law and aroused more contention. Peter declares before his brethren the work of God the Holy Spirit: the Voice of divine revelation from heaven, God’s command in his heart, the work of the Spirit of the LORD.

Secondly, Peter declares that the Holy Spirit prepared the heart of Cornelius and the elect in his household the same as he had Peter’s. (Acts 11: 13-14.) Peter declares that not only did the Lord prepare him to preach to the Gentiles but the Spirit also prepared Cornelius to gather his house and his friends to hear the gospel of Christ. See how Peter continues to point his brethren to the work of the Lord, away from the law.

Thirdly, Peter declares how the Lord baptized the Gentiles in the Holy Ghost (Acts 11: 15-16; Ephesians 2:18; Colosians 3:11) Peter declares he could not withstand God (Acts 11: 17)

Fourthly, as Peter rehearsed this matter to those who contended with him, he was proclaiming the gospel to those contentious brethren (Acts 11: 18.) This work of God the Holy Spirit in turning Peter’s brethren from the captivity of sin in their flesh back to Christ is one aspect of what is meant in, Roman 6:14: For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

In this text we see plainly how you and I will deal with one another if we turn from Christ to the law. May his grace in the heart, make the gospel of Christ our Righteousness the tie which binds our hearts in One (Ephesians 4: 1-3.)
Clay Curtis.

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