Theological term
Regulative Principle
449 sermons · All terms
The Commission Given to Joshua
Joshua 1:1–9 records the divine commission given to Joshua upon the death of Moses — a commission built on four pillars: the reminder of God's covenant promise, the blessing of God's presence, the charge to courageous obedience, and the centrality of God's Word. God's appointment of Joshua as Moses' successor demonstrates that sovereign providence works through human instruments, yet is never bound to them; the faithfulness of God outlasts every leader. The sermon draws a direct line from the conquest commission to the Great Commission of Matthew 28, arguing that Christ's promised presence with His church is the only sufficient ground for courage and faithfulness in gospel ministry.
2LCF Chapter 15 - Of Repentance Unto Life and Salvation
The 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 15, treats repentance not as a human achievement that merits divine favor but as a sovereign gift granted by God in effectual calling, rooted in the covenant of grace, and ratified by the active and passive obedience of Jesus Christ. The chapter distinguishes saving repentance — an evangelical, Spirit-wrought change of mind toward sin — from both mere Judas-like sorrow and the moralistic performance of good works in place of bad. Five structural concerns of the chapter are examined in sequence: the place, necessity, outflow, duration and duty, and result of repentance, culminating in the assurance that no sin is so great as to bring damnation upon those who truly repent. Hearers are called to daily, particular repentance for known sins, to pray for strength and supplies of the Spirit, and to embrace the ministry of reconciliation as the abiding means by which God renews sinners and saints alike.
Ask FGBC - Podcast with Jim Butler, Dr James Renihan, Dr Richard Barcellos
This roundtable conversation between three pastors and theologians addresses a wide range of questions submitted by church members, covering biblical theology, covenant theology, baptism, eschatology, and Christian living. The discussion moves from how Christ fulfills Old Testament Israel, through the covenantal basis for believers' baptism, to the nature of the eternal state, the hermeneutics of applying Old Testament promises, the place of ethnic Israel in relation to the church, and the means of grace for raising covenant children. Throughout, the speakers return to a consistent Reformed hermeneutic: Christ is the true and greater fulfillment of all Old Testament promise, the church is the eschatological Israel of prophetic expectation, and the ordinary means of grace — Word, prayer, and faithful worship — remain God's appointed instruments for the conversion and nurture of his people.
The Authority of the Church
Christ's promise in Matthew 16:19 to give 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven' to the church raises two perennial dangers: authoritarian abuse of ecclesiastical power and the outright abdication of it. This sermon expounds the identity of those entrusted with these keys (apostles, elders, and the gathered congregation together), the nature of the authority delegated (binding and loosing through preaching and discipline), and the proper ground of confidence when the church acts — not sacerdotal infallibility, but the assurance that heaven ratifies the church's faithful obedience to Scripture. The practical conclusion is that the keys are exercised through the proclamation of the Word, the admission and exclusion of members, and the administration of the sacraments — never through entertainment, self-help, or moral do-goodery.
The Triumph of the Church
What is the church, who builds it, and can anything destroy it? Expounding Matthew 16:13–18, this sermon works through Peter's confession of Christ as the Messiah and Son of the living God, traces the promise of the Davidic Covenant in 2 Samuel 7 to its fulfilment in Christ's declaration to build His church, and refutes the Roman Catholic claim that Peter is the rock upon which the church rests. The sermon closes with the triumph of the church: Christ owns it, Christ builds it, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
Ask FGBC #5 - Are people who “chose” for Jesus actually saved?
This pastoral Q&A addresses whether Christians who use Arminian or synergistic language — 'I chose Jesus,' 'I accepted Jesus' — are genuinely saved, or whether such language betrays a fatal misunderstanding of the gospel. The response distinguishes sloppy speech from substantive doctrinal error, urging a judgment of charity toward those lacking theological precision while insisting that doctrinal faithfulness is essential to Christian identity. The episode closes with a call for patience with new believers growing in understanding and for the importance of sound preaching and good church membership as the ordinary means by which precision is cultivated over time.
The Theological Foundations of the Lord's Supper
The Lord's Supper rests on a layered theological foundation that most communicants have never fully considered. Drawing from 1 Corinthians 11:23-26, this sermon traces six doctrinal streams — Scripture's divine inspiration, the perfections of God, the person of Christ, covenant theology, the substitutionary cross, and communion with God as a means of grace — showing how all of them converge in the ordinance. Transubstantiation is rejected on the grounds of Chalcedonian Christology, and the new covenant ratified in Christ's blood is anchored exegetically in Jeremiah 31:31-34. Hearers are called to approach the Lord's Table with an informed and joyful obedience, knowing that in this ordinance the risen Christ, by His Spirit, feeds and strengthens the faith of His people.
The Lord's Supper
Paul's rehearsal of the Lord's Supper institution in 1 Corinthians 11:23–26 exposes the Corinthians' wretched conduct precisely because the ordinance comes by divine apostolic command and carries the full weight of Christ's atoning death. The sermon traces four aspects of the Supper: its character as a divine command, as a remembrance generally, as a remembrance of Christ specifically, and as a proclamation of His death until He comes. Christians who absent themselves from this ordinance rob themselves of the Spirit-wrought strengthening that God has annexed to this living symbol of the gospel.
2LCF Chapter 21 - Of Christian Liberty and Liberty of Conscience
Christian liberty, properly understood, is not primarily about matters of lifestyle preference but about the freedom Christ has purchased for believers: freedom from the guilt, power, and punishment of sin, and freedom for joyful, childlike access to and obedience toward God. The 1689 London Baptist Confession chapter 21 unfolds this in three movements — the definition of Christian liberty (paragraph 1), the protection of liberty of conscience (paragraph 2), and the qualification that Christian liberty is never a license to sin (paragraph 3). Central to paragraph 2 is the confession's axiomatic claim that God alone is Lord of the conscience, which means neither civil authority nor ecclesiastical authority may bind the conscience beyond or against the Word of God. The practical application presses believers to distinguish between God's explicit commands and their own preferences, and to resist the near-universal temptation to elevate personal opinion to the status of thus saith the Lord.
2LCF Chapter 1 - Of the Holy Scriptures, Part 2
What does it mean to interpret the Bible correctly, and how does the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith guide that task? Working through paragraphs 5 to 10 of Chapter 1, this study introduces the discipline of hermeneutics — the science of biblical interpretation — by tracing six principles the Confession sets forth: the scope of Scripture (the glory of God in the salvation of sinners through Christ), the sufficiency of Scripture (expressly stated and necessarily implied), the perspicuity of Scripture (clear enough for the unlearned on all saving matters), the translation of Scripture (grounded in divine inspiration and providential preservation), the interpretation of Scripture (the analogy of Scripture and the analogy of faith), and the finality of Scripture (Holy Scripture as the supreme judge over all councils, creeds, and private opinion). The practical burden is that a faulty hermeneutic produces bad doctrine, and that reading the Old Testament through the lens the New Testament apostles themselves provide is not optional but the pattern Christ himself commanded.
The Child and Parent Relationship, Part 2
Ephesians 6:4 commands fathers not to provoke their children to wrath, but to bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord — a positive obligation grounded in the fifth commandment and the sanctifying work of the Spirit in the believer's life. This sermon expounds that single verse within the broader household code of Ephesians 5:22–6:9, situating Christian parenting as a fruit of sovereign grace rather than a means of earning it. The prohibition against provoking children is unpacked through five practical failures — unrighteous anger, unbiblical discipline, inconsistency, partiality, and imbalance of law and gospel — before the exhortation to train and admonish is developed from the book of Proverbs under four marks of a faithful parent. The sermon closes with concrete applications: pray for children, provide for them, protect them, preach law and gospel to them, and be present with them.
The Promise of Blessings and Cursing, Part 2
Leviticus 26:14–46 sets forth the covenant curses God threatened against Israel for breaking the Mosaic Covenant — a covenant of works — escalating through drought, wild animals, war, cannibalism, wholesale destruction, and exile. These curses came to historical fulfillment in the fall of the Northern Kingdom to Assyria in 722 BC, the fall of the Southern Kingdom to Babylon in 586 BC, and the destruction of Jerusalem by Rome in AD 70 — events prophesied in the Olivet Discourse and confirmed by Paul in 1 Thessalonians 2. The chapter closes with a promise of restoration conditioned on Israel's humble repentance and God's fidelity to the Abrahamic covenant. Believers under the New Covenant are freed from these covenant curses because Christ bore them fully, fulfilling the demands of the law and standing as the surety of a better covenant.
The Promise of Blessings and Curses (Part 1)
Leviticus 26:1–13 opens with a promise of blessing conditioned on Israel's obedience — a structure that raises the question of how the Old Covenant relates to the New. This study expounds the covenantal framework underlying Leviticus 26, arguing that the Old Covenant operated as a covenant of works at the national level, distinct from the covenant of grace realized in Christ. The blessings of rain, peace, and God's presence promised to Israel find their fulfillment in the New Covenant, where the obedience that secures blessing is Christ's own, imputed to his people by faith alone.
The Penalty for Blasphemy
Leviticus 24 addresses both the daily obligations of tabernacle worship and the capital penalty for blasphemy, grounding each in the direct speech of God to Moses. The chapter's narrative pivot — an incident in which a man of mixed Israelite and Egyptian descent blasphemes the name of Yahweh — becomes the occasion for case-law application of the third commandment, surrounded by reminders of the lex talionis and the equal accountability of stranger and native-born alike. The typological furniture of the holy place (lampstand and showbread) points forward to Christ as the true light and bread of life, while the blasphemy legislation, with its witness requirements and retributive principle, reveals a God who guards his own honour and structures justice with both severity and safeguard. The sermon exhorts hearers to put away every profane use of the divine name and to cultivate a reverent, wholehearted employment of it in thought, word, and worship.
The Triumph of the Lamb
Revelation 12 offers a behind-the-scenes theological account of Christ's incarnation, death, ascension, and their cosmic consequences for the devil and the church. The chapter unfolds in three movements: the incarnation of the Son (vv. 1–6), the defeat of the dragon in heaven (vv. 7–12), and the persecution of the woman (vv. 13–17). The decisive victory belongs entirely to the blood of the Lamb, not to any merit or faithfulness of the saints. The suffering of God's people in this present evil age is not evidence of divine absence but of the devil's rage against a church already secured by Christ's triumph over him.
Live Stream - November 26, 2023
Colossians 1:13–20 sets forth one of the richest concentrations of Christology in the New Testament, and this exposition works through it under three heads: the concise statement of salvation as divine deliverance from darkness into the kingdom of the Son, an expansion on the identity and work of that Son (his essential Divine Majesty, his mediatorial kingship, and his Redemptive Excellence in the crosswork), and finally the apostolic proclamation of this same Christ as the proper content of all Christian preaching. The sermon argues throughout that the errors threatening the Colossian church — and the church today — are answered not by novelty but by a high and uncompromising Christology that refuses to bring Christ down from his throne. The closing application draws from Hebrews 5: Christians are to press on from milk to solid food, growing in the knowledge of Christ so as to speak truthfully of the King of Kings to a world that in the Christmas season catches only a blurred glimpse of a babe in a manger.
The Husband and Wife Relationship, Part 1
Ephesians 5:22–24 presents the duty, reason, and practice of a wife's submission to her husband within the covenant of marriage. The passage is expounded within the broader Pauline household code of Ephesians 5:21–6:9, which itself flows from the Spirit-filled life commanded in verse 18. The sermon grounds wifely submission in both the created order (the husband as head by divine indicative, not negotiation) and in the analogical relationship of Christ and the church. Husbands and wives are called to embrace their respective obligations — loving leadership and willing, comprehensive submission — as an act of obedience to God, knowing that the grace enabling this obedience flows from the gospel of Jesus Christ alone.
Leviticus 20 - the Death Penalty
Leviticus 20 catalogues capital offenses under the Mosaic law — idolatry, witchcraft, adultery, incest, homosexuality, and bestiality — and provides the occasion for a sustained biblical-theological treatment of the death penalty across the covenants. The study traces the authorization of capital punishment from the Noahic Covenant in Genesis 9 through the Mosaic legislation and into the New Covenant via Acts 25 and Romans 13, arguing that the death penalty remains a binding obligation upon civil magistrates. Romans 13 is read as the New Testament's clearest statement that the sword entrusted to the civil magistrate is God's instrument for executing wrath upon evildoers in history, not merely a sign of general authority. Hearers are called to think biblically about the proper and limited role of civil government, to resist the conflation of civil submission with capitulation to tyranny, and to uphold the abiding moral normativity of capital punishment for murder and other heinous crimes.
The Necessity to Walk in Wisdom, Part 3
What does it mean to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and how does that filling express itself in the life of the church? Expounding Ephesians 5:19–21, this sermon argues that the Spirit's presence produces four concrete effects: mutual instruction through song, praise to the Lord Jesus Christ, gratitude to God the Father, and submissive regard for one another — all of which together constitute Trinitarian Christian worship. A sustained lexical, theological, and contextual case is made that the 'psalms and hymns and spiritual songs' of verse 19 refer to the biblical Psalter as the divinely authorized songbook of the church, and the sermon closes by grounding the call to walk in wisdom in the sufficiency of Scripture and the free grace of God in Christ.
Holiness in the Daily Lives of Old Covenant Israel
Leviticus 19:19–37 presents a series of miscellaneous laws governing mixed breeding, pagan practices, sacred prostitution, necromancy, care for the elderly and the stranger, and fair trade — all set within the covenant calling of Israel to be holy as God is holy. These laws are classified under the threefold Reformed distinction of moral, ceremonial, and judicial law, with the ceremonial portions fulfilled and abrogated in Christ while their embedded moral duties remain, traceable to the Ten Commandments. The passage is expounded to show that Israel's separation from surrounding nations was not arbitrary but theologically grounded in God's own act of separating Israel as his covenant people. The enduring application is that the law's pedagogical function — exposing sin and driving the people to the Lamb of God — is as operative for the New Covenant believer as it was for ancient Israel.
The Good Fight of Faith
The Christian life is not ease but warfare, and 1 Timothy 6:11–12 summons every believer to flee wickedness, pursue righteousness, fight the good fight of faith, and maintain steadfast perseverance. The sermon is careful to frame these imperatives not as conditions for acceptance with God but as the necessary marks of one already conquered by sovereign grace and effectually called. Paul's martial language is grounded in the objective content of the faith once delivered to the saints and in the subjective grip the believer must not release. The passage receives its sharpest application at a baptism service, where the public confession of Tabea and Benjamin illustrates that the effectual call comes by the same sovereign grace whether a person is seized dramatically on a road to Damascus or nurtured quietly in the home of a Eunice and a Lois.
Wednesday Bible Study - Oct 18, 2023
Leviticus 19 opens the Holiness Code's application to individual, family, and social conduct, demanding that God's covenant people be holy as he is holy. Working through verses 1–18, this study traces four overlapping imperatives: the pursuit of holiness as separation unto God, reverence for parents as the foundational social structure, sabbatarianism as a trans-covenantal moral obligation grounded in creation and redemption, and the prohibition of idolatry as covenant fidelity. The New Covenant application is drawn throughout — holiness, the fifth commandment, the Lord's Day, and the rejection of false worship all bind the blood-bought, Spirit-filled church with the same authority they carried in Israel, though the ceremonial forms have been fulfilled and set aside in Christ.
Live Stream - October 15, 2023
Ephesians 5:15–17 calls believers to walk circumspectly — not as fools but as wise — by redeeming the time in days that are evil. The sermon distinguishes biblical wisdom from mere intellectual knowledge, defining it as the skillful application of God's word to the whole of life. The twin remedy against folly is the regular study of Scripture (with particular attention to the Book of Proverbs as a manual of wisdom) and persistent, faith-filled prayer for wisdom as commended in James 1. The new man in Christ is not left to himself but is given the pattern and the means to navigate a present evil age in a manner consistent with his calling.
Wednesday PM - Sept 27, 2023
Leviticus 17 governs the sacrificial use of blood among the covenant people of Israel, and this exposition traces three interlocking regulations: the prohibition against slaughtering sacrificial animals outside the Tabernacle, the prohibition against ingesting blood, and the rules for handling game animals. The central rationale is penal substitution — the blood of the animal represents life given in the place of the worshiper's life, prefiguring the atoning work of Christ. The Holiness Code of Leviticus 17–26 functions as the ethical imperative that follows the indicative of sacrificial forgiveness, a pattern that anticipates the New Covenant movement from justification into sanctification.
The Blessings of the Ascended Christ
The ascended and glorified Christ actively dispenses blessings to his church from the right hand of the Father. Expounding Acts 2:22–47, this sermon traces three categories of those benefactions: his proclamational gifts (the gift of preachers, the preaching of the Word, and the Spirit's empowering of that preaching), his salvific gifts (effectual calling and the forgiveness of sins), and his ecclesiastical gifts (the creed of the church, the building and unity of the church, the gathering around apostolic doctrine, and the new covenant ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper). Believers are exhorted to pray for Spirit-empowered preaching, to attend diligently upon all the appointed means of grace, and to find their unity in the objective content of Christian confession rather than in secondary things.
Salvation, Not Judgement
Luke 9:51–56 presents Christ setting his face toward Jerusalem with the cross and his ascension before him, while James and John, shaped by the contentious spirit of their day, demand fire from heaven on a Samaritan village that had refused to receive him. The sermon expounds why Christ rebuked them: his ministry is one of salvation and life, not judgment and destruction, and the spirit that calls for condemnation of the ungodly misunderstands the nature of his mission. Believers are therefore called to imitate Christ's patience and mercy toward those who reject the gospel — going to another village rather than returning contempt for contempt.
The Anointing at Bethany
John 12:1–11 presents the anointing at Bethany as a window into the worthiness of Christ on the eve of His passion. Mary's extravagant gift of costly spikenard — lavished on the feet of Jesus six days before the Passover — is set in deliberate contrast with the sanctimonious theft of Judas Iscariot and the misguided indignation of the disciples. Christ receives the anointing, defends Mary from her critics, and interprets the act as preparation for His burial, underscoring that the one going to the cross is altogether lovely and chief among ten thousand. The sermon calls believers to a devotion that spares no expense in worship while also commending practical service to the poor — not as competing priorities, but as the inseparable fruit of a life oriented toward Christ.
The Active and Passive Obedience of Christ
The obedience of Christ — both active and passive — is the sole foundation of justification by faith alone. Working through two texts in Matthew's Gospel, this sermon expounds the theological distinction between Christ's active obedience, in which He fulfilled all righteousness on behalf of His people, and His passive obedience, in which He drank the cup of divine wrath and was overwhelmed by death as a ransom for many. Sinners cannot contribute a righteousness of their own; they need both the imputed righteousness of Christ's perfect life and the cleansing of His atoning blood. The occasion of three baptisms serves as the concrete illustration: the water publicly declares what God has accomplished inwardly through the finished work of the Savior.
The Ministry of Paul in Ephesus
Acts 19:1–10 presents what appears to be a re-baptism of John's disciples by Paul, but a careful reading of the passage's punctuation and structure reveals that verses 4 and 5 record what Paul said — a summary of John's baptism — while verse 6 records what Paul did: lay hands on these men to confer the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Spirit. John's baptism was Christian baptism, requiring repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, and these disciples had already received it. The extraordinary sign gifts of tongues and prophecy that accompanied the Spirit's coming in Acts 2, 8, 10, and 19 were revelatory gifts suited to the first-century church's founding mission and are not normative patterns for all believers in subsequent ages.
The Attempted Murder of the Good Shepherd
John 10:31–42 presents the religious leadership of Jerusalem responding to Christ's declaration 'I and my Father are one' not with worship but with stones. This exposition traces three movements: the revelation of Christ's divine glory in verse 30, the attempted murder by the Jewish leaders in verses 31–39, and the fruitful reception of Christ in the Transjordan in verses 40–42. Central to the passage is Christ's appeal to Psalm 82 and the argument from lesser to greater — if God calls earthly magistrates 'Elohim,' on what grounds do they stone the One whom the Father sanctified and sent? The sermon closes with an encouragement to the people of God: where Jerusalem rejects, the Transjordan receives, and the Good Shepherd will gather His sheep from every tribe and nation.