Topic
Anthropology
562 sermons · All topics
The Ethics of Motherhood
Titus 2:3–5 sets older women in the church as instructors of younger women in the domestic virtues that honor the created order and adorn the doctrine of God. Against a cultural moment that treats the word 'mother' as offensive and obliterates God-wrought gender distinction, the passage calls women to love husbands and children, to exercise discretion, chastity, and diligence in the home, and to submit to their own husbands — not as cultural accommodation but as a reflection of the eternal created order grounded in Genesis and reaffirmed by Christ's redemption. The overarching rationale Paul supplies is theological: the conduct of women in household and church either blasphemes or adorns the Word of God before a watching world. The sermon closes by grounding every duty in grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, warning that no degree of faithful motherhood constitutes grounds for justification.
The Problem of Sin and the Mercy of God
Proverbs 28:13 sets the problem of sin and its remedy in sharp relief: the one who covers his sin will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes sin will have mercy. The sermon works through the anatomy of sin-covering — denial, minimization, blame-shifting, and self-righteousness — with biblical examples ranging from Adam and Eve to Ananias and Sapphira, demonstrating the futility of every human attempt at self-atonement. Confession is shown to be not merely verbal acknowledgment but a saving act of faith in Christ, inseparably joined to repentance, whereby the sinner lays the hand of faith upon the surety of the new covenant and receives imputed righteousness. The closing application calls both unbeliever and believer to stop covering sin and look in faith to Christ, the only authorized covering for guilt before a holy God.
The Deliverance of David by the Lord
The providential preservation of David under Saul's murderous pursuit, traced through 1 Samuel 19, illuminates how God delivers His people by ordinary and extraordinary means alike. Three escalating attempts on David's life — a thrown spear, messengers at his house, and a third company sent to Ramah — are each turned aside, culminating in the Spirit of God falling upon Saul's own men and upon Saul himself, rendering them incapable of violence. The chapter also traces the inverse arc of Saul's apostasy: his repeated, deliberate disobedience issues in a divine hardening that mirrors the 'giving over' of Romans 1. The central pastoral lesson is that the clearest evidence God has not deserted His servant is not that the trial is past, but that the servant is still standing in the middle of it.
Nov 08, 2020 Sunday PM Service
First Timothy 5:1–2 instructs Timothy — and by extension all Christians — on how to treat members of the congregation according to age and gender, framing those relationships by analogy to the family. The sermon grounds this instruction in the Fifth Commandment, drawing on Westminster Larger Catechism questions 124–131 to show that the commandment's scope extends beyond natural parents to all relationships of authority, age, and equality. Pastors must exhort older men as fathers, younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters with all purity — avoiding harshness on the one side and laxity or impropriety on the other. The closing application presses the doctrine of adoption: because believers are children of God and joint-heirs with Christ their elder brother, the church is a genuine household, and its members bear mutual responsibility to encourage and bear one another's burdens without waiting for pastoral direction.
The Believer's Gratitude Toward God
Psalm 103 grounds thanksgiving not in vague sentiment but in the specific mercies of a covenant-keeping God toward those He has redeemed. Working through David's threefold structure — the reminder to bless God, the reasons for blessing God, and the reflection on God's kingdom — the sermon traces the chief benefit of divine grace as the forgiveness of sins accomplished in Christ, before moving outward to temporal providences, divine mercy measured against human frailty, and the universal summons of all creation to praise. The sermon draws on Deuteronomy's warnings against forgetting God's benefits and Paul's account of the worthy walk in Colossians 1 to show that detailed, specific thanksgiving is a mark of those who have received grace. The congregation is called to speak to their own souls, directing them away from self-absorption and toward the God whose mercy extends from everlasting to everlasting.
Sunday School - Biblical view of self-defense, part 2
Matthew 5:38–42 is frequently misread as a blanket prohibition against self-defense, capital punishment, and just war — three instances of justifiable homicide that Scripture plainly upholds. This exposition argues that Jesus is not contradicting the lex talionis (the law of retribution found in Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy) but is correcting the Pharisaic misapplication of a civil-judicial principle to everyday interpersonal conduct. The passage addresses four specific situations — insult, litigation, conscription, and benevolence — and calls believers to a disposition of forbearance in personal relations, while leaving entirely untouched the legitimacy of lawful self-defense, just war, and capital punishment as administered by the civil magistrate.
The Rejection of Saul by the Lord, Part 2
The rejection of Saul in 1 Samuel 15:24–35 exposes the anatomy of false repentance, the character of a reprobate, and the nature of a God who does not change. The sermon works through Saul's admission of guilt, Samuel's execution of Agag, and the theological tension between God's expressed regret and his immutability, resolving that tension through the doctrines of divine impassibility and anthropopathism. The justice of God in dispatching the wicked is shown to be a cause for righteous rejoicing, not moral discomfort, as texts from Judges 4–5 and Proverbs 11 confirm. Saul's downward trajectory — blame-shifting, false piety, delusion, fake repentance, and apostasy — is held up as a warning that great privilege does not equal saving grace, while Christ's imputed righteousness is offered as the only ground of true standing before God.
Sunday School - Sept 6 - Self-Defense, Part 1/2
What does Scripture teach about the right of individuals to use lethal force in self-defense? Working through Exodus 22:2–3, a range of Old Testament illustrations, and the teaching of Jesus in the Gospels, this study argues that defensive homicide is not murder and is consistent with the whole counsel of God's law. The session also draws on Francis Turretin's four conditions for lawful self-defense and the Westminster Larger Catechism's treatment of the sixth commandment, situating the biblical case within the broader Reformed and historic Christian tradition. The study closes by distinguishing private revenge — which Scripture forbids — from necessary defense of life, family, and property, which Scripture assumes and authorizes.
The Believer's Response to Trials
James 1:2–8 commands believers to count trials 'all joy' — a disposition that runs counter to every natural instinct. This exposition works through the passage in two movements: the believer's response to trials (vv. 2–4), which establishes the identification, expectation, disposition, and divine purpose of affliction; and the believer's request during trials (vv. 5–8), which calls for the pursuit of wisdom and the exercise of faith. The central burden is that God's redemptive purpose in suffering — conformity to the image of Christ — supplies both the ground for joy and the reason to seek wisdom rather than mere deliverance.
The Lord's Prayer in Gethsemane
What does the agony of Christ in Gethsemane reveal about who He is and what He accomplishes? Expounding Matthew 26:36–46, this sermon traces the Savior's three prayers against the disciples' repeated failure to watch, showing that Christ's soul-sorrow is perfectly consistent with His true humanity, while His unwavering resolve to drink the cup of divine wrath flows from His eternal commitment as covenant mediator. The cup is not metaphor for mere suffering but the concentrated fury of God upon a sinless substitute — which explains both why martyrs die differently than Christ and why the imputation of His active obedience is as necessary as the forgiveness of sins. Believers are called to marvel at His sufficiency, to watch and pray with sobriety about their own weakness, and to rest entirely on the righteousness of Another.
Man's Responsibility and Rejection of Christ
Human responsibility before God stands alongside divine sovereignty — neither cancels the other. Drawing on Ezekiel 33, Psalm 2, Isaiah 45 and 55, and the gospel invitations of Christ, this address confronts the perennial tendency of sinners to evade accountability by deflecting blame onto circumstances, other people, or divine predestination itself. The hearer is called to abandon every such evasion, acknowledge personal guilt before the moral Governor of the universe, and flee to King Jesus Christ for mercy, grace, and peace with God.
The Christian Husband/Father
The duties of the Christian husband and father are examined through the book of Proverbs, with Proverbs 4:1–9 as the anchor text and wide-ranging support from Deuteronomy and the New Testament. The sermon sets forth the godly husband as one who fears the Lord, deals with sin, provides for his household, protects his wife, communicates faithfully, and maintains sexual purity. The Christian father is then treated under four heads — being a godly man, loving his children, instructing them in word and life, and disciplining them with both verbal correction and, when necessary, the rod — all exercised in love rather than anger or indulgence. The closing application calls fathers to confess sin before their households, pray for and preach law and gospel to their children, and rest not in their own performance but in the imputed righteousness of Christ.
Exodus 1
Exodus 1 traces the rapid shift from Israel's prosperity under Joseph to their brutal subjugation under a new Pharaoh who knew nothing of the covenant arrangement his predecessors had honored. The chapter moves in two broad movements: the origin of the oppression in the multiplication of Israel, which paradoxically fulfilled God's Abrahamic promise of seed and land, and the gravity of that oppression as Pharaoh escalated from forced labor to state-sponsored infanticide. The defiance of the Hebrew midwives Shiphrah and Puah, grounded in the fear of God rather than the fear of man, illustrates the Reformed conviction that civil obedience finds its limit where God's law begins. The sermon closes by drawing three contemporary applications: vigilance against the gradual escalation of tyranny, confidence in the sovereign providence of God who keeps his covenant promises even through suffering, and the call to Spirit-wrought courage that refuses to silently deny Christ.
The Second Missionary Journey, Part 8
Acts 18:1–11 records Paul's arrival and eighteen-month ministry in Corinth, one of the most morally degenerate cities of the ancient world. The sermon traces Paul's gospel strategy — reasoning in the synagogue, enduring Jewish opposition, and turning to the Gentiles — before dwelling on Christ's night vision to Paul: 'Do not be afraid, for I have many people in this city.' The doctrine of election explains how Christ could speak with certainty of many yet-unconverted people awaiting the call; the gospel, not moral reform or civil intervention, is the sole instrument for transforming a corrupt culture. The sermon closes with a call to pray for and to be men who preach Christ and Him crucified, stand under opposition, persevere in weakness, and believe the promise that Christ is present with His church in the great commission.
CLIP: Man's Responsibility and Rejection of Christ
Human responsibility before God does not disappear behind divine sovereignty. Drawing from Acts 18, Ezekiel 33, and Psalm 2, this clip exposes the error of using God's sovereign election as a shield against personal accountability for rejecting Christ. The call is direct: sinners must own their rebellion, lay down their weapons against God, and come to Christ who freely offers rest, water, milk, and wine to all who are weary and thirsty.
The Second Missionary Journey, Part 6
Acts 17:16–21 presents the Apostle Paul in Athens, a city saturated with idolatry and celebrated for its philosophical culture. The sermon traces three movements in this brief passage: Paul's provocation of spirit at the sight of rampant idolatry, his deliberate response of preaching Christ in both the synagogue and the public marketplace, and his engagement with Epicurean and Stoic philosophers who summon him to the Areopagus. Paul's example establishes that righteous anger at the transgression of the First and Second Commandments, mingled with grief and compassion, is a mark of God's people — and that the fitting response to such provocation is not silence but the proclamation of Jesus and the resurrection.
The Christian's Duty toward Non-Christians
Titus 3:1–3 sets out the Christian's duty toward both civil government and all people outside the church. The sermon traces the divine origin of civil government from Genesis 9 through Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2, arguing from Francis Turretin's two-kingdom framework that Christ rules both the civil and spiritual spheres, and that the civil state therefore has no authority to command the church as church. Verse 3's catalogue of pre-conversion vices — foolishness, disobedience, malice, hatred — is read as a theological reason for patient, peaceable, and humble conduct toward non-Christians: believers were once exactly what they now struggle to bear in others, and those others may yet become objects of the same sovereign grace.
The Instruction of the Church, Part 1
Titus 2:1–5 instructs specific people groups within the church to live in a manner consistent with sound doctrine — not as a means of salvation, but as the fruit of it. This exposition works through the virtues required of older men (sobriety, reverence, temperance, soundness in faith, love, and patience), the conduct and teaching role of older women, and the domestic calling of younger women. The complementarian ordering of church and home is grounded not in culture but in the creation and fall account of Genesis 1–3, with particular attention to 1 Timothy 2 as a cross-reference. The governing purpose of all these exhortations is stated in verse 10: that the conduct of God's people would adorn, rather than blaspheme, the doctrine of God our Savior.
The Second Missionary Journey, Part 2
Acts 16:6–15 traces the divine hand behind the second missionary journey's westward turn into Macedonia and the conversion of Lydia in Philippi. The Spirit's successive prohibitions of ministry in Asia and Bithynia are not judgments on those regions but demonstrations that God actively directs the missionary enterprise according to his sovereign purpose. The conversion of Lydia — a woman whose heart was dead in trespasses until God opened it to receive Paul's preaching — illustrates that the efficient cause of every conversion is divine grace, not human ingenuity, while the instrumentality of gospel proclamation and the responsibility of hearers to believe remain fully intact. The sermon calls the church to define missionary work precisely as the Spirit-sent, church-commissioned preaching of Christ crucified, rejecting both Arminian confidence in the sinner's free will and hyper-Calvinist reluctance to call sinners to faith.
The Tenth Commandment
The Tenth Commandment's prohibition against covetousness exposes the internal nature of God's law in a way no other commandment does: it is a sin but not a crime, reaching the desires and affections rather than merely outward conduct. Covetousness is shown to be inextricably linked to idolatry (Ephesians 5:5; Colossians 3:5), rooted in discontentment with God's providential allotment, and often the seed from which violations of every other commandment spring. Positively, the commandment calls believers to acknowledge God's sovereign ownership of all things, rest in his promise of temporal provision (Hebrews 13:5), cultivate contentment (1 Timothy 6:6), and displace covetousness with a charitable, generous spirit. The sermon also treats the three classical uses of the law — civil, pedagogical, and normative — showing that the Tenth Commandment functions as a searching pedagogue that drove the Apostle Paul and the rich young ruler alike to confront their need for Christ.
Genesis 44-45
Genesis 44–45 presents the arrest of Joseph's brothers, Judah's substitutionary intercession for Benjamin, and Joseph's dramatic self-disclosure — all framed by a fourfold emphasis on the providence of God. The separation between chapters 44 and 45 artificially interrupts what is one of the most theologically dense scenes in the entire Pentateuch: Judah, the man who once sold Joseph into slavery, now offers himself as a slave in Benjamin's place, functioning as a type of Christ. Joseph's forgiveness of his brothers flows directly from his theological grasp of divine sovereignty, demonstrating that a right understanding of providence is the engine of genuine forgiveness. The sermon closes with the typological significance of both Judah and Joseph as portraits of the Lord Jesus Christ embedded in the redemptive narrative of Scripture.
Genesis 39:1-23
Genesis 39 is often read as a story about Joseph's moral courage, but the chapter's governing theme is God's faithfulness to His covenant promises. The Lord's presence with Joseph — announced in verse 2, reaffirmed in verse 21, and confirmed in verse 23 — is the cause of every blessing Joseph receives and the power behind every temptation he resists. Joseph's typological role as a savior for Israel unfolds through a chain of providential reversals: sold as a slave, falsely accused, imprisoned — yet each step is a necessary preparation for his eventual exaltation over Egypt. The sermon calls hearers to pursue communion with God through Scripture, prayer, and corporate worship as the indispensable means of resistance against sin.
The First Missionary Journey, Part 10
Acts 14:8–18 presents Paul and Barnabas in Lystra, where a miraculous healing of a congenitally lame man provokes the crowd to mistake the apostles for Zeus and Hermes. The sermon moves through three movements: the healing and its spiritual significance, the apostles' repudiation of pagan worship, and Paul's proclamation of the living God to a purely pagan audience. Particular attention is given to the doctrine of divine impassibility — the classical confession that God is without passions — as the necessary corollary of divine immutability, with pastoral argument that this doctrine secures rather than undermines the believer's confidence in God's unchanging love and justice. The sermon closes with an appeal to repent of all idolatry and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as the only Savior for sinners.
Free Grace Baptist Church - February 16, 2020 AM
Acts 14:8–18 records Paul and Barnabas at Lystra, where the healing of a congenitally lame man provokes the pagans to identify the apostles as Zeus and Hermes and prepare to offer sacrifice. The sermon works through three movements: the miraculous healing and the greater spiritual reality it signifies, the apostles' repudiation of the attempted worship, and Paul's positive proclamation of the Living God to a fully pagan audience. Central to the exposition is the doctrine of divine impassibility — grounded in Paul's declaration that the apostles are 'men of like passions' and the obvious implication that the true God is not — which the preacher traces through the 1689 Second London Confession, Numbers 23:19, 1 Samuel 15:29, Malachi 3:6, and James 1:17, arguing that a God who changes states cannot be the unfailingly just, merciful, and forgiving God the gospel requires. The congregation is exhorted to repent of idolatry in all its modern forms, to study the doctrine of God rather than settle for a domesticated deity, and to trust the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as the only way of escape from wrath.
The Seventh Commandment
Deuteronomy 5:18, the seventh commandment, prohibits adultery and by extension the full range of sexual sins Scripture condemns throughout both Testaments. This sermon works through the basis of the commandment in God's threefold purposes for marriage, catalogs the specific sexual sins the commandment forbids — adultery, fornication, incest, rape, sodomy, bestiality, unlawful divorce, polygamy, prostitution, and pornography — and then treats the internal disposition of heart lust that Jesus expounds in Matthew 5. The sermon concludes with practical counsel drawn from Proverbs 5 and 6 on the three means of protection against sexual sin, and closes by applying the civil, pedagogical, and normative uses of the law to the contemporary church and culture.
The Darkness of Depression
Proverbs 15:13 declares that sorrow of heart breaks the spirit, and Scripture is neither silent nor superficial on the darkness of depression. This sermon surveys the presence of depression among the people of God across the canon — from Elijah under the broom tree, to David's lament in the Psalms, to the Man of Sorrows himself — establishing that the condition is real, that it afflicts genuine believers, and that in itself it is not sinful. Practical counsel drawn from both special and general revelation is offered: the physical ABCs of rest, diet, and exercise; the spiritual ABCs of prayer, Scripture, and corporate worship; and careful instruction for those seeking to help the suffering, closing with the reminder that the ground of hope is not gladness of feeling but the imputed righteousness of Christ received by faith alone.
The Sixth Commandment
The sixth commandment, 'You shall not murder,' forbids not only the external act of taking innocent life but also the internal dispositions of hatred, unwarranted anger, and character assassination that flow from the same malicious heart. The sermon distinguishes murder from three lawful forms of killing — capital punishment, just war, and self-defense — grounding each in the abiding authority of Scripture from the Noahic Covenant through the New Testament. The image of God in every human being is the theological foundation for the commandment's reach across abortion, euthanasia, and the neglect of capital punishment. Hearers are called to clarity on the law's three uses, to renounce internal murder within the church, and to find in the gospel the only remedy for sinners who have violated this commandment in heart or deed.
Genesis 40:1-23
Genesis 40 records the imprisonment of Pharaoh's chief butler and chief baker alongside Joseph, the dreams God gave them, and Joseph's divinely sourced interpretation of those dreams. The chapter turns on Joseph's declaration that interpretations belong to God alone — a polemical claim against Egyptian dream-divination — and on the bitter irony that the butler, restored exactly as Joseph predicted, promptly forgot the man who served him. Working through the three movements of the chapter (the imprisonment, the dreams, and their fulfillment), this study shows God's providence operating through every injustice and disappointment to advance Joseph toward his appointed exaltation, demonstrating that God never forsakes his people even in the deepest pit.
The First Missionary Journey, Part 9
Acts 14:2–7 records the apostolic ministry in Iconium: Jewish opposition, the faithful perseverance of Paul and Barnabas, and the eventual division of the city. The sermon expounds these three movements in the text while devoting extended attention to a doctrinal excursus on the proper relationship between faith and repentance in gospel preaching — arguing that repentance is not a preparatory work the sinner performs before coming to Christ, but the inseparable companion of faith, both being gifts of God in the covenant of grace. The practical conclusion calls the church to faithful, courageous, wise, and Spirit-dependent proclamation regardless of mounting opposition.
The Fifth Commandment
The Fifth Commandment — 'Honor your father and your mother' (Deuteronomy 5:16) — is not merely a domestic rule for ancient Israel but a trans-covenantal moral law binding on all people in every station of life. This exposition works through the Hebrew meaning of 'honor,' traces the commandment across both Testaments, and extends its scope beyond the family to encompass the workplace, the church, and the civil commonwealth, showing that all of life is structured by the superior-inferior relation God has ordained. The law's three uses frame the conclusion: civil restraint, pedagogical exposure of sin and need for Christ the perfect law-keeper, and normative direction for the blood-bought children of God.