Topic
Apologetics
374 sermons · All topics
The Trial Before the Jews
John 18:13–27 presents the trial of Jesus before the Jewish authorities alongside Simon Peter's three denials, and John's deliberate interweaving of the two scenes forces the reader to measure Peter's cowardice against his Master's composed, unflinching faithfulness. Jesus, the true high priest, stands before the illegitimate proceedings of Annas and Caiaphas — proceedings marked by false witnesses, unprovoked violence, and a verdict predetermined by envy — and yet he defends his disciples, demands lawful evidence, and maintains his identity without wavering. Peter, by contrast, cannot acknowledge his Lord to a servant girl, illustrating the fickleness that characterises even redeemed sinners. The sermon closes by calling believers to remember both the rooster's rebuke of unfaithfulness and the grace of a Saviour who restores the very disciples who forsook him.
Ask FGBC #42: What Words Aren't In The Bible But Help Protect Its Teachings?
Scripture and theology regularly employ concepts that require precise extra-biblical vocabulary to guard against error and heresy. This Q&A session works through a range of theological terms — Trinity, consubstantiality, partitive exegesis, inseparable operations, and more — explaining why the church has historically coined and defended such language rather than restricting itself to bare biblical words. The discussion traces how heretics from the Arians to the Anomeans exploited the refusal to use extra-biblical terms, and why the apostolic mandate to 'earnestly contend for the faith' requires the full use of theological grammar inherited from the church's confessional tradition.
The Preface to the Ten Commandments
Deuteronomy 5:1–6 opens the Ten Commandments not with a command but with a declaration of divine redemption — 'I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.' This study works through the summons to covenant obedience, the grace-grounded preface to the Decalogue, and the uniqueness of the moral law as trans-covenantal and abiding. The threefold division of the law — moral, ceremonial, and judicial — is examined through the confession, the prophets, the Gospels, and the epistles, equipping believers to distinguish what abides in the new covenant from what was fulfilled and abrogated in Christ.
2LBC - Chapter 2 - Of God and the Holy Trinity
What does it mean that God is one, simple, immutable, immense, and triune — and why does any of it matter for Christian worship? This confession study works through the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith Chapter 2 ("Of God and the Holy Trinity"), tracing the three movements of the chapter: God's essential glory in paragraph 1, God's transcendent relations in paragraph 2, and God's triune majesty in paragraph 3. Along the way, foundational interpretive principles for speaking rightly about God are established — the legitimate use of logical consequences from Scripture, the necessity of extra-biblical vocabulary to guard biblical truth, and the reading of anthropomorphic language according to the meaning rather than the letter. The session closes with a direct application: the doctrine of God is not speculative labor but the very foundation of communion with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and of the creature's comfortable dependence upon him.
CTF 2025 - Session 8 – Q&A Panel
A Q&A panel from a theology conference on the doctrine of God addresses questions arising from the preceding lectures on classical theism. Three theologians field questions on divine impassibility (including whether God can be grieved), the eternal decree and the covenant of redemption, divine aseity and the Son's relationship to the Father, the nature of time in the eternal state, the role of philosophy and natural theology in arriving at the classical doctrine of God, and whether genuine evil exists within God's sovereign economy. The discussion throughout presses for formulations of doctrine that protect divine simplicity, immutability, and impassibility while preserving the integrity of biblical language and confessional categories.
CTF 2025 - Session 2 - Divine Simplicity
Divine simplicity — the doctrine that God is without parts of any kind, physical or metaphysical — is the necessary precondition for God to be the absolute first cause of all things confessed in Romans 11:36. This lecture, drawn from 2LCF Chapter 2 Paragraph 1, works through the logic of composition and dependence to show that any being composed of parts is doubly dependent: upon those parts and upon whatever unifies them, and is therefore disqualified from being the uncreated Creator. Divine infinity is then treated as a corollary of simplicity: because God has no compositional structure of finitude, his being is actual, unbounded, and without lack, which is the only reliable ground for absolute trust and worship.
CTF 2025 - Session 4 – The Depth of God’s Eternal and Incomprehensible Nature
What does it mean for God to be eternal, and can finite creatures truly know an incomprehensible God? This conference session works through the classical doctrine of divine eternity — arguing from divine simplicity, immutability, and infinity that God's eternity is not endless temporal succession but the timeless, simultaneous, and perfect possession of boundless life — before turning to divine incomprehensibility, which is not a confession of ignorance but the recognition that the knowledge God has revealed of himself in nature and Scripture far surpasses the creature's capacity to measure or contain it. The session draws on Boethius, Augustine, Turretin, Charnock, Owen, and Bavinck to show that the two doctrines are inseparable, and closes with Solomon's prayer in 1 Kings 8 as a doxological meditation: if heaven itself cannot contain God, no created mind can comprehend him, and that inexhaustibility is the very ground of endless worship.
The Resurrection and Justification
Romans 4:25 binds the death and resurrection of Christ together as twin pillars of the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Christ was delivered up because of the offenses of his people — bearing the substitutionary curse that divine justice demanded — and was raised because of their justification, the resurrection serving as the Father's public testimony that satisfaction had been rendered and righteousness secured. The sermon works through four reasons why Paul links the resurrection to justification: the resurrection declared Christ to be the Son of God with power, testified that his sacrifice was accepted, confirmed that satisfaction was rendered, and marked the completion of redemption and the inauguration of Christ's present session. Believers are called to rest their entire confidence for standing before God on this finished work, and the unconverted are urged to confess and believe in the risen Lord Jesus.
2LCF Chapter 1: Of the Holy Scripture, Paragraphs 1-3
The 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith opens with the doctrine of Holy Scripture because all subsequent confessional theology stands or falls on this foundation. This session works through paragraphs 1–3 of Chapter 1, establishing first the necessity of Scripture — grounded in the insufficiency of general revelation for saving knowledge and the cessation of direct prophetic revelation — and then the identity of Scripture, treating the question of canon (which books belong) and the exclusion of the Apocrypha. Three criteria for canonicity are examined: the providential exposure of books, the divine attributes Scripture bears, and apostolic origin broadly understood.
Ask FGBC #40: Is It Okay to Have Children’s Bibles With Pictures of Jesus?
The second commandment forbids images of God and Christ, including pictures of Jesus in children's Bibles. While children's Bibles without images may serve a limited purpose, parents are called to instruct children directly from Scripture, since it is by the Word — not by pictures — that God saves sinners and edifies his people. Any children's Bible used should accurately represent the sense of Scripture rather than obscure it through paraphrase.
The Use of the 2nd London Confession
A confession of faith is not a human addition to Scripture but a tool the church uses to define, defend, discriminate, discipline, and delimit its doctrine. Drawing on passages from the Pastoral Epistles, Jude, and Ephesians 4, this Sunday School address argues that the Second London Baptist Confession of 1689 serves the local church in six concrete ways: it establishes doctrinal boundaries, equips members for apologetics, vets candidates for ministry, grounds church discipline, protects Christian liberty by identifying what lies outside its purview, and anchors the church in the catholicity of the Reformed tradition. The session closes with a call to reject autonomous biblicism in favour of confessional theology understood as the fruit of the Spirit's ongoing work in the teaching ministry of Christ's church.
The War Against the Midianites
Numbers 31 records God's command to execute vengeance upon the Midianites for their role in seducing Israel into idolatry and apostasy at Baal-peor — a crime instigated by Balaam that caused 24,000 Israelites to perish under divine judgment. The study argues that the severity of Moses' orders upon return from battle is not arbitrary cruelty but the just execution of God's judicial wrath against specific criminal offenders. Three passages from Deuteronomy (chapters 13, 20, and 21) are examined to demonstrate that Israel's normal wartime ethic was governed by humane principles that distinguished her from surrounding nations, underscoring that the Midianite war was a unique act of covenantal vengeance rather than a general template for holy war. The session closes by grounding these difficult texts in the consistency of God's justice, goodness, and faithfulness in bringing his people to the land of promise.
Spurgeon & Open Air Preaching
Drawing on Hebrews 13:7's command to remember and follow faithful ministers, this lecture examines the life, preaching, and open-air ministry of Charles Haddon Spurgeon as a model for gospel proclamation. The speaker presents material from his published doctoral dissertation on Spurgeon's open-air preaching, working through three open-air sermons and Spurgeon's own pedagogy for street evangelism. A recurring application presses the listener — whatever their theological sophistication — to proclaim the excellencies of Christ to all people, including the lowest and most despised.
Ask FGBC #36: Is Hell Eternal?
The eternal duration of hell is defended from Scripture and theology against the common objection that finite creatures cannot deserve infinite punishment. The Greek word for 'eternal' is the same in 'eternal life' and 'eternal death,' establishing the symmetry of the two destinies. The objection that a finite sinner cannot warrant eternal punishment is answered by the infinite dignity of the God sinned against: sin is transgression against divine majesty, and the measure of punishment is calibrated to the offended party, not the offending creature. The doctrine calls the church to evangelism and the unbeliever to reckon seriously with the implications of unbelief.
The Sixth Commandment
The Sixth Commandment — 'You shall not murder' (Exodus 20:13) — addresses far more than the physical act of killing; it presupposes the dignity of every human being as an image-bearer of God and condemns unrighteous hatred of the heart. This sermon expounds the Hebrew word for murder, distinguishing it from lawful killing in capital punishment, just war, and self-defense, before pressing the command's indictment of abortion and euthanasia as violations of the sanctity of life. Jesus's teaching in Matthew 5 extends the commandment's reach to unwarranted anger and character assassination, and the three uses of the law — civil, pedagogical, and normative — frame both the church's public witness and the believer's ongoing sanctification. The sermon closes by insisting that the most faithful response to a death culture is to preach both the law and the cross of Christ.
The Free Offer of Eternal Life
Paul's defense of his ministry in 1 Thessalonians 2:1–4 is not merely self-vindication but a demonstration that the gospel he preached is categorically different from the self-serving philosophies of his day — it came without error, without moral corruption, and without deceit. The message cost Paul greatly to deliver, yet it costs the hearer nothing to receive, because Christ paid the full price. God himself, through appointed ambassadors, freely offers eternal life to sinners who will lay aside their rebellion and receive the gift by faith alone.
CTF 2025: What Are the Modern Day Issues With the Trinity?
Two ministers survey the modern doctrinal errors threatening a right understanding of the Trinity, contrasting them with the robust trinitarianism of the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689 LBCF) Chapter 2. The discussion identifies the eternal subordination of the Son controversy, Arianism, Sabellianism, and social trinitarianism as recurring and contemporary departures from orthodox Trinitarian confession. Particular attention is given to the Confession's insistence on the one will and one operation of God, against models that fracture the divine unity by assigning separate wills or discrete percentages of action to each person.
Ask FGBC - July 2024 Podcast with Pastors Butler and Kirkpatrick
Two pastors work through a wide-ranging set of questions submitted by listeners, covering the Reformed doctrine of the will, repentance and faith, holy days, Christian political engagement, believers' baptism, the New Covenant, forgiveness of unrepentant offenders, ongoing confession of sin, witnessing to homosexual neighbors, the Sabbath shift from Saturday to Sunday, the day of the Lord, the beatific vision, common grace, saving versus temporary faith, and the holy walk. Throughout, the answers are grounded in the 1689 London Baptist Confession and exposit the relevant biblical texts, consistently distinguishing the Reformed Baptist position from Arminian, dispensationalist, and paedobaptist alternatives. The session serves as accessible catechetical instruction for believers at all stages while modeling how confessional Reformed Baptist theology addresses both doctrinal and practical questions.
Live Stream - December 29, 2024
Paul's autobiographical defense in Galatians 1:11–17 establishes that his gospel did not originate from any human source but came through the direct revelation of Jesus Christ — a claim with consequences for the very doctrine of justification. The sermon traces three lines of argument: the general proof that no man would devise the gospel of grace, the particular proof from Paul's former violent persecution of the church, and the proof from his first movements as an apostle independent of the Jerusalem church. The closing application draws out three implications: confidence that the true gospel is from God, hope in divine sovereign grace to save the most hardened sinners, and assurance that peace with God rests solely on the substitutionary work of Christ, received through faith alone.
CTF 2025 - Key Theological Concepts
This conference preview discussion addresses three interconnected concepts in classical Trinitarian theology: inseparable operations, appropriations, and missions. The speaker argues that a basic grasp of six to ten theological concepts drawn from creedal and confessional tradition — concepts the church developed through careful exegesis, not speculative innovation — is sufficient to give a reasoned defense of Trinitarian doctrine against modern deniers, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Arians. The practical exhortation is that every believer, not only the academically trained, owes a coherent account of the Trinity to anyone who asks.
The Conduct of the Believer
Philippians 1:27–30 presents a twofold exhortation to the church: that believers conduct themselves in a manner worthy of the gospel, and that they do so with courage in the face of adversaries. The sermon expounds the Greek word for citizenship as the governing concept of verse 27, grounding the call to worthy conduct in the reality of justification by faith — the life of sanctification flows necessarily from what God has graciously accomplished in the believer. Corporate unity in striving together for the faith of the gospel, and undaunted boldness before enemies, are shown to be not optional virtues but demonstrable proofs of sovereign grace at work in God's people.
The Wars of the LORD
Numbers 21 traces Israel's journey through military victory over the Canaanites, the punishment and grace of the bronze serpent, and the conquest of the Amorite kings Sihon and Og. The bronze serpent — condemned people bitten by fiery serpents, healed only by looking in faith to the remedy God prescribed — is taken up by Jesus in John 3:14 as a type of his own crucifixion, teaching that salvation comes by divine initiative alone, received through faith, not works. The same recurring sins of complaint, lack of faith in providence, and idolatry that marked the first generation persist in the second, warning the church that these corruptions follow the sin nature across every generation. The chapter closes with God's sovereign hardening of Sihon and the defeat of the giant Og, both down payments on the promised conquest and demonstrations of God's faithfulness, sovereignty, and goodness to his people.
Ask FGBC #31: What is the difference between saving and common grace?
Common grace and saving grace are distinct but related aspects of God's goodness. Common grace is God's non-redemptive kindness extended to all mankind and creation — including the restraint of sin, fruitful seasons, and the capacity for civic good among unbelievers — while saving grace is God's particular redemptive work in the hearts of sinners through the preaching of the gospel. Understanding this distinction shapes how Christians relate to the world, how they pray for unbelievers, and how they understand the church's mission without compromising it.
Ask FGBC #26: How to witness to homosexual neighbours?
A pastoral question-and-answer exchange addresses how believers should relate to homosexual neighbours — including neighbours pursuing same-sex IVF — without either withdrawing from the world or condoning sin. Drawing on 1 Corinthians 5 and Romans 1, the speakers argue that homosexuality is one sin among many, that the root problem is man's estrangement from God, and that genuine friendship and neighbourly kindness are the proper soil in which gospel witness grows. Practical boundaries are discussed alongside the call to be ready to give a reasoned defence of what Scripture says.
Ask FGBC #25: How do I handle family members, friends, etc, not believing?
A questioner is grieved by family members and friends who refuse to believe the gospel, citing a theology that demands a prolonged crisis of sin and misery before conversion is credible. The response addresses both the pastoral burden of watching loved ones reject Christ and the theological confusion that treats immediate repentance and faith with suspicion. Practical counsel includes persisting in prayer, reading Scripture together rather than arguing theology, and pointing to the diverse conversion experiences in the New Testament and in works such as Pilgrim's Progress to show that Scripture nowhere requires a prescribed experiential cycle before a sinner may come to Christ.
Ask FGBC #19: Should Christians engage in politics?
Should Christians engage in politics? This Q&A addresses the Christian's dual citizenship — as a member of both the church and the civil body politic — and argues that while political engagement is neither commanded nor forbidden by Scripture, it is entirely lawful. The discussion distinguishes the church's spiritual sword (the gospel and the keys of the kingdom) from the civil state's coercive sword, drawing on the Noahic covenant in Genesis 9 as the foundational charter for justice, family, and enterprise in society. The threefold use of the law is applied to show why preaching against abortion or civil injustice is ethics and theology, not partisan politics.
The Baptism of Saul of Tarsus
The baptism of Saul of Tarsus in Acts 9:17–25 demonstrates the proper order of Christian baptism: conversion precedes the ordinance, which then publicly marks the believer as a disciple of Christ. The passage is treated as a direct answer to Stephen's dying prayer in Acts 7:60, with Saul's transformation from chief persecutor to chief preacher serving as a vivid display of sovereign, redeeming grace. The sermon draws out three observations from Saul's early ministry — the immediacy, the effects, and the hostility of his preaching — and closes with the baptism of three new believers, each of whom gives a brief testimony of their own conversion.
The Martyrdom of Stephen
Acts 7:54–8:1 records the martyrdom of Stephen, the first Christian martyr, whose death exposes the murderous hatred that unbelieving Israel bore toward the Messiah and those who bore witness to Him. Standing alone before the Sanhedrin, Stephen receives a vision of the glory of God and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of the Father — confirming his theology of temple, rebuking his executioners, and manifesting the presence of the triune God with His servant in extremity. His dying words, mirroring Christ's own prayers from the cross, demonstrate that true temple worship — the meeting of God and sinners in prayer and forgiveness — is found not in any physical structure but in the Lord Jesus Christ. The passage calls believers to theological preparedness, courageous witness, and dependence on the triune God in the face of opposition, however severe.
The Persecution of the Apostles and the Church
Christ's warning in John 16:1–4 that the apostles and the church will be expelled from synagogues and killed is not given to produce fear but to prevent stumbling. The sermon works through two movements: the purpose of Jesus' instruction (verse 1) and the nature of the church's enemies (verses 2–4), showing that persecution is religiously motivated and theologically driven by a denial of the Trinity. The world's hatred of Christ's servants follows necessarily from its hatred of Christ Himself, and remembrance of His warnings equips believers for preparation, encouragement, perseverance, and pity toward those who persecute. The sermon closes in 1 Timothy 1:12–17 with the apostle Paul as the supreme exhibit of divine mercy toward the chief of sinners — the former persecutor who became the persecuted.
The World's Opposition to Believers
Christ warns his disciples that the world's hatred toward them is an inevitable consequence of their union with him — not a sign of failure, but of faithfulness. Working through John 15:18–21, this exposition examines the world's opposition to believers (vv. 18–19) and the believer's likeness to Christ as the ground of that opposition (vv. 20–21). The sermon argues that sovereign election, not personal virtue, is what separates the believer from the world, and that solidarity with a hated Savior should produce not despondency but the kind of rejoicing seen in Acts 5 when the apostles counted themselves worthy to suffer shame for his name.