Topic
Ecclesiology
1,163 sermons · All topics
The Covenant between David and Jonathan
The covenant between David and Jonathan in 1 Samuel 20 is examined as both a historical narrative of loyalty under mortal pressure and a typological pointer to the new covenant secured by Christ. The chapter is organized around three movements: David's urgent meeting with Jonathan, Saul's explosive response at the new moon feast, and the final covert signal and farewell. Four features of the Davidic-Jonathanite covenant — help in trouble, uncommon commitment, costly commitment, and peace in the midst of confusion — are shown to find their fullest expression in the Lord Jesus, whose blood, righteousness, and resurrection constitute the only ground of covenant peace. The sermon calls hearers to covenantal faithfulness in marriage and family, to kill pride after the pattern of Saul's ruin, and to enter the new covenant through faith in Christ alone.
The Fifth Commandment
The Fifth Commandment, 'Honor your father and your mother' (Deuteronomy 5:16), is the first commandment of the second table of the law and governs not merely the parent-child relationship but all relationships between superiors and inferiors in family, church, and civil society. The command to 'honor' (Hebrew: to treat as weighty and burdensome) carries covenantal significance for Israel and is extended by Paul to Gentile believers in Ephesians 6, demonstrating that the moral law transcends any particular covenantal administration. The sanction attached to its violation — from the rod and reproof of Proverbs to the death penalty of Deuteronomy 21 — underscores the gravity God assigns to lawful authority. Pedagogically, the commandment exposes the universal failure of all people to render perfect obedience and drives sinners to Christ, who alone fulfilled this word by continuing in subjection to Joseph and Mary throughout his earthly life.
1 Samuel 23
First Samuel 23 traces David's flight from Saul through a series of dramatic reversals — the rescue of Keilah, Jonathan's covenant encouragement in the wilderness, and the treachery of the Ziphites — all held together by the governing theme that God did not deliver David into Saul's hand. The chapter exposes the stark contrast between Saul, who has no access to God's word and sinks deeper into self-deception and tyranny, and David, who inquires of Yahweh through priest and prophet and receives both divine direction and covenantal friendship. The providence of God is the chapter's spine: from the fortuitous arrival of Abiathar's ephod, to Jonathan's timely encouragement, to a Philistine invasion that halts Saul's encirclement at the last moment. Hearers are called to recognize the privilege of access to Scripture, to be Jonathans who encourage others with the promises of God, and to rest in the providence of the God who orchestrates all things for the preservation of his people.
The Call to Marvel, Part 2
What does it mean that God has 'bestowed' on sinners the right to be called children of God? Expounding the first half of 1 John 3:1, this sermon works through the content and intent of the apostle John's call to marvel — tracing divine love, divine grace, and divine fatherhood as the three constituent elements of the Christian's astonishment. The sermon presses the doctrines of adoption and sovereign grace against any scheme of salvation that credits the creature, and closes by showing that the same behold which exhilarates also obligates: children of God are to pursue practical godliness, avail themselves of the ordained means of grace, and walk in cheerful conformity to the law of their Father.
The Fourth Commandment
The Fourth Commandment, as confessed in the 1689 London Baptist Confession chapter 22, binds all men in all ages to set apart one day in seven for the worship of God. This exposition of Deuteronomy 5:12–15 traces the Sabbath from its creation ordinance grounding in Genesis 2, through its Sinaitic rationale of creation and redemption, into its prophetic anticipation in Isaiah 56 and 58, and finally to its New Covenant fulfillment on the first day of the week as the Lord's Day. The sermon argues that the Sabbath's moral principle — one day in seven devoted to God — is permanent and continuous across the covenants, while the positive element (the particular day) shifts from Saturday to Sunday in light of Christ's resurrection. Hearers are called to receive the Sabbath not as a legalistic burden but as God's gift, and to guard equally against Pharisaic rigidity and antinomian dismissal.
The Deliverance of David by God
1 Samuel 19 records the escalating persecution of David by King Saul and God's sovereign deliverance of his chosen servant through Jonathan, Michal, and the overpowering work of the Holy Spirit at Ramah. The chapter functions typologically: Saul embodies the murderous rage of all who reject God's anointed, while David's preservation foreshadows the Father's protection of the greater David, the Lord Jesus Christ. The sermon traces two broad movements — the defense of David by Jonathan and the deliverance of David by Yahweh — and calls hearers to trust the same God who delivered David through every trial, on the ground that his care for his people does not always mean the removal of affliction but sustaining grace in the midst of it.
1 Samuel 20
1 Samuel 20 narrates the covenant bond between David and Jonathan at the moment Saul's murderous hostility becomes unmistakable, and this study treats that covenant as the chapter's controlling theme. The covenant of hesed — loyal, steadfast, committed love — provides David recourse in danger, proves a vehicle for uncommon faithfulness (fulfilled in 2 Samuel 9 with Mephibosheth), demands costly commitment (Jonathan surrendering his royal rights under the threat of his father's spear), and affords peace in the midst of confusion. The central application is that the church of Christ, and Christian marriage in particular, ought to display the same covenant fidelity Jonathan and David embodied: a kingdom-first selflessness that subordinates personal ambition to the advancement of God's purposes.
The Conversion of Matthew
What does genuine conversion look like? Expounding Matthew 9:9–13, this sermon traces the call of Matthew the tax collector — one of the most notorious sinners in first-century Jewish society — to show that Christ's power to forgive is precisely suited to the wretched. The three movements of the passage — the call to discipleship, the feast at Matthew's house, and Jesus' confrontation with the Pharisees — together establish that Christ came not for the self-righteous but for sinners, and that His summons produces immediate, costly, and joyful obedience. Five marks of genuine discipleship are drawn out: saving faith, repentance as a consequence (not a condition) of grace, kingdom priority, beholding Christ as altogether lovely, and serious pursuit of sanctification — set alongside an honest account of remaining corruption and the struggles that attend the Christian life.
The Importance of the Lord's Supper
The Lord's Supper is a divine commandment, not a recommendation, instituted by Christ on the night of his betrayal and binding on his church until he comes again. This exposition of 1 Corinthians 11:23–26 moves through four aspects of the ordinance's importance: its nature as a positive and sovereign institution, its character as a commanded act of remembrance, its object as Christ himself in his person, life, and atoning death, and its quality as a means of grace through which the risen Christ spiritually nourishes his people by his Spirit. The sermon calls believers to joyful, cheerful compliance with the Lord's table — to come, take, eat, and be fed by the exalted Savior who blots out the sins of all who trust in him.
Of Justification (2LCF 11.1-6)
The doctrine of justification — that sinners are legally declared righteous before God on the basis of Christ's work alone — is examined through 1689 London Baptist Confession chapter 11, paragraphs 1, 2, and 5. The sermon distinguishes the essence, grounds, and method of justification, exposing the errors of Rome's infusion theology, Arminian faith-as-righteousness, and Baxterian neonomian imputation, while showing that faith is the instrument, not the ground, of justification. The inseparable yet distinct relationship between justification (a single forensic event) and sanctification (a progressive inward work) is explored against both legalism and antinomianism. Hearers are called to theological precision, assured confidence in their unlosable standing before God, and consistent holy living as fruit of that standing.
Of God's Covenant (2LCF 7.3)
The Covenant of Redemption (pactum salutis) is the pre-temporal, intra-Trinitarian agreement between the Father and the Son in which the Father gives a particular people to the Son and the Son willingly undertakes to be their mediator and surety. This teaching examines the definition, parties, stipulations, and promises of the pactum, traces its exegetical foundations across both Testaments, and shows how it grounds the Covenant of Grace and underwrites definite atonement. Understanding the Covenant of Redemption provides believers with firm assurance, because the immutable and impassible God has covenanted in eternity to save the elect in Christ, and that plan cannot fail.
The Second Commandment
The second commandment (Deuteronomy 5:8–10) distinguishes the object of worship, addressed by the first commandment, from the manner of worship — forbidding both the making and the worship of images as representations of God, including images of the Lord Jesus Christ. The sermon works through three considerations: the positive demand for regulated worship according to the regulative principle, the twofold prohibition against idol-making and idol-worship, and the reasons grounded in the jealousy of God and the covenant curse and blessing. The great need of the hour is not merely moral reform but the proclamation of the gospel so that sinners are turned from their idols to worship the living God in the way He has prescribed.
1 Samuel 18
1 Samuel 18 traces two trajectories simultaneously: the providential rise of David and the accelerating spiritual declension of Saul. The chapter is not primarily a political narrative but a spiritual one — the Lord's presence with David explains his success, his military favour, and the love of all Israel, while the Lord's departure from Saul explains his fear, his envy, and his murderous scheming. The sermon presses three lessons from the text: the danger of spiritual declension through neglect of God's ordained means, the sovereignty of God who turns Saul's every scheme to David's advantage, and the parallel threats to God's kingdom from both external enemies and internal corruption.
The Instruction on Celibacy and Children
Matthew 19:10–15 presents two closely linked teachings: Christ's instruction on celibacy and His reception of little children. Against Rome's doctrine of clerical celibacy and any Protestant tendency to exalt singleness above marriage, the sermon argues that celibacy is a sovereign gift of God given to some, not a spiritual superior state to be mandated or celebrated above the married estate. The blessing of the children exposes the disciples' failure to understand that Christ receives the weak and dependent, and the passage calls fathers to the concrete duty of bringing their children to Christ through prayer, Scripture, and faithful church attendance.
The Instruction on Divorce, Part 2
Sexual immorality and willful desertion are the two lawful grounds for divorce recognized in Scripture, and this exposition of 1 Corinthians 7:10–16 establishes both the prohibition against divorce and the Pauline exception. Paul's instruction divides into two sections: the command to believing spouses not to separate, and the rule governing mixed marriages in which one partner is converted after the wedding. The sermon argues that when an unbeliever departs and dissolves the marriage, the believing spouse is released from bondage and may remarry, grounding that conclusion in the absence of a prohibition in verse 15, the consistent biblical assumption that lawful divorce permits remarriage, and the analogy with Matthew 19:9. Throughout, the original intent of marriage as a lifelong, one-flesh covenant is upheld as the governing norm, with the exceptions confirming rather than undermining that norm.
Of Good Works (2LCF 16.4-6)
The second half of a two-part study on 1689 London Baptist Confession chapter 16 (Of Good Works) examines paragraphs four through seven, working through the doctrines of supererogation, the nature of merit, the acceptance of believers' works before God, and the status of works performed by the unregenerate. Supererogation — the Roman Catholic teaching that the saints perform meritorious works beyond what God requires, which the church then dispenses as indulgences — is refuted from Romans 3 as incompatible with the universal sinfulness of mankind and the nature of divine law. The study then distinguishes between condign merit (which belongs to Christ alone) and any informal divine reward, while grounding the acceptance of believers' imperfect works solely in their union with Christ and God's free grace. The works of unregenerate men, however outwardly decent, are shown to be spiritually dead, incapable of pleasing God, though greater external wickedness remains more displeasing to him than lesser.
The Instruction on Marriage
Titus 1:1–9 provides Paul's instructions to Titus for establishing gospel order on the island of Crete, centering on the appointment of qualified elders. The sermon works through the twofold purpose of Titus's ministry — setting things in order and appointing elders in every city — before examining the elder's domestic faithfulness (blamelessness, sexual fidelity, faithful children) and personal faithfulness (five vices to avoid, six virtues to exemplify). The exposition closes with the elder's indispensable giftedness: holding fast sound doctrine so as to both exhort the people of God and silence those who contradict. The whole is applied to the congregation as a call to pray for qualified men, to know the qualifications, and to insist that the church install only those who demonstrably meet them.
The Conduct of God's Servant
Second Timothy 2:20–26 confronts the reality that the visible church always contains both honorable and dishonorable vessels, and calls God's servant to respond not with contentious disputation but with flight from youthful lusts, pursuit of righteousness, and gentle correction of those in error. Paul's metaphor of vessels in a great house is applied to Timothy's pastoral conduct: cleansing oneself from the influence of false teachers issues in sanctification and fitness for the Master's use. The closing verses ground the servant's patient, humble engagement in the doctrine of repentance as a sovereign gift of God — not merely a failure of argument or evidence, but a work of divine grace that alone restores men from the devil's snare to rational, truth-knowing life.
The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant
Peter's question about the limits of forgiveness — 'up to seven times?' — draws from Christ the parable of a servant forgiven an astronomically unpayable debt who then seizes a fellow servant over a trifling sum. This sermon works through Matthew 18:21–35 in three movements: the setting of Peter's question, the three scenes of the parable itself, and the concluding verdict of verse 35. The central argument is that the forgiven community must be a forgiving community — not by counting to 490, but by forgiving without counting — and that a professing Christian who withholds forgiveness from a repentant brother thereby gives evidence that he himself has never truly received the grace of God.
The Solid Foundation of God
The apostle Paul's charge to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:16–19 to shun profane and idle babblings confronts the church with two realities: the devastating spread of doctrinal heresy and the unshakeable solidity of God's foundation. Paul names Hymenaeus and Philetus as concrete examples of men who, by denying the future bodily resurrection, not only increase in ungodliness themselves but overthrow the faith of others — a danger compared to gangrene consuming a body. Against this alarm, verse 19 supplies a double seal of comfort: the doctrine of election (the Lord knows those who are His) and the doctrine of sanctification (those who name Christ depart from iniquity), grounding the confidence that no heretical assault can ultimately destroy what God has established. The sermon applies these truths by calling the church both to vigilant doctrinal discipline and to fearless trust in God's sovereign preservation of His people.
The Possession of the Church's Authority
Christ's declaration in Matthew 18:18 — 'whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven' — establishes that the local church possesses a real, though delegated, authority to exercise the keys of the kingdom through gospel preaching and church discipline. Drawing on the parallel passage in Matthew 16:19 and the Heidelberg Catechism's definition of the keys, the sermon argues that binding and loosing refer to the church's authority to exclude the unrepentant and restore the repentant, always in accordance with God's word and never by arbitrary preference. Verses 19 and 20 ground this authority in the corporate prayer and the promised presence of Christ himself among his people when they faithfully implement these keys. The sermon closes with a summons to love the church, exercise its authority prayerfully, and pursue its three primary duties — preaching, discipline, and the administration of the sacraments — without addition or subtraction.
The Pursuit of Christian Unity
Ephesians 4:1–3 commands believers to walk worthy of their calling by cultivating four virtues — lowliness, gentleness, long-suffering, and forbearing love — as the means by which the church maintains the Spirit-wrought unity already given to it. The sermon distinguishes this genuine, truth-grounded unity from any ecumenicism that achieves togetherness by dissolving doctrinal conviction. Because the Holy Spirit is the author of church unity and the triune God is its ultimate foundation, to abandon the pursuit of it is to dishonor God himself. Hearers are pressed to give diligent, active effort to preserve what the Spirit has produced, and those outside of Christ are reminded that Christian ethics, including the pursuit of unity, can only flow from salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.
The Procedure for Church Discipline, Part 3
Church discipline in Matthew 18:15–17 follows a divinely ordered three-step procedure: private confrontation, the involvement of witnesses, and finally the public action of the gathered church. This sermon works through the second and third steps, examining the Old Testament warrant for the two-or-three-witness requirement (Deuteronomy 19:15) and the nature of the church's decisive judgment to treat the unrepentant as a heathen and tax collector. The goal at every stage remains the recovery of the sinning brother, and excommunication — a corporate act of the whole congregation, not merely the elders — is understood as an expression of love and a means God may use to bring a rebel to repentance. The sermon closes with an evangelistic warning: the church's earthly excommunication is a pale shadow of the final excommunication pronounced by Christ on the last day.
The Procedure for Church Discipline, Part 2
Church discipline is not optional for any believer — Matthew 18:15 commands the offended party to go directly and privately to the one who has sinned against them, before any witnesses or congregational involvement. This sermon works through the situation, command, and outcome of that first private confrontation, distinguishing between genuine sin and mere preference, and between the path of direct rebuke and the path of love covering a multitude of sins. The goal throughout is not excommunication or the infliction of pain, but the recovery of a sinning brother and the preservation of the purity and peace of Christ's church.
The Minister Approved by God
What does God require of a faithful gospel minister when heresy invades the church? Expositing 2 Timothy 2:14–15, this sermon argues that the approved minister is marked by three things: a diligent commitment to reminding the people of God of gospel truth, a pursuit of God's approval rather than human favor, and an accurate, straight-cut handling of the word of truth. The damning danger of false teaching — whether outright denial of the resurrection or the subtler corruption of justification by works — makes these qualifications not merely desirable but necessary for the health of the church.
The Incentives for Perseverance, Part 2
Paul's 'faithful saying' in 2 Timothy 2:11–13 supplies three conditional clauses that together form both an encouragement and a warning for the persevering Christian. The sermon exposits the believer's union with Christ in conversion (dying and rising with Him), the present communion that sustains endurance, and the solemn warning that denial of Christ evidences a faithlessness that Christ Himself will not overlook. The means of grace — Scripture, prayer, and corporate worship including the Lord's Supper — are set out as the God-appointed instruments by which believers are kept running the race.
The Procedure for Church Discipline, Part 1
Matthew 18:15 introduces Christ's binding procedure for church discipline within the local church — a subject that exposes both the authority of the head of the church and the love that drives the restoration of erring brothers. Four introductory matters are addressed before the first step is reached: the definition of formative and corrective discipline, the necessity of discipline as obedience to Christ, key presuppositions (including five biblical arguments for defined church membership), and the practice considered against common misreadings of Matthew 7 and Matthew 13. The purpose of discipline is shown to be threefold: the reconciliation and restoration of the offender, the purity of Christ's church for the glory of God, and the protection of the people of God from the spread of unchecked sin.
Of Effectual Calling (2LCF 10.1-4)
Effectual calling is the sovereign, monergistic act by which God brings his elect out of spiritual death and into saving union with Christ — by his Word and Spirit alone, apart from any foreseen merit or creaturely co-operation. Walking through 2LCF Chapter 10, paragraphs 1–4, this study situates effectual calling within the broader covenant structure of the confession, distinguishing it from the general gospel call that goes forth indiscriminately to all. The session addresses the regenerating work of the Spirit, the doctrinal grounding of infant salvation, the exclusion of the non-elect from saving grace, and the eternal perdition of those outside Christ regardless of moral sincerity — with a sustained application to how these truths ought to shape corporate prayer and gospel proclamation.
The Incentives for Perseverance, Part 1
Paul's command to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:3 — endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ — is not left without support. This sermon expounds 2 Timothy 2:8–10, identifying two of three incentives Paul provides for perseverance: the contemplation of Christ in his true humanity, Davidic lineage, and resurrection, and the conduct of Paul whose imprisonment and suffering demonstrate that the word of God cannot be chained. The doctrine of election underlies Paul's endurance, for he suffers all things for the sake of the elect, knowing that gospel preaching is the God-ordained means by which they obtain salvation in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Hearers are called to feed their souls on Christ through Scripture and to measure their own trials against the apostolic pattern of suffering for the gospel.
The Warning Against Despising Believers
Jesus' warning in Matthew 18:10–14 against despising fellow believers is neither a peripheral concern nor a suggestion for pleasant church life — it is a binding command addressed to the very tendency toward pride and contempt that lurks in regenerate hearts. The sermon works through three movements: the prohibition itself with its two supporting reasons (the ministry of angels and the redemptive mission of the Son of Man), the parable of the straying sheep (read in its Matthean context as pastoral recovery rather than evangelistic proclamation), and the Father's stated will that none of these little ones should perish. The congregation is pressed to see that when the Father, the Son, and the angels all esteem the little ones, any contempt shown by one believer toward another is an affront to the entire Trinitarian economy of redemption. The exhortation is concrete: kill pride at the root, receive rather than reject fellow believers, and willingly surrender Christian liberties rather than scandalize a brother for whom Christ died.