Clark Field Baptist Church – Angeles City, Philippines
My earliest memories in life are singing in the children’s choir at Clark Field Baptist Church while my dad was stationed at Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines. We had the privilege of growing under two pastors, Allen Smith & John Dill, both of whom were IMB missionaries and both of whom impacted my young life greatly. To this day both men are good friends with me family and men who I still look up to as examples of Christ.

Adamsville Baptist Church – Goldsboro, NC
Moving from the Philippines to North Carolina, and being a part of the Adamsville family, only heightened my love for missions as I grew up a bit in the RA program at Adamsville. Sitting under the teaching of Pastor Al Wright is where I first experienced the Spirit of God stirring in my heart and would eventually pave the way for me to surrender my life to King Jesus.

Deer Park Baptist Church – Newport News, VA
Deer Park Baptist Church is where I finally bowed my knee to Christ. I spent my pre-teen years at Deer Park and made my first real friendships that were not only guys I enjoyed time with, but also showed me what it was like to run after Jesus. Pastor Gary Burden, his wife Frances, and their sons, Tim & Stephen, became serious friends of my family. I still remember seeing Pastor Gary in shorts one Sunday afternoon. After the shock wore off, it became the first time I realized that pastors were real people, just like me.

First Baptist Church – Chipley, FL
We were not at FBC Chipley for too long, as my dad accepted his first pastorate not long after we moved to Florida, but FBC was where the Lord called me to serve in vocational ministry, while growing under the leadership of Pastor Adolf Phares and my youth pastor Lou Fortier, who is now a pastor close to me in the Kansas City area. Learning under Lou taught me what it looked like to take holiness seriously and to be a student of scripture.

Orange Hill Baptist Church – Chipley, FL
Orange Hill is probably where I grew the most. Sitting under my dad as a pastor was a new experience for me, but knowing that God was calling me into ministry, it also allowed me to experience a hands on intern-like experience. I watched and learned what it looked like to do sermon prep, hospital visitation, funerals, weddings, and door to door visitation, all beside my dad who has always been my greatest spiritual hero. Working as a bi-vocational pastor, he taught me to be faithful and love people, even when you are working yourself in the ground. All the while, he showed me what it looked like to love your family deeply. I’m still not sure how he did it.

This is also the church where our one deacon, and his wife, Howard & Sue Gilbert, hired me to work on their small farm, and for the next 5 years I learned how important it was to work hard, do a good job and appreciate the rewards of that labor. I will never be able to say thank you enough to the family at Orange Hill who helped shape me deeply.

Shiloh Baptist Church – Chipley, FL
Shiloh was the last church I was a member of before I began serving on church staff. Under the leadership of Pastor Gary Wiggins, a man I love deeply, I learned to trust in God’s sovereignty, and to rest in his leadership. This is the church that licensed me to ministry and gave me my first real ministry responsibilities, responsibilities which were unpaid but which were real, and began to teach me what it looks like to faithfully lead others in church life.

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This post is probably more cathartic for me than helpful to any of you, in fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if you stopped reading a long time ago. With that said, I realize that my life is not just mine, but is an amalgamation of those who I have loved like family and who have shaped me on my own journey with Jesus, and for that I wanted to take a moment and say thanks. Each of these stops along the way remind me of God’s good grace in my life, and encourage me to continue to pursue him and to love his church. Because of them, I am blessed.

Thanks.

The video was created by Desiring God and John Piper said this as a means of introduction.

I tremble with the glad responsibility of introducing you to Ian & Larissa Murphy in this video. Tremble, because it is their story and so personal. So delicate. So easily abused. So unfinished. Glad, because Christ is exalted over all things.

HT: Justin Taylor

HT: Timmy Brister

The Nefarious Nectar of Narcissism

“I worry that what you just heard was, ‘give me a lot of bacon and eggs’. What I said was, ‘give me all the bacon and eggs you have’. Do you understand?”

As I watched this short little clip, I could not help but think that this seems to be the typical “Christian” response to the ‘come and die’ call of the gospel. Luke 9:23-24 looms large in my mind as I think often about the gospel. Consider the words of Jesus.

And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.”

It would appear that many who respond somehow to the typical gospel message actually hear that call a bit differently than Jesus issued it. I wonder sometimes if, as gospel preachers, we should clarify that call as we preach it to something that is a bit more reminiscent of a Ron Swanson quote. It might be helpful to say to those listening,

“I worry that what you heard was, ‘take those bad corners of your life, and die to them’. What Jesus actually said was, ‘whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it’.”

The call to follow Jesus has been interpreted as a call to follow Jesus by dying to those bad corners of our life – you know, the bad habits, the clear sins, those things we do not really like about ourselves. Thankfully we surely have a few redeeming qualities, so, for God’s sake, we need to bring those in to the relationship. Surely Jesus did not mean we have to actually die to the ‘good parts’ of our life. Those must be safe. In fact, those are important for us to maximize for Jesus, so we will hold on to them.

In doing so, we have created a Christian sub-culture that is decidedly un-Christian, at least in the truly biblical sense. We are materialistic, gossip loving, self-advancing, comfort chasing church goers. We are not self-denying, cross bearing, Jesus chasing Christians. The call of the gospel is a call to die. Simply put, it is a call to die to everything about you. In order to believe Christ and respond in faith to the gospel we must come to the end of ourselves and believe that even the best parts of us are sad, filthy attempts in God’s eyes. This was exactly what Isaiah was trying to communicate in Isaiah 64:6.

We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.

This is why we see very little missional living among the church today. We cannot risk for the gospel. Pain might be involved. We cannot sacrifice for the gospel. It would hurt too much. A lack of missional living is ultimately bound up in a flawed view of the gospel. If we did not die to ourselves, all of ourselves, when we responded to the gospel in the first place, how can we expect the church to be full of Christians who will die to themselves every day?

So ultimately, hear this as a plea to rightly understand the gospel. Jesus did not die so that he could save you and make you into, ‘the best you, you can be‘. Jesus died because even the ‘best you’ is short of anything righteous and is in desperate need of the gospel.

The best thing I could say to you today is please, give up. Quit. Stop pursuing so incessantly your good stuff. Quit holding on to your things. Die to yourself, trust in Christ, and follow him. If you heard the gospel call as a call to ‘die to the bad stuff’ in your life, run from that. It is nothing but a false gospel. Die to yourself today, and allow Christ to replace your life, with his.

“I worry that what you heard was, ‘take those bad corners of your life, and die to them’. What Jesus actually said was, ‘whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it’.”

1. The Pursuit of Holiness, Jerry Bridges
   While in college, an older classmate, Shawn, asked me if I would be interested in walking through this book together. Eager to learn, I agreed and we began to meet weekly as he helped mentor/disciple me using this book. This book radically shaped my view of holiness and my need to walk in it, yes even to pursue it. This is one book that I would recommend to every believer, to be read on an annual basis. It is that powerful.
2. Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, Don Whitney
   Dr. Whitney served as the co-pastor of a house church that I attended for a few months when I was 17 years old. He patiently helped me to understand some of the aspects of the sovereignty of God that I was struggling with as an eager, but frustrated teenager. Later he became my professor in seminary, and challenged me as few do. To this day, when I am struggling with specific aspects of church life, he is one of the first people I will pick up a phone and call for wisdom.This specific book, among the many he has written, has shaped the way I practice the spiritual disciplines. I am forever grateful for the influence of this book, and Dr. Whitney personally, helping shape my commitment to discipline alone, but more specifically the spiritual disciplines. This is the other book that I would encourage every believer to read on an annual basis. It is that influential.
3. George Muller: Delighted In God (HistoryMakers), Roger Steer
   I love biographies. Simply put, I believe learning from the lives of others may be among God’s greatest tools to shape later generations. Among all the biographies I have read, none has impacted me quite as significantly as that of George Muller. There is a good chance you have never heard of him, and that is a travesty. Do not wait any longer. Run over to Amazon and buy this book. Now. You will be glad you did.
4. The Prodigal God, Tim Keller
   I have struggled my entire life with the need to perform for God. I had become a walking modern day pharisee, and was not even aware of it. I did know, however, that my spiritual life was more drudgery than delight, and I knew that was not right. Enter Keller’s magnificent book. Today no living writer has influenced my life and theology quite as much as Tim Keller, aside from the possible exception of John Piper. This book literally transformed my life. If you grew up in religious circles, I cannot recommend this book strongly enough.

So, those are the four books that most significantly shaped my spiritual formation. What books have shaped you?