Back in the Day: When Vinyl Was It!

For those of you who have heard me talk lately about the resurgence of vinyl, here's a really cool video that explains just why vinyl is making a comeback. Kind of make's burning CD's seem so . . . . 2008.

Help For Dad's on Father's Day

Having just finished sharing with you from God's Word about what it means to be a dad in light of what the Bible says, Mark Driscoll has written a short book taken from his message to father's a number of years ago. Even though it is short (for some of you that will be a welcomed thought!), it is packed full of insight and is summarized well by the title, Pastor Dad. For those of us that consider being a father of great importance in regards to how we serve Jesus, this is a very helpful and economically sound resource.

Evidence of Grace #2

As I am on this topic of evidences of grace, I would like to talk about one major evidence of grace that I have seen in the past year. Although I am committed to preaching through books of the Bible, this can sometimes prove to be difficult if the book repeats itself (as I have found in Deuteronomy), or if there are a number of difficult passages in a row (as I have found in Deuteronomy), or if it is a long book (as I have found Deuteronomy to be). On this basis it may appear that I am disappointed with our present series, Obey & Conquer, where we are preaching sequentially through the book of Deuteronomy. That is actually opposite of what I have found. Over the past year, I have had numerous positive comments on some of the things that Jesus is doing through the preaching of this great Old Testament book. For me it has helped to do a number of things. 1) It has clearly shown the need for Jesus Christ by showing us the depth of the law and the great grace of Jesus to save us from having to follow the nuances of the various difficult (not the moral law found in the 10 commandments), thereby showing us how great Jesus really is, 2) It has helped to shape the vision for this church in this community at this time, 3) It has touched on issues that I would never choose to preach on until I had more life experience (a.k.a. divorce), 4) It has helped our entire church family get a very real grip on a book of the Old Testament. That all of this has happened simply by preaching through a book has been for me a very real evidence of the grace of Jesus. 

Evidences of Grace #1

As I shared at the devotional for our annual meeting, the first evidence of grace that I have seen is that over the past two years, our church family has seen at least 5 professions of faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. I define a conversion as a genuine understanding of what it means to be a sinner and a genuine understanding of what it means to need a Saviour who not only forgives sinners of sin, but provides for them new hearts that they serve Jesus and His mission with (Jeremiah 31:33,34 & Matthew 28:19,20) I am not by nature a pessimist and reading Canadian sociologist Reginald Bibby reminded me that the Christian horizon in Canada is not as bad as one might think (read his short article here).  However, statistically, most churches that are over 25 years old have a very difficult time growing via new conversions. Statistics Canada says that while Protestant Christianity is growing, it is not quite keeping up with the population growth, and thereby losing ground slowly. This means that some, if not many churches will eventually die without conversion growth. All of this to say, 5 genuine conversions in the past year is evidence that God works through His Word, He has been answering our prayers, and it is possible for churches that are almost 50 years old to experience new believers who freshly understand and experience the power of the gospel. This has been a great encouragement to me and is one of the evidences of the grace of Jesus in our church family in 2008.

It's been a long time.

I know, I know, a blog is supposed to be updated regularly, but the truth of it is, I haven't been totally sure what to write about these past couple of weeks, well months. It has been a good season of ministry over the holidays and now in the new year, although it is hard to believe that February is almost gone. I thought I would start everything up with the fact that over the last few months I have been reflecting much on evidences of God's grace. About this time last year I was at a conference where one of my favourite preacher's, C.J. Mahaney challenged us with something out of 1 Corinthians. He described the Corinthian church as it is described in that letter--messed up. However, something about the way that the book is introduced that is striking; Paul refers to the Corinthian church as, ' . . . called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our LORD Jesus Christ . . .', and Paul always, ' . . . gives thanks to my God for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus'. (1 Corinthians 1:2,4) If you read the rest of the book, it hardly feels like this is a church that is worthy of these kind of statements. That's because, as Mahaney so passionately points out, Paul trained himself to look for evidences of God's grace. If you were at the BEMC annual meeting this past February, you know that I pointed out a number of evidences of grace that I have seen in this church family in the past year. Over the next couple of days I will try to share with you some of these evidences that I have seen. Stay posted.

Here's C.J.'s message.

Upcoming Series: Christmas Q's

A very big thank you to all of those who took the time to give me input for my first ever sermon poll! Altogether I received 32 responses and the top three vote getting questions were (from most popular to least popular) 1) Why is the story of the wise men such a big part of the Christmas story? 2) Does Mary's virginity really matter? and 3) What historically was going on at the time of Jesus' birth? (See the side bar for the rest of your results) It was a well worthwhile effort as one of the questions I would have never considered preaching had it not been for your valuable effort. So, now that the votes are in, the preaching schedule will look like this:

Sunday, December 7 - Christmas Q1: What historically was going on at the time of Jesus' birth?

Sunday, December 14 - Christmas Q2: Does Mary's virginity really matter?

Sunday, December 21 - Christmas Q3: Why is the story of the wise men such a big part of the Christmas story?

Wednesday December 24 - Traditional Candlelight Service retelling the Christmas story.

Thank you to all who participated.

Trev

An experiment that you are needed for!

Have you ever wanted to have a say in what is being preached on any given Sunday? Well, although it is somewhat limited, here is your chance! This year, I'd like to try an experiment. I'd like you as the listener or friend to have a say in what I will cover. I have blocked off 3 Sundays for Christmas themed messages this year, Sunday December 7, Sunday December 14 and Sunday December 21st. What I have devised for you is a list of possible questions that I am willing to tackle this year. What I am asking is that you as a listener pick the top 3 questions that peak your interest and respond in one of four ways. 1) 

Vote using the box underneath my picture. 2) Click on the comments button at the bottom of this post and list your three questions. 2) Email me your list to trevorrysavy@shaw.ca or 3) Fill in the card you find in your bulletin on Sunday November 30th and drop it in the offering plates at the back of the sanctuary. Tuesday December 2nd will be the last day to give input and after that the 3 questions with the most votes will be tackled over the next three Sundays. If there is a question that is not on the list, feel free to write it out. There's no question that is too silly, so feel free to write out whatever is on your mind. I hope to hear from as many of you as possible! Here is the list of questions.

1) Does Mary's virginity really matter?

2) Why are the other characters in the Christmas story important to us?

3) Why is it important that the Scriptures be fulfilled in the Christmas story?

4) What historically was going on at the time of Jesus' birth?

5) What does it really mean that God became flesh in Jesus Christ?

6) What is Joseph's role in the Christmas story and what does it matter?

7) What was the spiritual temperature of Israel at the time of the birth of the Messiah?

8) Why is the story of the wise men such a big part of the Christmas story?

9) Fill in the blank.

Looking forward to it,

Trev

Fresh Book, Fresh Understanding

This past Sunday I quoted from a book that I have been reading by Timothy Keller called, 'The Prodigal God'. Although there are few books that I would consider must reads, this one fits in that category. Having just studied and preached my way through Jesus' parables of 'lostness' in Luke 15, the content of the book immediately captured my attention. What surprised me however, is that rather than focus simply on the lost coin, lost sheep or lost  younger brother, Keller focuses his attention almost completely on the elder brother, whom is portrayed as just as lost. This makes sense when we realize that in the parable of the prodigal son, the audience is comprised not of younger brothers, but actually of older brothers (aka the Pharisees or religious teachers).  I was also immediately surprised to find out that in spite of all of my research, I had never realized that the word, 'prodigal' does not mean wayward but rather, 'recklessly extravagant', and 'having spent everything'. Since that is true, prodigal then describes the father in the story of the parable as much or more than it describes the son. Truthfully, I have always thought of the elder son as an aside, but a closer look at the parable reveals that truly, the reaction and emotions of the elder son are in fact one of the keys to the whole story. If this peaks your interest, you've got to check it out! Since it is difficult to find books on the gospel, and particularly how the gospel works and continues to work in the lives of people, I couldn't recommend this one more. It is only 133 shorts pages of easy reading and Keller's style is extremely likeable. Put this on your short list of books to get in the next month. It's available at Chapters, or you could order it online here.

Food, money and a few things in between.

As I said before, each week I would like to give you some more food for thought regarding Sunday's message. (pun intended!) Having subscribed recently to a magazine that keeps me informed of much of the culture around me, November's issue of WIRED magazine speaks about the whole issue and future of food in the world. If you are interested in reading what I am, you can find the specific article here. As per usual in our culture, our so-called smartest people believe that to solve the global food shortage crisis we need a scientific solution. Although I think science will help us create healthier food, science can never stop us from being greedy or idolatrous in our food addictions. This worldly solution is an example of what I was speaking about when I said that often we are 'outside-in' in our thinking--meaning that we sometimes believe that changing our external behavior first will then affect what is in our hearts. The Bible says the complete opposite however. Jesus in fact said, 'Hear me, all of you, and understand: There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him . . . For from within, out of the heart of a man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.' (Mark 7:15-22, ESV) Let us be reminded then, that simply not eating, or eating only what we need will still never truly solve the problem. What we need is Jesus to change our hearts to the points where we begin to see our intake of food as a way to bring glory to him. One way this is done is by being thankful for our food. Another way, is by inviting others to partake of the goodness that God has given to us. In fact, regularly inviting strangers to take part of our mealtimes is the true definition of hospitality and a requirement of God's leaders. (See 1 Tim. 3:2) May we be reminded of God's goodness and grace to us as we eat today.

Hello everyone,

This is our new attempt to connect more of what is said on Sunday with what is lived Monday through Saturday. On Sunday, November 2nd, I preached a message on Idolatary that was particularly intensive for me personally. If you heard it you will know that it came at an unlikely time in my own life, but for that very reason, it was particularly helpful and meaningful for me to both study and preach at the same time. At the end of the message, I simply read a list of questions that I used in the powerpoint presentation on Sunday morning. There were reasons why I did not make them available in a handout, the foremost of which when I asked permission, said it would be a copyright infringement by the author of them, Darrin Patrick of The Journey Church in St. Louis. It is not a copyright infringement however for you to visit the church website and copy or print this list for yourself, and this post serves to direct you there if you would find them helpful. I certainly did. You can find them here.

Of course not all of the questions will cause us to reflect deeply, but surely a couple of them will hit home. As I reflected on the questions, the one that probably bit the deepest was, ‘What do I do to cope?’ I admit that rather than seeing more evidence of the glory of Jesus Christ, I often dream about leisure activities or sports. These things in and of themselves are not wrong or bad, in fact they are God’s good gift to me, but too often I find myself drawn to hope in them or wish for them when things aren’t going my way on any particular day. Since Jesus promises that He in fact is my strength in anything and everything, I am amazed at my own sinfulness to turn first to leisure or sport rather than my Saviour in my time of need. And that’s just the beginning. What I am also thankful for is that in spite of my own terrible knack for finding new ways to sin, I have a real Saviour who can not only draw me away from my idolatry, but can turn my worldly passions into new desires for friendship and worship of Him. What an awesome Saviour we have.

I would totally welcome your feedback on this.

Trev