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Category Archives: sin

Sin still dwells in me.

I am still thinking through this morning’s sermon from Pastor Pat. He preached through Romans 7:13-25. This used to Sin-Kills be a confusing text for me until I understood that humans do not really do anything good or righteous. Even those folks who might call themselves “Christian”, think they are good now, but that is such a false assumption on their part. As the Apostle Paul states in the Romans 7, he does the very things that he desires not to do, and hates those things, and yet still does them. He has the desire to do what is right but not the ability to carry it out.

Now, come on, this is the Apostle Paul writing here. Surely if anyone had the ability to do good, it was him right? Not so, says the Apostle himself. For he states in verse 23 of chapter 7 that there is a war going on between the law of his mind (doing good) and the law of sin within his body. In the next verse he even refers to himself as a wretched man. Even as a follower of Christ.

He then poses the question that I did not totally grasp until later in life because I thought that since I became a Christian, I should now be doing righteous things. The question is this:

Who will deliver me from this body of death?

Or, who can save this wretched man that I am. The answer comes on the heels of the question in the form of gratitiude.

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

It is only through the finished work of Christ, his life, his death, and resurrection that good things happen through man. Try as he might, he cannot do the good on his own. It is work of the spirit of Christ in him. As Christians we should never, ever boast about the good that happens through us. It is only Christ Jesus doing that good through us. We have no righteousness of our own.

If you’d like to listen to the enlightening sermon online go here. If you’d like to download it and listen to it later go here.

Soli Deo Gloria!

4 Comments

Posted by barrydean on May 24, 2009 in Apostle Paul, Patrick Abendroth, Romans, sin

The Weeds of Anger

09 Nov

During our adult bible study on Sunday mornings we are reading through a book by Jerry Bridges call “Respectable Sins – Confronting the Sins We Tolerate“. This week we looked at the sin of anger. Very often we tend to tolerate this sin because we believe anger is justified in many cases and in certain situations. Although the bible does provide some examples of righteous anger, the main focus of teaching is on our sinful anger, and our sinful reactions to other people’s actions or words.

Today we looked at the chapter in the Bridges book titled “Weeds of Anger”. One of the first things Bridges points out is the scripture we have all used to provide justification for our anger. You know the verse in Ephesians 4:26:

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger.

According to Bridges, the apostle Paul is not granting us permission to be angry, let alone commanding it, as the imperative mood might suggest. Rather, Paul takes for granted that we will become angry, and he is telling us how to handle it. Basically Paul is saying “Don’t hold on to your anger. Get over it quickly.” As Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show liked to say “Nip it in the bud.”

Also in this chapter, Bridges leads the reader to look at some of the long term results of anger, what he calls “weeds of anger.” He chooses the term weeds because it emphasizes something we dislike that takes root and is often difficult to get rid of. Bridges discusses five noxious weeds that spring up from unresolved anger. The fives weeds are:

Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted by barrydean on November 9, 2008 in anger, Jerry Bridges, Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate, sin, Weeds of Anger

D.A. Carson is coming to Omaha Bible Church

25 Sep

I am very excited about this year’s 2008 Fall Conference. Not just because I love to attend conferences focused on the study of God’s word. But because one of my favorite authors and biblical scholars will be speaking this year. D.A. Carson has authored such great books as “The Gagging of God”, “How Long, O Lord?: Reflections on Suffering and Evil”, and “The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God” which we used in a previous bible study class. One of my favorite quotes from Carson is:

I would like to buy about three dollars worth of gospel, please. Not too much- just enough to make me happy, but not so much that I get addicted. I don’t want so much gospel that I learn to really hate covetousness and lust. I certainly don’t want so much that I start to love my enemies, cherish self-denial, and contemplate missionary service in some alien culture. I want ecstasy, not repentance; I want transcendence, not transformation. I would like to be cherished by some nice, forgiving, broad-minded people, but I myself don’t want to love those from different races- especially if they smell. I would like enough gospel to make my family secure and my children well behaved, but not so much that I find my ambitions redirected or my giving too greatly enlarged. I would like about three dollars worth of gospel, please.

-D.A. Carson, Basics For Believers: An Exposition of Philippians (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1996/2005), pp. 12-13.

If you are in the Omaha area Saturday, October 4th, you should stop by and study God’s word with D.A. Carson and the rest of us attending the conference. You can register by clicking on the banner above and using the register link. For the time being please watch the video below as Carson answers the questions: What is sin? How is it different from Idolatry?

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Posted by barrydean on September 25, 2008 in bible conference, D.A. Carson, Omaha Bible Church, sin, suffering

Spurgeon in Wordle

24 Sep

Above is a Wordle I created with the text from Charles H. Spurgeon’s sermon “Secret Sins” Please click on the image to view the larger more detailed version. The word cloud or wordle is designed to make the words larger the more frequent they are used in the text. You will notice an anomaly with one word as it relates to the modern church and it’s use of the word today. That is the use of the word sin. In this word cloud it is one of the largest words in the abstract image. In the contemporary church you would be hard pressed to find more than a handful of churches in a metropolitan area that use the word sin on a regular basis. That needs to change. Believers of Jesus Christ are called to make disciples of Christ by using His gospel. If we don’t use the word sin then how do we fully explain the reason for salvation?

ht: Really Robin for finding the Wordle tool.

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Posted by barrydean on September 24, 2008 in Charles H. Spurgeon, gospel, Jesus Christ, Local church, sin, wordle

God in the dock?

10 Aug

This weekend we continued our study of Romans. Going verse by verse, we are looking at Romans 1:18-32, mainly the wrath of God toward man’s sin. This week we looked at point two of the “Universals of God’s Wrath” regarding man’s sin to help us see just how good the “good news” of Christ is. The second universal is “God’s wrath is universally deserved.” Romans 1:18-23 tell us that God naturally gave all men the knowledge of His existence, but we have chosen to suppress it and have exchanged that knowledge for foolishness. Man has chosen to worship the creature rather than worship the Creator.

As the puritan Thomas Watson has said; “The chief end of man is to glorify God.” But man did not honor or glorify Him. This is the basic and natural function of man. Yet man did not get it right. We have no excuse. Man deserves God’s wrath. Man continues to search for the meaning of life, but his search will be futile. As Romans 1:21 (NASB) says:

For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Man’s search, his speculations have become futile. And this my friends is the basis of idolatry, and deserving of God’s wrath. Pastor Pat gave as a nice quote from C.S. Lewis that fits this topic nicely and is the basis for my posting today.

Ancient man, he explains, approached God (or even the gods) as an accused person approaches his or her judge. But for modern man these roles are reversed. Man is the judge, and God is in the dock.

Modern man has God on trial. We want to see how He measures up for us. We sit in judgement of Him. Oh, how foolish we have become. We most assuredly are deserving of God’s wrath. This reality should cause us to shout and praise God for the grace of Christ and His substitutionary death. He took the wrath for us. But I am jumping ahead in Romans. That good news is described in chapter 3. More to come.

I will be posting the Romans series on my Sermon Audio page, but until then you can hear the entire sermon here.

6 Comments

Posted by barrydean on August 10, 2008 in C.S. Lewis, God in the dock, God's wrath, Puritan, Romans, sin, Theology

Don’t go there!

13 Jun

Today, while searching for Puritan quotes I came across one that really hits home. It is from Irish writer Richard Steele. I love how some of these guys look like aging 80’s rock stars. (see image to right) Anyway on with the quote. It is from Steele’s writing “A Remedy For Wondering Thoughts”.

The belief that God is everywhere should persuade us to sin nowhere.

We should not delude ourselves into thinking that because we are alone physically or in thought that we are outside of God’s reception. God’s is with us. Christ is in us. Wherever we go, God is there. So a word or actually a phrase to myself and other brothers and sisters: Don’t go there!

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Posted by barrydean on June 13, 2008 in Puritan, quotes, Richard Steele, sin

Modern day Nineveh’s

22 Feb

Do you live in a modern day Nineveh? Perhaps you might, according to Forbes magazine. Dr. Albert Mohler just posted an interesting article to his blog site on the subject of the most sinful cities in America. I was grateful to see that Omaha and Wahoo didn’t make the list. Although I think Wahoo might give a run at the most bars per population, if they had a category for that. Check out the article and see how the list was derived and see if your city made the list.

America’s most sinful cities?

Snuff the rooster

20 Feb

Someone once said that there is a song for everything, and for everything there is a song. There could be some truth to that. When I read the following article by Peter Jones over at TheResurgence about how our society, and even the church deal with sin and guilt, the chorus lyrics to this old Alice In Chains song came screaming back:

Here they come to snuff the rooster
Yeah here come the rooster, yeah
You know he ain’t gonna die
No, no, no, ya know he ain’t gonna die

Please link to the article by Peter Jones and let me know what you think about how we try to “kill that rooster”.

Will someone please kill that rooster?

3 Comments

Posted by barrydean on February 20, 2008 in Alice in Chains, emergent, guilt, Peter Jones, sin, theraputic Christianity

Omaha mall shootings

07 Dec

As the gentle snow falls all over Omaha this morning. Our little big town will never quite be the same as we try to sort out the tragic events of a very long day yesterday. Most of us here in Omaha are remembering where we were and what we were doing. Here is what I can recall.

Yesterday, December 5th, as I was busy at work my work mate and friend Don received a phone call that some one has shot people at Von Maur in Westroads Mall, the largest shopping mall here in Omaha. The mall is only 15 minutes from our office. Don has an emergency radio receiver and so we began to listen to the reports and conversations coming from this horrific tragedy as it unfolded. We just couldn’t believe what we were hearing. We were hearing about victim after victim being pulled from the store. Nearly 50 local and state police vehicles had arrived or were en route. They were calling for more emergency teams to be dispatched. As I sat there and listened and prayed for those folks who were hurt or dying. I also thought about the individual or individuals who were perpetrating this on shoppers and store employees. What goes into the heart and mind of such a person? My first thought was nothing goes in their heart and mind but what is already there. For we are born with a sinful nature. Aside from the salvation from Jesus Christ no one does good. My next thought was this: But are all sinners capable of this depth of depravity? Since I have studied God’s word over the years I would have to say yes. All men are sinners and are totally depraved. (Genesis 6:5, Jeremiah 17:9, Romans 3:10-11) It is only by the grace of God that we don’t have more tragedies like this one.

As I write, we have learned (because we are now inundated with news of this horrific event) that nine people have died including the shooter. He took his own life. And five were injured. Erik Raymond who is one of our assistant pastors at Omaha Bible Church and a fellow blogger at IrishCalvinist has written a great posting about the events here yesterday. I would encourage to go to “How Would You Respond to the Shootings at Omaha’s Westroads Mall?” and read it.

Please pray for the families of the victims, the family of the shooter, and for our little Midwest town in Nebraska.

Local news network link.