J.C. Ryle on the Importance of Doctrine Within the Church

"If you want to do good in these times, you must throw aside indecision, and take up a distinct, sharply cut, doctrinal religion.  If you believe little, those to whom you try to do good will believe nothing.  The victories of Christianity, wherever they have been won, have been won by distinct doctrinal theology, by telling men roundly of Christ's vicarious death and sacrifice, by showing them Christ's substitution on the cross and His precious blood, by teaching them justification by faith and bidding them believe on a crucified Savior, by preaching ruin by sin, redemption by Christ, regeneration by the Spirit, by lifting up the bronze serpent, by telling men to look and live, to believe, repent and be converted.  This, this is the only teaching which for eighteen centuries God has honored with success, and is honoring at the present day both at home and abroad.  Let the clever advocates of a broad and undogmatic theology - the preachers of the gospel of earnestness and sincerity and cold morality - let them, I say, show us at this day any English village or parish or city or town or district, which has been evangelized without 'dogma,' by their principles.  They cannot do it, and they never will.  Christianity without distinct doctrine is a powerless thing.  It may be beautiful to some minds, but it is childless and barren.  There is no getting over facts.  The good that is done in the earth may be comparatively small.  Evil may abound and ignorant impatience may murmur, and cry out that Christianity has failed.  But, depend on it, if we want to 'do good' and shake the world, we must fight with the old apostolic weapons, and stick to 'dogma.'  No dogma, no fruits!  No positive evangelical doctrine, no evangelization!"  (J.C. Ryle, Holiness)

J.C. Ryle on Christianity's Unexplainable Facts (4 of 4)

"When skeptics and infidels have said all they can, we must not forget that there are three great broad facts which they have never explained away, and I am convinced they never can, and never will.  Let me tell you briefly what they are.  They are very simple facts, and any plain man can understand them."

Fact #1 - Jesus Christ

Fact #2 - The Bible

Fact #3 - Christianity

"Whenever you are tempted to be alarmed at the progress of infidelity, look at the three facts I have just mentioned, and cast your fears away.  Take up your position boldly behind the ramparts of these three facts, and you may safely defy the utmost efforts of modern skeptics.  They may often ask you a hundred questions you cannot answer, and start ingenious problems about various readings, or inspiration, or geology, or the origin of man, or the age of the world, which you cannot solve.  They may vex and irritate you with wild speculation and theories, of which at the time you cannot prove the fallacy, though you feel it.  But be calm and fear not.  Remember the three great facts I have named, and boldly challenge skeptics to explain them away  The difficulties of Christianity no doubt are great; but, depend on it, they are nothing compared to the difficulties of infidelity" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

J.C. Ryle on Christianity's Unexplainable Facts (3 of 4)

"When skeptics and infidels have said all they can, we must not forget that there are three great broad facts which they have never explained away, and I am convinced they never can, and never will.  Let me tell you briefly what they are.  They are very simple facts, and any plain man can understand them."

Fact #1 - Jesus Christ

Fact #2 - The Bible

"The third fact is the effect which Christianity has produced on the world.  If Christianity is a mere invention of man, and not a supernatural, divine revelation, how is it that it has wrought such a complete alteration in the state of man kind?  Any well-read man knows that the moral difference between the condition of the world before Christianity was planted and since Christianity took root is the difference between night and day, the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of the devil" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

Resurrection and Life

This Sunday at ElmCreek Community Church we will be looking at John 5:25-29.  In this passage Jesus explains that life is found in Him alone, for He is God and Judge of everyone.  But this life is not just something that all believers can look forward to.  It is life that can be experienced now.  And once this life is experienced there is no denying its reality for the believer.

Kent Hughes tells the following story:

“Years ago the great G. Campbell Morgan was preaching in Tennessee.  During the sermon he stated, ‘By no means can every Christian remember the time when he was born again.’  At the end of the sermon someone challenged his statement.  Morgan turned to him and asked the man, ‘Are you alive?’  The man said, ‘Why of course I am!’  Morgan said, ‘Do you remember when you were born?’  The man said, ‘No, but I know I am living.’  Morgan replied, ‘Exactly.  Some Christians may not remember the moment of their new birth.  But they are spiritually alive and know it and that is what counts.’  You can know you have eternal life.  When the dead hear the voice of Christ, they enter into that relationship of life.” 

Join us this week at ElmCreek Community Church as together we give worship and praise to Jesus, the giver of life.

Striving to know Christ and make Him known,

Mark

J.C. Ryle on Christianity's Unexplainable Facts (2 of 4)

"When skeptics and infidels have said all they can, we must not forget that there are three great broad facts which they have never explained away, and I am convinced they never can, and never will.  Let me tell you briefly what they are.  They are very simple facts, and any plain man can understand them."

Fact #1 - Jesus Christ

"The second fact is the Bible itself.  If Christianity is a mere invention of man, and the Bible is of no more authority than any other uninspired volume, how is it that the book is what it is?  How is it that a book written by a few Jews in a remote corner of the earth, written at distant periods without consort or collusion among the writers; written by members of a nation which, compared to Greeks and Romans, did nothing for literature - how is it that this book stands entirely alone, and there is nothing that even approaches it, for high views of God, for true views of man, for solemnity of thought, for grandeur of doctrine, and for purity of morality?  What account can the infidel give of this book, so deep, so simple, so wise, so free from defects?  He cannot explain its existence and nature on his principles.  We only can do that who hold that the book is supernatural and of God" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

J.C. Ryle on Christianity's Unexplainable Facts (1 of 4)

"When skeptics and infidels have said all they can, we must not forget that there are three great broad facts which they have never explained away, and I am convinced they never can, and never will.  Let me tell you briefly what they are.  They are very simple facts, and any plain man can understand them.

"The first fact is Jesus Christ Himself.  If Christianity is a mere invention of man, and the Bible is not from God, how can infidels explain Jesus Christ?  His existence in history they cannot deny.  How is it that without force or bribery, without arms or money, He has made such an immensely deep mark on the world as He certainly has?  Who was He?  What was He?  Where did He come from?  How is it that there never has been one like Him, neither before nor after, since the beginning of historical times?  They cannot explain it.  Nothing can explain it but the great foundation principle of revealed religion, that Jesus Christ is God, and His gospel is all true" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

John Calvin on the Affect of Scripture

"There was good ground for the apostle's declaration, that the faith of the Corinthians was founded not on 'the wisdom of men,' but on 'the power of God' (1 Cor 2:5), this speech and preaching among them having been 'not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power' (1 Cor 2:5).  For the truth is vindicated in opposition to every doubt, when, unsupported by foreign aid, it has its sole sufficiency in itself.  How peculiarly this property belongs to Scripture appears from this, that no human writings, however skillfully composed, are at all capable of affecting us in a similar way.  Read Demosthenes or Cicero, read Plato, Aristotle, or any other of that class: you will, I admit, feel wonderfully allured, pleased, moved, enchanted; but turn from them to the reading of the sacred volume, and whether you will or not, it will so affect you, so pierce your heart, so work its way into your very marrow, that, in comparison of the impression so produced, that of orators and philosophers will almost disappear; making it manifest that in the sacred volume there is a truth divine, a something which makes it immeasurably superior to all the gifts and graces attainable by man" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on Skepticism and the Christian Reaction

These words were written by J.C. Ryle in 1879, but they speak as if written today.  It is a long excerpt, but worth the time to read.

"Our lot is cast in an age of abounding unbelief, skepticism and, I fear I must add, infidelity.  Never, perhaps, since the days of Celsus, Porphyry and Julian, was the truth of revealed religion so openly and unblushingly assailed, and never was the assault so speciously and plausibly conducted.  The words which Bishop Butler wrote in 1736 are curiously applicable to our own days, 'It is come to be taken for granted by many people, that Christianity is not even a subject of inquiry, but that it is now at length discovered to be fictitious.  And accordingly they treat it as if, in the present age, this was an agreed point among all people of discernment, and nothing remained but to set it up as a principal subject of mirth and ridicule, as it were by way of reprisals for its having so long interrupted the pleasures of the world.'  I often wonder what the good bishop would have now said, if he had lived in 1879.

"In reviews, magazines, newspapers, lectures, essays and sometimes even in sermons, scores of clever writers are incessantly waging war against the very foundations of Christianity.  Reason, science, geology, anthropology, modern discoveries, free thought, are all badly asserted to be on their side.  No educated person, we are constantly told nowadays, can really believe supernatural religion, or the plenary inspiration of the Bible, or the possibility of miracles.  Such ancient doctrines as the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the personality of the Holy Spirit, the atonement, the obligation of the Sabbath, the necessity and efficacy of prayer, the existence of the devil and the reality of future punishment, are quietly put on the shelf as useless old almanacs, or contemptuously thrown overboard as lumber!  And all this is done so cleverly, and with such an appearance of candor and liberality, and with such compliments for the capacity and nobility of human nature, that multitudes of unstable Christians are carried away as by a flood, and become partially unsettled, if they do not make complete shipwreck of faith.

"The existence of this page of unbelief must not surprise us for a moment.  It is only an old enemy in a new dress, an old disease in a new form.  Since the day when Adam and Eve fell, the devil has never ceased to tempt men not to believe God, and has said, directly or indirectly, 'You shall not die even if you do not believe.'  In the latter days especially we have warrant of Scripture for expecting an abundant crop of unbelief.  'When the Son of man comes, shall He find faith on the earth?'  'Evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse,' 'There shall come in the last days scoffers' (Luke 18:8; 2 tim. 3:13; 2 Peter 3:3).  Here in England skepticism is that natural rebound from semi-popery and superstition which many wise men have long predicted and expected.  It is precisely that swing of the pendulum which far-sighted students of human nature looked for; and it has come.

"But as I tell you not to be surprised at the widespread skepticism of the times, so also I must urge you not to be shaken in mind by it, or moved from your steadfastness.  There is no real cause for alarm.  The ark of God is not in danger, though the oxen seem to shake it.  Christianity has survived the attacks of Hume and Hobbes and Tindal, of Collins and Woolston and Bolingbroke and Chubb, of Voltaire and Payne and Holyoke.  These men made a great noise in their day, and frightened weak people, but they produced no more effect than idle travelers produce by scratching their names on the great pyramid of Egypt.  Depend on it, Christianity in like manner will survive the attacks of the clever writers of these times.  The startling novelty of many modern objections to revelation, no doubt, make them seem more weighty than they really are.  It does not follow, however, that hard knots cannot be untied because our fingers cannot untie them, or formidable difficulties cannot be explained because our eyes cannot see through or explain them.  When you cannot answer a skeptic, be content to wait for more light; but never forsake a great principle.  In religion, as in many scientific questions, said Faraday, 'The highest philosophy is often a judicious suspense of judgment.'  He that believes shall not make haste: he can afford to wait" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

Stewardship - Treasure

Jesus Christ has a very interesting view of money.  In Mark 12:41-44, Jesus and his disciples witness many wealthy individuals placing large amounts of money into an offering box at the temple.  They also witness a poor widow give “two small copper coins” amounting to 1/64 of a day’s wage, far short of the amounts given by the wealthy.  Using it as a teachable moment, Jesus’ response is not what the disciples expect.

Over the past two Sundays we have been wrestling with the topic of stewardship in Matthew 25:14-30.  God calls us to be good stewards of the time, talents, and treasure given to us.  What does it look like practically to be a good steward not only in our daily life but also as a member of the body of Christ?  Our goal as His people is to have a biblical view of our finances and how God calls us to steward the treasure He has given us.

Join us at ElmCreek Community Church as we strive together to live out the truth of God’s Word, obeying His commands out of love for Him.

Striving to know Christ and make Him known,

Pastor Mark

John Calvin on the Holy Spirit and the Authority of Scripture

"Let it be held as fixed, that those who are inwardly taught by the Holy Spirit [agree completely] in Scripture; that Scripture carrying its own evidence along with it, [grants] not to submit to proofs and arguments, but owes the full conviction with which we ought to receive it to the testimony of the Spirit.  Enlighten by him, we no longer believe, either on our own judgment or that of others, that the Scriptures are from God; but, in a way superior to human judgment, feel perfectly assured - as much so as if we beheld the divine image visibly impressed on it - that it came to us, by the instrumentality of men, from the very mouth of God.  We ask not for proofs or probabilities on which to rest our judgment, but we subject our intellect and judgment to it as too transcendent for us to estimate.  This, however, we do, not in the manner in which some are wont to fasten on an unknown object, which, as soon as known, displeases, but because we have a thorough conviction that, in holding it, we hold unassailable truth; not like miserable men, whose minds are enslaved by superstition, but because we feel a divine energy living and breathing in it - an energy by which we are drawn and animated to obey it, willingly indeed, and knowingly, but more vividly and effectually than could be done by human will or knowledge.  Hence, God most justly exclaims by the mouth of Isaiah, 'Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he' (Isa 43:10)" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on the Importance of What We Think of Christ

"What do you think of Christ?  Is He great or little in your eyes? Does He come first or second in your estimation? Is He before or behind His church, His ministers, His sacraments, His ordinances?  Where is He in your heart and your mind's eye?

"After all, this is the question of questions!  Pardon, peace, rest of conscience, hope in death, heaven itself - all hinge upon our answer.  To know Christ is life eternal.  To be without Christ is to be without God.  'He that has the Son has life, and he that has not the Son of God has not life' (1 John 5:12).  The friends of purely secular education, the enthusiastic advocates of reform and progress, the worshipers of reason and intellect and mind and science, may say what they please, and do all they can to mend the world.  But they will find their labor is in vain if they do not make allowance of the Fall of man, if there is no place for Christ in their schemes.  There is a sore disease at the heart of mankind, which will baffle all their efforts and defeat all their plans, and that disease is sin.  Oh, that people would only see and recognize the corruption of human nature, and the uselessness of all efforts to improve man which are not based not the remedial system of the gospel!  Yes, the plague of sin is in the world, and no waters will ever heal that plague except those which flow from the fountain for all sin - a crucified Christ" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

John Calvin on Those Who Refute the Authority of Scripture

"It is preposterous to attempt, by discussion, to rear up a full faith in Scripture.  True, were I called to contend with the craftiest despisers of God, I trust, though I am not possessed of the highest ability or eloquence, I should not find it difficult to stop their [boisterous] mouths; I could, without much ado, put down the boastings which they mutter in corners, were anything to be gained by refuting their [criticisms].  But although we may maintain the sacred word of God against gainsayers, it does not follow that we shall forthwith implant the certainty which faith requires in their hearts.  Profane men think that religion rests only on opinion, and therefore that they may not believe foolishly, or on slight grounds, desire and insist to have it proved by reason that Moses and the prophets were divinely inspired.  But I answer, that the testimony of the Spirit is superior to reason.  For as God alone can properly bear witness to his own words, so these words will not obtain full credit in the hearts of men, until they are sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.  The same Spirit, therefore, who spoke by the mouths of the prophets, must penetrate our hearts, in order to convince us that they faithfully delivered the message with which they were divinely entrusted.  This connection is most aptly expressed by Isaiah in these words, 'My Spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of they mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever' (Isa 59:21).  Some worthy persons feel disconcerted, because, while the wicked murmur with impunity at the Word of God, they have not a clear proof at hand to silence them, forgetting that the Spirit is called a [promise] and seal to confirm the faith of the godly, for this very reason, that until he enlightens their minds, they are tossed to and fro in a sea of doubts" (John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on Our View of Ministers of Christ

"What do you think of the minister of Christ? Strange as that question may seem, I verily believe that the kind of answer a man would give to it, if he speaks honestly, is very often a fair test of the state of his heart.

"Observe, I am not asking what you think of an idle, worldly, inconsistent clergyman, a sleeping watchman and faithless shepherd. No! I ask what you think of the faithful minister of Christ, who honestly exposes sin, and pricks your conscience? Mind how you answer that question. Too many nowadays like only those ministers who prophesy smooth things and let their sins alone, who flatter their pride and amuse their intellectual taste, but who never sound an alarm, and never tell them of a wrath to come. When Ahab saw Elijah, said, 'Have you found me, O mine enemy?' (1 Kings 21:20). When Micaiah was named to Ahab, he cried, 'I hate him because he doesn't prophesy good of me, but evil' (1 Kings 22:8). Alas, there are many like Ahab in the nineteenth century! They like a ministry which does not make them uncomfortable, and send them home ill at ease. How is it with you? Oh, believe me, he is the best friend who tells you the most truth! It is an evil sign in the church when Christ's witnesses are silenced, or persecuted, and men hate him who reproves (Isa. 29:21). It was a solemn saying of the prophet to Amazia, 'Now I know that God has determined to destroy you, because you have done this, and not hearkened to my counsel' (2 Chron. 25:16)" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

John Calvin on the Church and the Authority of Scripture

"Paul testifies that the church is 'built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets' (Eph. 2:20). If the doctrine of the apostles and prophets is the foundation of the church, the former must have had its certainty before the latter began to exist. Nor is there any room for the [criticism], that though the church derives her first beginning from thence, it still remains doubtful what writings are to be attributed to the apostles and prophets, until her judgment is interposed.  For if the Christian church was founded at first on the writings of the prophets, and the preaching of the apostles, that doctrine, wheresoever it may be found, was certainly ascertained and sanctioned [prior] to the church, since, but for this, the church herself never could have existed. Nothing, therefore can be more absurd than the fiction, that the power judging Scripture is in the church, and that on her nod its certainty depends. When the church receives it, and gives it the stamp of her authority, she does not make that authentic which was otherwise doubtful or [refuted] but, acknowledging it as the truth of God, she, as in duty bound, shows her reverence by an unhesitating assent. As to the question, How shall we be persuaded that it came from God without recurring to a decree of the church? it is just the same as if it were asked, How shall we learn to distinguish light from darkness, white from black, sweet from bitter? Scripture bears upon the face of it as clear evidence of its truth, as white and black do of their color, sweet and bitter of their taste" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on Our View of Ourselves

"What do you think of yourself? What Paul thought of himself you have seen and heard. Now, what are your thoughts about yourself? Have you found out that grand foundational truth that you are a sinner, a guilty sinner in the sight of God?

"The cry for more education in this day is loud and incessant. Ignorance is universally deplored. But, you may depend, there is not ignorance so common and so mischievous as ignorance or ourselves. Yes, men may know all arts and sciences and languages, and political economy and statecraft, and yet be miserably ignorant of their own hearts and their own state before God.

"Be very sure that self-knowledge is the first step towards heaven. To know God's unspeakable perfection, and our own immense imperfection, to see our own unspeakable defectiveness and corruption, is the ABC in saving religion. The more real inward light we have, the more humble and lowly-minded we shall be, and the more we shall understand the value of that despised thing, the gospel of Christ. He that think worst of himself and his own doings is perhaps the best Christian before God. Well would it be of many if they would pray, night and day, this simple prayer: 'Lord, show me myself'" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

Stewardship - Talents

“We have nothing to do with how much ability we've got, or how little, but with what we do with what we have. The man with great talent is apt to be puffed up, and the man with little (talent) to belittle the little. Poor fools! God gives it, much or little. Our part is to be faithful, doing the level best with every bit and scrap. And we will be if Jesus' spirit controls” (S.D. Gordon, The Bent-knee Time).

This week at ElmCreek Community Church we will continue to study the parable of the talents in Matthew 25:14-30, focusing on our God-given abilities.  Join us as we strive to understand how to use our natural gifts for the work of our Master and Lord and how as disciples of Jesus Christ we should view our talents.  May the Holy Spirit use our time together to convict, mold, and change us as his disciples so that we may better preach through word and deed the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Striving to know Christ and make Him known,

Pastor Mark

John Calvin on the Importance of the Word in the Depravity of Our Nature

"For if we reflect how prone the human mind is to lapse into forgetfulness of God, how readily inclined to every kind of error, how bent every now and then on devising new and fictitious religions, it will be easy to understand how necessary it was to make such a depository of doctrine as would secure it from either perishing by the neglect, vanishing away amid the errors, or being corrupted by the presumptuous audacity of men.  It being thus manifest that God, foreseeing the inefficiency of his image imprinted on the fair form of the universe, has given the assistance of his word to all whom he has ever been pleased to instruct effectually, we, too, must pursue this straight path, if we aspire in earnest to a genuine contemplation of God - we must go, I say, to the word, where the character of God, drawn from his works is described accurately and to the life; these works being estimated, not by our depraved judgment, but by the standard of eternal truth.  If, as I lately said, we turn aside from it, how great soever the speed with which we move, we shall never reach the goal, because we are off the course.  We should consider that the brightness of the divine countenance, which even an apostle declares to be inaccessible (1 Tim. 6:16), is a kind of labyrinth - labyrinth to us inextricable, if the word do not serve us as a thread to guide our path; and that it is better to limp in the way, than run with the greatest swiftness out of it.  Hence the psalmist, after repeatedly declaring (Pss 93, 96, 97, 99, etc.) that superstition should be banished from the world in order that pure religion may flourish, introduces God as reigning; meaning by the term, not the power which he possesses and which he exerts in the government of universal nature, but the doctrine by which he maintains his due supremacy: because error never can be eradicated from the heart of man until the true knowledge of God has been implanted in it" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle on the Unsearchable Riches of Christ

"Set down in your minds that there are unsearchable riches in the characteristic qualities, attributes, and dispositions and intentions of Christ's mind towards man, as we find them revealed in the New Testament.  In Him there are riches of mercy, love and compassion for sinners; riches of power to cleanse, pardon, forgive, and to save to the uttermost; riches of willingness to receive all who come to Him repenting and believing; riches of ability to change by His Spirit the hardest hearts and worst characters; riches of tender patience to bear with the weakest believer; riches of strength to help His people to the end, notwithstanding every foe without and within; riches of sympathy for all who are cast down and bring their troubles to Him and, last but not least, riches of glory to reward, when He comes again to raise the dead and gather His people to be with Him in His kingdom.  Who can estimate these riches?  The children of this world may regard them with indifference, or turn away from them with disdain; but those who feel the value of their souls know better.  They will say with one voice, 'There are no riches like those which are laid up in Christ for His people'"  (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).

John Calvin on the Seed of Divine knowledge

"While man must bear the guilt of corrupting the seed of divine knowledge so wondrously deposited in his mind, and preventing it from bearing good and genuine fruit, it is still most true that we are not sufficiently instructed by that bare and simple, but magnificent testimony which the creatures bear to the glory of their Creator.  For no sooner do we, from a survey of the world, obtain some slight knowledge of Deity, than we pass by the true God, and set up in his stead the dream and phantom of our own brain, drawing away the praise of justice, wisdom, and goodness, from the fountain-head, and transferring it to some other quarter.  Moreover, by the erroneous estimate we form, we either so obscure or pervert his daily works, as at once to robe them of their glory and the author of them of his just praise" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

John Calvin on Having Our Own Views of God

"We must hold, that whosoever adulterates pure religion (and this must be the case with all who cling to their own views), make a departure from the one God.  No doubt they will allege that they have a different intention; but it is of little consequence what they intend or persuade themselves to believe, since the Holy Spirit pronounces all to be apostates, who, in the blindness of their minds, substitute demons in the place of God.  For this reason Paul declares that the Ephesians were 'without God' (Eph. 2:12), until they had learned from the gospel what it is to worship the true God" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

Stewardship - Time

Growing up I was what you may call a procrastinator.  I’m not the “late to a meeting” type of guy, but a “wait until the night before” kind of guy.  One such incident happened while attending seminary, the night before a six-page book report was due for one of my classes.  I had read the book (well, skimmed it mostly) but had yet to put any words on paper.  I spent four to five hours that night writing my report, stressing about finishing it on time, and praying I received a decent grade.  In the end, all the stress, legs falling asleep for sitting at the computer so long, and going to bed late could have easily been avoided if I had begun writing the paper days before.  Needless to say, I did not use my time wisely.

Perhaps you too are a procrastinator or have experienced the pain of waiting for a procrastinator, but when it comes to life as a disciple of Christ the temptation to procrastinate is present for everyone.  This week at ElmCreek Community Church we will begin a three-week series in Matthew 25 on the stewardship of our time, talents, and treasures.  Join us at ElmCreek and may we all be prayerfully prepared to submit ourselves to the call and commands of our God.

Striving to know Christ and make Him known,

Pastor Mark

John Calvin on Idolatry

"To the darkness of ignorance have been added presumption and wantonness, and hence there is scarcely an individual to be found without some idol or phantom as a substitute for Deity.  Like water gushing forth from a large and copious spring, immense crowds of gods have issued from the human mind, every man giving himself full license, and devising some peculiar form of divinity, to meet his own views" (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion).

J.C. Ryle: The Unsearchable Richness of Christ as both God and Man

Ephesians 3:8 (ESV)

"To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given,

to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ."

"Set down, first and foremost, in your minds that there are unsearchable riches in Christ's person.  That miraculous union of perfect Man and perfect God in our Lord Jesus Christ is a great mystery, no doubt, which we have no line to fathom.  It is a high thing; and we cannot attain to it.  But, mysterious as that union may be, it is a mine of comfort and consolation to all who can rightly regard it.  Infinite power and infinite sympathy are met together and combined in our Savior.  If He had been only Man, He could not have saved us.  If He had been only God (I speak with reverence), He could not have been 'touched with the feeling of our infirmities,' nor 'suffered Himself being tempted'  (Heb. 4:15; 2:18).  As God, He is mighty to save; as Man, He is exactly suited to be our Head, Representative, and Friend.  Let those who never think deeply, taunt us, if they will, with squabbling about creeds and dogmatic theology.  But let thoughtful Christians never be ashamed to believe and hold fast the neglected doctrine of the Incarnation, and union of two natures in our Savior.  It is a rich and precious truth that our Lord Jesus Christ is both 'God and Man'" (J.C. Ryle, Holiness).