October 2, 2018October 1, 2018 Peter Witkowski Discipleship

Hope For Lonely Christians

Pastors-lonely We are a lonely bunch. Only slightly more than 1 in 4 Americans (27%) have a close group of friends according to a recent UCLA study. And less than 1 in 4 Americans (24%) believe that have close relationships they desire. The loneliness epidemic pervades Bible believing churches as well. We often feel detached from the person down sitting just a few inches down the pew from us.

And we cannot blame Twitter, Snapchat, and Facebook for our lack of social interaction. Those who like to tweet and post as if the just release their first blockbuster film feel just as connected as those who thrown away their smartphones and unplugged their T.V.’s. According to the UCLA study, the main predictor of loneliness is time spent with people.

This axiom however does not tell us who to hang out with. Who should we spend our time with? With whom should we entrust our secrets, hopes, and odd sense of humor to?

The apostle Paul enters into this discussion at the end of 2 Timothy. As he concludes his letter to his beloved son in the faith, Paul discusses relationships. He encourages Timothy and the readers of 2 Timothy, to avoid those who deny the gospel, to graciously entrust themselves to those who love the Jesus, and to fully depend upon God.

Do Not Trust Those Who Reject the Faith

Paul warns Timothy about Demas and Alexander the coopersmith. Demas who once labored side-by-side with Paul and who appears in Colossians at a trusted friend abandon’s Paul to pursue the world. Demas counted the cost and deemed the world’s trinkets of sex, fame, fortune, and respect to be better than the God of the universe. Alexander directly and forcefully opposed Paul’s gospel doing great harm to Paul. Paul warns Timothy to watch out for both men.

We should make friends, but we should not entrust ourselves to those who openly reject the gospel. We should not try to win men and women who missed that past 6 years of Sunday services back to our church by offering them leadership roles on the coffee team or on the deacon board. Rather, we should warn our church members to not entrust themselves to those who love sex, gossip, money, and prestige more than the gospel. We should warn our teenagers not to go to the parties and to form close relationships with those who brazenly deny the gospel by boasting of their sins. And we must be cautious when seeking to partner with other churches. The presence of the word ‘church’ on a sign or the symbol of a cross on a steeple does not make an organization a godly church. If a church denies the virgin birth, if a church denies the miracles of Jesus, and if a church proclaims that there is more than one road to heaven, they have denied the gospel. We should not partner with such people. We should avoid them and warn other Christians about those who deny Christ. We should not entrust ourselves to those who despise the gospel.

Graciously Trust Those Who Love Jesus

The Christian should trust other men and women who love the Lord. Paul found great comfort in godly relationships. He wrote in 2 Corinthians 7:6:

But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the arrival of Titus.

We maybe struggling today, we may feel alone tomorrow, and we may be on the brink of despair because we have not fostered relationships with our brothers and sisters in Christ. And we must entrust our souls to them.

We were not made to live alone but in relationships with others. We are designed to fill up our brother’s or sister’s lack of faith. Conversely, they are made to fill up our lack of faith. Paul needs Timothy. He encourages Timothy to come to him quickly at the end of 2 Timothy. Paul needs help and Timothy can help him by bringing the scrolls, the cloak, and the parchment. Seemingly Paul needs supplies to keep doing ministry in prison. And he needs Timothy’s help. Brothers and sisters, depending upon others in the faith is not a display of weakness. It is a display of God honoring trust. We needs our Christian family. And they need us.

But we must not expect our brothers and sisters to be God. They will fail us and disappoint us. If you remember the story of John Mark mentioned in 2 Timothy 2:11, you know Mark had a less than stellar start to his ministry. He left Paul’s and Barnabas’s missionary journey earlier. And when it came time for the next trip, Paul refused to work with Mark. Yet at the end of his life, Paul is calling for Mark and declaring him to be useful. Paul is modeling forgiveness. Brothers and sisters we must entrust ourselves to other believer, but we must do so realizing they will fail. And we know this because we know that we will fail. We should entrust ourselves to other believers with hearts full of grace.

Entrust Yourself to the Lord

And Paul sees this playing out again during his last trial. He writes:

At my first defense no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them! But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. – 2 Timothy 4:16-17

Christians failed Paul. We will fail each other, but we can keep on going. We can forgive and repair relationships, because God never fails. He stands by us. He is there even when our friends don’t pick up the phone. He is there even when our pastor fails to take our concern as seriously as we take our concern. God is there. Because God is there, we base our life on him. And when people fail us, we can forgive them because God never fails us. God will save us. Though we might be at the point of death, God will save us. More importantly, God will keep us. Regardless of how lonely we feel, regardless how many people leave us, and regardless of how sick we become, God will never leave us. He will save us from the jaws of destruction. Nothing can separate you from his love and from his eternal salvation. He conquers all, including death! Place you trust in Christ.

Lonely? Who are you trusting?

May 31, 2018May 31, 2018 Peter Witkowski Discipleship

What is the Mission of the Local Church?

What should our local church be doing? Is it missions? How about kids’ ministry, choir, youth programs? What do the people of God do when they come together? What is the mission of the Church?

With a nail, a hammer, and a document of 95 thesis, Martin Luther turned the world upside down in 1517 seeking in part to answer the question: “What does a local church do?”. He knew that the local churches of his day exported religious vice and wickedness to the medieval world. The gospel seldom appeared in church, the clergy at all levels lacked biblical knowledge, and the sacraments were twisted into graceless works the little resembled the teachings of Scripture. Luther started out to reform the church seeking to answer the question what does the local church do.

The History

Since 325 A.D, the church has defined itself as the one, holy, catholic, apostolic church. The local church was defined as being a church that submitted to the Bishop Rome, which was made holy by Christ through salvation, that was universally recognizable, and that was founded on the teaching of the apostles which was often interpreted and expanded upon by church officials.

Luther and Reformers redefined these historical terms to better reflect the gospel. The Reformers claimed that the church was one under Christ. All who were saved were saved by Christ to be part of the church. They believed that church should be holy; it should be composed of those who had been redeemed by Christ and who were being sanctified. They agreed to the catholic nature of the church. But they did not believe all churches had to look the same and practice the same liturgy. Rather, they claimed the church was catholic in its timelessness. All true churches in all ages were viewed as being part of the universal church. And they believed the church was apostolic. But the Reformers believed that the apostolic nature of the church should be limited to the teaching of the apostles. Solo Scriptura, Scripture Alone.

The Reformers sought to clearly divide themselves from the Catholic Church by adding two more marks to the definition of the local church. The Reformers said the local church should rightly administer the sacraments and preach the Word.

The Answer

Now back to our question. What does the local church do?

The local church comprised of holy believers who have been united to the universal church by salvation in Christ Jesus preach the Word and administer the sacraments correctly. For a group of believers to be a church, they must preach the Word and practice baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

John Calvin plainly said,

Wherever we see the Word of God purely preached and heard, and sacraments administered according to Christ’s institution, there, it is not to be doubted, a church of God exists.

What about kids’ ministry, Super Youth Sundays, the choir, missions, singing, and prayer? All of those things begin and flow from the preaching of the Word and from the sacraments. You can have church without them. But you cannot have a church apart from the preaching of the Word and apart from the Sacraments.

Paul tells Timothy:

“Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. 14 Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you. 15 Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. 16 Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers (1 Tm 4:13-16).

Do we want to have a healthy God glorifying church? Do we want to reach young families, encourage the old, and bless the new converts? Then, we preach the Word. Paul tells us we keep a close watch on our doctrine on the truth of the Bible and teach it to others.

What saves people? What makes our church look attractive to lost world? What breathes new life into the exhausted and crumbling congregation? It is the Word of God. The preaching of the Word of God is central to all that we do. The Holy Spirit works through his Word to redeem the lost and to sanctify the redeemed.

Christ is the Word become flesh.

John 1:1-4 states:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

To know Christ, to experience him, revive our hearts through his presence, we must preach the Word. As Jesus says in John 17:17, “Sanctify them in truth; your word is truth.” The church must be dedicated to the proclamation of the Word.

How is the done? The Word is proclaimed and taught through every element of the service. Pastor Mark Dever rightly notes,

Everything teaches, whether you intend it to or not. The songs teach people doctrine and proper affections for God. Your prayers (or lack of them) teach people how to pray themselves. The kinds of prayers you pray or don’t pray) teach people about the important difference between prayers of adoration confession, thanksgiving, and supplication. The way you administer the ordinances teaches people about their meaning and even the very meaning of the Gospel. You preaching teachers people how to study and use the Bible appropriately. Everything from the call to worship to the benediction counts as teaching. Teaching is everything.

Everything the local church does begins and ends with the Word of God. Singing, prayer, and evangelism are all driven by our understanding of the Word of God. The songs that we sing reflect what we believe about the Bible. The prayers that we pray reflect our understanding of God and ourselves. Our passion and methods for reaching the lost are driven by our understanding of what the Bible says about salvation. All the other functions of the local Church can only exist if the Word is fully, accurately, and faithfully preached. And all the other functions of the church help with the preaching and dissemination of the Word. In short, if we get Sunday morning preaching wrong, we will work in vain to fix our church. The struggling church does not have a discipleship, outreach, or kids’ ministry problem. It has gospel proclamation problem.

Martin Luther notes,

Outwardly he deals with us through the preached Word, or the gospel, and through the visible signs of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Inwardly, he deals with us through the Holy Spirit and faith. But this is always in such a way and in this order that the outward means must precede the inward means.

If a local church hopes to be filled with the Holy Spirit and wishes the world to be changed by Christ, that assembly of believers must preach the Word.

Any local church that does not preach the Word is not a church. Religious clothing, sacraments, stain glass windows, and the sacraments alone do not make a group of people a local church. Religious minded people can have and do all these things and never preach the gospel. They cease to be a church when they preach a different gospel proclaiming salvation through other names, deeming sins to be acceptable, and demanding good works in the place of grace. Paul writes in Galatians 1:8

“But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.”

The one true, holy, catholic, apostolic church preaches the one true gospel.

Our Motivation: The Glory of God

Why do we do this? Why should the church be passionate about preaching the Word?

The local church should be passionate about the Word because Christ is only present where the Word is preached. And we as the people of God can only expand the kingdom of God through the power of Christ. Moses nails this truth on its head in Exodus 33 when he says,

And he said to him, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. 16 For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”

What makes the people of God distinct? What makes our local church distinct from every other social group? It is the presence of God via the Holy Spirit who works through the words of God as revealed in the Scriptures. The local church desperately needs God.

When the church fails to value the Word’s of God, God will not be present. And when the church ceases to experience the supernatural presence of God decay sets in. When the church cares more about tradition, cultural acceptance, and political power than about glorifying God, God will leave the church. James McDonald rightfully notes,

God will quickly withdraw His favor where sin is ignored or avoided and difficult people are coddled instead of confronted in love.

The local church should be about the preaching of the Word because she desires to experience the presence and power of God. Apart from Him, the local church can do nothing. And with Him the local church can do everything.

What does the local church do?

The local church preaches the word and rightly performs the sacraments (more on that soon!)

May 20, 2018May 19, 2018 Peter Witkowski Discipleship

What is the Church?

Church. We know what it is right. We have been around, to, and in church. “Here is the steeple; Open the doors and see all the people.” We know how it goes.

Yet despite our great familiarity with the church, few of us can sit down and easily rattle off a definition of the church. We go to church; we may even work for a church, but we do not know what a local church is. We cannot confidently say this is church and that is not. And we need to be able to.

As Jonathan Leeman notes,

To claim interest in Christian fellowship or even in the church while paying little heed to church structures is like claiming to love family while paying no heed to the differences between parent and child or husband and wife.

The answer to the question, “What is a local Church?” is of monumental importance.

The Scriptures teach that,

“Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Eph 5.25b-27).

Christ died for the Church. Christ came to call a people to himself who join together to worship God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. And if we hope to be with Christ in heaven we need to be with his church today.

So what is the true local church?

Does our college student have the freedom to exchange her local church for the solid BCM or Campus Crusade ministry on campus? Both preach the Word and have worship? Can we do church in our small group apart from the larger congregation? Is the ordinance observing church that preaches all roads lead to heaven a church? Does our small group have the right to excommunicate Steve from church if he refuses to stop embezzling money from work? Is church defined by size or by doctrine of by both? What is church?

I will answer this question over the next several weeks. I invite all those who live in the greater Amissville, Warrenton, and Culpeper, Virginia area to join the congregation of Amissville Baptist Church’s first seminar Bible study at 7PM. We will be discussing everything from preaching to baptism, to elders, seeing God’s plan for his people, his bride: the church.

If you cannot join us or if you want to keep studying in between lessons, I encourage you to follow along with us here at witkowskiblog.com.

And now to the definition: What is the local Church:

The local church is the spiritual, physical, and spatial assembling of God’s universal Church which consists of those who have and, will be, redeemed through Christ’s blood by the Holy Spirit according to the will of the Father. Initiated at Pentecost, The local church consists of baptized believers who have covenanted together to regularly assemble for the purpose of preaching and obeying the Word, worshiping God, administering the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, maintaining the purity of the church, and evangelizing the lost (Heb. 10:25; Mt. 28:18). The local church is led by elders, served by deacons, and ruled by the members.

We will spend the next 8 weeks unpacking our definition, by spending a week on each of the following topics: