Tuesday, January 29, 2013

23 DAYS TO THE ST LOUIS HOLINESS CONVENTION


In a few weeks, US President Barack Hussein Obama will deliver the State of the Union address to the Congress and the nation.  No doubt the President will repeat the now familiar words of his predecessors, "The State of the Union is strong."  

Perspective matters. 

From the vantage point of a secularist who favors moral relativism--the redefinition of marriage, the devaluation of human life, and the demoralization of our culture--things are certainly looking great.  But from the view of the virtuous--those who prize courage, temperance, prudence, justice, faith, hope, and love--America has never been in worse condition.

As it was in 18th century Great Britain, so it is in 21st century America.  Only a revival of Scriptural holiness can save this judgment-bound nation.  

Theologies that excuse or justify sin will not suffice in this hour.
Christians that ignore Christ's demand for "Total Truth" and "Divine Love" will never bring reform to our nation.
Churches that have imbibed the spirit of the age will never be infused with the Spirit of holiness.

It is time for us to seek God's face!  It is time for us to gather together to advance the one message that will awaken and save this generation! 

God has not called us to uncleanness, but unto holiness.  (1 Thessalonians 4:7)
Without holiness no man shall see the Lord. (Hebrews 12:14)
Now yield your members servants to righteousness unto holiness. (Romans 6:9)
Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. (2 Corinthians 7:1)
And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. (Ephesians 4:24)
Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. (Psalm 29:2)

We HOPE TO SEE YOU, YOUR CHURCH LEADERSHIP, YOUR DENOMINATIONAL LEADERS, YOUR CONCERNED CHRISTIAN FRIENDS, at this year's ST. LOUIS HOLINESS CONVENTION!

If you need a ride from the airport let us know.  We are only 10 minutes away from Lambert International. (314) 607-1424

Pastor John Poff, Convention Committee
Pastor Rick Jones, Convention Committee

Friday, January 18, 2013

34 DAYS TO THE CONVENTION!


The evidence is incontrovertible.  Our nation is in moral free-fall.  And what's worse, the Church of Jesus Christ has abandoned the Spirit of Holiness and adopted the spirit of the age.

Historians tell us that Great Britain was spared a French Style revolution by the Spirit driven influence of the Methodist Revival.  Men like John Wesley, Charles Wesley, Adam Clarke, John Fletcher, and Joseph Benson urged their countrymen, "Flee the wrath that is to come!"  They prayed and they preached. They wrote and they rode.  Circuit riders rode their horses thousands of miles to reach their lost generation.  They gave and were spent.  Many died young pursuing their God-given passion to win the lost.

THIS IS OUR DAY!
THIS IS OUR TIME!
THIS IS OUR MOMENT!

Will we sit on the sidelines or engage in the battle?  Will we allow self interests to stymie God's interest--salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth?  Will we stand back or move forward?  

PLEASE ATTEND THE 10TH ANNUAL ST LOUIS HOLINESS CONVENTION THIS YEAR!  

Let us know how we can help you make that possible.  Let us know that you're planning on coming.  Let us know that you're praying for the convention.  

WE HAVE THE MESSAGE THE NATION NEEDS!  Join us for this exciting gathering of some of America's greatest exponents of Scriptural Holiness.





Sunday, January 13, 2013

PASTOR'S PERSPECTIVE JANUARY 13 2013


Recently these alarming statistics came across my desk.  “If you live in the typical American community–with 100 average neighbors–here’s the reality: 7 of your neighbors struggle with depression, even contemplating suicide; 7 abuse or are addicted to drugs or alcohol; 8 are struggling with unemployment; and 60 don’t profess to know Jesus Christ as their Savior.” That makes me hope we’re not “typical!”  

What seems so obvious to God’s people, seems so obscure to the world.  The answer is not found in man’s wisdom, nor in man’s methods, nor is it found in man’s means.

The transformation that we need comes when we “present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God.”  As we refuse to be conformed to this world--what they value, what they honor, what they do, and then present ourselves to the Lord, God miraculously works in us to completely transform us!  

HE CHANGES WHO WE ARE! “Be ye transformed!”
HE CHANGES HOW WE THINK! “By the renewing of your mind”
HE CHANGES HOW WE LIVE! “That ye may prove the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God!”

THIS IS NO TIME TO GIVE UP ON GOD’S WORD, TURN FROM GOD’S WILL, RUN FROM GOD’S CHURCH, OR REFUSE GOD’S LOVE!  Now is the time for God’s people to PRESENT THEMSELVES WHOLLY! 

I’m so glad that God loves me!  Oh I’m so glad I’m a child of the King!  I’m so glad He is on throne!  And I’m glad He will never leave us or forsake us!  Hallelujah!

PASTORS PERSPECTIVE SUNDAY JANUARY 6 2013


We come now to the first Sunday of a new year.
Looking forward to the days and months to come there are many who expect only trials and troubles ahead.  They see the financial outlook as gloomy, the political prospects as doubtful, the world situation as tenuous, and their family situation as hopeless.  

It’s no wonder they are troubled, they are looking in the wrong place!  The horizontal plane has always been fraught with doubt and disaster.  But we’re not looking around!  We’re looking up!

That changes everything.

We’re looking to the GOD of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob!  We’re looking to the GOD of Moses, Joshua, and Caleb.  We’re looking to the GOD of David, Esther, and Daniel!  We’re looking to the GOD who delivered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the fiery furnace!

We’re looking to the GOD who gave His Only Begotten Son to redeem this pitiful sin-chained world.  We’re looking to the GOD who raised up JESUS from the dead. 

We’re looking to the  GOD who baptized the first disciples with the HOLY GHOST at Pentecost and birthed a Christian Church that has persisted through tyrants, opponents, compromisers, and critics for 2000 years!  And HIS TRUTH is marching on.

We’re looking to the GOD who says, “I will never leave thee nor forsake thee!” Who promises, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age!”  Who said, “Let not your heart be troubled!”

You know, this may turn out to be our best year yet!  LOOK UP!

OUR TRIUMPH IN TIMES OF TROUBLE


The words of the inspired Daniel—the same Prophet who had an excellent spirit, who was captured and taken to Babylon, who refused to defile himself with the King’s meat, who interpreted the hand-writing on the wall, who was delivered from the mouth of the lions, who revealed the exact year of Christ’s coming 600 years before He came, and foretells of Messiah’s reign— are both disturbing and comforting. 

Carefully read what he wrote:

…And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time:
and at that time thy people shall be delivered,  every one that shall be found written in the book.

And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.

And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever…

Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried;  but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand… 
D  A  N  I  E  L    1  2  :  1  f  f

Daniel predicted trouble, and He predicted that it would be worse than ever before. 

He predicted that the wicked would do wickedly, and that their understanding would be darkened so that “none of the wicked shall understand.”  How many times in recent days have we listened to the news or heard of unspeakable tragedy and thought, “What were they thinking? Don’t they understand what they are doing?” 
The wicked are clueless.  The Apostle Paul tells us why.  21 when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.  22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. 24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: 25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.” (Romans 1:22-25)

Indeed, the wicked don’t understand. 
They don’t understand God’s grace or God’s truth.
They don’t understand God’s holiness or God’s love. 
They don’t understand God’s Word or God’s Will. 
They don’t understand God’s creation or the laws that govern creation.
They don’t understand God’s moral law or the consequences for violating His law.

In fact, when the wicked suffer the consequences of their own wrong-headed and evil-hearted choices, they inevitably refuse to change course.  They resist God’s Word, insist on their way, and persist in folly and failing. 

In the Revelation of the Apostle John we read of a day when the judgment bound unrepentant, facing directly into the wrath of God will “blaspheme the name of God.”  (Revelation 16:9ff).  Rebellion devastates understanding.

AND WHAT OF GOD’S PEOPLE? They too will see and experience trouble as never before. 

BUT GOD PROMISES THEM DELIVERANCE, “thy people shall be delivered,” EVERLASTING LIFE, “shall awake to everlasting life,”  GODLY INFLUENCE, “ turn many to righteousness,” PURITY, “be purified, and made white, and tried”, AND UNDERSTANDING, “the wise shall understand.”

THIS IS NO TIME TO GIVE UP ON GOD’S WORD, TURN FROM GOD’S WILL, RUN FROM GOD’S CHURCH, OR REFUSE GOD’S LOVE!  Now is the time for God’s people to stand up for Jesus!  “Be not conformed to this world, but be ye TRANSFORMed, by the RENEWing of your mind, that ye may PROVE that good, acceptable, perfect will of God.”  Romans 12:2.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

39 DAYS TO THE ST LOUIS HOLINESS CONVENTION



10 DECEPTIVE IDEAS SHAPING OUR TIMES


1.     FATE not FAITH determines eternity.

This tenacious error of the ancient world has been adapted and embraced by growing numbers of Christian believers.  “When it’s your time to go, you’ll go.”  “God, and God alone decides who will be saved and who will be damned. 
Man has absolutely nothing to do with his salvation.”

The Scriptures reveal that God is the Lord of history.  But it is abundantly clear that God granted personal sovereignty to those He created “in His own image.”  To think otherwise makes God Himself the author of Adam’s disobedience, relieves Adam’s descendents of moral responsibility for their God-ordained behaviors, and removes the necessity for rebellious men to repent and to seek sanctifying grace. 

With so many challenges, so much that is wrong with the world, and even so much that we see wrong within us, the retreat into fatalism—“whatever will be, will be” or even “whatever is, is of God’s making” is a convenient escape for the fainthearted and a cherished rationalization for the carnal hearted.

2.     DEMOGRAPHICS not IDEOLOGY decides destiny. 

As the United States slips closer to its nadir, finger pointing is rampant.  Many point to our nation’s changing demographics to explain our decline. We are more urban than we used to be.  We are more culturally diverse than we used to be.  We are browner than we used to be.   The strident xenophobes avow that demographics make an American renaissance impossible.

But the Word of God declares, “we wrestle not against flesh and blood.”  Ours is an ideological, spiritual war, “against the rulers, authorities, powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil.” It is admittedly easy to associate appearances with ideologies, but it is wrong.  It is not the color of a person’s skin that matters.  It is the content of our character, the turn of our minds, and the habits of the heart that count.

3.     FREEDOM guarantees FREEDOM. 

As Os Guinness so rightly observed, “The greatest enemy of freedom is freedom.”  In his new classic, “The Suicide of a Free People,” Guinness argues, “Freedom requires virtue, virtue requires faith, and faith requires freedom.” “Freedom without virtue will bring the Republic to its knees.”

Moderns equate lawlessness with freedom.  But lawlessness yields anarchy. 

Freedom is not simply secured by the lifting of external restraints.  That “negative freedom” is only one part of true freedom.  Freedom is secured when we are free to think, to do, and to be right.  They whom the Son sets free, are free indeed. 

One man said, “That man is truly free who is conscious of being the author of the law he obeys.”  When the law of God is written on our hearts by the Holy Ghost who is given to us, obedience is not imposed it is spontaneous. 

Freedom does not secure Freedom, the Spirit of God does. 

4.     GOVERNMENT SECURES SECURITY. 

A few weeks ago a young lad said to me, “The government is our best friend.”  Our coinage says, “In God we Trust,” but more and more it is clear that it is “In Government we Trust.” 

What folly.  Governments are ordained by God, but they are not the guarantors of security, the source of sustenance, nor are they the arbiters of morality.  These are endowed by our Creator.

 Men who depend on men are inevitably disillusioned.  Only men who fully rely on the God of Scripture are truly secure. “Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.” Psalm 127:1.
                                                                                                                 
5.     VIRTUE, TRUTH, LOVE ARE IDEAS THAT ARE MAN-MADE, MAN-DEFINED, AND MAN-CENTERED.

In a recent political convention held in Charlotte, NC, Americans were told, “It doesn’t matter who you are, where you come from, what you look like, or where [sic. who] you love.” At a White House bill signing, the President told Americans that we are, “building a nation in which we’re all free to live and love as we see fit.”

These are the sentiments of modern men who have rejected the authority of God and made man himself the measure of all things.

The post-modernist deconstruction of Virtue, Truth, and Love have set us back 3,000 years—“every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”  Judges 17:6, Judges 21:25. 
Until God’s authority is embraced and God’s Word is esteemed, we will continue “Slouching towards Gomorrah.”  The Apostle Paul’s inspired narrative of the demoralization of society (Romans 1:21-32) is striking in its perfect description of our generation.  “Professing themselves to be wise they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God…”  Looking at the tragic end of that generation portends trouble ahead for this generation.

6.     CHRISTIANITY IS ONE DIMENSIONAL.

In an effort to make Christianity marketable and more acceptable, too many have reformulated the Gospel from its all-encompassing implications into a set of specific requirements.

Salvation has been reduced to intellectual assent (believe these facts), ethical compliance (follow these rules), or spiritual experience (experience ecstasy in worship or prayer) and you will be saved.  By insisting on only one or the other of these aspects the enemy has diluted the Gospel and limited the all encompassing power of the Gospel. 

The need of our day is what Nancy Pearcey called, “Total Truth.”  We need a Gospel that intellectually, morally, and spiritually transforms men and their relationships with God and each other.

We need Christians who will believe and live so that “in all things He [Christ] might have the preeminence.” (Colossians 1:18).  Sincere Christians prayerfully, thoughtfully, and willingly embrace Christian culture above popular culture.

7.     HOLINESS IS IMPOSSIBLE.

Orthodox Christians believe that Adam and Eve were created sinless and without even an inclination to sin.  Adam and Eve’s disobedience changed everything.  As Adam was created “in the image of God,” (Genesis 1:27) Adam’s son was begotten “in his own likeness and image.” (Genesis 5:3).  Every child since has inherited a nature that rebels against God’s authority and that is prone to sin—to disobey God.

Orthodox Christians are universal in their belief that only “the pure in heart…shall see God.”  (Matthew 5:8) . We all believe that  man’s rebellious nature must be sanctified before he can enter heaven.  Most believe that this purity is granted in the moment the Christian believer dies.

Some believe that man’s rebellious nature can be restrained through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Others believe that man’s rebellious nature can refined through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Few would contend that man’s rebellious nature can be so wholly sanctified that in the place of the rebellious self-will would be a pure love for God’s will. 

So long as Christians are convinced that the rebellious nature is beyond the scope of redeeming grace no remedy will be found.  But throughout the New Testament, Christians are urged to pray that they would “know the Love of Christ and be filled with all the fullness of God,” (Ephesians 3:19), that “the very God of peace would sanctify wholly” (1 Thessalonians 5:23), that “the love of God [would be] shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost,”(Romans 5:5), and that they would be made perfect (Hebrews 13:21, 1 Peter 5:10) in that love which “casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18).   

8.     ALL IDEAS ARE EQUALLY VALID

Open-mindedness is the virtue of our day.  In his classic, “The Closing of the American Mind,” Allan Bloom laments, “Openness—and the relativism that makes it the only plausible stance in the face of various claims to truth and various ways of life and kinds of human beings—is the great insight of our times.  The true believer is the real danger.  The study of history and of culture teaches that all the world was mad in the past; men always thought they were right, and that led to wars, persecutions, slavery, xenophobia, racism, and chauvinism.  The point is not to correct the mistakes and really be right; rather it is not to think you are right at all.”

Moderns even have an out of context Bible verse to justify their open-mindedness.  Jesus said, “Judge not.” (Matthew 7:1). 

It is certainly important to learn and understand the perspectives of others.  It is not true that all viewpoints are equally valid or correct. Some ideas are right.  C. S. Lewis observes, “"An open mind, in questions that are not ultimate, is useful. But an open mind about the ultimate foundations either of Theoretical or of Practical Reason is idiocy." (The Abolition of Man).  We have arrived.

9.     SPIRITED IS SPIRITUAL

“Oh Pastor, we saw the most spiritual church service on television,” the people exclaimed.
“Really?” I asked, “What made you think so?”
“Oh the people were jumping up and down and some were running around the building,” They explained further, “the music just made you want to get up and dance!”

Excited spectators love a good show. 
We love to sense God’s Spirit in the Church.  We relish the joy of God’s presence among His people.  We are thrilled when people sense God moving in their hearts and fall to their knees to seek Him.   But we are left cold by carnal displays of fleshly entertainment that parade themselves as super spiritual.  You will not see tears of repentance, willing restitutions, or testimonies of victory over sin in the party-church.
Spirit-ed is not the same as spiritual.  When the Holy Spirit comes there is one infallible evidence that He is at work—namely this: holiness!  Holy love: “Though we speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity I am become a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.” (1 Corinthians 13:1). Holy truth: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth:” (John 16:3) Holy living: “For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness.” (1 Thessalonians 4:7).  And Holy joy, “For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.”  (Romans 14:17).

10.  GENDER IS MALLEABLE & IMMATERIAL
Miss Canada was recently disqualified from the Miss Universe Pageant because it was discovered that she was a he.  He had the hair of a lovely woman. He had the physical appearance of a beauty queen.  He wore the clothing of a pageant winner.  But he was not what he appeared to be.  
In Genesis we read, “God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”  (Genesis 1:27).  Attempts by modern men and women to deny, alter, or blur their God-given gender identity are more than folly, they are sinful.
For the first 20 centuries, the Church of Jesus Christ placed a strong emphasis upon gender identity. 

We urged our men to be providers (But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel. 1 Timothy 5:8), to be protectors (Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; Ephesians 5:25), and to be godly leaders, ( For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Ephesians 5:23). 

We reproved effeminacy in men (Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, …nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,… shall inherit the kingdom of God. 1 Corinthians 6:9,10), and accented our unique gender by our appearance, (Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?15 But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering 1 Corinthians 11:14,15 and The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God. Deuteronomy 22:5). 

We upheld the complementary roles of gender and disapproved of the unisex philosophy and look.  Christian men are to treat Christian women with honor, and Christian wives are to respect their husbands, (…and the wife see that she reverence her husband. Ephesians 5:23) and are submissive to their husbands in the Lord, (Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. Ephesians 5:22, Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives;  While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear.  Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;  But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.  For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands: Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.  1 Peter 3:1-6).

Today our civilization is reaping the result of a godless humanism which dethrones God, and enthrones carnal men.  It is carnal rebellion that lies at the root of our refusal to be who God made us to be, to do what God commands us to do, and to look the way God teaches us to look.  . 
We may fuss with God, we may refuse His Word, we may reject His will, but hidden in the DNA of every cell of our bodies lies the truth of our given gender.
Long after Miss Canada lies moldering in the grave, archeologists may uncover his grave and assume that he is a she.  But genetics will reveal, what Miss Canada refused to accept, “she” is a he.   Men who suppose that they can deny nature and nature’s God are destined for dissatisfaction here and destruction in the hereafter.






Churchill:  What kind of people do they think we are?
Guinness:  What kind of people do we think we are?
Jesus: What kind of people does God think we are?  God looks on the heart.