Biblical Masculinity Wednesday, Dec 12 2007 

Biblical Manhood and Preaching and Sojourn and Spiritual Growth Courtney 11:03 am

I know it’s a little strange for me to write a post with this title, but I wanted to encourage each of you to listen to one of our pastors, Daniel Montgomery’s, sermon from this past Sunday.  He is doing a series on biblical manhood and womanhood, and focused on the dudes this week.  Though it was addressing manhood, I didn’t stop talking about it with Bill until 10:30 last night.

Here are a few things I really found helpful:

1)  Pointing out how masculine Jesus was even though our society tries to make him extremely feminine. 

2)  Seeing how unappealing chuch is for many men because of the lack of masculinity shown by most church-going males.

3)  Learning how to see my son’s aggression as a good thing that was given to him by God and looking at some ways to help him direct that energy for good, not evil.

4)  Being brought to tears once again as I praise God for giving me a husband who is truly a manly man, which equals being a godly man.

 

Two Homes In One Day! Thursday, Sep 27 2007 

Family Updates and Preaching and Sojourn Courtney 7:50 am

Yesterday was a day of beautiful blessings for us (as every day is).  When Bill got home from work, we left for the lawyer’s office and closed on our first house!  We have been praying for a house for more than three years, and God gave it to us to yesterday.  Praise the Lord!  When we got in the car, Bill prayed a prayer of thanksgiving, and I loved something he said.  “I praise you God for letting us borrow Your house for a while.  Give us grace to be good stewards and use the house to further Your kingdom.”  I pray I always remember this house is really God’s to do with as He wills.

A couple of hours later, we went to church for our interview with one of our elders.  This was our last step to becoming partners (members) of Sojourn.  The interview really helped us think about different aspects of the gospel and encouraged us greatly.  We have been challenged to become more intentional missionaries in our home, so I plan on doing some posts in the future sharing what we are doing in that area.  At the end of the interview he told us he had no problems nominating us for partnership, so we got our church home, too!

It is extremely important to Bill and me to daily pray for and encourage our leadership in our church, so I’ll mention something as a side note.  We were thankful to be interviewed by the elder who is our main preaching pastor, Daniel Montgomerey.  We got to share with him how we came to Sojourn because of his inability to get away from the gospel in his preaching.  This man’s preaching is saturated with the grace that has been shown us by our Savior’s substitution for us on the cross.  Besides my hubby, :-)  Daniel is my favorite preacher to listen to.  You should listen to at least one of his sermons on Sojourn’s website.  You will be greatly convicted and encouraged by what the Holy Spirit says through him Sunday after Sunday.  This man is bold yet full of grace, and we are so grateful the Lord put us under his and our other elders’ leadership. 

 

FREE New Attitude Resources Monday, Jun 11 2007 

Preaching and Resources Bill 8:06 am

I wanted to let you know about some wonderfule free resources that are available from the New Attitude website.  New Attitude is a conference aimed at promoting a “humble orthodoxy” among my generation (roughly speaking, the twenty-somethings), though that doesn’t keep them from being extremely relevant to any age.  They recently held their annual conference here in Louisville and they have made all of the messages available for free download.  They are all excellent, but I would give my highest recommendation for the messages given by Eric Simmons, John Piper, and C.J. Mahaney.

Also, slightly down the page you’ll see two article downloads that C.J. recommended in his message “Discern Your Heart.”  They are both by Christian author/counselor David Powlison.  I believe Courtney used the first article called “Personal Reflection” on her retreat recently and found it extremely helpful.  I’ve been reading over the second article entitled “X-Ray Questions” for the past few days and have found them already bringing to light the idols of my heart.  Although this is from a book discussing how to biblically counsel others, I intend to keep examining myself in light of these probing questions over the next few weeks to see where I show faithlessness and idolatry without realizing it (or sometimes while realizing it, but being unwilling to let go of my sin).  If I could be so bold, I would challenge you all to take some time to work your way through the article in the coming weeks, too.  If you’re at all like me, I tend to think I’m “doing fine” in following Christ until someone comes along who raises the bar, exposing my “strong” faith for the unholy mess that I make of it.  It is my prayer for me and for any of you that choose to take this challenge is that we’ll see our sinfulness for what it is, how small we’ve made God, and how truly demanding faith in Christ is when we’d like to think that it takes so little from us.  I’m praying that the Holy Spirit will bring about God-glorifying change in us.  Following our recent posts on humility, I also pray that we’ll be humbled by our weak faith in a great God, strengthened not by our own might, but by his promises and great faithfulness.  May it be so, O God.

 

Some Great Sermons Wednesday, Feb 28 2007 

Preaching and Resources Bill 2:02 pm

While I pay claims here at Humana, we can listen to headphones while we work. I use the time not only to listen to music, but also to hear some great preaching. I was extremely blessed today after listening to a preacher I’ve read a little from and heard even more about: Tim Keller. On the website of the church he pastors (Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York) there are several free sermons available for download. Today I listened to the three sermons on the Gospel. They were outstanding! Keller’s preaching is simply superb, speaking equally well to both “mature” Christians and those who don’t know much at all about Christ. He’s engaging, passionate, and doesn’t yell. I commend it to any of you who might read this entry (which I don’t expect to be many of you). I hope you’ll take advantage of it.

Free Tim Keller Sermons

NOTE: My personal favorite was the sermon entitled “Lord of the Wine” which discussed the glorious experience of tasting (experiencing) God, not just having knowledge of Him. I pray that I will have the type of sensory of experience of God that Keller describes.