Since it’s Mother’s Day and some of our families are dedicating their children today, I thought it might be helpful to share some thoughts about what we do to develop spiritual life in children.

John 1:12-13 is a good place to begin. There John writes, “But as many as received Him [Christ], to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” Being born into a Christian family does not automatically confer spiritual life on someone. No one becomes a child of God apart from personally receiving Christ.

Yet Jesus expressed confidence that even young children could receive him. On one occasion when His disciples tried to prevent some parents from bringing their children to Jesus to receive a blessing, He said, “Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all” (Mark 10:14b-15).

So what can a parent do to encourage their children to have genuine faith in Christ?

First, parents can model sincere faith.  In his letter to his assistant Timothy, the Apostle Paul wrote, “For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am sure that it is in you as well” (2 Tim 1:5). There’s no indication whether Timothy’s father was a believer, but his mother and grandmother set a good example for him to follow.

Second, parents can teach their children the Scripture. In 2 Timothy 3:15, Paul said of Timothy, “from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” The knowledge of Scripture alone does not save, but someone cannot be saved apart from that knowledge.

Some parents, conscious of shortcomings in their own knowledge of Scripture, are overwhelmed by this responsibility. That’s where the church comes in. The church can never take the place of parental example and teaching, but the church can come alongside parents. Both parents and their children can benefit from the dynamics of church life that Paul described in Ephesians 4:15, “speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ.”

Finally, parents can pray for their children. In a sense, that’s what those parents were doing in Mark 10:13-16 when they brought their children to Jesus. They were enlisting other godly people, in this case Jesus Himself, to pray for their children.

I’m grateful for the passion that so many people at Calvary East have for investing in the spiritual lives of children. We have faithful people serving in our Children’s Ministry who faithfully love, model, teach, and pray for our children every week.

Together all of us as a church family can invest in the spiritual lives our children in the hope that as they mature they will receive Christ and then pass on His truth to others.

- Bryan Craddock

Friday, May 4, 2012

There are certain parts of the Christian life in which most of us always feel we need to improve. This came out last week in a survey we did for our discipleship ministry. Several people expressed interest in learning how to pray.

In one sense prayer is simple and instinctive for a true child of God. It’s us crying out to our Heavenly Father as Paul mentions in Romans 8:15. In commenting on this verse, a scholar named C. E. B. Cranfield wrote, “Nothing more is required of us than that we should cry to the one true God,  ‘Abba, Father’ with full sincerity and with full seriousness.” This fundamental reliance upon God is the essence of what it means to relate to God as a believer.

But some times when the storms of life rage around us, we bow our heads to pray and find ourselves at a complete loss for words. Paul says in Romans 8:26 that in those moments the Holy Spirit intercedes for us, speaking to God on our behalf, asking for the perfect solution to our troubles even though we ourselves do not know what that solution is.

Perhaps the more common problem is that our prayers become repetitive and routine. We feel that God deserves to hear something passionate and profound in our prayers. But  instead we stumble around awkwardly and find our minds wandering off to other thoughts. In 1 Timothy 4:7, Paul tells Timothy, “Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.” And I think it’s safe to say that one of those areas where we have to exert Holy Spirit empowered discipline is in learning to pray.

This month we’re going to make learning to pray the focus of our Adult Sunday School class. Of course, learning to pray takes a lifetime. There’s no way that we can really accomplish  such a lofty goal over a few weeks. To be more specific, my hope for these class times is that God will kindle in our hearts a new devotion to praying and to deepening our prayer life.

So what do you think that you need to learn about prayer? Have you ever asked yourself that question? Think about it and come share your thoughts with the rest of us as I Iead our discussions on this topic at 9 a.m. each Sunday morning in May.

- Bryan Craddock

Dear Calvary East Church Family,

Jared Ransom and I had the great privilege of representing all of you this afternoon. We delivered to Comstock North Elementary all of your donations to our last minute playground supplies drive for Easter Sunday. The principal was thrilled. You donated 8 basketballs, 11 bounce balls, 6 soccer balls, 1 football, 6 plastic bats, 22 plastic baseballs, 3 double jump ropes, 29 single jump ropes, 4 frisbees, 18 boxes of sidewalk chalk, and an 8 pack of bubble solution. Great job! I praise God for your generosity and concern for our community. Simple projects like this are one way to let our light shine before men in such a way that they may see our good works, and glorify our Father who is in heaven (Matt 5:16).

- Bryan Craddock

This weekend at Calvary East, we get to observe both ordinances of the church: communion Friday night and baptism on Sunday morning. Some churches call these sacraments, believing that God gives us saving grace through these acts, but we do not see any biblical support for this sacramental view. We understand baptism and communion to be symbolic acts that Jesus ordained for His followers to do.

According to 1 Corinthians 11:23-29, communion (often called the Lord’s Supper or the Eucharist) is a symbolic way for us to remember and proclaim the death of Jesus Christ. The bread reminds us of the sufferings of Christ’s body. The cup reminds us of the shedding of Christ’s blood. 1 Corinthians emphasizes that those who participate should examine themselves so that they don’t participate in an “unworthy manner.” In other words, if you trust Christ as your Lord and Savior and are turning away from sin in your life, then it’s right and good for you to participate in communion. If these things are not true of your life, then participating in communion becomes a mockery rather than a proclamation of Christ’s death. Aside from Good Friday, we generally observe communion at Calvary East in our Sunday morning worship service on the first Sunday of every month.

According to Romans 6:4, baptism symbolizes that a believer has died and risen with Christ. In our study of Romans, we have been learning that sin condemns us before God and enslaves us. But through His death, Jesus bore the condemnation for sin and through His resurrection, He broke the power of sin’s mastery. We receive forgiveness for sin and freedom from its power when we personally trust Christ as our Lord and Savior. Baptism, then, is a proclamation and a personal commitment to honor that forgiveness and freedom in how we live (1 Peter 3:21). We observe baptism in our Sunday morning worship services at Calvary East whenever we learn of someone who wants to be baptized. Contact us here if you would like to be baptized.

- Bryan Craddock

Sometimes you have to take hold of unexpected opportunities.

For the past few years, we’ve been looking for meaningful ways for Calvary East to serve the Comstock community.

• We’ve helped out at Comstock Daze, a community fundraiser for the Great Lakes Burn Camp.
• We’ve hosted a monthly release time Bible class for children from Comstock North Elementary.
• We’ve filled backpacks with supplies for Comstock Kindergarteners.
• We’ve collected cleaning supplies for Comstock seniors in need.
• We’ve provided Christmas gifts for a few local families who were financially struggling.
• A few of our members have started helping tutor Comstock kids in reading.

This Wednesday I heard of another opportunity: playground supplies. With tight school budgets, Comstock North Elementary, just around the corner from our building, is in need of some basic playground supplies: kickballs, basketballs, soccer balls, waffle balls and bats, jump ropes, double dutch jump ropes, and sidewalk chalk.

My first thought was that this was a simple, tangible way for all of us at Calvary East to show our interest in serving our community. But then it struck me. Wouldn’t it be great if we could provide these playground supplies as an Easter present?

Let’s see what we can do this weekend to provide an Easter surprise for Comstock North on Monday morning.

 - Bryan Craddock

Join us at Calvary East on Friday, April 6 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, April 8 at 10:30 a.m. as we read and reflect on the biblical accounts of those days and celebrate their significance for our lives today.

• Communion will be served during the Good Friday service.
• Easter Brunch will be served at 9:45 a.m. Sunday.
• Childcare will be available for children under 4 years of age.
• Older children are welcomed to participate in our worship services

Baptism can be a touchy subject. For centuries, Christians have debated what baptism really amounts to (salvation, conversion, professing faith, joining the church, or receiving the Holy Spirit), when someone should be baptized (in infancy, immediately after professing faith in Christ, or after reaching a certain level of spiritual maturity), and how someone should be baptized (immersion, pouring, or sprinkling).

These questions become even more sensitive for those who have been baptized, but wonder whether their baptism was legitimate. In this article, I attempt to briefly tackle those questions, pointing you to a few of the 91 New Testament passages that refer to baptism.

What is Baptism?

The New Testament strongly emphasizes that salvation is received through faith in Christ (Jn 3:16; Ep 2:8-9). Faith unites us with Christ so that we receive the Holy Spirit (Ro 8:9) and are united with other believers as the church (1 Co 12:13). These points help us see that being baptized is not essential to salvation, conversion, entering the church, or receiving the Spirit. Thus, I conclude that baptism is a way to profess and publicly testify that you believe (Ac 2:41).

When Should I Be Baptized?

Christians began to baptize infants early in church history. At the time, they did so because they thought it would wash away sin inherited from Adam. After the Reformation, some began to teach that infant baptism makes children a part of God’s covenant people, the church. Acts 16 refers to two instances (vv. 15 & 33) where entire households were baptized, but this doesn’t prove that infants were baptized.

If baptism is a profession of faith, then it should take place after someone believes, but not too long after. In New Testament examples of Christian baptism, people are baptized immediately after they believe in Christ (Ac 2:38-41; 8:36-38; 10:47-48; 16:15; 16:33; 18:8). This immediacy explains why baptism is sometimes commanded as a response to the gospel (Mt 28:19; Ac 22:16).

How Should I Be Baptized?

While immersion is not commanded, it is clearly modeled. Believers were baptized in rivers or ponds (Mt 3:6; Jn 3:23; Ac 8:38). In cities like Jerusalem, people probably used pools (Ac 2:41). Ultimately, I think the what and when questions discussed above, are far more important than how.

The Personal Challenge

So what should you do if you believe, but have never been baptized? Be baptized! Don’t worry about what people may think or say. If you are convinced that this is a biblical practice, then follow your conviction. Contact me and we will schedule a time for you to be baptized.

What should you do if you are convinced of believer’s baptism, but were baptized as an infant? Some consider re-baptism a rejection of their heritage, but it doesn’t have to be. It’s possible to respect and appreciate your parent’s intentions, while at the same time choosing to be baptized based upon your own personal conviction of what Scripture teaches.

 - Bryan Craddock

This is the rainy season in Southern California. When I lived there it wasn’t all that uncommon around this time of year to hear news reports of magnificent ocean front homes being destroyed when the foundation washed away from underneath them.

A similar erosion has happened at times in the history of Christianity. When a foundational belief seems to grate against cultural sensitivities, leaders may be tempted to ignore it in their preaching and teaching. Some may even begin to deny it outright.

The imputation of sin taught in Romans 5:12-21 is one of these foundational beliefs to the gospel. As we’ll see in our study of the text this morning, Paul teaches that all people are sinners from birth because of Adam’s sin.

At the beginning of the fifth century, a British monk named Pelagius began to deny this truth. At the time, many people in the Roman empire were Christians, but in name only. Leadership positions in many churches were filled by corrupt, power hungry men. In their disgust, some people sought a purer, more rigorous form of Christianity. They turned to the extreme legalism and self-denial of monasticism.

Pelagius argued that people use the concepts of imputed sin and the grace of God to excuse their sinful behavior. He taught that whatever God commands implies the ability of the one who receives the command to obey it. Thus he claimed that it was possible for man to live a life of perfect obedience apart from God’s grace.

The church has repeatedly condemned the teaching of Pelagius as a heresy because it undermines the gospel. Why would Christ need to die and rise again if men could be righteous through their own efforts? The imputation of Adam’s sin to all humanity is foundational to the gospel.

Sadly, the ideas of Pelagius never fully disappeared. There is still a temptation to soften the biblical teaching on the imputed sinfulness of man. With our culture’s emphasis on self- esteem, I suspect that many professing Christians mistakenly assume that their own efforts to obey God are good enough apart from His grace. Let’s recognize this danger and reinforce our foundations before it’s too late.

- Bryan Craddock

Last fall we introduced the song “Every Day” to go along with our study of trials in James. At that time I wrote an article to explain how the message of that song comes from and is supported by Scripture. We have taken the same approach with our study of Romans.

“Came To My Rescue” is a song that reminds us of God’s grace in rescuing us from our sin and bringing us into His presence. It is also a song that gives voice to our desire to be with God and to dedicate our lives to His praise and glory. Those main ideas, God rescuing us when we are in despair and our desire to honor and glorify Him, permeate this song.

The chorus lays out this rescuing grace of God and how that brings about in us a desire to be with Him who has saved us. While there are several psalms that reflect this, I think that Psalm 116 really captures the tone of this song. The fact that this is in the chorus is very appropriate since it is from this act of God to rescue us that our desire for closeness to Him and for Him to be glorified flows.  And as the chorus we sing it many times throughout the song.

The verses lay out in some detail our response to God’s grace. We seek His face (Ps 27:8, 2 Chr 7:14), we worship (Ps 29:2; 95:6), we fall on our knees (Lu 5:8, Eph 3:14), we trust Him with our lives (Ps 26:8; 20:7), and we are humbled by His presence (Ps 95:6).

While the verses give detail and image to our heart’s response to the grace of God, the bridge distills those images into a declaration of intent. “In my life, be lifted high. In our world, be lifted high. In our love, be lifted high.” In these lines we see most of our experience being dedicated to the glory of God. “In my life”, we want God to be glorified in how we live our lives, in the things we do. “In our world”, our passion for God’s glory extends beyond ourselves to include the world we live in. It’s a desire to see our neighbors live for His glory, to see our society point to God, and in the end to see the redemption of all created things. “In our love”, there is the potential for all our relationships to be God honoring. The greatest commandments are to love God, and love others. And Christ said that one of the identifying marks of His followers would be their love.

So as we sing this song, it’s my desire that our minds will be focused on what God has done for us and our hearts will be drawn to live and love for God’s glory.

- Jared Ransom

Examine the doctrinal statements of evangelical churches, and you’ll find that most of us use the same words to explain our view of the Bible. We say that it’s inspired, infallible, inerrant, and authoritative. But sit through the worship services of these churches, and you’ll observe stark differences in how their pastors preach.

To some degree, these differences flow from their personalities. Some pastors are intellectual and bookish. Others are very emotional. Some come across as kind of jolly and entertaining, while others are intense. Personality differences aside, different preaching styles are also indicative of different conceptions about how we think about communicating God’s truth.

The Apostle Paul summed up his instructions on preaching in 2 Timothy 4:1-2: I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.

Paul expresses some tensions here. Preaching must be urgent but also patient, confrontational but also encouraging, commanding but also instructional. Is it any surprise that even the most diligent pastors find it hard to strike the right balance?

As I have thought through these tensions, I attempt to make it very clear that God’s Word is the authority not me. This comes out in a number of ways.

I work very hard at drawing our attention to the words of Scripture. I encourage you to follow along in your own copy of the Bible as I read. I devote significant time in a sermon to explaining the terms and concepts used in a passage. Where there are significant differences of interpretation, I explain them. On most Sundays the outline of my sermon even reflects the flow  of thought in a passage.

I also try to keep our attention on the words of Scripture by what I don’t do. Some pastors are so entertaining, that you walk away from a sermon remembering their stories and jokes rather than the passage. I still use illustrations, but I don’t really emphasize them. I keep them brief and focused on explaining the passage.

I emphasize focusing on Scripture to express my absolute confidence in God and the words He has given us in the Bible. I do not apologize for Scripture, and I do not hold back from addressing any biblical subject, even if it may seem offensive to our culture. At the same time, I do try to be gracious, clear, and balanced when I address controversial issues.

Finally, I place a strong emphasis on personally applying God’s Word. I always challenge people to think of a next step that they should take in response to God’s Word. Some pastors are strong and direct in telling people what needs to change in their lives. But people often walk away from this kind of preaching feeling as if they’ve only heard the pastor’s opinion, not God’s. I want any sense of conviction people experience to be from the Holy Spirit, not from any effort on my part to manipulate their emotions.

So what difference does any of this make outside of a worship service? Over time people in a church tend to approach Scripture and communicate Scripture the same way that their pastor preaches. My hope is that we’ll all grow to show a consistently humble heart toward God and His Word, and a humble confidence in His authoritative truth as we share it with others.

- Bryan Craddock