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I had the privilege to attend the Here We Still Stand Conference October 17-20 in beautiful San Diego, California.  You can see notes from most of the speakers in previous posts.  Today, I wanted to share a favorite quote from each of the speakers that I heard.  Enjoy! Christ takes all of the evil, death, and sin on the cross and gives us His righteousness. What must I do to be saved?  LOOK, BEHOLD- 40 Minutes in the Old Testament discussing Numbers 21 God doesn’t shame doubters but gives them reason to believe. Jesus welcomes doubters.  Front Porch with the Fitz's Christ is not a second Moses. The goal of the Law is to kill you. The goal of Christ is to raise you from the dead, forgive you. Daniel Emery Price The most popular sermon in the church today is “Just Do It” or “Try Harder”. Instead, we need more churches preaching the gospel. It’s all about the work of Christ. When the Law becomes the primary message of the church, it robs us of grace and...

Culture and the counter cultural cross Our crisis today is not that we are losing religion but we are more religious than ever. religion is the justifying story of your life. religion is your preferred guilt management system. religion is about “enoughness” We have never been more pious. Thesis 2 and 3 from Heidelberg Disputation No matter how close we get, we never arrive at enough.  Fresh targets have become our focus of enoughness (food, exercise, work, parenting, politics, romance) Seculosity-religiosity that is directed horizontally rather than vertically.  We have created a million different religions to secure our righteousness. They maintain all the demand. These things are not bad, but they cannot bear the weight of making us righteous. Theology of Glory-It’s up to you.  Performanicism.  The Good Place—our attempts to secure righteousness actually go backwards because of our motives Real love does not recoil at weakness, it is where it ...

Below are quotes from various speakers at Here We Still Stand: How do you kill an awakening?  Add some requirements. Throw in some kickers (what to do). Limit God's love. Be too serious.  There's something unreasonable about God's love toward us. If we never get better, he will love us the same. Jesus gives us the message of reconciliation.  This includes forgiveness of sin (taking our all our sins) AND giving us His righteousness. Double imputation is a hill worth dying on. Christ died on it. Capon-We talk so loudly about "shoulds" and shouldn'ts" that they eclipse forgiveness of sins. Preaching 45 minutes of law and then throwing the gospel in at the end is not gospel centered, it's gospel caboosed. There is more than one way to be legalistic. Legalism is not just "thou shalt nots" but also tips/steps we tell people to do.  In Christ, you are as secure as Christ is. It's not that we are not hearing law. Social medi...

Our first speaker on Saturday morning at Here We Still Stand was David Zahl from Mockingbird. Here are his thoughts: "Repeating What We Have Heard" Social media basically exists to send signals. Those people of Facebook have received their reward in full. Most of our signaling is not overt. We are signaling all the time. Signaling is about self-justification. Signaling is connected to the Law. It flows from guilt and shame. Whatever you are using to self justify yourself is the Law to you. The Law is everywhere.  We are more religious now than ever before. Religion is all Law. Law disconnected from the Gospel turns into a competition. There are two signals at the heart of the Reformation-Law and Grace. Documentary of Daryl Davis-picture of grace This righteousness needs to come from outside of us. This means that the church thrives when people don't have it all together rather than appearing as good people. Matthew 22-Parable of the Wedding Banquet-The U...

Here are some of my favorite tweets from the last few weeks.  This is one of the blessings of social media where we can hear the gospel from people all over the world. If you like the tweet, go and follow the person on Twitter.  In the Gospel we don't get instructions about how to create a better version of ourselves. We get a new identity, a gift.-David Zahl Behavior follows belief. Who do you think you are? Satan says you're dirty and used. God says your clean and holy with a limitless future. @JeremyG220 We are justified, sanctified, & glorified by grace. The entire Christian life is lived under the reign of God’s grace. (Jerry Bridges) Grace was not an addition to God’s plan; grace was a part of God’s plan from the very beginning. Law was temporary, but grace is eternal. (Warren Wiersbe) Only God could rescue Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from fire. God rescues us, too, from sin through His Son, Jesus. #thegospelprojectkids

I have enjoyed reading a small book published by Mockingbird Publications called Law and Gospel. It is helpful in understanding how both words shape and influence the Christian life.  I finished the book last week so here are some quotes to think about: the Law must continue to convict us of our utter unrighteousness, and the Gospel must continue to save us...So where the Law is a closed fist, the Gospel is an open hand. Gratitude is a natural response to salvation. It does not require coercion or encouragement; to the extent that individual understands what has happened, gratitude will flow organically and abundantly from their heart. The precise form it takes will be different every time, but such is the nature of fruit. Belovedness can actually beget love itself. God's presence and promise are objective comfort, not to be conjured or obtained but only recognized. Thus the wild, absurd, unconditional truth of God's love in Emmanuel--"God with us," just a...

I am currently reading Law and Gospel published by Mockingbird.  Here are a few quotes that I liked from my reading last week: Jesus does not relate to lepers, tax collectors, prostitutes, and reprobates on the basis of what they bring to the table but on the basis of who he is. Though the law is conditional--a two-way street--the gift of Christ is unconditional.   The injunction to forgive may be a good and noble command, but it cannot inspire us to do so. Again, the Law commands that we love perfectly. The Gospel announces that we are perfectly loved. The Gospel announces that we are justified by grace through faith: not by what we do, or even who we are, but by what Christ has done and who he is.

Here is the final post by speaker/topic from Liberate 2015. Previous posts are organized the same way for the pre-conference and Thursday-Friday noon. Blessings! Eric Metaxas-"Transformed by Amazing Grace" here Ray Cortese-"It is Finished-The Present Power of These 3 Words" here Tullian Tchividjian-"It is Not Finished" here David Zahl-"It is Finished: The End of Score-Keeping" here Steve Brown-"Relax, It Really is Finished" here

We have determined who we are through God's Word. When you get this, you are free. (Steve Brown) All have fallen short of the glory of God, but that hasn't stopped us from comparing distances. (David Zahl) Grace always shows up as a surprise. (John Zahl)

Commercial for FitBit-It is a lifestyle device not just fitness device Quantify all of our daily life Data is used for self-justification What does it look like to keep score?  Chart ourselves or others We love quantification because we love control. If I know where I am headed, I have the power to control it. If I score high enough, I will be alright. The Law (10 Commandments, Sermon on Mount) keeps score  The law (world) keeps score, as well as the voice inside We always lose when we keep score. All have fallen short of the glory of God, but that hasn't stopped us from comparing distances. Scorekeeping hits home in our marriage, parenting, friendships, work. The moment a good work becomes public it loses its goodness. This is why Christ told us to keep it quiet. We are addicted to scorekeeping and Christians deal with this just as much as anyone else. Moralism has crept into our food choices. Do we only rest to work better? What about scorekeeping with ...

Several of the videos are now available from speakers at Liberate 2014.  Today, I wanted to share some of my favorite quotes from each speaker.  You can read all my notes on blog posts from February 20-23.  The King has banged the gavel and pardoned our past, present, and future sins.  If you don't get justification, you will run from God not run to Him. (Matt Chandler) Grace isn't just a doctrine. It's 24/7. It's a pool where elephants can swim and children can play. (Steve Brown) Home is not a place to settle, but a place to set out from. (Sally Lloyd-Jones) Two preliminary points in making connection with others: you have to get to the end of law (sanctions don't work with kids, spouses, or others) & the name of the game is healing. (Paul Zahl) Three things the gospel does that religion cannot do    1. Gospel reveals to us God is more glorious than our idols (2 Corin. 3:18)    2. Gospel overwhelms us with grace (1 John 4:19) ...

David Zahl was first speaker on Saturday morning. His topic was "All We Need is (One Way) Love" Website is mbird.com 3 things came across his screen as he was preparing for his message: The Onion-love is unconditional, Depressed man tries to feed himself to tiger but was rejected, & effect of loneliness on 3000 older people-twice as likely to die Why are we so lonely? The church is not immune from loneliness. It has everything to do with the Law. We are focused on self-actualization. The price we pay for ambition is loneliness. We are lonely because there is a shortage of love. There is a whole lot of law & not enough gospel. Sin isolates. It inspires hiding. We block intimacy. Hiding makes us even more lonely. How do we deal with loneliness? We distract ourselves from it and keep ourselves busy. Everyone needs to stop.  The gospel allows us to do that. Another way we deal with loneliness is to buy people's love. We make it tr...

I know the Liberate Conference is two weeks away, but I need to focus on the warmth on this cold day in Kansas.  I will be posting notes here from the speakers during and after Liberate which is Feb. 20-22, 2014 in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.  Below are pictures of several of the speakers at Liberate.