Archive for the 'Retreat06' category
September 2, 2006 4:00 pm
 I’m told that the CDs of the five15 Retreat messages won’t be ready for purchase tomorrow. But they will definitly be available by next Sunday, and I’ll see if we can arrange to have them for sale at the five15 BIG MEETING on 9/9.
Thanks for your patience.
Categories: Retreat06, five15 blog
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 Meditation is essential to understanding and applying Scripture. I think this is why the writer of Psalm 119 resolves no less than six times to meditate on God’s Word. And it is why I decided that we would practice together on the five15 Retreat.
Below is the simple method I led us in, as we worked our way through Isaiah 40 together. You could apply this method to any one verse or any one chapter of God’s Word. I’ve included samples that y’all came up with on the retreat from Isaiah 40.
1. Take 5 minutes or so to read the verses several times through. Write down any words or phrases that seem particularly important to you. For instance:
From verses 1-11, we noticed the words voice, speak, cry, and behold. It seems that God is eager to reveal himself.
In verses 25-31, we saw a stark difference between the words describing God (strength, might, power) and the words describing us (faint, weary, exhausted).
2. Next, ask what these verses reveal truth about God: His character and His actions. Write down at least one sentence that begins with the Word “God.” If you have time, write down as many as you can…
“God is infinite, and His vastness is beyond our comprehension or description.”
“God is completely wise and needs no human counsel.”
“God strengthens the weak; He is compassionate, active, and personal.”
3. Now, write down at least one sentence that begins with the word “I.” If you have time, write down several. The “I” sentence could work in two different ways: things we learn about ourselves in relation to God, or things we resolve to do in response to God’s revelation of Himself. Examples of each include:
“I am like a grasshopper in God’s eyes: small, insignificant, and fleeting. This puts my arrogant assessment of my importance back in the proper place.”
“I will wait on the Lord rather than act out of arrogant self-sufficiency.”
4. Finally, make some gospel connections. The whole Bible points to Jesus, so where do you see the Savior in these verses? It’s not as hard as you might think:
Read verse 3 again. Sound familiar? If not, check out Matthew 3, Mark 1, Luke 3, or John 1. These words are used by John the Baptist right as Jesus comes on the scene to begin his public ministry. Isaiah 40:3 begins a paragraph that ends in verse 5: “And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” This is pointing to us to Jesus!
Verse 11 describes God “tending his flock like a shepherd.” Read about any Good Shepherds lately? Head over to John 10 and check it out. These verses, written some 600 years before Jesus, are speaking of Him, and ultimately fulfilled in Him.
I hope you enjoyed meditating together while we were on the retreat. Enjoy your Moleskine and keep at it!
NOTE: I am indebted to Mike Bullmore for the God-and-I sentence idea. Thanks, Mike!
Categories: Retreat06, five15 blog
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September 1, 2006 10:07 pm
This last picture is not for the faint of heart. This is what happens when someone plants paintball in a bag of peanuts M&Ms. Nasty.
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Aron Osborne
2 Peter 3:18 - Growing In Holiness
God has given us the gifts we need to grow but has given us the responsibility to grow.
“To everyone who is downright earnest about his soul, and hungers and thirsts after spiritual life, the question ought to come home with searching power. Do we make progress in our religion? Do we grow? Surely it becomes us from time to time to examine ourselves and take account of our souls.” J.C. Ryle
“Time is fast flying. Life is fast ebbing away. Soon it will be seen whether we have built on the rock or on the sand. Surely we should take time to examine ourselves and look into our souls. Do we get on in spiritual things? Do we grow?” J.C. Ryle
“You may be a Christian and have your feet on the rock, and yet live far below your privileges. It is possible to have union with Christ and yet little if any communion with Christ.” J.C. Ryle
“Nothing affects your character more than the company you keep.” Charles Spurgeon
“Let us seek friends that will stir us up about our prayers, our bible reading, about our use of time, about our hearts, and salvation.” Charles Spurgeon
“When I speak of a man growing in grace, I mean simply this - that his sense of sin is becoming deeper, his faith stronger, his hope brighter, his love more extensive, his spiritual mindedness more marked. He feels more of the power of godliness in his own heart. He manifests more of it in his life. He is going on from strength to strength, from faith to faith, and from grace to grace.” Charles Spurgeon
“The man whose soul is growing gets more dominion over sin, the world, and the devil every year. He becomes more careful about his temper, his words, and his actions. He is more watchful over his conduct in every relation of life. He strives more to be conformed to the image of Christ in all things… He is not content with old attainments and former grace. He forgets the things that are behind and reaches forth unto those things which are before, making ‘Higher! Upward! Forward! Onward! his continual motto.” Charles Spurgeon
“I have just enough of a taste of the majesty of God to want more. I know what it means to be a forgiven man and what it means to be sent on a mission. My soul cries for more. My soul needs more.” R.C. Sproul
Categories: Retreat06, five15 blog
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Aron Osborne
Genesis 19:1-22 - Lessons From The Life of Lingering Lot
Nothing quenches the power and work of the Holy Spirit in our lives like lingering in sin.
“The Holy Scriptures, which were written for our learning, contain beacons as well as patterns. They show us examples of what we should avoid, as well as what we should follow. The man whose name heads this page of Scripture is set for a beacon to the whole church of Christ. His character is put before us in one little word: He lingered. Let us sit down and look at this beacon for a few minutes. Let us consider Lot.” J.C. Ryle
“Remember this in choosing a husband or a wife, if you are unmarried. It is not enough that your eye is pleased, that your tastes are met, that your mind finds likeability and friendliness, that there is affection. There needs to be something more than this. There is a life yet to come. Think of your immortal soul. Will it be helped upwards or dragged downwards by the union you are planning? Will it be made more heavenly, or more earthly, drawn nearer to Christ, or to the world? Will your faith grow or will it decay? I pray you, as Baxter said, ‘Think and think and think again before you commit yourself.” J.C. Ryle
“There are those who cannot find it in their hearts to quarrel with their besetting sin, whether it be sloth, indolence, ill-temper, pride, selfishness, impatience or what it may. They allow it to remain a tolerably quiet and undisturbed tenant of their hearts. They say it is their health, or their constitutions, or their temperaments, or their trials, or their way. Their father, or mother, or grandmother, was so before themselves, and they are sure they cannot help it. But all may be summed up in one sentence. They linger.” J.C. Ryle
“Make a wrong choice in life, an unbiblical choice, and settle yourself down in the midst of worldly people, and I know no surer way to damage your own spirituality, and to go backward about your eternal concerns. This is the way to make the pulse of your soul beat feebly. This is the way to make the edge of your feeling about sin become blunt and dull. This is the way to dim the eyes of your spiritual discernment. This is the way to bring a moral palsy on your feet and limbs, and make you go tottering and trembling. This is the way to tie your arms in fighting, to fetter your legs in running, to dry up the sources of your strength and become a slave.” Paul Tripp
“The motto of your life must be, ‘Watch, watch, watch.’ For, mark you, you are sure to leave some leaven, and if you leave a little it will work and spread…you will tell me I am holding up a high standard. I am; but then you have a great Helper.” Charles Spurgeon
“I charge you, and exhort you, by all your hopes of heaven and desires of glory, if you would be happy, if you would be useful, do not be a lingering soul.” Charles Spurgeon
“Be killing sin or it will be killing you.” John Owen
Categories: Retreat06, five15 blog
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Aron Osborne
Acts 2:37-41 - Cut To The Heart
“The old-fashioned grace of repentance is not to be dispensed with; there must be sorrow for sin; there must be “a broken and a contrite heart. This, God will not despise; but a ‘conversion’ which does not produce this result, God will not accept as genuine.”
“When the truth pricks the hearers of it in the heart, the impression becomes operative. In the case before us, if you read the narrative, you will find that these men became earnest enquirers; they said the rest of the apostles, ‘Men and brethren,-what must we do?’”
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