I just got back from a nice Italian lunch with my friend Chris whom I met at The Shepherd’s Conference and a friend from his church who is attending this conference with him. We ate the meatiest pizza I’ve ever laid eyes upon. They don’t make pizza like that back home in Canada! Of greater significance, we seem to have found a restaurant that has significantly less traffic than the other local hangouts. This may serve us well through the remaining day-and-a-half of this conference.

This afternoon we have the privilege of hearing R.C. Sproul speak on “The Center of Christian Preaching: Justification by Faith Alone.” It seems to me that if we could want to hear any man in the world today speak on the subject of “justification by faith alone,” it would be Sproul. Few men have dedicated more time to understanding and preaching this critical doctrine. Few men are more qualified to speak to share with us this: the very heart of Christian doctrine.

Justification is the doctrine upon which the church stands or falls, and ultimately, the doctrine upon which you and I stand or fall. This doctrine is the “Atlas” upon which the whole of Christianity rests. Were Atlas to shrug, the entire structure of the Christian faith would fall to the ground and be shattered. This is not a common understanding of the doctrine of justification by faith alone in our day. It is now considered, tragically, the small print of the gospel. The battle over justification by faith alone is considered, by so many, a tempest in a teapot. Many have declared the Reformation to be over since Catholicism and Protestantism have supposedly mended their fences and now stand together. The New Perspective tells us that both sides completely misunderstood Paul’s true teaching on justification. Yet it should not be surprising that we see a minimalist attitude being expressed about this doctrine. Towards the end of his life, Martin Luther warned (rightly it seems) that in every generation the gospel will have to be reaffirmed because this doctrine, when proclaimed boldly and accurately, will produce conflict. We are those who, when faced with the options of fight or flight, prefer to flee conflict even if the stakes are as low as being burned not at the stake but at the payroll of a local church. With this increasing significance comes an eclipse of the understanding of this doctrine.

Dr. Sproul will discuss the Roman Catholic understanding of the doctrine of justification so we can understand the Reformation understanding up against the Roman Catholic.

Rome did teach and does continue to teach that justification is a sacerdotal matter. The grace of justification is administered by and through the church, by the priesthood, through the sacraments. Justification begins by the sacrament of baptism which functions by the working of the works (near-automatically) and in baptism the grace of baptism is infused into the recipient of the sacrament, which is to say it is poured into their soul. This grace is sometimes called “the righteousness of Christ.” This does not fully justify the recipient because the person needs to assent to and cooperate with this grace to such a degree that he actually becomes righteous. If you are righteous, then you will be justified and remain in a state of grace as long as you keep yourself from mortal sin. Mortal sin is defined as sin that kills the justifying grace that has been infused into the soul. A person who commits moral sin loses his justifying grace. When mortal sin occurs, and justifying grace is lost, that can and often does happen, while authentic, genuine faith remains. A person can have real faith and not be justified. Once mortal sin has been committed, the church requires the sacrament of penance which is called “the second plank of justification for those who have made shipwreck of their souls.” The sacrament of penance gains “congruous” merit, which makes it fitting that God once again restores a person to grace and gives him a new infusion of the grace that is needed.

Too often Protestants slander the Roman Catholic Church by not being accurate in regards to Catholic doctrine. Rome teaches that, in order to be justified, a person needs to have faith. The Church says that faith has three functions to perform in justification: the initiation of justification, the foundation of justification, and the root of justification. They maintain the importance of faith. It is a necessary condition for justification, but not a sufficient condition. Protestants believe that faith is a sufficient condition. The presence of genuine faith links you to Jesus and His righteousness and becomes the instrument by which you are justified. This distinction alone is enough to generate a reformation. The difference, then, is faith versus faith alone. Rome teaches grace plus merit. Christ plus your own righteousness is necessary to be redeemed. You cannot be justified without grace, but you also cannot be justified without merit.

A great debate during the Reformation was “the instrumental cause.” The church, beginning as early as Augustine, made us of Aristotle’s distinctions between different types of causes: material cause (the material out of which something is made), a formal cause (a blueprint or a plan), a final cause (the purpose for which something was made), and an efficient cause (the person who does the making). Rome says that the instrumental cause, the tool, is the sacrament of baptism followed by the sacrament of penance. They affirm that the efficient cause is God’s declaration. The Reformers said that the instrumental cause is faith. Faith is the instrument of our justification. This does not mean that faith is a work or carries its own merit. Christians—those who are justified—are at the same time righteous and sinners. The Catholic Church declared this a legal fiction.

Luther said that this is the heart of the gospel. God counted or reckoned Abraham as righteous by virtue of imputation—the single most important term in the debate. So much of the controversy focuses on this single idea of imputation. The meritorious cause that we have to be justified, the only ground of our justification, is the imputation of the righteousness of God to us. Don’t ever negotiation the imputed righeousness of Christ! This is not an abstract doctrine! It is not merely important for us to believe this, but to defend it and to contend with our all for this doctrine.

We are given a righteousness that is outside of us—apart from us. The only righteousness that will justify us is the righteousness of Christ. Without this we are naked and helpless. We need to be covered in Christ’s righteousness.

We are not justified by the doctrine of justification by faith. We can give assent to this doctrine and contend for it without having the faith that alone will justify you. Justification is not accomplished by a profession of faith. It is the posession of faith, not the profession of it, that saves. We must not give people a false sense of security by making them believe a profession is enough! The doctrine simply describes what it is that brings us into a state of justification.

Dr. Sproul recounted the testimony of his own conversion and shared how this doctrine leaves us as the publican, who cannot even lift his head but cries out “have mercy on me, a sinner!”

The gospel of Rome is no gospel at all. It saves no one. There is no other gospel than this one: justification by faith alone. This is a simple matter. It is not a difficult doctrine. But we must be careful. It is an easy doctrine to get into a head, but far more difficult to get into the bloodstream. For this reason we must hear this doctrine again and again and again. Satan constantly seeks to deceive us, thinking that we must add our own merit to Christ’s. But we must stand firm on this doctrine. “Do not move from that.”

Following Dr. Sproul’s speech, Bob led us in song again, singing “Before The Throne of God Above.” We will resume again with another panel session after a short break.

Interspersed throughout this week’s conference are panel sessions. There are five of them: two featuring the Together for the Gospel foursome and three others, each featuring one of the special guests (R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur and John Piper). These sessions are an opportunity for those in attendance, most of whom are pastors, to listen to these men chat amongst themselves in a somewhat informal context. It is an opportunity to see a group of men learn from each other and discuss what is of utmost importance to them. They are loosely moderated but clearly without a strict agenda.

By the very nature of these sessions they are very difficult to transcribe or summarize in the same way as the general sessions. So much of the panel discussions depends on the relationships between the men, their jokes and jabs, and their interaction that I don’t feel I could do justice to them. Because of this I will not attempt to “liveblog” those sessions. If you are able in the future to obtain audio (good)or video (better) of these sessions, I would recommend that you do so. I’m sure they will prove both entertaining and edifying.

Having said that, if I can pull a few quotes or pearls of wisdom from these sessions, I’ll be sure to let you know about them.

In the panel session that just passed, Mohler, Duncan, Mahaney and Dever walked us through a statement of belief which was in the classic form of a series of affirmations and denials. I do not know when this will be publically available (it may be already). It has clearly been written within a cultural context and addresses many of the common errors within modern evangelicalism. Through their affirmations they bring the gospel to the forefront while critiquing so much of what we are told is Christian. They deny, though not by name, open theism, aspects of the new perspective on Paul, modalism and other Trinitarian errors, church growth, gender roles and more. It is a short document but well worth reading and meditating upon.

After a very short break and a brief video about Boyce College, Al Mohler took the pulpit to bring a message on “Preaching with the Culture in View.”

He is a bit nervous about the concept of preaching with culture in view, for he sees a polarity of dangers. There are some Christians who take the culture with no seriousness at all while others allow it to become dominant within their ministry. There are some who think wrongly that culture is an irrelevancy when it comes to ministry, but this should not be the case. Like it or not, we are embedded in a culture. There are others for whom the culture becomes such an issue of fascination that they become part of an inculturated ministry.

He will begin with defining expository preaching which he defines in part as “That mode of Christian preaching which takes as its central purpose the presentation and application of a portion of Scripture.” It is important to note that the primary task of the pastor is to be faithful to the text of Scripture, not to the culture and everything else is subordinated to this task. The application of Scripture will unavoidably lead to the discussion of culture, for we must apply Scripture within the context we find ourselves in. Our concern for the culture is that within the culture is where we will find sinners. It is not for the culture itself for it is only fleeting. The authority of the Bible must always be in view for the Scripture’s authority is transcultural.

Culture needs to be put in its place. He defined provided a few different definitions of culture, but at its most basic culture is that which allows human beings to relate to each other. We live in a time when culture is celebrated and cultural diversity has become an ideal (though this celebration of diversity is exceedingly arbitrary). It is very difficult for us to know and understand our culture and how it has shaped and influenced us simply because we are completely immersed in it.

Evangelicalism in America arose in a time and context in which it was quite a natural fit. It arose easily and did not see culture as inherently hostile. It is impossible to withdraw entirely from culture for since Genesis 3 we live within a sinful, imperfect culture. It is also not possible to dictate who all Christians of all time must understand and engage with the culture. There are many different cultural contexts.

We need to avoid the trap of believing that there was a golden age. There was no golden era in history when culture was less worldly than it is today. Culture has always been as sinful as the people who live within it. Culture cannot be our main concern but it is also not worthless. Culture can even be seen as a gift that allows us to live together, that allows us to value the institutions that maintain life.

To understand culture we do not simply go back to the 1940’s and 50’s. Mohler suggests we go as far back as Augustine who wrestled with many of these same issues. He suggests that no book is more helpful in understanding this issue than “The City of God.” He understood that there is only one city that is eternal (the city of God). All other cities are passing. How was it that so many people were fooled into thinking that Rome would be eternal? Christians are to believe that they are citizens primarily in the city of heaven. Our interest in the other city, in the culture, is that this is where the sinners live. We can love the people in this culture without loving the culture itself. We should not be surprised to see sinners acting like sinners, celebrating and institutionalizing their sin. Yet we cannot withdraw from people for they are the objects of God’s love.

While we can appreciate much of the culture and be thankful for it, we must always maintain some type of seperation. We must realize that this is but our secondary citizenship for we are primarily citizens of the city of God. “Why our culture presents significant interpretive problems for the Christian culture.” Why our culture must be understood by the preacher. We live in a world which is far more “liquid” than in any other time in history. Change comes fast and furious—far more so than at any time in the past. The world of parents and grandparents is vastly different than the world that our children will face.

We have a National Geographic understand of the importance of adapting to culture. We see people “over there” and know what they need to do, but do not often unerstand what we need to do here.

Self-fulfillment - Radical individualism. Life is a quest and the self is a project. What they want out of life is to build a sense of self and it becomes the reference of all meaning. We live in an age where the primary question asked by most questions is “am I well?” and in this they are asking a psychological question. Most Americans believe that what their problem is is something has happened to them and that the solution will be found within. They feel that they have an alien problem to be resolved with an inner solution. The Bible says that we have an inner problem with an alien solution! Pastors can talk about the gospel and, if the preacher is not entirely clear, it may be seen as a form of therapy.

Self-sufficiency - Every individual posesses what is necessary for meaning and happiness; it needs only to be drawn out. This is buttressed by a society that appears those who appear to be most self-sufficient rather than those who understand their categorical insufficiency. The gospel is not about how we become more self-sufficient.

Self-definition - This has become more radically important in recent years. Most Americans now believe that we have the ability to define ourselves, even defining what it means to be human or to be male or female. We claim the right to define marriage, gender, authority, sexuality, and everything else. We need to control our own evolution. This comes hand-in-hand with postmodern theories of truth.

Self-absorption - This leads to expressive divorce. We are so self-aborbed that we will divorce others to “become what we need to be.” Divorce is merely a learning experience in the project of the self. Even a few years ago we would not have heard about divorce becoming a good thing.

Self-transcendence - This explains why many people are obsessed with spirituality and why people will hear the preaching of the gospel as just another form of spirituality. We extend the self through self-transcendence in spiritual practice. “We need to be clear about the ‘mono’ in monotheism.” We have a world of inherent polytheism.

Self-enhancement - The idea that we can extend life indefinitely. People think that the project of the self can extend to “aesthetic surgery.” Our culture has absorbed a lie about what it means to be human.

Self-security - We have an obsession with health and safety—physical, financial, etc. Most Christians throughout the history of Christianity have not felt safe. People no longer go to bed feeling that they will die in the night and face hell. We take safety for granted.

The importance of all of this is that people we preach to will hear what we say in their own terms, within their own context, within their own culture. Pastors cannot take for granted that what they see will be received in the way it was intended.

We are and must ever be mindful of the fact that we are elect exiles. We are here, we have an address and a phone number. We come out of a certain culture where certain things make sense and certain things do not. But all of this is passing. It is missiologically important but only temporary. We cannot just withdraw for this would deny our commission. But we cannot feel home for this denies our identity. Our task is to preach and teach the gospel until we see the elect from every tribe and tongue and nation. We will not be Americans or any other nationality, but we will be His.

Day two of the Together for the Gospel conference began early. We left our hotel room at 7 and went searching for some breakfast. The lineup at Starbucks wrapped around the restaurant, so we sought out a small deli where the lineups were long, but not devastating. The conference began at 8 AM. It is set to continue through most of the day before wrapping up close to 10 PM. With most of the breaks we get today being of the 5 minute variety (where 3000 men head to only one bathroom), it will be a long, full and no-doubt blessedly challenging day.

Following a video introduction to the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Bob Kauflin led us in a time of worship with only a piano, singing “How Sweet and Awful is the Place” and “How Deep The Father’s Love.” Mark Dever then introduced the books we were given this morning: Getting The Gospel Right by R.C. Sproul, Women’s Ministry in the Local Church by Ligon Duncan and Susan Hunt and Give Praise To God (a tribute to James Boice) which features a variety of contributors. He introduced and welcomed Ligon Duncan “despite his grevious errors” in being Presbyterian. Ligon Duncan then took the pulpit to deliver a message on “Preaching From The Old Testament” drawn from the familiar words of 2 Timothy 3.

Preach the Old Testament and preach it as a Christian book - Paul urged Timothy to do just that, referring in verse fifteen to these words as “the sacred writings.” When Paul says that all Scripture is profitable, he refers to the Old Testament. Timothy is to teach the truth of justification by grace along through faith alone from the Old Testament. Duncan quoted a theologian who said “we must plant our feet firmly on the rock of the Old Tesatment.” The Old Testament must be harmonized, not contrasted, with what we learn from the New Testament—even those parts that have since been superceded such as the ceremonial laws and worship within the temple.

Preach the Old Testament Expositionally - Pastors are to expound books of the Old Testament. The whole of the Scripture is the final authority in the life of the believer (tota scriptura). A pastor can equip himself to do this by listening to good sermons on the Old Testament and by reading books and commentaries that deal with the Old Testament.

Preach Christ from the Old Testament - In Luke 24 we see men who had had their hopes dashed by the death of the One they had thought was the Savior. Jesus’ response told them that they were slow of heart to refuse to believe in all that the prophets had said. Had they listened to the prophets they would have understood that the prophets spoke of Jesus, foretelling his death and resurrection. Jesus, then, models the necessity and ability of pastors to preach Christ from the Old Testament. This is particularly easy to do when a New Testament author has given us an explanation or interpretation of a passage from the Old. But we ought to be able to preach Christ naturally and exegetically from all of the Old Testament. This does not mean that we force Christ in an odd way into places that He is not, but that we realize that there is always a way to Christ and His cross from every passage in Scripture. There is only one way to God, and that is through Jesus Christ, but there is a dazzling array of ways of getting to Christ through the Old Testament. Duncan led us through a variety of Old Testament texts that, each in a different way, led clearly and directly to Christ, to His cross, and His resurrection.

Preach the One Plan of Redemption History from the Old Testament - There are many helps available to the pastor who wishes to do this. There is a common New Testament exhortation which uses the formulation of “this is that”—“this is that which was prophesied”—and it models how pastors are to preach the plan of redemption even from the Old Testament. Scripture glories in the discontinuities between the Old and the New Covenants. We do not need to downplay these discontinuities but can likewise glory in them without excusing them. We are to seek the plan of redemption even in the earliest verses of the Scriptures. Even when the New Testament is preached, the pastor should point back to the Old Testament to help people understand the continuity of the Bible.

Preach Grace from the Old Testament - Paul says to Timothy that the Old Testament Scriptures are able to give the wisdom that leads to faith by grace. Paul would see no discontinuity between the way men are saved in the New Testament and how they were saved in the Old for to prove salvation by grace through faith he turned to the Old Testament. Gospel logic, even in the Old Testament, always has grace before law.

Preach the Character of God from the Old Testament - R.C. Sproul has helped so much in this regard. This is important because the Old Testament is the primary source for many biblical doctrines including the attributes of God. It is, in many ways, far fuller in its explication of the attributes of God than the New Testament. Without preaching the Old Testament we may raise a generation of Christians deficient in their knowledge of the character of God.

Preach Experientally from the Old Testament - Calvin and the Puritans emphasized that it is the Psalms that give us the language of the Christian experience. The greatest transaction in history is the one that took place on the cross when Christ cried out in His forsakeness. It is drawn from the Psalms. We must not undervalue the experiential teaching that we get from the Old Testament—Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Job, and others. As we see their struggles, we see and understand our struggles. The experience in the Old Testament is so varied and so deep. It stands in contrast to the trite, shallow experience of God that is celebrated in evangelicalism in our day.

Preach the Christian Life from the Old Testament - We cannot believe that the Old Testament does not teach us how to live as Christians in the twenty-first century. Some claim that we ought not to have moralistic messages drawn from the Old Testament, but this goes directly against the teaching of Paul and Jesus. We learn from the New Testament that the stories of the Old were given to teach us how to live.

We will return in five minutes to hear Dr. Albert Mohler deliver a message. That will be followed by a panel discussion before we break for lunch.

The first session features Dr. Mark Dever, pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington D.C. The message, which has the theme of “The Pastor’s Understanding of His Own Role” is titled “Three Marks of a Faithful Pastor.” It is drawn from 1 Corinthians 4 which contains a striking contrast between the real ministers of Christ and the imposters. This passage shows us three marks of a real minister.

A cross-centered message (verses 1-7) - In this passage we see the phrase “the mysteries of God.” Paul tells the Corinthians that they should not be dividing among themselves over unimportant divisions. There should be no division between ministers of that same gospel. Ministers of the gospel are the stewards of mysteries. A steward is not an owner but someone who has been entrusted with something else. A church is given to a pastor in trust.

Even Apostles were fundamentally servants, for they had no authority to spread anything other than the gospel of Christ. Pastors are called only in so far that they give God’s message to His people. It is God who owns the church and He has a message to His people. He will, through his kindness and mercy and grace, entrust that message to mere men. Mark encouraged pastors to know and understand and believe that God’s Word makes God’s people. Thus pastors are called to humbly minister to others with and through this Word. In verse two we read that the pastor must prove faithful to the charge given him. “We are not called to be original, but to be reliable,” he said. He also quoted D.A. Carson who says “What matters most in God’s universe is what God thinks of us.” Pastors must remember that they cannot please God if they live to please men.

The recurring theme of these verses is that the pastor is a steward who will be called to give an account for the message that has been entrusted to his care.

A cross-centered life (verses 8-13) - Paul turns to sarcasm in the next verses, mocking to godly effect the Corinthians’ prosperity (whether it was real or imagined). Many of them were feeling confident and fulfilled, yet regardless of how they felt, Paul pulled them back to reality and showed them that they really don’t “rank.” Paul rejects the type of “reigning” that the Corinthians advocated. He remarked on how different the Christian life is than the imposters had taught the people. Despite what the Corinthians believe and despite what so many people within evangelicalism believe, there is a better way than the wisdom of the world. Pastors must preach Christ and Him crucified. If Christ was pierced and punished and crushed and wounded, and if Paul was also scorned and rejected, how can today’s pastor expect any different if he is to be faithful to the One he serves? True ministers are happy to be despised if, somehow through this, Christ can be proclaimed. This was the experience of Paul, even as he wrote this letter to the church at Corinth.

Dever challenged pastors to inconvenience themselves in order to serve others. He taught that a pastor’s own comfort is a danger to his own soul. We all have a bias towards our own comfort and pastors need to be active in identifying and fighting against that.

Cross-centered followers (verses 14 to the end) - Pastors have a difficult time putting themselves forward as examples, but this is something they are called to do. Disciples learn from other disciples just as children live within families to learn from others. Pastors are to be examples of people who love Christ and their congregations more than they love themselves. A Christian minister should live out a Christ-like life and lead others to do the same. Paul loved the people of Corinth in such a deep, pure way and so he urged them to imitate him as children imitate a father. A pastor puts upon himself the right kind of pastor when he calls upon others to imitate him. He does a good thing when he makes himself an example of godliness. A pastor is called to teach better than he can live. A pastor can do this. But he is called to live in such a way that he illustrates the great truths that he preaches from God’s Word. The example of the pastor should be followed in the church.

Paul effectively orders the Corinthians to humble themselves. We don’t often think of humility as a duty, but it is a crucial Christian virtue. It is a confession that we are not always right but that God is! We cannot claim to be Christians if we do not have a desire to be humble. That virtue is a handmaid of all the other virtues. Of all people, pastors need to be pastors.

Paul finishes the chapter by saying that he will come to Corinth (Lord willing) and says that he will investigate these things. Paul challenges the Corinthians to ask whether these false teachers are bearing fruit—if people are being saved by their ministry. He warns that if necessary he will come with a whip of sharp, devastating reproof. Paul shows that a congregation is a proof of a pastor’s ministry. There is a certain necessity of Christian church growth; not necessarily numerical growth but spiritual growth. God has left us a visible representation of Himself in His church, in each congregation He has called pastors to serve. We will see more of the image of Jesus in the local church than we ever could in a picture of His likeness.

What Paul is saying is what we need to hear. The important issue of recovering churches is putting the Word at the center and this happens most notably through preaching. The men who will speak this week are men who are bold in challenging men to grow in Christ. They are men who have placed preaching at the center of their ministries.

Dever concluded with an exhortation to watch for false teachers in our day—teachers who proclaim a worldly message that removes the cross as the center of the church. These men masquerade as sheep while all the while sowing a deadly seed through the body of Christ.

Following this session, Bob Kauflin led us in singing “There Is A Fountain.”

We are packed in to the Grand Ballroom of the Galt House Hotel, a huge hotel in the downtown core of Louisville, Kentucky. We’re shoulder to shoulder, knee to knee. The room is packed from back to front with men who have come to hear about the gospel. The room is filled to overflowing and the organizers had to turn away hundreds more. What a beautiful thing it is to be together for the gospel.

We are in a great ballroom. Huge chandeliers hang overhead. A lighting truss surrounds a stage that is flanked by two large screens which alternate between footage of the current speaker and shots of the audience. Immediately behind the pulpit—a small, open pulpit—is a three-part Together for the Gospel banner. A sea of chairs, stretching to the furthest reaches of the room, face the stage.

To begin the conference, Mark Dever gave away gift certificates to the man who came furthest to attend the conference (he was from India), the man who had been a pastor for the longest (50 years) and the pastor who had been the main preacher at his church the longest (45 years).

Dever explained that these men are not together on what to wear, on what pulpit to use or on what songs to sing or on what music to play. Mark suggested that if any Sovereign Grace guys are present, they be given access to the aisle seat so they can move around a little bit. They are not together on applause or on “amen’s.” The Sovereign Grace folk will surely be vocal in letting you know their agreement, Baptists will mumble a polite “amen,” whereas Presbyterians believe that silence is consent. Neither are they together on how to introduce the speakers. Mark encouraged us to make a game of this and during the week keep track of all things that these men are not together on. “Together for the ___________ [fill in the blank].” We are free to keep track of all the things they are not together on. If you are at the conference this week, feel free to post a comment with other things they are not together about.

Mark concluded his introduction with a brief explanation of the purpose of this conference. He explained that the keynote speakers—Sproul, MacArthur and Piper—were merely bait used to bring together all of these pastors—thousands of them—so they could meet together here, to form relationships with people from their local area. They are together to celebrate the centrality of the gospel and to take that focus to their church homes.

After mark left the stage, Bob Kauflin led us in a couple of hymns. This led to C.J. Mahaney taking the stage to provide a brief monologue, to explain the choice of the books we have been given thus far (The Reformed Pastor by Richard Baxter which was published 350 years ago this month and The Deliberate Church by Mark Dever and Paul Alexander along with one of three 9Marks booklets.) and to introduce his friend Mark Dever.

If you happen to be at the conference and would like to say “hello,” I am sitting immediately to the right of the sound booth. Feel free to drop by!

I have been given the great honor of liveblogging the first ever Together for the Gospel Conference. This is a conference dedicated to one thing: the centrality of the good news of Jesus Christ.

“Mark Dever, Ligon Duncan, C.J. Mahaney, and Albert Mohler minister in diverse contexts, but they are united in this: the centrality of the gospel of Jesus Christ, preached clearly and lived faithfully. Now they are coming together in a unique conference to encourage you in the sufficiency of the gospel’s power to build your local church. Special guests John MacArthur, John Piper, and R.C. Sproul will each bring a message and join in panel discussions. Come together with these men and explore what really matters in your life, church, and ministry. Come together for the gospel.”

As you read this, I am travelling to Louisville, Kentucky to participate. As with the other conferences I have blogged, I hope to allow those who cannot attend to experience just a little bit of the atmosphere. I hope to be able to provide a synopsis of each of the sessions so that you, too, can be edified by the preaching of these men of God.

So please be sure to check in through the remainder of this week. I look forward to being able to serve you, even if only in this small way. I hope and pray that the conference will be a blessing both to those who are able to attend and those who are not.

Timmy Brister, he of Provocations and Pantings fame, has been hard at work putting together a time of fellowship for bloggers who will be attending the upcoming Together For The Gospel Conference. The fellowship will take place immediately before the conference begins—on Wednesday, April 26 at 3:00 p.m. in the Heritage Hall of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Registration begins earlier that afternoon, and the bloggers event will end with sufficient time to grab a bite to eat and get to the conference early enough to get a good seat.

Details about the structure of the event are still being worked out, but it looks there will either be a speaker (and one well worth listening to) or a round-table or something worth the brief journey to the seminary. And best of all, there will be a time of fellowship where we can meet our fellow bloggers. The seminary is not far from the hotel where the conference will take place, so this event will not take you far from home base.

If you are planning on attending, you should email Timmy at gospelcentral@yahoo.com and provide your name, blog title, and a contact number. If you need directions to the seminary, click here. For Timmy’s post announcing the event, click here.

If you are able to attend, be sure to come over and say “hello!”

There is always something a little bit strange about returning from a conference. When at such a gathering one’s mind is set on a particular topic for a day, two days, five days. And what’s more, there are hundreds or thousands of other people in attendance, all of whom are focused on this same subject. For the duration of the conference a whole group of people are living in a little world nearly all their own - a little world where everyone has the same primary interest, at least for a few days.

For the past few days I, along with 3500 other men, have been thinking about preaching and about the gospel. I’ve been thinking about the challenges that face the church in the years to come and have come to an ever-deeper understanding that it is really only the church that can bring hope to the world. It is only the church that has the answers to our society’s deepest problems. And it is only godly men who can shepherd these churches.

This has been a challenging week. I have had my faith tested and sharpened. I have been challenged by men far more humble and godly and committed and sanctified than I am. I have been challenged to be a better man. A better Christian.

I don’t think I want to be a pastor, and perhaps that is the same as saying that I don’t think that God wants me to be a pastor. I’ve often wondered, you know, whether I should begin some sort of vocational ministry. I have often wondered if I should answer some type of call (whatever the “calling” is that people keep talking about) and become one of these shepherds. But having been privileged to sit through seminar after seminar, session after session, I have come to at least two conclusions.

The first conclusion is that I have a deep love and respect for pastors. Not just any pastors, mind you, but those pastors who are willing to humbly place themselves under the authority of the Word of God and submit themselves wholly, willingly to the ministry of the Word. We need pastors so desperately. Our churches are crying out for them. Christians of all ages, all denominations, are weeping in desperation for men - godly men - to lead them. They are crying aloud for men to lead them into God’s deepest truths. They are groaning in desperation for men to open the Word of God to them.

I have seen so many examples of men and women who are saved and spend a period of time in a church that does not feed them with the Word of God. These people inevitably become hungry. They know instinctively that they are lacking and famished, and may not even know what they hunger for. Yet if that hunger goes without being fed, eventually these people lose the hunger and settle into a spirituality that is based not on sound teaching from the Word but on whatever fad is being passed off as true spirituality. They find purpose and Jabez and their wild hearts, but never receive deep, satisfying teaching from God’s Word.

It is those pastors I most admire who forsake the fads and trends in Christianity and dedicate their ministries to simply teaching the Word. I hope and pray that the thousands of pastors at the Shepherd’s Conference who do just that were blessed and encouraged. I trust they believe in their hearts that faithfulness to God is so much more valuable than the praise of men.

The second conclusion I have reached through this weekend is that I am not going to be one of these pastors. I listened to Steve Lawson exhort pastors to give their lives for the church and felt my heart stir for pastors. I heard the other speakers - John MacArthur, R.C. Sproul, Al Mohler, Ligon Duncan - tell us just how badly we need a revival of pastors. I felt their passion, but not for me. My heart cried out for pastors, but I felt no tug. I looked at the priorities and desires and qualifications for these pastors and did not see myself reflected in them.

I don’t think I am cut out to be a pastor. And I think that’s okay. And it’s more than okay - it’s great.

I still want to teach. I still want to do what I can to disciple and teach and equip, but not within the scope of the pastoral ministry. I would do nearly anything to somehow be able to help these pastors do what they do, for there are few people I admire more.

I’m not certain about all of this, of course. But I guess the point is that if I traveled to California with more questions than answers, I seem to have returned with more answers than questions. And for that, I am grateful.

Just before I left the conference I spoke to Phil Johnson one last time and he mentioned that, while all of the Shepherd’s Conferences have been great, this one somehow seemed to have an epic feel to it. I cannot speak for the conferences from past years, but I also felt that this one was extraordinarily powerful and meaningful, not just for myself, but for all those I spoke to. God did some amazing things in and through that assembly of pastors, teachers and men of God. I was blessed to be a part of it.

This is the final session of the 2006 Shepherd's Conference. J. Ligon Duncan, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Jackson, Mississippi and chairman of The Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, will bring us the final address. It is interesting to see that this place has cleared out quite a bit already as clearly many of the pastors have needed to leave early to return for Sunday worship services in their home churches. Chris Taylor, a pastor with whom I enjoyed some wonderful fellowship this week, is one of them. Doug McHone has also already headed home.

I am still not entirely sure what I will do this afternoon. I will head out immediately afterwards to visit a nearby nonprofit organization, but following that I have absolutely no plans. I'm sure I will have a great afternoon and evening before my flight departs at a (revised) time of 11:30 PM.

Duncan's session will deal with gender. MacArthur suggested, when introducing the speaker, that few Evangelicals are aware of the importance of this issue. I would even suggest that few are even remotely aware that there is an issue! Dr. Duncan is an authority in the area of biblical manhood and womanhood and I look forward to hearing the message he will bring to us today.

Today's message will show that biblical manhood and womanhood is absolutely essential to discipleship within the local church. You cannot make a Christian disciple without addressing the issues of biblical manhood and womanhood.

Duncan will make five arguments for why this is the case - five reasons why biblical manhood and womanhood is crucial for discipleship. This will be based on Genesis 1 and Ephesians 5. The fundamental justification for the importance of speaking of this topic is more than just that it is part of the whole counsel of God.

Genesis 1:26-31 tells us of the creation of man. In the creation, man and woman, made in the image of God, entailed them being a walking, talking, breathing witness of God. Biblical manhood and womanhood is essential to them fulfilling their responsibility to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. They are reflecting God's truth. Their roles are essential to imaging and representing God in the world. At the outset of creation manhood and womanhood matters for man to image God in the world - to point to a reality of God. Gender, then, is part of the very reason we were created.

In Genesis 2 we see God saying "it is not good for man to be alone…" The Divine definition of being between one man and woman is rooted in these words, "for this reason." What reason? Because the Lord God fashioned a rib out of the man, brought her to the man, and said "here is Eve." Here is the helper that answers the need of fellowship. Marriage is created in the marriage order and.

Ephesians 5 is a well-known passage on this topic. It is an extraordinary passage in many ways. Men often miss the reason they are to love their wives. The job of a husband is to be an instrument in the hands of the Holy Spirit for her sanctification. We are to help prepare our wives to face the Lord. We are to live dying for our wives daily for their sanctification. When you live this out in marriage, you are a living, breathing, walking, talking illustration of union with Christ. You are the picture of the kind of relationship that Christ has with His church and that His church has with Christ. Biblical manhood and womanhood is not just a subcategory of all we do as disciples. Rather, it is an essential of our bearing witness of the sovereign God in this world and our witness of Christ's redeeming work in the world. It cannot be avoided, ignored or de-emphasized, but needs to be taught, celebrated, expressed, gloried in, advanced, an apologetic must be provided for it, it must be inculcated in the discipleship of the church. Why? There are several reasons:

Our culture is now completely egalitarian and this poses a particular challenge to the church. Christians can no longer be assumed to be instinctively complementarian. On the other hand, we look out at the culture and see even the sons of this age wiser than the next. Another conflicting indicator we get is the infringement of egalitarianism into Evangelicalism. The lines are becoming increasingly blurred so that we now have people claiming to be complementarian egalitarians.

Why is it important to address biblical manhood and womanhood?

Because men and women are different and these differences need to be recognized and taken into account in the course of Christian discipleship: It is glorious to celebrate the differences between men and women. When we say that the roles of men and women are interchangeable, we suppress the truth. The differences between men and women are part of what makes us image bearers of God and should not be apologized for!

If we celebrate biblical manhood and womanhood in the local church, our attitude ought to be vive la difference!". God made us this way and it is better than any other way. But it is so radical that it needs to be deliberately and specifically inculcated.

Because the Bible teaches so much about biblical manhood and womanhood: People sometimes argue that this is not worth discussing as there are really only six or seven dividing verses. But this issue goes far deeper, as it is rooted in creation and redemption as an essential part of what God is doing in us to display His glory. We can never ignore biblical teaching. A church that wants to be biblical, wants to make sure that women embrace the teaching of Scripture with joy and energy, and that the men will take up their responsibilities with joy and energy.

Because when biblical manhood or womanhood is ignored or not practiced, it results in disasters for marriages and families: More marriages dissolve between the husband and the wife did not embrace biblical teaching on manhood or womanhood than those that dissolve because of adultery. Unbiblical understanding of manhood and womanhood can only lead to chaos and disaster.

Because the issue of manhood and womanhood is at the very heart of the cultural transition we find ourselves in right now: The gender issues are not simply the tip of the iceberg in the cultural mega-shift we are seeing now. This pagan worldview wants to erase the creator-creature distinction. All our problems, they say, can be traced to monotheism. If God created male and female distinct, and in their living together in the roles He prepared for them, they were to image Him as the creator of all creation, and in our marriages we are to image this relationship between God and His people, what better strategy can there be than to erase the male-female relationship as a step to erasing the creator-creation relationship. This is a war plan for Satan to destroy Christianity.

Because it is one of the, if not the way that biblical authority is being undermined in our times: If you can get women's ordination, room for homosexuality, women as pastors in the churches and no male headship in the home out of the Bible, you can get anything out of the Bible. If you can get Paul's statement "I do not permit a woman to teach" to say "I do permit a woman to teach" you can make people believe anything. In this case there is nothing you cannot get out of the Bible or read into the Bible. We also undermine authority when we believe something from the Bible but refuse to teach it.

No matter how unpopular, it is the job of the pastor to teach what the Bible says to the eternal glory of God.