Christ Church

Grace & Peace: Revelation 86

Douglas Wilson on

“At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16:11).

“And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication” (Rev. 14:8).

This is the first place in the Revelation where the name Babylon makes its entrance. The Babylon that is introduced in this place has her fall actually described a few chapters later, in chapter 18. A great deal of ink has been spilled in trying to identify this Babylon, and both here and in the sections that follow I will hazard my reasons for supposing Babylon to be Jerusalem—the city doomed to destruction throughout the course of this entire book.

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Bible Challenge #24

Becky Pliego on

¡Hola, hola! Time to re-group, Friends, and time to remember why we are doing this challenge.  Remember where we started? Yes, Psalm 119. We read of the Psalmist’s love for God’s Word. Of the way his heart, and soul, and flesh longed for it.  We read how the Psalmist, through being in the Word, came to understand the fear of the Lord and clung to His testimonies. We saw Him praying, struggling, asking God to incline his heart to His testimonies and not to selfish gain. He wanted to know God more, to understand the Word of the Lord more, to obey Him more. And that is why we are here. Because we want that in our own lives. We are not reading to check boxes, we are reading because we know that if we don’t feed our souls and minds with the Word of God we will starve. And this is not hyperbole, this is true. So, as you see, we need this reminder, we must not forget that this challenge is not about us feeling good for keeping up with our readings; the goal of the challenge is to be able to come before God with a humble heart, putting aside all our cares and perfectionism to pray every day: Lord, I need you, feed me with your Word. May my life be a testimony of how much I love your Word.

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Communication Strategy

Christ Church on

Dear Congregation,

As we grow in size as a congregation, communication challenges also increase. Our church community is about the size of the city of Troy, so we need to be aware of this as we send and receive communication. In Jim Wilson’s Principles of War, one of the key components of an effective battle strategy is communication. The elders, staff, and deacons of Christ Church recognize that as our church grows (alongside the growing sister ministries of Christ Church), not only the difficulty, but also the need for effective communication grows. We do want to strive to be efficient and effective our communication to you.

There are a couple challenges to be aware of as we work on building better communication in our community. First, with technology comes multiple channels for communication. These channels include cell phones (text/calls), Facebook messenger, email, and of course other various forms of social media. If we really aren’t careful, we could have channel overload, which adds to the challenge of how to maximize our communication and what channels to use to make sure everyone receives adequate church communication. Secondly, when there is a serious matter to be communicated to the church, we do not want to put this out over email. Obviously, some communication is for our church body only, and would be inappropriate to be publicly distributed. So, in the cases of sensitive information, we try to use head of household meetings for this type of communication. Lastly, communication is a two-way street. This means the church needs to be communicating to the best of our abilities, and active engagement from the congregation with the proper channels of communication is also necessary.

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Grace & Peace: Revelation 85

Douglas Wilson on

“At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16:11).

“And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters” (Rev. 14:6–7).

We should first consider the fact that in this place the gospel is being proclaimed by a flying angel in the midst of the sky. We know from the record of Scripture that the gospel was fundamentally entrusted to the church, and not to angels (Matt. 28:18-20). But the fact that men are the ordinary preachers of gospel does not require the angels to be silent about it, as in this instance the angel isn’t. When Paul chides the Galatians for drifting away from the gospel, he says this: “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed” (Gal. 1:8). The problem here was that it was a different gospel, and not the fact that it was preached by an angel. So ordinarily men are to preach the gospel, but this proclamation from the heavens fits in with what we are taught elsewhere.

We are coming to the climax of God’s wrath being poured out over Jerusalem, and Jesus had predicted this very thing before that destruction. “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come” (Matt. 24:14). This angel speaks to all nations—to “them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.” This is a sign that the demolition of Jerusalem is about to happen.

This angel preaches, it says, with a “loud voice.” What is the content of what he says? What is the shape of this everlasting gospel? What the angel says here fits in with what we are taught elsewhere. He says that men are to “fear God” (Luke 1:50; Luke 12:5). “But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him” (Acts 10:35). He says that men must “give glory to him” (Matt. 5:16; Matt. 9:8). “Insomuch that the multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see: and they glorified the God of Israel” (Matt. 15:31). He says that “the hour of his judgment is come” (John 12:23, 31-32). “And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: Of sin, because they believe not on me; Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged” (John 16:8–11). And as we saw in the first chapters of Genesis, the God of the gospel is the God who made all things—whether “heaven, and earth, and the sea,” or “the fountains of waters.”

In short, what the angel declared in the preparation for Jerusalem’s destruction sounds very much like what the apostle Paul declared.

“God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device. And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent: Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead” (Acts 17:24–31).

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