Blessed are those whose delight in God’s law is evidenced by their constant chewing and tasting of its eternal truths. For more meditations and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
This is my discussion of the fourth and fifth chapters of Thomas Watson's book, Heaven Taken by Storm , from 2020. Visit bcnewton.co for more resources for knowing and loving God's Word. Questions for Reflection What does Watson mean by hearing the Word? Do you attend to the hearing of the Word with the devotion that he describes? Are your prayers marked by holy violence? Which of Watson’s points to consider most stirs up your heart to and in prayer?...
It is our responsibility as parents to instruct our children how to guard against the wiles of the world while also preserving their innocence. We do our children no favor by presenting a fantasy of the world as harmless to our children. For more rooted theology for the unwithered church, visit bcnewton.co
Blessed are those who delight in God’s law, for by it they behold the Blessed One. For more meditations and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
Dead Men Preaching is a monthly series aimed at bringing sermons from the past into the ears of the present. This month's sermon is by Jonathan Edwards on procrastination, his text being Proverbs 27:1: Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. For more sermons and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
That is the question that every preacher must ask, and he must answer that question for himself in accordance with the wisdom of the Spirit. I know plenty of faithful fellow preachers on both sides of the question. Even so, here is my experience attempting to answer the question. To read this article and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
Blessed are those who turn away from the seat of scoffers, choosing to prize rather than ridicule the wisdom of God. For more meditations and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
This is my discussion of the second and third chapters of Thomas Watson's book, Heaven Taken by Storm , from 2020. Visit bcnewton.co for more resources for knowing and loving God's Word. Chapter Two Outline Mortification of Sin Provocation to Duty Chapter Three Outline Each paragraph in this chapter is essentially its own attempt to give us “a right notion of Scripture” so that our desire would be to read it diligently. Read the Word as…a book made by God Himself. a perfect rule of faith. a soul...
In 1968, Paul Ehrlich published his bestselling book, The Population Bomb , which predicted the apocalyptic death of millions in the 70s and 80s as the result of over-population. Surely you have heard the nutshell of his argument before: the earth and its resources simply cannot sustain humanity’s ever-growing population. Sixty years later, the fact that nearly all of his predictions have failed to come true did not stop the now ninety-year-old from doubling-down on the disaster of over-populati...
Blessed are those who avoid the way of sinners, who turn away from the path of evil and pursue the wisdom and righteousness of the LORD. To read this meditation and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
This is my discussion of the first chapter of Thomas Watson's book, Heaven Taken by Storm , from 2020. Visit bcnewton.co for more resources for knowing and loving God's Word. Chapter Outline Introducing the text (pp. 1-3) Violence Concerning Magistrates (pp. 3-4)In punishing the guilty (p. 3) In defending the innocent (pp. 3-4) Violence Concerning Christians (pp. 4-7) What this violence is not (pp. 4-5)An ignorant violence (p. 4) A bloody violence (pp. 4-5)Toward oneself Toward another What this...
The only way not to walk in the counsel of the wicked is to walk according to the counsel of the Scriptures . To read this meditation and other resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
Here is a brief introduction to the book Heaven Taken by Storm , its author Thomas Watson, and the Puritans in general. For more resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
Wise men and women somberly, but boldly, look death in the face, praying for God’s grace to keep them from wasting their limited time here on earth. To read this article and other resources, visit bcnewton.co
Indeed, the blessed man is the focal point of the psalm, and he is described by action ( meditating on God’s law), by comparison ( like a tree ), and in contrast to the wicked . Biblically, to be blessed is to be favored by God. Conversely, the wicked are disconnected from God, still “alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds” ( Colossians 1:21 ). To belong to God means being blessed, wise, and alive, while rejecting God is wickedness, foolishness, and death. And each and every person must...
The first Sunday of each month I will be recording sermons from church history for a series called Dead Men Preaching. I recorded a reading of this sermon by Thomas Watson back in 2020 whenever our church read through Heaven Taken by Storm together. Titled “Parting Counsels”, Watson delivered this message to his church after the Act of Uniformity ejected him from the pastorate. The best place to read this and other sermons from this time is Sermons of the Great Ejection from the Puritan Paperbac...
From Israel’s enslavement in Egypt to their wondrous crossing of the Red Sea, the first fourteen chapters of Exodus are some of the most well-known stories in all of Scripture, which added a degree of gravity to preaching through them last year. Yet, as is almost always the case, well-known is a bit of a misnomer. It would probably be more accurate to say that we think that we know exodus story. The reality is that most of us remember the broad story beats: slavery, Moses in a basket, burning bu...
My goal is not to say all that could be said about Psalm 1; instead, I simply hope to present enough thought on each phrase of this psalm to provoke further meditation in you, the reader. I pray that you take these nuggets of Scripture, easily memorized, and ponder them in your heart and mind throughout the day and week. For more meditations and resources for knowing and loving God's Word, visit bcnewton.co
God’s execution of judgment upon the gods of Egypt was not simply upon an abstraction but upon the actual demons that reveled in such worship. The LORD judged them by exposing them as the frauds, the vanities, that they are. They called themselves divine, masquerading as being sovereign over particular domains of creation, yet Yahweh displayed with each sign that He “is the blessed and only Sovereign” (1 Timothy 6:15). To read this article as well as other resources for knowing and loving Script...
Proverbs 1-9 and Song of Songs certainly can be seen as giving a similar message with emphasis toward boys and girls respectively. Yet rather than seeing Proverbs 31 as a boy-centered conclusion to Proverbs, I believe it provides a significant meeting of those two themes. To read this article and more resources, visit bcnewton.co
While Exodus does not explicitly give a reason, it certainly comes pretty close to doing so. Consider God’s words to Pharaoh in Exodus 9:16, while warning of the plague of hail: “But for this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.” God could have erased all of Egypt in the blink of an eye. He could have rained fire and sulfur upon them until the whole country was nothing but ash and dust, just as He did to Sodom and Gomorrah . Howe...
These six principles that governed how Henry commented upon Scripture should, likewise, govern how we read Scripture. Read to this article and other resources, visit bcnewton.co
Even if we were to study a book of the Bible one verse at a time, there would still be no way extracting every nugget of truth and wisdom from its pages, so given the pace with which we will be studying Exodus (often moving one chapter or more per week), there will obviously be many items of discussion that we will simply will not have time to dive into on Sunday mornings. I hope to present the most significant and interesting of these in articles called An Exodus Excursus later in the week, whi...
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A common assumption seems to be that forgiveness of a debt means simply wiping it out of existence altogether as if it never happened at all. Unfortunately, that is not how debt works. To read this article and other resources, visit bcnewton.co
Grumbling, like all other sins, brings judgment and destruction. Yet the danger with grumbling is that, again, it comes naturally to us all as well as being so easy to excuse and even justify. For example, have you ever began to complain by saying something like "I just need to vent for a minute"? Or maybe you end by saying facetiously, "Sorry for the rant!" What is really being said is, "Grant me moral immunity to grumble for a moment." To read this article and other resources, visit bcnewton.c...
While the culture war continues to rage, I would like to very briefly ask my brothers and sisters in Christ to poke our heads above the fray of headlines and to consider the years ahead and how they might impact our actions today. To read this article and more resources, visit bcnewton.co
After last reading of the pilgrims’ assault and triumph over Giant Despair and of their coming to the Delectable Mountains and what the Shepherds there revealed to them, we come now to the end of their journey and to the end of John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress. In these final pages, the company meets two more worthy pilgrims, Mr. Valiant-for-truth and Mr. Steadfast. They also pass through the Enchanted Ground into Beulah Land, where Christiana and many others are summoned to cross the River ...
In our previous reading, Christiana and her ever-increasing company of pilgrims added Feeble-mind and Ready-to-Halt as well as Gaius' daughter, Phoebe, as James' wife. They then came to the town of Vanity and stayed in the house of Mnason, finding the town much less hostile to pilgrims that it was during Christian’s time. While staying there, Great-heart and several other worthy men fought back a great monster that had periodically plagued the town. In our present reading, the pilgrims continue ...
When we last left Christiana and her companions, they added another pilgrim to their party, an older man named Honest, and then came upon the house of Gaius, where they were able to stay for over a month. We pick up the story once more with the pilgrims still resting in Gaius' house. Here we will read of how Gaius employed Great-heart's service in ridding the land of a fearsome giant named Slay-good, how they met another pilgrim named Feeble-mind, and how, after leaving Gaius, they came to the t...
