May 12, 2019
SOVEREIGN GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH
MEETING LOCATION
251 Green Lane
Ewing, NJ, 08368
Clay Curtis, pastor
Telephone: 615-513-4464
Clay@FreeGraceMedia.com
MAILING ADDRESS:
7 Birch Street
Pennington, NJ, 08538
Schedule of Services
Sunday 10: 15 AM Bible Class
Sunday 11:00 AM Morning Service
Thursday 7: 30 PM Midweek Service
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NURSERY
We have a nursery equipped with a
digital flat screen television broadcasting all services live, for children
four and under.
All
articles by the pastor unless otherwise noted.
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SUBSCRIBE TO OUR YOUTUBE WEBSITE: The videos are now listed as individual
sermons, as well as full services—click here.
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Proverbs
13: 8: The ransom of a man’s life are
his riches: but the poor heareth not rebuke.
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THE
LESSON LEARNED AT THE POTTER’S HOUSE
“Arise, and go down to the potter's
house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words.” (Jeremiah 18:2)
When Jeremiah went to the potter’s house the Lord taught him that all
men are in the hand of God to do with as He pleases. If any of us will be saved we must learn that
same lesson. God is not in our hand to
decide if we will let Him save us or not. We are in God’s hand. He decides what He will do with us. God does not have to have mercy on you or
me. If God saves me He will be just in
doing it. If God damns me He will be
equally just in doing it. God is
sovereign so does as He pleases. Thank God
He has been pleased to have mercy on sinners and save them by His grace through
the glorious Person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Pastor
Frank Tate
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“NOT
EVERY ONE”
Matthew
7:21
The
Lord Jesus Christ spoke in Matthew 7, verses 21-23, words, which are to me,
some of the most sober, startling in the Bible. H e says that there will be,
not a few, but many who will stand before him at the last day, fully expecting
to enter heaven, to whom he shall say: ”Depart
from me.” So it is not enough to say I’m a believer, just about everybody does
that, I must truly be one. And only Jesus Christ can make me one. If I do not know Jesus Christ, may he convince
me of it now and reveal himself to me, instead of being convinced when it’s
forever too late. Pastor
Larry Criss
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THE
RAINBOW
Genesis
8: 20-22; 9: 8-17
Whether
young or old one thing that causes excitement for us all is to look up in the
sky and behold a rainbow. What is its
spiritual meaning of the rainbow? God
made a covenant with Noah that he would never again destroy the world with a
flood. As a token of that covenant, God
set the rainbow in the sky. Each time
you see the rainbow in the cloud remember that God promises, “While the earth remaineth, seedtime and
harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not
cease.” (Gen 8: 22) God promises, “Neither
shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall
there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.” (Gen 9: 11)
The covenant that God made with Noah, of which
the rainbow is a reminder, points us to the everlasting covenant of grace which
God makes with his people in Christ. After
the ark bore the flood of God’s justice, “Noah
builded an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every
clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the LORD smelled a
sweet savour.” (Gen 8: 20-21) Like as Noah built an altar, Christ is
himself our Altar. Noah made a sacrifice
and offering; Christ is himself the sacrifice and offering for the sins of his
people. The fire of God consumed Noah’s
sacrifice; the fire of God’s justice came down upon Christ in the room and
stead of his people but Christ consumed the fire. God smelled a sweet-savour in
Noah’s offering; in Christ’s one offering God smelled a sweet-savour (Eph 5: 2). So
in Noah’s sacrifice, we see Christ the Lamb for whose sake God will not curse
his people, “And the LORD smelled a sweet
savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any
more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more
every thing living, as I have done. And God blessed Noah and his sons,…And God
spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying, And I, behold, I establish
my covenant with you, and with your seed after you…neither shall all flesh be
cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a
flood to destroy the earth” (Ge 8:
20-21; 9:1, 8-9; 11; Eph 1: 3-12).
So we see how God’s promise to Noah
typifies the everlasting covenant of grace. Therefore, believer, each time you see a
rainbow in the sky remember God promises, “In
a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting
kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the LORD thy Redeemer. For this is as the waters of Noah unto me: for
as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so
have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the
mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not
depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the
LORD that hath mercy on thee. (Isa 54:7-10)
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ASSURANCE
OF GOD’S COVENANT
God said
to Noah, “I do set my bow in the cloud,
and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. (Ge
9:12-13)
First, the rainbow is God’s token of his
covenant that he will not destroy the earth with a flood anymore. But our assurance of the everlasting covenant
of grace is that God the Father has set Christ in the heavens like as he set
the rainbow in the cloud, “Who was
delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.” (Ro
4:25) Our risen Redeemer is himself the Covenant God has given to his
people to assure us we are established in his grace (Isa 49:8). John described Christ’s appearance, “And I saw another mighty angel come down
from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his
face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire” (Rev 10: 1.)
Secondly, God said, “And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that
the bow shall be seen in the cloud.” (Gen 9: 14) The rainbow is the shining
of the sun’s beams which seen only against the dark backdrop of a cloud; God
brings the cloud over the earth for the purpose of showing us the glory of the
sun in the rainbow. Likewise, God’s
glory in Christ is only seen against the dark backdrop of sin; sin is the dark
cloud which came over the earth by God’s design just so we could see “the light of the knowledge of the glory of
God in the face of Christ Jesus.” (2 Cor 4: 6) When Ezekiel saw God’s
throne, he saw God’s glory in Christ Jesus and described his appearance, “As the appearance of the bow that is in the
cloud in the day of rain, so was
the appearance of the brightness round about. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD” (Eze
1:28). So our assurance is God’s glory which we behold in Christ against
the dark backdrop of sin like as we behold the sun shine in the rainbow against
the dark backdrop of the cloud.
Lastly, our assurance is not in our beholding
Christ but in God our Father beholding Christ. God said, “And
the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the
everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is
upon the earth” (Gen 9: 16). On the day of Passover, God promised, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you”
(Ex 12: 13). As the rainbow is
between us and God, Christ is between God and all his people. When God looks upon Christ he is reminded of
his covenant because this is how he sees Christ, “And immediately I was in the spirit: and, behold, a throne was set in
heaven, and one sat on the
throne. And he that sat was to look upon
like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there
was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald” (Re
4:2-3). Christ our Covenant is ever
before God with a rainbow round about the throne therefore God “will ever be mindful of his covenant” (Ps
111: 5).