Over the coming days, I hope to make some short posts designed to review and reflect back on the Together for the Gospel conference.   

I’m not aiming for a full recounting of the messages, nor posting my full notes from each session, but rather looking for one thing that captured my attention from each message, and hopefully whetting your appetite to download the audio and take a listen for yourself.

So, onwards… 

T4G 08 – Session 1: Ligon Duncan - Sound Doctrine (Essential to Faithful Pastoral Ministry)

Download the audio for this message for FREE from here.

DOCTRINE MATTERS! That’s the one thing that struck me from Ligon Duncan’s message. Doctrine matters.

We live in an anti-doctrinal, anti-theology world, where doctrinal/theological truth is held in great suspicion and is under immense attack. But, as Christians we cannot escape or avoid the necessity and importance of studying systematic theology. Bad theology ruins lives, but good theology works deep into our hearts, through the power of the Holy Spirit, and produces life!

Particularly striking were four reasons Ligon Duncan gave for why it is vital to study systematic theology:

1. For God’s glory (Romans 11:33-36)
2. For our assurance (John 15:15)
3. For knowing how to live (e.g. marriage – Eph 5:25)
4. For joy (Philippians 3:1)

Doctrine matters. The challenge I took away is, am I digging deeply and studying the truth of God’s Word and bringing it to bear on my life, my family and in the church I serve? It’s hard work, but the rewards are worth it!

Here’s a short clip of Ligon Duncan’s message:

Today (Friday 25th April) 13 of us leave to join up with 40+ others from Christchurch and Sovereign Grace Church Merthyr for “The Choice“, the Sovereign Grace UK Singles weekend away at Cefn Lea Conference Centre in Newtown, Powys.  

Please pray for for everyone going, that we would encounter God through the worship, teaching and fellowship, and that we would seeing lasting change in our lives.

I’m sure the audio messages will be available following this weekend, but for now here’s the planned run down of sessions and titles:

Session 1 – The Call to Follow Jesus (Pete Greasley)
Session 2 – The Cost of Following Jesus (Nathan Smith)
Session 3 – The Joy of Following Jesus (Dave Taylor)
Session 4 – Following Jesus in a ‘Post-Modern’ World (Gareth Lloyd)
Session 5 – The Choice to Follow Jesus (Pete Greasley)

Having now returned from T4G and got back in the swing of things, over the coming days I hope to make a few posts detailing the trip and the conference messages. 

For now, all the excellent messages are available to listen to or download for FREE from here.   

Yesterday, Peter and I made the 4+ hours trip from Bristol to Pwllheli, North Wales to take in a day of the New Word Alive conference.  It’s run/hosted by UCCF and the Keswick Convention.  

2008 is the first year of this new conference, which came about through a parting of the ways between Spring Harvest and UCCF over serious doctrinal disagreements (more here for those interested).  

This year, the conference has been served by the exceptional teaching gifts of Terry Virgo, John Piper and Don Carson, with a choice of a host of morning and afternoon seminars taught (mainly) by UCCF staff.   We managed to get up to Pwllheli about mid-day and took in an afternoon seminar on evangelism, taught by Roger Carswell, and the evening session by John Piper.  As you might expect, John Piper was in exceptional, Spirit-anointed form!  He preached the second part of his 2 messages on “Treasuring Christ and Suffering” from Romans 8.   

The audio/DVD’s of the sessions are being made available shortly, although you can freely download and listen to Piper’s first message here.

For further details of the conference let me point you to some links so you can benefit from all that’s been happening.

For Adrian Warnock, this conference was a “working gig” and he has blogged his reflections/notes/interviews here:

NWA08 – A Conference is Born

NWA08 – Terry Virgo Preaching Grace

NWA08 – Don Carson on 1 John (Part 1)

NWA08 – Don Carson on 1 John (Part 2)

NWA08 – John Piper “Treasuring Christ & Suffering” (Part 1)

NWA08 – John Piper “Treasuring Christ & Suffering” (Part 2)

Here’s the audio for Sunday’s message just gone, entitled “The Disciple’s Prayer” from Luke 11:1-13.

CALLING ALL THOSE GOING TO T4G FROM THE UK!

The good people at the T4G registration team reliably inform me that there are 20+ people attending the conference from the UK. The 3 Sovereign Grace Churches from the UK (including the guests we are taking with us) account for only half that number, so we are looking for the others!

We’d love to try and get together with you and make contact with everyone from this side of the pond (similar to what Tim Challies is arranging for the Canadians!)

So, if you are from the UK and attending the TOGETHER FOR THE GOSPEL 2008 please drop me an email at nathan@gracechurchbristol.org or leave a comment on this post and we’ll try our best to make arrangements!