By Tim Frank
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Carthage

Focal Passage: Luke 1:26-35

Merry Christmas!

This is the week we have looked forward to throughout the year. The retail stores began decorating for this season well before Thanksgiving. Christmas presents have been bought and wrapped in many homes for weeks. In fact, most church and community Christmas events have come and gone. All that remains is the celebration of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Each year, we are reminded of the hustle and bustle of Christmas. The excessive spending and the constant activity of the season can cause one to miss the true meaning of the season. On this Sunday before Christmas, may we slow down and focus on the One whose birth we celebrate.  Let us remember Jesus and worship Him as the literal, physical, and eternal Son of God. [Read more…]

By Tim Frank
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Carthage

Focal Passage: John 1:14-18; 8:30-32; 18:36-38

When my older daughter was in high school, one of her assignments was a debate on absolute truth. She had the side in favor of absolute truth.

In order to make the argument for absolute truth, she had to first establish there is one God who is Lord of all, maker of all and above all. Once established, the one true God is absolute truth and what He says is absolute truth. Apart from God, there is no absolute truth. In Him, there is absolute truth. [Read more…]

By Tim Frank
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Carthage

Focal Passage: Psalm 19:1-6; 111:7-10 

I remember as a boy walking to the deer stand on cold, clear mornings, well before the sun began to dawn. On those nights, away from the lights of town, the stars filled the sky with an occasional shooting star passing in sight. Those were times of wonder and awe as I looked into the vastness of space. I could see the visible wonders of the universe and knew in my heart there is a God who created it all.  

Many years have passed since those carefree days of discovery. Yet, through these years, my wonder and awe of the creative power of God has grown.  As pictures from telescopes and space voyages reveal, the universe is much larger than we can see or grasp.  With hundreds of millions of stars in our galaxy alone, the next nearest to our sun being 4.2 light years away, truly we can proclaim with the Psalmist in Psalm 19:1, “The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork.” 

The universe, the sun, the stars and all creation are examples of what scholars call “General Revelation.” They give a witness to every person on the planet that there is a God. They do not use words or language, their voice is not heard, but the message is loud and clear. There is a God who is majestic, caring, creative, detail oriented and dependable.  [Read more…]

By Tim Frank
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Carthage

Focal Passage: Jude 1-4, 20-25

My wife is a software engineer with a company in Southern California. Every day she works diligently, searching through hundreds of lines of computer code, looking for errors in the code.  Her job is to make sure the code is not corrupted; corruption would cause a complete breakdown of the system. A complete breakdown is called a computer crash.

Jude, the brother of James and half-brother of Jesus, challenges all Christians to work diligently to defend the faith from corruption. He uses strong language as he exhorts believers to contend earnestly for the faith that has been delivered to the saints. He calls for followers of Jesus to fight with all their might to keep error and falsehood from creeping into the doctrines of the church. [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill

Focal Passage: 1 Thessalonians 5:12-22

“A party of pioneers on the Oregon Trail suffered for weeks from a scarcity of water and grass for their animals. Most of the wagons had broken down, causing endless delays in the stifling heat. A feeling of fretfulness and futility prevailed. Optimism and cheer were gone. Courage was in limited supply.

“One night the leaders called a meeting to air complaints. When they gathered around the campfire, one man stood up and said, ‘Before we commence our grief session, don’t you think we should at least first thank God that He has brought us this far with no loss of life, with no serious trouble from the Indians and that we have enough strength left to finish our journey?’ [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill

Focal Passage: John 11:1-4, 38-45

When I was 8 years old, a lady named Maureen Ellis came to my grandfather’s mobile home park (we called it a trailer park back then) and led a Vacation Bible School-type event in the laundry room that was attached to the bathhouse.

Most mobile homes did not have bathrooms in those days, much less laundry rooms. The situation was less than ideal as women came in and out doing their laundry. But Mrs. Ellis made the best of it and shared the love of Christ with several of us kids during that week.

As a result, I began attending Ivy Memorial Baptist Church in Nashville. A friend and I would sit on the second row and try to out-sing the choir — in quantity if not in quality. I eventually invited Christ into my life at age 9. [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill 

Focal Passage: Romans 8:26-32 

The late Dr. Howard G. Hendricks, professor at Dallas Theological Seminary for 60 years, often spoke at conferences and seminars around the country. I have several of his messages on cassette tape. On one of them he tells about meeting an acquaintance and asking him how he was doing. The other person replied that he was okay under the circumstances. Dr. Hendricks shot back, “What are you doing under there?”

It seems as if there is an overwhelming number of circumstances that surround us on a continual basis. Not only is the number overwhelming but some of the individual circumstances seem overwhelming.  [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill

Focal Passage: 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 

The following illustration comes from Illustrations for Biblical Preaching, WordSearch Bible Software. 

“A modern army is fitted with a strategic mix of various weapons to maximize its effectiveness in fulfilling its purpose. Some soldiers receive a rifle and some are given pistols or ride in a tank armed with a cannon and machine guns. Others operate missiles, jet fighters, bombers or ships. To win the war, it takes the unified effects of all these weapons, operated by the shared efforts of all the variously equipped soldiers.

“God, as the wise Commander-in-Chief in our spiritual warfare, has likewise given to each of His children in the body of Christ spiritual gifts so that they can work together to be effective in fulfilling His will. And, as in a physical war, if Christian “soldiers” work together and use their gifts, the task of the church on earth will be accomplished.” [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill

Focal Passage: 1 Corinthians 2:6-16

Pastor and author Gordon MacDonald once wrote, “I used to struggle with [overconfident intelligentsia] while living in Boston. I would leave the town of Lexington, where my family and I lived, and I would drive past the towers of Harvard University. Another mile down the road, on the left, sits the campus of MIT, and to the right, the campus of Boston University. Straight ahead were the towering headquarters of many great multinational corporations.

“There were moments when I was tempted to be intimidated by these unmitigated, unadulterated symbols of power. Here were great world leaders being trained in the business school at Harvard. [Read more…]

By Jerry Price
Retired Pastor, Spring Hill

Focal Passage: Psalm 19:7-14

One of my favorite hobbies is woodworking. I have a few power tools which either came with a printed owner’s manual or one I downloaded from the Internet. Each manual begins with a statement similar to this: “Please read, understand and follow all instructions included in this book.”

Then follows three to five pages of detailed safety instructions that apply to that tool. Without exception, there are some of those instructions which include strong warnings that failure to follow them may lead to serious injury or even death. [Read more…]