Series
Rev. Jerry Hamstra
The Book of Esther
The Book of Esther
Sermons
Rev. Jerry Hamstra
Introduction to Acts
Introduction to Acts

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs (4) Faith, Reason and Knowledge (2)

“Evolution cannot rationally account for anything because of the huge role it gives to chance, but it certainly cannot account for the deeper spiritual and psychological and moral aspects of human life. The jump from nothing to something and then from random something to orderly something, and then from orderly physical stuff to the profound spiritual, psychological and moral aspects of life is a whole list of impossibilities. At the end of the day our experience of life is nothing like what you would expect if the secular worldview were true.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

The Fifth Commandment (8) Authority and the State

“As we have been seeing in our studies of the Fifth Commandment, we are to submit to those whom God has placed in authority over us and that doing so is for our good – it is the way of life and blessing. But as we have also seen along the way is that that is sometimes problematic because authority is often misused and abused because all authority figures are sinners and many of them are not saved. There is an awful lot of suffering in the world because of the abuse of authority.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs (3) Faith, Reason and Knowledge

“ If you do not start your thinking with the God of the Bible, it is impossible to give a reasonable account of the world and the big questions of life. You don’t start with reason and reason your way to God. You start with God and show that any reasoning about ultimate things that does not start with God is actually irrational. ”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

The Fifth Commandment (7) Authority in the Church

“The requirement of believers in Jesus Christ to submit to the oversight of elders requires them to be members of a specific congregation. The biblical teaching about salvation includes church membership and not submitting to church membership is direct disobedience to the clear teaching of the word of God.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs (2) The Conforming Power of Society and the Biblical Answer

“We live in a secular world that teaches that all that matters is our lives in the here and now. The Bible teaches us that the most important thing for human beings is how they relate to the God of the Bible. And what we will see the more that we study the Bible and ourselves and the world around us is that the world of which we are a part reflects perfectly the word of its Creator.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

The Fifth Commandment (6) Honor to whom Honor is Due

“We are to honor other people appropriately because we are all made in the image of God. That gives value to every human being and we are to acknowledge that value in the way that we think of one another and in the attitudes that we have towards one another and in the way that we treat one another. We are to show them respect as people who are valuable and significant because they are made in the image of God.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs (1) Destroying Arguments Raised Against the Knowledge of God

“One of the secular beliefs that we will have to address is the belief that the secular world-view is based on reason alone while the biblical world-view is based on a faith that is not reasonable. Part of demolishing arguments raised against God is to show that no-one believes what they believe on the basis of reason alone. There are many factors that go into why we believe what we believe and one of the factors that is very powerful is the company that we keep, the society in which we live and the desire to be accepted and admired by people that we admire.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs

Biblical Responses to Secular Beliefs

In Romans 12:2, we are told “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind….” This series of sermons will consider a number of biblical themes that address some of the beliefs of the secular worldview that are so influential in our society. The goal of this series is that with the Lord’s blessing it may contribute to keeping us from being “led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (2 Corinthians 11:3).

The Fifth Commandment (5) Submit to One Another

Read: Ephesians 5:1-21
Text: verse 21

“In biblical thought the freedom of individualism is really bondage and the submission to God and to the obligations of belonging to the body of Christ is really freedom. True freedom in biblical terms is not freedom to express ourselves and to do whatever we want to do, it is living as God has designed us to live and that involves a significant dose of self-denial and submitting to the demands and constraints of our relationships with other people.”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra

Living with Realism and Hope in our Time

“The application for us as we face a new year is, “Do not be complacent. Do not take it for granted that you are not being pulled into the current of worldly thinking and worldly living. Think very seriously about your life and values and priorities in the light of biblical teaching.” One of the common themes of the best Christian literature on this subject is that the only Christians who will survive in the current environment are those who go deep – that is those who are serious about their relationship with the Lord...”
— Rev. Jerry Hamstra