http://www.trinityopcnovato.org Serving Novato, Marin County, California and the World Wide Web. This site provides information about the Christian ministry of Trinity Presbyterian Church, OPC. This site also broadcasts the latest sermons and Sunday schools from Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) in Novato, CA. Our sermons seek to exposit Scripture, preaching Christ and the cross, and understanding the impact and demand of the Word on our lives. Thu, 09 Feb 2012 23:54:18 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Copyright © by W. Reid Hankins and Trinity Presbyterian Church, 2011 info@trinityopcnovato.org (Rev. W. Reid Hankins) info@trinityopcnovato.org (Rev. W. Reid Hankins) Religion & Spirituality:Christianity 1440 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/wp-content/plugins/podpress/images/tpc-vertical144.jpg http://www.trinityopcnovato.org 144 144 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/?feed=podcast Sermons and Sunday Schools Serving Novato, Marin County, California and the World Wide Web. This feed broadcasts the latest sermons and Sunday schools from Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) in Novato, CA. Our sermons seek to exposit Scripture, preaching Christ and the cross, and understanding the impact and demand of the Word on our lives. Church, Novato, Marin, Hankins, Sermon, Christian, OPC, San Rafael Rev. W. Reid Hankins Rev. W. Reid Hankins info@trinityopcnovato.org no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/07/17/hand/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/07/17/hand/#comments Mon, 18 Jul 2011 04:33:29 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/?p=1428 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/07/17/hand/feed/ 0 0:00:01 Sermon preached on 1 Peter 4:7-11 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 7/17/2011 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. 1 Peter 4:7-11 7/17/11 “End of All Things is at Hand” The[...] Sermon preached on 1 Peter 4:7-11 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 7/17/2011 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. 1 Peter 4:7-11 7/17/11 “End of All Things is at Hand” The “End is Near.” If you see someone holding a cardboard sign with those words hand written on it, it’s likely you might scoff a bit inside. We’re used to seeing on TV or movies all sorts of doomsdays preachers that hold up signs like that or shout that in the city streets. Just recently Harold Camping and his followers said such things, and are still essentially saying such things. Others have before them as well. But let us be clear. We can disagree with Harold Camping setting a date. We might disagree with the approach and tone of people holding up cardboards signs. But the biblical truth is that indeed the end is near. That’s our very first verse for today. Verse 7 says here, “But the end of all things is at hand.” The NIV translates that as “The end of all things is near.” Same thing. Not just of some things. The end of all things has drawn near. That’s a biblical truth. And Peter says it should inform how we live right now. And so this will be our study for today. We’ll consider first the nearness of the end. Second, we’ll consider the general response commended here, based on this reality. In other words, how do we live in light of the end of the world. Third, we’ll hone in on one of those responses – we’ll consider in more detail the serious and watchful prayer commended in verse 7. Let’s begin with considering the nearness of the end. That’s verse 7′s bold pronouncement. Since Peter said this about 2000 years ago, it’s a fair question to ask what he meant by this. If the end was so near back then, how come it hasn’t come yet? So in this first point, I want us to understand in what sense the end has drawn near. Let’s start with the translation. The NKJV does a very good job with the translation here. To say that the end of all things is at hand, it to say how the end has drawn near. It expresses in one sense, the imminence and closeness of it, while at the same time acknowledging that’s it not here yet. Jesus used this exact same language with regard to the coming of the kingdom. The gospels start out recording Jesus saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.” Well, I think there’s a helpful parallel there in thinking about the kingdom of God being at hand, and the end of all things being at hand. These things are closely connected. At the final end of all things, that’s when the kingdom of God will come in its fullness. And yet when Jesus teaches about the coming of the kingdom, we see there is a present dimension to it as well. There’s a sense in which the kingdom has come already through Christ’s ministry, especially his death and resurrection. His kingdom rule already operates by his Spirit and through his church, reigning from heaven at the right hand of God. His kingdom advances ever forward on earth, having a definitive victory already over Satan at the cross, as souls are won for him. And yet there’s clearly a sense in which the kingdom of glory has not come yet. That will happen in its fullness on Christ’s return. And so Christ’s kingdom has come, already, and not yet. It’s so imminently at hand, that in part we already taste of it, though not in its final fullness and glory. Well, that’s very similar with the end of all things. The New Testament talks about us being in the last days. Let me mention just a few. John says in 1 John 2:18 that it is the last hour. Hebrews 1:2 says that we are in the last days. James 5:3 says we are in the last days. It’s the implication of Jude 1:17 and Paul in 2 Timothy 3:15. [...] Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/05/08/evangelism-prayer-support/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/05/08/evangelism-prayer-support/#comments Sun, 08 May 2011 22:32:15 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/?p=1335 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/05/08/evangelism-prayer-support/feed/ 0 0:32:29 Adult Sunday School class led by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 05/08/2011 in Novato, CA. This week we continues our series on evangelism and discussed prayer and evangelism. Adult Sunday School class led by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 05/08/2011 in Novato, CA. This week we continues our series on evangelism and discussed prayer and evangelism. Evangelism Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/01/30/abba-father/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/01/30/abba-father/#comments Mon, 31 Jan 2011 06:32:41 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/?p=1204 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2011/01/30/abba-father/feed/ 0 0:36:57 Sermon preached on Romans 8:12-30 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 1/30/2011 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. Romans 8:12-30 2/30/11 “Abba, Father!” Next week we will [...] Sermon preached on Romans 8:12-30 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 1/30/2011 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. Romans 8:12-30 2/30/11 “Abba, Father!” Next week we will begin a new sermon series through 1 Peter. Before we began that, I wanted to take another week off and deal with the topic of prayer. A few weeks back as we started out the new year, I called us to really think about discipleship this year. To really take serious this year your discipleship. Often when we think about discipleship, we probably think about what we are learning. About learning the teachings of Christ. Well, certainly Jesus taught about prayer. But he taught about it, so that we would do it. Prayer is one those most fundamental spiritual disciplines that disciples do. Following Christ includes praying like he taught, and even praying like he himself did. I think for most of us, this is something we need to ever continue to grow in. We need to ever grow in our prayer life. Of course one of the things that Jesus particularly taught us about our prayer life was to approach God as our Father. That’s how the Lord’s Prayer starts out, “Our Father.” This is an emphasis we see quite a bit in the New Testament. It stands out, because it was not an emphasis in the Old Testament. Certainly we can see how God was a Father to his people in the Old Testament, and yet that’s just not a focus in Old Testament prayer and worship. Jesus and the apostles in the New Testament, very much bring this out. In the era where the grace of God is so clearly revealed, his adoption of his people as his children is a part of that revealed grace. And that’s what we find in our passage today. This passage teaches about adoption, and relates that to our prayer life. And related to this, it also discusses Christian suffering. We’ll consider these interrelated topics today, with the overall focus to understand how our adoption as sons and daughters of God encourages our prayer life. That’s what I want us to leave today with: to be encouraged in how being a child of God affects our prayer. I think most Christians recognize, in some sense, the value of prayer. And yet I think many of us also find our prayer life lacking in what we know it could be. It’s my hope to encourage us today; to think about not only God’s call for us to pray, but about how his Spirit is at work in us, to grow us in our prayer life, as his children. Let’s begin first this morning by thinking about our adoption. Theologically, we affirm that when we become a Christian, that God adopts us into his family. We see that teaching in this passage. Verse 14 calls us sons of God and verse 16 calls us children of God. But the verse in between tells us in what sense we are his sons and his children. Verse 15, “For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” Verse 15 is talking about a change that took place right at the beginning of our Christian life. Before we became a Christian, we were not in this sense sons of God. We were not his children. But at that initial point of faith in Christ, we underwent a status change. We usually talk about that change in terms of justification: that when we first turned in faith to Christ, we found forgiveness of sins, and the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. At that point of initial faith, in a legal sense before God, we had a change of standing. We suddenly went from being seen as a condemned sinner, to being seen as a righteous believer. That’s our justification. But verse 15 reminds us of another change of status that happened at the same time. We were adopted. God adopted us as his children. In the Greek, this word for adoption that we see in verse 15 is a legal term. It c[...] Romans Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2010/11/21/being-vigilant-in-it-with-thanksgiving/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2010/11/21/being-vigilant-in-it-with-thanksgiving/#comments Mon, 22 Nov 2010 05:07:10 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=969 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2010/11/21/being-vigilant-in-it-with-thanksgiving/feed/ 0 0:30:34 Sermon preached on Colossians 4:2 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 11/21/2010 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. Colossians 4:2 11/21/10 “Being Vigilant In It With Thanksgivin[...] Sermon preached on Colossians 4:2 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 11/21/2010 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div. Colossians 4:2 11/21/10 “Being Vigilant In It With Thanksgiving” This week our nation celebrates Thanksgiving. I like to take advantage of these sorts of important holidays in our country and use them to remind us of things that we are probably more inclined to be thinking about already. And so today’s message will think about thanksgiving. Not the holiday per se, but the actual concept of thanksgiving. What is thanksgiving? Well, of course it is giving thanks. But most specifically, it is giving thanks for something. It’s giving thanks for some thing we’ve received. It’s offering thanks for some blessing or benefit that you’ve received. It’s an expression of gratitude. It’s saying thank you out of appreciation for what was given to you. Of course, today we are most specifically talking about giving thanks to God. That’s not something we can take for granted. Our nation’s holiday of Thanksgiving is one celebrated by both believers and atheists. Of course, all of us can use this holiday to thank our family and friends for their love and care in our life. Yet, as Christians, we especially thank God for all that he’s done in our life. We thank God for countless things; for our family and friends; for the harvest; for our food and clothing and shelter; for our jobs; and especially and chiefly for our salvation. Our thanksgiving can come in different forms. It can be an attitude we have. You might be someone with a generally thankful attitude. Someone who goes around constantly feeling gratitude in your heart and mind toward God and others. Thanksgiving can also be expressed through our actions. We know that sometimes we give thank you gifts to others, or do some other action as a gesture of thanksgiving. And as Christians, we say that our obedience to God’s laws is done out of gratitude. We strive to have godly actions as a way to thank God for his wonderful salvation in our life. And yet the most common way I think we all express thanksgiving is verbally. It’s something we say. We use words to give verbal expression to our thanksgiving. Hopefully those words reflect an inner state of your heart; that you really are thankful, and your words are expressing that. It’s this expression of thanksgiving that we’ll be particularly considering today from this passage. Today’s message will consider how we express our thanksgiving in words; how we thank God with our words. That of course happens through prayer. We should express thanksgiving to God in all these ways, in our attitudes, in our actions, but yes, also in our words. We should tell God thank you in our prayers! And so today we’ll look at this verse about this very thing. First, we’ll think in general about how we ought to express our thanksgiving in prayer. Then we’ll consider the devotion we ought to have to this thanksgiving in our prayers. Last, we’ll reflect on the vigilance we should have in this thanksgiving. So let’s begin by thinking in general about thanksgiving in prayer. Look at this verse with me. You’ll note that the verse starts out as just a general command to pray. And yet the final part of the verse connects the thanksgiving with the prayer. It says that we should have thanksgiving in our prayer. Now for most of us, this probably seems pretty obvious. And yet, I think it’s obvious because the Scriptures have trained us in prayer. But it is important that we are told this. You see, the actual word for prayer in the Scriptures, grammatically, really places the focus on making petitions. The actual word in the Greek language draws our attention to the requests we make to God. That of course can be [...] Colossians Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/23/westminster-shorter-catechism-107/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/23/westminster-shorter-catechism-107/#comments Mon, 24 Aug 2009 03:59:58 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=456 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/23/westminster-shorter-catechism-107/feed/ 0 0:37:59 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 107 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 08/23/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 107 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 08/23/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/09/westminster-shorter-catechism-105/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/09/westminster-shorter-catechism-105/#comments Mon, 10 Aug 2009 00:08:37 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=442 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/08/09/westminster-shorter-catechism-105/feed/ 0 0:38:43 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 105 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 08/09/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 105 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 08/09/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/26/westminster-shorter-catechism-103/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/26/westminster-shorter-catechism-103/#comments Sun, 26 Jul 2009 22:06:32 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=431 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/26/westminster-shorter-catechism-103/feed/ 0 0:37:32 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 103 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 07/26/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 103 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 07/26/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/05/westminster-shorter-catechism-102/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/05/westminster-shorter-catechism-102/#comments Mon, 06 Jul 2009 04:14:40 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=412 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/07/05/westminster-shorter-catechism-102/feed/ 0 0:35:55 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 102 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 07/05/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 102 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 07/05/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/28/westminster-shorter-catechism-101/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/28/westminster-shorter-catechism-101/#comments Mon, 29 Jun 2009 01:33:50 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=405 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/28/westminster-shorter-catechism-101/feed/ 0 0:34:50 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 101 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 06/28/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 101 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 06/28/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/21/westminster-shorter-catechism-100/ http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/21/westminster-shorter-catechism-100/#comments Mon, 22 Jun 2009 04:55:21 +0000 Pastor Reid Hankins http://www.novatoopcsermons.org/?p=397 http://www.trinityopcnovato.org/2009/06/21/westminster-shorter-catechism-100/feed/ 0 0:37:06 Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 100 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 06/21/2009 in Novato, CA. Adult Sunday School on Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 100 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 06/21/2009 in Novato, CA. Rev. W. Reid Hankins no no