Here is a helpful article by Carl Bosma:

GOD'S LOVE: THE COMPELLING FORCE OF CHRISTIAN MISSIONS

Novelist Reynolds Price claims that Jesus' teaching "has resulted in the most far-reaching movements of mercy, tolerance and human freedom..." ("Jesus of Nazareth: Then and Now," Time, Dec 6, 1999, p. 94). For this reason he also asserts that Jesus' words in Matthew 11:28-29, "Come to me," offer the old welcome. Even though Price professes that Jesus cured him from cancer, he cannot accept Jesus' final instruction to his disciples in Matthew 28:18-20. In his opinion, "that last command goes on contributing heavily to the evils of national and religious warfare, institutional and individual hatred, imperialism and enslavement...".

Under the banner of love and human freedom, Price and others plead for cultural diversity and religious inclusiveness. Since they consider all Christian missionary efforts to be at odds with religious pluralism, they call for an end to Christian missions.

An important argument against the current call for ending Christian global missions is the intrinsic Scriptural link between God's love and his disciples' permanent obligation to disciple the nations in the period between Christ's first and second coming. A principal reason for continuing the commission to preach the gospel "to the ends of the world" and "to the end" is that the missionary enterprise is not only a natural response to Christ's royal edict (Mt. 28:18-20), but that it is also rooted in God's persistent love for his creation (John 3:16) as that love manifests itself in redemptive history.

Jesus accepted his mission. Because of Christ's loving obedience, God reconciled himself once for all to the world (Col. 1:20; 2 Cor. 5:18) by making peace through Jesus' blood, shed on the cross (Col. 1:20) and by "not counting men's sins against them" (2 Cor. 5:19).

So that the nations might participate fully in the blessing promised to Abraham (Gal. 3:8), Jesus, the seed (Gal. 3:16) and the son of Abraham (Mt. 1:1), also sent his disciples into the world (John 17:18; 20:21). He empowered them with the Spirit to declare God's pardon of sins (John 20:22-23). Consequently, the disciples' commission is based on the connection between God's sending his Son into the world and the Son's sending the disciples into the world.

A significant corollary of the sequence of sendings described above is that discipleship and mission are inseparably connected. Jesus called disciples to make them fishers of men (Mk. 1:17 par.). Jesus' invitation to come, to take up his yoke and to learn from him in Matthew 11 and his final command in Matthew 28 to go, to make disciples and to teach cannot be split apart. Those who have taken up Jesus' yoke and learned from him will make his last command their first concern.

God's gracious forgiveness and reconciliation require one to participate in the ministry of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:18) because of Christ's compelling love (2 Cor. 5:14). To impress this requirement on the minds of their members, local [churches] should impress upon their members Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 9:16: "Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!" Since God's love compels us to make disciples, I urge [churches] to increase its world missions outreach in the new millennium. Each one should reach one!

Hear Octavius Winslow on the supremacy of Christ to the family:

There is a supremacy in the feeling of Christ’s preciousness to the believer, which is worthy of a remark. Christ has the pre-eminence in the affection of the regenerate. “Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.” Listen to His own words, asserting His claim to a single and supreme affection: "Whoso loveth father or mother, brother or sister, wife or children, more than Me, is not worthy of Me.” There are natural ties of affection—the parental, the conjugal, the filial; there are ties, too, of human love and friendship, linking heart to heart; but not one word does He who inspired those affections, who formed those ties, breathe, denying their existence or forbidding their exercise. Nay, the religion He came to inculcate distinctly recognises these human relations, and seeks to strengthen and intensify by purifying, elevating, and immortalizing them. But mark the emphatic word employed by Christ–“MORE than Me!”…In a word, Christ should become more supreme and precious to our hearts by all the sweet, sacred relations and affections of life.—Octavius Winslow, The Precious Things of God, page 25-26

This year, we hope to reach the Spanish-speaking world by translating Divided, A Weed in the Church, the Divided website, and the NCFIC website.

When we launched the NCFIC website many years ago, we had no idea how quickly and broadly the message would spread. Families were transformed. Churches were planted. People were connected.

In order to create the Spanish arm of the NCFIC, there are several projects to accomplish. Please join us in breaking this culture and language barrier to bring the message of church and family reformation to the Spanish-speaking world.

Here is a breakdown of the various projects and their costs for each one:

I. Translate Divided Resources – $8,000

1. TRAILER: Translate, cast, record, edit, etc.
2. DVD: Translate, provide text to create a new DVD master
3. WEBSITE: Translate completely, including the extra features

II. Translate A Weed in the Church – $5,900

1. BOOK: Translate and edit book (300 pages, 60,000 words)

III. Translate NCFIC website (100 web pages + 20 audio recordings) – $7,500

1. HOME: Translate navigation, links, graphics, etc.; make Spanish versions of existing graphics, etc.
2. BLOG: Translate 36 select blog entries
3. EVENTS: Translate information for all 9 events listed
4. RESOURCES: Translate 35 select article resources. Translate and record 20 select audio resources. Identify and compile 5 gospel article resources (from Chapel Library and others), and 5 gospel sermons in Spanish (from SermonAudio)
5. NETWORKS: Translate menu and navigation text, excluding info for each church/family
6. STORE: Translate individual pages for Spanish-language resources only (Divided, A Weed in the Church, Feminine by Design, Gospel-Centered Marriages)
7. ABOUT US: Translate 9 drop-down pages, including 17 FAQ answers
8. DONATE: Translate
9. CONTACT US: Translate

IV. Select audio messages from past NCFIC conferences – $3,125

Transcribe, translate, and record 25 messages. Examples: Sufficiency of Scripture; Love the Church; Family Reformation; Child Training; The Master's Plan for Fatherhood; What is a Family-Integrated Church?

V. Represent NCFIC at “Expolit” a premier Spanish-language ministry conference in Miami – $5,100

Total project cost: $29,625

We believe that God is able to bring about a biblical church and family reformation in the Spanish-speaking world. Please join us as we endeavor, by God's grace, to reach them.

Recently I have read about men who say that we don't need to be too consistent with family worship. After all, they may say, it's not in the Bible. The reality of family worship is in the Bible. In addition, this opinion, by some men, is contrary to the settled opinion of others like Charles Hodge:

Social prayer includes family prayer, and prayer in the assemblies of the people for social worship. As man’s nature is social, he must have fellowship with his fellow men in all that concerns his inward and outward life. No man lives, or can live for himself, in religion any more than in any other relation. As the family is the most intimate bond of fellowship among men, it is of the utmost importance that it should be hallowed by religion. All the relations of parents, children, and domestics are purified and strengthened, when the whole household is statedly assembled, morning and evening, for the worship of God. There is no substitute for this divinely appointed means of promoting family religion. It supposes, indeed, a certain amount of culture. The head of the family should be able to read the Scriptures as well as to lead in the prayer. Those, however, who cannot do the former, may at least do the latter. All persons subject to the watch or care of the Church should be required to maintain in their households this stated worship of God. The character of the Church and of the state depends on the character of the family. If religion dies out in the family, it cannot elsewhere be maintained. A man’s responsibility to his children, as well as to God, binds him to make his house a Bethel; if not a Bethel, it will be a dwelling place of evil spirits.[1]

[1] Charles Hodge, vol. 3, Systematic Theology, 706.

Recently, Reformation Heritage Books sent out a pertinent letter from Joel Beeke about the importance of family worship.

"Have we forgotten the urgency of evangelism and to save souls as we enjoy the comforts of the Church?"

This often happens to churches…The former lifesaving station. 

I am looking forward to this…

Thomas Boston, commenting on "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness," says:

It is a sign men have no spiritual hunger when they are more for religious disputes—than the practice of piety. Some men feed only on difficult questions and controversies (1 Timothy 6:3, 4). These pick bones—and do not feed on the meat. They have hot brains but cold hearts. Did men hunger and thirst after righteousness, they would propound to themselves such questions as these, 'How shall we do to be saved? How shall we make our calling and election sure? How shall we mortify our corruptions?' But such as ravel out their time in frothy and useless theological disputes, I call heaven to witness, they are strangers to this text. They do not 'hunger and thirst after righteousness'.

God describes the Church in many ways, and each of these is for our benefit. Each of them exposes the beauty, practicality, and blessing of God's design for His Church.

Here is a good list of New Testament Metaphors for the Church.

This past Sunday, we considered Matthew 13:24-43, where Jesus is teaching about the kingdom of heaven. In this passage, Jesus gives three parables: 1) the wheat and the tares, 2) the grain of mustard seed, and 3) the leaven. He explains through these what the kingdom of heaven is like and what those who hear should know about it.

You can listen the sermon through this audio player:

A simple concordance search on families does not tell you everything you need to know about what the New Testament teaches about family life. But the New Testament presents many expressions of family life:

• A spiritual father mentoring young men Timothy (2 Tim. 1:2), Titus (Tit. 1:4), Onesimus (Phm. 1:10)
• A husband and a wife, Aquila and Priscilla, laboring together in the gospel and ministering to the great preacher Apollos (Acts 18:26), and risking their necks for the apostle Paul (Rom. 16:3-4).
• A father crying out for his demonized son (Mark 9:24)
• A father grieving over his dead daughter (Mark 5:22-23)
• A woman caught in adultery (John 8:2-11)
• A woman with five husbands (John 4:18)
• A young man falling asleep during a long meeting, falling out a window to his death and then brought back to life (Acts 20:9-12)
• Children being converted in households at the preaching of the apostles – Philippian Jailer (Acts 16:31) and Cornelius (Acts 10:24, 44)
• Brothers seeking to follow the Lord Jesus – Nathanael (John 1:45-50)
• The family of Jesus and their attitudes toward Him (Matt. 12:48-50)
• Jesus giving his mother to be taken care of by John on the cross (John 19:26-27)
• The 12 apostles came from only 6 families (Matt. 10:2-4)
• A husband’s love in marriage is the picture of Christ’s love for the church (Eph. 5:25)
• A submissive son does the will of his father, doing only what he sees him doing and hears him saying (John 5:30)
• Older women teaching the younger women how to have godly family life (Tit. 2:4)
• Children wanting to be hear the Lord Jesus (Mark 10:13-15)
• Children shouting Hosanna (Matt. 21:15)
• A child providing his bread and fish to feed 5,000 (John 6:10)
• Children in prayer meetings (Acts 12:13)
• A young man growing in stature and favor with God and man (Luke 2:52)
• Children in the midst of controversy and danger – Paul’s nephew (Acts 23:16-17)
• A son-in-law caring for his mother in law – Peter (Matt. 8:14)
• Apostles preaching a gospel that is for "children’s children" (Acts 2:39)
• Prayers that invoke God’s blessing on coming generations not yet born (Eph. 3:14-21)
• A little girl raised from the dead – “talitha cumi”, which is little girl arise (Mark 5:41)
• Families being torn asunder by the gospel (Matt. 10:34-39)
• Two sisters treating Jesus differently, Martha and Mary (Luke 10:40-42)
• Two sisters grieving over their beloved brother (John 11:21, 32)
• A centurion appealing to Jesus for his a sick child (Matt. 8:5)
• Brothers who are greedy and envious for their inheritance (Luke 12:13)
• A widow making shawls for the other widows (Acts 16:14)
• Divine commands to take care of the fatherless and the widow (Jas. 1:27)
• A young girl, Rhoda, at a prayer meeting (Acts 12:13)
• Commands for young men (Tit. 2:6-8) and older men (Tit. 2:2)
• Commands for women (Tit. 2:3-5)
• Divine commands for marriage (Eph. 5:22-33)
• Divine commands for child discipline (Heb. 12:9)
• A newly, married couple with child (Matt.1:18)
• Genealogies (Matt. 1:1-16; Luke 3:23-38)
• A betrothed man treating a woman wonderfully in spite of the talk of the town (Matt. 1:19)
• A 12-year-old in temple collaborating with the older men (Luke 2:42-47)
• The first miracle was performed at a wedding (John 2:11)
• Many principles of behavior that are oil between the frictions, commands for how to treat one another. (Rom. 12:10; 13:8; 15:7; 1 John 2:10)
• The Bible begins with a marriage and ends with a marriage (Gen. 2:22; Rev. 21:2)

There is an interesting discussion about the youth group at James MacDonald's Harvest Chapel over at TeamPyro.

Much has been said about the importance of strategic friendships among men and women in the work of the Kingdom of God, to which I would whole heartedly agree. But what about strategic friendships for our children? How should this look? How should this play out?

In this article, I would like to take a different approach and look at the value of strategic friendships in our children’s lives, in a biblically-ordered church setting, where peer culture and age segregation are not the norm.

The subject has been on my heart. So last week, I sat down with my two oldest daughters, Naomi (17) and Anna (15), on separate occasions for a daddy/daughter talk on the subject of friendship. I simply asked...who are your best friends? The answers they gave were both without hesitation, that their mother and one another were their best friends. This was a fact I already knew because it is both verbalized on a regular basis and demonstrated in practice daily.

My desire, however, was to get outside the walls of our home, to the other people that they considered close friends.

What happened next was a deep encouragement to my soul as a father. Both of my daughters' lists of closest friends included 5 ladies ranging from as young as age 13 to two women over 50 and a few in between. I thought to myself, how wonderful that they both had godly young women whom they could treat as sisters and older women whom they could treat as mothers (1 Tim. 5:2) and receive the kind of influence that Titus 2 models for us.

I know that to some, what I have just said is weird, and they may immediately think that surely my children need more friends their own age. On the contrary, I want to say how marvelous it is to be apart of a church family that allows for both young and old to grow in Christ and community together. A church where it is not abnormal to see a 17-year-old praying with or visiting with a 13-year-old or a 50-year-old. Nor is it freakish to hear a 15-year-old list off a woman who has three adult children as one of her dearest friends.

I believe that is the way God intended friendships to be. Older friends that can invest wisdom of years into the life of the younger, who in turn, are often encouraged and invigorated in their own lives because of the friendships that flourish with these younger ladies.

The reality of these kind of strategic friendships is that they are wonderful for both men and women, young and old. These friendships that flourish have also been a blessing to me as a pastor. It has been one of the greatest joys of my life to have other men of God, who are old enough to be my father, befriend me, challenge me, pray for me, and rebuke me on occasion. I also have friends that are young men, new husbands, and new fathers that desire to grow into men of God who lead well.

May God help strategic friendships to flourish in our biblically-ordered homes and churches.

Iron sharpeneth iron; So a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend (Prov. 27:17).

Craig Houston, pastor of Westside Baptist Church in Bremerton, Washington was born and raised in Astoria, Oregon where he received his early education graduating from Astoria High School.Being blessed to grow up in a fourth generation Christian home Craig was converted to Christ and baptized at a young age at Bible Baptist Church. Craig later joined Bayview Baptist Church where at the age of 19, he surrendered to the call to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. He graduated from the Bayview Baptist Bible Institute in December 1997 and was ordained to the gospel ministry by Bayview Baptist Church. Since then, he has continued his education, graduating from Sound Baptist Bible College with a Bachelor of Theology.During Craig’s 12 years of pastoral ministry, he has served as a church planter in Oregon and since 2002 as the pastor of Westside Baptist Church in Bremerton, Washington. Pastor Houston has a heart and passion for the Glory of God, expository preaching, reaching the lost and restoring the Christian home. He and his beautiful bride Emily are the parents of ten wonderful children.

The Baptist Standard recently released an article about family integration, Divided the movie, and A Weed in the Church.

If you have not seen Divided the movie and would like to show it to your friends, you can view the movie for free at www.dividedthemovie.com.

The White Unto Harvest conference is only 8 months away! Due to many requests and in an effort to provide an affordable way to register, we are now offering a monthly payment option for conference registration. Instead of paying the full family or individual registration cost up front or waiting until the last minute, you can still get your registration in early while paying the registration cost in smaller increments up until the conference. The monthly payment amount is automatically determined by the number of months remaining before the conference.

Spurgeon answers the question in this way:

There is an allusion here to the prize which was offered to the runners in the Olympic games, and at the outset it is well for us to remark how very frequently the Apostle Paul conducts us by his metaphors to the racecourse. Over and over again he is telling us so to run that we may obtain, bidding us to strive, and at other times to agonize, and speaking of wrestling and contending. Ought not this to make us feel what an intense thing the Christian life is--not a thing of sleepiness or haphazard, not a thing to be left now and then to a little superficial consideration? It must be a matter which demands all our strength, so that when we are saved there is a living principle put within us which demands all our energies, and gives us energy over and above any that we ever had before. Those who dream that carelessness will find its way to heaven have made a great mistake. The way to hell is neglect, but the way to heaven is very different. "How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?" A little matter of neglect brings you to ruin, but our Master's words are "Strive to enter in at the straight gate, for many, I say unto you, shall seek"--merely seek--"to enter in, and shall not be able." Striving is wanted more than seeking.

Excerpt from a sermon. Published on Thursday, July 8th, 1915. Delivered by C.H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.On Thursday Evening, June 16th, 187

Charles Spurgeon, in a sermon, asked his congregation this question:

You will be going Home soon and when your Master says to you, “Did you do any sowing for Me?” you will have to reply, “No, Lord, I did plenty of eating. I went to the Tabernacle and I enjoyed the services.” “But did you do any sowing?” “No, Lord. I did a great deal of hoarding. I laid up a large quantity of the Good Seed.” “But did you do any sowing?” He will still ask—and that will be a terrible question for those who never went forth to sow! 

Maybe you want to be in a family-integrated church—it's a disaster to build a church around that. God-glorifying churches are built around God, the Gospel, His Word, and obedience to His ways. When churches form around anything smaller than these things, they are headed for trouble—with God and man. Churches built around homeschooling, family integration, fatherhood, entrepreneurialism, community, taking dominion, adoption, abortion—whatever—will always dishonor the name of Christ by setting their gaze on what might perhaps be fruits of obedience to the Word of God, rather than God Himself. While I am an advocate of age-integrated discipleship in the church, I have seen churches make this the central consideration. This is always a mistake. The central consideration of discussion is the centrality of God in the church.

How can you know you are saved? Jesus answers this question in Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23, where He speaks to the multitude by way of parables. The first is the parable of four soils - the wayside, the stony soil, the thorny soil, and the good soil. Which one of these grounds are you? Have you born fruit - some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty?