Go-To Guy

Dr. Steve Baugh of Westminster Seminary

Steve taught me Greek in his home in 1982-83. I get to visit with him in 2010 roughly once a week in this 2nd Edition.

He's pictured here in the back left.

G. Mark Sumpter

Bulimia Matters.21

The Bible talks right at us

“The Bible is brutally honest, presenting people and situations with a candor we probably would have softened had we written it. It refuses to gloss over sin’s impact on us and our world. But it is also honest for another reason: to demonstrate how the wisdom of the Lord and the transforming grace of Christ are powerful enough to address the deepest issues of human experience. If you read Scripture carefully, you will never get the idea that the work of Christ is for well-adjusted people who just need a little redemptive boost. It never presents any human condition or dilemma as outside the scope of the gospel. Redemption is nothing less than the rescue of helpless people facing an eternity of torment apart from God’s love.”--Paul Tripp

Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands, p. 195, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co, 2002.

G. Mark Sumpter

Hospitality Levels the Field

Eating together minimizes, maybe reduces altogether hierarchical notions

“Because eating is something every person must do, meal-time has a profoundly egalitarian dimension.

...Often we maintain significant boundaries when offering help to persons in need. Many churches prepare and serve meals to hungry neighbors, but few church members find it easy to sit and eat with those who need the meal. When people are very different from ourselves, we often find it more comfortable to cook and clean for them than to share in a meal and conversation. We are familiar with roles as helpers but we are less certain about being equals eating together. Many of us struggle with simply being present with people in need; our helping roles give definition to the relationship but they also keep it decidedly hierarchical. As one practitioner observed, eating together is the ‘most enriching part but also the hardest part. When we were first here it was so hard. We didn’t have any specific things to do, just be with people.’”

I am convicted to the core.

I have been a part of congregations that serve meals to the homeless; I don’t think I ever remember a practice of sitting down with those dear folks. Serving them is safer; it's just too risky to be with them.

This quote comes from the penetrating, well-written volume, Making Room—Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition (Eerdmans, 1999), p. 74.

G. Mark Sumpter

Trying to Force Him to be King

A constant temptation with which Christ was faced

D.A. Carson makes a connection between the temptation of Satan, where he holds out the kingdoms of this present world to Jesus (Matthew 4:8-10), and the time that our Lord recognized “that they [the crowd of the Jews] were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king” (John 6:14-15).

We see it as the temptation to rule apart from God’s plan, purpose and way. This slick temptation sought to lure Him away from the devotion and purpose of His mandate—a temptation to forfeit the foundational characteristic of a son’s relationship unto His father via the simplicity of trust, obedience and faithful service.

I had not thought about that temptation plaguing our Lord so repeatedly. I thought it was a Matthew 4 wilderness temptation matter with Satan alone; like a one-time thing and it’s over. But the vulnerability to slide into self-service always dogged Him, whether from Satan, the Jews, the Romans soldiers, one of the robbers beside Him on Golgotha, the disciples, and even a close friend in ministry like Peter. Carson’s comment made me start ticking through the Gospels and their stories on this.

It’s a huge temptation throughout Christ’s life.

“A man’s pride will bring him low…” Proverbs 29:23

Our Lord, who considered equality with God nothing to be held to tightly (Phil. 2:5-6), served His Father out of the abundance of thanksgiving and humility. Every gift of God was His; He used it all for God’s greater glory, not His own. He met this temptation for us, to be our Savior through and through; we can say that from the manger to the empty tomb He served as King all the way.

G. Mark Sumpter

Baseball Anniversary 20 Years Ago for Father and Son

1990 Headline: Griffey Jr & Sr – First Father/Son Tandem To Go Back-To-Back Rockets!!

Yesterday afternoon, as the 20th Anniversary-----September 14, 1990, the fans of the California Angels, sitting at Angels stadium in Anaheim, witnessed the very first father-son duo hit back to back shots out of the park. I think it was Ken Griffey, Sr. hitting just ahead of Jr.

The Seattle Mariners lost to the Angels, but the historic occasion is well-remembered.

G. Mark Sumpter

Charles Spurgeon 1

Spurgeon’s Pastors’ College

“Many of my readers will have read Spurgeon’s Lectures to My Students, recalling with joy such subjects as ‘The Minister’s Self Watch,’ ‘The Call to Ministry,’ ‘Sermons—Their Matter,’ and ‘The Faculty of Impromptu Speech.’ The lectures are evidence of the standards set in the college. At the time he gave them Spurgeon was only thirty-four.

The college now had three instructors beside Mr. Rogers. They were Alexander Ferguson, David Gracey, and J. R. Selway. The school majored on the study of theology, but the whole course was similar to that of many seminaries, and Rogers listed other chief subjects as ‘Mathematics, Logic, Hebrew, the Greek New Testament, Homiletics, Pastoral Theology and English Composition.’ Spurgeon mentions astronomy also as part of the course in physical science, and some of the men became, like himself, particularly interested in the stars and the laws governing the heavenly bodies.”

Arnold Dallimore, Spurgeon (Moody Press, 1984), p 107.

I agree with so many writing and teaching on the reformation of the purpose and philosophy of education happening in Reformed and Evangelical circles nowadays. The seminaries of the Reformed stripe in North America will be richly blessed as the years continue to tick by. The high school students of the late 1990s and moving into these early decades of the 21st Cent will be (are) top-shelf kids. They are top-shelf regarding their training and preparation for college and seminary. Like Spurgeon’s practice regarding education, the classically trained students are orbiting the Sun taking rides on the planets of life, faith, truth, revelation, the sciences, the languages and literature, and the fine arts, and they move in concert, and call up awe. The relationship between the Sun and planets are known, as well as the relationship between the planets themselves. It’s a splendid universe.

Note that all of life was on the menu at the Pastors’ College. It was getting grounded in an array of subjects as mentioned above. For Spurgeon, no question, it was training for bold faithfulness in the pulpit.

The students today anchored in the regiment of English Grammar, Latin, Greek and Hebrew, and in the basics of reading widely, and writing and speaking as rhetoricians are the students who will be the community of joy as a sound, robust Christian witness for the whole earth. Take notice—the Lord is doing marvelous things.

G. Mark Sumpter

Eyeball to Eyeball on Commitment in Marriage

A Couple in for Counseling—Wanting to Get Married

Woman sitting next to her boyfriend, her live-in: Who wants to marry somebody and commit to a relationship that might not work out? We’ve actually been living as if married, in every sense, and it’s been good to have sort of a test drive about one another.

Pastor: Having that view about marriage worries me, actually.

Woman: (Stunned look) What do you mean?

Pastor: (Going eyeball to eyeball with both of them): You have been living in an experiment, and there is no reason why the formality of marriage would change your habit of treating the relationship as an experiment. Christian marriage is a commitment, not an experiment.

I was taken in with this paraphrased piece from an old edition of Touchstone Magazine.

Tomorrow I am leading off with a talk on sex, sexuality and self-control for men. The test-drive age in which we live has been so formative. Experimental live-in situations assume man’s self-sufficient ways and answers for life. It’s all very person to person focused. It borrows just a teaspoon of Christianity—it’s not good for man to be alone, but then gives shape to life on man’s own standards. What worldly standards? I’ll live with you so long as I am still able to be at the center getting my way, according to my likes. Anything that pushes me too far out of the center no longer serves my purposes.

Rather than acknowledgement about heart issues of man’s sinful state, and his self-serving choices and pleasures, it’s the confession of “I have needs, you know.”

Where’s the binding agreement, a covenant that takes the focus off of each person, and places it on commitment? One of the assumptions above on the part of this couple is that love gives special permission, it places them in an unique spot: they think that experimenting with love is acceptable.

Is one of the attributes of love experimentation? Would it be found in 1 Corinthians 13? Love is patient…does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up… bears all things…experiments with all things….

G. Mark Sumpter

Young Men, Sex and the New Testament Times

Reading William Barclay’s Letters to the Seven Churches

I used to read to book store customers this quote from Barclay’s own pen:

“It is not that Jesus is God. Time and time again the Fourth Gospel speaks of God sending Jesus into the world. Time and time again we see Jesus praying to God. Time and time again we see Jesus unhesitatingly and unquestioningly and unconditionally accepting the will of God for himself. Nowhere does the New Testament identify Jesus and God. He said: `He who has seen me has seen God.' There are attributes of God I do not see in Jesus. I do not see God's omniscience in Jesus, for there are things which Jesus did not know...”

A Spiritual Autobiography Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1975, p. 56.


Evangelicals standing at the front counter, who had asked why we refused to carry Barclay’s material, would be shocked to hear this quote from such a popular writer. That huge matter aside, I have been reading his little study on the background of the churches of the Revelation.

One quote related to the church of Pergamos (Barclay commenting on Revelation 2:14c…, “to commit sexual immorality.”)

“It has been said that chastity was the one completely new virtue which Christianity introduced into the ancient world. In the ancient world sexual morals were loose; relationships outside of marriage were entirely accepted and produced no stigma whatsoever. Demosthenes has laid it down: ‘We have courtesans for the sake of pleasure; we have concubines for the sale of daily cohabitation; we have wives for the purpose of having children legitimately; and of having a faithful guardian of our household affairs.’ He was not saying anything which was in the least shocking; he was simply laying down what accepted pattern of sexual life. Cicero in his Pro Caelio pleads: ‘If there is anyone who thinks that young men should be absolutely forbidden the love of courtesans, he is extremely severe. I am not able to deny the principle that he states. But he is at variance, not only with the license of what our own age allows, but also with the customs and concessions of our ancestors. When indeed was this not done? When did anyone ever find fault with it? When was such permission denied? When was it that that which is now lawful was not lawful?’ To Cicero such relationships were an accepted part of life of a young man.” pp. 39-40


The Pauline admonitions, “…abstain from sexual immorality…,” and from Hebrews, “…Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge…,” and last, a text like, “A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife…” are watershed passages for the will of our Almighty—and He counsels us for blessing, emotional and physical security and so that we might be His witness of holiness, that we might not be in “fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them.”


I’ve been working on preparation for helping men with sexual lusts, pornography and related snares. The Lord Jesus Christ addressed this topic with both churches—Pergamos and Thyatira.


G. Mark Sumpter

100 Bible Verses

New Book Released Next Month

“Change your life from Genesis 1:1 to Revelation 22:20.

With the immediacy of Internet searches and ease of handheld devices, the custom of memorizing Scripture may not seem necessary, but best-selling author Robert J. Morgan makes an airtight case for reviving this rewarding practice in 100 Bible Verses Everyone Should Know by Heart.

It's vital for mental and emotional health and for spiritual well-being, he writes. It's as powerful as acorns dropping into furrows in the forest. It allows God's words to sink into your brain and permeate your subconscious thoughts. It saturates the personality, satiates the soul, and stockpiles the mind. It changes the atmosphere of every family and alters the weather forecast of every day.”

Broadman and Holman publishers supplies THIS BLURB HERE.

G. Mark Sumpter

Preaching within the Glorious Stream of Grace

Situating exposition into God's faithfulness

“Moralism, which merely tells people that what they are doing is wrong and tells them several practical steps to take that will correct that wrong, falls far short of preaching Christ. Preaching isolated biblical texts as examples of how to live without placing each story in the stream that leads to Christ falls short of preaching Christ.”

In the book, Reforming Pastoral Ministry, p. 120 (Editor: John Armstrong, a Crossway Publication, 2001).

Keeping the exposition and application in the stream of grace, keeps the preaching in an historical context. God works through persons and events, thus, we’re brought back to God’s work by His faithfulness, wisdom and power. That’s preaching that centers on Him. The persons and events of the Old and New Testaments feed into the person and events of Jesus Christ—His person and His work. Our union with Christ, by faith in Him, is one with His person of righteousness, of penal substitution and His glorious triumph at His empty tomb. In Christ, we’re given release from slavery to sin, and we’re given incentive and strength to live for God’s glory. Because He lives, we may live too. Lord, help me to preach the person and work of Jesus.

G. Mark Sumpter

Big Daddy Cabbage

At the Alaska State Fair

Speaking about the size of the vegetables grown in the Matanuska Valley as a sermon illustration has been overused by me, but it still provides an Alaska-size kick in the pants.

See this STORY.

As a kid, we enjoyed getting close to these creatures; obviously, it would take two, maybe three Shaquille O’Neal-size men to get their hands locked around these beasts.

G. Mark Sumpter

Eating the Sermon

Two Years Ago I Was Challenged to Give Up the Manuscript


“There’s no doubt you’ve become much more focused on us as the congregation—the change is super noticeable.” A member at Faith OPC.


“Get rid of your sermon manuscript.” A fellow OPC pastor.

I was challenged to get grounded in the vocabulary and the flow of the English Bible text from which I'm preaching, use the verses as my sermon outline and know the points of explanation and application well—that is, know what I want to say. This pastor friend of mine finished: Your congregation wants to listen to and feed off the sermon, not watch you looking down at your notes.

I have had to work against my fears about this:

1. I am extra nervous on Sundays and I fear that I will forget what I want to say.

2. My notes become a crutch.

3. I am a perfectionist, and therefore, I think using a manuscript will satisfy my hunger, as an obsession, for control and polish. Does someone smell idolatry?

4. I didn’t see this modeled for me growing up through the ranks of younger buckhood to middle ager buckhood. Can I do this? I’ve not seen it done.

5. Is it OK to forget a point, get mixed up a little? My pastor friend said, “You’re the only one who’ll know you forgot something—get over it.”

6. Don’t be afraid to make use of insight and application that the Spirit brings for illumination while in the execution of preaching the text. There have many times where there’s been illumination while reading the passage or preaching the passage, and they are truths or points that I had not seen while preparing it.

This challenge has been good for me. I do want to be prepared. Prayer is huge to be sure. I am learning to preach to God’s people, not be so tied to notes.

Last thing—I do have notes in the pulpit with me. Over time in the pulpit, I’ve gone from 13 pages, down to 10, down to 7 and the past 2 years down to 4 ½-5. I try to take into the pulpit the basic grid and helps that I need.

G. Mark Sumpter

The Church as Pace-Setter in Caring for Young People

“If youth ministry is really about saving kids from the acidic culture (which is bad) then youth ministry can easily slide into the wing of the church that ushers kids into conventionality. In other words, youth ministry is doing a good job when kids act and look conventional (happily religious). It could be argued that it was this driving need in light of a new radical youth culture in the 1970s that motivated parents to financially support a youth worker in their local congregation (not just at the denominational level)—they wanted someone with the expertise to make their kids conventionally religious kids (that showed this by being ‘good’).”

From web article by Andy Root Is Youth Ministry Working Too Well? Is it Making Kids too Conventional?

Root’s point is well-taken. Youth Ministry is not alone in promoting conventionality; any form of evangelical ministry can be about promoting a gospel that provides a better option for men, women and children. The last thing we need in our age is more option-preaching and teaching.

But there’s more. Is Youth Ministry working too well at rescuing youth from the evils of cold North American culture because it’s a follower of the other institutions that have concerns for the physical, educational, social and emotional well-being of youth instead of being a pace-setter for them?

One of the reasons I was drawn to this article by Root is that it interacts with Chap Clark’s book, Hurt: Inside the World of Today’s Teenagers (Zondervan, 2004).

When I re-read portions of that book recently, I was caught up short on how little the nature, calling and ministry of the local church was presented. That is, even though Clark develops in his book the acute need for acceptance, belonging and purpose that young people have, and how so often they are trying to communicate to older generations that frequently ignore them, he seems, whether intentionally or not, to marginalize the church’s central function of being the guide for all other institutions that are involved in the care and nurture of youth.

Clark spends time on matters of place and institution. He identifies the locations where youth socialize and interact: peer groups—he calls them clusters—and sports teams, school, the family, and two or three other places. Each of these spheres have a role for nurture and care. The church gets Appendix A at the back of the book.

Throughout the book, Clark genuinely breathes with strong systemic vision in his way of offering assessment of need and how to go about meeting that need. Youth live systemically. They intersect with and walk in the warp and woof of various institutions. Clark reaches out to institutions across the youth-world landscape; he’s to be applauded—his zeal is contagious about calling adults to care for hurt students of today’s America. But if the standards for that care get underscored in the realms of education, social interaction, mentoring by athletic coaches and so on as the pace-setting standards, we’ll end up nurturing conventionally acceptable kids. The work of restoration regarding those who are hurt requires the Savior of the world (John 4, the woman at the well), and being brought into the life and faith of person-to-person discipleship in the church. The church must get the attention as pace-setter of all other institutions, especially when we’re talking about relationships: the care and nurture of hurt people.

In this way, Christ’s church must get Youth Ministry’s attention. Until that prodigal son, Youth Ministry, comes home he will waste away in the pleasures of a Gospel-less life. Teens will get help, but still will hurt.

G. Mark Sumpter

Skool Tamarow. Chhhh I Don't Kneed Skool I Can Spel Phine!

Tis the beginning of the school year

“The Athenians…were enthusiastically fond of oratory, and ardently cultivated fluency of speech. It was by this art that Themistocles kept the fleet together for the great battle of Salamis. It was by this art that Pericles so long held control of Athens. The sophists, the philosophers, the leaders of the assembly, were all adepts in the art of convincing by eloquence and argument, and oratory progressed until, in the later days of Grecian freedom, Athens possessed a group of public speakers who have never been surpassed, if equaled, in the history of the world.”

I am so grateful for the 4 or 5 individuals in recent years that have urged me onward in taking up good books to continue the journey of learning. My wife last school year more than stretched me when she asked me to assume the duties of being a one-afternoon-each week tutor in English Grammar and Writing. I tutored four children as their parents sat in too.


I have some interest from high school students at present to launch a reading course on Ancient Greece and to learn New Testament Greek. We’ll see what develops. Hence, the quote above.


One like George Grant and his work at New College Franklin, Tennessee has inspired many the past 10-12 years to learn the stories of Western Civilization, and then to tell them to the next generation.

HT: J. Lockman, on the title for this entry


G. Mark Sumpter