Buckner Reunion

In obedience to Bethany, I will post something new. Sarah and I are in the middle of a Camp Buckner Reunion. I cannot tell you how fun this is. I love seeing all these camp people come in during their Christmas break and go crazy during reunion. There are lots of games being played, plenty of snacks consumed (in fact, I suffered from a "hooch hangover" this morning. It's when you feel like your stomach is one solid chunk of junk food because you ate so much the night before. It is not enticing to say the least and it will greatly influence what I eat tonight between 8 o'clock and the time I go to bed), tons of catching up with old friends and the occasional Bible study. Well, three to be exact. I was blessed with the responsibility to do all three so I thought I would let you know what I have been teaching on. The studies are on the imputation of Christ's Righteousness and they are broken down as follows.

1) Our Need for the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness
- This deals with mankind's representatives, Adam and Christ, as well as inherited or original sin. We need Christ's righteousness because God demands righteousness and we cannot provide it due to the effects of sin. I also portray why this doctrine is important and the need to understand it and apply it to your life.

2) The Imputation of Christ's Righteousness -- The Basis of our Justification
- The title pretty much says it all. I go into the specifics of Justification and Christ's righteousness: His perfect obedience (both active and passive), justification being a legal or forensic declaration by God, Christ's righteousness being an alien righteousness totally outside of ourselves. God can declare us just on the basis if Christ's righteousness alone being credited to us.

3) How This Righteousness Becomes Ours and the Benefits of Possessing it
- This is pretty straightforward. It comes as a gift, through the instrument of faith (which is NOT a work). I will spend quite a bit of time reviewing the previous Bible studies during this time as well as explaining in greater detail the practical application of understanding our position in Christ.

Those are the three studies and I will come back later and fill you in a little on each one. But for now, that's all you get because I am supposed to be putting together the last one right now. I will leave you with a few quotes that I ran across during my study that are quite a bit encouraging. Eron and Kari, if you two are in Burnet while I am giving these Bible studies I will feel really bad. I would have loved to have had Eron staring at me from the audience insuring that I am speaking the truth.

Take it easy and boast only in the righteousness that Christ provides.

John Bunyan “Our righteousness is both imperfect and short of continuance. But Christ’s righteousness will abide forever, it is a garment that will never wear out, or wax old, it is a righteousness that will last our lives, be of service at death, appear fresh at judgment, and will answer for us in a time to come, and give us an abundant entrance into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

John Murray “Regeneration is an act of God in us; justification is a judgment of God with respect to us. The distinction is like that of a distinction between the act of a surgeon and the act of a judge. The surgeon, when he removes an inward cancer, does something in us. That is not what a judge does—he gives a verdict regarding our judicial status. If we are innocent, he declares accordingly.
The purity of the gospel is bound up with the recognition of this distinction. If justification is confused with regeneration or sanctification, then the door is opened for the perversion of the gospel at it’s center. Justification is still the article of the standing or falling of the church.”