Hal Hammons, thepreachermag.

com

The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

Oh, no! Another magazine!

Posted 1/1/2014

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The Front Page

hank you in advance for reading this. I wouldnt blame you if you didnt. Frankly, Solomon could have just as easily written magazines instead of books in Ecclesiastes 12:12. These days, anyone with an opinion and a laptop can be a publisher. And it would seem at times, most do. But writing is an important task. And magazines are a convenient way to group related articles together for easier consumption. So its not a matter of whether the task should be done but rather how and by whom. In this particular instance, the whom is me. The how follows and will explain the whom. I determined shortly after I became a preacher and began submitting magazine articles that I would ever, ever, be a magazine editor. Too much hassle. Too much our side vs. their side. Too dependent on others to agree with me. Too much angst over how publicly and vociferously I should respond if they don t. I always said if I were to do a magazine it would be all Hal, all the time not because Im the best writer or editor around (Im not), but because, as any control freak will tell you, its easier in the long run if you just do it yourself. So here I am. The Preacher. The plan is to publish monthly, eight reasonably short offerings per issue, all by Yours Truly except page 5 (more on that in a bit). Articles are not solicited; if submitted, they will not be published. No offense intended. If you want to be heard, submit elsewhere or better yet, publish yourself. And God bless you. Each page has a theme. The front page article, the first of which you are reading now (and thanks again for that!), will be a bit more general perhaps about the magazine itself or about my situation in life and the work, perhaps about a particular event or time of year. Im playing that by ear a bit. Page 2 is devoted to exegesis which is a fancy preacher word for Bible study. We will work our way through a book (Colossians is first) and then move on to another. Page 3, Reprove and Rebuke, is devoted to doctrinal correctness, and is the counterpart to Page 7, Exhort with Patience. Page 4 is for my poetry (mostly songs and song lyrics waiting to become songs). Page 6 focuses on the wisdom literature. Page 8 is for my Final Word articles, with which you may already be familiar. All will be new work, never published anywhere else. Page 5 is entitled, More PLAIN TALK, and will feature the writing of one of my greatest mentors, Robert F. Turner. His PLAIN TALK remains, in my humble opinion, the greatest publication our brethren have ever produced. Its simple approach and format is the inspiration for The Preacher. It is no accident that I begin publication on the 50th anniversary of the first issue of PLAIN TALK. If I am impacting a single life a half-century from now as much as Bro. Turner is impacting me, I will consider my work not to have been in vain. So thats it. Read prayerfully, read honestly, read with a Bible nearby to keep me accountable. But please read. And if you find helpful in your walk with Christ, encourage others to read as well. And now I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified (Acts 20:32).

Hal Hammons, thepreachermag.com Page 2

The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

Approved to God
Posted 1/1/2014

Colossians 1:1-8 Constantly bearing fruit and increasing

e have no record of the apostle Paul ever visiting the brethren at Colossae. He preached in Asia for about years during his third preaching tour (Acts 19:10 22), during which time he easily could have visited Colossae. But since he refers to having heard of their faith (v.4) rather than having seen it himself, it does not appear that he did so. His personal connections to the church appear to be few, and he specifically give credit for the firstfruits there to Epaphras (v.7). But his lack of personal contact did not diminish his love for his unseen brethren or his commitment to them. His testimony to the Colossians service is reminiscent of his words to his brethren at Corinth a church with which Paul was intimately acquainted. But now faith, hope, love, abide these three, he wrote in 1 Corinthians 13:13. These three qualities, far more than the gifts of the Spirit over which the Corinthians were bickering, define the child of God. And this is precisely what defined the Christians in Colossae. They had faith. The one faith of Ephesians 4:5, the faith perfected through works of James 2:22, the faith once for all handed down to the saints of Jude 3, this faith characterizes the people of God at their most fundamental level. Such has always been the case. But now in Jesus, the faith that God exists and rewards (Hebrews 11:6) naturally leads to faith in Jesus as His Son and designated Savior (Romans 10:9 -10). Faith in Christ Jesus (v.4) means the utter confidence that the way He chooses for us, the way He designates in His word, is the way in which we should go that one who goes too far and does not abide in the teaching of Christ (2 John 9) is not walking by faith and therefore is not a true disciple. They had love. Love for all the saints (v.4) is a natural result, and testimony of, our love for the Father of us all (1 John 4:20-21). A body of believers united in a pure love of God will naturally find the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Ephesians 4:3). Certainly a church can have love without the truth. But it absolutely cannot be in truth without love. The love brethren have for one another is the loudest testimony of the power of the Spirit working in them. It is why Jesus said in John 13:35, By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another. A lack of love is the simplest, but by no means the only, evidence that the power of Jesus Christ is not impacting our lives as it should. They had hope. The word of truth, the gospel which has come to you (v.5-6) tell us our toil is not in vain in the Lord (1 Corinthians 15:58). The same hope that pushed the patriarchs through the wilderness toward a country of their own (Hebrews 11:14) buoys us through the difficulties of life as we press toward the city He has prepared for the faithful (Hebrews 11:16), where we will wear the crown given to all who have loved His appearing (2 Timothy 4:8). This gospel is constantly bearing fruit and increasing (v.6) in the heart of the true believer. If we do not see it doing so in our own lives, that should tell us something about our faith. And our hope.

Hal Hammons, thepreachermag.com

The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

A Plea for Plain Talk

Posted 1/1/2014

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More PLAIN TALK

Once Jesus told his disciples, I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world; again, I leave the world and go to the Father And his disciples said, Lo, now speakest thou plainly and speakest no proverb. (Jn. 16:28-29) Again (in 2 Cor. 3:2) Paul, having contrasted the Old and New Testament, and having shown the greater glory of the later, wrote: Seeing then that we have such hope, we use great plainness of speech. The days of hidden wisdom and the mystery of the gospel are past. (1 Cor. 2:7,10, Eph. 3:3-7) The Mystic Knights of the Sea may keep their pagan rites and child-like secrets but Gods children love the light, and rejoice unashamedly in the truth It is with such a spirit as this that Plain Talk is introduced. Politics and religion These subjects are taboo in social circles, we are told. Why is it so? Is it better to repeat the latest gossip, or feed the ego with stories of yesterdays deeds? Or do we simply admit we know so little about these vital life subject we can not carry on an intelligent discussion without becoming obnoxious? A Weaving Way Some preachers, and politicians, can not discus their subjects calmly and factually. They must build up steam, so that stale clichs, flag waving, and stomping can take the place of substantiated truth. Maybe some reluctance to discuss religion results from such displays. You say If this is religion, deliver me. And so Plain Talk Lets not throw out the baby with the wash water. Our subject need discussion, and we feel Plain Talk is one answer. Not abusive we write with malice toward none; nor with careless abandon our subject demands the best in us. Rather, we hope to get to the point with the plainness and directness warranted by the urgency of our message. Plain Talk seeks conscientious readers. Are you? Robert F. Turner, January 1964

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The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

Reprove and Rebuke

I am not a Campbellite!
Posted 1/1/2014

never met Alexander Campbell. To the best of my knowledge, I never met anyone who has. He was a fine man in many respects, as far as I can tell. Im sure he did a lot of good thing and a lot of not-so-good things, just like the rest of us. But in any case, hes not worthy of me adopting his name. I reserve that privilege for my Lord. The apostle Paul has my back on this. He condemned divisions in the church in Corinth and attributed it to their tendency to follow after men (1 Corinthians 1:10-12). He goes so far in verses 14-16 as to be grateful he did not personally baptize very many of them not to diminish the importance of baptism, which he absolutely required (Galatians 3:27, Romans 6:4, etc.), but to help escape the charge of aiding and abetting a party spirit. Once upon a time, my father and his brethren were tagged as Campbellites by various ones, insinuating that their doctrine had its origins in Campbell, Barton W. Stone and other American preachers of a century before. And to be fair, Im sure plenty of people followed after Campbell and Stone in the way others followed after Charles Russell, Joseph Smith, Mary Baker Eddy and other religious leaders. And they are all condemned under the blanket statement of our Lord in Matthew 15:9 But in vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of me. My father was not one of those Campbellites, though. Nor am I. Its easy to tag someone with a pejorative, lampoon their beliefs in absentia, declare victory over the straw man, and depart the field. If thats your idea of fighting the good fight of faith, though, I will have to take issue. I want to take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17) to prove something about my Lord, not about me. What does my opponent care about what I believe? The only thing of consequence is what the Lord teaches! All the time spent characterizing (more accurately, mischaracterizing) my position on this, that or the other would be better spent studying the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16) and then measuring our spiritual life by the Spirit who speaks to us through that gospel (Romans 8:16). I have little interest in proving myself to be an anti-Campbellite to someone who clearly has already made up his mind about me. At a certain point, Proverbs 26:4 comes into play Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will also be like him. Do I want to be someone who gets bogged down in namecalling, worldly and empty chatter (2 Timothy 2:16), bitter speech (James 3:9-12) and the like? Do I want to fit the categorization of 1 Timothy 6:4-5 he is conceited and understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words, out of which rise envy strife, abusive language, evil suspicions, and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain? If not, perhaps I should choose someone else to study the Bible with.

Hal Hammons, thepreachermag.com

The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

Four stones too many

Posted 1/1/2014

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Exhort with Patience

srael was afraid for a reason. The Philistines were far more numerous than they. They were better armed as Israel had no blacksmiths in those days and therefore precious few real weapons; in those days, Israel had to go to a Philistine even to get his plow sharpened (1 Samuel 13:19-20). And the obvious inequity between the warring forces was brought into even greater relief when the Philistine champion challenged whatever warrior Israel might offer, any warrior at all, to single combat. He was a seasoned veteran of battle, armed with the largest and most advanced weaponry available. And on top of that, he was nine feet tall. On the surface, it seems Israels ultimate response could not have been less appropriate. Instead of a soldier, they sent forth a shepherd not a boy exactly, but certainly not an experienced man. He was tall enough to wear the kings armor and carry his sword (1 Samuel 17:39), but he was uncomfortable with the armament, not having ever used it before. So instead, He took his stick in his hand and chose for himself five smooth stones from the brook and put them in the shepherd s bag which he had, even in is pouch, and his sling was in his hand; and he approached the Philistine (1 Samuel 17:40). Four stones too many, as it turned out. Its ironic. All this emphasis on age, experience, tools, strength and such like. And not only did the victor in the battle bring virtually one of that into combat, he did not even need as much as he did bring. It truly is, if you will pardon the expression, the original David and Goliath story. It is our story as well. Today, the people of God feel disadvantage in size. And with cause. The broad path of Matthew 7:13 is acquiring more and more travelers every day; it s broad for a reason, after all. We often feel like Elijah on Mount Carmel facing 450 prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18:22). And even if we somehow manage to survive, we still feel isolate in our righteousness. There may be 7,000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal, but we dont see very many of them on a week-to-week basis. We feel disadvantaged in weaponry. The very effective tools of the devil greed, violence, hate, carnality, deceit, etc. appeal to mans lust and as such are not from the Father (1 John 2:16). So we shun them as not appropriate for spiritual warfare. We feel disadvantaged in experience as well. All the knowledgeable people of the world seem to oppose us; even those highly trained in spiritual disciplines call into question such fundamental principles of faith as Gods creation, the virgin birth of our Lord, and even the existence of a spirit realm at all. But God doesnt need numbers to accomplish His will. Ask Jonathan; he will tell you, the Lord is not restrained to save by many or by few (1 Samuel 14:6). The weapons we receive may seem ill conceived when we look at them through worldly eyes. But God say they are divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses (2 Corinthians 10:4). They will work His victory if we have the faith to use them properly. The world may call us foolish, but the foolishness of God is wiser than men (1 Corinthians 1:25). If semiliterate fishermen can stand before the illuminati of their culture and say, we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard (Acts 4:20), so can we. The problem is not a dearth of opportunity for victory. The problem is not having enough faith to claim the victory God has already won for us.

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The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

To Know Wisdom
Posted 1/1/2014

Proverbs 1:7 The Fear of the Lord

he fear of the Lord is mentioned 51 times in the Bible. The exact phrase the fear of the Lord is found 14 times in the book of Proverbs by far the most appearances in any book. So it is appropriate that Solomon begins his list of proverbs with this one: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction (Proverbs 1:7). After spending the introductory six verses telling his reader how import the pursuit of wisdom is, this is the place he tells him to begin his quest. It is no accident that he also ends the book by praising the ideal woman for being, among other things, a woman who fear the Lord (Proverbs 31:30). Nor is it coincidental that, after a lifetime of seeking and compiling wisdom through every avenue known to man, Solomon concludes his writing in Ecclesiastes 12:13 by writing, The conclusion, when all has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14). As he intimates in Ecclesiastes, fearing God is directly attached to the judgment that awaits us all. But fearing God is more than just quaking in our boots. He is not a pagan volcano god, requiring adherents to throw virgins into his flaming maw in an effort to perhaps stay his wrath. He is the complete embodiment of love (1 John 4:8), of patience (2 Peter 3:9), of mercy (Psalm 86:15). None of these marvelous and happy traits of God erode away even the slightest aspect of His holiness and righteous wrath; but then, the reverse is true as well. As challenging as it may be for us, He is both. He loves and hates. He creates and destroys. He saves and condemns. Some have found it helpful to use respect as a synonym for fear and as long as the concept of a vengeful, condemning God is not lost, that may be a good way to view the fear of the Lord. Our relationship with Him is not (or at least, should not be) characterized by constant trembling but by constant reverence and awe at who He is, at what He is. While living in His fear, He assures us of His protection; The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him, and rescues them (Psalm 34:7). Therefore we are glad to say, The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true; they are righteous altogether (Psalm 19:9). The more we grow in our understanding of godly fear, the more appreciation and confidence we have for Gods loving side as well. But the lovingkindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to childrens children, to those who keep His covenant and remember His precepts to do them (Psalm 103:17-18). Perhaps the depth of understanding required to properly understand this fear is why Solomon tells us to start studying it at the very beginning. It will take more than a single lifetime here on earth to fully comprehend it. But in the meantime, we pursue it in earnest. We seek out spiritual mentors, particularly those whose inspired words are recorded in Scripture, and listen to them teach us as David does Come, children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord (Psalm 34:11)

Hal Hammons, thepreachermag.com

The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

I Give You All The Praise!

Posted 1/1/2014

Page 7

Sing a New Song

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The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. Ecclesiastes 12:10

The Final Word

Deceived
Posted 1/1/2014

cannot abide being deceived. Mostly, I think, its because I am so trusting. Take Lance Armstrong, for instance seven-time Tour de France champion, cancer survivor, man of charity, hero to millions, a tremendous success story all the way around. So when the doping allegations began to pile up, I tried not to listen. I focused on the people leveling the charges. Jealous competitors. Disgruntled former teammates. French people. I knew it might be a lie. But I wanted to believe. Well, turns out it was a lie after all. And although I have minimal effort and time invested in Lance Armstrong (I dont watch cycling, I havent given to Live Strong, I dont even wear that weird yellow bracelet), I cant help feeling cheated. I was sold a bill of goods, even if I didnt actually pay for it. A deceiver is someone who has decided his own agenda is more important than a pursuit of the truth. It may be, in his own mind at least, a noble agenda. Perhaps the only reason Lance Armstrong competed in, and cheated to win, those races was to establish his foundation and raise money for cancer survivors. But more often than not, the agenda in question is, at its core, selfish. Lance s too, I strongly suspect. Thats part of the reason all liars have a part in eternal hell (Revelation 21:8). A liar has decided his own version of the truth is more important than the real truth. Such a one cannot have fellowship with Him through whom truth is realized (John 1:17). If you think you can hold to your own version of the truth, you are deceiving yourself and to God. Ask Ananias and Sapphira how that worked out for them (Acts 5:1-10).

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