ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church

Lord's Day: June 14, 2026  Preacher: Carlos Montijo  Series: First John  Topic: God's Decree  Scripture: 1 John 5:14–16; Ephesians 5:15–17; Psalm 143:10; Colossians 4:12; Acts 20:27; Ephesians 1:7–10; Deuteronomy 29:29; 1 Corinthians 14:33; Isaiah 46:10–11; Job 42:1–2; Genesis 50:20; Acts 2:23; 4:28; Colossians 3:11; Ezekiel 33:10–11; 1 Samuel 2:25; John 6:40; 1 Thessalonians 4:3–11; 5:18; 1 Peter 2:13–15; 1 John 2:1; 1 Thessalonians 1:1; John 17:17; 2 Peter 3:18; 1 Timothy 3:15; Hebrews 10:24–25; 2 Samuel 10:12; James 4:13–17; 1 John 2:17 “The secret things belong to Yahweh our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may do all the words of this law." Deuteronomy 29:29 I.  The will of God The will of God is a doctrine that is not so difficult to understand in one sense (although certain aspects are complex)—but it is difficult for many to accept. Ephesians 1:7-10 II. Does God have more than one will? God’s decree does not always reflect His commands; yet His purposes are always accomplished in accord with His will. III. Does God have a permissive will? Isaiah 46:10-11 Was there a Cross because of sin? Or was there sin because of the Cross? Jonathan Edwards: “God decrees all things, and even all sins. Acts ii. 23. “Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain;” iv. 28. “For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.” If the thing meant, be only that Christ’s sufferings should come to pass by some means or other; I answer, they could not come to pass but by sin.” Gordon Haddon Clark, Christian Philosophy, The Works of Gordon Haddon Clark (The Trinity Foundation, 2004), IV <https://www.trinitylectures.org/christian-philosophy-the-works-of-gordon-haddon-clark-volume-paperback-p-145.html> IV. How then can we know the will of God? For our specific lives? What about Dr. Emerson Eggerichs' The 4 Wills of God? Pietism Join us on Sundays for worship at 10:00am: ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church4712 Montana AveEl Paso, Texas 79903 Contact us at: web: ThornCrownCovenant.Churchcall/text: (915) 843-8088email: ThornCrownCovenantBChurch@gmail.com Scripture quotations taken from the (LSB®) Legacy Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. LSBible.org and 316publishing.com

Lord's Day: January 25, 2025  Preacher: Carlos Montijo  Series: It Is Written: Scripture Alone  Topic: Authority  Scripture: Matthew 23:1–4; Luke 4:16–21; Exodus 18:13–26; Deuteronomy 1:11–18; Ezra 10:1–6, 10–12; Nehemiah 13:23–30; Matthew 7:29; John 8:14–15, 19; 1 John 2:23; John 9:39–41; Mark 7:13 2“The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses; 3therefore all that they tell you, do and keep, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them." Matthew 23:2–3 Jesus rebukes the scribes and Pharisees, who do not practice what they preach, insofar as what they preach/teach actually agrees with Moses and the prophets, the sacred Scriptures, the written Word of God. I.  The kathedra of Moses Moses’ seat is not some extrabiblical, “infallible” tradition or authority that is outside of or independent of what is written by God. II. What saith the Scriptures? Exodus 18:13–26, Deuteronomy 1:11–18, Ezra 10:1–6, 10–12, Nehemiah 13:23–30 III. God always requires His leaders to be called and qualified, without hypocrisy. Both then, in Israel (kings, scribes, priests, prophets, judges, etc.), and now, in the church (pastors, elders, teachers, etc.) Pharisees and Sadducees emerged, and seated themselves in the authoritative teaching chair of Moses (Matt. 23:2-3)—but, were they actually called and qualified by God to do so? The scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees were denounced by Christ as hypocritical, unbiblical usurpers and abusers of authority. We meet on Sundays for worship at 10:00am: ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church4712 Montana Ave El Paso, Texas 79903 Contact us at: web: ThornCrownCovenant.Churchcall/text: (915) 843-8088email: ThornCrownCovenantBChurch@gmail.com Scripture quotations marked LSB are from the (LSB®) Legacy Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. LSBible.org and 316publishing.com

Lord's Day: January 11, 2025  Preacher: Carlos Montijo  Series: It Is Written: Scripture Alone  Topic: Scripture  Scripture: Luke 11:45–52; Matthew 23:29–36; Zechariah 1:1; 2 Chronicles 24:20–22; Luke 7:28; Isaiah 7:14; Matthew 25:46; Ephesians 2:1–19 49“For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute, 50so that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, 51from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation.’" Luke 11:49–51 Sometimes Jesus was confrontational I.  Which Zechariah? Zechariah 1:1, 2 Chronicles 24:20–22, Protoevangelium of James II. Jesus does not include any martyrdoms from the Intertestamental Period Nor John the Baptist “So there was great distress in Israel, such as had not been since the time that prophets ceased to appear among them.” (1 Macc. 9:27, after Malachi) Jewish Talmud (Sotah 9:48b): “As the Sages taught in a baraita (Tosefta 13:3): From the time when Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi died, the Divine Spirit departed from the Jewish people, as these three were considered to be the last prophets.” III. Differing levels of authority within the canonical books of Scripture Law of Moses is the foundation for everything that follows All Scripture is authoritative, but the New Testament is the final written Word of God, making it more authoritative, the final, God-breathed, written Word that divinely expands on, fulfills, continues and abrogates, and interprets the Old Testament. Augustine: “The new is in the old concealed (hidden); the old is in the new revealed.” Beware: Inverted hermeneutic of Annihilationism, Conditional Immortality (Kirk Cameron) Louis Gaussen: “The whole tenor of Scripture places the writers of the New Testament in the same rank with the prophets of the Old; and even when it establishes any difference between them, it is always in putting the last in date above the first, in so far as one of God's sayings is superior to the saying that preceded it (not…in divinity, not in dignity, but in authority).”[1] We meet on Sundays for worship at 10:00am: ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church4712 Montana Ave El Paso, Texas 79903 Contact us at: web: ThornCrownCovenant.Churchcall/text: (915) 843-8088email: ThornCrownCovenantBChurch@gmail.com Scripture quotations marked LSB are from the (LSB®) Legacy Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. LSBible.org and 316publishing.com [1] François Samuel Robert Louis Gaussen, God-Breathed: The Divine Inspiration of the Bible, ed. by John W. Robbins, trans. by David Scott, Trinity Paper, 57 (The Trinity Foundation, 2001), pp. 78, 84 <https://www.trinitylectures.org/god-breathed-the-divine-inspiration-of-the-bible-p-88.html>.

Lord's Day: December 28, 2025  Preacher: Carlos Montijo  Series: It Is Written: Scripture Alone  Topic: Scripture  Scripture: Romans 3:1–2; Acts 7:37–39; Luke 24:25–27, 44–49; John 10:27–28; 1 Corinthians 14:21; John 1:45; Matthew 22:40; Romans 3:21–22; Acts 13:15; 10:43 1Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? 2Great in every respect. First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God. Romans 3:1–2 Opponents of Protestantism falsely claim that there is no evidence in the early church for the Protestant Old Testament canon. This betrays history, church history, and the competing criteria that were used—especially in the early church—to recognize the books of the Old Testament. I.  There were two primary competing criteria in the early church used to identify the Old Testament: 1. Which books were part of the Hebrew canon that the Jews used, and which Christ and His Apostles affirmed? Rom. 3:1-2, Acts 7:37-39, etc. 2. Which books did the (early) churches read in church and deemed edifying?[1] This is less precise. The church does not define God’s Word—God’s Word defines the church. II. The Protestant Canon of the Old Testament The overwhelming testimony of the Jews was that they held to an exclusive, 22/24 book canon of the Old Testament, matching the Protestant canon—apart from any "infallible" authority/council defining their canon—and Jesus and the Apostles quoted it to them repeatedly and demonstrated how He fulfilled it, refuted them with it, appealed to it as the highest authority, held them accountable to it, without ever debating which books were inspired. See “The Apocrypha Disproves Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy,” https://faithalone.net/topical-articles/articles/catholicism/apocrypha.html. III. Hebrew Bible—Tanakh—has three sections: Torah (Law), Nevi’im (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings) Apocrypha are not included in the Hebrew Bible. IV. The 22/24 Hebrew canon and threefold subdivision of the Old Testament is found in numerous ancient Jewish and Christian sources, and in the Old and New Testaments. Anglican John Cosin (1594-1672) lists over 76 Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox sources, authorities, councils which rejected/distinguished the Apocrypha, in A Scholastical History of the Canon of the Holy Scripture, https://confessionalbibliology.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/The_Works_Of_John_Cosin_Scholastical_his.pdf. V.  The New Testament uses synecdoches and shorthand phrases like “the Law and the Prophets” to denote the entire Old Testament. Also "the Law," “the Prophets,” “all the Prophets,” "the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms"  Old Testament also uses canonical synecdoches. We meet on Sundays for worship at 10:00am: ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church4712 Montana Ave El Paso, Texas 79903 Contact us at: web: ThornCrownCovenant.Churchcall/text: (915) 843-8088email: ThornCrownCovenantBChurch@gmail.com Scripture quotations marked LSB are from the (LSB®) Legacy Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. LSBible.org and 316publishing.com [1] John D. Meade and Peter J. Gurry, Scribes and Scripture: The Amazing Story of How We Got the Bible (Crossway, 2022), p. 120.