The Vision (1.9.26): A Gospel Church Ordered by Scriptural Rule

Image: Winter scene. Pond in North Garden, Virginia. January 2026.

Note: Devotion taken from last Sunday's sermon on Philippians 1:1-2.

“Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons: Grace be unto you and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:1-2).

Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi begins with three key points:

First, he identifies the senders of the letter (v. 1a). It is chiefly written by the apostle Paul, but also by his co-worker in the ministry Timothy. Timothy was a disciple with a good reputation among the brethren whose mother was a Jewish believer but his father a pagan unbeliever (Acts 16:1-2). He is listed as co-author with Paul of Philippians and five other NT letters (cf. 2 Cor 1:1; Col 1:1; 1 Thess 1:1; 2 Thess 1:1; and Philemon 1:1). The fact that two men are listed here is a reminder of the fact that we never minister alone but are always working alongside fellow laborers in the gospel.

They describe themselves as “servants [Greek: douloi, slaves] of Jesus Christ.” There is no room for arrogance in the Christian life and especially in ministry and service.

Second, he describes the recipients of the letter (v. 1b). It is addressed “to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi.” The word “saints” here means “holy ones,” those set apart for salvation through faith in Christ and sanctification as they abide in Christ. So, it is addressed to believers.

These saints were at Philippi in Macedonia (for the beginning of this church see Acts 16). Notice that the believers who lived in a particular area were meant to come together as the visible church in the place where they lived.

We have two key points here:

First: The church is regenerate. It is composed of believers.

Second: The church is local. We believe in the universal church, the mystical body of Christ. But the church is also local. If you are part of the universal, invisible church, you will also want to be part of the local, visible church.

Paul next adds, “with the bishops and deacons.” Are there three groups that are being addressed here: saints, bishops, and deacons? No. Only one group is addressed: the saints (believers) in the church. Within that church, however, there are men called to serve the body in two offices (cf. 1 Timothy 3:1-13). There are bishops (also known as elders or pastors), whose task is to teach and rule [administer], and there are deacons, whose task is to serve the church’s materials needs.

Third, Paul offers an apostolic blessing (v. 2). Notice he speaks of God’s grace, the means of their salvation, and peace, the end (outcome) of their salvation. By God’s grace, through faith in Christ, they have found peace with God (cf. Romans 5:1).

The church at Philippi was a faithful body of believers ordered by Scriptural rule. We too seek to be the same in our church.

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

WM 363: KEACH on the DIVINE AUTHORITY of the Holy Scriptures: Part 13 of 17: TESTIMONY of ENEMIES

 

JTR

The Vision (1.2.26): Encouragements and Exhortations at the Head of a New Year

Image: Moon over the dunes. Topsail Island, North Carolina. December 2025.

The New Year often brings with it resolutions for behaviors we intend to practice or goals we hope to achieve.

As we begin a new year, let me share five brief exhortations (along with a Scripture proof) that might serve as resolutions for members and friends of CRBC:

1.    Let us be committed to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.

“But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.” (2 Peter 3:18).

2.    Let us be committed to sustaining this local church in its worship and ordinances.

“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching” (Hebrews 10:25).

3.    Let us be committed to receiving and profiting from the “ordinary means” of grace, including prayer, reading the Word of God (privately in our personal lives and corporately in the church), hearing the preaching and teaching of the Holy Scriptures, submitting to baptism (if not baptized), and regularly taking the Lord’s Supper when it is served.

“As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby” (1 Peter 2:2).

4.    Let us be committed to meaningful fellowship and sincere expressions of love for the brotherhood of believers.

“A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another” (John 13:34).

5.    Let us be committed to personal ministry (beginning within our own household), to evangelism, and to missions (spreading the gospel around the world).

“As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith” (Galatians 6:10).

Grace and peace, Pastor Jeff Riddle

Personal Reflections: A Dozen Interesting Reads (Listens) in 2025

“Bring… the books” (2 Timothy 4:13). I think this was the first year the number of books I listened to outstripped the number I read. Here are a dozen or so highlights of 2025 (in no particular order):

First: D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Preaching & Preachers (Hodder and Stoughton, 1971).

I re-read this classic on evangelical preaching in 2025 and x-posted many of the aphoristic quotations.

Second: David N. Samuel, Pope or Gospel? The Crisis of Faith in the Protestant Churches (Marshalls, 1982).

This year I discovered the writings of the founding presiding bishop of the Church of England (Continuing). Excellent defense of traditional Protestant Christianity and critique of compromise in the contemporary Church of England (and Protestant liberalism in general). I also read his book The Church in Crisis and have started a couple of others.

Third: Paul Kingsnorth, Against the Machine: On the Unmasking of Humanity (Thesis, 2025).

Compelling critique of dehumanizing tendencies in the digital age, written by a formerly disillusioned British humanist who searched for meaning in Wicca and Buddhism, before turning to Christianity (EOC). This book will make you want to throw away your cell phone (or put it in a box and only take it out sparingly).

Fourth: Brent Nongbri, God’s Library: Archaeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts (Yale, 2018).

A bona fide expert in evaluating manuscripts of antiquity surveys the earliest extant writings of Christianity and points out the scholarly challenges (and even fraudulent misrepresentations) of these documents in various areas, including the reliable dating of them. Lots of quotes from this will likely appear in my writing/speaking in 2026.

Fifth: Inger N. I. Kuin, Diogenes: The Rebellious Life and Revolutionary Philosophy of the Original Cynic (Basic Books, 2025).

An unexpected find. Stimulating survey, reconstruction, and reflection on the life and teaching of the Cynic philosopher Diogenes, the man who lived in a jar and told Alexander the Great not to block his sun-bathing, by a UVA classics professor.

Sixth: Joel R. Beeke, Revelation (Reformation Heritage Books, 2016).

I did a one sermon per chapter bird’s eye view Lord’s Day afternoon preaching series through Revelation in the last half of 2025 and found Beeke’s commentary, based on his own expositional preaching through the book, a help.

Seventh: Gary Taubes, The Case Against Sugar (Anchor, 2017).

As I’m getting older and wanting to stay healthy and strong as long as I can, I’ve been reading a bit more on health and aging. This book will make you rethink any use of sugar in your diet.

Eighth: Caleb Morell, A Light on the Hill: The Surprising Story of How a Local Church in the Nation’s Capital Influenced Evangelicalism (Crossway, 2025).

This is a “biography” of Capital Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC. I have my own critique of the “Nine Marks” church movement, but I enjoyed learning about the life and history of this congregation.

Ninth: Kingsley Amis, The Alteration (Carroll & Graf, 1976).

What would the British Isles, North America, and the rest of the world be like if the Protestant Reformation had never take place? This sci-fi alternative-history fiction offers one fascinating vision. This led me to another vision of this scenario in Keith Roberts’ collection of intertwined short stories Pavane (1968) and to Philip K. Dick’s alternative-history vision of post WW2 in The Man in the High Castle (1962).

Tenth: Philip H. Eveson, Baptised with Heavenly Power: The Holy Spirit in the Teaching and Experience of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Mentor, 2025).

I got the book having read some excerpts online from the appendix sharing a portion of Lloyd-Jones’ personal journal on his own spiritual struggles. I did not skip to the end, however, when I got the book, and profited from reading it all the way through. Great insights into “the Doctor’s” theology of the Holy Spirit, Spirit baptism, revivals, and preaching.

Eleventh: (The Venerable) Bede, The Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Latin original c. 731; A. M. Sellar English translation, 1907; listened on Libri Vox).

Classic account of the arrival and spread of Christianity in England from the Romans to the Anglo-Saxon periods.

Twelfth: Howard Markel, The Battling Brothers of Battle Creek (Vintage, 2018).

Listened to this history about the rivalry between John Harvey and W. K. Kellog after visiting Battle Creek, Michigan last August and touring the Seventh Day Baptist Church, the Seventh Day Adventist Tabernacle, the remains of the Battle Creek Sanitorium (now the local federal building), and Oak Hill Cemetery. Spellbinding historical account of everything from Adventist fervor in the nineteenth century, frontier expansion in America, developing views of modern health and medicine, and the genesis of the cutthroat “cereal” industry.

Reads (Listens) from 2024.

-Tolle Lege (et Audi)

Personal Reflections: A Dozen Memorable Events of 2025

Image: Preaching at Westminster Baptist Church, London, November 2025.

“Man is like a thing of nought: his time passeth away like a shadow” (Psalm 144:4, 1662 BCP). As another year passes and a new begins, it’s a good time for reflection. Here are a dozen or so highlights (in general chronological order) from 2025:

First: I became a grandfather, twice over, in 2025. My precious granddaughter was born to my youngest daughter and her husband in January. Then my adorable grandson was born to my oldest daughter and her husband in April. I’ve experienced firsthand now what others told me about: The satisfaction and joy of seeing your children’s children. To top off the year my oldest son was engaged to his fiancé in December. DV, they will be married in 2026.

Second: I had the privilege of teaching a group of believers in Kenya on issues related to the text and translation of Scripture for the Trinitarian Bible Society in a series of sessions over zoom in January and February.

Third: I conducted several funerals. CRBC is generally a young body. We have had very few funerals over the last decade. This year, however, we had four deaths, and I took part in four funeral services: a beloved and faithful charter member at CRBC Carol Bradley; esteemed former missionary and my fellow elder for over a decade at CRBC Jeff Clark; a solid and encouraging layman, Rick Jones; the infant son, Adoniram Cook, of a beloved church family.

Fourth: I organized an Ordination Council in February and oversaw the ordination and installation of Ben Cook on Sunday April 13 as my fellow elder at CRBC.

Fifth: CRBC hosted the Spring Presbyterion (Pastors’ Fraternal) in Louisa on Friday April 11, and I gave one of the talks offering a review of the book The Case for Christian Nationalism.

Sixth: I gave a plenary lecture at the IRBS Faculty Conference on Church Planting on the topic “Setting in order the things that are wanting” (Titus 1:1-5) on Friday May 16 and attended the IRBS graduation ceremony on Saturday May 17 in Mansfield, Texas.

Seventh: I organized and oversaw our CRBC Youth Conference on Ex Nihilo Creation (with guest speaker Andrew McCaskill) at Machen Conference Center in Highland County on June 13-14 and then taught on the OT Wisdom Literature in our CRBC Vacation Bible School to the children of CRBC June 16-19.

Eighth: I enjoyed a week of family vacation at Topsail Island, NC, June 23-28.

Ninth: I served as chairman of the Reformation Bible Society and with the other executive committee members organized our second annual conference on August 2 at Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I gave a plenary lecture on “Erasmus and the Ending of Revelation.” I then enjoyed a preaching ministry at South Litchfield Baptist Church with host pastor Jay Chambers in southern Michigan the week following the RBS conference, August 3-6.

Tenth: I served as a messenger to the inaugural General Assembly of the Reformed Baptist Association of Virginia at Grace Baptist Chapel in Hampton on Friday, September 26 and was elected to serve as Moderator of the new association. I also attended the Keach Conference the next day on Saturday, September 27 in Yorktown.

Eleventh: I had a ministry trip to England, November 7-13. I preached alongside Pooyan Mehrshahi and host pastor Jonathan Arnold at a conference on Confessing the Faith & the Nicene Creed at Westminster Baptist Church in London. I also attended some TBS meetings in London, visited friends in the Gloucester area, and the midweek meeting of Providence Baptist Chapel in Cheltenham.

Twelfth: I was able to continue my writing, blogging, and podcasting ministry. I posted Word Magazine podcast episodes 317-362.  I contributed two chapters to the book It is Written and edited the Reformation Bible Society Journal, Vol. 1 on the theme The Reformation Text & the Septuagint, including contributing a chapter on “How Did the Earliest Church Use the Septuagint?” I also contributed articles and book reviews to various journals including “To the Saints which are at Ephesus” to Bible League Quarterly, “The Preservation of Scripture” to the BLQ and the Trinity Review, and “Father, Forgive Them: The Case for the Authenticity of Luke 23:34a” to the Puritan Reformed Journal.

SDG!

Read Personal Reflections from 2024 here.

Discussion Notes on Revelation 22:19

Image: Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, December 2025.

From an X post:

Last week an RB pastor friend got in touch asking for info for a discussion that had come up on Revelation 22:19.

Here's a slightly edited version of my response:

Regarding your question about Rev 22:19 (assuming this has to do with the "book of life" [TR]/"tree of life" [Modern Critical Text] variant), here are a few preliminary comments: 1. The TR is NOT based on the modern reconstruction method but relies on providential preservation; "book of life" is the reading that prevailed in Protestant (and especially English) Bible translation tradition. 2. The TR often follows the majority text but this is a case where it prefers an extant minority reading. 3. The reading "book of life" is only lightly attested in extant Greek manuscripts, but witness to it is not non-existent. Hoskier pointed to ms 141 (now known as ms. 2049) as holding the reading. Schmid also suggests mss. 296, 1668, and 2136 as supportive of the TR in Rev. 22. 4. Revelation is notorious overall for having the least, latest, and most disjointed extant Greek witnesses. It is particularly difficult for those who rely on modern reconstruction. 5. One example of the difficulty: At Rev. 4:8 both major modern printed editions of the so-called Majority/Byzantine Text supply different readings, because no clear Majority text prevails. Farstad/Hodges has a nine-fold "holy" and Robinson/Pierpont a three-fold "holy" at Rev. 4:8.

6. The TR can hardly be attacked for preferring a lightly attested reading, since the modern critical text also frequently does the same. For example, at 2 Peter 3:10 the NA28 has a reading that is a conjecture supported by no extant Greek mss. The modern text has multiple verses that have sequential readings found in no extant Greek mss. See my article: "Verses with 'Zero-Support' in the Modern Critical Text of the Greek NT."

7. Examination of the internal evidence shows that both "book of life" and "tree of life" are used in Revelation. Some suggest a scribe might have altered 22:19 to read "tree of life" at an early stage in order to have the passage harmonize with "tree of life" in Rev. 22:2, 14.

8. There has been peculiar controversy over the last six verses of Revelation (22:16-21). Since the nineteenth century it has been frequently suggested that Erasmus "back-translated" these verses from a Latin source. I gave a lecture last year for the Reformation Bible Society challenging the reliability and veracity of this anecdote.

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9. It is interesting that the original printing of the KJV carried a note at Rev 22:19 (still printed in some Bibles) at the phrase "out of the book of life," which reads, "Or, from the tree of life." This indicates an openness to the possibility that "tree of life" is original, though the translators preferred "book of life." This type of distinction is sometimes (though rarely) made in KJV in recognition of variants by the old Protestant translators, but this is a far cry from the modern critical approach that jettisons large portions of the traditional text of Scripture (like Mark 16:9-20 or John 7:53--8:11) or suggests that the text is, in no way, stable.

--

This friend also shared some notes given to him by another pastor (who uses the NKJV) providing another internal argument in favor of the "book of life" reading:

"God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book." •    Some of your translations may read “tree of life” here, but here we preach from the NKJV, which reads “Book of Life.” •    Now obviously we are not going to argue about certain manuscripts but we do indeed believe that the Lord has providentially preserved His Word and that it comes to us in what is called the Textus Receptus, or the Received Text •    But further than this, when we consider v. 19 in light of the flow and structure of the book of Revelation itself, the Book of Life makes deep and fitting sense •    When we hear of the Book of Life as it appears in this book, it is always associated with eternal judgment and salvation ◦    Revelation 3:5 "He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels." ◦    Revelation 13:8: "All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." ◦    Revelation 20:15: "And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire." •    To have one’s name removed from the Book of Life is to be shut out from eternal life and cast into judgment. •    The tree of life, on the other hand, is consistently portrayed as a reward for the righteous, never as something a false professor might lose. ◦    Revelation 2:7 “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.” ◦    Revelation 22:2 “In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.” ◦    Revelation 22:14 “Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.” ◦    In each of these three texts, the tree of life is promised to the righteous, to the overcomers, and to those who belong to God in the eternal state. ◦    It is never used in a context of loss, warning, or judgment. ◦    It is always reward-oriented, never spoken of as something that a false believer might have a “part” in and then lose. •    And so the language here—of someone’s “part” or “portion” being taken away—corresponds naturally with the idea of a name written in a book, not with fruit from a tree. •    So even at the level of the text itself, “Book of Life” accords with the solemn warning being given and underscores just how serious it is to tamper with the Word of God.

Revelation 22:19 "and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book."

JTR

WM 361: KEACH on the DIVINE AUTHORITY of the Holy Scriptures: Part 12 of 17: TESTIMONY of the CHURCH

 

JTR

WM 360: KEACH on the DIVINE AUTHORITY of the Holy Scriptures: Parts 10-11 of 17: TRIUMPHS & TROPHIES

 

JTR