FGA President's Letter - December 1st

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I hope you had a great Thanksgiving. It seems to me that when you celebrate thanksgiving you know that Christmas is not far off. Christmas is right around the corner as we step into the month of December.
The paradox of Christmas is that in a place that you do not think you will find anything you need is the place you actually find everything you need. In that stable we understand as Charles Haddon Spurgeon said, “The Infinite became an Infant. The Creator became a Creature. God was in a Cradle.”

We call it the incarnation. It is simply a miracle!
God became human!

The invisible became visible!

The untouchable became touchable!
Eternal life experienced temporal death!

The Transcendent One descended and drew near!
The unlimited became limited!

The infinite became finite!
The immutable became mutable!

The unbreakable became fragile!
Spirit became matter!

The problem of sin was solved!
In such a strange place we find everything we need.

As St. Anselm said. “Jesus did not come out of curiosity or out of some personal need. The Father sent him on an errand of mercy solely to accomplish our redemption.”  And that is the Christmas message that we freely proclaim. That little baby was no ordinary little baby. He is the one about whom Isaiah prophesied over 700 years before the birth of the baby Jesus, whose name will be called Emanuel - God with us. And so we proclaim that purification and propitiation has been prepared and as such eternal life is free for all those who believe in risen Lord Jesus Christ, the name above every name and the only name by which a man or a woman, boy or girl can be saved.  Let us make sure that this season above all seasons that we do not tell people what this age wants, but what it needs, not what it will reward but what without which it cannot be saved.
One of the ministry venues for FGA is our opportunity to connect. The FGA conference in October gave us such a great time to meet many from literally around the world. But we not only got to know them, we now have an opportunity to help them. One of our guests was Pastor Tero Fredrikson of Greater Grace Church, Vaasa, Finland. Read his message regarding the FGA conference.
Dear Friends,
I want to express my gratefulness to Dr. Bing and the FGA for the conference I attended last month. When we were singing the first worship song together I sensed the kind of unity I have longed for for a long time. That was only a prelude to the conference, since every message and workshop was so loaded academically, but also the presence of God was very real in the lives of the speakers and the attendants. I am writing a book in Finnish about soteriology from the free grace and dispensational perspective. In the future my plan is to extend the book to be a systematic theology. The purpose of the book is to be a textbook in Bible colleges and discipleship training. Writing the book is not an easy thing for me and I found myself in an academic impasse. I needed mentoring to get myself out of that situation, and your conference really helped me to move on.
I and my fellow elder Dr. Kale Koskinen were extremely built up by the way FGA received us. We were treated like kings. I want to become a member of FGA and be a part of that fellowship. The Free Grace gospel needs to be spoken out aloud in Finland. We need preaching, teaching, training and writing to accomplish the mission. Let us do it together.

I also believe that Greater Grace World Outreach affiliation will be blessed by the FGA. I got many doctrine books and I have passed them to our key pastors, and books have been receivedwith gratefulness and read with passion.
We have a vital role to play with Tero and many others who do not have many of the resources that we here in the USA at times take for granted. Perhaps this Christmas season we might not only look to our own church, city our country, but might we also think about, pray for, and get involved and invested with Finland and other “remote parts of the earth”. May we consider how the Lord might use FGA as a ministry and you as individuals to promote the glorious grace of God.

Serving Him with you
Until He comes for us,
Fred Chay, Ph.D.
President, FGA
 


 

 

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