Grace Toronto. A church for the city in the city. Get to know us.

Kim’s Convenience, winner of the Toronto Fringe Festival’s best new play contest in 2010 will enjoy its first production at the 2011 Toronto Fringe Festival.

The Grace Centre for the Arts is hosting a reception with the cast and playwright following the performance on Monday, July 11th at Pauper’s Pub.

A limited number of tickets for the July 11th performance will go on sale at Grace Toronto Church following the Sunday services on July 3rd and 10th for $11 (cash only.)

Additional tickets are available at the Fringe Festival site, or at the door 1 hour before the performance.

Performance:

Warning – Mature Language
Monday, July 11th, 8:15pm
Bathurst St. Theatre
736 Bathurst Street, Toronto, ON

Reception:

10:00pm (following the performance)
Pauper’s Pub (2nd floor)
539 Bloor Street West, Toronto, ON

Tickets: $11

For more details about the show, visit the Kim’s Convenience website.

map

Part 1 | Part 2

Easter Sunday has immense world-shattering implications.  The resurrection is the ultimate answer to questions about the Christian faith – they prove the words and deeds of Jesus Christ during his years of public ministry and Jesus had spoken and done things that point us to a new hope and a future hope.  Among them are some of the following that is yet to come:

The Resurrection Body

Dan’s sermon today took us through 1 Cor. 15:20-23 and 1 Cor. 15:35-37.  As he said, our earthly bodies are right now still subject to decay, but Christ is the firstfruit, the forerunner of all who will follow him in his resurrection.  As Christ is risen so we all shall rise again.  1 Cor. 15:35-37 indicates that our bodies today are but a seed, a kernel, or grain.  Tim Keller put it this way:  Psalm 96:11-13 and Isaiah 55:12 indicates that the trees, the mountains, and the hills will be singing and clapping for joy.  If in the kingdom of heaven, those that were formerly unable to speak will speak and praise God, how much more glorious will our resurrection bodies be?  A seed continues to be a seed while a shadow yet blots out the sun, but when the sun rises, the seed blossoms to become what it was meant to be.

Master of the Banquet

Jesus’ first miracle in John 2:1-11 shows God to be the Lord of the Feast.  He probably pours a deep dark black with a moderate white head with a faint smell of roasted barley and a touch of malt sweetness.  Creamy, smooth, and simple, with a semi-sweet finish.  Ok, so I ripped off the beer description from Draught Guinness, but that is probably how heavenly beer tastes like anyway.  In turning water into wine, Jesus demonstrated that God is not some cosmic party-pooper, but the true Master of the Banquet.  One day we will all experience this truth in all its fullness.

Intimacy Unbound

We are subject to all sorts of intimacy problems when it comes to relationships with others – friction, confrontation, social awkwardness, misunderstandings, and isolation.  We face many barriers to being “real”.

In Mark 12:18-26, the Sadducees tried to trap Jesus with a story about a woman who got married seven times to seven husbands who died one after the other (you have to wonder what she was giving them – “Have some more Kool-Aid, honey…”).  The Sadducees asked Jesus whose wife she will be in the resurrection of the dead.  Jesus answered that in the resurrection of the dead, people will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but be like the angels in heaven.  That’s not to say that there will be no marriage in heaven – examples like Ephesians 5:22-24 and Revelation 19:6-9 indicate that earthly marriage is a pointer to the true marriage between Christ and the church in the end of days.

What Jesus may be alluding to in Mark 12:18-26 is how in Christ everybody is family in heaven (also see Mark 3:31-35).  It shows us that heaven will be a place free where we can just be “real” with our brothers and sisters in Christ, a place devoid of the selfishness and pettiness that mars our earthly relationships.  Heaven is a future hope of true intimacy with God and fellow men.  It will be a redemption of the time wasted in our social war with others and ourselves while we lived in the flesh.

New Heavens and a New Earth

The Old Testament prophets had spoken of a future time when creation is renewed, when paradise lost becomes paradise regained.  Isaiah chapters 60, 65, and 66 point to a future time when all the nations of the earth (read: “all ethnicities and peoples”, not just socio-political nations) will worship the Lord just as Israel does.  It seems to indicate bustling trade and commerce streaming into the city of Jerusalem.

Jesus came to fulfill the Law and the Prophets (Matthew 5:17), including the prophecy of the new heavens and new earth.  Both the prophets and  Revelations 21 looks to a future time when God will dwell with man in all his fullness in New Jerusalem.

New Jerusalem is mentioned to be 12,000 stadia in measurement which makes it equivalent to a massive metropolis extending from the Canadian border to the Mexican border.  We need a new earth to go along with New Jerusalem because its measurements are simply astronomical.  The kings of the earth are said to bring their glory into it and nothing unclean or detestable will ever enter this new city.  I imagine this to be a city of furious opposites – the old world splendor of St. Petersburg or Rome and the avant-garde architecture of Denmark or Stockholm, the laidback attitude of Vancouver and the vitality of Toronto or New York City or Shanghai.  It is all at once exciting and relaxing, picturesque and urban, natural and sculpted, restful and untamed.  It will be the city of God in the kingdom of heaven, a place where everything is good, perfect, and imperishable, a divine expression of the redemption of creation.

Sub Specie Aeternitatis

The Apostle Paul tells us in Colossians 3:1-4 that in light of the resurrection of Christ, we should seek and set our minds on things above.  Paul is telling us to live sub specie aeternitatis, that is, to live under the shadow of eternity.  We can live our lives viewing it from an eternal perspective, that this life is a speck relative to the life that is yet to come.

We do not serve a silent and uncaring God, but a God who demonstrated his love for us in that while we were sinners, Christ died for us and rose up to claim victory over the power of sin and death and over the gods of this world.  Knowing that Christ is risen indeed should give us the perseverance to endure, to carry our cross and trust by faith that God will complete the work that he began in us (Phil. 1:6).  This should have repercussions as to how we spend our time, our financial resources, our emotional reserves, our physical vitality, and our mental acumen.  If we believe the resurrection of Christ, will we live for what is fading away or for the future hope that grows nearer day by day?

Christ is risen.  Christ is risen indeed.  Let us wait patiently for the salvation of the Lord.

Reflection in Song
- See What A Morning (Resurrection Hymn).  Stuart Townend.
- Over Death.  Sojourn Music.
- Christ The Lord Is Risen Today.  Zac Hicks + Cherry Creek Worship.

Resources
- Easter 2011:  Hope and Glory.  Dan MacDonald.  (Streaming Audio)
- Lord of the Wine.  Tim Keller.

Part 1 | Part 2

Χριστός ἀνέστη! Ἀληθῶς ἀνέστη! (Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed!)

It has been said many times in history and it shall be said again:  Easter is the most significant event, not only in the Christian faith, but in the history of the entire world.  This momentous event delineates our calendars to this day whether you call it B.C. (Before Christ) and A.D. (Anno Domini – “The Year of our Lord”) or by the more prosaic “Common Era”.

The Lynchpin of the Christian Faith

Easter Sunday is the outrageous notion that after centuries of the dead staying dead, one man, Jesus the Christ, had returned to life bodily from the gates of Hades.  And he did not return in just any sort of feeble bodily resurrection, but a resurrection in a different sort of physical body – an imperishable, perfect body no longer subject to the decay and corruption endemic in our world of death.  Easter Sunday is the shocking news that what had happened to Jesus the Christ will also happen to those who call him Lord and Savior in heart, mind, and soul.

The implications of the resurrection of Christ are immense.  It gives us a new hope and a future hope.  These hopes are hinged on the truth of the resurrection.  If not, the Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:14, then the Christian faith and everything Christians have done to preach it, spread it, and live their lives according to its precepts are in vain.  The resurrection is the defining moment in Christianity.  It is the smoking gun, the ultimate event that legitimizes the claims of its founder, Jesus Christ.  It is the lynchpin of the faith.

According to 1 Corinthians 15:17, without Easter Sunday, Good Friday will not be good.  It will just be Friday.  Then tomorrow is Saturday and Sunday comes afterwards.  Fortunately for us, the resurrection demonstrates the power and approval of God in Christ Jesus.  It shows the power of God over death in raising Jesus bodily from death.  It shows the approval of God in Jesus and puts the seal of legitimacy in his message of grace and mercy to the world.  After all, if God did not approve of Jesus and his message, he would not have been raised.  But as it is, God has glorified Christ and Himself by raising Jesus from the dead.

A New Hope

Christ-followers are so strongly identified with Christ that Romans 6:4-5 proclaims that we had died and were buried with Christ.  Likewise, we were resurrected with Christ to walk in the newness of life.  This newness of life is a new hope, but not strictly a future hope.  It also says that just as we were united with him in a death like his, so also we were united with him in a resurrection like his.

Man has always sought after something greater than ourselves.  We seek after what is good and elevate that thing to the level of a deity in our lives and spend our lives in pursuit of this thing, whatever it may be.  Despite the naive proclamation that idol worship is dead in our postmodern world, nothing could be further from the truth.

Dr. Tim Keller referenced David Clarkson who said that there are two forms of idolatry: (1) Open, outward idolatry, when men physically bow to anything besides the true God. (2) Soul idolatry, “when the mind is set on anything more than God; when anything is more valued than God, more desired than God, more sought than God, more loved than God. Then is that soul worship, which is due only to God.”  Soul idolatry is essentially treasuring or worshiping something that does not necessarily have a physical form.  It can be beauty, financial security, fame, respect, or something vague.  And the thing about idols is that they enslave all those who worship them.  You will work hard to feed that idol until you come to the end of yourself.

It began when Christ chose you to be bound to himself.  In the death of Christ, we were not only pardoned and exonerated from sin, but we also died to the gods we served.  In the resurrection of Christ, we are raised to newness of life no longer subject to the gods of old.

Are you sick of your life?  Have you tried to change but nothing ever seems to last?  Examine yourself and see if you are in soul idolatry.  Every single human being worships something (a particularly big one is worshiping one’s own self).  If you do not worship and enjoy God, you will worship something else and that something will let you down.

The solution, however, is not to destroy the gods in your life, nor the desire to serve a god.  The solution is to replace the old gods with something bigger, better, something more enjoyable and only God is big enough to drive out all the other false affections we put our hope into.

I invite you to come and be reminded that in the death and resurrection of Jesus, Christ has put to death the gods of this world and raised us to new life.  In his death, Jesus unshackled us from the spiritual masters that held us in slavery and secured the way back to God. His resurrection confirms the truth of His words, gives us a new hope, and guarantees a future hope.

If you have not yet done so, put your hope and your affections in Jesus and experience the power of his resurrection.

Reflection in Song

- In Christ Alone.  Keith & Kristyn Getty.
- Christ is Risen.  Matt Maher.
– Love’s Redeeming Work Is Done.  High Street Hymns.

Resources

- “The Grand Demythologizer: The Gospel and Idolatry“.  Tim Keller – The Gospel Coalition National Conference 2009.  (Streaming Video)

Part 1 | Part 2

The cross became the tree of death for the Son of God, so that it may become the tree of life for us.
- Tim Keller

The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.
- C. S. Lewis

On the cross in Good Friday, the mercy of God showed that just as God is just, He is also love.  God loved us very much, but his justice required that we be put to death.  How do we resolve this dilemma?

Grace and Mercy

What Christ did on the cross was both grace and mercy, pardon and exoneration.  Grace is giving us what we do not deserve.  Mercy is not giving us what we deserve.  Pardon is forgiving the wrong that has been done at the cost of oneself.  Exoneration is when one should not have been charged in the first place.

On one hand, the death of Christ pays for all the sins you and I have done.  It is finished once for all.  His life has paid the ransom for our pardon.  This is the mercy of God – He paid the cost of pardon with His own blood.

On the other hand, in the death of Christ, the great exchange happened.  For thirty three or so odd years, Jesus the Christ lived a perfect life before God.  Imagine two books.  In one book was written all the sins you have done.  In the other book was written all the perfect works of the perfect life of Jesus.  What Christ has done on the cross is give you His book in exchange for yours.  This is what I meant by exoneration.  When this happens, one cannot be charged under the law of God.  One cannot be charged for wrongdoing.  There is nothing to be charged for!

Jesus became sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21).  Jesus made us good because He loves us! This is why the Father God Almighty can rejoice over you like He rejoices in Christ because you are clothed with Jesus’ perfection.  When God sees Jesus in you, then He can say, “This is my son / daughter, whom I love, with whom I am well pleased.”  This is the grace of God – He paid the cost to exonerate you with His own blood.

Reflection in Song
- The Precious Blood.  Sovereign Grace Music.
- The Power of the Cross.  Stuart Townend.
- In My Place.  The Village (Michael Bleecker).

Part 1 | Part 2

Good Friday marks the day of one of the most important events in the history of the Christian faith.  It marks the death by crucifixion of Jesus the Messiah.  Why has this event been commemorated by the followers of Christ throughout the world and throughout centuries?  More importantly, why was this event worth commemorating in the first place?  What does it MEAN?

The monotheistic religions of the world – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam speak of a God who is holy (set apart / totally other / pure & perfect) and just.  Judaism and Christianity say that that God demands total, absolute perfection from the humans he had created.

There’s just one problem.  As I saw on one of my friends’ status on my FB newsfeed:   “Perfection is a non-achievable reality”.  We’re humans and we are all imperfect.

By Way of the Garden

The path to Good Friday first takes us to the Garden of Eden in the dawn of time.  It was there our first parents Adam and Eve beheld and lived in the manifest presence of God Himself.  God gave them the explicit instruction not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Then deceiver came in the guise of a serpent and delivered The Temptation.  Eat of the fruit and you will be like God knowing good and evil.  Then they ate the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil against the explicitly instructions of the Creator and, as a result were banished from the presence of God.  As they looked back at the place which once they called home, a flaming sword flashed to and fro, swinging this way and that, guarding the way back.  It was an exile of no return.  It was an exile from home and an exile from God.

By Way of the Temple

The Temple in Jerusalem represented the physical presence of God in the city.   The Temple itself is divided into “zones”.  The Most Holy Place represented the throne room of God on earth and it was separated from the Holy Place by a thick curtain embroidered with images of guardian angels.  Within this room dwelt the manifest presence of God.  The high priest of Israel alone can enter this room – only once a year after elaborate rituals of purification – and you enter on the pain of death.  The message was clear – God is holy.  His holiness consumes all impurity in his presence and when you enter His presence, you take your life in your hands.

The Second Garden

In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus experienced the ultimate temptation reserved thus far for him:  Disobey the command of God and disregard the mission for which he came.  “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me.”   The cup which Jesus was referring to was the cup of the wrath of God for the sins of the world.  Cup was now full and the time of judgement was on hand.  One way or another, someone must drink the cup – us or Him.

Jesus chose to carry out his mission – “Yet not what I will, but your will be done.”  With this decision, he reversed the choice our first parents did in the Garden of Eden.

As Jesus died on Good Friday, He drank the cup of God’s wrath and in so doing took the sin and the punishment of sin upon him.  He went and took the blow from the flaming sword of the cherubim, the blow that was meant for us. The sword took his life, but in doing so, the sword destroyed itself.  Jesus has brought us home to God.

The Final Temple

As Jesus died on Good Friday, He drank the cup of God’s wrath and in so doing took the sin and the punishment of sin upon him.  His sacrifice satisfied the demands of the law of God.  On his death, the curtains that separated the Most Holy Place from the rest of the Temple was torn in two by invisible hands.  Jesus has secured the way to God.

Reflection in Song
- “Let Us Love And Sing And Wonder“.  Jars of Clay.
- “Gethsemane“.  Keith & Kristyn Getty.
- “The Look“.  Sovereign Grace Music.
- “Here Is Love“.  Sovereign Grace Music.

Resources
- “The Final Temple” by Tim Keller

As Holy Week reaches its climax on Easter Sunday, I wanted to share some things I have learned and am reminded of today on Maundy Thursday.

All Roads Lead to Calvary

In his talk Getting Excited about Melchizedek from The Gospel Coalition National Conference 2011, D.A. Carson mentioned that there are many paths from the Old Testament that point to the work of Jesus Christ in the New Testament. One can demonstrate from pointers to the life and death and resurrection of Jesus from the path of the warrior priest-king (which Dr. Carson chose to take in his talk), the path of the Temple, the path of Sabbath rest, and the path of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) among others.

The Path of the Passover

Passover was instituted for the nation of Israel as a reminder of the time when God sent the Angel of Death to claim the firstborn of everyone dwelling in the land of Egypt.

In Exodus 13:1-2, God commands Moses to set apart for Him whatever is the first to open the womb from both man and beast. All the firstborn are set apart for God – they are either sacrificed to God by killing it or bought at a price (redeemed) by the blood of a sacrificial lamb.

In Exodus 12, God tells Moses that the destroyer will come and instructs all the Israelites to put the blood of a lamb on their doorposts. At the same time, Israel is commanded not to leave their homes until morning. This is because God’s avenger is coming down to Egypt to exact justice, but God’s justice is fair and will judge everyone who broke the law of God – Egyptians and Israelites alike. The blood of the lamb on the doorposts essentially redeems the firstborn of Israel from the sword of the destroyer. This was how Passover was instituted and you can read about it in Exodus 12.

Fast-forward to what is traditionally known as “The Last Supper” in the upper room where Jesus and the Twelve were celebrating what is known as the Passover seder.

The courses in the seder include the matzot (unleavened bread), 4 cups of wine, vegetables, bitter herbs, and the main course called zeroa, the roasted lamb bone that symbolized the korban pesach (the pesach sacrifice offered in the altar of the Temple of Jerusalem).

Traditionally the ritual is led by the eldest and most respected in the family. Jesus served in this role and when he began speaking, it was not the customary seder words that he spoke, but rather raised up the matzot and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” Then he took the wine and said, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.”

Dr. Tim Keller noted that the gospel writers did not mention what became of the main course of the seder meal. The roasted lamb was the centerpiece of the dinner! Then Dr. Keller said that the lack of the lamb at the meal was no oversight. It was because the ultimate Lamb of God was there at the table and ready to make the ultimate fulfillment of what the Passover really pointed to.

The seder traditionally had the children ask the Mah Nishtanah (The Four Questions). The most important question is:

Ma nishtana ha lyla ha zeh mikkol hallaylot?
Why is this night different from all other nights?

The traditional answer is of course that this night we are preparing to leave Egypt. We are preparing to leave in haste and leave behind a life of slavery and bondage.

The question is not recorded in the gospel as being asked by one of the Twelve, but the answer would have been this: Why is this night different from all other nights? It is because we are preparing to leave behind a life of slavery and bondage to sin and death for we were bought at the cost of what Jesus will pay on a Roman cross on Good Friday.

Reflection in Song:
- Behold the Lamb (A Communion Hymn). Keith & Kristyn Getty.
- The Feast.  City Hymns.
- We Hunger And Thirst.  Sovereign Grace Music.

Resources:
- Passover Seder, Wikipedia.
- Dr. Tim Keller’s sermon The Upper Room formed the entire structure of this note. His talk explains things much better than I ever could and contains greater detail about the significance of the seder in the upper room.

By Matt Wills

Calling: What is it, and how do I find mine?

Authors Note: This is the second version of this article. I had it written (and ready to publish) before I listened to this. In this sermon, Dan comments that in today’s society, we’re often unwilling to state something decisively. With that in mind, I have rewritten this article to reflect my feelings about this topic. Calling is important, and I believe that as unapologetically as I believe that Christ is our Lord and Saviour.

“Calling is the truth that God calls us to himself so decisively that everything we are, everything we do, and everything we have is invested with a special devotion, dynamism, and direction lived out as a response to his summons and service.”[1]

A short scan of the library, bookstore, or internet will show that a lot of people have written about our calling. If you’ve thought about calling, you realize that it’s fairly apt – God’s calling to us is supposed to pervade our entire sense of life. In “The Call”, Guinness writes about two levels of calling: the primary calling and the secondary calling. [2]

The primary calling is easy – in fact, the Westminster Catechism outlines it very clearly: “Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God, and fully to enjoy him forever.”[3]

Right now, I struggle most with the secondary calling – or how do we each respond specifically to this primary calling? Our jobs are NOT our calling. Our calling is bigger – it should encompass every part of our life – how we relate to others, how we work, where we work, where we live, and how we spend our time. Can you think of someone that loves what they do? How it is everything they think of and talk about?

I have a friend who is a successful entrepreneur. He loves what his company does, and he spends all of his time thinking about his job – and he loves it! It’s infectious, and when I’m around him, I find myself thinking and talking about his company too. We all know someone like that. What if that sense of dynamism was focused around God? What if our calling was so clear that we lived everything out in response to that calling? Imagine the spirit of worship that you’d have every day!

The hard part for many of us is finding that calling. In Exodus, we see God slowly revealing His plan to Moses, from the first meeting (Exodus 3) to His commandments (Exodus 20) and onwards. God often reveals things to us in bits small enough to digest. He is working His glorious plan, and letting us in on it as it unfolds. That being said, we need to be open to God’s path for us – it’s probably not what we’re expecting. There are four ways that we can hear God’s calling better:

1)     Worship and commune with God

If you’re going to figure out what He wants you to do, you need to know Him well! This includes having a personal, prayerful relationship. You also need to apply the gospel – we’re studying this now in our small groups.

2)     Know what God has given you

God has given us gifts from the spirit to do His will[4]. What has God uniquely gifted you for? Have you asked God to reveal His gifts to you?

3)     Listen to those God has put near you

There are people close to you (spouse, friends, church community) that can see beyond your self-imposed limitations. They will have great insight into your gifts.

4)     Meet an unmet need

God has made it plain that he intends to use us in His plans, regardless of our weaknesses (just look at the 12 apostles!). If there is somewhere that you have a heart for, that you think isn’t being served, why aren’t you meeting that need?

I don’t quite know what my secondary calling is –I’m still asking God to reveal His plan to me. I can’t answer what your calling is, but I can challenge you to find it:

What are you doing right now to tune into God’s plan for you – are you asking our Creator to share His perfect plan for you with you?

[1] Os Guinness, The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life (Thomas Nelson, 2003), 29
[2] Os Guinness, The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life (Thomas Nelson, 2003), 31
[3] Westminster Longer Catechism Q1
[4] “But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.” – 1 Corinthians 7:7b

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

For those of you who were unable to attend the Grace Centre’s mercy and justice training series, Living Mercifully in an Unmerciful City, the recordings have been made available, along with any accompanying resources.

Part 1: “Poverty, Injustice, Brokenness and the Baptized Imagination” – Pastor Kyle Hackmann

Listen to the MP3:  here Click here for the PDF handout.

Part 2: “Engaging the Orphan and the Widow” – Kate Masson

Listen to the MP3:  here