St. Mark Reformed Church

09/06/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

Are you looking for a good “pick me up” story? Something to read to the kids after dinner time that’s intriguing, colorful, encouraging to their faith, as well as true?

Then open up your Bible and read the book of Esther! It’ll do you good and it will fascinate the kids.

How so? For starters, it’s a well-crafted story of the deliverance of God’s people, even in spite of their sin and weaknesses. Mordecai not only tells Esther not to witness to others concerning her people or the God she worships, but he goes out and refuses to honor the king’s instructions to honor Haman. One man’s sin brings condemnation upon the whole people.

But that condemnation of the whole nation humbles him, and he repents by wearing sackcloth to demonstrate it publicly, as well as commanding Esther to witness to the king or perish with the rest of the Jews.

You know the story. But read it slowly and appreciate the craftsmanship of laying out facts and events and symbols early and then seeing those details used in the reversal of the plot. It’s exhilarating to read and unpack the threads as they unravel for Haman but are woven tightly for the Jews deliverance. Talk about “in the nick of time” excitement!

Which, of course, all points to Jesus and how he turns the darkness of Israel in his day to light and joy and deliverance for us his people. As the kingdom prospered under Mordecai and Esther, so the world today prospers under the Lord Jesus. There are no obstacles too great to keep him and the Spirit from fulfilling the Great Commission!

Are you looking for a good “pick me up” story? Something to read to the kids after dinner time that’s intriguing, colorful, encouraging to their faith, as well as true?

08/30/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

I highlighted last week the teaching of a Methodist minister running for office in Kansas. This week, let’s look at James Talarico, a PCUSA seminary student running for Senate in Texas. John Nolte of Breitbart News summarizes: “Talarico...poses as a pious, God-fearing Christian and deliberately leads people astray by preaching a heresy that twists naked sin (transs*xualism, transvestitism, homos*xuality, abortion, child mutilation) into something sacred, Christian, and beautiful.” (8/13 article: “Poll Shows Ken Paxton Ahead of James ‘God Is Nonbinary’ Talarico”). Talarico’s positions are well-documented in the media.

Again, these are subjects to bring up around the dinner table or at family worship. Jesus clearly taught in Matthew 19:4 that men are men and women are women: “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female…?” Notice Jesus relies on the Creation account: this is the way God made the world, even 4,000 years later. As for cross-dressing, Moses clearly said a woman should not put on a man’s clothes, or uniform, for battle. Homos*xuality is clearly a Sodomite story, as Paul clearly states in 1 Cor 6:9–11.

Abortion, the killing of an unborn baby, is ruled out by Psalm 139, since God is the one weaving the child in the womb; it’s His creation. Exodus 21:22–25 clearly values the life of the unborn baby as equal to an adult.

Child mutilation? Since the purpose of those surgeries is to attempt to change the s*x of the child, those would be forbidden by Jesus in Matthew 19.

So we listen to the word of Jesus, which is good, beautiful, and truthful; not the word of men twisting God’s word to hopefully receive a few more votes, or pervert our understanding of God’s word.

I highlighted last week the teaching of a Methodist minister running for office in Kansas. This week, let’s look at James Talarico, a PCUSA seminary student running for Senate in Texas. John Nolte of Breitbart News summarizes: “Talarico…poses as a pious, God-fearing Christian and deliberately ...

08/23/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

It’s the political season, and as usual, there is a mix of unbiblical teaching going around that should be addressed around the dinner table, especially since a lot of it is being said by ministers of one sort of another.

Methodist Pastor Adam Hamilton, Democrat candidate in Kansas’s Senate race, has taught and preached that all faiths end up in heaven: “When it comes to other faiths, I believe as a Christian that...–when they get to heaven, they’re going to see Jesus and they’re going to say, ‘Ah, it was you all along that I was searching for,’ but I don’t fear that those folks will spend eternity in Hell,” (2022 sermon titled “Is the Bible True? Is Jesus the Only Way?”). Hamilton has stated that he does not believe that an individual must know or follow Jesus Christ in their lifetime in order to be saved and spend eternity with God.

This unbiblical position raises a lot of questions: “Why be a Christian minister?”, “Why evangelize people in the first place?”, “Why even be a Christian?”

This position is clearly against the Great Commission in Matthew 28, where Jesus commands his followers to teach all the nations about “him,” and not just leave them in darkness. It is directly against John 14:6: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Jesus clearly says he is the only way to the Father in heaven. This positions is against this very Father’s command at his Transfiguration in Matthew 17, where the Father says from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him.” Not Buddha or Allah.

Finally, the Apostle Peter, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in Acts 4:8, says clearly in verse 12, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

It’s the political season, and as usual, there is a mix of unbiblical teaching going around that should be addressed around the dinner table, especially since a lot of it is being said by ministers of one sort of another.

08/16/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

We often don’t take family and children advice from bachelors, but C.S. Lewis is an approved exception! In his article “The Sermon and the Lunch,” he gives several points of advice for familial living that still ring true today and will help us with our own families to honor Christ and his kingdom.

First, he reminds us that since the Fall, no organization or way of life whatever has a natural tendency to go right. The family can be offered to God, converted, redeemed, and offer a channel of blessings and graces. But like everything else that is human, the family needs redemption. Meaning, that the members must fight to put off temptations, corruptions, and miseries. He notes wisely, “Charity begins at home: so does uncharity.”

Second, while not against natural “affection,” it is not a cause of lasting happiness. “Love” in that sense can become greedy, solicitous, jealous, and exacting. There must be a deeper “love” to hold the family together, a “my life for yours” love, love based on the way of Christ: “we love, because he first loved us.”

Third, Lewis is very much against the supposed pro-family slogan “at home we can be our natural selves.” The lunch at the Vicar’s house destroyed that idea, for everyone in the Vicar’s family was rude to each other, and if those actions were practiced outside the family, they would simply be knocked down! Nowhere on this side of heaven can we simply “be ourselves.”

Finally, he asks, “must we not teach that if the home is to be a means of grace it must be a place of rules? There cannot be a common life without a regula.” The alternative to rule is not freedom but the unconstitutional (and often unconscious) tyranny of the most selfish member.

We often don’t take family and children advice from bachelors, but C.S. Lewis is an approved exception! In his article “The Sermon and the Lunch,” he gives several points of advice for familial living that still ring true today and will help us with our own families to honor Christ and his ki...

08/09/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

“...even denying the Master who bought them…” — from 2 Peter 2:1

This phrase, while a monumental theological brain teaser, is a great passage to encourage you to persevere in faithfulness and love for Jesus and his church.

How so? Well, it can’t be true that the decretally elect would deny Jesus who ransomed them on the cross. What good is the decree, then? It isn’t everlasting, because these people, by denying the Master who bought/ransomed them, bring destruction upon themselves three ways in the context: destructive heresies, which bring destruction upon these persons, a destruction which is not far away in time, v. 3. Most don’t believe the decretally elect are subjects of destruction.

So Peter must be talking about covenantal destruction, not decretal. About destruction of people who are in covenant with God but then who reject those covenantal blessings by being a false prophet and teacher among the church, teaching heresies that destroy people and cause them to fall away, heresies that even destroy themselves in the end, v. 1e. These are people in the church who have suffered shipwreck of their faith (1 Timothy 1:19), and have fallen away or are in the process as they prey on the sheep of the church. These are the Christians who haven’t been “diligent to confirm their calling and election…” (2 Peter 1:10). Like King Saul, like Judas (v. 20-22), like the guy in 1 Corinthians 5.

Peter is warning his audience, and you, to watch out for these false teachers, and to live by what is revealed (Deuteronomy 29:29), not by their false teachings. To live by what Peter the Apostle is teaching in chapter 1, versus their misleading beliefs.

In short, he doesn’t want you to deny Jesus your Lord who bought you with his ransoming death. He wants you to proclaim him, and live by His Word!

This phrase, while a monumental theological brain teaser, is a great passage to encourage you to persevere in faithfulness and love for Jesus and his church.

08/02/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

Peter’s statement in 2 Peter 1:14 that “the putting off of my body will be soon…” bears some wholesome and encouraging reflection by us as Christians. The context makes clear he is talking about his death, but his seemingly nonchalant attitude of “putting off his body” deserves some further thinking, and embodiment, by us. It appears that Peter is not at all frustrated, anxious, flummoxed, or worried about “putting off his body,” but almost speaks about it as one gets his old and worn out tires replaced for new ones. And that surely is his point, spoken as mildly as it is. Death is surely his entrance into glory, and putting off this sinned-inflated body is a right necessity: this body has to be put off, if we are to put on a new, sinless, immortal body, as Paul teaches in 1 Corinthians 15.

Peter is a great double witness to Paul: your death is not something to be feared in Christ. In fact, it’s a necessary beginning to the rest of your life! It’s the putting off of this present body in order to receive another glorified and eternal body at the final resurrection. It’s our path as Christians to follow Jesus: “Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore…” (Rev. 11:17–18). As Paul exclaimed in Philippians 1, “to die is gain...My desire is to depart and be with Christ.”

So let Peter’s “matter of fact” approach to the putting off of his body guide you, as it does him, to the right use of this present life (1:12–15). Jesus’ divine power has granted to you all things that pertain to life and godliness (1:3), and part of that “all things” is living faithfully for Jesus until your name gets called for a glorious body “putting off”!

Peter’s statement in 2 Peter 1:14 that “the putting off of my body will be soon…” bears some wholesome and encouraging reflection by us as Christians. The context makes clear he is talking about his death, but his seemingly nonchalant attitude of “putting off his body” deserves some furt...

07/26/2026

The Weekly Perspective,
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

Because we are still on this earth, Paul says, “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). Walking by faith gives us good courage because of what is to come. Nevertheless, we often whine because we want to see things with our own eyes. The Israelites wanted to see the leeks and onions again; theys wanted to see Yahweh in the “golden calf,” King Saul wanted to see Samuel in the flesh; idolaters want to see their gods, not just hear the “voice” of Yahweh (Deuteronomy 6).

Yet there is a passage that will help you “see” what God is doing, and so encourage you in the faith and give you good cheer. It’s a passage that will open your eyes to all the things that Jesus is doing in YOUR day and age. Today!

What is that passage? It’s Revelation 20, where Jesus binds Satan so he can no longer deceive the nations (20:1–3) during the millennial period as he did before, as in the days of the recently vanquished harlot of chapter 17, the old covenant unbelieving Yahweh haters who rejected his Son Jesus for the power and protection of Rome (chapter 13). Satan deceived nations to worship false gods and receive marks on their bodies and follow him to the abyss, but no longer. He’s bound as to the gospel; he can’t keep the minds of men in darkness. And so in obedience to the Great Commission, the church goes out and baptizes and teaches and makes disciples of all the nations. Even in North Korea and Saudi Arabia and China and Iran there are believers in Jesus, worshipping and praying and fulfilling the Great Commission. Think about it: all across the globe there are churches, ministry centers, gardens and villages where Christ is worshipped openly, all filled with believers who don’t murder and maim and offer child sacrifice nor mo**st their neighbor’s daughter or steal his livestock or burn down their houses over petty disputes. Live by faith, and open your eyes and see the difference Jesus is making!

Because we are still on this earth, Paul says, “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). Walking by faith gives us good courage because of what is to come. Nevertheless, we often whine because we want to see things with our own eyes. The Israelites wanted to see the leeks and onions ...

07/19/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

(continued from last week) “Jesus is Lord” is the bumper sticker for the kingdom of God that came with Jesus’ coming. He is the Lord heralded in Genesis 3:15 that would crush the serpent’s head, and he is the fulfillment of all those “head crushing saints” sprinkled throughout the bible (Jael, woman with millstone who crushed Abimelech’s head, woman who had Sheba’s head thrown down, the oak tree that crushed Absalom’s head, David who crushed Goliath’s head [as well as chopping it off!], Jehu who had the 70 heads of the descendants of Ahab sliced off, [see your concordance for the rest!])

“Jesus is Lord” is the gospel: Jesus is the one who takes over the king’s domain given to him by the Father in Psalm 2. He is the one who rules with a rod of iron that all kings must kiss and serve lest they end up crushed. Jesus is the “head” who drinks by the brook while shattering the “heads” over the nations (Psalm 110:6-7).

So each Sunday when you sing “Thy kingdom come,” you aren’t just rehearsing a little nursery rhyme. No, you are singing your endorsement of the Father’s plan to give the world’s rule to his Son who smashes heads and says that He is the embodiment of the kingdom; that he is the Ruler who rules well and wise and willingly in the ways of the Father. You are singing that you are a follower of Jesus the Lord, the second Person of the Trinity, the “Yahweh” of the older testament now in flesh, the one who gives salvation to sinners with love and piety.

So remember, “thy kingdom come” is really you singing and meaning “thank you Father that ‘Jesus is Lord’ and you kept your promise to bring him in time and give him the kingdom of his Father David for all of us, sending him as Savior as well that we might be faithful, holy, followers in his kingdom.”

It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas around here! And it’s only July!

(continued from last week) “Jesus is Lord” is the bumper sticker for the kingdom of God that came with Jesus’ coming. He is the Lord heralded in Genesis 3:15 that would crush the serpent’s head, and he is the fulfillment of all those “head crushing saints” sprinkled throughout the bible ...

06/28/2026

The Weekly Perspective
by Burke Shade, Associate Pastor

Pastor Joe did a great job preaching the points of Revelation 18 last week!

But I want to focus on two things particularly that quite clearly apply to us believers and to St. Mark today. First, that of shunning the porneia that killed the harlot, and secondly, the complete and total death of the city/church as a result.

First, the harlot apostate city/church had “fallen” because of her flamboyant s*xual immorality (porneia) that she engaged in openly (3, 7). For us today, that’s not just bad theology, but also the embracing of its evil practice. It's ignoring the scriptural blessings and practices of single and married s*xual life, s*xual beliefs about po*******hy, sensuality, abortion, prostitution, fornication, adultery, etc. Our culture, even church culture, is as slovenly drunken with those sins as the harlot appears in 17:4-6. We must consciously deviate, personally and as a church, from any of the present day’s deviant deceptions.

Secondly, we must put off those sins and put on faithful biblical living if we as people and as a church are to live on with vibrant joyful sounds of life. The deafening silence of verses 22-23 are catastrophic! Today’s apostate churches have no baby voices, because abortion or birth control or false teaching on the blessing of children killed them all. There are no musical sounds in the church because there is no reason to praise God in our selfish nihilism. There are no sounds of craftsmen because we don’t believe in dominion anymore; Mother Nature owns everything! There are no sounds of food and no light because there are no more Lord’s Suppers; Jesus stands against all that the harlot stood for. Crucify him! There are no wedding bells because we hate the future and hate love.

All warnings to us to remain faithful to the true Groom, Jesus. Silence is death!

But I want to focus on two things particularly that quite clearly apply to us believers and to St. Mark today. First, that of shunning the porneia that killed the harlot, and secondly, the complete and total death of the city/church as a result.

06/25/2026

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