The Value of Learning People’s Names
As I mentioned during last Lord’s Day’s Sabbath School study of Jonathan Edwards’ book, Charity and Its Fruit, based on 1 Corinthians 13, David Stone shares about a homeless man who planned to leave a rescue mission one morning and commit suicide. But on his way, a volunteer called out his name to say hello. That stopped him and he stayed.
Later on, he told her: “You didn’t know it that day. But when you called out my name, you gave me a reason to live.”
This powerful lesson was from Stone’s Focus on the Family “Pastor to Pastor” podcast entitled “The Art & Importance of Learning Names.” You can listen to it here: podcasts.focusonthefamily.com/show/pastor-to-pastor-with-dave-stone/the-art-importance-of-learning-names. After offering how I have made good use of it, I’ll pass on some wise nuggets and tools Rev. Stone offers.
Facts and Statistics Regarding Immigration and Crime in the U.S.
February 25, 2026 Dear Saints, I am compelled today to share the following which was reviewed and approved by our church Session.In his notes from a public presentation slide referencing the chart above, World Relief VP of Advocacy and Policy…
Dr. David VanDrunen of Westminster Seminary California to Minister Both Services February 15
This Lord’s Day, February 15, Pastor Grant will again be on chaplain duty call for the SD VA Medical Center leading spiritual study groups, leading and preaching for the Protestant Worship Service in chapel, and visiting veteran patients with clinical…
Elder Ron Renner Shares on KPRZ Radio About Working, Sabbath Keeping, and Tithing
Elder Ron Renner shared on KPRZ 1210 AM’s “Tentmakers” with Jacob Gantos about working for about 50 years in the grocery business from a bag boy to high upper management. He especially talks about his commitment to the Sabbath Day…
Elder Ron Renner Shares Testimony of Conversion and 60 Years of Marriage on KPRZ Radio
Elder Ron Renner shared an amazing testimony about his and Linda’s conversion and 60 years of marriage on KPRZ 1210 AM’s Tentmakers radio program last Thursday. It ran the very same day as their 60th wedding anniversary while they celebrated…
A Study of the Morning After Pill: It Can be an Abortifacient
September 15, 2025 By Grant Van Leuven I didn’t know much about what is referred to as the Morning After Pill (MAP), often marketed as “Plan B,” but for various reasons I have spent time learning about it and shared…
Providence Preparing for Providence
September 12, 2025 Dear Saints, I had the opportunity to speak for chapel at Providence Christian College in Pasadena this Wednesday! Greatly excited about developments this year. And a wonderful opportunity to have lunch with my daughter, Olivia, who is…
The 7th Grievance of the U.S. Declaration of Independence Decries Tyrannical Restrictions on Vital Immigration Growth
September 8, 2025 By Grant Van Leuven I recently revisited the United States Declaration of Independence because of the way a speaker training a class of professionals serving immigrants bluntly described it and our country’s other founding documents with a…
The Puritan Thomas Goodwin’s Chaplaincy to Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell
September 2, 2025 By Grant Van Leuven As I prepare to enter a one-year chaplaincy residency program next month with the San Diego VA Medical Center, it is useful to revisit some things I wrote as as a result of…
The Bible Encourages Diligently Seeking for a Spouse
August 23, 2025 By Grant Van Leuven Because of a number of heart-felt requests for advice on finding a covenant wife or husband by church members and visitors during my fifteen years of ministry (and several within the last year…
Tuesdays with Morrie on a Saturday Flight to Milwaukee
August 18, 2025 Dear Saints, I always request Ginger Ale for my complimentary beverage on an airplane. But during my Saturday flight from San Diego to Dallas I asked for coffee. I had gotten little sleep the night before and…
Christians are Not Called to Be Famous, but Faithful–Not Clever, but Clear
For Lord’s Day, August 17, 2025 Dear Saints, Recently I heard two similar comments the same week that were both pithy and profound and which I’d like to share with you with our last Lord’s Day evening sermon in view,…
Listen to Our Interview on Keeping the Sabbath for “Tentmakers” Program on KPRZ Radio
August 13, 2025 Dear Saints, I wanted to share that I was blessed to interview with Jacob Gantos at KPRZ 1210 AM (Salem Media’s KPRAISE, also 106.1 FM in North County) in La Jolla for his radio program M-F at…
Jonathan Edwards on the Psalms for Church Worship in All Ages
June 24, 2025 Dearly Beloved, Last Lord’s Day, during my morning sermon about the rejoicing which Deuteronomy 12 expresses as a theme and result of recovering God’s prescribed worship regulations, I shared a few excerpts from Jonathan Edwards’ book, The…
Invitation to Support World Relief SoCal
May 15, 2025 Dear Saints, I invite you to visit my personal “Stand in the Gap” fundraising page for World Relief SoCal and consider supporting our “Welcoming the Stranger” work in partnership with the Church in San Diego County! To…
Dr. Alveda King (Dr. Martin Luther King’s Neice) on Her Civil Rights Work for the Unborn
Dear Saints, I just heard this interview on Family Radio driving home this evening. Wow! Dr. Alveda C. King (niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) shares about her work for the “civil rights for the unborn.” Her own story…
Comfort for Christians Facing Death
Dear Saints, With the memorial service for Pastor Bell June 22, our sister Jan recently going on home hospice, and my father’s funeral coming up in NY for which I’m leaving this Monday, it has been profound providence to have…
The Word of God Alone Teaches Us About Our Creation Origins
Dear Saints, Anthony Selvaggio writes in his book, A Proverbs-Driven Life, “The Bible is nothing less than God’s impartation to us of everything we need to know on this earth about him, his ways, his purposes, his Son, and how…
Christians Are Those Who Accept Christ’s Authority by His Power
For Lord’s Day, November 12, 2023 Dear Saints, Bonse Aba, Mu Pokelela, Ba Lipele Maka Akuba Bana. Kuba Bana, Kuba Bana, Kuba Bana Baka Lesa. Muya Ya Ya, Muya Ya Ya, Muya Ya Ya, Bakwa Lesa. Don’t worry, I’m not…
Augustine’s Confessions: Wholeness in Christ
For Lord’s Day, October 8, 2023 Dear Saints, In our last devotion, we saw how Augustine began to come close to God by slowly losing hold of himself in sickness of himself until he came to the end of himself. …
Augustine’s Confessions: Sickness of Himself
For the Lord’s Day, September 24, 2023 Dear Saints, A while back I was saving up some quotes I highlighted out of Augustine’s Confessions for potential topical sermon ideas. Well, I lost my idea of what I was thinking of doing…
When You Pick the Scriptures Up the Scriptures Pick You Up
For Lord’s Day, September 17, 2023 Dear Saints, Recently during our Wednesday night studies of the sixth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, the second half, “But Deliver Us from Evil,” with the Puritan Thomas Watson, we reviewed 13 means to…
Pastor Wallace A. Bell — 30 Years of Sermons Going from Cassettes to SermonAudio MP3s!
Dear Saints, I am happy to announce that we have begun to slowly convert audio cassettes “in-house” into digital form of sermons recorded during the 33-year ministry of the beloved Rev. Wallace A. Bell here at what is now called…
Scary Exciting Faith Responses
For Lord’s Day, February 25, 2023, Dear Saints, A few weeks ago, I was nudging Gabriel along in the Church parking lot to get more used to riding his big boy bike with training wheels. He took a while to…
Christianity is the Greatest Threat to Christianity, Culture, and a Christian Nation
For the Lord’s Day, December 3, 2022 Dear Saints, This Wednesday night we finished Ligonier Ministries’ Reformation 500 video series with a final Q&A panel discussion. Something in the end of the video, as you know, surprisingly rang out to…
Let Us Still Stand Against Worldliness for Christlikeness
For Lord’s Day, November 26, 2022 Dear Saints, As I have just entered the 13th year of ministry with you this month and very recently began reading through a book historically important to my second ministry employer, the Alliance of…
Defeat Deadly Despair!
For Lords’ Day, October 8, 2022 Dear Saints, First, let me rejoice with you that Abraham Van Leuven met with Session this week to review his fully completed Membership Class test and discuss his hearty desire to graduate to communicant…
Van Leuven Kids, Mommy Join Pastor for KPRZ Radio Show on God’s Names 09/29
Since this post, the show ran and here is a link for its podcast where you can now hear it: ____________________________________________________________ Dear Saints, I wanted to share the following, which also can be viewed publicly here (if it’s easier to…
Properly Prepare for the Lord’s Supper
For Lord’s Day, August 7, 2022 Dear Saints, During our Westminster Confession of Faith Membership/Enquirer’s Class this week we studied chapter 29, “Of the Lord’s Supper,” together. In that class we discussed the Biblical warrant and practical benefit of weekly…
Be Kind
Dear Saints, Our morning sermon this Lord’s Day will be on being “kind” and showing “kindness” with studies of these words in the Hebrew and Greek, and our featured text being the command in Ephesians 4:32: “ … be ye…
Be the Boss of Your Body (Avoid Gluttony, Actively Exercise)
For Lord’s Day, April 17, 2022 Dear Saints, In One Thousand Evangelical Illustrations (Webb), Albert Barnes wrote: “Neglect is enough to ruin a man … A man who is lying on a bed of sickness need not cut his throat…
Let Us Love to Learn Well
For Lord’s Day, April 10, 2022 Dear Saints, After Rachel and I enjoyed a light breakfast at a cafe on the Southwestern College campus a few months ago, I walked her to class on a beautiful brisk morning looking out…
Forgiven to Love and Serve
For the Lord’s Day, April 3, 2022 Dear Saints, In preparation for both sermons tomorrow, I’d like to share the following stories with you (from Aquilla Webb’s One Thousand Evangelistic Illustrations): Forgiving Mercy Many years ago in Russia a regiment…
Behold the Birds and be Blessed!
For Lord’s Day, March 6, 2022 Dear Saints, Today, I was reminded of the following Scripture by two little friends toying with me outside the window of the church’s copier room while I was making bulletins: Matthew 6:26: Behold the…
Have Christ’s Zeal for God’s House
For Lord’s Day, January 23, 2022 Dear Saints, Last Lord’s Day during our Sabbath Class going through the DVD entitled, “Puritan: All of Life to the Glory of God,” we studied the Puritans on “zeal” as an important aspect of…
Love of God’s Law and Sabbath Day Worship
For the Lord’s Day, October 10, 2021 Dear Saints, Finally, by God’s grace, I am preparing to come back to our exegetical sermon series (in the morning, Deuteronomy, in the evening, Philippians). Thus, in this Lord’s Day’s morning service we…
A Reminder of the Commandment to Get Adequate Rest — And Merry Medicine
For Lord’s Day, September 18, 2021 Dear Saints, Take a look at my parking job at church this afternoon! I only noticed upon returning to get something else out of the car I had forgotten! I thought it’d be fun…
May the Glory of God Run as a Silver Thread Through All Your Actions!
For Lord’s Day, September 12, 2021 Dear Saints, After his opening discourse we reviewed recently from Thomas Watson’s Body of Divinity (which can be read here in my MeetthePuritans.org article that was just published yesterday), he first focuses on the…
God Energizes You to be Electric
Dear Saints, Last week in our evening sermon with Philippians 2:12-13, we saw that, We Will Work Out God’s Will by His Working in Us Something that Rachel brought up regarding the Greek word for work, “energize”, in verse 13…
Jesus Christ is LORD!
For Lord’s Day, May 2, 2021 Dear Saints, I am planning and preparing to return to Philippians for our evening sermons this Lord’s Day. We left off with Christ’s incredible self-humiliation. But we will see next that His reward is…
Linger in the Presence of the Living God
For Lord’s Day, April 11, 2021 Dear Saints, “Elijah had the kind of spiritual boldness that is only given to those who linger in the presence of the living God.” These are the powerful words from a sermon by Dr.…
His Grace Rewrote Our Story, How Sweet it Is!
For Lord’s Day, April 4, 2021 Dear Saints, I heard two things on the Christian radio this week while driving that blessed me greatly thinking about our union in Christ and identity living in Him now as new creatures free…
Sin: The Exaltation of Ourselves at the Expense of God and Worshipping our Self-made Man creator
For the Lord’s Day, March 7, 2021 Dear Saints, First, I rejoice to report from the Renner’s that our sister and mother in the faith, after a long absence in the body (while present in the spirit and through our…
Be Not Greedy Crabs
For Lord’s Day, January 24, 2021 Dear Saints, Recently I was watching a fishing program on YouTube with the boys. This particular angler is especially enjoyable as he is a Christian who prays over his meals (which is often his…
Hold Up Your Shield of Faith Because the Devil’s Arrows Keep Flying at You
For Lord’s Day, January 17, 2021 Dear Saints, Mr. Delgado showed me a video today that was really amazing. Expert archer Lars Andersen is seen shooting 1,120 arrows in 1.4 minutes: 100 arrows in 18 seconds; 1,000 arrows in 25…
Avoid the Fallacy of Assuming False Causes
For Lord’s Day, January 3, 2021 Dear Saints, A few weeks ago I was reminded of the logical fallacy of false causes, otherwise referred to in Latin as non causa pro causa. It is the illogical connecting of some thing…
Remember to Be Thankful and Give Thanks
For Lord’s Day, November 1, 2020 Beloved, remember last week when we studied that God is love and we should thus be like Him and love Him back. We saw in Luke 7:47 that this love for God is seen…
Fear is Futile
For the Lord’s Day, October 11, 2020 Dear Saints, Today we will be studying fear again and learn it is bondage and to be cast off in the spirit of God’s loving adoption. Romans 8:15: For ye have not received…
A Resurrection Reflection
For Lord’s Day, September 27, 2020 Dear Saints, As we close our sermon series through Matthew with the Great Commission today, I’d like to share this acronym from William Hendriksen at the end of His mammoth commentary on Matthew’s Gospel:…
Every Lord’s Day is Easter Sunday!
For Lord’s Day, September 20, 2020. Dear Saints, As we return to the Gospel of Matthew we take it up at the grave of Jesus. And we find He is risen from the dead as the firstfruits of our resurrection.…