GBC Fayetteville: Recent Episodes
Pastor Billy Shaw
Grace Baptist Church Fayetteville is a church located in Fayetteville, NC with a global vision. We use our podcast to encourage believers in their walk with the Lord and to encourage unbelievers to trust Christ. Here you can find expository sermons and shorter episodes dealing with current issues and topics.
In Message 10 of the series, "The Old Testament: The Drumroll to Christ," Pastor Billy Shaw of Grace Baptist Church Fayetteville expounds the gut-wrenching story from Genesis 19 of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Commonly, people think of this story as a story exclusively about the judgment of God, but the portrayal of God is far richer than just flat judgment here. In verse 16, for example, the text says that the LORD was "merciful" to Lot. Fascinatingly, the Word of God tells us that God remembered Abraham and delivered Lot. Abraham interceded for Lot. God was merciful toward Lot, not because of Lot, but because of Abraham.
Do you know someone in your life that through rebellious choices and self-worship has declared war on God? Do you wonder every day when the judgment of God will finally come for their sinful choices? As you intercede for them, know that you are making a difference. Never give up on praying for your family. God hears and answers prayer. As Pastor Billy brings out in this message, even when the judgment does come, God can have mercy on your loved ones in the midst of that judgment on account of your prayers. Until then, we pray for their repentance and surrender to the will of the Almighty.
If you are in the Fayetteville, NC area, we invite you to join us in person for worship any Sunday at 10 AM at the Millstone 14 Theater. Otherwise, we invite you to join us online each Sunday at 9 AM, 11 AM and every two hours thereafter at https://GraceFay.org/Online
If you receive a blessing from this podcast and want to support the Lord's work at Grace Baptist, you can text the word "GIVE" to 910-710-5422. Thank you for your interest in what God is doing to get glory unto Himself through Grace Baptist Church of Fayetteville, NC.
A stand alone message, this challenge comes from Acts 26 and walks a listener through a biblical pattern for sharing his or her salvation testimony. Even if you are not confident in your own grasp of the doctrines of salvation, you can tell your own story. The Apostle Paul's testimony before King Agrippa and Festus in Acts 26 provides believers with an example from the inspired text of Scripture of a format for sharing their own stories.
If you do not have a salvation testimony, you can receive Christ as your Savior today! You agree with God that you have sinned and come short of His matchless glory, and you believe that He sent His only begotten Son to die in your place and pay the price for your sin. You receive the free gift of eternal life made possible through His resurrection from the dead - you receive it by faith. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved!
If you make that decision today, please get in touch with Grace Baptist Church either by 910-323-1630 or through our website https://GraceFay.org. We would love to help you get started on your journey with the Lord.
This message unpacks Genesis 15:1-6. God and Abraham have a conversation. It is in these verses that we are given a magnificent truth: righteousness comes by faith. "He (Abram) believed God, and He (God) counted it to him for righteousness." The Apostle Paul will remind his readers of this important text when he demonstrates conclusively that righteousness never did come by keeping of any law. Nor did it come from the works of our hands. Predating the Mosaic Law altogether, and going back to Noah, Enoch, and Abel, salvation has always been by grace through faith in the revealed Word of God concerning Messiah and His mission. God identifies Himself as Abraham's shield and exceeding great reward. For the saved, may we look to the Lord as our reward, longing so much more for Him than we long for any of His many blessings. For those who have never trusted Christ, this is a call to repentance and faith. No one can satisfy God's demands of righteousness in human power or strength. Only by placing our faith in the finished work of Christ Jesus our Lord can we know a right standing before God.
If you are local to Fayetteville, NC, or passing through on a Sunday, we'd love to invite you to worship with us in person at the Millstone 14 Theater on Camden Rd at 10 AM. We also offer Church Online at https://GraceFay.org/Online every two hours on Sunday beginning at 9 AM. Grace Baptist Church exists to give the people of the Cape Fear Valley region the opportunity to become fully developing followers of Jesus Christ.
This message unpacks a section of the Old Testament that is both essential for covenant understanding and difficult to digest in that it speaks of God's terrifying judgment of two wicked cities.
In Genesis 18, Abraham and Sarah receive three visitors. We understand that one of these men is a Christophany - a pre-incarnate appearance of God the Son. Three come to visit, but only two go down to Sodom. The two who go down to Sodom are angels on a mission - a mission of destroying the city due to its abundant wickedness before God.
So in Genesis 18, God again makes the promise of an heir to Abraham. Famously, Sarah laughs. As an illustration of progressive revelation, we have seen God promise a seed to Abraham. We have seen God clarify that the seed will not be Eliezer of Damascus but one coming from Abraham's own loins. In this chapter, we see God add the information that the seed would be the product of Abraham and Sarah (not Hagar). At the end of Chapter 18, Abraham sees the men looking toward Sodom. God can only have one item of business with such a wicked place - judgment. Abraham begins to intercede. God promises that for ten righteous in the city, He will not destroy it. But there indeed are not ten who are righteous. The message explores the devastating impact of the wickedness of Sodom on Lot and his family.
We live in a wicked generation. By training our families up in the ways of the Lord, we can be salt in our generation. We do not have to become like the world around. God has placed us in the world to make disciples, yet we are not of the world. Even in His terrifying judgment, God demonstrates His amazing mercy. He rescued Lot, because He remembered Abraham. The text even says the Lord was merciful to Lot. For those who have never trusted Christ, the message is simply: Trust the Rescuer to deliver you from wrath to come. Only He can save you from the certain judgment ahead.
If you are local to Fayetteville, NC, or passing through on a Sunday, we'd love to invite you to worship with us in person at the Millstone 14 Theater on Camden Rd at 10 AM. We also offer Church Online at https://GraceFay.org/Online every two hours on Sunday beginning at 9 AM. Grace Baptist Church exists to give the people of the Cape Fear Valley region the opportunity to become fully developing followers of Jesus Christ.
In this next message in our series through the Old Testament, Pastor Billy Shaw explains the well-known Flood narrative beginning from Genesis 6 and draws a connection between the rescue from God's wrath that Noah's ark provided and the rescue that Jesus Christ provides from the wrath of God towards our sin. In the same way that judgment was coming in Noah's day, judgment is coming in ours. A key difference, though, is that Noah's generation knew the exact time judgment would fall seven days in advance. In our day, no such time will be known by any of us. We therefore live each day ready to meet the Lord. For anyone who has never dealt with their sin and come to the cross of Jesus for forgiveness and redemption, it is time to get into the ark, which is Christ. For more information on how to do this call 910-323-1630 or email gracebaptistfayettevillenc@gmail.com. Follow us on social media @gracebaptistfayetteville. If you are local to Fayetteville, join us in person on Sunday mornings at the Millstone 14 theater at 10 AM each Sunday.
This message in the Old Testament series introduces the patriarch Abraham. We look at the covenant significance of this important OT figure and the role God had him play in salvation history. Of special importance to us is the reality that Abraham (then called Abram) grew in his faith. He did not start out as the giant of faith he became. He demanded a sign, some sense of assurance. He would grow in his faith, though. And the hero of Abraham's story is of course God, who is our great covenant-keeping God. God faithfully brings to pass all of His good promises that He makes to Abram. Jesus Christ our Savior is the fulfillment of the promise "in you shall all families of the earth be blessed." People of every ethnicity can receive forgiveness of sins and peace with God through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Jesus is the son of David, son of Abraham. If you have never trusted Christ as your Savior, do so today. If you need help knowing how to do that, please call 910-323-1630 or email gracebaptistfayettevillenc@gmail.com. Follow us on social media @gracebaptistfayetteville. If you are local to Fayetteville, worship with us in person any Sunday at 10 AM at the Millstone 14 Theater on Camden Rd. We have Church Online each Sunday at 9 AM, 11 AM and every two hours thereafter at https://GraceFay.org/Online.
If you've ever wondered why the world deals with such heartache, pain, death, and suffering, and if you've ever wanted a deeper understanding of man's sinful condition, why we crave the things that destroy us, why we are drawn to the forbidden, this message explores and explains it all. How did we go from the perfect Creation God had made, and upon which He looked and declared it was "very good" to the world we call home today?
Amazingly, the Tempter got Eve to focus, not on the hundreds if not thousands of trees the LORD God had given her but on the one He had intentionally withheld. He does this with us today also, inviting us to dwell on what we do not have rather than what God has provided. Satan did not outright contradict God's Word - he simply questioned it before contradicting it. The same happens today. Not all questions concerning God's revealed truth are innocent.
Then Adam was not a leader; he listened to the voice of his wife and ate the forbidden fruit.
We have in Genesis 3 a picture of the heart of our loving, merciful, gracious, benevolent God. In the face of mankind's ridiculous disobedience, God made the promise to send the seed of the woman (implying a virgin birth) who would bruise or crush the serpent's head, and the serpent would bruise His heel. The Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled this promise in His person and work as our sacrifice for sin. The New Testament makes clear that as by one man's disobedience, sin and death entered the world and passed upon all mankind, so by one man's righteous act (Christ dying on the cross) shall all in Him be made righteous. The first Adam sinned, and we were in him. Therefore we are concluded under sin along with him. The second Adam was sinless and died for our sin. All who are in Him share in His victory over sin, hell, and the grave. Pastor Billy Shaw of Grace Baptist Church in Fayetteville, NC expounds Genesis Chapter 3 in this message in the series, "The Old Testament: The Drumroll to Christ." Visit us on the web https://GraceFay.org and on social media @GraceBaptistFayetteville.
Chapter 4 of Genesis presents the somewhat well-known account of Cain slaying his brother Abel. It is a lesson on several spiritual realities. For one, we do not approach God on our own terms. The text does neither focuses on nor explains why Cain's sacrifice did not result in God's favor as his brother's did. Evidently, he did not "do well." Verse 7: "If you do well, will you not be accepted?" It is clear that something was amiss in the condition of Cain's heart. Worship from an impure heart may be worse than no worship at all. God desires and rewards pure worship. It seems that Cain did repent. When he says, "my iniquity is too great to bear," this can be translated, "my iniquity is too great to forgive." God's response to Cain in this part of the Chapter is consistent with him having repented.
In Abel, we have a type of Christ. He was a Shepherd, as is our Lord. He brought a Lamb; our Savior is the Lamb of God which takes away the sins of the world. Abel was hated and slain by his brother; Jesus was hated by His half-brothers and arrested to be crucified by His Jewish brethren. Abel died having committed no crime worthy of death; Jesus died without any sin of His own.
In the cities of refuge, (of which Cain's new city is an early example), we see a type of Christ. Sinners who do not flee to the city of refuge will face the avenger of blood on their own and will die. Those who flee to the city of refuge will be protected from the avenger of blood and will live. When sinners reject Christ, they face the wrath and justice of God all on their own in an eternity in hell. When sinners believe in Jesus, they receive Christ's imputed righteousness, and there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus who do not walk after the flesh but after the Spirit.
Pastor Billy Shaw of Grace Baptist Church in Fayetteville, NC walks us through this Chapter and these spiritual truths in this message in the series "The Old Testament: The Drumroll to Christ." Visit the church online https://GraceFay.org and on social media @GraceBaptistFayetteville.
Those familiar with the Old Testament will know that Enoch is one of only two figures in the Bible who did not die - the other being Elijah. Genesis Chapter 5 has a striking rhythm "and he died...and he died...and he died," which is interrupted by the account of Enoch who "was not, for the LORD took him." God had placed cherubim at the border of the Garden of Eden with a flaming sword to block mankind from gaining access to the tree of life and living forever. If mankind was to find eternal life, he would only do so on God's terms and following God's Way. Enoch did not see death but was translated to where God was. The book of Hebrews elaborates that Enoch had this testimony that He pleased God, and it is impossible without faith to please God. Enoch's faith is what brought him to eternal life. You and I can receive God's free gift of eternal life when we place our faith and trust in Jesus Christ for salvation.
Pastor Billy Shaw of Grace Baptist Church Fayetteville, NC takes us through the account of Enoch and all it teaches us about salvation by grace through faith in the person and work of Christ Jesus our Lord. Visit us on the Web at https://GraceFay.org and on social media @GraceBaptistFayetteville.
In this message, Pastor Billy Shaw walks us through the creation account given in Genesis 1-2 and covers fundamental truths that still affect daily life today. The message stays focused on Jesus Christ, especially His role in creation. As Colossians 1:16 says, "All things were created by Him and for Him." The message briefly touches on the Sabbath principle. This foundational message is key in setting up the remainder of the series.
Grace Baptist Church of Fayetteville, NC has kicked off a series through the Old Testament in which Pastor Billy Shaw will be guiding the church through a 15,000-foot view of the arc of the OT's 39 books. In this introductory message, Pastor Shaw covers important topics such as the proper and improper use of the Old Testament, what do we mean when we say "Old Testament," and how the Old Testament relates to the New Testament. We also discuss the value and importance of studying the Old Testament. The key question the message pursues is "What Purpose Does the Law Serve?" The question is asked and answered in Galatians 3:19-26. The Apostle Paul provides three answers to the question.
Lead Pastor Billy Shaw walks us through the final Chapter of 2 Thessalonians. Throughout the Scriptures, whenever God's propositional truth is set forth, it expects a response. There are doctrines to believe, promises to claim, commands to obey, and more. In this Chapter, Paul ties various exhortations given to the church at Thessalonica to attributes of God - that God is faithful, loving, patient, the Lord of peace, a God of grace. The fact that God is who He is leads to exhortations as to how we should lead our lives and address the challenges we face. A main issue tackled in this chapter is the sin of laziness, which always leads to the risk of burnout on the part of the diligent. How does one handle this issue with the mind of Christ? The answer and much more is right here in 2 Thessalonians Chapter 3.
Grace Baptist Fayetteville often explains that we use expository preaching in our weekly services. But what does that mean? How does that play out in the experience of the church? What is our approach to expository preaching? Lead Pastor Billy Shaw explains how the teaching ministry of GBC Fayetteville pursues the expository method.
Lead Pastor Billy Shaw walks us through the second Chapter of 2 Thessalonians. This chapter covers the sequence of end time events, namely the three things that must take place before the Day of the Lord is present. It also gets into details in the text about the lawless one, or Antichrist. The thrust of it all is that, properly understood, the Bible's teaching about future things comforts and establishes the hearts of believers.
This message, originally delivered July 25, 2021 at Grace Baptist Fayetteville, NC, kicks off a series through 2 Thessalonians. Pastor Billy Shaw walks us through the reasons Paul sets forth in this chapter that we are to give glory to God. Whether you are going through an intense hardship or even religious persecution, this chapter has comforting insight for you. The promises of God are sure, and He will bring to pass all His good pleasure concerning His children. There's never been a better time to trust Christ as your Savior, if you have not yet done so. He loves you, and gave Himself for you. Trust Him today!
In this episode, Pastor Billy Shaw (GBC Fayetteville, NC) recaps the 2-year series through 1 Corinthians and expounds the last fourteen verses of Chapter 16. The series is titled, "How the Gospel Rebuilds a Healthy Church;" this message is titled, "Standing Firm to the End."
Pastor Billy Shaw unpacks 1 Corinthians 16:1-9 in pursuit of the truth that God creates opportunities for His children. The message draws out principles for believers and churches in the areas of giving and stewardship as well as the priority of outreach and obeying God's voice.