Pilgrim Baptist Church

There is a difference between a man who makes it and a man who meets Him well. John doesn't write 1 John 2:28 to the lost. He writes it to believers. And what he says ought to stop every Christian who thinks showing up is enough — because a saved man can

They always show up with more — more knowledge, more experience, more spiritual depth than you ever got from that old narrow-minded church you used to sit under. And John's answer to all of it is one sentence. "This is the promise that he hath promised us

Sit with that for a minute — because it explains nearly every departure you've ever watched and couldn't make sense of. When someone walks out the door of a sound, Bible-preaching church — especially when they go out teaching something — the exit wasn't

The devil doesn't need your Bible. So instead, he fills your hands with good things — Christian things, even — until you are doing everything for God except sitting with God. It's not his power that gets you. It's his patience. He's not showing up with

Every believer has the same Book. The same promises. The same indwelling Holy Ghost. But not every Christian has the same fruit. That gap — between what God handed every saint and what each saint actually does with it — that's where faithfulness either

Write it down. Whatever is consuming you right now — the neighbor situation, the thing somebody said, the problem that feels like it needs solving this minute — write it down. Put a date on it. Close the notebook. Then wait two days. Most of it resolves

If you want to pray more, keep your Bible open on the kitchen table before the coffee brews. If you want to be on your phone less, put it in another room at night and stop carrying it into every quiet moment God gives you. Stop making it easy. Then stop

Everything has a price. And price tells a story. God didn't negotiate the terms of your redemption. He didn't send an angel. He didn't offer a symbolic gesture. He sent His Son. The price He paid says nothing about what you deserved — and everything about

Most of us were taught to avoid the world because of what it does to you. The corruption. That's real — but it's not the deepest thing John is saying in 1 John 2:15-17. John isn't primarily warning you about the world's wickedness. He's warning you about

You've heard it too — "Well, the King James Bible didn't come down from heaven on a string." Nobody said it did. What we believe is this: the God who wrote it, kept it. That's just believing what the Bible says about itself. "The words of the LORD are

There's a difference between contentment and compromise, and the Christian life depends on knowing which one you're practicing. Paul said he had learned to be content — and that word "learned" ought to stop us cold. Contentment isn't natural. It's forged

Most Christians want to win the fight. They just don't want to do the work before the fight. A believer gets blindsided — a temptation they weren't ready for, a conversation that exposed them, a moment that called for something they didn't have. And they

Most of us have disqualified ourselves from the sin of hatred because we've never flipped a table or screamed at somebody in a parking lot. That's not John's definition. Two chapters after warning us about hating the brethren, John gives us the working

The Christian life was never about your ability. Ability is about you — your gifts, your effort. Availability is different. It's submission. It's deciding God is important enough to put His service first. Will you avail yourself? https://fortunato.blog

Two weeks from now, Pilgrim Baptist Church will host our 6th Annual Bible Conference — Behold Your God: Comfort and Strength for the Weary Soul — April 22–24 right here in Cookeville, Tennessee. Ten sermons. Five preachers. All of them working through

Most people think of obedience as the price of admission. Do right, stay saved, keep God happy. That's not Christianity — that's a paycheck mentality dressed up in church clothes. John makes a distinction in 1 John 2:3 that most people miss entirely. He

Nobody remembers Wednesday. Friday gets a holiday. Sunday gets a celebration. Wednesday gets a church service that half the congregation skips. But Jesus Christ — our Passover Lamb — died on a Wednesday. Nissan 14. The exact day God ordained in the Law of

Every spring, the circus comes to town dressed up like a church service. Helicopter egg drops. Carnival games. Free hotdogs. Free gas cards. Free steak dinner. And somewhere at the end, wedged between the bounce house and the prize table — a little Jesus.

Every modern Bible translation removes the word easter from Acts 12:4 and replaces it with passover. The King James Bible didn't make that swap — and one word in the very next verse tells you exactly why. The answer is one word. Then. "Then were the days

Most people in church pews would say they know Jesus. They said so at the altar. They said so at the water. They'll say so again before Sunday's over. But John doesn't ask what you say. He asks how you live. There are two kinds of knowing in 1 John 2:3,

Most people think of Jesus as Savior. Fewer think of Him as Advocate. But 1 John 2:1 is plain: "we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." Not "we had." Not "we will have." We have. Present tense. Right now. Picture the courtroom.

You stand up to preach, and there's a war going on that nobody can see. Dry mouth. Butterflies you can't pray away. Thoughts scattering. A split second where you wonder if any of it is going to land. So you plant your feet. You take a breath. You open the

That's the unspoken motto of too many institutions — and too many hearts. Say it out loud. Cheaper not to care. You can hear the boardroom that birthed it. Cut the corners. Minimize the exposure. Protect the margin. But God never built anything that way.

Most of us waste years waiting for permission we already have. We tell ourselves that real change belongs to somebody else. The pastor's job. The elder's responsibility. The husband with more experience. The wife with more patience. Meanwhile we sit still

Most of us aren't struggling with whether to murder someone. The battle is whether we'll call our pride pride. That's where self-deception lives — not in the sins nobody defends, but in the respectable ones we've baptized with better names. We confess the

There's a question that comes up more than you'd think — usually delivered with a tone that's meant to end the conversation before it starts: "If you chose Christ, doesn't that mean you get some of the glory?" You've just been handed a trick question

There's a reason John uses the present tense. "The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin." — 1 John 1:7 Not cleansed. Not will cleanse. Cleanseth. Right now. Ongoing. Continuous. That one word dismantles the whole performance trap. John

God never called His people to live afraid, eyes fixed on every shadow. Wisdom recognizes danger. But fear isn't wisdom — it's a counterfeit. Scripture doesn't show us a timid people. It shows us Abraham leaving everything he knew. Peter stepping out of

The false teachers didn't lack conviction. They lacked calluses. They had opinions about Jesus. Persuasive ones. Convincing ones. Sometimes ones that sounded like scripture. But they didn't have Him. John's not building an argument in 1 John 1:1. He's

God put warning labels in the Bible long before the government put them on anything. There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. — Proverbs 14:12** One sentence. No fine print. The destination is hell.

Eve had a husband. She should have used him. "Yea, hath God said?" That question deserved silence from her and an answer from him. But she engaged it alone — and Paul didn't miss it. In 1 Timothy 2 he commands women to learn in silence, not to usurp

You're capable. And that might be the very thing working against you. It shows up in pastors, fathers, and business owners. It sounds like "I'll just handle it." But stewardship isn't only about what you can do — it's about who you're raising up.

"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." — Galatians 6:9 You don't know which Sunday message lands at 2 a.m. on a Tuesday. You don't know if that tract you handed the cashier at Walmart ended up on

There is a kind of commerce that depends on darkness. It finds its margin in confusion, its profit in the uninformed. It does not want you thinking at all. It needs you off-balance. This is not a new problem. The prophet Amos condemned merchants who

Your child will face a moment — in the locker room, at the lunch table, maybe even in church — where the crowd goes one way and God's Word goes another. Most parents train their kids to be liked. To be polite, agreeable, easy to get along with. That's not

A packed house and a Spirit-filled church are not the same thing. We've spent so long confusing the two that nobody bothers to ask which one we're building. Count the seats. Fill the seats. Add more seats. And we called it ministry. The only thing

If you're too busy for church, you're too busy. I've heard every version of the excuse. Sports. Travel. Rest. Family time. They're not bad things. That's what makes it complicated. Nobody's skipping church for something obviously wrong. They're skipping

A lot of believers are exhausted. Not from doing too much — from trying to balance standing still. You already know this feeling. The wobble the moment you stop pedaling. A bicycle cannot stay upright without motion. Neither can you. Sanctification is a

Picture a woman who turned down a promotion to be home when her kids walked through the door every afternoon. Her coworkers pitied her. Ten years later, her daughter made the same choice — not because she had to, but because she'd seen what it built. No

There's a trap most Christians don't realize they're standing in. "I wouldn't do it that way" is not the same as "the Bible forbids it." But we blur that line constantly — in our marriages, in our churches, in the way we raise our children and quietly

We don't call it selfishness. We call it wisdom. We call it stewardship. We call it knowing what's best for our family. But most of it is just baptized selfishness — self-interest dressed up in responsible-sounding language so we don't have to feel bad

Some people don't come back to apologize. They come back to brag. You'll recognize it. There's someone who wronged you — maybe they lied about you, left ugly, or did damage they never owned. Then one day that person shows up — soft voice, spiritual

Somebody figured out you can build a following online just by tearing other men down. Reaction video after reaction video. Ministry after ministry — not known for what they teach, but for who they're against. The follower count goes up every time somebody

You don't owe anyone a closing argument justifying your convictions. The Lord Jesus Christ said, "Let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay" (Matthew 5:37). Jesus wasn't being cold. He was showing you what character looks like. A man of God whose word

They say ignorance is bliss. If that's true, I'm a blizzard. Ministry has a way of showing you things you can't unsee. People you trusted. Situations you didn't ask for. Conversations that stay with you at 2 in the morning. Nobody warns you about that

I'm grateful for this nation. Grateful for freedom, for provision, for the military that protects our families. None of that is lost on me. But being grateful for your country and confusing the church's mission — those aren't the same thing. No political

There is a kind of mockery that is holy. Not the kind that tears down a struggling soul or settles a personal score. The kind Elijah used on Mount Carmel when he stood before 450 prophets of Baal and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is talking,

For some families, a question eventually surfaces that they never saw coming — whether God might be calling them to pull up roots and relocate for the sake of finding a faithful church. It is a question worth taking seriously, because the stakes on both

⚠️ If you have kids or grandkids, you need to see this. You've heard them say it. "6, 7." It's in the hallways, at lunch, on every phone screen. Adults call it "brain rot" and move on. But what if it's not nothing? I've searched the scriptures address

The New Testament doesn't imagine a church without order. It assumes one — and builds on it. God didn't leave that to chance. Paul wrote to Timothy and Titus about almost nothing else. And Hebrews 13:17 puts it plainly: Obey them that have the rule over