Desiring God 2008 - 1st Session, Sinclair Ferguson

What a beginning to the conference! Dr. Ferguson opened with an exposition of James 3:1-12. He made four basic points of the necessity of controlling the tongue in the life of a believer:

1. The tongue is difficult to control (James 3:2). If we can control our tongue, we can control ourselves (James 1:26)

2. The tongue has a disproportionate power for its' size (James 3:3-5)

3. The tongue can cause destruction (James 3:4-5).

4. There is a deadly inconsistency that plagues the tongue (James 3:9-11)

Ferguson's solution to this problem was "20 Resolutions". They can be found here.

This whole teaching, Dr. Ferguson was able to establish quite clearly, is seen in the gospel in that we must first see, as Isaiah did (Isaiah 5 & 6) the depth of our sin if we are ever to receive and understand the height of God's grace (James 1:18). As God brings His regeneration (James 3) our hearts are transformed and that will lead to a transformed tongue.

You can hear the whole session here. The conference is making the audio portions of the sessions available within an hour of their presentation. The videos will be available within 24 hours. All this is for free. Everything can be found at Desiring God. I think John Piper and the folks at Desiring God Ministries should be highly commended for making so much high quality material available without charge

There are over 3200 people attending the conference. The Book Store is well stocked and massive. One of the things that is immediately noticeable is the large number of younger people attending as you'll see in the slide show below. It really warmed my heart to see a young man, probably less than 20 years old, engaging Dr. Ferguson after his session. It's comforting to know the future of the church and sound doctrine is alive and well in these young people.

The last session was a panel discussion with John Piper, Mark Driscoll (very impressive) and Sinclair Ferguson, who gave his testimony.