Gospel Preaching 27

May 24, 2015

I Corinthians 2:2 For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
3 I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, 4 and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

A Christian, whether he is preacher or hearer, must be sure that he is speaking and hearing, not his own word, but God’s Word; otherwise it would be better if he had never been born, and preacher and hearer together must go to the devil. (Martin Luther)

Matthew 7:28 When Jesus had finished these words, the crowds were amazed at His teaching; 29 for He
was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.

When Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount, the crowds were amazed at His teaching because He taught as one who had authority. The scribes would walk around and quote the differing opinions of those who had been before them, but Jesus spoke on His own authority. He did not quote the scribes and He did not quote any authority. He spoke with power and He spoke using the Old Testament Scriptures as well.

In sermon after sermon and book after book we find the scholars and ministers of today doing what the scribes did in days past. The scribes had their authority by quoting many famous and brilliant scribes and today people have their authority by quoting the scholars. Pastors and scholars have no power today because they are not seeking the face of the Lord and they are not seeking Him to teach them. They have no confidence in their own views of Scripture and so they resort waffling about the character of God and the Gospel. As long as men continue to study, preach, and write like that they will have no power and there will be no “thus says the Lord” to the people.

Without knowing for sure the “inspiration” for Luther’s statement above, it could easily be Matthew 7:28-29 since what Luther wrote is certainly an echo of the works of Christ. There is no power in the pulpit in these days and men are giving learned lectures and educated talks, but they don’t appear to have spent time praying and seeking the Lord enough to be able to speak with authority and confidence that they are speaking the words of God. This is vital for there to be Gospel preaching. It is not enough for men to give their own opinion or the opinions of other pastors or scholars, they must be taught of the Lord Himself and then stand in the pulpit as if speaking for God because they are.

The man standing in the pulpit and proclaiming Christ must not just be saying what he has learned from the scholars, but instead he must be proclaiming the Christ who has revealed Himself to that man. It is not enough to dance around issues and speak with the firmness of a jelly fish, but a man must speak as if speaking from the Lord. The Gospel has to do with the eternal destinies of eternal souls and it has to do with the glory of God. If a man cannot preach this Gospel with some degree of conviction and declare it with authority, then he needs to get out of the pulpit and stop preaching. While the Bible speaks of a doubting Thomas, there is no place for a minister who has doubts great enough to hinder him from preaching the Gospel with authority. When one proclaims the Gospel from Scripture, what that man says is based on the authority of Scripture which is on the authority of God. It should also be said that the devil attacks people with fiery darts and tries to raise doubts in the minds of the people of God, so this is not to say that men are to be perfect in conviction each time they stand to preach. But even in their doubts they must use those doubts and fiery darts to drive them to the Savior who alone can give them strength to stand and declare the Gospel of grace alone to needy sinners.

We can imagine a doubting general giving orders to his troops. We can imagine a doubting businessman trying to gain finances for a financial venture. The general and the businessman in these illustrations may indeed be speaking of important things, but not even close to as important as the Gospel. A doubting general would most likely try to work himself up and come up with a confidence even if it was forced. A doubting businessman would probably just be turned down quickly. The point is that preachers must preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the authority of Jesus Christ. They must tell sinners on the basis of what God says that they will perish if they do not repent. They must tell sinners that if they have Christ they will never perish and they should say those things from the depths of their hearts. Gospel preaching requires men to spend time with the Lord and speak that way. Preaching that beats around the bush or is an easy on the ear preaching is preaching that will convince no one of anything about the Gospel. In other words, it has no authority and has no sanction from the Savior. We cannot preach the Gospel without the authority and sanction of Christ. We cannot preach the Gospel without hearts that have been humbled, broken, and then filled with Christ.

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Musings 71

May 24, 2015

The Church (in name) is in deep, deep trouble. Liberalism has taken the vitals out of most of the professing Church a long time ago. Rationalism and irrationalism has always troubled the professing Church under the guise of scholarship and learning or simply being oriented and led by the feelings. Pelagianism has not gone away and instead is rampant in the modern professing Church. R.C. Sproul said several years ago that if Luther were alive today he would write a book entitled “The Pelagian Captivity of the Church.” While the Reformers were willing to die in their stand against Pelagianism and Arminianism, today those things are not thought of as serious errors.

What has happened? There have been various explanations for the ills of the modern, professing Church in our day. It has been said that the problem is that we have gotten away from the sacraments, have gotten away from confessionalism, or that we have lost our connection with people with not having the right music, the right methods, the right dress, and the right message. Some argue that we don’t have enough expository preaching, enough discipleship, or perhaps we are just not committed enough in our day. While those things may be true to a degree and at certain points, something else may be the real problem.

A book arrived in the mail today from International Outreach. It was (and is) entitled The Existence and Attributes of Satan, written by Thaddeus McRae. As I read the Introduction (written by William Nichols) the problem (at least a major part of it) of the modern, professing Church became clear. The modern, professing Church does not really believe in the devil even though they may confess that they do. Following the Introduction as it quotes the author, “There is a personal devil. He is known by several names:

1. The god of this world, 2 Corinthians 4:4
2. Beelzebub the chief of the devils, Luke 11:15
3. The devil and his angels, Matthew 25:41
4. The angel of the bottomless pit, Revelation 19:11
5. The accuser of the brethren, Revelation 12:10
6. The great dragon
7. That old serpent the devil
8. Satan the deceiver

“He is also likewise represented as possessing character.” He is described in Scripture in these ways:

1. He is a deceiver
2. He is a murderer
3. He is the wicked one
4. He is a liar
5. He is the tempter

The sin which caused Satan to fall was that of pride. It was his exalting himself and wanting to be like God that was his fall, which then became how he tempted Eve in the Garden. Quoting from the Introduction which quoted McGray, “My hearers, consider the devilish nature of pride…Its very essence is antagonism to God. He who over-estimates himself will readily go farther. Being ‘lifted up’ with his own sufficiency, he will soon learn to encroach upon the rights of others. He is all-important, and all things must therefore subserve his interest; and as he ascends in his own esteem, he may ere long aspire to divine honors, and become a rival of his Maker.”

As can clearly be seen the problem in the modern, professing Church has two heads. One, it dismisses the activity of Satan unless it is in a confession where it must be confessed. But on a practical level, the practice of church goes on like he does not really exist. Two, Satan has breathed forth his poison, the poison of pride, into the modern, professing Church. He has done this in numerous ways, but he has done it. The modern, professing Church is shot through with proud ministers. They are proud of the external success, proud of their education, proud of their suits, or perhaps proud of what they know. The churches are full of proud deacons, proud elders, and proud committee members. The churches are also full of proud members because proud leaders have been deceived and now the churches are full of proud unbelievers. When the churches are deceived by the deceiver, souls murdered by false gospels, full of wickedness from the wicked one, full of lies from the liar, and being tempted by the master tempter, the churches are more like synagogues of Satan than the Bride of Christ. The only answer is to seek the Lord Himself and seek Him for humbled and broken hearts. There is no answer for pride but humility. There is no answer to the tempter but from Christ Himself who defeated the tempter.

The modern, professing Church has been lied to, deceived, and assaulted with false doctrine and the abuse of Scripture. When the evil one tempted Eve he twisted the words of God. When the evil one tempted the Lord Jesus he twisted the application of the Scriptures. As one who appears as an angel of light, he is always trying to deceive people about what good and evil are. This is how he turns professing churches away from the true Gospel and gets them to proclaim a false gospel. This is how he turns ministers away from preaching the truth and instead preaching easy and popular messages. He nurtures pride in the guise of humility, twists niceness to be thought of as love, and makes it appear that believing truth and knowing God is to be proud. He turns true unity into people seeking to be ecumenical. He turns sovereign grace into something that men can apply to themselves by an act of the will. In short, the evil one has hijacked the modern, professing Church to a great degree. We must seek the Lord for humility and light. We must seek the Lord to teach us rather than trust in our own proud hearts or the proud hearts of others.

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Christ Preparing our Hearts 21

May 23, 2015

Be persuaded that your soul is far more valuable to you than the whole world and there are only two places (heaven and hell) that you will spend all eternity in.

Certainly believe it, that heaven is so glorious, that it is worth all your care and pains be it never so much; and that hell is so dreadful, that you may reasonably fly from it with all diligence, earnestness and speed; that it is better you had never been born, if you should die in your sins, and perish everlastingly. What a direful screech will your soul give, if it goes out of your body into unquenchable burnings!

The Scriptures sets out heaven as so glorious that it cannot be understood in this life. We know, however, that it is to be in the presence of God and it is (as Jonathan Edwards described it) a world of love. It is a place where every single person who has Christ will be taken and plunged into an ocean of perfect love. It is a place where people are beloved of God, beloved of others, and all love God because He first loved them. Christ Himself is the light in that place. It is pictured as a place of eternal pleasure, joy, and a place where there is no pain or sorrow. We are told by Paul that the glories to be revealed are worth all the suffering and pain that we have in this life, but even more that the things in this life are not even worth comparing to the glories to be revealed. Heaven, then, is a place that should be sought no matter what. But Christ alone can open our eyes to give us a longing for heaven because Christ Himself is our foretaste of heaven in this life. We should seek Him to give us this taste.

On the other hand, hell is a place to be avoided at all costs and all pains. Hell is such a place of incredible suffering and anguish of soul that a person should flee from it with all of their might. Hell is the place where out minds will be opened to every terror of mind and the body will receive suffering for what it has done in life as well. It is a place where there is the absent of all good and all comfort, yet the presence of all evil and suffering. All the lusts of the body will be raging and yet never satisfied. The body will crave water in the midst of the fire and yet it will never receive one drop of water. The eyes will see the good that believers have and yet know that the souls in hell can never have one bit of good. Oh how the soul will be tormented with hatred and jealousy while knowing that it will never have one moment of relief of this unceasing and unmitigated wrath upon it. Yet people go on in this casually as if time was nothing but to be wasted and religion was an easy way to go about things.

It has been said that one spark from hell dropped into the soul is what men need to be awakened to the sobering reality around them, but it is also true that one drop of glory from heaven should awaken men to the glories there.
As the first quote at the top of the page says, “be persuaded that your soul is far more valuable to you than the whole world and there are only two places (heaven and hell) that you will spend all eternity in.” In light of the glories of heaven and the terrors of hell, no soul should do anything that is inconsistent with seeking the Lord. No one should do anything but seek the Lord for a heart that is prepared for Himself and therefore for eternity. While Christ has been said to go in order to prepare a place for His people, we must also know that He alone can prepare out hearts as His dwelling place. No human being can make his or her heart fit to be the dwelling place of God, so we must know that the Lord must do this work if it is to be done at all.

What will happen to the soul that will not seek the Lord for his or her soul to be made into a dwelling place of the Lord? That soul will learn by experience and a doleful and awful experience that it is better if that person had never been born than to die in his or her sins and drop into the flames of hell to perish everlastingly. People speak of depression in modern America, but in that place there is utterly no hope in the soul when the veil of this life is taken away and it sees that nothing but eternal misery is ahead of it. As the soul is in this unspeakable misery without the slightest hope of the slightest mitigation of its torment and it has nothing to look forward to but an increasing torment forever and ever, that soul will know by awful experience what utter despair really is.

If the sinner could imagine what screams will come from his or her mouth as it hears the words of the Lord to go away from Him into the eternal fire and indeed it is delivered into unquenchable burnings, that soul will wish it has sought the Lord to be freed from its sins, its addictions, its lusts, and anything that could be thought of as sin. That soul will have wished it had sought the Lord with greater intensity to flee from sin and the hell it deserves. It will wish that it had sought the Lord and spent its time fasting and praying to avoid sin and to have Him.

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Real Repentance 24

May 22, 2015

Matthew 3:7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 “Therefore bear fruit in keeping with repentance; 9 and do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father’; for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham.

There may be an abiding consciousness of sin, with self-condemnation, where there is not the least degree of self-indignation, or self-abhorrence. Humility is knowing that we are not humble. (Thomas Adam, Private Thoughts on Religion)

It is a tremendous thought that sheds a lot of light when we see that a large part of true humility is to know that we are not truly humble and perhaps far from a perfect humility. In this life there is always room to grow in humility. The unregenerate heart is blinded and deceived by a selfish heart which is a heart that is full of pride and self-love. The proud heart can easily be deceived into thinking that it is humble by a mere show or outward form of humility, or perhaps by thinking that is not as proud as others. The religious but unconverted person will strive for humility in all the power of a natural man trying to be religious, but it cannot work. Until God regenerates a soul and works real repentance in that soul, no soul can have the least amount of true humility because true humility can only come to the soul that has the life of Christ in him or her.

This is so vital for people to grab a hold of. Yes, it is true that we must have humility to receive grace. Yes, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. But if grace could come to those who could work up grace on their own, then grace would come as a result of works. All a person would have to do is to work up humility as if it could come as a result of a human work of pride and self-love, and God would give grace. This is plainly absurd to reason and nauseating to those who love the free grace of God. The soul must have a real repentance worked in it by grace in order for it to have true humility. True enough there is a working of the Spirit to bring the unregenerate man down and bring humble him in an outward way, but true humility can only be in the soul of a person that has truly repented of self and pride in the inward man.

Humility can be praised and not possessed. Humility can be sought after in the external and religious sense and yet hated in the inward man. As the only sovereign the one and true God has a right over each and ever person to all they are and to all they think and do. As the only sovereign the one and true God can uphold or harden each person as He pleases. The natural man, whether religious or not, hates this and will not submit to it. The spiritual man hates the idea that he has not submitted to it more and wrestles with his own heart agonizing over the pride that he finds in it. The natural man (religious or not) does not see his own pride and as such does not see the hatefulness of his pride. The religious but unconverted person is seeking to be religious (perhaps even very religious) out of pride and as such is deceived about his or her religious actions and pride.

Oh how a man can stand in the pulpit and wax eloquent about Christ and his view of the gospel and become more and more proud of himself and what he thinks are the results of his orthodoxy. Oh how men who are full of themselves can be orthodox and be good or even great speakers and have hundreds or thousands following them, yet do nothing but deceive others and become more and more proud and full of themselves. Men can inspire the building of great edifices in the name of God and for His name while in their hearts they are seeking themselves and the aggrandizement of their own names. When men stand up to “preach” they are doing nothing but seeking the attention and honor of others for themselves. As the Pharisees prayed to get honor from men and did acts of righteousness to obtain that honor, so men use religion in our day to obtain honor for themselves. That is what their heart desires regardless of what comes out of their mouths.

The great need of human beings is for God to remove the blinders from their eyes that they can see how wicked they are in their self-love and pride. Then and only then can they seek a real repentance from their pride and be granted a humility to see that they are far from perfect humility. How men should long to be delivered from their pride which is a sign of true humility rather than thinking they have arrived at humility. That awful pride and self-love that fills their religious actions and moves them to their religion should be seen as the worst of sin rather than a mitigating factor. Oh how a soul should long for God to grant him or her real repentance from that cursed pride and love of self so that s/he could be free from that cursed self in a real repentance and be given a true humility. Oh how a humble soul will wrestle with its pride, yet the proud heart is blinded to it and so does not see the need of an inner and real repentance. Real repentance is rare in our day because few see the need for it and are deceived into thinking that their external acts of repentance are enough. How desperately we need a work of God in our day to awaken us to our great need of real repentance from our self, pride, false humility, and our religious self-righteousness. We must come to Him stripped of all self-righteousness and look to Christ alone for all things.

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Real Repentance 23

May 21, 2015

Matthew 3:7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 “Therefore bear fruit in keeping with repentance; 9 and do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father’; for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham.

There may be an abiding consciousness of sin, with self-condemnation, where there is not the least degree of self-indignation, or self-abhorrence. Humility is knowing that we are not humble. (Thomas Adam, Private Thoughts on Religion)

Adam strikes to the heart with a piercing quote again, though it is to be feared that truths like these are seldom read by a few and never read by the majority. One can have a sense and even abiding consciousness of sin and yet there be nothing resembling real repentance. One can have an abiding consciousness of sin and that with self-condemnation, yet there can still be nothing resembling real repentance. In some ways and some aspects Adam gets to the very heart of heart religion here. The heart can have a sense of sin and be moved in some ways and yet that can still be on the very surface of true Christianity.

In many ways this gets to the heart of real repentance which is the repentance from the deepest parts and aspects of the soul. It seems self-evident that the soul can have a consciousness of its sin and yet continue on in sin. The soul can even know it is worthy of condemnation for its sin and still continue on in its sin. What is needed, however, for real repentance, is for the soul to be indignant with self and to abhor self. Only when the soul is turned from love for self and its pride to the abhorrence of self will real repentance have occurred. However, once again, the heart has many ways to get around real repentance and be satisfied with a deception. The soul can be indignant against itself in a self-righteous way rather than indignant against itself that it has sinned against God. This is a dangerous deception. The soul can also abhor the fact that it has been caught in sin or abhor the fact with self-righteousness that it has sinned, but that is not the same thing as abhorring the very self as a vile and wretched sinner against God. We have to be very careful and seek discernment from the Lord.

The soul that has been granted real repentance will be able to discern, though it may require much prayer and seeking of the Lord, some degree of true indignation and abhorrence of self. The unregenerate person can despise self and be indignant with self, but the source of that will always be self-love and pride. Yet the regenerate person will always be fighting self and pride as regeneration does not make a person perfect, so the regenerate person always has those things with him or her along with the signs of true repentance. This means that it is quite difficult at times to wade through the issues of the heart and the work of the evil one who wants to deceive and misdirect our attention to things other than Christ.

Adam states that humility is knowing that we are not humble. This sounds simplistic at the first reading, but the more one ponders it the more one begins to get a glimpse of the meaning. The proud can work up a humility in their own power and deceive themselves into thinking that they are proud, but the humble will know that they are not thoroughly and finally humble and so they will see their pride and know that they are not naturally humble. The person that sees that s/he has no sufficiency in self to be humble and looks to Christ to work all of his or her humility in the soul is a person that sees that s/he is not truly humble and so must always be fighting the pride that arises in the heart. The heart that sees that it should be humble simply because it is a creature knows that it is not perfectly humble and at times when it has some humility that humility is fleeting. The person that sees how humble s/he should be because of his or her sinfulness knows that sin will still work in that heart and will work against humility and for pride. The person who knows that humility is not natural and that every aspect of it comes as a gift from Christ, that person will seek the Lord for humility on a constant basis because that person understands that s/he is not humble beyond what the Lord gives as He pleases.

The Lord must work real repentance in our hearts and make us truly humble. The heart that has had some degree of real repentance will abhor self because of its sin even though it is a converted soul. The heart that has some degree of real repentance is a heart that is not perfect and is dependent upon the Lord to see its sin, to hate its sin out of a love for God, and that it must have humility as a gift as well. The really repentant soul looks to Christ for all as a gift and by grace alone.

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Real Repentance 22

May 20, 2015

Matthew 3:7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 “Therefore bear fruit in keeping with repentance; 9 and do not suppose that you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham for our father’; for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham.

Till we know sin, and feel the burden of it in some degree, we shall be blind to every thing else, in Scripture, whether of nature or grace; we shall pray with great reserve, and never mean half of what we say. (Thomas Adam, Private Thoughts on Religion)

It is interesting that Adam says, though somewhat self-evident in my view, that apart from knowing sin and having a burden for it we shall be blind to every thing else, but included in that is that we shall pray with great reserve and never mean half of what we say. Prayer and speaking with honesty are vital to the spiritual soul, but most likely Adam is referring to our prayers when he says that we never mean half of what we say. If we view prayer as a way of communing and communicating with God, then if we only mean half of what we say (at best) this shows us how superficial we are. If prayer is a mark of our spiritual life and we only mean half of what we say, then that also shows us how superficial (non-spiritual) we are. Since God knows our hearts, our real desires are set out in His presence and He knows how superficial we are and how badly we need true repentance to really pray.

It is also not possible to work up within our own strength a burden of sin in order to fool God about our prayers. How this brings light to our pride and self-love which are the strength of sin. Pride and self-love blind us to our sin and actually moves us to sin as well. In fact, those things are at the heart of our sinful and fallen nature. Part of the awful effects of pride and self-love is that wicked drive for human beings to be self-sufficient. The fact is, however, it is the humble alone who can truly pray. This should show us the great need of a true and inner repentance in order to live before God, commune with God, and to seek the face of God.

Pride and self-love are also the very energy of hypocrisy and our being like the Pharisees in terms of the differing forms of legalism. Our exalted view of ourselves and our abilities in the things of religion blind us to how much we are pretending before others, to ourselves, and before God. Our prayers are what we think they should be, but they do not come from the heart and they do not come from Christ in the soul. Our prayers are not what we truly desire and so our hearts do not desire the things of God (in truth) and instead they pretend to desire the things of God in words and yet that simply reflects a hypocritical heart.

Until our hearts have some degree of burden from sin and some degree of real repentance, our prayers are nothing but vile acts of self-love and idolatry before God. Without a burden for our sin we are satisfied with self and our level of “spirituality.” Without a burden for sin we show that we are not concerned with our remaining sin (whether unconverted or converted) and so we are not humbled before God and our prayers are the offerings of self. Without true love for God we only operate upon the power of self-love and pride. Why do we think that our prayers that are fueled by self-love and pride are acceptable to the living God? After all, a prayer of pride and self-love is nothing more than the prayer of the Pharisee who “was praying this to himself” in Luke 18:11.

Once the Spirit opens our eyes to see that the very nature of sin is self-love and pride and not just what we do, we can see the horror of our most religious acts and that includes our prayers if not shows that our prayers are even the very worst of our sins. While many complain that their prayer-lives are not what they should be, few will admit that their prayer lives are full of pride and self and as such they don’t mean what they ask for and as such their prayers are open displays of hypocrisy before God. Apart from a real repentance, we cannot truly pray. Apart from a real repentance, our prayers are nothing but hypocrisy. Apart from a real repentance, we are deceived about our prayers and our whole religious life. Apart from a real and inward repentance, we are putting on faces and pretending to be religious before others, ourselves, and God. While we may be able to fool others at times and ourselves most of the time, we are only fooling ourselves if we think we can fool God at any point in time. Apart from a real and inward repentance from self and pride, the whole of life is nothing but empty deception. We must have a real and inward repentance worked in us and granted us by Christ. If not, we are just deceiving ourselves even more and showing how badly we need a real repentance.

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Christ Preparing our Hearts 20

May 19, 2015

Be persuaded that your soul is far more valuable to you than the whole world and there are only two places (heaven and hell) that you will spend all eternity in.

You can count on it that it is very difficult to come to heaven, but the way to destruction is broad and easy. Take it to heart that you have a deceitful heart with you, a wicked devil close to you, and snares and hindrances around and before you.

When we think of the power of the evil one and the power of sin, we should know for certain that we must have Christ as our Teacher or we will be deceived. The vast majority of people in our day who think that evangelism makes a difference are those who run around just telling people to believe as if all things depended on their mere choice or act of the will. No, as Scripture says, “So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy” (Rom 9:16). This text should be drilled into our hearts when we do evangelism. We must strive to get men to look to God to have mercy on them rather than for themselves to do something by an act of their own will or their own running or coming. Before men can be saved by Christ alone, men must be undeceived about himself, sin, and Christ.

20 “The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful (Mat 13:20-22).

Over and over again we are told not to be deceived regarding salvation. In the text above we see the parable of the soil or the parable of the sower. The sower went out to sow and some of the seed fell on rocky places. This is a man who heard the word and immediately received it with joy. This person can be seen as someone who is having a hard time in life and hears the word preached and responds with an act of the will or makes a choice and so has great joy thinking that s/he is saved. But that person, despite an act of the will or a choice, was deceived about being converted. Yes, the person believed. Yes, the person had great joy in believing. However, the person was not truly converted.

Some of the seed fell on some ground that had thorns. This is the person who hears the word and yet the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word. The text does not say that this happens immediately or whether it happens over time, but in accordance with the earlier verses and the analogy of the seed being choked by the thorns we can safely assume that the person believed the word for at least a short time. But again, the seed was choked to where there was no fruit because of the deceitfulness of wealth. The lure and the love of wealth takes the heart and trust of a person and they focus on it rather than on spiritual riches. The point, once again, is that sinners need Christ at all points and at all times to teach them.

For such men are slaves, not of our Lord Christ but of their own appetites; and by their smooth and flattering speech they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting (Romans 16:18)

The pulpits of America (and beyond) seem to be full of men who are slaves of their own appetites and indeed they have smooth and flattering speech by which they deceive the hearts of others. These types of men have no ability to tell others the way of conversion, but they have nice and flattering ways of speech which sound good to those whose hearts are deceived already. These nice and flattering ways of speech can sound good to those who want to hear good things about themselves and about how easy salvation is. The road to hell is full of preachers who have nothing but nice things to say about them and even flattering things to say. The devil is not the meanest preacher in town, but the nicest preachers and the smoothest preachers are the ones he deceives people with.

The way to destruction is easy and takes no real effort. The way to destruction is filled with people who think that they are on the way to heaven when in fact they are almost in hell. The way to destruction has many deceptions about sin, our own hearts, other people, church, and Christ Himself. What we must see is that the way to destruction is full of deception. The deceptions are numerous and they are very deceptive. Only Christ can teach us the truth as He is the Truth. Only Christ can open our eyes by His life and light to see just how deceived we have been and perhaps still are. Only Christ can give us a new heart and give us true faith. Only Christ can drive His word into our hearts and make them bear fruit and to overcome and be steadfast in the difficulties. The narrow road is difficult, but Christ is the Way on that road and it ends in the presence of the living God.

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Gospel Preaching 26

May 18, 2015

I Corinthians 2:2 For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
3 I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, 4 and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

A Christian, whether he is preacher or hearer, must be sure that he is speaking and hearing, not his own word, but God’s Word; otherwise it would be better if he had never been born, and preacher and hearer together must go to the devil. (Martin Luther)

These are very sober words of Luther, though if they are not true then they can be dismissed. But how can these words of Luther be anything but true? Preachers are commanded to preach the Scriptures, preach Christ, and preach the Gospel and nothing else. But of course those three things are all one in reality. If one is to preach the Scriptures with the same intent as the intent of the Scriptures, then one will preach Christ and the Gospel. If one is to preach Christ, then one must find Him through the truth as set out in the Scriptures. If one is to preach the Gospel, then one must preach Christ and the Christ of the Scriptures.

Gospel preaching is not a man who is standing up and speaking of frivolities and inane things, but Gospel preaching happens when a man has been gripped by the fact that what he is preaching is the very Word of God and that he is speaking forth the very words that God has spoken. Gospel preaching is not one man speaking to another, but instead and in a very real sense it is a man that is speaking forth the words of God to men.

The Christ that is declared in Gospel preaching is not just one that a man has come up with in his own brain, but He is the Christ that God has revealed through Holy Scripture but has also opened the mind of the man and has shone His light of glory into. Those who have been given ears to hear are hearing the words of God though they are spoken through a frail and sinful man, but they are also hearing with ears that have been given to them to hear the words of God spoken.

The Gospel that is declared by a man set apart by God is not one that he has discovered because of his own study and brilliant (or not) intellect, but it has been shone into His heart by God Himself. The Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Gospel of the glory of God and the Gospel of grace alone is not just a few words about a few historical facts, but the Gospel is the whole Christ put on display in His work that He has accomplished out of love for the Father, to the glory of God, and in the place of sinners. The Gospel cannot be watered down and made to be man-centered because it is no longer the Gospel at that point. The Gospel preacher must have the Gospel taught to him by the Spirit and it must be the burden of his heart. The Gospel preacher does not preach just because he is paid to do so and not because he is expected to do so, but the Gospel preacher has an inward drive and desire to make known the wonders and glories of God in the Gospel and by the Gospel.

The Gospel preacher has a burden concerning men and wanting them to look to Christ rather than his own preaching and his own wisdom. As long as men look to the preacher for wisdom or trust, then will not be looking to the power of God alone. But instead the Gospel preacher has a message from God and that message must be accompanied with a desire for men to look to Christ and not the preacher or his preaching. It is deadly to the souls of men and women to look to the preacher and his wisdom and powerful speaking or anything else. Men and women must look away from the preacher and pray to behold Christ. The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation and it is not in the power of the preacher to do anything but speak as God gives the words and heart.

Paul had weakness and fear and was trembling in and of himself, yet the Gospel he preached was a demonstration of the Spirit and of power. It was not a demonstration of his own power because he had none. Instead, we see Luther’s words agreeing with those of Paul. The preacher must preach the words of God. The best of Gospel preachers will see themselves as the worst of sinners and see what a privilege it is to preach the Gospel. The best of Gospel preachers will know that they can say nothing good or spiritual unless it comes from God first. The best of Gospel preachers will have no hope in themselves and not trust in themselves but clinging to the cross themselves they will preach Christ and Him crucified. The best Gospel preacher is the most broken and the most humbled.

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Gospel Preaching 25

May 17, 2015

I Corinthians 2:2 For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
3 I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, 4 and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

It is the devil, it is the world, it is our flesh that are raging and raving against us. Therefore, dear sirs and brethren, pastors and preachers, pray, read, study, be diligent. Truly, this evil, shameful time is not the season for being lazy, for sleeping and snoring. Use the gift that has been entrusted to you, and reveal the mystery of Christ. (Martin Luther)

I attended a church in a small town not far (30 miles or so) from where I live. The pastor of the church was not preaching and had an assistant “preach” for him. It was truly a sad occasion to watch the opposite of Gospel preaching take place. People gather at a church (in name or in reality) and Gospel preaching needs to happen.

There was quite a bit of historical background, but the vast majority of that was of no use in the “lecture.” If the historical background is not used to get at the intent of the text and then lead to or directly manifest Christ, it is really time wasted. While the historical background can be of use in certain ways, it can also be nothing more than a waste of time and certainly that was the case this morning. It was sad to see so much of the time for a sermon used up in information that had no direct relevance to the lecture.

Second, there were a lot of personal stories, but nothing of the biblical Christ. We heard a lot of things about people and how people are hurting and how people need to be helped, but there was nothing about how Christ alone can truly help people. We heard so much about physical problems and so on, but we did not hear of how Christ saves sinners nor did we hear of how it is Christ who works to make His people grow.

Third, the message was given with tears at times, but shedding tears is not the same as proclaiming Christ. There were several songs sang, and some of the songs were glorious in their proclamation of Christ and the blood of Christ. This is to say that the shedding of tears over things that came up in the lecture should have happened during the singing of such theological truths. The songs were full of Christ and the cross of Christ, but the “preaching” was empty of Christ and the cross of Christ. Preachers can feel things deeply and can be deeply moved at what they are saying, but apart from Christ they are not preaching Christ or in the case this morning there was no preaching at all.

Fourth, there was nothing of the nature of sin mentioned, though there might have been mentioned something about destructive behaviors. The problem of sin is so deep that even if a person modifies his or her behavior, they are modifying their behavior for sinful reasons. The real issue that needs to be addressed about sin is not particular sins, but of the sinful nature. People don’t need behavior modification, they need new hearts. But again, we were hearing stories and a few times something about destructive behavior. But we did not hear a thing about the sinful nature of human beings and of regeneration.

Fifth, the things that were mentioned were stressed apart from Christ. True, men need to be humbled. True, men must have faith in order to be saved. But there is no faith apart from Christ. Christ is the only proper object of true faith, so if one is stressing a false faith and does not speak of it as being focused on Christ, then it is false teaching on faith. Not only that, but faith and humility were spoken of as things that are in the power of man and that by attaining them man can get what he wants from God. It was also said that when bad things happen, if we will humble ourselves and have faith God will remove those bad things. In other words, if we will humble ourselves and come up with faith God will take away the bad things and good things will happen.

Nothing was said in this “sermon” about the sovereignty of God and how He uses “bad things” to break our hearts and make us content in all things. Nothing was said that had anything to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and His kingdom in His people. The old hymns speak much of Christ and the Gospel, but new preachers don’t even try to preach as well as the songs we sing. God has withdrawn His Spirit from the Church as seen by the lack of Gospel preaching. If there is no Gospel, there is no church.

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Christ Dying For Us

May 16, 2015

The Sum And Substance of Christ Dying For Us

Therefore, if when Christ died was the time this was to be done, and if Christ was ordained to do it, if Christ was mighty to save, if Christ took flesh to do this work, if it was the will of God that he should do it, if Christ came on purpose to do it, if our sins were laid upon Christ and He suffered the punishment the curse of them, if He has redeemed us, if it was prophesied of Him that He should justify many and that His work should prosper, if Christ did answer His types, if He has exceeded all the Priests and sacrifices under the Law; if there needs no more offerings for sin; if Christ has done all the Law required, if Christ has done what He came to do, if we are justified by His blood, if He has made us holy, and presented us without spot, if we are free from all sin, if Christ has done all that can be done to make us just and righteous, if Christ did wash away our sins in His own blood, if Christ has said, “It is finished;” then it’s done, it’s done, it’s done, perfectly and completely done. Then what I have said is fully proved namely, that Jesus Christ, by once offering, the sacrifice of Himself, when He was on the Cross, put an end to sin and so destroyed all the sins of His people for ever and presented them just, righteous, and holy, without spot, etc. before God, Col. 1:13,14,21; Col. 2:13,14.

Here Is A Fountain of Consolation
Oh, what a fountain of consolation here! What marrow and fatness is here. What sweetness if like to this, to all who believe? Who now may say, once sin was mine, then it was laid upon Christ and now they are neither mine nor His because they are not at all: For by His blood He washed them all away; and now they are all gone, blotted out, and shall be remembered no more, no more, no more. Now Christ’s righteousness is mine, as well as His, for I was “made the righteousness of God in him,” 2 Cor. 5:21. And I did nothing at all to procure these things to me.
The Appearance of Free Grace
In this appears free grace. Here is Christ, and Christ alone, and nothing but Christ. All things else pass away, because they are “under the Sun,” Eccl. 1:2. They are full of mutation and change. Faith may be obscured and the soul greatly deserted, so as to see no light, Isa. 50:11, yet when at the worst, they need not be comfortless, John 14:18, for still God is their God, and their lives are hid with Christ in God, Col. 3:3, “Who is the same today, yesterday, and for ever:” Heb. 13:5. We change oft, but he “never changeth,” Mal. 3:6. In this is our happiness, comfort, and glory. Even then when we cannot apprehend Him, yet were we in Him, Eph. 1:4. So we are, and ever shall be in Him and one with Him, and are comprehended of Him: 1 John 5:20. “Because I live,” saith Christ, “ye shall live also,” John 14:19. What Doctrine in Religion is more sweet and comfortable, more necessary or profitable, yea, or more honorable to the Lord Jesus Christ? This is that which holds forth the love of God, that sets the Crown upon His head, and will not give His glory to another, Isa. 42:8; Jer. 4:2. This will have Christ to be our life, Col. 3:4; peace, Eph. 1:14; glory, Isa. 45:25. This is that which thrusts us out of our selves, our life, our righteousness, Rom. 10:3; Tit. 3:5, to His, to live in Him, and caused us to say, “O Lord thou art our righteousness,” Ezra 9:15, “The Lord our righteousness”, which life is most sweet and serviceable because this is sure, and more spiritual. In a word, this makes Christ all in all, Col. 3:11, and exalts Him above all, which is His place, Psal. 89:19.
The Life Of Our Souls Is Christ In Us
Surely that which is the life of our souls, upon which the eternal happiness of our souls depends, is not in any thing in us, but is Christ in him, 2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Cor. 1:10. It lies in Him, so that it may be kept safe for us. So that we might not live upon any thing within us, faith is given that by it we may live out of our selves in another, even the Lord Jesus where our life is, Col. 3:3, 4.

Samuel Richardson

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