Steve Camp’s Blog- Check it out

The Below articles are taken from Steve Camps’ blog Camp On This and I just HAD to put all three on. Some wonder why I blog, and such articles as those below answer that question. I don’t blog to build a reputation or seek the applause of men. Rather I blog because it keeps me sharp. It keeps me learning, it keeps me in the Word of God and it also allows me to gather resources that I will use in the future. My sole prayer is that God would use it for his own glory and that people will be blessed/brought/built up in their faith through it. I think the 3 articles below allow for the possibility of all 3.

ASSURANCE
…our joy and confidence in salvation wrought by the Lord Jesus Christ

The Gift of God’s Son, the Guarantee of All Other Blessing
He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? -Romans 8:32

He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all–how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? -Romans 8:32

Since God did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t God, who gave us Christ, also give us everything else? -Romans 8:32

“When God calls a sinner, He does not repent of it. God does not, as many friends do, love one day and hate another; or as princes, who make their subjects favorites and afterwards throw them into prison. This is the blessedness of a saint; his condition admits of no altercation. God’s call is founded upon His decree, and His decree is immutable. Acts of grace cannot be reversed. God blots out His people’s sins, but not their names.” -Thomas Watson

“If our religion be of our own getting or making, it will perish; and the sooner it goes, the better; but if our religion is a matter of God’s giving, we know that He shall never take back what He gives, and that, if He has commenced to work in us by His grace, He will never leave it unfinished.” – C.H. Spurgeon

“God commended his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” If, then, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, will he freely give us all things. “All things!” How comprehensive the grant! “According as his Divine power has given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness.” Holding the security in the hand of faith, you may repair to your Heavenly Father, and ask for all that you need. So to speak, God has bound himself to withhold no good thing from you. He is pledged, and from that pledge he will never recede, to grant you all you need. What is your demand? Is it the Spirit to seal, to sanctify, to comfort you? Then draw near and ask the gift. “For if you who are evil know how to give good things to your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” Is it pardon? Then ask it. He who provided the sacrifice for sin, will he not freely bestow the forgiveness of sin? Is it grace? Having given you the Reservoir of grace, is he not as willing and “able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work?” Is it comfort? Having given you the “Consolation of Israel,” will he not prove to you the “God of all comfort?” Is your necessity temporal? Are your circumstances adverse? Filled with forebodings of approaching difficulty, the cruse of oil and the barrel of meal dwindling, are you anxious and fearful? Take your temporal need to God. What! will he bestow the higher blessings of grace, and withhold the inferior ones of providence? Never! And can you press to your believing heart the priceless, precious, unspeakable gift of his Son, and yet cherish in that heart the gloomy, misgiving, thought of God’s unwillingness and inability to supply all your need?” – Octavius Winslow

“For non-reformed theologies…”at the end of the day, the security of the believer finally rests with the believer. For those in the opposite camp [Reformed], the security of the believer finally rests with God — and that, I suggest, rightly taught, draws the believer back to God himself, to trust in God, to a renewed faith that is of a piece with trusting him in the first place.” – D.A. Carson

From the “Hymnbook of Heaven”:
1 Samuel 2:9; Nehemiah 9:16-19; Psalm 31:23, 32:7,23,28-33, 38, 84:5-7, 89:30-33, 94:14, 97:10, 121:7, 125:1; Proverbs 2:8; Isaiah 40:30, 54:4-10; Jeremiah 32:38-42; Matthew 18:6, 12-14, 24:22-24; Luke 1:74, 22:32; John 3:36, 4:13, 5:24, 6:37-40, 51, 8:31, 10:4, 8, 27-29, 17:11, 15; Romans 6:1-4, 7:24-8:4, 28-39, 11:29, 14:14; 1 Corinthians 1:4-9, 3:15, 10:13; 2 Corinthians 1:22, 5:5; Ephesians 1:11-14, 4:30; Philippians 1:6; Colossians 3:1-4; 1 Thessalonians 5:23; 2 Thessalonians 3:3-5; 2 Timothy 1:12, 4:18; Hebrews 3:14, 7:25, 10:14, 36-39, 13:5; 1 Peter 1:3-5; 2 Peter 3:8; 1 John 2:19, 3:9, 5:4, 13, 18; Jude 1, 24.

It’s as almost as though Jesus was concerned lest some might foolishly fall into the trap of worshiping his blood relatives! Indeed, here is Jesus’ own condemnation of the error of adoration and veneration of Jesus’ mother. They do not hold a special place in the kingdom of God, but are like all those who do the will of God. Yet Catholicism, as can be seen from this event, continues to elevate Mary improperly to the status of, in effect, a goddess to whom prayers are offered.

Benedict XVI did not even omit to provide a sacrifice to this de facto goddess. It is reported that, “In a gesture of filial love, the Pope then offered the Madonna a golden rose.” One is reminded immediately of the similar offerings presented by the Philistines to the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament, particularly given Catholicism’s claim (or at least the claim of her apologists) that Mary is the “ark of the New Covenant.”

 

UNACCEPTABLE WORSHIP
…the delusion of engineered manipulation

“Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.” Jesus *said to her, “Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. “But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” -John 4:20-24

by A.W. Tozer

What Is Not Acceptable?
THE STARK, TRAGIC FACT IS THAT THE EFFORTS of many people to worship are unacceptable to God. Without an infusion of the Holy Spirit there can be no true worship. This is serious. It is hard for me to rest peacefully at night knowing that millions of cultured, religious people are merely carrying on church traditions and religious customs and they are not actually reaching God at all. (Whatever Happened to Worship?, p. 46)

The manner in which many moderns think about worship makes me uncomfortable. Can true worship be engineered and manipulated? Do you foresee with me the time to come when churches may call the pastor a “spiritual engineer?” (Whatever Happened to Worship?, p. 85)

You are not worshipping God as you should if you have departmentalized your life so that some areas worship and other parts do not worship. This can be a great delusion—that worship only happens in church or in the midst of a dangerous storm or in the presence of some unusual and sublime beauty of nature around us. I have been with some fellows who became very spiritual when they stood on the breathtaking curve of a steep mountain cliff! (Whatever Happened to Worship? p, 124)

It is impossible for any of us to worship God without the impartation of the Holy Spirit. It is the operation of the Spirit of God within us that enables us to worship God acceptably through that Person we call Jesus Christ, who is Himself God.

So worship originates with God and comes back to us and is reflected from us, as a mirror. God accepts no other kind of worship. (Whatever Happened to Worship?, pp. 44-45)

I can offer no worship wholly pleasing to God if I know that I am harboring elements in my life that are displeasing to Him. I cannot truly and joyfully worship God on Sunday and not worship Him on Monday. I cannot worship God with a glad song on Sunday and then knowingly displease Him in my business dealings on Monday and Tuesday.

I repeat my view of worship—no worship is wholly pleasing to God until there is nothing in me displeasing to God. (Whatever Happened to Worship? pp. 124-125)

Lessons from Cain
There are many kinds of worship that God cannot accept. Cain’s worship in the Old Testament was not accepted because he did not acknowledge the necessity of an atonement for sin in the relationship between God and fallen man. (Whatever Happened to Worship?, p. 40)

The kind of worship Cain offered to God has three basic and serious shortcomings:

First is the mistaken idea that God is a different kind of God than what He really is. This has to do with the person and the character of the sovereign and holy God. How can anyone ever worship God acceptably without knowing what kind of God He really is? Cain surely did not know the true character of God. Cain did not believe that the matter of man’s sin was eternally important to God.

Second is the mistake of thinking that man holds a relationship to God that in fact he does not. Cain casually assumed that he was deserving of acceptance by the Lord without an intermediary. He refused to accept the judgment of God that man had been alienated from his God by sin.

Third, Cain in the Old Testament record, and with him an unnumbered multitude of men and women since, have mistakenly assumed that sin is far less serious than it really is. The record is plain, if men and women would only look at it and consider it. God hates sin because He is a holy God. He knows that sin has filled the world with pain and sorrow, robbing us of our principle purpose and joy in life, the joy of worshipping our God!

The kind of worship offered by Cain is inadequate, without real meaning. Bringing it as an issue to our own day under the New Testament, I assure you that I would not knowingly spend an hour in any church that refuses to teach the necessity of the blood atonement for sin through the cross and the merits of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ! (Whatever Happened to Worship?, pp. 41-42)

Emptiness of the Average Church Service
It will be seen how empty and meaningless is the average church service today. All the means are in evidence; the one ominous weakness is the absence of the Spirit’s power. The form of godliness is there, and often the form is perfected till it is an aesthetic triumph. Music and poetry, art and oratory, symbolic vesture and solemn tones combine to charm the mind of the worshiper, but too often the supernatural afflatus is not there. The power from on high is neither known nor desired by pastor or people. This is nothing less than tragic, and all the more so because it falls within the field of religion where the eternal destinies of men are involved. (The Divine Conquest, [now titled The Pursuit of Man], p. 90)

The Whole Life Must Worship God
It is possible to worship God with our lips and not worship God with our lives. But I want to tell you that if your life doesn’t worship God, your lips don’t worship God either. (Sermon, “Doctrine of the Remnant,” Chicago, 1957)

The total life, the whole man and the whole woman, has got to worship God. Faith and love and obedience and loyalty and conduct and life—all of these are to worship God. If there is anything in you that doesn’t worship God, then there isn’t anything in you that does worship God very well. If you departmentalize your life and let certain parts of you worship God but other parts of you do not worship God, you are not worshipping God as you should. It is a great delusion that we easily fall into the idea that in church or in the presence of death or in the midst of sublimity that we are spiritual. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #6, Toronto, 1962)

There is Samaritan worship
Samaritan worship is heretical worship in the correct meaning of the term. A heretic is not a man who denies all of the truth, he’s just a very persnickety man who picks out what he likes and rejects the rest. Heresy means I take what I like and I reject what I don’t like. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #3, Toronto, 1962)

There is nature worship
It is the poetry of religion. It is the high enjoyment and the contemplation of the sublime. We have an awful lot of nature worshipers and worshipers of God through nature, which is a better way of saying it. It is a high enjoyment, a concentrating of the mind upon beauty as distinct from the eye and the ear. If your ear hears music, that’s beauty. If your eye sees beauty, that’s art. But if you think beautiful thoughts without music or art, that’s poetry and you write that down. Some people mistake rapt feeling for worship. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #3, Toronto, 1962)

Some mistake the music of religion for worship
Whatever elevates the mind and raises to near rapture the soul, that’s supposed to be worship. (The Chief End of Man, Sermon #3, Totonto, 1962)

Not all worship is acceptable with God. And there is a lot of worship in our cultured society that God will never receive in this world or the next. There is religious experience that God will never accept. There is the warm feeling of personal friendships with religious people. There is the sound of the organ and the beauty of the hymns. But apart from truth and the Holy Ghost there is no true worship. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #3, Toronto, 1962)

You cannot worship just as you please
This is one of the tricks of the devil and a very favorite pet of unconverted poets and unconverted people with a bump of sublimity on their head but without the new birth. They teach that we just worship God any way we want to worship God and all will be well. Authentic religious experience is altogether possible apart from redemption. It’s entirely possible to have authentic religious experience and not be a Christian and not be converted and be on our way to eternal hell. You remember that Cain had an experience—an authentic religious experience. He talked to God and God talked to him. It is possible to have an experience with God and yet not have a saving experience with God. It is possible to worship and yet not worship aright. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #3, Toronto, 1962)

Worship has to be in the Spirit and by the Spirit
The notion that just anybody can worship is all wrong. The notion that we can worship without the Spirit is all wrong. The notion that we can crowd the Spirit into a corner and ignore Him, quench Him, resist Him and yet worship God acceptably is a great heresy which we need to correct. Only the Holy Spirit knows how to worship God acceptably. (“The Chief End of Man,” Sermon #8, Toronto, 1962)

Worship Comes Before Work
It may be set down as an axiom that if we do not worship we cannot work acceptably. The Holy Spirit can work through a worshipping heart and through no other kind. We may go through the motions and delude ourselves by our religious activity, but we are setting ourselves up for a shocking disillusionment some day.

Without doubt the emphasis in Christian teaching today should be on worship. There is little danger that we shall become merely worshipers and neglect the practical implications of the gospel. No one can long worship God in spirit and in truth before the obligation to holy service becomes too strong to resist. Fellowship with God leads straight to obedience and good works. That is the divine order and it can never be reversed. (Born after Midnight, pp. 125-126)

Whatever keeps me from the Bible is my enemy, however harmless it may appear to be. Whatever engages my attention when I should be meditating on God and things eternal does injury to my soul. Let the cares of life crowd out the Scriptures from my mind and I have suffered loss where I can least afford it. Let me accept anything else instead of the Scriptures and I have been cheated and robbed to my eternal confusion. (That Incredible Christian, p. 82)

A Hard Message
If there is anything in me that does not worship God, then there is nothing in me that worships God perfectly! I do not say that God must have a perfection of worship or He will not accept any worship at all. I would not go so far; if I did, I would rule myself out. And we would all hang our harps on the willows and refuse to sing the songs of the Lord in a strange land. But, I do say that the ideal God sets before us is that we should worship as near to perfectly as we can. And that if there are areas in my being that are not harmonious and that do not worship God, then there’s no area in my being that worships God perfectly. (The Tozer Pulpit, Book 1, p. 55)

See to it that there isn’t a spot or an hour or a place or a time or a day or a location that isn’t consecrated and given over to God. You’ll be worshipping Him—and He’ll accept it! (The Tozer Pulpit, Book 1, p. 53)

 

The Three Stages of Grace

We’ve died once to the penalty of sin:

Titus 2:11 ¶ For the grace of God has appeared, with salvationa for all people,

Saved by grace.

All of man’s estate from birth hopelessly marred in the fathomless effects of sin. By nature we are all children of wrath, sons of disobedience, slaves to sin; with the only merits of our righteousness compared to the riches of dirty, filthy rags. From the moment of our conception in the womb– we are completely sinful. The wages of sin is death; all who sin die. That is why even infants die; they are sinful, sinners, and worthy of eternal perdition (Roms. 5:12-19).

What about infants who die; the mentally handicapped; or those who are ignorant of and have never heard the gospel? Are they given an exemption from the effects of sin, eternal judgment and punishment, and the righteous justice of a holy God? Are they somehow insulated from eternal wrath because of their age, mental capacity, and ignorance and that salvation is granted to them due to their “state of being” and not due to the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ?
Those that assert that all babies who die receive instant heaven, do so to sooth the aching hearts of grieving parents (which we all understand). But our hope beloved in the tragic death of an infant is not in the destiny of the child, but in the character of God. A baby’s perceived “innocence” affording them instant heaven is only an accommodation afforded by the sentimental whims of man. “In sin my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5). We are all sinners (including children) not because we commit acts of sin; but because we are sinful to the core of our being – by nature. There is not a God-sized hole within us that needs filling by divine intervention. Our entire being is corrupt–and it is the same for our children.

Someone’s age is not that which insulate one against God’s holy divine judgment anymore than someone’s mental cognation or ignorance from not hearing the good news of the gospel. Something are still a mystery to us beloved and we must leave them in the just hands of a righteous God. It would be wrong for any of us to be inflexibly dogmatic on the guaranteed eternal salvation of all infants, all who are mentally handicapped, and all those who die in the ignorance of never hearing the gospel. Those that do, IMHO, out of good motives, are promising false hope. And that promise is not up to us, but only up to God Himself.

We need to be born again. Paul leaves no doubt in the bankrupt abilities of man and the greatness of the grace of our God in salvation: “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9). “The grace of God has appeared bringing salvation…” and without grace, there is no hope of eternal life.

Grace is “hard” to live by; for grace robs man of his glory, of all boasting in his own abilities to be made acceptable to God, and dashes his religious pride to the ground. Grace strips us self-confidence, perfectionism, and our own goodness. Grace crushes our arrogance and exalts Christ; lifts holiness and dashes human morality

We die daily to the power of sin:

Titus 2:12 instructing us to deny godlessness and worldly lusts and to live in a sensible, righteous, and godly way in the present age,

Sanctified by grace.

No man through human effort can perfect himself. “Having begun in the Spirit are you trying to perfect yourself in the flesh?” (Gal. 3:3). It is a temptation for any of us once we have tasted of the fount of God’s grace in salvation, to then revert back to a life of works in our sanctification. Paul says here in Titus that grace is our teaching; “instructing us to deny…” We are new creations in Christ, but yet we are incarcerated in unredeemed flesh (Romans 7). The things we want to do, we don’t do; and the things we don’t want to do, we do. “O wretched man am I” Paul says in the midst of this struggle.

Sanctification does and must flow from genuine regeneration; but we must remember beloved, it is all of grace.

One day we will be free from the presence of sin:

Titus 2:13 while we wait for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Titus 2:14 He gave Himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to cleanse for Himself a special people, eager to do good works.

Glorified by grace.

Grace will see us through til the end. “Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.” (Jude 1: 24-25) 

A.W. Tozer- The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing

 “The way to deeper knowledge of God is through the lonely valleys of soul poverty and abnegation of all things……….The world said, ‘Abraham is rich,’ but the aged patriarch only smiled. He could not explain it, but he knew that he owned nothing, that his real treasures were inward and eternal. There can be no doubt that this possessive clinging to things is one of the most harmful habits in the life. Because it is so natural, it is rarely recognised for the evil that it is. But its outworkings are tragic.

     We are often hindered from giving up our treasures to the Lord out of fear for their safety. This is especially true when those treasures are loved relatives and friends. But we need have no such fears. Our Lord came not to destroy but to save. Everything is safe which we commit to Him, and nothing is really safe which is not so committed.

    Our gifts and talents should also be turned over to Him. They should be recognised for what they are, God’s loan to us, and should never be considered in any sense our own. We have no more right to claim credit for special abilities than for blue eyes or strong muscles. ‘For who makes you to differ from another? and what do you have that you did not already receive?’ (1 Cor 4:7)

    The Christian who is alive enough to know himself even slightly will recognise the symptoms of this possession malady, and will grieve to find them in his own heart. If the longing after God is strong enough within him, he will want to do something about the matter.

A.W. Tozer

The Islamisation of Europe

I recently received a copy of the Barnabus Fund magazine which keeps me up-to-date with the persecuted church. Within this edition there was an article on the Islamisation of Europe. I plan to add to this post in due course with more on what the article had to say, but for the meantime I thought I would post my second Voddie Baucham article for the day. So if you are a Voddie fan then aren’t you lucky! I was just browsing his blog and HAD to post this. I agree fully with what he says. I don’t know about you but I do not have an optimistic outlook for the future. I really do have a deep burden that a time of persecution is quickly drawing nearer for Christians in the West. As a British Citizen, I can only survey the increasingly antagonistic “hatred” for God and the Bible as one-step closer to the doors being opened for persecution. But it seems to me that many do not see this. Many Christians are going along in their daily lives without realising the perilous “wooden-plank” upon which the UK and Europe now treads. Voddie rightly states that the only way we can overcome this is by getting out onto the streets, into the workplace and proclaiming the gospel again. If we do not Islam is waiting in the wings and in only a few generations we may witness the Islamisation of Europe. The continued delapidation of Christianity (even if it is only Christian morals) in Europe, and more worryingly the UK and Ireland, is indeed a cause for concern. When will the church wake up and sound the alarm? Or has the battery stopped working and have we forgotten to change it? People are saved from a fire when the fire alarm works quickly. Likewise the Church must sound the alarm to Christians and seek the Lord in prayer for guidance in a state of humble repentance, beseeching Him to send genuine revival/reformation to these lands once more. May the Lord give us all some backbone to stand for His truth instead of cowering away from secular humanism.

As the United States continues to embrace the neo-Marxist, socialist concepts of Statism,  classism, secularism, anti-natalism, and “tolerance,” Europe is already reaping a bountiful harvest of the aforementioned crops.  In a recent speech delivered in New York, Geert Wilders issued a chilling clarion call.  In candor rarely seen on either side of the pond when addressing Islam, Wilders told his audience:

“I come to America with a mission. All is not well in the Old World. There is a tremendous danger looming, and it is very difficult to be optimistic. We might be in the final stages of the Islamization of Europe. This is not only a clear and present danger to the future of Europe itself; it is a threat to America and the sheer survival of the West. The danger I see looming is the scenario of America as the last man standing. The United States as the last bastion of Western civilization, facing an Islamic Europe. In a generation or two, the US will ask itself: who lost Europe? Patriots from around Europe risk their lives every day to prevent precisely this scenario form becoming a reality.” (Geert Wilders, chairman, “Party for Freedom,” the Netherlands. The Hudson Institute, September 25, 2008)

Ironically, most Americans think the War in Iraq and/or Afghanistan is the key battleground in the “War on Terror” (I have yet to hear anyone explain how you fight a war against a ‘concept’ using guns and bombs), the key battleground is the marketplace of ideas.  Specifically, cultural and religious ideas.  Islam cannot and will not be defeated on the battlefield.  Nor will government ever be able to stem the tide of Islamic Jihad.  The only answer is truth about  Islam and it’s Prophet, and the juxtaposition (and proclamation) of Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Wilders understands the need to present the truth about Islam.  In his speech, he made reference to the movie “Fitna.”  He noted:

I am a lawmaker, and not a movie-maker. But I felt I had the moral duty to educate about Islam. The duty to make clear that the Quran stands at the heart of what some people call terrorism, but is in reality jihad. I wanted to show that the problems of Islam are at the core of Islam, and do not belong to its fringes.

Amazing!  A lawmaker who felt morally obligated to explain religious truth as it relates to an impending cultural crisis.  We could learn something from this man.  Europe is dying because they have forsaken the gospel (and a biblical view of children).  They sought salvation in socialist policies and ended up destroying the very foundation of society.  Now men like Wilders are left to shout from the rooftops as they watch the inevitable play out before their eyes.

God has given us three indispensable and inter-related institutions: the church, the family, and civil government.  When we fail to uphold these three institutions by adherence to God’s word, there are always negative consequences.  In Europe, the family has failed (escalating divorce rates, plummeting birth rates, and the legalization of same-sex unions); the church is dying (less than 5% church attendance in most of Europe); and the government has seen Hitler’s socialist vision fully realized without as much as a shot being fired.  The time was ripe for an invasion; and that’s precisely what Europe is experiencing. 

By the way, here in America, the symptoms are almost exactly the same.  The family is failing (escalating divorce rates, plummeting birth rates, and the legalization of same-sex unions); the church is dying (195 million un-churched [#4 in the world], no county in the US has a greater churched population today than it did 10 years ago, the population grew 11.4% in the last decade, while church attendance declined 9.5%, and 85% of American churches are plateaued or declining); and the government has fully embraced socialist ideals.  Add to that mandatory government education (or socialist/secular humanist indoctrination), porous boarders, birthright citizenship and you’ve got a perfect storm brewing.

Voddie Baucham

TWENTY-THREE GREAT SINS OF EVANGELICALISM–Why We Must Pray For A Reformation Again.

TWENTY-THREE GREAT SINS OF EVANGELICALISM–Why We Must Pray For A Reformation Again.

Many Christians today are calling for revival. They are mistaken to do so. Revival is the imbuing of what already exists with new life. In the past, Evangelical Christianity has experienced renewed vigor from the Holy Spirit in great moves of God many call revivals. These are times, such as the Welsh Revival, when God, in a special work, in response to the need of the church and the prayers of the saints, breathes into the church and individual saints new spiritual power to live holy lives and to witness.What we need is a reformation much like the Protestant Reformation. God didn’t revive the Roman church. To make it stronger and more powerful would be to aid the kingdom of Satan because its doctrine was Satanic. God called a remnant out of the Roman church to return to biblical doctrine and practice. Thus, Historical Evangelicalism was born. Modern Evangelicalism is not the same. We have gone into sin and lost doctrines that are essential to make biblical faith possible and added others that make biblical faith impossible. We must not seek new vigor for Evangelicalism. We must change it or simply leave it to return to Historical Evangelicalism, that is, the faith once for all delivered.

May it please God, not to revive an old donkey, but to make us a lion again.

1. The Lost Doctrine of Regeneration.
If we aren’t changed, we aren’t saved. Jesus said that if we are His sheep, we will obey His commands and if we don’t, we aren’t His. John 10, Matthew 7:18.

2. The Lost Doctrine of Sanctification.
If we aren’t being made progressively more holy, we aren’t saved. Romans 8:28-29.

3. The Lost Doctrine of Personal Holiness.
If we aren’t radically different than those around us, we aren’t saved. Matthew 10:17 & 16:6; Luke 6:26; Ezekiel 36.

4. The Lost Doctrine of Corporate Holiness.
If our churches and institutions aren’t pure from false teaching, false teachers, and any who hold to false teaching, they are no longer Christian institutions. We must change them immediately or stop supporting them in any way whatsoever and leave them. Deuteronomy 12-13; I Corinthians 5:9-13; Revelation 2:6; 14-16, & 19-24.

5. The Lost Doctrine of the Glory of God.
If we seek our own glory or success, we are sinning. Philippians 1:12-18; Psalm 145. Matthew 23.

6. The Lost Fellowship of Suffering.
If we avoid embarrassment for being Christians, don’t worry. We aren‘t. Matthew 10: 32-33; Romans 10:9-10.

7. The Lost Leadership of Men.
If men don’t act like men again with courage and self-sacrifice, all is lost. Our fathers gave their lives for correct doctrine. Many of today’s pastors and leaders won’t risk being called “insensitive.” Men, let the ladies be sensitive. You be godly. And lead. And die. I Timothy 2:9-3:13.

8. The Lost Doctrine of the Sufficiency of Scripture.
If we read books other than the Scripture for Christian doctrine, we are blaspheming, calling God a fool or a liar. II Timothy 3:16-17. The only two proper uses of other religious works are 1) to illuminate Scripture by way of explanation or example by another more discerning or more familiar than we are, or 2) to research false teaching in order to expose the lie and expel the false teacher for the protection of those weak in the faith and for the preservation of the holiness of each of the saints and for the preservation the corporate holiness of the church, Christian school, or any other Christian institution. I Corinthians 5:9-13.

9. The Lost Doctrine of Truth over Relationship.
If we value anyone, even our families, over being right with God in practice and doctrine, we aren’t saved. This is a call back to holiness and sacrifice, not meanness. Read and take seriously what Moses and Jesus taught in the following references. You will see that following God under either the Old Covenant or the New Covenant meant that many would be separated from families, friends, and loved ones who will not accept the truth. Much false teaching and many other sins in the church are tolerated simply because one brother will not sever ties with another who has fallen. In other words, will you be willing to be divorced by your spouse because he or she will not tolerate God in the house? Pastors, will you jeopardize your career for the gospel? Many will not. This is a disgrace unfit for the kingdom of God. Choose you this day whom you will serve! Deuteronomy 13; Matthew 10:32-39.

10. The Idolatry of Love.
If we worship the god preached in most of Modern Evangelicalism, we are idolaters, because the god of most Evangelicals is only love. The God of Scripture is much more. I John 5:6; Deuteronomy 4:24, 5:9.

11. The Sin of Reproving the Reprover. (The New Phariseeism–Unbiblical Rules Against Telling The Truth.)
If we continue to adopt the unscriptural ethics of the idolaters of love, we will continue to be like the Pharisees of old, adding laws God has never given, and honoring human tradition over Scripture. In our zeal for the soft, the sentimental, and the mediocre, we hate the prophet and make artifical rules to silence him. Amos 5:10 & 14-15; Matthew 11:16-19; Amos 7:10-17.

12. The Idolatry of the Effeminate. (Worshipping the Uber-mommy.)
The American jesus isn’t the Jesus of Scripture. It’s a bizarre mix of god, goddess, man, and an uber-mommy unknown to Scripture. We have idolatrous pictures of this imaginary girlygod standing at a knobless door, unable to conquer the human heart that Yahweh, the true God, created. This contradicts both reason and Scripture. Exodus 20:4-6; Revelation 1-3; Nahum 3:13; Leviticus 19:17-18; II Timothy 2:1.

13. Self Idolatry.
If we continue to preach self-esteem, we deny Christ, Who taught us we are filth. Filth awaiting judgment. Roman 3:23, 6:23.

14. The Idol of the God Who Serves Me.
If we continue to seek earthly blessings from God, rather than self-denial, we continue to indulge our emotions and expect riches and health on Earth, while our souls die. Luke 22:19; I Corinthians 9:27.

15. The Lost Doctrine of the Value of Doctrine.
If we continue to deny the importance of strong biblical doctrine, we are self-contradictory fools, valuing the doctrine that says no doctrine is to be much valued. II Timothy 2:14-18.

16. The Lost Doctrine of the Powerlessness of the Church and Its People.
If we continue to speak as if God cannot act without our cooperation, we will remain idolaters, blaspheming the Sovereign Yahweh, and worshipping a domesticated god we control. Deuteronomy 11:25; John 6:44-65.

17. The Lost Doctrine of Redeeming the Time.
If we continue to spend time in secular entertainment, we will remain unfaithful servants, not evangelizing those for whom God has made each one of us responsible, all the while poisoning our souls with the humor of Satan, the mindset of this world, and the desires of the flesh. Ephesians 5:15-16.

18. The Lie of “Impacting the Culture.” (Whatever That Means.)
If we continue to engage in this and other nebulous doctrinal sophistries, we will go to our graves, not fulfilling the Great Commission, which calls us to the specific task of teaching individuals the Scripture. Culture is the world, and is to be shunned. Learn the customs of politeness and modesty. Avoid the contamination of the values of any human culture. Love not the world. Romans 12:1-2; I John 2:15-17.

19. The Lost Obedience to Witness. (Evangelicals Who Don‘t Evangelize Are Lying!)
If we continue to cower, and not witness, we disobey Christ’s last command on Earth and refuse to disciple anyone as Christ taught us to. All His students were required to witness almost from day one. How have we come to the point at which a man can be called a Christian who isn’t regularly witnessing? It is dishonest. It is disobedient. It is inexcusable. May God damn the preacher who says otherwise. The book of Jude; Ezekiel 33.

20. The Lie of Relevance.
If we continue to attempt to “make the gospel relevant”, we are apostates, leaving the original gospel, which God told us was plenty relevant since it, and only it, is the power to save from eternal wrath. Are we smarter than God? Romans 1:16.

21. The Lost Doctrine of God’s Hatred for the Wicked. (Lost to the people, hidden by the preachers.)
If we continue to speak and preach about the god who is only love and does not hate evil and the workers of evil, we are idolaters and lie to our hearers, damning even our own children to eternal hell unless they rebel against us and return to the God of Scripture Who is loving to the repentant and burning in His anger against the unrepentant. Psalm 5:5.

22. The Lost Doctrine of Repentance.
If we continue to preach belief without Christ’s call to repentance from all known sin, we have another gospel and will spend eternity in hell, with the blood of our followers on our hands. Jude 4; Matthew 4:17.

23. The Lost Doctrine of the Fear of God.
If we continue to tell people that God is to be respected and not feared and that He will not send anyone to hell, we are liars whom God will judge eternally in hell. Most of our preachers have lied to us on this issue. Because we insist upon a god who doesn’t scare anyone we either fail to speak of hell or tell the lie that our god doesn’t send anyone there. Scripture says otherwise. Revelation 14:9-11; Malachi 1:14; Hosea 3:5 , 11:10-11; Daniel 5:25-26; Jeremiah 2:19, 5:22-24, 10:7, 10:14; Isaiah 2:10-19, 33:6, 50:10, 57:11, 59:19, 64:1-2, 6:5; Jonah 1:8-16; Jude 4; Habakkuk 3:2-16; Matthew 10:28.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

Christian Preaching

Preach to Glorify God

The ultimate goal of Christian preaching—as with all other things—is the glory of the Triune God. When the minister proclaims God’s true and beautiful Word, he honors the Persons, attributes, and works of God. But the glory really radiates when the Spirit uses his Word to change lives. If someone is convicted, saved, comforted, inspired, redeemed by the preached Word, God was at work, showing himself to be good, sovereign, gracious, and altogether glorious.

Preach to Transform

In order to glorify God, preaching aims at complete redemption and renewal. The goal is to make the hearer better able to engage reality (God, self, others, world, culture, etc.) from a Biblical perspective. Every facet of every life is fair game—if a person thinks, feels, speaks or acts at all, then those ways of participating in God’s world ought to be made to serve God’s glory. Sometimes the transformation is dramatic, as when a person is convicted and converted. Sometimes the change is externally imperceptible, as when a person is reassured once again of God’s love. Always it should be so that the person loves God with his whole heart, soul, mind and strength better than he did when he first sat in the pew.

Preach against Unbelief

In order to transform people, preaching aims to increase their faith. The desired progression is from sin to holiness (sanctification), which requires faith. A person will only be changed through truly believing the Word of God. Whether Christian or not, all of us have the same problem: we do not believe the Word of God enough to let it shape our lives in every way. Therefore the preacher must target the unbelief in the hearer, and proclaim the Word as beacon that draws forth true faith from those in whom the Spirit works.

Preach the Gospel

In order to inspire faith, preaching must convey the Gospel. The Good News is that God is for us in Jesus Christ. Helping the hearer understand this goes well beyond a “simple” evangelistic message. The grace of God addresses us at every point in our lives: it establishes and strengthens our faith (and, therefore, obedience). Certainly, preach the Law as well—bad news often precedes the Good News. But the majestic goodness of God, displayed in the Gospel, must characterize our preaching week in and week out. This wins our faith.

Preach Christ from All the Scriptures

The person and work of Jesus Christ is the substance of the Gospel. The beginning, middle, and end of the Christian life must be informed by the redemption that is in Christ Jesus—all the Scriptures are helpful for this. Jesus himself made it very clear that he is the main subject of all the Scriptures. Paul set the tone for our preaching by saying, “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” Friends, a sermon is not Christian unless it is Christocentric.

Preach with Unction

“And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.” The anointing of the Spirit is necessary for true boldness in preaching. Apart from the Spirit’s empowerment, a preacher might muster some fervor, but he will lack authority, and might not even possess the courage to maintain God’s truth before sinners. The right proclamation of the Word requires holy unction, which comes by the grace of God through prayer.

Preach with Clarity

God himself has condescended tremendously to help us understand his will. Therefore, preachers have no right to dwell in theological obscurity in their pulpits, but are called to preach with clarity. If it is important that the Gospel be understood by all who hear, then preaching should be not only in the common language, but also concise, uncluttered, logical, and memorable. Preachers do well to improve upon these basics of clear communication as they seek to imitate the Fountainhead of all communication, the Word of God incarnate.

[Source: Theokosmos- Eric Costa]

Who Needs A Creed?…for those who think Creeds are useless (the “No Creed but Christ idea)

Who Needs A Creed?

Article by Mark Johnston  April 2008

When I was at Primary School in the British state school system many moons ago, it was still the norm not only to teach pupils the Apostles’ Creed, but also to have them recite it in class. Looking back on that experience brings many thoughts to mind.

On the one hand, it is almost incredible to think that a state education system could require all pupils to learn such an overtly Christian statement of faith by heart. It would be inconceivable today – as much because it meant learning something by heart as for the fact it happened to be Christian. But on the other hand, the act of standing and reciting the creed had something of the feel of the daily act of pledging allegiance to the flag must have for many American school children. The words rolled of our tongues, but with little or no understanding of their meaning, or true appreciation of their significance. My guess is that the same is true for many churches where the practice of reciting the creed is still in vogue today and that raises the question, ‘Who needs a creed?’

The answer to that question from many in the broad sweep of Christendom, would probably be, ‘Not us!’ Such ancient documents are seen at best as outdated and at worst an irrelevance in an age that is more interested in the present than the past and in which the very idea of beliefs that are fixed is tantamount to sacrilege. That may be the majority view – in a de facto, if not conscious sense – but that does not mean it is right. The church is always confessing its beliefs whether it realises it or not; the issue is whether or not they reflect belief that is authentically Christian. There is a perennial need for such views to be challenged, ultimately for the sake of the gospel.

That has come home to me more than ever in the congregation and community I serve on the edge of inner city London. Within the church there is an entire cross-section of people from all sorts of backgrounds. At one end of the spectrum there are those who are well-grounded in the Faith after years of teaching and study. At the other end are those who come along to Sunday services and mid-week groups who haven’t got the faintest clue of what Christianity is all about. And there is everything else in between! On top of that there is the local parish: a diverse community with all shades of religious belief and none at all. People generally are suspicious about church – especially a church that has the word ‘evangelical’ on its sign. So where does one begin to address such an array of needs? Let me suggest a number of ways the creed can help.

It Helps us Wrestle with the Challenge of Articulating the Faith
The very notion of ‘creed’ immediately suggests the idea of expressing belief. In the barest sense it is an expression of truth in abstraction: ‘This is what Christians believe…’ but historically there was more to it. The Latin verb credo from which ‘creed’ is derived carries a more personal and existential connotation. Hence several major creeds begin with the words ‘I believe in…’ – in the sense of placing confidence in, or relying on particular truths. The Apostles’ Creed spells out the truths a person must believe in if he or she is to be a Christian.

 Its history says a lot about its purpose. Even though legend had it that the original authors of this statement of faith were the twelve Apostles – each one contributing one of its twelve constituent parts – the reality is that it evolved from a number of earlier statements of faith. The main antecedent was the so-called Old Roman Creed; but that in turn seems to have been an evolution of two other documents: the Epistula Apostolorum and what has come to be known as Der Bazileh papyrus – probably part of an Egyptian communion liturgy. Each in their own historical setting was an attempt to articulate the faith crisply and clearly for seekers and catechumens.

Those who framed these various statements of faith were simply following the pattern found in Scripture itself. From the simplest article of faith found in the Great Shema – ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.’ (Dt 6.4) – right through to the Carmen Christi of Philippians, the Bible has multiple examples of its teachings being summarised and confessed. Its teaching has to be systemised if it is to make sense.

Martin Luther commends the Apostles’ Creed by saying, ‘Christian truth could not possibly be put into a shorter and clearer statement.’ Philip Schaff says, ‘As The Lord’s Prayer is the Prayer of prayers, the Decalogue the Law of laws, so the Apostles’ Creed is the Creed of creeds.’ The challenge it presents to the church in the 21st Century is to use it as a framework for expressing these time-honoured truths that are essential to Christian faith for the world of our day.

It Provides a Tool for Teaching the Faith
It has been said that the Apostles’ Creed was the Alpha course, or Christianity Explored course of its day. That isn’t far from the truth. Successive generations have come up with their own tools for presenting the main teachings of the Bible, but the Apostles’ Creed is the mother of them all. It sets the principle and provides a paradigm for what needs to be taught.

J.I. Packer’s book, I Want to be a Christian (1977), is a fairly recent example of how the Creed can continue to function in a contemporary church setting as an effective teaching tool today.  He uses it as a framework for exploring each tenet of faith it contains, in such a way as to lead young Christians to see the essence of what is meant, but at the same time providing pointers to those who want to dig deeper.

At an even simpler level, the simple practice of memorising the creed and reciting it publicly still has enormous merit – especially in an age when memorising anything is deemed passé. In the syllabus of what every child ought to learn by heart, the Apostles’ Creed must take its place alongside the Books of the Bible, Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer as one of its core components. And if adults haven’t got there yet, it’s never too late to start.

The creed is a wonderfully versatile tool for instruction. It has a use with children, seekers, new converts and those who realise that no matter how long we may have been in the faith, familiar truths always have fresh depths to be explored.

It Makes us Focus on the Heart of the Faith
There is always a temptation to get lost in the minutiae of what the Bible teaches – as is seen in all too many of the distractions and controversies of the New Testament Church and the church generally throughout its history.  Nowhere was that more damaging than in the church at Corinth and Paul’s response to their distractedness is timeless. He reminds them of what he had taught them in the first place: ‘What I received I passed on to you as of first importance…’ (1Co 15.3) – here are the core teachings that form the bedrock of the Christian Faith.

So as the Creed spells out the sum of saving knowledge for the early church, it takes us first and foremost to the God of the Bible in all his uniqueness and glory. His uniqueness lies in the fact that he is Trinity and his greatest glory is seen in the salvation he provides at such extraordinary cost through his own Son. Grasping this is the theological equivalent of finding the holy grail of science: the theory of everything.

In an age when evangelical Christianity is rapidly losing its way in a maze of ‘steps to salvation’ and myriad books and sermons on the ‘how to’ of the Christian life, the creed brings us back to the heart of both the gospel and the faith: God himself.

It Guards the Gospel against Distortions of the Faith
Historically, creeds have had a double function: to serve as both a fence and a foundation. They serve as the latter in that they crystallise the essence of all a person needs to know for life and salvation – that inevitably is more than just a ‘simple gospel’. In that sense they provide a foundation for the church, since the church is the community of the redeemed and is built on the teaching ‘of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone’ (Eph 2.20). The Apostles’ Creed encapsulates positively what the essence of that teaching is.

The sad reality of course is that the community of the redeemed has been plagued, not merely from without, but more often from within by distortions of that teaching. So creeds have been formulated to provide a fence to guard the church against such aberrations. It is noteworthy that the most insidious distortions of the faith that threatened the church in the early centuries of its existence concerned the doctrine of God himself – whether as Trinity, or in the mystery of the incarnation. It is understandable, therefore, that the Apostles’ Creed is particularly concerned to secure that fence, given the era in which it was framed.

It would be nice to think that almost twenty centuries later, the church no longer needs to go over these elementary teachings of the faith again; but it does. Whether through the assault of Open Theism or that of well-meaning ignorance, the truths enshrined in the Creed still need to be guarded and the Creed itself continues to be a most effective way to do so.

It Shows the Need for Personal Faith
Perhaps the greatest threat of all to the church and the teachings on which she stands in every generation is that of sliding into nominalism. Paul warns Timothy that the Last Days will be characterised by those (in the church) who have a ‘form of godliness’ but who deny its power (2Ti 3.5). He warns against them in the strongest possible terms.

It’s a danger that lurks most subtly in the Reformed community where we are inclined to lay great store on scholarship and precision. It can be paradise for the kind of people who Paul is warning about – especially those who delight in controversy.  The essence of Christianity that is authentically Reformed is its concern for authentic experience. The experiential Calvinism of the Reformation and Puritan eras was driven by the conviction that all truth leads to godliness. The study of theology can never be merely academic.
 
The first three words of the Creed embed that conviction at the very centre of the truths it goes on to confess. It is only as we declare our belief in this God and all that he has done that we can actually know him along with all the benefits he promises in the gospel. There is a piety reflected in the Creed that is the key to understanding its truths and making them live for the church and all its members. The piety of genuine personal faith.

 Mark Johnston is the Senior Minister of Grove Chapel in Camberwell, London.

R.C. Sproul- Quotes

“At the heart of Reformed Theology, at the heart of Luther and Calvin’s struggle, and in Knox and Jonathan Edwards, were men who were awakened to the greatness, to the majesty, to the holiness, and the sovereignty of God. By contemplating the holiness and sovereignty of God, they were driven to develop their doctrines of the grace of God. Because until you meet a God who is holy and is sovereign, you don’t know what grace means. I don’t think we are ever going to see a healthy evangelical church until the evangelical church is solidly Reformed, where it takes biblical Christianity seriously with a right concept of a sovereign God.

That’s because unreformed Christianity has failed in our culture. It has been pervasively antinomian (no law, no Lordship), and has been pervasively liberal in it’s trends and tendancies away from Scripture, because there’s been no real basis in the sovereignty of God.

Today’s evangelicals are never amazed by grace, because they don’t understand sovereignty. They don’t understand God. The evangelical church today is sick, more sick than it ever has been. We need a style and a variety of Christianity that is not a religion, but is a life and a worldview, where at the heart and foundational structure of it is a sound and deep biblical concept of the character of God.”

R.C. Sproul from “A Blueprint for Thinking”

A Phobia of Fearing God

Reformation Diaries

A Phobia of Fearing God

June 10 , 2008

by Bo White

The teacher in Ecclesiastes, after a tour of our material existence, writes, “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (Eccles. 12:13, ESV). Frankly, this doesn’t seem to be a common theme from pulpits around our country and it certainly isn’t the theme of the worship songs streaming on the contemporary Christian music scene. In fact, the whole idea of fearing God seems to be lost in many respects. The logic goes something like this: God is a loving God and Jesus tells us over and again to not be afraid and when we address God, we should say “Our Father in heaven” (Matt. 6:9). Therefore, let’s talk to God, draw near to God, and even invite God into our “family” meetings where the children of God gather to feel his presence. And while much of this is true, it’s only a half-truth. And half-truths are worth very little.

John Bunyan writes, “The presence of a king is dreadful to his subjects, even if he carries himself ever so condescendingly. If then there is so much glory and dread in the presence of a king, what fear and dread must there be in the presence of an eternal God!”[1] Kings invite their subjects into their presence; the subjects never invite the king. I was in a worship service recently where the pastor began with these words: “We invite you God to come and be here with us.” I couldn’t help but think that instead of proclaiming the beginning of worship, the pastor was actually proclaiming the end of it. Why would I kneel before someone I had the power to invite over to our little church building? What awe is there in a deity that needs an invitation?

The concern churches have of creating a community that is grace-centered and characterized by sincere love has lead to a God who is increasingly more familial than majestic. In a very real sense, we believers seem to be afraid to fear God. Now, I am phobic in my fear of snakes. I don’t like them; and so I run from them because inwardly I feel threatened, insecure, and simply do not want to find out if a specific snake is a friend or foe. There isn’t much logic to it, which is why it’s a phobia. It’s unreasonable for me, in many respects, to fear snakes, simply because most of them can do me no harm. I frankly don’t like them and oftentimes it’s for no good reason.

But God created all things by the power of his word. God sustains all things by his word. At the word of God, every living thing in the universe came into existence. The wind and the waves obey the words of Jesus (see Mark 4). Let the truth of the power of the word of God sink a moment into your mind and heart. You can scream your lungs out at a thunderstorm and that will affect absolutely nothing. But the still small voice of God can make it rain for forty days and forty nights. God is, in a word, awesome.

Bunyan puts it this way, “For if God shall come to you, indeed, and visit you with the forgiveness of sins, that visit will remove the guilt, but increase the sense of your filth—and the sense of this, that God has forgiven a filthy sinner, will make you both rejoice and tremble.”[2] Notice that Bunyan doesn’t leave us with an either/or option. When God forgives us through grace alone on the merit of Christ alone, we indeed rejoice and we also tremble. Jesus is both Son of God and King of Kings. By our union with Christ, we are both adopted children of God as well as servants of the Almighty King. We are not only sons who can rejoice in being near to God, nor are we simply servants who are subjects to a loving King. We are inseparably both sons and servants.

In Luke 15, the famous parable of the Lost Son ends with not only a royal banquet scene but with the prodigal understanding that he longs simply to serve in his loving Father’s house. The tension the follower of Christ lives with then is that through Jesus our sins have been eternally paid for and there is now no sacrifice needed. Jesus paid it all. Yet Jesus invites us to live in a kingdom, not the Democratic Republic of God. We are forgiven and free, but we have no vote. God alone is sovereign.

During the 1770s, lining the streets of Boston were signs that read: “We serve no sovereign here.” My concern is that these same signs unwittingly hang today in some church buildings because there is no awe, no willingness to bow a knee, and no authentic reverence or fear of God. We don’t want a sovereign God who can do whatever he ordains or pleases. We want a serving God who will do whatever we want. And this is revealed with our current obsession, as Christians, to be relevant.

Let’s be clear. Jesus is the exact representation of God (see Heb.1:3), so Jesus is a revelation. So many churches though plead for Jesus to be relevant more than a revelation. And in being relevant, the fear of God is gone. And when the fear of God is missing, then believers will turn to slick marketing, trendy music, and emotional highs rather than to the Jesus who can calm storms and walk out of his own grave. The longer the church strives to become relevant, the longer there is a phobia for fearing God, and the longer the wait will be for renewal and reformation. “You see, all true reformation and genuine spiritual renewal comes from Christ alone. True reformation is not worked up by human effort. The last church in the world to be visited by spiritual renewal will be the church which thinks it can produce it.”[3] After all, if God is sovereign, then he will initiate the movement of his Spirit, not the other way round.

So, yes, on the one hand, let’s draw near to God because “no one has sins forgiven, no one goes to heaven, no one has peace until there is faith in Jesus Christ.”[4] But, on the other hand, let’s be crystal clear: “No one comes to me [Jesus] unless the Father who sent me draws him” (John 6:44). The fact that God has drawn us near to him should leave us not only free of all chains with a peace that passes understanding, but also on our knees saying, “I know you love me. What’s next? I am at your service.

Bo White, a graduate of Covenant Theological Seminary, is a teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America. He currently attends New Valley Church in Phoenix, Arizona, and is chief messaging officer of Food for the Hungry, an international organization committed to a gospel-centered approach to ending poverty worldwide.

[1] John Bunyan, The Fear of God (Morgan, PA: reprinted by Soli Deo Gloria, 1999), 6.

[2] Bunyan, 9.

[3] Robert Reymond, The God Centered Preacher (Glasgow:  Christian Focus Publications, 2003), 185.

[4] R. Kent Hughes, Sought by Grace (Chicago: Moody, 2002), 78.

A Quick Look at the Doctrines of Grace

If anyone makes the assistance of grace depend on the humility or obedience of man and does not agree that it is a gift of grace itself that we are obedient and humble, he contradicts the Apostle who says, “What have you that you did not receive?” (1 Cor. 4:7), and, “But by the grace of God I am what I am” (1 Cor. 15:10). If anyone affirms that we can form any right opinion or make any right choice which relates to the salvation of eternal life, or that we can be saved by assent to the preaching of the gospel through our natural powers without the effectual work of the Holy Spirit, who makes all whom He calls gladly and willingly assent to and believe in the truth, he is led astray from the plain teaching of Scripture by exalting the natural ability of man, and does not understand the voice of God who says in the Gospel, “For apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5), and the word of the Apostle, “Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our competence is from God” (2 Cor. 3:5).
Adapted from The Council of Orange (529 AD)

That statement made by the Council of Orange is truly brilliant. It detracts all glory from man and gives it all to God. We, by our fallen proud nature, are naturally inclined to claim it was us who chose God. However a detailed study of scripture from Genesis to Revelation reveals quite the opposite. The question that one must ask his/herself is this; “Am I willing to submit to the Authority of a Holy and Sovereign God in the salvation and redemption of his people, giving all glory to Him for His gift of Faith by Grace through Christ and Christ alone?” My feeling is that we have Christians who refuse to accept and acknowledge this truth and as such this leads to strife, pride and rebellion against God’s Word and effectively God himself. God’s word is final and has full authority over and above man’s tradition or intellect. “The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.””
– Psalm 19:7,8

Check out the following links for a study regarding the Doctrines of Grace

The Cambridge Declaration (1996)
Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals – Embraces the “essential truths of Christianity as those were defined by the great ecumenical councils of the church” and the “solas” of the sixteenth century Protestant Reformation.

Doctrines of Grace – Categorized Scripture List
Nathan Pitchford

The Cause of God and Truth by John Gill
John Gill

Are There Two Wills in God?
John Piper – Divine Election and God’s Desire for All to Be Saved

The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination
Loraine Boettner

Introduction to the Reformed Faith
John M. Frame (.pdf)

By Grace Alone
Jim McClarty (pdf) – A study in the fundamental reformation doctrines, commonly called the Doctrines of Grace.

Why Can’t They See This?
Tom J. Nettles

The Sovereignty of God in Salvation
A.W. Pink

Series on the Doctrines of Grace
Charles Spurgeon

A Teacher’s Manual for the Study of the Doctrines of Grace
Roger L. Smalling (pdf)

Summary of the Sovereignty of God in Salvation
John Piper – The “Five Points” of Calvinism

The Doctrines of Grace
http://www.the-Highway.com – Helpful and Concise Explanation of the Five Points with Scripture

Solus Christus- A Brief Explanation

Solus Christus – Christ Alone

As evangelical faith becomes secularized, its interests have been blurred with those of the culture. The result is a loss of absolute values, permissive individualism, and a substitution of wholeness for holiness, recovery for repentance, intuition for truth, feeling for belief, chance for providence, and immediate gratification for enduring hope. Christ and his cross have moved from the center of our vision.

We reaffirm that our salvation is accomplished by the mediatorial work of the historical Christ alone. His sinless life and substitutionary atonement alone are sufficient for our regeneration, justification and reconciliation to the Father. We deny that the gospel is preached if Christ’s substitutionary work is not declared and faith in Christ and his work is not solicited…God’s grace in Christ is not merely necessary but is the sole efficient cause of salvation. We confess that human beings are born spiritually dead and are incapable even of cooperating with regenerating grace. We reaffirm that in salvation we are rescued from God’s wrath by Christ alone. It is the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit that unites us to Christ by releasing us from our bondage to sin and raising us from spiritual death to spiritual life in Him. We deny that salvation is in any sense a human work. Human methods, techniques or strategies by themselves cannot accomplish this transformation. Faith is not produced by our unregenerated human nature. – adapted from the Cambridge Declaration of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals

Reformation Essentials by Michael Horton

Preaching Christ Alone by Michael Horton

Solus Christus and the Pastor by Rod Rosenbladt

Christ vs. Moralism by John Hendryx

Jesus Christ Fount of Every Blessing by John Hendryx

Just One Name by Robert Reyburn

The Sufficiency of Christ Alone by John MacArthur

There is Salvation in No One Else by John Piper

The Only Way by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones – Ephesians 6:10, 11

Jesus said “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father except through Me (John 14:6)

Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12)

For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5)

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. (John 3:36 and 1 John 5:12)

Christ Alone by Ligon Duncan Acts 4:12 & John 1:29

There is No Other Name Under Heaven by Dr. Kim Riddlebarger (United Reformed Church)

Jesus, the Only Savior by Gregory Koukl

Is There More than One Way to God? by John Hendryx

In Christ Alone: Living the Gospel Centered Life by Sinclair B. Ferguson (recommended book)