Jun 16
15
GOD’S GLORIOUS GOSPEL
The gospel of the glory of God in the salvation of sinners is the most wonderful, the most amazing, the most marvelous, and the most glorious “Good News” which ever fell upon human ear. It is in every way characteristic of its Author (God-like!) and suitable to the desperate need of spiritually dead sinners (John 5:21-27; Eph. 2:1; Rom. 5:12). It manifests the holiness and righteousness of God in justifying the unrighteous, the infinite love of God in saving the altogether unloveable, and the infinite power of God in creating life in those who are “dead in trespasses and in sins.”
This salvation is fully accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ for and in sinners. There is full! free! eternal! salvation for sinners in the Lord Jesus Christ. This salvation comes to sinners freely, by grace, through faith in Him. In the sovereign mercies and grace of God sinners hear the “Good News,” believe the “Good News,” and they have Christ and life. “He that hath the Son hath life.”
When food and drink is set before the hungry and thirsty, they eat and drink with relish and thanksgiving. When the Lord Jesus Christ, the all-sufficient Saviour is set before lost, guilty, condemned, hell-deserving, dying sinners, they embrace Him and live upon Him with thanksgiving.
Maurice Montgomery
THE MESSAGE OF OLD
Many religious organizations proudly advertise their services as “contemporary”. Their true message is, “we deal with topics that are relevant for today’s world.” These religious organizations unashamedly proclaim, “Tell us what you want, and that’s what you’ll get. We will meet your needs”. This tactic is nothing more than an attempt to be all things to all men in order that the masses might be drawn in. These congregations major on issues that are actually nothing more than current events. They sing songs that are designed to glorify the flesh with words that exalt man. Preaching the Gospel has been replaced with “share time” to fill the need for so-called “spiritual growth.” After all the necessary programs have been strategically laid out to meet the criteria of their supposed spiritual needs, these organizations then provide every sort of entertainment and bodily exercise humanly possible. With million dollar budgets, these religious “works-shops” do whatever is necessary to meet the bottom line. That Christ’s honor and truth are being disregarded; that men’s souls are being merchandised means nothing to them! Obviously, men have been left to their own fleshly desires and the blindness of their unregenerate heart.
In the church of the Lord Jesus, oh how different is the case. The issue is not some current event. The believer must hear the truth of Him who changes not. He is not satisfied unless he hears the message of the sovereign, ruling, reigning God who has everlastingly loved a particular people in Christ. The saint of God thrives on the message, the “psalms, hymns and spiritual songs” exalting their heavenly Father, the very God who has chosen a people in Christ “before the foundation of the world,” that they should be holy and without blame before Him in love. The believer subsists on the declaration of the beloved Son who, as the Surety of the sheep, has lived in righteousness before God’s law on behalf of all that the Father has given Him. Herald again the glorious message, which is without controversy — the message of God, manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory. The regenerate sinner needs to be told again and again how Christ put away his guilt by divinely being made to be sin for him. To the one who has been made to know something of his true need, the message of how the Lord Jesus Christ died under the wrath and judgment of God’s holy law for His sheep, that they might be made the righteousness of God in Him, never grows old. Rehearse again in the saint’s ears these eternal truths, truths that when received are rejoiced in as if they had never been heard before. Justification by Christ’s imputed righteousness, propitiation by His blood, and freedom from condemnation for those blessed ones found in Christ, that is the message that changes not, the message that is the life-sustenance of the renewed man.
Marvin Stalnaker
The love of the truth
“They didn’t receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.” 2 Thessalonians 2:10
There is a receiving of ‘the truth,’ and a receiving of ‘the love of the truth.’ These two things widely differ. To receive the truth will not necessarily save—for many who receive the truth, never receive ‘the love of the truth.’ Professors by thousands receive the truth into their judgment, and adopt the plan of salvation as their creed—but are neither saved nor sanctified thereby. But to receive ‘the love of the truth’ by Jesus being made sweet and precious to the soul, is to receive salvation itself. “Unto you therefore who believe He is precious.” 1 Peter 2:7 J.C.Philpot
BREAKING THE LAW TO KEEP THE LAW
Matthew 26:3-5 “Then assembled together the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people, unto the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and consulted that they might take Jesus by subtilty, and kill him. But they said, Not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar among the people.”
Here are the chief priests, the highest-ranking priests in the land — men who have more right to the ceremonies of God than anyone. Here are the scribes, men who were the most knowledgeable in the law –those that we, in our day, would call lawyers. Here are the elders of the people; those who knew firsthand the frailty of perishing flesh. Those who had broken the law time-and-time again, who by years of experience should have known beyond all the others the impossibility of fulfilling all that the law demands.
Nevertheless, this religious host is gathered at the chief priest’s palace for one purpose. In his own deceived heart each one came to the table in the name of God. Each one came as a son of Abraham. Each one came as a defender of the law of God. Each one came for the purpose of determining how they could take this man Jesus subtly and kill him. Yet, in doing so, they had no idea that they had purposed to kill Emanuel, God with us. They purposed to kill the seed of Abraham in whom all the nations would be blessed. In seeking to keep the law of God they would break the law of God Thou shalt not kill. And to further show the hypocrisy of their godless religion, they purposed to do this at a time other than the feast day so that their outward appearance would remain holy before the people.
These are the very acts of every religious law-worshipping person in our day. There is a crucifying of Christ again and again. The promise of God to Abraham is counted as worthless. There is a constant breaking of God’s law in an attempt to keep God’s law. And all is done in total hypocrisy while attempting to appear holy before men.
How utterly defiled is the thinking of the natural heart!
Clay Curtis
Galatians
If I had opportunity to address all the preachers, religious leaders, theologians, and religious people of this world at one time, who believe and teach that salvation is in any way, to any degree dependent upon or determined by the will or work of man, I would lay this solemn charge, this horrible indictment against them: ― You frustrate the grace of God and make the death of the Lord Jesus Christ an insignificant, meaningless, useless thing. That is precisely the charge Paul laid against those who taught such heresy in Galatia. Then, he declared, as spokesman for all who believe and preach the gospel of God’s free, sovereign, saving grace in Christ, “I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain” (Gal. 2:21). That is just how serious the book of Galatians is.
When Paul sat down to write this Epistle, he was clearly provoked and angry. This book was intended (intended by Paul and by God the Holy Spirit who inspired it) to be a deliberate, forceful confrontation. There are no friendly greetings, no gentle salutations, no kind, soothing reflections in this book. Everything in these six chapters is “in your face” confrontation.
To say the least, the apostle was a little hot under the collar. Why? What provoked Paul and stirred his anger? The Galatian churches, churches God raised up under the influence of Paul’s ministry among them, were being led away from Christ and his gospel by false teachers in their midst. These men, professing to be the servants of Christ, were slandering Paul, accusing him of being a false prophet, and denying the gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace in Christ. All the while they pretended to promote and defend it. They were trying to make Christianity a mere extension of Judaism, just as multitudes do today.
They did not openly deny that salvation is by the free grace of God in Christ. They did not openly state that Christ is not enough, that Christ is not sufficient, or even that works must be mixed with faith. The messengers of Satan are far too subtle for that. They were teaching salvation by grace through works; but they did not state it quite that way. The Galatian heretics taught that true faith is a faith that expresses itself in the observance of the Mosaic law and that any faith that did not express itself in law obedience was a false faith. These men and their heresy were being embraced by the Galatian churches.
Extract from Don Fortner.
It is a creature of many lives!
Man is a strange compound. A sinner, and
the worst of sinners, and yet a Pharisee!
A wretch, and the vilest of wretches, and
yet pluming himself on his good works!
Did not experience convince us to the contrary,
we would scarcely believe that a monster like man,
a creature, as someone has justly said, “half beast
and half devil,” should dream of pleasing God by his
obedience, or of climbing up to heaven by a ladder
of his own righteousness.
Pharisaism is firmly fixed in the human heart.
Deep is the root,
broad the stem,
wide the branches,
but poisonous the fruit,
of this gigantic tree, planted by pride
and unbelief in the soil of human nature.
Self-righteousness is not peculiar to only certain
individuals. It is interwoven with our very being.
It is the only religion that human nature . . .
understands,
relishes, or
admires.
Again and again must the heart be ploughed up,
and its corruptions laid bare, to keep down the
growth of this pharisaic spirit.
It is a creature of many lives! It is not one blow,
nor ten, nor a hundred that can kill it. Stunned it
may be for a while, but it revives again and again!
Pharisaism can live and thrive under any profession.
Calvinism or Arminianism is the same to it. It is not
the garb he wears, nor the mask he carries, that
constitutes the man.
J.C. Philpot.