Dec 25
4
The Warning
2 Peter 2:1
As there were many false prophets among the children of Israel in the Old Testament, so there shall be many false teachers rising up in the church of Christ until he comes again. Though they profess to be redeemed by Christ and claim to love him and trust him, though they seem to be most amiable and kind, the poison of asps is under their lips. Their doctrine is damning! Their doctrine is a denial of Christ, not of his coming, but of his accomplishments, not of his Being, but of his character, not of his death, or atonement by it, but of the efficacy of it! To deny Christ the Lord is not a mere denial of the title Lord, but a denial of his character as Lord, rightful Master and absolute Sovereign! “Beware of false prophets!”
Don Fortner
The Unstoppable Force of God’s Grace
Grace is not merely doctrine, but an unstoppable force of God. It is never without effect! We are chosen by grace with the undeniable effect that we are His. We are redeemed by grace with the certain effect that we are free. We are called by grace with the inescapable effect that we come to Him. We are preserved by grace with the inevitable effect that we shall be with Him forever.
Joe Terrell (1955-2024)
God hates high looks and never fails to bring them down. All the arrows of God are aimed at proud hearts. Are you glorying in your graces or in your talents? Are you glorying in riches and your increases of goods?
Know for sure that God is not impressed with you in yourself. He will pull these human flowers of self-deceit up by their roots. “He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”
Scott Richardson
The Gospel of God’s grace in Christ Jesus is not a thing to be proved, but Truth to be believed. It is not submitted to our reasoning powers as a subject for critical examination. But the Gospel is a MESSAGE FROM GOD, addressed to the conscience, feelings, and affections. For this reason, men fond of argument and proving everything by strictly logical deduction generally make VERY POOR PREACHERS. In Scriptures, God does not argue, HE PROCLAIMS!
J. C. Philpot
Lay before me a code of spiritual laws – and I shall break them; a string of rules – and I shall scatter them; a round of duties – and I shall evade them; directions for my daily walk – and I am sure to wander from them; point to the precepts – and they will prove me perverse time and time again. Men do not need rules to regulate their behaviour- they need grace to save,
Thomas Bradburry
“The gospel of
God’s grace.” Acts 20:24
(Don Fortner)
There is no grace but
free and sovereign grace.
There is no election but eternal and
unconditional election.
There is no redemption but particular and
effectual redemption.
There is no salvation but by the irresistible
grace
and omnipotent power of God the Holy Spirit.
There is no security but by the absolute
preservation
of God’s immutable goodness.
And any pretended gospel that does not proclaim
these things is, as Paul says, “another gospel’
that is damning to the souls of men.
In love
(Law, “Gleanings from the Book of Life”)
Behold the overflowing riches of the grace
and love of Jesus. Every page of the Gospel
story teaches the feelings of His heart.
In love He receives His people as
His own.
Before the world was framed, He inscribed
them on the tablets of His heart.
In love He undertakes their
cause, and
espouses them as His bride.
In love He works out for them a
righteousness so bright, so perfect, so
glorious, that Jehovah’s eye can find no
flaw, no spot, no blemish in it.
In love He beautifies them with
His
shining robe, and fits them for the
banquet in the heaven of heavens.
In love He guards them from every
foe,
and makes them more than conquerors
over all the hosts of darkness.
In love He makes all things to
work
together for their good.
In love He leads them to lie down
in the
rich pastures of Bible truth, and instructs
them in the Word which is “able to make
them wise unto salvation.”
In love He will come again to
receive
them to Himself.
In love He will present them pure
and
blameless to His Father with exceeding joy.
In love He will dwell among them
through
the ages of eternity!
The world is . . .
(by Horatius Bonar)
The
world is . . .
blind, and knows it not;
poor, and thinks itself rich;
foolish, and thinks itself wise.
It is not aware of the extent
of its
ruin, alienation, and depravity.
It is not alive to its danger,
its
hopeless prospects; nor its doom.
“If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” –John 15:19
If you walk in the fear of God, and follow in the footsteps of a persecuted and despised Jesus, the world will hate and despise you as it hated and despised him, as he himself declares, “If the world hates you, you know that it hated me before it hated you.” God himself has put enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent (Gen. 3:15); and nothing will secure you from the manifestation of this enmity if you are on Christ’s side. Neither rank, nor property, nor learning, nor education, nor amiability, nor the profusest deeds of liberality, nor the greatest uprightness of conduct, will stave off the scorn of men, if you are a sincere follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, and carry out in practice what you hold in principle.
If you are not conformed to Jesus here in his suffering image, you will most certainly not be conformed to Jesus hereafter in his glorified likeness. But if by living for and unto Jesus and his cross, your name be cast out as evil, wear it as your distinguishing badge, as adorning the breast of a Christian warrior. If men misrepresent your motives or actions, and seek to hunt you down with every calumny that the basest malignity can invent, do not heed it as long as you are innocent. They cannot find you a better or more honourable crown, if indeed your godly life provoke the cruel lie. It is a crown that your Master bore before you, when they crowned his head with thorns. If you feel as I have felt, you will at times count yourself even unworthy to suffer persecution for his name’s sake.
J.C.Philpot
Why
is it there is so much
error in the Church of God?
From Winslow’s, “Learning of Jesus”
The only authoritative Teacher in the Church of
God, the only true Prophet, is the Lord Jesus Christ.
Why is it there is so much darkness and crudeness
in the books we read, and in the sermons we hear?
Why is it that we see so much ignorance and
obscurity in setting forth the truth of God?
Why is it there is so much
error in the Church of God?
It is because men will not sit at the feet of
Jesus and learn of Him. Men would rather learn
of their fellow men than of the ‘God man’.
They prefer human writings to the Divine.
They prefer the school of man, to the school of God.
And this is one reason why there is so much
false doctrine, the teaching that causes to err,
both from the pulpit and from the press.
We may be carried away by great learning, brilliant
genius, and apparently profound piety; but if we
place ourselves at the feet of Jesus as a lowly
disciple, and there receive our views of truth, we
shall then understand those profound mysteries
of God’s revealed Word, which are hidden from
the worldly wise and prudent, but revealed to
those who become learners of Christ.
“Learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart:
and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” Matthew 9:29
Their
religion is hollow, unsubstantial, and unreal
(Winslow, “Christ’s Intercession for Tried Faith”)
The most beautiful ritual,
the most accurate creed,
the most costly religion,
the most splendid profession,
without Christ in the heart,
is but as fuel preparing for the
final and eternal conflagration.
What, my reader, if your religion
should prove to be nothing but chaff?
Does the bare probability startle you?
Ah! there are multitudes whom it might well
startle; for multitudes are thus deceived.
Not a grain of saving grace is found in their souls.
There is….
no vitality in their faith,
no solidity in their profession,
no substance in their religion.
Before every wind of false doctrine they bend, and
by each blast of temptation they are carried away.
The stubble of the field, and the chaff of the
threshing floor (fit emblems of their profession),
are not more unsubstantial and fleeting than it.
All is woeful deception!
They have substituted….
a form of godliness for its power;
union to the church for union to Christ;
the baptism of water for the regeneration of the Spirit;
gospel ordinances for sanctifying grace;
works of benevolence for faith in the Lord Jesus.
And thus their religion is hollow, unsubstantial, and
unreal; possessing a “name to live, they are dead.”
And what will be the end of such?
Departing into eternity in this state of soul deception;
building their hope of heaven upon this false foundation;
in their sad experience must be realised the awful
description which the evangelist gives of the judgment
power of Christ; “whose fan is in his hand, and he will
thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into his
barn; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable
fire.”
Thus will perish….
all human religions,
all false hopes,
all hollow professions,
all soul destroying doctrines;
the ‘wood, the hay, the stubble,’ of a
form of godliness, destitute of the power.
An honest scientist will admit that with every new discovery comes a multitude of new questions. So as knowledge increases the mystery of the universe deepens. The more we learn, the more we realise we don’t know. Is this not infinitely more true concerning our knowledge of God? Truly, he is past finding out. The more the Lord reveals of himself to us, the more unsearchable he becomes. “Scratching the surface“ does not begin to describe our knowledge of the Almighty. So that every child of God will say with David; “such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.“ Ps 139:6. Yes, we have words to define the precious truths we believe. Words like imputation, sovereignty, holiness, eternal, just to name a few. But what do these words really mean? “If any man think that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know.” 1 Cor. 8:2. Thank God for saving us through faith. Faith simply believes what it cannot begin to fully understand.
Greg Elmquist
The idea of a sinner working his way to Heaven or earning God’s favour is not only obnoxious to the Holiness of God and repugnant to His grace but is also a repudiation of the work of Jesus Christ and an insult to human intelligence!
Maurice Montgomery
How little we understand of God’s dealings with us! If we suffer the slightest set-back in this world’s goods or pleasures, we take it as a sign of God’s judgment and disfavour. If we prosper in this world, we believe
that it is evidence of God’s pleasure with us. But it is likely the opposite.
When God would visit a man with judgment aimed at his destruction, He withholds not the goods, but the spiritual ones; and the one He truly loves is often deprived of worldly goods so that he will more readily seek
spiritual goods. Which would you rather suffer, blindness of eyes or blindness of heart? Which would you rather have, riches in gold or riches in grace?
Then, let each of us learn to not judge God’s ETERNAL dealings with us by His TEMPORAL dealings with us. I know that this is hard to do; but it is the essence of living faith to judge, not by what is seen, but by what is not seen, to live by faith in God’s promises, not by sight.
Joe Terrell
God hates high looks and never fails to bring them down. All the arrows of God are aimed at proud hearts. Are you glorying in your graces or in your talents? Are you glorying in riches and your increases of goods?
Know for sure that God is not impressed with you in yourself. He will pull these human flowers of self-deceit up by their roots. “He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”
Scott Richardson
The Gospel of God’s grace in Christ Jesus is not a thing to be proved, but Truth to be believed. It is not submitted to our reasoning powers as a subject for critical examination. But the Gospel is a MESSAGE FROM GOD, addressed to the conscience, feelings, and affections. For this reason, men fond of argument and proving everything by strictly logical deduction generally make VERY POOR PREACHERS. In Scriptures, God does not argue, HE PROCLAIMS!
J. C. Philpot
Lay before me a code of spiritual laws-and I shall break them; a string of rules-and I shall scatter them; a round of duties – and I shall evade them; directions for my daily walk – and I am sure to wander from them; point to the precepts – and they will prove me perverse time and time again. Men do not need rules to regulate their behaviour – they need grace to save,
Thomas Bradbury