{"id":7288,"date":"2026-09-28T07:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T07:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/?p=7288"},"modified":"2026-09-28T07:15:00","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T07:15:00","slug":"bulletin-edition-september-2026-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/?p=7288","title":{"rendered":"Bulletin Edition September 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WHERE IS THE LAMB?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

     As Abraham walked up Mount Moriah with his son Isaac to offer him up as a burnt offering to God, Isaac did not yet know that was his father\u2019s intention.  He asked his father, \u201cBehold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?\u201d <\/em>That is a question that should be asked concerning every sermon that is preached:  Where is the Lamb?  I am not suggesting hearing in a critical way,  looking for certain words or phrases and condemning the sermon if they are not spoken. A sermon could be preached where the word \u201cLamb\u201d is never used and it could still be a great sermon because it is all founded on Christ crucified. If it is not, it is  a false message no matter how good it sounds.  I heard a preacher say, \u201cThere is no blood\u201d in the sermon on the mount, only \u201cFollow Me.<\/em>\u201d  The preacher was wrong!  Although the word \u201cblood\u201d was not used, it was the blood of Christ that was the foundation of it all!  With regard to every message I preach or hear, \u201cWhere is the Lamb?\u201d Todd Nibert<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

FEAR AND FAITH<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The fear of God and faith in Christ cannot be separated.  You cannot have one without the other.  The one is the evidence of the other.  Wherever there is true reverence and fear and awe of God, you are afraid to look anywhere but Christ alone!  When you look to Christ alone, it is because you have such an awe and fear of God in His holy Character, you are not looking anywhere else\u2026the true fear of God causes faith in Christ alone.  Faith in Christ alone comes from an understanding of the true character of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Todd Nibert<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We hold that a man is never so near grace as when he feels that he can do nothing at all but cry for mercy. But, when he says, \u201cI can pray, I can believe, I can do this or that,\u201d the marks of self-sufficiency are still on his brow.                        <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Henry Mahan <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGrace ceases to be grace unless it is totally and absolutely irrespective of anything and everything, whether good or bad in the objects of it.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Augustus Toplady<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before we can worship in peace of conscience and liberty of heart, we must know, on the authority of God\u2019s Word and by the power of God\u2019s Spirit, the entire question of sin has been forever settled by the blood of the Divine Sin offering. All of God\u2019s claims and all our necessities as ruined guilty sinners have been forever answered. This gives perfect peace; and in the enjoyment of this peace we worship God. Because we have a perfect sacrifice, we have a perfect conscience.                     Maurice Montgomery<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSovereign Grace Hated by the Modern Religionist<\/strong>\u201d
    By C H Spurgeon
If anything is hated bitterly, it is the out-and-out gospel of the
grace of God, especially if that hateful word “sovereignty” is
mentioned with it. Dare to say “He will have mercy on whom
he will have mercy, and he will have compassion on whom he
will have compassion” (Romans 9:15), and furious critics will
revile you without stint.

The modern religionist not only hates the doctrine of sovereign
grace, but he raves and rages at the mention of it. He would
sooner hear you blaspheme than preach election by the Father,
atonement by the Son, or regeneration by the Spirit.

If you want to see a man worked up till the Satanic is clearly
uppermost, let some of the new divines hear you preach a
free grace sermon. A gospel which is after men will be
welcomed by men; but it needs divine operation upon the
heart and mind to make a man willing to receive into his in
most soul this distasteful gospel of the grace of God. My
dear brethren, do not try to make it tasteful to carnal minds.

Hide not the offence of the cross, lest you make it of none effect.
The angles and corners of the gospel are its strength to pare them
off is to deprive it of power. Toning down is not the increase of
strength, but the death of it.

Learn, then, that if you take Christ out of Christianity,
Christianity is dead. If you remove grace out of the gospel,
the gospel is gone. If the people do not like the doctrine
of grace, give them all the more of it.

I preach the doctrines of grace because I believe them to be true;
because I see them in the Scriptures; because my experience endears
them to me; and because I see the holy result of them in believers.

The doctrine which I preach to you is that of the Puritans:
it is the doctrine of Calvin, the doctrine of Augustine,
the doctrine of Paul, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
The Author and Finisher of our faith himself taught the
most blessed truth which well agreed with our text-
“For by grace are ye saved through faith;
 and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.” Eph 2:8<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BLOOD!<\/strong>
(Octavius Winslow, “The Preciousness of Christ’s Blood”)
<\/em>
Among the precious things of God, there is not one so precious, so inestimable, so
influential, as “the precious blood of Christ.”

The atoning blood of Immanuel is the divine bath of the soul.
 
All salvation,
all purity,
all peace,
all holiness,
all hope,
all heaven, are bound up in the atoning blood of Immanuel.

There is no acceptance for the sinner,
no cleansing for the guilty,
no pardon for the penitent,
no sanctification for the believer,
but in the vicarious sacrifice of the Son of God.

A holy Saviour offered up a sinless atonement for
unholy, sinful man! Look at it, beloved, in this
light, and let your hearts glow with love, adoration,
and praise, as you kneel before the cross, and feel
the distilling upon your conscience of that blood
that pardons, covers, and cancels all your guilt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Precious Blood of Christ!<\/strong>
by Spurgeon-<\/em>

Standing at the foot of the cross, we see his hands, and feet,
and side, all distilling crimson streams of precious blood.

It is precious because of its “redeeming and atoning efficacy”.
By it the sins of Christ’s people are atoned for;
they are redeemed from under the law;
they are reconciled to God,
and made one with Him.

Christ’s blood is also precious in its “cleansing power”.
<\/strong>It “cleanses from all sin.”
“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.”
Through Jesus’ blood there is not a spot left upon any believer,
no wrinkle nor any such thing remains!

O precious blood, which makes us clean, removing the stains of
abundant iniquity, and permitting us to stand accepted in the
Beloved, notwithstanding the many ways in which we have
rebelled against our God!

The blood of Christ is likewise precious in its \u201cpreserving power”.<\/strong> We are safe from the destroying angel under the
sprinkled blood. Remember it is God’s seeing the blood
which is the true reason for our being spared.

Here is comfort for us when the eye of faith is dim,
for God’s eye is still the same.

The blood of Christ is precious also in its “sanctifying influence”.
<\/strong>The same blood which justifies by taking away sin,
does in its after-action, quicken the new nature and lead it
onward to subdue sin and to follow out the commands of God.

There is no motive for holiness so great as
that which streams from the veins of Jesus!

And precious, unspeakably precious, is this blood,
because “it has an overcoming power”.
<\/strong>It is written, “They overcame through the blood of the Lamb.”
How could they do otherwise?
He who fights with the precious blood of Jesus,
fights with a weapon which cannot know defeat.

The blood of Jesus! sin dies at its presence,
death ceases to be death,
and heaven’s gates are opened!

The blood of Jesus! we shall march on, conquering and to
conquer, so long as we can trust its power!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IT IS THE BLOOD THAT SAVES<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“And He said unto them, This is My blood of the new testament, shed for many.”–Mark 14:24<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Never did those lips, upon which grace shed its divinest, sweetest fragrance, utter words so precious as these. The language is figurative, but the truth is literal. “This is My blood,” <\/em>or, this cup is the ’emblem’ of “My blood of the new testament,” <\/em>the new covenant, “shed for many,” <\/em>for the sins of beings whom no man can number. We are thus brought into contact with the most essential and vital doctrine of the Bible, the great Atonement of the Son of God. <\/em>Beloved, the blood of Jesus is very precious to a poor, guilt-burdened sinner. It is the blood that saves him. <\/em><\/strong>There is everything you need in the blood of Jesus, forgiveness for every guilt-burdened, healing for every sin-wounded conscience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The blood of Jesus speaks peace, the blood brings us into the holiest, and places us in the very presence of the Father. It is the blood that keeps the heart pure, and supplies it with the most powerful motive to holiness. It is the blood that sustains the soul in death, and after death places it before the throne in robes washed white, with the “new song” breathing from its joyous lips. My soul, consider the blood of Jesus in two or three essential points of light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is the blood of the Incarnate God. Herein lies its intrinsic worth, its essential efficacy. The Deity of the Saviour gave it all its merit to atone, and all its virtue to cleanse. We marvel not that the apostle should denominate it, “the precious <\/em>blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish.” It is the most precious thing in the universe–it is the precious blood of Him whose person is precious to those who believe. Is it, my soul, precious to you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, then, remember that faith <\/em>alone is necessary to make its saving virtue ours. Believe only, and all the sovereign efficacy of Christ’s blood is ours. This “precious blood” and “precious faith” constitute the two most precious things in the universe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look at it, also, as applied <\/em>blood.<\/strong> We know that the blood of the paschal lamb would have availed nothing to the Israelites when the angel of death swept through the land to slay the first-born of the Egyptian, had it not been really and visibly sprinkled upon their dwellings<\/em>. It was the applied <\/em>blood that saved them. So must it be with the blood of Jesus, our Passover slain for us. If we want to be placed in a state of non-condemnation, if we desire to be quite sure that we are safe from eternal death, the blood of Jesus must be applied <\/em>to the conscience. Rest not short of this, my soul! Clearly this is the mind of the Spirit in those remarkable words of the apostle, “You are come <\/em>to the blood of sprinkling.” There is a present <\/em>coming to the blood of Jesus, and this gives us a present salvation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is the blood of Jesus that sanctifies.<\/em><\/strong> <\/em>It sets us apart as a holy people for God, it cleanses the heart from vain thoughts, worldly imaginations, and impure desires–from the taint and defilement of indwelling sin. Rest not short, then, of the applied <\/em>blood of Jesus. This will remove all your doubts, quell all your fears, and bring you into perfect peace. The Holy Spirit is prepared to take of the blood of the covenant, and sprinkle it upon your heart, and then all will be peace<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The blood will give you great power in prayer<\/em>. Coming to God with this plea, you may open all your heart to Him, confess every sin, disclose every sorrow, make known every need, and reveal, as in the light of the noontide sun, every secret cloistered there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a word, it is the blood of Jesus that SAVES, saves us from a present condemnation, and saves us to a future and eternal salvation. There is no salvation elsewhere. Here is pardon for the vilest sinner, for the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin. <\/em>Yes, dear Lord! it is Your blood, Your own blood, possessing all the dignity and virtue of Your Godhead, and this will be my song and my joy through eternity, “Unto Him who loved us, and washed us from our sins IN HIS OWN BLOOD, <\/em>and has made us kings and priests unto God and His Father–to Him be glory forever and ever. Amen.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take our sins to God!
<\/strong>
Spurgeon, “A Troubled Prayer” No. 741. Ps. 25:18<\/em>

We must take our sins to God!
<\/strong>
The Christian, when he sins, thinks that
he must fight this battle for himself,
wrestle with his own evil temper himself,
and he himself must enter into conflict
with his lusts and his besetting sins.

But when he comes into the fight, he
soon meets with a defeat, and then
he is ready to give it all up.

Take your sins to God, my brethren!

Take them to the cross that the blood
may fall upon them, to purge away their
guilt, and to take away their power.

Your sins must all be slain. There is only
one place where they can be slaughtered-
the altar where your Saviour died.

If you would flog your sins, flog them with
the whip that tore your Saviour’s shoulder.
If you would nail your sins fast, drive the
same nails through them which fastened
your Lord to the cross. I mean, let your
faith in the great Surety, and your love to
him who suffered so much for you, be the
power with which you do conflict with evil.

It is said of the saints in heaven, “They
overcame through the blood of the Lamb.”

That is how you must overcome.

Go to Jesus with your sins!
No one else can help you!
You are powerless without him!

The most sinful are welcome to Christ.
If your sin has become so outrageous
that it were wrong for me to mention it;
if it has become so tremendous in its power,
that, like the chain and ball at the convict’s
foot, you cannot escape from it, yet still
come with all your sins to Jesus!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WHERE IS THE LAMB?      As Abraham walked up Mount Moriah with his son Isaac to offer him up as a burnt offering to God, Isaac did not yet know that was his father\u2019s intention.  He asked his father, \u201cBehold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?\u201d That is a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7288","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bulletin-editions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7288","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7288"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7288\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7289,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7288\/revisions\/7289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}