Theology You Can Use - The Existence Of God

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Well, we are going through Sunday night services discussing this issue. Is theology practical?
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In what ways might theology assist us? In other words, does theology drive your methodology?
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And does that drive then your doxology? That is to say, what you believe about God determines what you do and determines the depth of your praise to Him.
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We've been talking about this issue of Scripture, particularly through Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology, but tonight we move to something different, and that is chapter 9 of Grudem's book called
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The Existence of God. Now on Sunday mornings, you know I ask questions and they're rhetorical. I don't expect answers, but on Sunday night, you can go ahead and answer those out if you like.
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I have a question for you, congregation, tonight. How can you know that God exists? How would you try to prove to someone that God exists?
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Or, in fact, would you do that? Luke? He's created something, okay?
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Good? Haley? The Bible? Okay. Any other non -Avendroths that would like to contribute?
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Yes? Human body, okay. It's intricate and complex.
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Fine. Yes, Pat? Order, intelligent design.
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Okay, good. Anyone else?
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Wesley? The Bible class said so? Okay. Well, I think everybody has said truthful things, but that's really what
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I'm getting at tonight, is we're not going to necessarily have to prove the existence of God because creation proves it.
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God himself has actually proved it. Do we have any atheists here tonight? Do we have any agnostics here tonight?
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Nobody at least will admit it. We usually have some really hyper kid who wants to raise his hand to every question, but did not for that.
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How do we know that God exists? I would say to you, if you'll turn your Bibles to Romans chapter one, that God exists and he proves his existence by creation and by conscience.
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And so I don't want us as a church to spend a lot of time trying to prove God. We are dealing with people whose minds have been blinded by Satan through 2
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Corinthians chapter four, verse four, and we do not have to spend time proving the existence of God.
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And I will try to do everything in my power tonight to try to encourage you not to do that even though you'll want to.
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When you meet an unbelieving friend and you sit down and you talk about issues of life and you have a real desire for them to have forgiveness of sins, to have the hope of heaven, to have faith in Christ Jesus alone,
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I don't want you to spend a lot of your time trying to prove A, that the Bible's true, or B, that God exists because in their heart of hearts they believe
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God exists. Do you think that's true? I feel like I'm preaching to the choir, but I'm in fact preaching to the congregation, who should be a choir.
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By the way, we need a choir. So if you'd like to be in the choir, or you'd like to direct the choir, you can talk to me afterwards.
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John Blanchard wrote a book recently, and does anybody remember the book, probably two years old, besides Pastor Steve?
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Does God believe in atheists? Does God believe in atheists?
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Atheism basically means theism, the belief in God, and you put an A in front of it, an alpha, call that an alpha privative, and it takes the word and negates it.
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So if you have the word typical, and you put an A in front of typical, it becomes what? No longer typical, but atypical.
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And so people who are theists, and you have an A in front of them, they are atheists, and they believe that there's no
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God, but I believe the Bible teaches clearly, and we'll see right now in Romans 1, that there are no such thing as atheists.
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Take a look at Romans 1, verse 18, and we will show you the evidence both from Scripture, Haley, you were right, and by creation,
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Luke, in fact, you were right, that there is a God, and that He exists. And then we'll look at 1
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Corinthians 1 as well. God's righteousness has been revealed in verses 16 and 17 of chapter 1, and now something else is revealed, and that is
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God's wrath. God's wrath is revealed in verse 18, it says, from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, men that don't act godly and don't act righteously, and these men, certainly women are included, suppress the truth in unrighteousness.
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Suppression means to prevent, to try to stop, to try to make ineffective.
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It means to prevent something, and people try to take something that they believe, their own sin, well, let's back up for a second, true or false?
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Unbelief is a moral problem. If you don't believe the gospel, there's a moral issue, really, with you, is that true?
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Does that affect the way we evangelize at all, by the way? So glad you're paying attention, pal.
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What happens when you want to sin, if you're an unbeliever, but the Bible is telling you that you can't?
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What do you end up doing to the character and nature of God or the character of the Bible? What do you create in your own minds?
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A new truth, and you just say, well, let me slice off God's wrath. The one thing that really gets people is
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God's immutability. Why? Because it'd be one thing if God was holy almost all the time, but just once in a while, we would appreciate if he's not that holy, and so the immutability, that God does not change, we kind of hope that's not really true, because once in a while, we hope he's not omnipresent, and he's not omniscient, and he's not all holy.
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And so people take the truth of God as unbelievers, and they say, we have to reject that.
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God certainly is not a God of wrath, and holiness, and justice, and righteousness. He's just a God of love, and they kind of denude
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God, and they just cut away some of his attributes, so they can get a God that is more pleasing in their own eyes, that will allow them to do the things that they do.
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That is to say, this God that they create in their minds will allow them to say, for the most part,
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I'm good, but there's sometimes I'm not good. This God that they create in their own minds is an imaginary God that says to them, you know, compared to your next -door neighbor, you're pretty religious, you're pretty good.
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And they take the truth of God, holy, all -seeing, omnipotent, omnipresent, and they say, we've got to hold that under.
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We've got to suppress that in what we do, because we can't take it. Why do
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I believe everyone believes in God? They might not have saving faith, but they know there's a God, verse 19,
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Romans chapter one, because that which is known about God is, it's hidden, right?
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That's what the text says. It is evident within them, not only by creation, but by conscience, for God made it evident to them.
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Man has been given the truth. What is knowable about God, they know. It shows up inside of them, in their inner sense, their conscience.
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And externally, verse 24, since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes,
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His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without what, excuse.
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And Charles Hodge, the theologian, said, quote, the knowledge of God does not mean simply a knowledge that there is a
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God, but as appears from what follows, a knowledge of His nature and attributes,
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His eternal power and Godhead and His justice. Did you get that? People just don't say, well,
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I believe in God, but they know about a God who's powerful, who creates and who's just.
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Why would you try to prove to people that there's a God like that, when God has already made that evident?
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I don't know if you're like me, but whenever I'm on the airplane, I think if I am notified by the pilot that we're going to crash within one minute, what would
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I say to someone next to me? Would I stand up and preach the gospel to everyone? What actually would I say for the first minute?
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If I had 60 seconds to preach, what portion of those 60 seconds do you think I should begin to explain to them why there's really an existence of God, why
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God really exists? How much time would I spend on that?
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I don't need to. I don't need to spend any time. You believe in God, but you don't like the
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God that's in the Bible, so you have to create a different kind of God. You don't worship some kind of little idol found in the middle of India somewhere.
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What's the education God again? Pardon me? Yeah, Saraswati.
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You don't worship that kind of God, but you take a God who you've manufactured in your own mind that doesn't have his wrath and his holiness and his righteousness and everything else.
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The problem with unbelief is not a mental problem. It is a moral problem, and when people act like this, what does
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God do when people act this way? What does he do to them, unbelievers? Sometimes God judges sin with what?
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You say swiftness, with equity. We would go for those, but let's push it a little bit.
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Sometimes God judges sin by more sin.
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How about that? God sometimes judges sin by letting people have more sin, isn't that odd?
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That's strange. These are the kind of people it happens to.
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If you read in verse 21 of Romans 1, for even though they knew God, again, it is not intimate saving knowledge, but they know about his power and attributes and other things in verse 20.
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They did not honor him as God. Even a God who has power should be honored and thanked, and they became futile in their speculations and their foolish heart was darkened, professing to be wise.
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They became fools and did something that's so amazing.
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They began to worship bugs and scorpions and other things, scarab beetles. They exchanged the glory of the incorruptible
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God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and of four -footed animals and crawling creatures.
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They have this great God, but he's holy, he's just, he's righteous, he's transcendent.
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We can't have a God like that because he reigns on our parade, so let's make a new God. And that new little
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God is a little spider. He's a little scarab. He's some kind of little bug.
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If that's not sin, I don't know what else is. Maybe let's worship a bird. How about that? What kind of bird do you like to worship?
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Maybe a pheasant, quail, pigeon. We shoot those. We don't worship them.
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God's wrath is revealed from heaven against unrighteousness. And when people want to sin, sometimes
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God said, you like sin, okay, I'll give you more sin. I'll take my restraint off of you.
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And that's exactly what you find in verse 24 and following. God's wrath of abandonment.
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He gives people over. Hey, there's no God. I don't want to do it. It's obvious that he's here, but I'm not going to worship him.
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And so God is going to permit these nations to go their own ways, according to Acts chapter 14.
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And here he gives them over three times. You know the passage. Therefore, God gave them over in their lust of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them.
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He gave them up like a court official. It's a judicial term.
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Hand them over. When I went to do court duty on Wednesday, I was fascinated by it all. And I kind of wanted a big crime case because it would be interesting.
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Not that I want crime to be committed, but in fact, if it already has and you need a judge. When they said, could you be in a partial juror,
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I thought to myself, I'm not impartial about anything. I put kind of Bible teaching pastor, hoping
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I'd get kicked out, but that didn't work either. But the case I got had nothing to do with crime.
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It had nothing to do with anything fascinating. It had to do with somebody backing out of a Dunkin Donuts parking lot and hit somebody in the drive -thru.
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The good news, it only lasted until one o 'clock, and then I was free to do what I'd like to do for three more years.
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If, in fact, it would have been a crime case and the judge receiving the verdict from the foreperson of the jury, he would have said guilty, and then he would have, at that time or another time, read the sentence.
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And then he would have said to the court officer, the one standing there with the gun, take that person and give them over to the policeman at the jail.
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That's this kind of term. MacArthur said, this is a judicial term in Greek used for lording over a prisoner to his sentence.
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When men consistently abandon God, he will abandon them. It's just like Judges chapter 10, yet you have forsaken me,
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God said, and served other gods. Therefore, I will deliver you no more. Go and cry out to the gods which you have chosen.
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Let them deliver you in the time of your distress. God says, okay, you want to act like there's no
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God, I'll hand you over to sexual impurity. Uncleanness, the word is in verse 24, decaying matter, grave material.
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God often punishes sin by abandoning people to sin other sins.
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Let them alone. Listen to this quote from someone about the
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United States of America and ask yourself, is God judging us?
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We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have been preserved the many years in peace and prosperity.
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We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten
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God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined in the deceitfulness of our hearts that all these blessings were to be produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own.
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Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self -sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace.
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Too proud to pray to God that made us. It behooves us then to humble ourselves before the offended power,
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God, to confess our national sins and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.
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April 30th, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln.
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This is the way you want it? Okay. Hosea chapter 4, verse 17, a verse that will send shockwaves through your heart.
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Ephraim is joined to idols, and God said, let him alone.
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These are the kind of people that God did that to. Look at verse 25. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever.
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Amen. They deny God exists. They deny God is over them.
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They deny that God should be worshipped and honored and loved. They deny that then the love of God should manifest itself in love for neighbor.
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For this reason, God, there it is again. Judicial abandonment gave them over to degrading passions.
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You know society is bad when women go because they usually hold everything together. They're the last to be affected, people say, by moral collapse.
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For this reason, God gave them over to degrading passions for their women. It's Paul saying, even the women did this.
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They exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural. The same way also men abandon the natural function of the woman and burn in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own person the due penalty of their error.
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And then the last giving over is found in verse 28, and just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer,
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God gave them over to a mind that was broken. He gave them over to a depraved mind, a disapproved mind, to do things which are not proper.
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God, we want you not in our minds. God said, well then you don't need your mind anymore.
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And then all the things that they do. If you'd like to know what people do today, I don't even know if Jerry Springer's on anymore.
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I hope not. But this is a good illustration right here of Jerry Springer, verse 29, 30, and 31.
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Verse 32, isn't it interesting with this kind of wraparound? And though they know the ordinance of God, atheists know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death.
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They not only do the same, but give hearty approval to those who practice them. There's at least somebody worse than me, so I'm going to heaven.
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Now beloved, if you've got to prove the existence of God, don't waste your time. What would you say instead of, you know, these are the reasons why there's a
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God. What should you say instead? Anyone? There is a
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God. You know there's a God. Repent. Okay, good. You guys all look like this tonight.
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When Paul was set before the leaders in Rome, what did he say? What was his three -pronged message?
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He talked about sin. He talked about judgment to come. He talked about righteousness, straight to the point.
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Everyone believes in God. There are no atheists in foxholes. There are no atheists on their deathbeds.
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And there are no atheists in the entire world. That's why the traditional proofs that God exists,
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I'm trying to encourage you as a pastor, don't waste your time doing those. The cosmological argument, everything has a cause.
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Well, how did this happen? Back up. How did that happen? Back up. How did that happen? Back up.
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And if you back up far enough, there's got to be a God. I think that's a waste of time. The teleological argument, the argument from design.
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It's interesting. It's good for Christians to understand, but it's not going to change someone's nature so that they now love righteousness and hate sin.
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Wayne Grudem said, If valid proof for God means able to compel agreement even from those who begin with false assumptions, then, of course, none of the proofs is valid because not one of them is able to compel agreement from everyone who considers them.
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Turn to 1 Corinthians 1, verse 18 and following. You'll spend the rest of time here. Only God can overcome the sin of unbelief and only
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God can persuade and convict and to make unbelievers believe. Do you believe that?
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If you believe it, then it should affect what you do. That's the whole series. If you believe only
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God can save, then you have to do only God -ordained methods to get them saved. That is prayer, evangelism, proclamation.
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If you turn into this whole kind of evidence is the demand of verdict for unbelievers, you're going to run into trouble and you are denying what you say you believe.
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You say, well, I'm going to just give them... Do you know that the Bible contains over 300... Let's just figure out a way to evangelize.
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Let's just make one up. Steve probably did this on the apologetics thing better than I can, but here we go.
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I used to go to Gold's Gym in North Hollywood. We live right down the street and we would go there. It was the most fascinating place.
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I look over there and there's Denzel Washington asking me for a spot. And I thought, when he can't bench anymore,
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I'm going to push down kind of hard and say, you think you're a Hollywood star, huh? No, I didn't do that.
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Because that was in the day when American Gladiator was out. Remember that show? They had these contestants and regular people come off the street and they're kind of going against the
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American Gladiators. I mean, these people had the biggest biceps, triceps, deltoids on these people.
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And you should have seen the guys. I mean, it was amazing. I'm not kidding. I just sometimes look at the girls on the bike next to me thinking, oh,
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I met this guy and I began to preach. And what I'd usually do is I'd have my little Greek cards there because I learned
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Greek at Gold's Gym. And they'd say, well, what are you doing? I'd try to lure them in a little bit. Studying Greek?
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Do the next set. What are you studying Greek for? The New Testament was written in Greek.
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Do another set. Why would you study the New Testament? I'm studying to be a pastor.
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Do another set. Why would you be studying
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Greek to learn the New Testament to be a pastor? Well, I want to tell people how they can have all their sins forgiven in Jesus Christ.
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Oh, Denzel? I began talking to this guy and he would come up with all these things and they were all these objections.
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And I would try. I had a good heart. And if you've done this, I commend you for your desire for wanting to honor
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God and to get people saved. But I'd say, well, you know, the Bible has 300 prophecies that speak of Jesus Christ.
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And you know the probability of one man fulfilling all those prophecies. It's like one to the billionth power of such and such.
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It's just unbelievable. Well, yeah, that's fine, but I still don't believe.
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That was kind of a big gun in my arsenal. Let's see, what else could I do? Do you know,
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I used to just be the worst sinner, reprobate, unbeliever, all these kind of things, and the power of God changed me and I'm the testimony of what
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God can do with just rubbish. You should believe in such a God. Oh, that's nice.
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Okay, let's see, what else do I have? When my daughter was born, little
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Maddie, she was born, came out of Kim, and I looked at Maddie and I just said to everybody really loudly, ain't evolution grand?
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Do you mean to tell me that the blood in a person, whether it's a baby or the mom or the dad, if it's this much more thick, the baby will die because the heart can't pump it, and if it's this much more thin, you'll bleed to death the first time you cut somebody?
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Come on, intelligent design, there's order. Didn't work.
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Okay, what am I going to do now? When all else fails, let me tell you about what the
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Bible says. And then I began to preach, because evangelism is not about argument.
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Evangelism is not about intellect. Evangelism is not about anything except the proclamation of the word of God because Romans chapter 10 says, faith comes from smooth talking.
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That must be the Phillips translation. Faith comes by argument, stacking up all the evidences.
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Evidence serve their place. And where do evidences serve their place well? And that is in the hearts of believers, yes?
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I'm glad for intelligent design. I'm glad that God could create. I'm glad for all that. I just got a book for the kids about creation and the bombardier beetle.
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And the bombardier beetle, when it's going to be eaten by some larger creature, can put some gases together in its abdomen and shoots out the gases at 212 degrees
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Fahrenheit and blows up and doesn't blow himself up. I mean, how long does it take for that to evolve?
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First time it doesn't work, bang, you're dead. Start over. First time, bang, you're dead. Third time, bang, you're dead.
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There's no missing bombardier link. Sometimes I can't believe what
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I say. I come on Sunday night sometimes just to hear what I'll say. Faith comes by hearing and hearing a message about Christ Jesus proclaimed.
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Apologetics that does not drive the Christian to proclaim the gospel in evangelism is simply an apology.
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Apologetics to confirm the Christian in their faith is wonderful.
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It's a good strengthening thing. Only God can overcome sin in the life of an unbeliever.
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And our only job is to pray for people that the Spirit would be pleased to open their eyes and to preach them the gospel.
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Now look at 1 Corinthians 1, verse 18. Paul has given some introductory remarks. And he jumps right in and says in verse 18, it's absolutely amazing.
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I wish seeker -sensitive churches would actually read this. And one thing
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I know about seeker -sensitive churches, they don't believe this because your theology affects your methodology, and if you don't do something,
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I know what your theology is or isn't. For the word of the cross is to those who are perishing, moronic, that's the
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Greek word. It's stupid. It's nonsensical. Can you imagine?
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Behold your King, the Messiah on a cross, bleeding. That's not pleasing to the unsaved.
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How do you slick that up? How do you market that? What celebrity spokesperson do you get to say, here's the
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King of the world on this cross? I wonder how the four
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Ps of marketing would work for that. Product, price, place, and promotion.
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One man said that one man dies on a piece of wood on a nondescript hill in a nondescript part of the world and thereby determines the destiny of every person who has ever lived seems stupid.
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And that's what unbelievers think. That's stupid. It doesn't please me.
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That's moronic. It's foolish. But to the believer, what does the believer do?
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The believer used to say, that is moronic, and now it's no longer moronic. It's unbelievable.
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To us that are being saved, it's the power of God. Jesus didn't die a martyr's death.
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He has the power of God to save people. The substitutionary atonement. Dying in our place, on our behalf, in our stead, or if it's contemptible to one, it's lovely to another.
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What the perishing say, that guy can't even save himself. The believer says, that is absolutely amazing that he would die for me.
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And verse 19 says it's written, quoting Isaiah 29, 14, I'll destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever.
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I will set aside. Where's the wise man, verse 20?
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Where's the scribe? Where's the debater of the age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? And what's the answer to that?
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Makes his point clear with these rhetorical questions. Where's the wise man? Where's the lover of philosophy?
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Where's the sophist? He's not around. Where's the scribe? Where's the intellectual scribe?
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Where's the disputer? God's made these foolish. How did God make foolish the wisdom of the world?
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Verse 21 answers that. For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know
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God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.
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God says your worldly wisdom, I reject because it doesn't recognize my wisdom. It doesn't make sense to an unbeliever.
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It's not supposed to. One man said, how do you package a product to sell it?
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This is like selling a seat that's too hard. It's like selling stale soda. It's like selling perfume that doesn't smell good.
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Their own wisdom, their own investigations of nature, they can't come up with it.
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But it's by the foolishness preaching. Verse 22, here's how people act.
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For indeed, Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom. Jesus said, by the way, I'm only giving you one sign.
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And what was that sign? By the way, we read the whole book this morning. Book of Jonah is the sign of Jonah.
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That was the only sign he was giving to these sign seekers. People were after miracles or evidence.
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Here's your sign. Plain, bland, white bread, crucified
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Messiah, religious or non -religious.
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How do you take the cross? And make it taste good. I don't know why my grandmother ever did this, but when
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I had a cough when I was a kid, it's the German side of my family. Like that matters, but just to give you more background.
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And whenever I had a cough, and in the morning I go to one grandparent's house, the next morning I go to another grandparent's house, as my mother worked for a mutual of Omaha at the time, and my father at the phone company.
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And her remedy for my cough was scotch. It'll solve a lot of problems.
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Crying kids, splinters in your finger. Here's some sour mash, son.
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Okay. But I didn't really like scotch when I was a kid. Don't care for it now either.
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So what grandma did, is she got a teaspoon of sugar, poured the scotch on the sugar.
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Open wide. Spoonful of sugar will help the medicine go down. There's no, to continue the analogy before I forget, there's no amount of sugar, or sweetener, or splenda, or whatever it is, to coat on the cross so it looks good, and it feels good, and it's right.
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The cross is basically this to the unbeliever, your whole life counts for not zero, but it's not anything but a big demerit.
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Everything about you, you've gone the wrong way. You're running that way when God says run that way, that's why
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God calls people to repent, but your life counts for nothing. Who wants to hear that?
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So what do we do to kind of sugar up the gospel? What do we do to kind of cut it?
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It's a little too dense, isn't it? We need to kind of, kind of dilute it a little bit. Make it beautiful, or endearing, or palatable, or attractive.
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Maybe we'll cut something off, maybe we'll add to something, but we've got to make it kind of nice. Paul doesn't do that at all.
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Woe to us if we don't preach the gospel. Look at verse 23. But even though this is true, the
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Jews want signs, the Greek wants wisdom, I'm not going to give you what you want, I'm going to give you what God has required of me to give you, but we preach the
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Messiah crucified. And I know to the Jews it's a stumbling block, and to the
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Jews it's foolishness. A crucified Messiah, isn't that a contradiction of terms?
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It's like a fish in government, you can't do that. He did not debate, he did not argue, he did not discuss, he did not analyze, he did not dispute, he didn't do anything except,
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I know you're not going to like it, it's like stubbing your toe, but here it is, here comes the gospel.
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And it's one thing if somebody's crucified, but this is the one who is crucified for sins.
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And it's a scandal. The word stumbling block there is scandalon, something that makes you fall, something that makes you trip, could be a little trip wire, you're infantry men and you trip on it, and everything explodes.
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To the Jews they're going to think this is horrible, it will exasperate them, it will irritate them.
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They had a derisional term for Jesus, and he was called, I won't pronounce it in Hebrew, but he was called the man that was hanged.
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You're going to preach to me the man that was hanged? Last time I checked, Deuteronomy 21 says, And if a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, you hang him on a tree.
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The criminal is crucified. He's cursed. Galatians 3 says,
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Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. Okay, everybody come and hear the gospel,
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Jews and Gentiles alike. And instead of tripping someone, let's use another analogy.
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You get a big stick, and you get the stick full of tar and dirt, and then you take that stick, and you poke it in their eye as hard as you can.
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Now for you little ones, that's figurative speech. I don't want you poking anybody's eyes.
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But when you preach the gospel, that's exactly what you're doing. A soft tender spot of your body like your eyes, and Paul said,
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I'm just preaching the cross, and they're not going to like it. If I said this, how would you respond?
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If you preach the gospel to an unbeliever, and they're not offended, true or false, either you didn't, no, one or the other,
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A or B. Either A, you didn't preach the gospel, or B, you did preach the gospel, and God is working on them and drawing them.
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When you preach the gospel, it's the offense. It trips people up. It's a dirty stick in their eye.
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Now maybe there are other options. They're so cold. They're so callous. They've heard it all before, and God has seared their conscience.
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There are other options. But for the sake of preaching, for the sake of hyperbole tonight, I'm trying to get you to know that when you preach the gospel to an unbeliever, it will offend them.
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Why are we surprised when it does? Galatians 5 .11,
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Brethren, if I preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been abolished.
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If you add something to the cross, well, you can contribute this, or you can do this. You can act this way, and it's
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Jesus and you together, arm in arm, like a bride and a groom coming down the aisle. I know Jesus is in the lead, and you follow, but if you get to do something, it's just not as offensive.
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We were playing basketball today out in the yard, just shooting around, and somebody said, Oh, that's not fair. And so my typical response is,
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Life's not fair. And here we have a God who favors some and passes over others.
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What kind of God is that? By the way, the word favor, what's the synonym for the word favor?
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Grace? God graces some. And by definition, the word grace,
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He doesn't grace others. We repel against grace because we want to do something.
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We want to contribute. We want to help. There's no spin control for the cross.
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It's all God, and God disposed favor on those
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He wills. Verse 24 says, But to those who are called, there it is, God calls them, effectual call, both
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Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Oh, the wisdom of God for the believer, that God could be just and loving at the same time.
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It's amazing. Verse 25, Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
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Is God really foolish and weak? Or is this a device of speech so we can understand it?
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There's no weakness of God. There's no foolishness of God. But in comparison, we want to be careful with the
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Gospel. We want to be faithful to preach what we have. Verse 26, Not only is the
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Gospel foolish, but God uses foolish vessels. For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise, according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble.
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If you were in Corinth and you heard this for the first time, this isn't going to sound good because you're kind of in the rarefied air and you're kind of a mucky -muck and a big shot.
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I'm glad it doesn't say there's not any wise. There are a few wise and mighty and noble, but not many.
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I came up with Crispus and Sethastenes. They were rulers of the synagogue in Acts 28.
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Gaius was a rich, hospitable man in Romans 16. Erastus, a chancellor of the city of Corinth.
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But there are not many of those kind of people. Not many articulate, gifted, wealthy, powerful sports stars.
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Why? Because you've got the foolish Gospel and you've got kind of foolish people preaching the Gospel, so everybody knows the power is of God.
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Have you ever said this? If only so -and -so would get saved, God could turn the world upside down.
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What if Madonna would get saved? Think how many more
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Christians there would be. Think if Kareem Abdul -Jabbar got saved.
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He'd change his name back to Luau Cinder and everybody in Los Angeles would repent. I want those people saved, don't you?
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But I think God can kind of get along without stars. I hope
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George Bush is a Christian. I believe him in his word. How much different is our country because we have a
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Christian president, a man who's born again? Lots of more people got saved. We look from human perspective, but God's got something upside down or right side up, verse 27.
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But God has chosen. It's with determination. It's with plan. It just didn't come out like this.
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This is the way He's always had it set up. He's chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise.
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God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong. God has chosen it this way.
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And then to really make the stick go deeper into the eye and the base things, the low born, the slaves.
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And only my two Indian brothers and their spouses could get the whole issue that if I translated it for an
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Indian, I would say, and God has chosen the lowest caste people of the world.
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He's chosen the despised ones. He's chosen the untouchables. God has chosen the things that are not.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, Pradeep. I read in Barnes' commentary this week, quote, when a man of rank among the
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Hindus speaks of the low caste persons of notorious profligates or of those whom he despises, he calls them
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Allah Thav Barkal. Is that right? It must be.
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They don't know. That is translated, those who are not. God uses the people who aren't.
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He goes on to say, the term does not refer to life or existence, but to equality or disposition and is applied to those who are vile and abominable in all things.
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Okay, Corinth. Okay, Corinthians. Okay, Jews. Okay, the wisdom class.
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Here's God. He's got a message that says, behold your Messiah, He's on a cross. Believe in Him because you're a sinner.
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And by the way, the people that proclaim that word to you are the lowest of the low of the low.
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And why does He do it? That He might nullify the things that are in verse 29.
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Almost kind of a condensed Jeremiah 9, 23 and 24 into one short pithy part of a sentence that no man should boast before God.
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It's not our message. It's not who we are. It's God's ultimate choice. It's not the class of people.
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Not rank. Not wealth. Not anything. And then verse 30. Aren't you glad? But by His doing.
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All by God's doing. Not you and God. Just by God's doing. We're passive in salvation. You are in Christ Jesus who became to us wisdom from God.
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The Son is wise. What He did is so wise because He can pay for the sins of all those who would ever believe and He also can take
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His righteousness and apply it to them at the same time. The better way to translate verse 30 is this.
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Who became to us wisdom from God? That is righteousness. Jesus is our righteousness. That is sanctification.
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He makes us holy. And that is redemption. We were slaves to sin and now we've been bought out of the marketplace by His blood.
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Therefore, as it stands written and always will stand written, let him who boasts, boast of the
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Lord. Psalm 115. Do you know the song? Not unto us, but unto thy name give glory for thy mercy and thy truth's sake.
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God, no matter what, makes sure that no one gets credit. He deliberately makes sure the vessels are empty, the proclaimers are empty, they contribute nothing.
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Different standards. And then Paul practiced what he preaches and then we need to wrap this up.
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Chapter 2, verse 1. Hey, when I came to you, here's what I did. You think I have two different messages?
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What I just told you I do. What you should do, I did. And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God.
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I didn't have a bunch of eloquence. I didn't try to capture you in such a way where you had to believe me because I was a good talker and I had verbal skills and kind of an acumen to do it properly.
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I used to be in sales and I try not to have my sales background come into play when
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I preach or when I talk to you in private because I don't want to manipulate you. But do I want to persuade you?
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Is persuasion good? Yes. But Paul said, you know,
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Paul's a smart man but he didn't have to depend on any of these philosophical arguments. And then you know the passage is so good.
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Paul said it's all about the cross. It has nothing to do with the preacher. For I determined, literally, I made a resolution.
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I made a resolution no matter what. Hope you make the same tonight to know nothing among you except evidences that demand a verdict.
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Except Jesus Christ, even Him crucified. You could translate it and Him crucified but probably better is even
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Him crucified. I preach to you a crucified Messiah. That's who I preach. Even a crucified
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Messiah. That is the resolution of every person in this room when they evangelize. That's the one you preach.
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It's anti -selling. Barnes said the preaching of the cross is the only kind of preaching that will be attended with success.
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Verse 3, And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. I am frail.
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I am insufficient. I am not adequate. I have to tell you that makes me feel good.
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I am nervous, shaky, stage fright but it's not about anybody else.
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It's about God. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom but in demonstration of the
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Spirit and power. Paul said I'm after what only the Spirit can produce.
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That your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men but on the power. So now how do you evangelize?
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How do you evangelize when someone says well, I don't believe in God. I don't believe that He exists.
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How can you prove God exists? I don't believe the Bible. Well, what would
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Paul say? I believe what Paul would preach a crucified
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Messiah to them anyway. This makes it so easy.
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So I'm not a good evangelist. Well, then let's just get the message straight. You've got a two -pronged message.
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You've got sin and you've got a Savior. That's all you need to know, right?
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I'm going to talk about sin, this particular person's sin, and I won't let up on their sin until they say
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I am a sinner and I have a desperate need and if I die in my sins, I'm going to hell. This is Romans 3, verse 19.
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You keep pressing them with loving the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength and loving their neighbor as themselves and they can't do it and when they say
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I give, uncle, I have no righteousness, I can't do it, I've fallen short, what am I going to do?
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Then you offer the Savior and you offer them a crucified Messiah.
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Now, was He raised from the dead? Yes. What if they say yeah, but I don't want to hear about that?
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Then what do you do? Eventually, you say well, I'm not going to throw pearls before swine but you gently, nicely smile and you say well, that's a really good question but the real issue is
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Jesus Christ and they say well, no, no, but you know, how could
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God allow all this suffering? If God's all loving, how could He have that happen? Well, that's a good question again but the real question is how could you even be alive to ask that question after you're such a sinner?
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And the good news is for sinners like you there's this great crucified Messiah that I want to proclaim to you.
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Well, you know, my grandparents they died and they died in a Roman Catholic system or a
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Greek Orthodox system or a Buddhist system or a New Age system or whatever other system you want Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons you just name the works righteousness system and so, what am
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I going to do? After you preach to them sin you preach to them the crucified Messiah because they're alive now and you want to tell them the truth
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It's the most loving thing you can do to tell people about sin and salvation but it's not mainly loving to them it's mainly loving to God I think my ministry was transformed when
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I realized that I don't mainly preach for you I preach for God if He's happy I mean,
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I want you to be happy I like being your pastor if you kick me out
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I can't imagine what you do to Steve Kevlar but we preach for God you evangelize for God and God says forget all these strategies and these are the kind of ABCs and you do all these different things and you try to get them in quick and you try to trick them and deceive them
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I've got this book in my office it says what you do is you have a New Testament in your back pocket you talk to somebody and right when the time is appropriate it says you whip out that New Testament and you've got your little mark right there this is a billfold by the way it's not a
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New Testament and you whip it out and then you kind of say see, read this and you put your arm up behind the guy and you kind of squeeze him a little bit to kind of give him some pressure and when you say we need to pray to God and you need to commit yourselves to Jesus you can kind of push down on the back of his shoulder to kind of make him forced to pray friends, we just preach the gospel you know some of the biggest crusades in all the world for evangelism have people planted in the seats who are already
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Christians and when the guy says if you'd like to come to the front to receive Jesus Christ that's all you have to do just come right up to the front and if you confess
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Jesus before men he'll confess you before the Father just come right on up and they have plants people who are
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Christians in there to try to grease the wheel a little bit no it's just you know, in marketing it might be good if they've got some new
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M &Ms with almonds in them and there's 50 different areas that you can put those little things in by the convenience store if you're a smart convenience store person you take about 10 of those out and put them behind the shelf because who wants to go try something new when nobody else has tried anything new so you take about 10 out and you walk up and you go wow, other people are trying these new things too
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I think I'm going to try them too that looks good but that's not the gospel the gospel is
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God, you have told me that if I love you I will obey you here is my love for you as I preach to them the crucified
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Messiah and in the meantime you will also be doing the most loving thing for them that you could ever do and that is with the time that you have forgetting archeology forgetting evidences forgetting changed lives forgetting intelligent design forgetting second law of thermodynamics you tell them here's the only savior of sinners and when they say no
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God is still glorified it is not your responsibility to save anyone because if you can save them
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Jesus didn't save them so to me this is freeing I know
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God says everyone believes in God and now I'm going to specify what they need to know about God in order to be saved alright our time is up this morning's sermon was on persecution tonight's sermon is on evangelism
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I wonder if the two go together go in peace, serve the Lord let's pray
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Father, we exalt your name tonight only you could come up with such a gospel and only you could save us through what we used to think was something stupid
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I personally used to think that this gospel was good but it was too restrictive I used to think,
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Father, that this was something nice but I didn't want it to make a claim on my life and Lord, I pray that you would rip asunder any false illusions tonight of someone thinking that they can believe you as savior but not take you as Lord because in fact you made your son both
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Lord and Savior and Father, we would ask that you would help us to preach Jesus Christ and repentance of sins just like the
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Great Commission in Luke 24 says and we would have just so much joy preaching the gospel that we could hardly contain ourselves because we would know that we have been faithful to you in Jesus name,