The Beza Briefing - Faith (Part 2)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.

My name is Mike Abendroth. Glad to have you today with us on NoCoRadio Land. I hope you have learned over the years. I hope you�ve actually seen me grow in my theology. Sometimes the old reruns, I�m not sure if I�m going to like some of those.

But that�s okay. Right? There�s hope. If there�s hope for me, there�s hope for you. I�m trying to think what�s going on here in the future of No Compromise Radio. I think we�re going to record some more YouTube videos, haven�t done that for a while.

I really haven�t done much since I got sick back in September. So now let�s see. I�ve been on the mend October, November, December, January, and February. That�s five months. They said that I should be back to 90 in about another six months.

So I guess that�s a long recovery for bioterror weapons. It�s crazy. Anyway, God knows our days. And while we�re alive on No Compromise Radio, we�re going to try to tell you about the Lord Jesus. Hopefully I�m going to do some more stuff with American Gospel folks, Mr. Kimber there, and appreciate his ministry.

And what else? I think that�s it. I probably will be at the Shepherds� Conference. I have three kids in California. I�d like to go visit them. I don�t even know if I�ll go to one seminar, because I�d rather just catch up with some old friends and stuff like that.

So I think if this is going to play, I think this is going to play Wednesday, the day Shepherds Conference starts. So I hope to see you there. You walk five feet and you see another friend, and five feet and another friend, and half the fun is just sitting there talking and drinking coffee and, I don�t know, eating In-N-Out burgers.

But I don�t know. I don�t know. Do I dare go to a session? Will they let me into a session? I like, by the way, what�s happening at Master�s Seminary. As I have become covenantal in my thinking, that means I�m not dispensational.

But I love the hiring of Peter Sammons and Mike Riccardi at the seminary. Peter Sammons took over the Master�s Seminary journal two journals ago, I believe. So I think they�re like spring and fall. So he�s got two that he�s been the editor or the compiler.

And by far, above and beyond, better than the previous journals, with lots of people from FESCO. Maybe Barcelos was he, did he write an article, or Renahan, a bunch of people like that, writing articles, Act of Obedience of Christ, I think two issues ago.

Great stuff. I�ve heard that it�s not well-received by some students and some other professors. Maybe I�ll find more about that when I go to the Shepherd�s Conference. But I want them to do well. I, again, have certain things that I don�t agree with them anymore, but I think people like Peter Sammons and Mike Riccardi are the right kind of hires, and I hope they keep hiring them.

If they fire them, then you�ll know it�s the downgrade. But if they keep them and hire more people like them, I will say, �Wonderful. Glad. Happy to do that. My son Luke, speaking of seminaries, I think Luke will, this summer, begin to study at Westminster Seminary in Escondido.

So that will be fun for Luke. Luke lives in San Diego area, and he�s been working there for a while. You�ve heard Luke here on No Compromise Radio. I think Luke is a great preacher. I want him to learn some historical theology and exegesis in Greek and Hebrew and stuff like that, but he knows how to preach, and I told Scott Clarke, �Don�t mess up his preaching at the seminary.

So whatever degree he has my preaching skills, and I�m sure he�ll be a better preacher than I am. I just have more years under my belt so far. He�s got his mother, Kim�s, love for people, and so that�s a pretty good combination.

So I�m thankful for all four of my kids, son-in-law and wife. It�s been a great life. When I went to the doctor in August, before I got really sick, I went to go get my blood test. I�ve got some blood issues.

That�s probably why I got COVID so bad with the pre-existing condition. And she said, �How are you doing This was at Dana-Farber Cancer Hospital in Boston. I said, �I�m doing great. I have the greatest life.

I have a great wife and kids and ministry. I was riding the bike 150, 200 miles a week then, and probably tanned, and coming back from vacation. I said, �I just have the greatest life. I mean, it�s just great.

I mean, there are trials and things, of course, and blood issues and prostate cancer. Anyway, that�s still true. It�s just there�s been some trials, and it�s still true. It�s just been a great life.

Does not the Lord give us exceedingly abundantly beyond what we could ask or think, not only in this life and the riches that we find in Christ Jesus, but also in life to come? It�s been humbling the last five months, six months.

It�s been good. It�s been a growth time. It�s been, did I say humbling? I don�t have lung problems so much anymore. Once in a while, I�m out of breath, but not too much. I can shovel, push the snowblower around, ride a bicycle, but just long-term GI problems is not fun.

Colonoscopy this, endoscopy a week and a half ago, and now colonoscopy this Friday. It�s like, �Oh, somebody figure this out. I can tell you that I don�t have E. coli, that I don�t have C. diff, and that I don�t have salmonella, and that I don�t have celiac.

I can tell you those things. Please, do me a favor. We have some No Compromise listeners that are very, very kind, and they want to send me some herbs, not herb like Peter Tosh herb, Bob Marley herb, but they want to send me some herb remedies or, you know, it�s take this instead, take the slippery elm.

Why would it be called that? It should be called clogging elm. Take the apple pectin. You know, there�s all these kind of things that people want to give me. Just pray for me. That�d be good. You don�t have to send me, you know, if I do the colonic cleanse, and I do this, that, and the other.

I�m just, just, thank you, but no thanks. I�ve just said to half my listeners, �Hey, stop that. Oh, well. Well, today on No Compromise Radio, we�re talking a little bit about Theodore Beza. We are back to Beza.

The Holy Spirit Uses the Means of Grace to Create and Strengthen Faith

The Beza Briefing, The Christian Faith by Theodore Beza, a man who took over for John Calvin, wrote a great little systematic theology, 100 pages or so, 110 pages, and I�ve just been reading it, making comments, and I said to Scott Clarke, �I�ll try to do better and I didn�t say that.

He�s very encouraging. Theodore Beza, The Christian Faith, 4 .4. This is the Holy Spirit section, and last time we looked a little bit about faith, which I thought was super interesting. Here it says, �The means by which the Holy Spirit uses to create and preserve faith in us.

So, it�s interesting that he has the faith section underneath the Holy Spirit, and now how the Holy Spirit uses, what he uses, the means that he uses to create and preserve faith in us. Now, even there, right away, oh, faith, yes, is a gift, and faith is a command.

So, we are telling people to believe, and we know that there�s no possible way they can unless Ephesians 2, Acts 14, Philippians 1 .29, that this gift has been given. Beza, �In order to create in us this instrument of faith right, it�s not a ground of our salvation, not the cause of our salvation, but here the instrument, �how we receive God�s work, the triune God�s work.

Also, I was going to say, you know, the Father sent the Son, the Son did the work, obeyed the law, died for our sins, was raised from the dead, the Spirit of God applies that to our life. I was going to say something about inseparable operations, but let me just keep going.

�Also, to feed and strengthen it more and more, the Holy Spirit uses two ordinary means without however communicating to them his power by working by them. The preaching of the Word of God and his sacraments, Matthew 28, Acts 6, 10, 10th chapter of Romans, James 1, 1 Peter 1.

And how does God feed and strengthen faith? And I�ve said this before, in the days of COVID and people not showing up for church, it is unsustainable for you to live a Christian life that is growing and maturing and doing well apart from the means of grace, apart from the Lord�s Day worship, where the preaching is a message about the Lord Jesus and the sacraments, baptism, and the Lord�s Supper.

I know some people are too sick and they can�t come, they�re 95 years old and can�t walk. Okay, I understand that. Further on, we will return to this. In the first place, we shall define what this so precious faith is and what are its effects and powers.

4. 5. How faith is necessary and what faith is. We are at this point such enemies of our salvation because of our natural corruption, Romans 8, 1 Corinthians 2, that if God had merely contented himself to tell us that we should find our salvation in Christ Jesus, �Hey, hey, I�ve already read this.

This is so not right. I thought, �Hey, haven�t we already done this We have. I have a wrong note here. So here�s what this means, No Compromise radio listeners. I don�t have time to start over today because I have a doctor�s appointment, but the Lord God wanted you to hear this again from me.

It was a rerun on a Thursday. Well, at least I didn�t read all of 4 .5, all of 4 .6, and I�m here, supposed to be at 4 .7, �We�re justified by faith alone. I have a note in my book that says, �Start here.

What would that mean? Oh, I�m so sorry. But we speak thus with the apostle, and we say that faith alone, by faith alone we are justified, insomuch as it embraces him who justifies us. Jesus Christ, to whom it unites and joins us.

We are then made partakers of him and all the benefits which he possesses. These being imputed and gifted to us are more than sufficient to make us acquitted and accounted righteous before God. And I think I said last time, I�m such an idiot, I think I said last time that these systematic theologies, these treatments of God and his Word, they�re devotional.

They warm my heart. When I get Christ� righteousness imputed to my account, it�s enough, it�s more than sufficient to make us acquitted and accounted righteous before God. Same with you. Now we go to 4 .8.

Oh, this is bad. This is what, you know, this 13 years of professional radio will get you that. But you get what you pay for now, right? 4 .8. �To be assured of one�s salvation through faith in Christ Jesus is not at all arrogance or presumption.

4 .8. Okay, well, I�m glad you stayed tuned, even through my faux pas. This is important, right? Baize is writing, he understands what�s going on in history, and the Roman Catholics are going to call assurance of salvation presumption of sin, that you could presume somehow that you know for certain that you�re going to go to heaven when you die.

You can�t know for certain. By the way, that elicits a lot of work, a lot of payments, a lot of indulgences, a lot of prayers from the dead, etc., but it�s the bad route to go. Oh, you say, �Well, the Rome teaches it.

Some can know. Mary, she knew. And like the thief on the cross, he knew, and Paul knew. But all of us, we don�t know. Let�s see what Baize said on page 16, the Christian faith, Holy Spirit. �It is established that to be assured of one�s salvation through faith is not only neither presumptuous nor arrogance, but, on the contrary, is the sole means of stripping oneself of all pride, to give all glory to God.

Romans 8, Ephesians 3, Hebrews 10, 1 John 4, Romans 3, Romans 4, 1 Corinthians 4, 1 Corinthians 9. �Because faith alone teaches us to go out of ourselves okay, that�s important, �there is nothing but cause for complete damnation.

Thus, it sends us away to Jesus Christ. And it teaches us and assures us that we shall find salvation before God through His righteousness alone. �Truly, all that is in Jesus Christ, that is to say, all the righteousness and perfection in Him there was no sin and, moreover, He has fulfilled the righteousness of the law is placed to our account and gifted to us as if it were our own, provided that we embrace Him by faith.

Now, that is such an excellent paragraph. I underlined the whole paragraph. When you look to yourself, and you earnestly acknowledge that in yourself you�ve got what? I mean, think about the people that are pushing all the final justification and final works and final this and final that and future grace books and everything else.

Think about that. When you just look to yourself, I mean, there�s nothing but cause for complete damnation because we realize our works aren�t perfect, they�re not good enough, they�re not entire enough, exact enough, perpetual enough.

So what do you do? Faith thus sends us away to Jesus Christ and it teaches us and assures us that we find salvation before God through His now let me add the words perfect, entire, exact, perpetual obedience alone, or righteousness alone.

It�s placed to your account. Christian, you get credit for Jesus� law-keeping, gifted to you as if it were your own, like you did it. I love that. Beza, that is why St. Bernard said, �The testimony of our conscience is our glory, not the testimony which the deceived mind, deceiving its owner, gives from itself to the vainglorious Pharisee.

Luke 18. This testimony is not true, but the testimony which the Holy Spirit gives to our spirit is true. 4 .9. Theodore Beza, read by Mike Ebenroth, No Compromise Radio. Sometimes we read things over and over again until you finally get it.

That�s what happens when you�re going to do this show and it�s going to be a show on Ephesians 4 and our new identity in Christ, put off, put on, infinitives, not imperatives. In verses 22 to 24, and then you last-second switch.

Faith Finds Its Remedy in Christ Against the Multitude of Our Sins

4 .9. Faith finds in Jesus Christ all that is necessary for salvation. This requires to be expounded in detail so that one may know if, through faith, we take hold of a remedy sufficient to assure us fully of life eternal, according to what is written, �The just shall live by faith.

Habakkuk 2, Romans 1, Galatians 3. We say, therefore, that everything which obstructs man from communion with God, who is perfectly righteous and good, lies in three points. But in the face of each of them, we find the remedy, not in ourselves, but in Jesus Christ and all that He has, provided that we are united and joined to Him in communion of all His benefits, John 17.

That is why the church, that is to say, the assembly of believers, is called the spouse of Jesus Christ, her husband, Romans 7, 2 Corinthians 11, Ephesians 5. It is to more clearly show the greatness of union and communion which exists between Jesus Christ and those who, through faith, have entrusted themselves to Him.

For by virtue of this union and this spiritual marriage through faith, He takes all our miseries upon Himself, and we receive from Him all His treasures. By pure goodness and mercy, this is what we are going to see.

Well, Beza, you've got me hooked. I can't wait to see that. I can't wait to see and learn and be reminded that Jesus has taken all my miseries and I get all His treasures. How about you, dear listener?

All your miseries, Jesus takes. All His treasures, He gives. Selah. 410, Theodore Beza, the remedy which faith finds in Jesus Christ alone against the first assault of the first temptation, the multitude of our sins.

In other words, okay, yeah, but I got so many sins. I've sinned so many times even as a Christian. I'm sinning when I think I'm going to die in a hospital in central mass with COVID pneumonia and acute lung failure.

I've got a lot of sins. Is this going to work out? Beza said, the assurance which we have on this point regarding the saints or ourselves. That's the title of this section. Therefore, let us now see how in Jesus Christ alone, we find sure remedies against all the temptations of Satan and all the troubles of our conscience.

In the first place, Satan and our conscience to show that we are truly unworthy of being saved and very worthy of perishing, put in the forefront the nature of God, perfectly righteous. He who is the great enemy and avenger of all iniquity.

Now it is true we are covered with infinite sins. It follows therefore that there is nothing more for us to do than to wait for the wages of sin. That is to say eternal death. What shall men be able to plead against this conclusion of Satan and of their conscience?

Certainly nothing which would avail unless it is what I say. For if they have recourse to the mercy of God, forgetting his righteousness, they are deceiving themselves. One thing is certain. The mercy of God is such that it is necessary, however, that his righteousness also be totally acknowledged, which we have declared already.

If we desire then in order to cover our sins, to plead the merits of the saints, we do them a great wrong. For David himself writes, enter not into judgment with thy servant, Psalm 143. And in another passage, he confesses that his works cannot ascend to God, Psalm 16.

And what does St. Paul say of Abraham, this holy person and father of believers? If Abraham, he says, were justified by his works, he has reason for self-glorying, but not before God. For what says the Scripture?

Abraham believed in God, and this was imputed to him for righteousness, Romans 4. And what says St. Paul regarding himself? Certainly he says, I do not feel guilty, but I am not thereby justified, 1 Corinthians 4.

How then can we plead the merits of the saints to satisfy our sins? Since they themselves have recourse only to the mercy of God alone, procured by Jesus Christ, Philippians 3. What are we going to do?

We're going to go ask the saints, but where did the saints get their mercy from? How do they receive mercy? Moreover, Beza said, if the saints themselves have merited paradise by their holy life, which cannot be seen that they themselves testify to the contrary, would they have not already received payment for their merits?

Ooh, schmody, schmody, schmodyhosen. Would they have not already received payment for their merits? With that claim, therefore, shall we plead them before God one more time? Since to say that they had so much merit that there remains some left over for us is to give the lie to what they have left us in writing.

Moreover, it is not as if we were saying that they have nothing to do with the death of Jesus Christ, seeing that they have in themselves more than enough to have need of him. And then, if they have excess merits, in what way would we know that they are ours?

Oh, that's such a good question. If there's a treasury of merit, and we've got extra merit because there's extra workings that go on in the Roman Catholic system for saints and really holy people, how do I get them?

How do I get those? It is because we think it so, or because we have bought them. Oh, but St. Peter rebukes Simon the magician for this false and accursed trade. May thy money perish with thee, he says, for thou hast thought to buy the gift of God with money, Acts 8.

There is how in believing that we honor the saints, we actually dishonor them as much as possible. Now, if the works of the saints have nothing to merit in this sphere, what shall we find in ourselves or in any other living man which is sufficient to fortify us against this assault of Satan?

But in order to cut short all these false imaginings, let us consider the following points. Firstly, would we not think a man to be destitute of sins, who persuades himself that he is free of a creditor under the pretext that he imagines he is paid, or that it's another paid for him?

This is how we always act toward God when we are not content with the soul satisfaction of Jesus Christ. For what foundation have all the rest except the fantasy of men? As if God must find good all that seems good to us.

But on the contrary, let us hear what Jesus Christ says. They honor me in vain in teaching the commandments of men, Matthew 15. And in another passage, when you have come to appear before me, who then demanded these things from you, Isaiah 1.

In the second place, when we say that we rest on the sole mercy of God, but we imagine that we ourselves have paid for it, holy or in part, is this not but to mock his mercy, Romans 4? Thirdly, not to be content with the sole merit of Jesus Christ, but to wish to add others to it, is this not as if one were saying that Jesus is not the Christ?

That is to say, our Savior, but only in part, Galatians 2. Fourthly, is this not to strip God of his perfect righteousness, Romans 3, and consequently of his divinity in the measure in which that is possible to us by daring to oppose to his wrath the works of men against whom such could be said, no matter how good they are, Luke 17.

David said, enter not into judgment with thy servant, Psalm 134. Well, my name is Mike Abendroth. This is the Beza Briefing on the Holy Spirit with a little rerun. That is so good. You've got to go get that book.

I think I need to reprint this on my own. I probably could do it.

No Compromise Radio, minister. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.