The Voice of Christ to His People

Providence Baptist Church

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Have you heard the voice of Christ? I hope you have. We hear the voice of Christ through His Word, and we hear the voice of Christ through the preaching of His Word.

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Herman Hoeksema, he's a Dutch Reformed theologian from the 1900s, he says, through preaching you do not hear about Christ, but you hear

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Him. He goes on to say, a preacher is not a person who merely speaks concerning Christ, but one through whom it pleases

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Christ Himself to speak, and to cause His own voice to be heard by His people.

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A preacher, therefore, must proclaim the whole counsel of God unto salvation as contained in holy writ.

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That's Herman Hoeksema. The Westminster Larger Catechism says this, it is required of those that hear the

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Word preached that they attend upon it with diligence, preparation, and prayer.

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Examine what they hear by the Scriptures. Receive the truth with faith, love, meekness, and readiness of mind as the

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Word of God. That is, they are to examine, to make sure He's preaching faithfully, but as they hear the

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Word of God being preached, they are to receive the preaching of the Word of God as the

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Word of God. The second Helvetic confession, 1566, it says, the preaching of the

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Word of God is the Word of God. Daniel Doriani. Martin Luther said,

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Every honest pastor's and preacher's mouth is Christ's mouth, and the word which he preacheth is likewise not the pastor's and preacher's, but God's.

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Similarly, John Calvin said, When a man has climbed up into the pulpit, it is so that God may speak to us by the mouth of a man.

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So Doriani continues. So preaching is God's Word in some sense, yet the preacher's words are human, too, and therefore often garbled, weak, or even false.

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But the Spirit makes the broken human words become a living Word of God to the hearers.

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Okay, here's what I'm saying, and it's not just what I'm saying, it's what I think the text is saying, and of course I would issue a caveat of caution.

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But I believe that the text is telling us that when we preach the Word of God rightly, we are preaching the very voice of Christ.