Puritan Golden Treasury

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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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

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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.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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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

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, ministry. Mike Abendroth here.

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I don't know why I feel like I'm under the weather today, maybe it's allergies. Who knows? But I think I'm probably always feeling under the weather.

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It's like at the end of the book of Ecclesiastes. Oh God, give me some warning signs that I'm getting one day closer to death.

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And we have those warning signs given to us as we age.

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Did you ever think about that? I'm turning now to Ecclesiastes 12. This wasn't in my scheduled program notes.

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I don't know why my producers didn't take care of that for me, but we'll fire them soon. Remember also your

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Creator in the days of your youth. Before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say,

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I had no pleasure in them. Before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened and the clouds return after the rain.

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In the day when the keepers of the house tremble and the strong men are bent.

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By the way, I think my legs are still pretty strong because I'm working out all the time.

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But the strong men are bent. I used to be 6 '2". I think I'm maybe just a hair under 6' now.

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And the grinders cease because there are few. My teeth are getting worn down. And those who look through the windows are dimmed.

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I have my reading glasses on right now, matter of fact. The doors of the street are shut when the sound of the grinding is low.

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My hearing is very bad. I had some testing done. I have some ringing in my ears. And they said basically you have the memory loss.

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You have the hearing loss of a man who shot a lot of guns in the military.

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So the one who rises up at the sound of a bird can't sleep through the night very well. All the daughters of the song are brought low.

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They are also afraid of what is high, afraid of heights. I did go on a couple little jumps on the mountain this year with my skis because I had better skis.

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The terror is in the way. The almond tree blossoms. That's true. You should see with the gray hair that I have. I just shave it off.

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The grasshopper drags itself along and desire fails because man is going to his eternal home.

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You'll have to study what those last ones are. I won't tell you. I know what they are, but you're going to have to find out yourself. The mourners go about the streets before the silver cord is snapped, or the golden bowl is broken, or the pitcher is shattered at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern, and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to the

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God who gave it. Vanity of vanity, says the preacher, all is vanity.

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When I look at myself in the mirror now, I regularly think my days are fleeting.

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Forget middle age. Middle age is 35. I'm almost 52, probably by the time this thing airs.

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52 years old. Well, today on No Compromise Radio Ministry, we're going to just do something fun.

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You know how people take the Bible, and they just open it up to a random verse, and say, this is

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God speaking to me today. God, give me a word, and then you open up the Bible, and then you try to torque the

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Bible, and make it say something that the author never intended to fit your particular situation for the day.

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Like this morning, I woke up and thought, you know, I need to put on some fertilizer. Should I?

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Is it going to rain tomorrow? It needs to rain within two to three days of placing down the crab seed. Should I?

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Shouldn't I? Open up the Bible, and what you do, do quickly. So there you have it. So I had to put on that fertilizer.

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Well, I put on the fertilizer, but I didn't open up the Bible for those verses. Actually, I was studying 1

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Corinthians 11 this morning with the head covering. But people just take the Bible and open it up randomly.

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I'm just going to open it up right now, randomly, and open up to a verse. Let us know. Let us press on to know the

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Lord. He is going out as sure as the dawn. He will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.

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Now, you know what? I honestly just looked at that verse randomly. But there in Hosea 6, it says something about the spring rains.

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I'm so glad I put down the fertilizer. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. My hand's up in the air.

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I'm praising God. Wow. Can you imagine? He's going to come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.

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That's tomorrow. It's spring. It's water. I've got the fertilizer, crabgrass thing. It's a sign from God.

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I probably should read down in verse 7 as well. But like Adam, they transgressed the covenant.

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There they dealt faithlessly with me. So see, there you go. You have to watch out how you do that.

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I know wisdom is better than following. But anyway, back to the point at hand. You can write us at info at nocompromiseradio .com.

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Today, I'm going to take a book, and I'm going to open it randomly and read things, and then see how that works for a show.

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I know. I know. It's going to be better than you think, okay? A Puritan Golden Treasury compiled by I .D

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.E. Thomas. Banner of truth, Puritan paperback. And it's got a picture of John Owen, I believe, on the cover.

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Let's see if that's true. A portrait of John Owen. That's true. And John Owen was quite the dapper man.

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He liked to dress up. I'm trying to think of the name that they called him. They called him a dandy. That's a dandy.

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Isn't that a Hermit's Hermit song, Steve? Hey, dandy, dandy. I saw

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Herman's Hermits at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk a couple summers ago, and they handed my daughter a

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CD. So there you go. So in this book, the

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Golden Treasury of Puritan Quotations, I think you'll be encouraged. If you have a lot of quote books for sermon preparation or Sunday school preparation or Bible study preparation, you can get all those quote books and those illustration books and just toss them.

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You don't need any of those. Maybe you keep one around, but this particular Treasury of Puritan Quotes is worth keeping, not because I use it for sermon preparation, but I need it for radio shows.

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Now, in all honesty, I'm going to pick the first one, but the other ones

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I'm going to do randomly. By the way, this book has some meaning to me, and I'll tell you the story. We were at Grace Church, and we thought to ourselves, do you know what?

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Let's just see the list of widows who can't get to the church because they're sick, and let's go visit them.

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So there was about eight or ten, so I would take my home group, my home Bible study, and we would go there and visit them during Christmastime or Easter or whatever the holidays were, and we visited them.

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And then we did it on a regular basis, and we got to know some of them. And this particular person was named

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Barbara, and we visited Barbara, and I moved then to Massachusetts, and Barbara died, and she said to her daughter that Mike Abendroth could come and have some of her theological books.

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And so I was there for a shepherd's conference, I think, and I went over to her house, and I have

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Barbara's books, some of her books. Barbara Cole, that was her name. She was very kind and dear, and so I look in the front, and it says,

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Barbara Cole, Puritan Prayers, she wrote in the front, and just thought, you know what?

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What a special thing that was. I didn't go serve her and have the people serve her to get anything, but God is very good and generous, and I'm thankful to get to know

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Barbara. She's not sick anymore. That's the good news. All right, so here's the scoop.

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Here's the first one on No Compromise Radio today to just help you think about God and his word.

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Emotion. So the good thing is with this book, it's got subject topics, and so it says emotion.

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How about this? Richard Sibbes. Measure not God's love and favor by your own feeling.

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The sun shines as clearly in the dark day as it does in the bright.

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The difference is not in the sun but in some clouds which hinder the manifestation of the light thereof.

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Isn't that excellent? You can think back in the days of the Passover, and you might be saying to yourself inside the house with the blood over the door and the doorposts that I don't feel very safe, but in fact you are safe because of what

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God's word says. And so sometimes you might not feel God's love, and so you shouldn't say, well,

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God doesn't love me because I've got a hard time. You can know of God's love for you certainly by reading the

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Bible, Romans chapter 8, but mainly by focusing upon Christ and his work for you on Calvary.

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So I'm going to just open up the book, and here we go. Let's just read one in just random, okay?

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Ready? Blessings. John Owen, did you never run for shelter in a storm and find fruit which you expected not?

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Did you never go to God for safeguard driven by outward storms and there find unexpected fruit?

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The exceeding abundant blessings of our God. That's true. And you imagine to yourself,

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I deserve cursing. Someday you should read the book of Genesis, and when you do, ask yourself the question, why does

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God give people what they don't deserve? And grace. We should be getting the curse of God, and yet you see the word over and over and over,

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God making the point in the first book of the Bible. God blesses people. And so I like to say to people now,

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God bless you. But I don't try to do that in some sloganeering, trite cliche.

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A trite cliche is a clite. Some just throw away word.

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I want to say in my mind, and then I say it with my lips, God bless you. I know you don't deserve blessing, but God blesses you anyway, and that's my desire that I would want

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God to bless you. Let's try another one here. I just opened it up to suicide.

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Let's see what the Puritans say about suicide. George Swinnick. He that would not die when he must, and he that would die when he must not, are both of them cowards alike.

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All right, let's go to another one. Suffering. Suffering by Joseph Church. Sufferings are but as little chips of the cross.

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See, now every one of these would make me want to preach. Now that particular one, there's a context to it, and I'm not going to preach because I'm smarter than that.

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I know better than that. Okay, now that last one I don't think was so good in other words, but let me give you one

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I just looked at, and this is an excellent one. This is going to make you want to buy this book. William Gurnall.

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Pride. Pride loves to climb up, not as Zacchaeus to see Christ, but to be seen.

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Isn't that true? Pride doesn't climb up like Zacchaeus to say, I need to get a load of Christ, I need to get a sight of Christ in my mind, but I want to be seen.

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Well, here's one that you know, and this is preaching. Richard Baxter. Maybe you don't know this, but you should know this.

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Screw the truth into men's minds. Screw the truth into men's minds.

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Now you probably know Baxter who said, I preached as never sure to preach again, and as a dying man to dying men.

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You probably remember that, but Richard Baxter said screw the truth into men's minds.

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I like to think to myself that I need to so hammer this point home that I need to rivet.

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Why can't I talk today? This is, you know, rivet, rivet, to rivet this into the minds of men.

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John Flavel on preaching, since I like preaching, and since I can't talk today, I'm going to read Flavel on the same page.

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Hot iron, though blunt, will pierce sooner than a cold one, though sharper.

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So men have hearts that are hot for God, fired up, and God will bless the man.

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All right, what about meditation? Thomas Watson. Meditation is chewing the cud.

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Can you imagine that? You see those cows, and they just chew and chew and chew and chew, and I think too often we evangelicals, we want things fast.

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We want a 24 -and -a -half -minute show called No Compromise Radio so we can just be done with it. Some have written in and said, why don't you have a longer show?

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And then I say, well, I can barely put together a 24 -and -a -half -minute show and do that well.

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Why would we want to go longer than that? Anyway, most shows now are 30 minutes, aren't they? They are. All right, so No Compromise Radio today, a

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Puritan gold and treasury. We're just going for it, and I can always edit this show later. Friendship.

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Friendship. Let's see what friendship, what do we have to say regarding friendship?

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Clothes and company do oft times tell tales in a mute but significant language.

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And that is in the context, by the way, that's Thomas Brooks, that's in the context of should you have friends, should you be friends with ungodly people.

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And you can tell, the show is totally falling apart.

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I want you to know now, just five seconds ago, I almost just hit the stop button. I look down,

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I'm 14 minutes in. You have to just put up with me. If you listen already, this is your first show, sorry.

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If this is your 700th show, you have to give me a blooper every once in a while. All right, let's see what else we have.

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Salvation. Let's see if I can bail myself out. Giles Furman. I never heard of Giles Furman.

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I'm glad he's not called Giles Vermin. That would be bad. It is the duty of all the sons and daughters of Adam who hear the gospel preached and Christ offered to them to believe in or receive

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Christ, whether they be prepared or not prepared. That is excellent.

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See, that rescued me. Modesty and apparel. How about this? Thomas Brooks. They that borrow the fashions of the

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Egyptians may get their boils and their blotches. Oh, see, we were rescued.

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Certainly such as fear the Lord should go in no apparel, but first, such as they are willing to die in, secondly, to appear before the ancient of days in, thirdly, to stand before the judgment seat in.

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The clothes that you wear today, would you be willing to die in those clothes? Wow, that is amazing.

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While I'm on the same page, I might as well look at the moralist, good but not good enough, William Gernal. The one of a renewed heart is a hair on the moral man's pen that blurs and blots his copy when he writes fairest.

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His uprightness does others more good in this world than himself in the next.

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I'm glad I didn't stop the tape because in all honesty, that kind of quote regarding moralism, moralism,

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I'd rather be married to a moralist. I'd rather be living next door to somebody who's a moralist than some licentious person.

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I'd rather live next door to a Mormon. They make a better neighbor than does a suicide bomber.

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But when you're trying to be moral to get to heaven, it does your neighbors more good than it does you.

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So throw away your morality. You can't get to heaven by being good.

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If so, why would God send the son to die on behalf of sinners? William Gernal said, the archer may lose his game by shooting short as well as shooting wide.

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The hypocrite shoots wide. The moralist shoots short of the mark.

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All right, controversy. Thomas Adams, it's often foolish and unprofitable, controversy is.

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That's why I don't like our intro. I don't want a controversy, I want provocative. As in the burning of some wet fuel, we cannot see the fire for smoke.

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So the light of the scriptures is dust by the vapors of controversy. Now there's a time to stand up for the truth and there's a time to get overboard when it comes to controversy and that's certainly something

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I don't want to do. Christians, John Collins, you are to follow no man further than he follows

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Christ. I think that's good, don't you? Children, it is common sense to put the seal to the wax while it is soft,

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Arthur Jackson. When you've got little kids, go for it then because it's easier to influence them when they're smaller, humanly speaking, than when they're older.

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Let's keep going. Sin, sin hath the devil for its father, shame for its companion and death for its wages,

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Thomas Watson. I'm going to read another one, John Bunyan. Sin is the dare of God's justice, the rape of his mercy, the jeer of his patience, the slight of his power and the contempt of his love.

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Doesn't that make you not want to sin? Boy, how sick is sin. Sin is the dare of God's justice.

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I dare you. You know these people that say if God is real, I dare him to strike me down with a lightning bolt right now.

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The rape of his mercy, the jeer of his patience. I'm going to read another one, Thomas Brooks, on the same subject, sin.

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A holy man knows that all sin strikes at the holiness of God, the glory of God, the nature of God, the being of God and the law of God and therefore his heart rises against all.

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He looks upon every sin as the scribes and Pharisees that accused Christ and as that Judas that betrayed

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Christ and as that Pilate that condemned Christ and as those soldiers that scourged

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Christ and as those spears that pierced Christ. Thomas Brooks.

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Lastly, Thomas Adams. Sin is the strength of death and the death of strength. Well, I'm still reading the

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Puritan Golden Treasury, I .D .E. Thomas. I'd like you to get that book. It would be an excellent book for you even though I might be using a bad show to promote it.

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Oh, man. How about this one, life? Samuel Ward. To live well is to live twice.

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Isn't that interesting? Not that a good life, a life well lived will earn heaven but live well in the sense that you have bowed your knee to Christ Jesus and by faith you've seen him as the

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Messiah and believed in him with your heart. Then you live twice.

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You live a glorious life. All right, let's do another one. Okay, what do we have here?

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Chastisement. Ooh, God's wounds cure. Sin's kisses kill.

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William Gernal. John Trapp, better to be pruned to grow than cut up to burn.

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The Puritans just had a way about them, didn't they? Atheism, Ezekiel Hopkins. Unless the being of God be presupposed, no tolerable account can be given of the being of anything.

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That is true. Ezekiel Hopkins also said there's a conscience in man, therefore there's a

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God in heaven. That is absolutely true. Well, I'm switching things around here. Providence.

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John Flavel. Grace makes the promise and providence the payment. Now see, that is one of those

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Selah moments. Mm, stop and let that sink in. Very, very famous quote by John Flavel in Providence.

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Some providences, like Hebrew letters, must be read backwards. So Hebrew letters are not read from left to right like English, but from right to left.

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And that's how you need to see Providence. Sometimes. All right, parents.

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Parents. William Whatley. Let me take heed, therefore, that I do not over love him, that I do not cocker him, and as it were, mar and kill his soul by over cherishing his body.

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I have no idea what that means. Oh, I have no idea.

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Love, Thomas Watson. Love is the queen of the graces. It outshines all the others as the sun of the lesser planets.

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See why this is not a good idea to do with your Bible? If it's not a good idea to do with this book, it's not a good idea to do it with the

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Bible. Now this one's worth it right here. This is still under the love of God. This is the best.

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This is the best quote of the day. Ready? We love him because he first loved us. Love is like an echo.

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It returneth what it receiveth. Isn't that good? That's just neat. John Owen. We are never nearer

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Christ than when we find ourselves lost in holy amazement at his unspeakable love.

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We are never nearer Christ than when we find ourselves lost in holy amazement at his unspeakable love.

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How about evangelism? John Bunyan. A man who has his eyes up to heaven.

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The best of books was in his hand. The law of truth was written upon his lips, and he stood as if he pleaded with men.

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When was the last time you pleaded with a man to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? Evil thoughts.

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William Secker. Vain thoughts defile the heart as well as vile thoughts.

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See, we don't like vile thoughts, but vain thoughts, nah, not so bad. All right, what else do we have here?

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We have, just flipping through, atonement. If he hides the sin or lessens it, he is faulty.

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If he leaves it still upon us, we die. He must then take our iniquity to himself, make it his own, and so deliver us.

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For thus having taken the sin upon himself, as lawfully he may and lovingly he doth, it followeth that we live if he lives.

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And who can desire more? John Bunyan. Now that is great. See, now this is getting to be a better show.

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I'm glad you hung in there with me. John Owen. There's no death of sin without the death of Christ. John Howe.

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The wrong that man had done to the divine majesty should be expiated by none but man and could be by none but God.

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Christ did not die for any upon condition if they do believe, but he died for all

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God's elect that they should believe. Backsliding. He falls deepest into hell who falls backward.

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Thomas Watson. Ooh. Thomas Manton. Weariness makes for wandering.

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And lastly, William Grinnell. None will have such a sad parting from Christ as those who went halfway with him and then left him.

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So today on No Compromise Radio Ministry, a Puritan Golden Treasury compiled by I .D

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.E. Thomas, Banner of Truth. We are glad you listened today, and you know the

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Bible says that dead flies make the perfumer's ointment go off a stench. So there you have it. Info at NoCompromiseRadio .com.

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No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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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.

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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.

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You can check us out online at BBCChurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff, or management.