David King - The Centrality of Preaching

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Good evening, brothers and sisters, and welcome to the first night of the 2006
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Alpha and Omega Ministries National Conference on Pulpit Crimes, the Criminal Mishandling of God's Word.
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It's a joy to see all of you here tonight. It's also a joy to be given the pleasure of introducing our first speaker.
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His name is David King, and he's been a dear friend of mine for approximately eight years,
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I believe, something like that, about eight years. Dave also, he was a guest very recently on the radio program that I host out on Long Island, Iron Sharpens Iron, and I would actually urge all of you, no matter where you live, to tune into the program because you could listen live on the
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Internet, and you could find out that information later if you'd like on how to listen to Iron Sharpens Iron.
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But it is a live Reformed talk show, and we have guests like James White and David King, our first guest speaker, but I would appreciate it if you could tune in and call in during the program.
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But let me tell you a little something about David King. David King is a graduate of Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi, and he is a pastor and teaching elder in the
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Presbyterian Church in America, PCA. He has co -authored with William Wester the three -volume set,
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Holy Scripture, the Ground and Pillar of Our Faith, which is a defense of the Reformation principle of Sola Scriptura.
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I have a copy of that volume right here. It's a three -volume work which is available in the back, and I urge you to please get this book as well as the other two volumes because it is a masterpiece.
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And what amazes me is that our brother David King could write such a wonderful book.
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The first time I heard David's voice, he left a message on my answering machine, and I did not know who he was.
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I was, I think, running the first debate at that time with James White, and I pressed play on the answering machine and I heard a voice say,
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My name is David King. I'm looking for a man named
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James White. I would like to share a meal with him.
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Could you call me and give me his phone number? Thank you.
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I called up James and said, All right, it's the joke. Who's this practical joker you got calling me?
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But I found out later that this is the brilliant man that you're going to hear preach. In fact, he preached at the church where I am a member of several years ago, and he's one of the most powerful preachers that I've ever heard in my life, and I mean that with Here's my dear friend and brother,
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Pastor David King. I don't remember the phone call.
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Did you make that up? If you are here tonight and wondering who in the world this guy is standing here about to speak to you, and I want you to know ahead of time,
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I share your concerns. I was asking myself that question, and I want you to know up front, this can be a disclaimer for what follows, that I did my best to dissuade
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Michael O 'Fallon of having me speak here to no avail, and I just want you to know, if that doesn't serve any comfort to you in what is to follow, it certainly does afford me a little bit of comfort, because I did try to talk him out of it.
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I don't know why in the world I'm speaking at the same conference that Dr.
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James White is speaking at, Dr. Tom Askle, Dr. Don Kistler, Burt Parsons, as well as Steve Camp, but I want you to know it is a privilege to be here, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak to you tonight on a subject that is very near and dear to my own heart.
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And that is the centrality of preaching, the ambassadors for Christ, the centrality of preaching, because I am convinced that there can be no greater privilege in all the world than to preach the glorious gospel of the grace of God in our
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Lord Jesus Christ. If you have your Bibles, you might want to turn with me tonight to the 20th chapter of the
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Acts of the Apostles. We're going to be looking at a number of scriptures tonight, but I'd like for you to keep this one before you somewhat, although we will be scanning a number of passages.
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Just to give you a little bit of background to this passage at the close of his third missionary journey, as he, the
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Apostle Paul, was making haste to return to Jerusalem so that he could be there in time for the celebration of the day of Pentecost.
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And also during his last voyage from the Aegean Sea to Palestine, Paul's ship makes harbor in Miletus, and from there you'll recall he summons the elders of the
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Ephesian church to meet him in port. And the following passage is a brief portion of the account of that meeting of Paul with the
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Ephesian elders. And I think of particular interest to us here in this passage is his rehearsal to them of his manner and ministry among them.
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So let's look together at Acts chapter 20, begin reading at verse 17. Hear the word of the true and living
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God. From Miletus, he, that is Paul, sent to Ephesus and called for the elders of the church.
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And when they had come to him, he said to them, you know from the first day that I came to Asia in what manner
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I always lived among you, serving the Lord with all humility, with many tears and trials, which happened to me by the plotting of the
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Jews. How I kept back nothing that was helpful, but proclaimed it to you and taught you publicly from house to house, testifying to Jews and also to Greeks, repentance toward God in faith toward our
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Lord Jesus Christ. And see, now I go bound in the spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to me there, except that the
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Holy Spirit testifies in every city saying that chains and tribulations awake me.
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But none of these things moved me, nor do I count my life dear to myself so that I may finish my race with joy and the ministry
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I received from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.
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And indeed, now I know that you all among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God will see my face no more.
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Therefore I testify to you, or I take you to record this day that I am innocent of the blood of all men, for I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God.
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Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood.
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Now all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man is the flower of the grass.
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The grass withers, and the flower thereof falls away, but the word of our Lord shall stand forever.
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Let's pray. O Holy Fathers, we bow before you tonight.
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We come in the consciousness, O God, that left to ourselves, we can neither read nor mark your word aright.
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And Father, we think of that terrible indictment upon the religious leaders of our
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Lord's day to whom he said, you searched the scriptures, but you are not willing to come to me that you might have life.
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And O Lord, we as well tremble at the thought that we can take your word, your scriptures into our hands, have their precious truths set before our minds and our hearts.
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We can engrave them on our memory, even make them the object of diligent study and industry, and yet miss the very message contained therein.
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And O God, it gives us cause to see our own need, to cry out to you,
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O God, that you would come in the person of your Holy Spirit, that he would be pleased to come tonight and subdued the feeble efforts of your servant.
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Father, that you would enable us to focus upon your word. And Father, that you would command the attention of the precious souls gathered in this place, that your word may be proclaimed aright, and that it might be written upon our hearts and sealed there by the power of the
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Holy Spirit. O Father, come, send your Holy Spirit, may he be our blessed teacher in this hour together.
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We ask in the precious name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
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As he anticipated his impending departure and bidding a final well on this occasion to the
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Ephesian elders, and while charging them with their own responsibility of the spiritual oversight of the church at Ephesus, the
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Apostle Paul could pronounce in no uncertain terms these words which we find recorded in chapter 20 and verse 26 as somewhat of a vindication of some three years of ministry among them.
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Wherefore I take you to record this day that I am innocent of the blood of all men.
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And then he proceeds to utter this next pronouncement, which in turn gives us the reason why he had this testimony sealed to his conscience.
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For I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God.
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And he tells us specifically here how he had acquitted himself in this regard among the
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Ephesians. He says in verse 20 of Acts 20 that he kept nothing back from them which was profitable to them, but taught them publicly from house to house, testifying to Jews and also to Greeks repentance toward God and faith toward our
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Lord Jesus Christ. This the Apostle goes on to say was the ministry which he had received from the
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Lord Jesus himself to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.
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Everywhere the Apostle Paul went, this was the pulse beat of his burden to publish abroad the news of his crucified
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Lord and of his mighty resurrection from the dead. Indeed, it was on the basis of divine revelation and apostolic authority that he declared and demonstrated in customary fashion.
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We find this, for example, Acts 17 and verse 2, how that the Old Testament scriptures pointed in part and parcel progressively and convergently to the redemptive event of Jesus Christ and him crucified as well as his resurrection from the dead.
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That is in a word, wherever the Apostle Paul went, he preached unceasingly from the scriptures these great objective truths which cluster around the
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Lord Jesus in all the glory and beauty of his person and in all the sufficiency and perfection of his sinless life, his sin -bearing blood -letting substitutionary death on behalf of sinners as the only hope of sinners.
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Indeed, every time I read this account of the Apostle Paul, I'm struck afresh with the conviction that there can be no greater ambition in the heart of the true minister of Jesus Christ than to be able to preach
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Jesus Christ and him crucified. And then in retrospect of such a ministry, to be able to say with the
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Apostle Paul, I take you to record this day that I am innocent of the blood of all men.
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Whether he is loved or admired, respected or liked, or even ridiculed or cursed and hated, it is of little consequence to such a man in the end.
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So long as he knows that he has discharged himself of this debt which he owes to the
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God who saved him and called him into the ministry, and in that day when he stands before God, he will not be guilty of the blood of men.
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And so I ask you, what greater ambition can there be in the heart of the true minister of Jesus Christ than to be able to register such a testimony with one's own conscience in the presence of God and men, as the
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Apostle Paul was able to do on this occasion under the direct inspiration of the
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Holy Spirit. And in our time together tonight, I would like to touch upon three areas drawing from the standard of God's inscripturated word by which we are informed and normed according to its directives.
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First of all, I would like to say a word regarding the centrality of preaching in the establishment and life of the church.
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Secondly, a brief, indeed too brief a word about the man who would preach.
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And then thirdly, a word regarding the message he is to bring.
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First of all then, let's look together at the centrality of preaching in the establishment and life of the church.
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Now he's not an inspired author of Holy Scripture, but I would like to begin somewhat by giving you the remarks of John Calvin.
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This is taken from one of his sermons on the Epistle to the Ephesians.
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He made this comment about the ministry of the word. Now the fact is that it, and he's speaking about the church, cannot be built up, that is to say it cannot be brought to soundness or continue in a good state except by means of the preaching of the word.
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So then, if we earnestly desire that God should be honored and served and that our
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Lord should have his royal seat among us, peaceably to reign in the midst of us if we are his people and under his protection, if we covet to be built up in him and to be joined to him and to be steadfast in him to the end, to be short, if we desire our salvation, we must learn to be humble hearers in receiving the doctrine of the gospel and in hearkening to the pastors that are sent to us.
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How are we to communicate the gospel? That's a good question for you and I to ask in our own day.
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How are we to reach people? How are we to correct people who are careless about worship, who are careless about their worship attendance?
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How are we to bring the word of God to bear upon the lives of our young people, upon the lives of those who have abandoned themselves to a course of sin and their own devices and the mindset of this present age?
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Well, in as much as our faith and our convictions are informed by the word of God, also these things are to be normed by the word of God and so it is to the scriptures and to the scriptures alone that we must go to seek an answer.
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In the New Testament, and I apologize that I simply do not have the time to trace out this activity in the
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Old Testament tonight, but in the New Testament there are two basic word groups that are employed to describe the activity of preaching in the establishment and life of the church.
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There's first of all, the activity described of the K -Rux.
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He is a preacher. He is a herald. He is a town crier.
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For instance, in 1 Timothy 2 and verse 7, as well as 2 Timothy 1 and verse 11, the
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Apostle Paul informs us that he was appointed as a K -Rux, as a preacher.
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In 2 Peter 2 and verse 5, this word is descriptive of Noah as a preacher of righteousness.
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A K -Rux was to engage in the activity of K -Russo and that's the
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Greek word which simply means to proclaim, to make known, to preach. This verb is used at least some 75 times or so in the
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New Testament to describe the act of proclamation or preaching.
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You find it, for example, in Romans chapter 10 and verse 14, where Paul asks, and how shall they hear without a preacher?
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There the verb K -Russo is in the form of a participle. That is, how shall they hear without one who proclaims?
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And in Mark chapter 1 and verse 14, this verb is used to describe the activity of our
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Lord Jesus himself, where we read, now after John was put in prison,
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Jesus came to Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom.
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And then there's the word in the New Testament for evangelist, one who preaches the good news, one who engages in the activity of evangelism.
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And that verb in the Greek is the verb euangelizo, to bring the good news, to preach the good news.
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For example, we read in Acts chapter 8 and verse 25. So when they had testified and preached the word of the
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Lord, they returned to Jerusalem preaching the gospel, euangelizo, in many villages of the
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Samaritans. It means to bring the good news, to proclaim it.
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Now strikingly, in Luke chapter 4 and verses 18 through 19, while describing the activity of his commission as God's anointed and appointed prophet, priest, and king, both of these verbs, euangelizo and keruso, are brought together in close proximity.
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And they're employed by none other than our Lord himself as he sets before his hometown crowd of Nazareth the purpose for which he has come.
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There in Nazareth of Galilee, our Lord walks into the local synagogue and the book of the scroll is placed in his hand.
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And he proceeds to read a passage from the prophecy of Isaiah.
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We know it as the 61st chapter, verses 1 and 2.
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The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel, euangelizo, to the poor.
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He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim keruso, liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim keruso, the acceptable year of the
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Lord. You see, our Lord, by his own activity, has forever elevated the dignity of preaching and the method of preaching for the establishment and the continued life of the church.
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Again, in Luke's description of our Lord's ministry in the 8th chapter of his gospel, the same two
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Greek verbs for preaching are brought once again side by side with one another.
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There we read in verse 1, now it came to pass afterward, that is following this account of our
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Lord's rebuke of Simon the Pharisee, that he went through every city and village preaching keruso and bringing the glad tidings, euangelizo, of the kingdom of God.
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But these examples are not the only time in Holy Scripture where these two words for preaching, euangelizo and keruso, are brought together into such close proximity.
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In the 8th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, following the great persecution which arose against the church at Jerusalem, we read there in verses 4 and 5,
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Therefore those who were scattered went everywhere, preaching euangelizo, the word.
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Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria and preached keruso,
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Christ, to them. And if I had the time, I could point you to numerous other instances in the
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New Testament where the noun forms of these two Greek words for preaching are intermingled with the other in verb form, as in the relationship of a predicate to its direct object.
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Suffice it to say that these two Greek verbs, euangelizo and keruso, together with the use of their noun cognates, stand out in biblical language, in biblical usage, as the two predominant words employed to describe the preaching activity of our
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Lord and of the primitive apostolic church. So then if we ask the question, with what instructions did our
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Lord Jesus leave for His church? After I'm gone, what are you to do?
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Again, Luke 24, I begin at verse 45, And He opened to their understanding that they might comprehend the scriptures.
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Then He said to them, Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the
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Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached, keruso, in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, and you are witnesses of these things.
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He said to His apostles in Acts 1, You shall receive power when the
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Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all
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Judea, and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. And when we probe even further into the book of the
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Acts of the Apostles, we see the kingdom extending beyond Palestine out to the farthest reaches of the borders of the
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Gentile regions, and then into the Gentile world itself. And what is the great means for the extension and the expansion of the kingdom of God?
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It is not the gathering of the great ecclesiastics of the earth to promote the kingdom.
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It's not the coming together of the planned evangelistic campaigns of the great minds of the earth, but rather it is by humble and sometimes weak and frail and feeble men preaching the word of the true and living
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God. Therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word, and that was and is the great means ordained of God for the spread of God's kingdom, for the establishment of God's kingdom.
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And according to the biblical pattern, and we've already examined some of the key passages tonight, according to the biblical pattern, we learn that preaching is the grand ordained means of God for the extension and expansion of the kingdom of God from its inception all the way through to its consummation.
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And any other means attempted is an intrusion upon the wisdom and the will of the king himself.
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While commenting on 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 17, the late scholar
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Leon Morris wrote this. He said the essence of Paul's commission was not to administer rights, even important rights like baptism, but to preach the gospel.
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Preaching is the primary function in the original commission given by Christ to the twelve.
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Throughout the New Testament, this function remains primary.
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The apostles had a unique place as witnesses to the saving act of God in Christ.
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Their main business was to proclaim it. Thus they spent their time in ceaseless labors as they made this gospel known.
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The faithful preaching of the cross results in men ceasing to put their trust in any human device and relying rather on God's work in Christ.
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And I would submit to you, my dear brothers and sisters tonight, if we understand this, we will not, you and I, merely tolerate some traditional structure of church life in which there happens to be the centrality of preaching.
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No, we will if we value our never dying souls defend individually if necessary the preaching, the centrality of preaching for ourselves and for our children because the kingdom of God will not advance any further than the centrality of preaching is maintained in any given expression of the kingdom of God.
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Furthermore, if we understand this, we'll zealously, you and I, seek to spread the word ourselves by every means at our disposal.
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We may not be called upon formally to teach and to expound and to apply and to exhort in the sanctuary of God's people.
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We may not be called upon formally to teach, but surely the word of God does teach us that every means suitable to our gifts and station in life, we're to seek to communicate that message by a book, by a tract, by a faithful witness to a friend, to a neighbor, to work associates.
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Why? Because if they are ever to enter the kingdom of God, it will be because some seed has been cast upon the earth of their heart.
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And if we understand this principle, we will continue to underscore the centrality of preaching not merely as a matter of form, but as a matter of conviction to treasure and to guard and to promote the training of other men to go forth and preach the gospel.
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For what is the greatest blessing that we can offer to our own generation? What is it?
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Is it not to send forth to them able sowers of the word?
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Is that not what we desire? Mark 4 in verse 3, listen, behold, our
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Lord said, a sower went out to sow. Our greatest blessing is not to be derived from clever and brilliant theologians who sit around and write learned books for other learned men to read and write learned reviews for one another and learned journals about how learned they are.
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But our passion, surely, surely our passion is that in the context of a living church and under the special forming influence of men who are themselves able sowers of the word, that God will raise up good farmers, not elegant think tank people, not kings and lords, but just good farmers who are willing to go forth with all the shame upon them.
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What are you? I'm just a preacher. I'm just a preacher throwing seed on the earth.
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Mark 4 verse 26, the kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground.
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And the great message of the parable of the sower is surely that it underscores in vivid terms the origin and the means by which the kingdom of God is established from its very conception to its ultimate consummation.
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Now then, given the biblical perspective on preaching that I have tried to set before you tonight, it should alarm us that it is no stretch of the imagination to assert that preaching in the
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United States, if not worldwide, has declined in the past 150 years.
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And that is a pulpit crime. When you stop and consider what passes for preaching in many churches today, how often you come to a worship service expecting the word of God to be preached and having been read, if it's even read at all.
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How often do you come expecting the word of God to be opened up and it doesn't have to be by anyone great, just someone who's faithful to God's word.
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Faithfully opening up God's word and applying that word to the people of God.
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How many times have you come to church expecting to have something of that blessing only to be entertained by a pulpiteer who has turned comedian?
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Or maybe a master of ceremonies who looks like he's conducting the pep rally.
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Or a speaker who's turned psychologist. Or something along the lines of many comforting strokes for many different folks.
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But you know, I have to agree with a man much better than myself who has said that all failures in the pulpit today are basically either, are the failure either of the man who preaches or of the message he brings.
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It was not for naught that the apostolic directive that the apostle Paul gave to Timothy was expressed in this language.
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Take heed to yourself and to the doctrine. Continue in them for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you.
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Now I want us to look not only at the centrality of preaching as we've sought to do in the establishment and life of the church.
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Now very briefly, let's look at the man who would preach. The apostle Paul tells us in 2
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Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 20. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ as though God were pleading through us.
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We implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.
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If preaching is anything, preaching is a divine activity.
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And in this divine activity, it has pleased God to use men to bring the message in his institutes of the
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Christian religion. I want to read these words to you from Calvin again. He said, those who think the authority of the word is dragged down by the baseness of the men called to teach it, disclose their own ungratefulness.
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For among the many excellent gifts with which God has adorned the human race, it is a singular privilege that he deigns to consecrate to himself the mouths and tongues of men in order that his voice may resound in them.
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It is a wonder beyond words that God is pleased to plead his gospel to the world through the instrumentality of men to take sinful men, to make them his ambassadors, that God would even save sinners and then employ some of them to represent himself and through them plead with men to be reconciled to himself.
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Wonder of wonders, such men must be men of prayer. Indeed, they must be men whose ministry and lives are saturated with prayer.
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Prayer is a constant reminder to you and I that we are utterly dependent upon God if we're ever to be used of God.
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I was reading the other day and someone said that he used to pray that the
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Lord would use him. He said, now his prayer is, Lord, make me useful.
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I think we need to be made useful if God is going to use us. The pulpit must be filled with men whose lives are filled with the
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Holy Spirit. Ordinarily, powerful preaching doesn't just happen. It doesn't just happen.
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It grows out of the soil of what a man's heart and life is before God and men.
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You say, well, pastor, do you have any scripture for that? Paul writing to the
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Thessalonians, 1 Thessalonians 1 and verse 5. There he says, for our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the
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Holy Spirit and in much assurance as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake.
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As you are a pastor at a church, I've discovered this in my own ministry, if there are any pastors here tonight, the longer you're at that church, by the way you live your life, your effectiveness as that church's minister will either increase or decline according to your manner of life.
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Paul says the two are joined together. And this is precisely, you'll recall what we read in the passage from Acts chapter 20 when
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Paul rehearses his ministry to the Ephesian elders. He reminds them of that.
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He says, you know, from the first day I came to Asia in what manner I always lived among you serving the
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Lord with all humility. The preacher must be a man of humility.
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Some years ago, I was reading the sermon of another minister,
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Dr. Ray Ortlund, Dr. Ray Ortlund Jr. He used to be a professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.
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He said this in the sermon, it arrested my attention. Listen to what he said. He was preaching about preaching.
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He said, I used to think that I was a half decent preacher with the potential of becoming a good preacher.
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And back in my seminary prof days, I felt frustrated that I wasn't more widely recognized.
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Not anymore. I've discovered how mediocre
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I am. By now, if God's blessing attends my preaching at all,
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I'm amazed. In fact, I've come to realize that there is a hidden advantage for God's power is made perfect in weakness and his power is what
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I want. That is why for Christ's sake, and now he's quoting Paul, I delight in weaknesses and insults and hardships and persecutions in difficulties.
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For when I am weak, then I am strong. Second Corinthians 12, 10.
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And then Dr. Ortlund goes on to say this, the best pulpit is a cross.
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So if you're under criticism from your people, that doesn't mean
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God hasn't called you to preach. It means God is positioning you to preach with greater power than ever before.
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Thank God for your cross. It's his appointed place to empower you.
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Now there's a word about the centrality of preaching in the establishment and life of the church, a brief word about the man who would preach.
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And I hurry on because this is really the heart of what I wanted to say to you tonight.
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The K. Rooks, the herald, the preacher is one who comes bearing the message of another.
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The message he bears is not his own. A preacher, if he's a true preacher of Christ, is always conscious of the reality that he is
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Christ's herald. And that's how the term is used repeatedly throughout the
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New Testament. He realizes that his message is the message of the
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King of Heaven. He comes bringing a message as one who is vested with public authority to declare that message.
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But he realizes it is the official message of another. It is the message of the
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King of Heaven. And his official message is a message of law and gospel.
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You see, the kingdom of God drew near in the person of the
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King. Mark 1 in verse 4, Jesus came to Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God.
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But in this present age, the King draws near in the persons of his messengers, his representatives, his ambassadors, his heralds, laying down the law, yes, but wonder of wonders, laying down the law with good news to lawbreakers.
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You see, God's law demands perfect obedience. And even the slightest deviation or deflection from that standard calls forth the judgment of Almighty God on all lawbreakers.
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For what is the essence of sin? First John 3 in verse 4, whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness.
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Sin is lawlessness. Sin is the transgression of the law.
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And what are the righteous requirements of God's law? They're twofold.
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The first is this, Ezekiel 18 verse 4, the soul who sins shall die.
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Galatians 3 in verse 10, cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things written in the book of the law to do them.
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God's law righteously condemns every sinner and sentences us all to death.
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But in the Lord Jesus Christ, God's own son, he has sent one in great love to take that condemnation which was ours and to place it upon himself.
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He has fulfilled the righteous requirements of the law for his people, on behalf of his people, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us and that we would never have to die a cursed death for it because he died it for us.
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And then the second requirement of the righteous requirement of the law is that we, you and I, would in turn be holy and sincerely obedient in all we do and are and think before God.
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But who of us can stand? All of us have to cry with Isaiah the prophet, woe is me,
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I am undone, I have broken what God requires,
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I have fallen before God. In Adam, I shared his sin,
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I bit it off and spit it out. I shared in Adam's transgression and not only his transgression, but my own life bears testimony to the transgressions of God's law.
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But in his own son, God has provided not only a perfect sacrifice for sin, but a perfect obedience in the place of our sin that will be imputed or credited to all who believe in him.
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He has provided a righteousness for all who are his. He is our righteousness.
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He stands as our covenant head at God's right hand to represent us,
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Christ our righteousness, pleading our calls before the great moral governor of the entire universe.
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Nothing less than that will do us good. In Romans chapter 8 and verses 1 and following, though Paul does not employ the language of imputation,
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I'm convinced he has the concept in mind. When he speaks of the purpose or the end of the work of Christ is to ensure that the righteous requirements of God's law might be fully met in us, perfectly met in us, so that we could live before God justified lives, not perfectly, but purposefully, knowing that Christ has kept
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God's holy law in full perfection for us. But that doesn't mean that you and I can simply sit back and say, well, you know,
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I'm saved by grace. I thank God that I can just live any way I want. No, because Paul goes on to say in the same chapter,
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Romans 8 and verse 4, he says that we do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the spirit.
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And why is that? Because imputed righteousness is altogether inseparable from an imparted personal righteousness.
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Indeed, it is the fountain of personal righteousness. Imputed righteousness is the foundation of personal righteousness.
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And where there is imputed righteousness, there will be personal righteousness.
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An unholy Christian is no Christian at all. And if we have any sense, you and I, of the sinfulness of sin, it will surely show itself.
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And dear people, it's not simply a matter of temperament or culture. It's the matter of a heart humbled before God, broken by the law of God, but melted by the love of God in Jesus Christ.
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There are so many things that I could say, but I want to close with this. The greatest crime of the pulpit today, and I believe it's been the greatest crime in every age, but the greatest crime of the pulpit is to withhold
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Christ from sinners. That's the greatest crime of the pulpit. The greatest failure of the pulpit is the failure to hold out
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Christ as the only savior of sinners, to sinners. Now, I understand the spiritual reality that people must first see and feel their need for Christ, if ever they're to receive him.
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I understand we must bring both law and gospel. People must hear the law and be convicted of their sin.
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We cannot afford you and I watering down the biblical's degrading assessment of man and his sin, and his estrangement from, and alienation from, and rebellion against the
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God who made him. There must be this passionate, unrelenting, and I would even say, restless resolve, marshalling all of our gifts and faculties in the
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Holy Ghost to preach Jesus Christ and him crucified, if first things are to be kept first in the pulpit.
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If due caution is not exercised to maintain this sacred trust and resolve, then expediency and selfish objectives will redirect and turn our attention to secondary and peripheral issues.
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We cannot afford that in our generation. Pulpits can degenerate into nothing more than symbolic fire extinguishers, discharging in vain to put out the latest flame of ill will and discontent among the people of God.
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And then left to ourselves, there is also the inevitable tendency, at least so it seems to me, to major on the minor and to minor on the major.
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Surely it was not without reason that Philip Melanchthon, the younger colleague of Luther, prayed
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God on his deathbed that he might be delivered from the Rabiaeus Thalagorum, the raving madness of the theologians.
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Because there is that tendency to be distracted to minor things.
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Those of us here tonight who are ministers of the gospel, who have been set aside for and charged with this sacred trust, we in particular must take great care as Paul did, 1
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Corinthians 2 and verse 2, to make Christ and him crucified and risen again from the dead, the only object of our faith and the singular subject of our preaching, and never ever drive a wedge between the two.
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We must labor to avoid that as much as we would hell itself. We must, as George Whitefield sought to do, preach a felt
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Christ. Surely this is at least in part what Paul had in mind when he said to Timothy, take heed to yourself and to the doctrine.
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Now there is a great deal more I could say with reference to the implications of what I've sought to address tonight.
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But I leave you with this final entreaty. I've talked about it. I want to do it.
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I want to speak a word tonight to those of you here tonight who perhaps are yet strangers to the
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Lord Jesus Christ. Those of you here tonight who have never really turned from your sin and from yourself to the
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Savior. Perhaps you're a member of a church. Perhaps you're a regular church attendee.
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Perhaps you support the church. Perhaps you supported the church faithfully for years with your pocketbook.
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Perhaps you support Alpha and Omega ministries. You may even be a
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Calvinist. You may be cultivating the most orthodox looking tulip garden in your neighborhood.
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But as Thomas Watson put it, knowledge without repentance will be but a torch to light your way to hell.
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And we need to take heed to ourselves, not belittle in the doctrine. Oh no, we've got to have the doctrine, but we must take heed to ourselves.
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And if you are a stranger to Jesus Christ, you need to come to him.
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Though on the outside, there may be every appearance of a genuine Christian profession and commitment on the inside.
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Nonetheless, you know very well in your inside, before God, that something is terribly amiss.
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And you're far from grace and you're far from God tonight. Perhaps you thought about giving yourself up to Jesus Christ.
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You've experienced, perhaps, season after season of divine visitation when
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God drew near to you in the preaching of the gospel. When the convicting power of the
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Holy Spirit was made so real to your own heart that it caused you to tremble as it did
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Felix, as Herod felt the effects of John the Baptist preaching.
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But you tried to put it off, thrust it out of sight and out of mind.
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My friend, you need to face the music tonight. All is not well with your soul. Attending the conference like this will not get you into the kingdom of God.
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The only thing that will get you into the kingdom of God is faith in the
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Lord Jesus Christ. You may be here tonight and I suspect that maybe some of you are.
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You need to be told that you're simply living in make -believe world.
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A never -never land. Thinking as though everything is all right, as though the ultimate issues of life are not hanging in the balance.
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And you've even turned a deaf ear, perhaps, to the accusations of your own conscience and you suppress the chidings of your conscience to yourself.
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And now God is addressing himself to you again right now. And you're hearing him now, perhaps, in a way that you've never heard him before.
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And he's telling you that now is the acceptable time. Now is the day of salvation.
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And if this is indeed the case, then for heaven's sake, while God is dealing with you,
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I call upon you as a minister of the gospel to forsake your sin and run for mercy to Jesus Christ.
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To cling to him and let him cleanse you. And don't put it off any longer.
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You know what Proverbs 27 and verse 1 does? It prohibits your procrastination as a sinner.
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Proverbs 27 verse 1, do not boast yourself about tomorrow. For you do not know what a day may bring forth.
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Do not boast yourself about repenting and believing in Christ tomorrow.
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The word of the gospel comes to us in only one time reference. And you know what? This may sound strange to your ears as a
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Calvinist, but it's true. The word of the gospel comes to us in only one time reference.
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And you know what that time reference is? It's today. Today, if you'll hear his voice, harden not your heart.
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There is only one day on which you can be certain to be saved.
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And that is today. You may be in hell tomorrow, my friend.
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I'm not saying you will be. But you can't say you won't be.
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Because you do not know what a day may bring forth.
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Seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he is near. And when is he near?
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He's near today. He may be far off tomorrow, as far as heaven is from hell.
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Draw near to Christ today. The Lord Jesus Christ stands before you tonight in all the glory of the gospel.
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And he offers you himself. Indeed, he bids you come to him just as you are.
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And he stands before you in all of your crimes and rebellion against the God who made you.
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And he lovingly but sovereignly commands you this moment to stack arms.
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To cease from your hostilities against the God who made you. To end your rebellion against him this very moment.
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And capitulate to his terms of unconditional surrender. Come to Christ.
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My friend, the overtures of mercy are rousing you from your slumber of death tonight.
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Wake you who sleep, the scripture says. Arise from the dead. And Christ will give you light.
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Therefore, you need to begin to be in dead earnest about the ultimate issue of your never dying soul before God.
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If you're outside of Jesus Christ, begin to cry out to Christ saying, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me.
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And be like blind Bartimaeus. Don't let anyone shut you up. You keep crying to Christ for mercy.
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Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And don't be satisfied with shaking a preacher's hand.
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Don't be satisfied with any sense of peace until God the
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Holy Spirit speaks peace to your soul in the words of Jesus. Son, daughter, be of good cheer.
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Thy sins be forgiven thee. What a terrible thing it would be to look back from a godless eternity and to bemoan the reality that tonight you heard these, the very things that would have made for your peace.
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But alas, you refuse to hear now is the day of salvation.
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If you're a stranger to Jesus Christ, may God grant that in eternity, and this will be my prayer, that in eternity, you will have great calls to rejoice endlessly.
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Because this was the time when Christ drew near to you in the ministry of the word and you heeded his voice.
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The time when you responded to him in repentance and faith. The time when the ultimate issues of life, of God, of judgment, of heaven and hell, your guilty and never dying soul, your forgiveness of sin, peace with God.
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In short, all of these great spiritual realities were brought into sharp focus before your own mind and heart.
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In short, that this time came for you this night and did not pass ere you had pressed into the way that leads to life by embracing the son of God's love.
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Even the Lord Jesus Christ, whom to know, is life eternal. Let's pray.
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O Holy Father, we bow before you. And Lord, we thank you for your holy and infallible word.
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And O Lord, when we are in some measure made to taste the powers of the world to come and sense the felt realities of heaven and hell, of forgiveness, of non -forgiveness, and of guilt and of damnation.
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O Lord, these are indeed awesome realities. And we pray,
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O God, that the Holy Spirit would so fasten them upon our minds and our hearts that they would follow us even into the wee hours of the morning, into our bedrooms, when we lay ourselves down to sleep, to the extent that we may feel their pressure and not be able to escape the reality thereof.
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In short, O God, that you would make our souls restless until they rest in you.
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And that, Father, we would find no peace until we find the peace of your forgiveness in the
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Lord Jesus Christ. O Lord, to be able to pillow our heads tonight in the comfort and the unspeakable bliss of knowing that all controversy between us and the
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God who made us has been resolved by the blood of your own majestic Son.
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O Lord, grant that we may know him tonight. And Lord, may the great day of judgment reveal that it was no mere happenstance that these sobering truths were brought to bear upon our hearts and our minds this night.
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God, we plead that the last day of unveiling will show that your word this night did not return unto you void.
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Father, we beg this for the good of our souls and for the glory of our
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Savior, in whose name and by whose merits we offer these our pleas.