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Pastor Mike Abendroth preaches through 1 Corinithians 1!
No Compromise Radio. Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.
Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse with no compromise.
What if some guy just got up and said, thus saith the Lord? And another guy got up here and says, thus didn't say the Lord, thus saith the Lord. How would you determine the difference? Answer, God would confirm true, USDA approved, UL approved, and how did he approve it?
By signs and wonders and spectacular things. If I would stand up 2 ,000 years ago and say, God told me to have you give all your money to Jesus, this is my address. By the way, that's what people do on TV.
And another person said, God told you that you should be a sacrificial giver, you should give with cheerful liberality, and if you're not compelled to give, then just don't give. And then we say, huh, well they're different, which one do we follow?
And then all of a sudden, I walked down and I touched everyone on the forehead and everyone here who was sick was completely healed, not just of bad backs, not just of leg lengthening, not just of making fillings turn into gold, but new arms grew out.
People could stand up out of their wheelchairs. People would say, you know what, the doctor's given me five months to live and I am completely whole. Who would you believe? You know who you would believe.
Today, that's not an issue for us because we confirm the word preached by the word canonized in the scripture. People show up at Corinth. Hey, you're in this big city, there's all kinds of people saying, God told me, God told me, God did this, God did that.
Paul showed up and said, Jesus Christ and Him crucified, nobody else, believe in Him or you pay for your own sins, and then he did signs and wonders and healings and the church of Corinth said, confirmed.
I believe it. That's what he's talking about here. The testimony concerning Christ was confirmed in you. First, externally, and then, of course, internally, confirmed with signed gifts, miraculous works of the Holy Spirit.
Listen to what B .B. Warfield said. It's a shocking quote. Miracles do not appear on the page of scripture vaguely, here, there, and elsewhere indifferently without a signable reason. In other words, why are there miracles in the Bible?
Take all of the history of the world and condense biblical miracles and you'll have about a hundred years of biblical miracles. Why are they just punctuation marks here and there? Why aren't they all everywhere all the time?
They belong, Warfield said, to revelation periods when God reveals His mind and appear only when God is speaking to His people through accredited messengers declaring His gracious purposes. That word there in your Bible, confirm, means a legal guarantee.
How is this legal guarantee confirmed in your heart? By the confirmation of your eyes and senses and you say, this guy is doing miracles. The next book, 2 Corinthians, Paul says this. The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance by signs, by wonders, and by what?
Here comes an apostle called by God, thus saith the Lord. And how is he confirmed? How is his message confirmed and how is he personally confirmed? Answer, signs, miracles, and wonders. And what's the result?
There's this wonderful double result. Look at the passage, chapter 1, verse 6 and 7. Specifically, the double result of this confirmation in verse 7. Number one, so you're not lacking in any gift. God has wonderfully given gifts and you're not lacking in one.
What's the second result? That since you know the truth, you can understand the truth, it's been preached to you, it's been confirmed outside of you, it's been confirmed in you, it should all lead to what?
Jesus is coming back. And I'm going to await eagerly. If this is the foretaste Jesus saves from sin temporally, I can't wait till he comes back and deals with it altogether. If he's taking care of the power of sin, if he's taking care of the penalty of sin, I want him to come back and take care of the what?
Presence of sin. If you know Jesus Christ has saved you from your sins now and you believe the gospel message, repent or perish, Jesus is the only Savior, the risen Savior, and you must trust in him. You'll say to yourself, I read the Bible, he's coming back.
That's exactly what happened with Corinth. Not lacking in any gift, that was the first result. They're waiting eagerly for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Romans says the creation waits in eager expectation.
And then Paul says in Romans, we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons. God, thank you for BBC. Their past benefits, they're saved. And you've confirmed the work in their life so much they're anticipating future benefits, the second coming.
How is the gospel confirmed in our hearts and our minds? We don't need sign gifts anymore because signs pointed to something. They pointed to the close of the canon. How is the truth confirmed in you?
Chapter and verse. I can confirm everything I say or not say because it's right here. Why do you think, by the way, I say often, look at your Bibles. Look at yourself. Look inside yourself. That's what people say now.
Just look inside yourself. You've got to take a good long look. And I with you have looked long enough to realize that's not a really pretty picture. So I need information from outside myself. How can I confirm God says?
I say to you, you are going to die one day and stand before God and then there'll be a judgment. And Jesus will either be the one who absorbs God's judgment for you or you will absorb God's judgment. How do you know that's true?
You know it's true because it's confirmed what? Acts 4, verse 12. Number four, the fourth reason you could be thankful. God, I think of BBC and I don't think of the parking lot anymore. People complain about the parking lot.
And, hey, truth be told, I probably complain about the parking lot too. I love a new parking lot. But you go, I'm going to think about BBC and I'm going to go, oh, man, that parking lot's weak. That person I met the other day, I thought they were nice and I thought we were going to be friends.
And they just, they haven't acted the way they should. The list could go on and on. How about when you think of BBC, you go, God, I thank you. You've given us saving grace. You've given us preaching. You've given us illumination.
You've given us a confirmation that you're true and that you're coming back. And number four, you can be thankful for BBC. The people here, the sinful people here at BBC, less than perfect, because God will graciously one day glorify each and every Christian here.
Because God one day will make them not just positionally perfect, but practically perfect. Why worry about what's going to already happen? If I look around and I say myself, boy, I sure wish, you know, they wouldn't act that way.
You know what? One day you won't. You say, I sure wish Pastor was just, he was kinder and he was more loving. One day I'll be perfectly loving and perfectly kind. By the way, on a side note, when people go, well, that's not a very loving church.
Here's what they mean. They have the wrong view of love because love means we'll tell you the truth. Love rejoices. First Corinthians 13 with the what? Truth. I love you. I'll tell you the truth. Love is not, ooh, ah, it's not that.
I guess it can contain that. But the love I'm thinking about is agape love. Love tells you the truth. So when people say, well, you know, you're not very loving, I have a couple comments. One, would you pray for me to be more loving?
Two, are you sure you understand what loving is? And three, are you just so convicted by the word of God you've got to say something to get relief to go to run to some kind of pablum place? Okay, back to the message.
I'm glad people show up. Every week I preach and I go, I can't believe they showed up the next week. It's the jackhammer of the word, right? Soft-hearted people want hard words from the pulpit. Doug Wilson's right.
They say, Lord, I've got a hard heart. I don't love my wife like Christ loved the church, but I want to. I haven't, but I have that desire. I know that's what pleases you. I know that's what honors you.
So, God, convict me. One of my favorite things in life, especially when ladies come to me and say after the church or e-mail, I like that hard message. I think to myself, not that, I think God has worked in your heart.
Because if you like hard messages, you don't just wake up one morning, just slay me, God. That's what God is doing in your heart. Show me somebody who's mature and I'll show you someone who says, I want the truth.
And I don't have to be stroked and I don't have to be coddled. Tell me the truth. Now, sometimes we need to encourage people and sometimes we need to comfort. I'm not saying we don't do that with the word of God.
Paul says this, I thank God that these imperfect Corinthians are one day going to be in heaven and they'll be perfect. That's good. I like that. Verse 8, who will also confirm you. He confirms the message, Christ crucified, and he confirms that earlier.
And now he confirms you. He doesn't confirm in you now. He confirms you. You will be confirmed. To the end, blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not just confirmed in you, but now confirm you.
In spite of the false gods at Corinth. In spite of the thousand priestess that would come down for communal worship. Sex with these people in Corinth to say their communion with the gods. In spite of Satan and the culture and self and everything else.
Paul said every one of these churches, people at the church of Corinth who's been saved, guess what? Everyone is going to heaven. I have a question for you. Can God lose a Christian? People say, well, can you lose your salvation?
Friends, retreat back to point one. If God makes you a Christian, then God's not going to, in his immutability, unmake you a Christian. God says, I've given them saving grace and that saving grace will finish, won't it?
I sang a song even before I was a Christian. He who, I want to sing it for you, but you know what it'll be. He who began a good work in you, right? He'll be what? Faithful to complete it. That's Philippians 1 .6.
See, in spite of my singing, you know the verses. He who began a good work in you will be unfaithful, won't follow through. I am a prime example. Sometimes people say, well, we just wish you could confess more of your sins in the pulpit.
You'll feel like you're more one of us and we'll feel like you're one of us. Hang out with me for a while, you'll feel like I'm one of you. It's not my job to confess all my sins, but I'll confess something here.
How's that? I have great intentions to do things. It's hard for me to follow through and get them all done. I think, you know, I'm going to paint the trim in the kitchen and I'm going to do this and I'm going to do that.
And I've got this to-do list that starts off really well. I can show you another illustration. I have literally in my house 20 books that have a bookmark in them. Those are the ones that aren't hidden under the bed so Kim can't see.
But there's books everywhere. In the old days, I could say, well, if a neutron bomb hits, they're good to kind of protect us from the fallout. Now with nukes, it doesn't work. So I say to myself, I start jobs, but I don't finish.
God started a work at Corinth, but I don't know if he's really going to finish. Pretty sinful, having incest with their mother-in-law. How can God work in them? He says he is going to confirm you to the end and blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ.
That is absolutely amazing. He's not saying in their life they're blameless now, but on judgment day they will be blameless. Why? Because all the blame that would be poured out on them has been poured out on Jesus.
They have a substitute. They have blood over the door in their hearts, as it were. That word blameless is very fascinating. It means without accusation. Elders are to be without blame. You say, well, you just said you sinned.
Without accusation in 1 Timothy 3 means this. The accusations don't stick. Think about it. If an elder was going to be taken out of the ministry for one accusation, anybody at any time could go, I'm going to get rid of that guy.
I've been called all kinds of things. But the question is, does it stick? Is it true? And you can just imagine Satan with all his ferocity says, look at how they sin. Look at what they do. And on judgment day, what will stick?
Nothing. You'll be without blame. Not reprovable. Turn with me, if you would, to Jude verse 24. There's no chapters in Jude. Jude 24. Let me show you another passage that's really close. The same English word with a different Greek meaning that I think will encourage you, where on judgment day you will be blameless.
And I think that's worth thanking God for. And by the way, I think it's worth saying to yourself, why am I getting all caught up in people's imperfections when one day they will be perfect? Jude is sitting down to write this letter, kind of like Romans, and he gets interrupted divinely with some news.
And he has to contend for the faith. And there's all kinds of bad teachers, false teachers. Will people make it? And then at the very end, they will make it. Look at Jude 24. Same English word but with a different meaning.
But I think it's helpful for us to remember our king today this way. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling. Literally him who is able. He's always able. He doesn't slip. He doesn't forget.
He doesn't make a mistake. He doesn't overlook. This God who is continually able to keep you from stumbling. The word keep there, by the way, means a shepherd would watch his sheep, the flock. And he would keep his flock by night.
What does keep mean? Watch, protect, guard. That's exactly what this means here. He who is able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy.
Who's able to do that? By the way, when sinful man or woman is around holy God, what happens there physically? Moses says he sees God and what does he describe? The pavement underneath God because he can't see God and live.
When Isaiah sees the vision of God and he's transported into the heavenlies, he sees Jesus. What does he describe? Starting from the bottom up. When Peter says, hey, Jesus, you just got us a lot of fish.
This is pretty exciting. You're the God of the universe. Way to go. Knuckles. High five. What did he do? He says, depart from me. I'm what? I'm sinful. You're holy, thrice holy, and I'm sinful by word and by being.
How do you stand in the presence of God? How on judgment day do you stand? I see too many people. They go into court. They're hiding their face. They've got the thing on their head. They don't want to be seen.
They try to get into court and then the deputy or someone else, face the judge. The verdict will be read. Stand and face the person or whatever they say. How do you stand before God? Look at the text.
Blameless with great joy. How does that happen? The word blameless there isn't the one we just looked at in 1 Corinthians, but I think it's exciting to see. 1 Corinthians is accusations don't stick because the accused has been Christ Jesus.
He's cursed in our place. This one means no defect. You've got an animal. You want to slay the animal for Passover. You couldn't give the one that somehow wasn't perfect. It had to be whole. It had to be perfect.
It had to be this something that was going to be sacrificial. If you give to God something, you know, the run of the litter, then that's not sacrificial. You give the run of the litter up anyway. You give your best.
This is that word here. Who's able to make you stand in the presence of his glory? Blameless with great joy. And by the way, I can't stop here and jump back to 1 Corinthians quite yet. Whose joy is it?
Will you be joyful in heaven? As a five-year-old would say to me, duh. This is God's joy. Who's got joy over the sinner who's been redeemed? God's joy. That is an amazing thing. The joy of God. How about Zephaniah?
It reminds me of that. Chapter 3. Speaking of the remnant of Israel. The Lord your God is in your midst, a victorious warrior. He will exalt over you with joy. Joy. Sounds like Hebrews 12. Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.
Who for the joy set before him. That's that kind of joy. Now let's go back to 1 Corinthians chapter 4. I just wanted to show you that blameless word standing before God. We're without spot, without blemish.
Because we have the righteous robes of Christ. And we have no accusation that can stick. Satan can say it, but it won't stick. Because Christ has absorbed the just punishment. Do us. So Paul says, I'm just thankful when I think of God.
He's going to finish it. You can't miss this, by the way. In verse 8. This is just kind of a freebie. Who will confirm you to the end blameless in the day of our Jehovah Yahweh Lord. Remember that in the Old Testament?
The day of our what? The day of the Lord. Cataclysmic judgment. And now it's called the day of, who's the judge? Now we call it not the day of our Lord. Here Paul calls it the day of Jesus Christ. This is the deity of Christ.
Friends, don't get people, don't let people influence you. Because they're less than perfect here at BBC. Because one day they will be. And salvation has been determined by God. Left up to them, they couldn't do it.
But it's been decreed by God. And now number 5. We need to finish this. Wrap it up. Can't talk about Thanksgiving next week for Thanksgiving. We have to get to the division section. All right. By the way, I'm thankful, very thankful as a pastor.
That I'm not held here at the church to the hallmark holiday preaching schedule. When do you ever get to preach besides these other things? I mean, how many Mother's Day sermons can I preach on Hannah and Proverbs 31 and other things?
You just want the truth. And you don't have to say, well, now it's this particular day. And it's flag day. I read something very interesting, by the way. This is a side note too. It's easy to take a pulpit out of a church.
But if you mess with a flag, you're fired as a pastor. Pulpit you don't need. But if you take that sacred American flag. I'm patriotic, by the way. I wish I would have served our country in the military so I could say these things.
It's kind of like when I say things about alcohol. I don't drink, but it's not always a sin to drink. I think to myself, this church just wants the truth. And if I preach to you a passage next week, and it should be during Thanksgiving time.
And it's on how not to have church splits. You'll go, thank you. That is a great thing. It's like Calvin gets kicked out of Geneva. Three and a half years, he comes back. You think he'd say, it's great to be back.
Here's my introductory sermon. What did he do? He said, now remember three and a half years ago we were in that particular chapter and verse? Turn your Bibles there. That's where we're picking up. I pastor the greatest church in the world.
I thank God for you that I could just preach the text. Actually, this week I listened to some kind of how to be a good public speaker. Unbeliever wrote it, but I just was listening. It was on tape. And they said, people will want you to speak less.
No one will ever come up to you and say, I sure wish you would have preached or taught a little bit longer. And I thought, ha-ha, they don't know Bethlehem Bible Church because last week a person said, oh, it's only 1130, and we've still got plenty of time.
Did I make that in you? Did you make that in you? You just come up with it, and you're trying to flatter me? That is the grace of God in your heart when you say, I used to hate biblical preaching. I was watching my clock the whole time, and now the message is over.
I haven't watched my clock because I want to know what the Bible says. Who came up with that? Paul could say, I thank my God that that's the way people love to hear the word. Number five, 1 Corinthians 1, verse 9 will tell us that you can be thankful for people at Bethlehem Bible Church because God is faithful.
Corinth might not be faithful. Bethlehem Bible Church might not be faithful, but God always is faithful. The same sovereign God that called the Corinthian church will finish the work, as I said earlier.
Years ago, we had this promise keeper movement, and I just thought, I got enough promises I already break. I don't need seven more. And so promises in God, chapter 1 of 2 Corinthians, verse 20, yes and amen, only in Christ Jesus.
God is faithful. The way the literal translation works is faithful is God. To push to the front of the Greek order of wording the emphasis. So instead of taking a yellow highlighter for us, we'd underline faithful.
They didn't have highlighters, and they probably didn't have yellow highlighters either. They would flip it around. Faithful is God for emphasis. You can't read 1 Corinthians without saying these people are faith what?
Less. They're unfaithful. But God is faithful. How can you thank God for BBC Less Than Perfect? You go, because God is faithful. Moses knew it. He is God, the faithful God who keeps his covenant. Isaiah knew it.
Because of Yahweh who is faithful. Paul said it to the church of Thessalonica, 1 Thessalonians 5. Faithful is he who calls you, and he also will bring it to pass. Faithful means a prop or a support or a crutch.
Specifically, this word is talking about a person, not a thing. So it's not like a wooden crutch that Scott Goddard was using with his broken ankle. It's more of a person who acts like a crutch, but they're a person.
They're the person of God. Faithful. Absolutely relied upon. Psalm 33 said, God is faithful in all he does. You say, I'm suffering, 1 Peter 4. Entrust your souls to a faithful creator who does what is right.
How can we be thankful for less than perfect people? God is faithful. A .W. Pink said, unfaithfulness is one of the most outstanding sins of these evil days. In the business world, a man's word is, with exceedingly rare exceptions, no longer his bond.
In the social world, marital infidelity abounds on every hand. The bonds of sacred wedlock being broken with as little regard as the disregarding of an old garment. In the ecclesiastical, ecclesiastical, in the church realm, now the point of my passage, in quote, has no effect.
I'm not going to even read the end. Okay, I'll read it. In the church realm, thousands who have solemnly covenanted to preach the truth make no scruple to attack and deny it. Yet Psalm 89, the Bible says God's faithfulness surrounds him.
Envelops him. He is faithful. His faithfulness should help us not to worry. His faithfulness should help us not to complain. His faithfulness should say to our hearts, I can be confident in this God. He started the work.
He'll finish it. By the way, medical care can't stop this. Obamacare can't stop this. Nuclear bombs cannot stop this. The plunging dollar cannot stop this. Your 401k cannot stop this. And woe to us if we're unfaithful.
But even your unfaithfulness can't stop this. Because God is faithful.
No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Ebendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.
Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 10 .15 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.
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