Real Gospel (Part 2)

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.

Christ Did Not Need to Be Brought Down or Raised Up

Two weeks ago, I read on the internet that 78 ,000 people signed up for a one-way trip from Earth to Mars, whatever it was, 2035. One-way trip to Mars. I had a lot of thoughts, learning from a bad example.

But here's the thing. Knowing how ghastly hell is, knowing how eternal hell is, knowing how bad sin is, how holy God is, how real hell is, if you were told you had to go to the moon to earn your salvation so you wouldn't have to go to hell, just how soon would you start making your rocket?

If you were told the only way you can go to heaven is to get to the moon, that's what you have to end up doing, are you going to go to hell? I think you'd start working pretty hard. I know I would be consumed with, as the Damocles sword of every day of my life passed by, I'm not going to make it.

I better try to figure this out. And here's what Paul is saying, quoting Deuteronomy chapter 30. You don't have to go to heaven to get Christ to come down for the incarnation because he's already been incarnated.

You don't have to go into the depths of the abyss to say, Jesus, are you still down there? I better raise you from the dead. You don't have to travel anywhere. You don't have to do anything because it's already been done.

You don't have to scale the heavens. Jesus has come down and glory has filled our soul. Let me read to you Deuteronomy 30. You'll get the idea. Without turning there, let me just read to you the full section from where it's quoted.

For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven that you should say, who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us that we may hear it and do it.

Neither is it beyond the sea that you should say, who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us that we may hear it and do it. But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart so that you can do it.

You don't have to go do anything. You don't have to go someplace. You don't have to say, you know what? For my salvation, I need a man to die for a man. So let me go up into heaven now, climb Jacob's ladder if it's possible, have Jesus cloak himself with humanity, and then bring him down here because the only way I can get to heaven is having a representative who lives for me.

And then he's going to have to die for me because the wage of sin is death and he dies for my sins. He didn't sin but I did so he dies for me and then he goes down into the grave and now I've got to bring him back up again because his salvation isn't good enough until he's been raised from the dead.

Paul says you don't have to do anything. MacArthur said his point is that the righteousness of faith does not require some impossible odyssey through the universe to find Christ. And if I could give you a southern accent from J. Vernon McGee, you don't have to make the trip anywhere to get it.

But I can't do accents. You don't make the word flesh. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. You don't have to go to heaven to find Christ. He's near to you in the gospel. Israel, you don't have to go to heaven to get the gospel.

You don't have to go down to the abyss to get the gospel. The gospel's been preached to you starting in Genesis chapter 3. Because your most sincere efforts can't get you to heaven. Think Tower of Babel.

Can't do it. No need to bring Christ down from heaven. He's already come. And what does it say? Chapter 30 of Deuteronomy found in your text verse 8. The word is near in your mouth and in your heart. You can immediately receive righteousness by faith, trusting in the word of the gospel.

It's accessible. It's available. You don't have to go into the tent of the holy of holies to find God. God came down. Charles Hodge said, instead of directing us to climb up into heaven or to go into the depths, Paul tells us the thing that is required is simple and easy.

Believe with your heart and you will be saved. Which leads us to number 5. How not to be saved? Number 5, just accept Jesus in your heart and go on living like you used to. Just accept Jesus in your left ventricle and go do what you want.

Confessing Jesus as Lord and Believing in the Resurrection

Verses 9 and 10. Now, we always go to chapter 10 verses 9 and 10 and we like to confess these words. We like to say them. We like to memorize them. I love these verses. But see how it's tied with the last verse, because look at verse 8 again, friends.

Here's a little nugget just for you so you can see context. Chapter 10 verse 8, in your mouth and in your heart, in your mouth and in your heart, confess with your mouth and believe in your heart. See how it's tied together?

He's thinking of Deuteronomy 30 verse 9, because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart with all you've got, in other words, it's not talking about location, it's talking about fervency, belief that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

For with the heart one believes, it's justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. Jesus as Lord. Now think about this for a second. That is a stumbling stone for sure. Jesus as Kurios, as Lord.

Do Jews like to say that? I'd like you to go to Israel today and go around and tell people Jesus is Lord. Now think about this for a second. Old Testament, written in Hebrew, God's name is Yahweh, personal covenant keeping name, Yahweh.

But most of the time when the New Testament was thinking about the Old Testament, it was the Greek version of the Hebrew Old Testament called the Septuagint, where we get the word 70. And the Septuagint was written in Greek because Alexander the Great came down and brought in the Greek language, now everybody's speaking Greek, and so guess what the name is for Yahweh in the Greek?

7 ,000 some times when you see the word Yahweh in the Old Testament, in the Greek it's translated to what? Kurios, Lord. Jesus is Yahweh. Israel has to accept that, and right now for the most part, they aren't.

Chapter 11 next week we'll see that there's a hope for Israel, a future for Israel. Jesus as Lord. He's the divine covenant keeping God that made everything. He's the God-man, Isaiah 7. He's the mighty God, Isaiah 9.

He's the substitute for sinners, Isaiah 53. He's the king, Micah chapter 2. He is Yahweh. This is a real belief, it's not just intellectual, it's with your heart. Now it's interesting to me that Gentiles wouldn't want to do this either.

I was just in Corinth with some of the folks that are even here today, and when we went to Corinth we could see the Bema seat, 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 10, the judgment seat, but over by the front there was the little temple to Apollo, and you know it was very simple.

You just had to go there once a year, didn't you? And take a little pinch of incense, and walk over to the temple entrance, and just sprinkle it out like a little fairy dust and say, Caesar is Lord. You can go do whatever you want for the next 365 days.

Takes you 8 seconds to say it, 2 seconds to say it, Caesar is Kurios. That's all you have to do, Caesar is Kurios. But Gentiles can't do that now, can they? When the gospel comes by faith, here's what you must recognize, it's not faith in faith, it's faith in the revealed person of Christ Jesus who is Lord.

You don't make Jesus Lord, Jesus is Lord, and you either confess Him as Lord or you don't. Confess means to agree with. I agree that He is Lord, I believe with all my heart that He is Lord. He is Savior, He's my Savior.

Martin Luther said the life of Christianity consists of possessive pronouns. It's one thing to say Christ is a Savior, it is quite another thing to say He is my Savior and my Lord. The devil can say the first, the true Christian alone can say the second.

I wonder if you're here today and you're not a Christian, Jesus is Lord. You must believe Jesus is Yahweh, sovereign, powerful, authoritative. And when Jesus died on the cross, God the Father raised Him from the dead.

What does the text say? That God raised Him from the dead. You can study the resurrection, the Holy Spirit raised Jesus, Jesus raised Himself, but almost every other time it talks about the Father raising Jesus, why?

Because the Father raises the Son because He accepts the Son's ministry. When Jesus said it is finished, the Father says I validate that death on behalf of sinners. Everywhere you go, Christ was raised from the dead.

The apostles had that as a mantra, as a theme. Acts chapter 2, God raised Him up. Acts chapter 2, God raised up. Acts chapter 3, God raised from the dead. Acts chapter 3, having raised up His servant.

Acts chapter 4, God raised from the dead. Acts chapter 5, God raised Jesus whom you killed. Acts chapter 10, God raised Him on the dead. Acts 13, God raised Him from the dead. Acts 13, raising Jesus. Acts 13, raised Him from the dead.

Acts 13, God raised Him up. Acts 17, any guesses, raising him from the dead. Faith in faith? Hardly. Faith that just says, yeah, I believe some of that stuff and go on living. No, this is with everything.

What does the text say? With the heart, with the center of all your personality. Don't say to yourself, heart knowledge, head knowledge, that's not thinking like the Bible. This is with your mind, with your soul, with your mission control center, with all you've got with your heart.

Serious affection. You have knowledge of it, you have a sense, you have a trust, this is saving faith. Number six, how not to be saved? Don't trust the scriptures. Don't trust the scriptures. If you don't wanna be saved, then don't trust the scriptures.

Salvation by Scripture, Not by Excuses

Oh, how do you know the Bible's true? Verses 11 through 13. Of course, he's talking to the Jews and we can learn from that, but here he says, for the scripture, verse 11, singular, says, pointing to Isaiah 28, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.

No shame, no disappointment, for there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. The same Lord is Lord over all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. We learned a little bit of that in Ephesians chapter three reading today, didn't we?

And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord, literally, and all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved. The same gospel is accessible to Jew and Gentile, and you can just imagine the Jewish monopoly on this God, and Paul says, no, that's not true at all, and when he's saved, no one will be disappointed.

No disappointment when you get saved, no being ashamed. He's got a power to save, whether it's a Jew or a Gentile, abounding in riches, high privileges, excellencies of God, and everybody who believes will be saved because the scriptures teach that.

Israel's failure was a failure to believe God and his word, that you have to believe. You don't work for heaven. What shall we do that we may work the works of God, they asked Jesus. He said, this is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.

And just a few more, number seven, believe that people only need natural revelation to get saved. Believe that people only need to learn about the sun and the moon and the stars and how powerful God is and how wise he is by nature, by creation to be saved.

Verses 14 through 17 don't teach that. It teaches that people need to have an idea of who God is. It's not faith in faith, it's in the object of faith. Verse 14 and 15, haven't these verses inspired millions of missionaries?

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? Now we're thinking of Israel here, but of course it has great implications for us, the people we know. And how are they, Israel, to believe in him of whom they have never heard?

How are they to hear without someone preaching? See how the rhetorical questions just start adding up? There's gotta be preaching, there's gotta be hearing, there's gotta be belief so God can be called on.

And how are they to preach unless they're sent? As it is written, more Bible. How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news. I said to the young moony lady, I said, let me tell you some good news.

Now I don't think anybody really has beautiful feet visually, physically. My opinion, every person ever born has hobbit feet, just look bad. But by the grace of God, I preached the good news to her and for a flash on Wednesday night, my feet were really beautiful.

I just thought I pulled in randomly to get a good spot, no door chippers underneath this tree. But God had me pull right there and here comes a girl to my door. And then I said, let me tell you some good news.

In spite of your wickedness, she looked at me and she said, do you really think I'm bad? I said, I think you're so bad that if you die the second, you're gonna go straight to hell forever. She said, really?

I said, yeah, but here's the good news, you don't have to. I have some really good news for you. Jesus Christ of the Bible is true and he is such a kind savior, such a generous savior, such a good savior.

He didn't stay in heaven, he cloaked himself with humanity and heaven came down, the personal work of Christ Jesus. And he lived a life you could never live. Think about it, up until his dying breath, practically he's obeying the law for you.

What does he say to Mary? He says of Mary to John, honoring his parent to the very end. John, behold your mother, taking care of his mother, earning righteousness for all those who would believe. And then he dies on the cross.

He dies on the cross for people like me who are arrogant and prideful and selfish. And for you too, trying to tell people that Sun Yung Moon is the Messiah. Actually Sun Yung Moon in 1935 was approached by Jesus, allegedly, small J, and Jesus said, I didn't finish everything at Calvary, could you help me?

You gotta repent of that kind of thinking. I have good news for you. I said, wouldn't you like to be forgiven? Wouldn't you like to go to heaven? You've got a zeal but not according to knowledge. How do they believe in whom they've not heard?

And I wanted to tell them who Jesus was. Reminds me of the story of the evangelist Gypsy Smith. He's a Gypsy in England. He came to Christ as a young boy. He loved to preach up and down the country. There in America, Harry Ironside said that Gypsy Smith came to Moody Church in Chicago on one occasion and held meetings and told about his conversion and his Gypsy life.

The people would sit in trance with these wonderful stories he told. At the end of the meeting, he would give an altar call and people would surge forward in great numbers. Dr. Ironside said he used to wonder what they were coming for.

Did they want to be Gypsies or what? Because he never told them about who Jesus was in all his glory and they never were given anybody to believe in. God could have picked angels to preach the gospel to people.

He could have had an angel come down and bring some gold tablets as a representative but he picked people like us. How beautiful are the feet of those who bring glad tidings of good things. Verse 16, but they have not all obeyed the gospel.

Israel has not obeyed for Isaiah says, quoting Isaiah 53, one Lord who has believed what has been heard from us, what he has heard from us rather so faith comes from hearing and hearing through the message of Christ.

A body of truth, doctrine. They didn't believe. God sent the messengers, they proclaimed the message. Jews heard the message, they didn't believe. Spurgeon said faith cannot be washed into us by immersion nor sprinkled upon us in christening.

It is not to be poured into us from a chalice nor generated in us by a consecrated piece of bread. There's no magic about it, it comes by hearing the word of God and by only that way. Literally out of a report of God.

That's why we want to preach the full counsel of God. Number eight, two more and then we're done. How not to be saved, learning from Israel's bad example. Number eight, make excuses for unbelief. Make excuses for unbelief.

No Excuse for Unbelief

How could a good God do that thing and allow the bombings in Boston? How could he allow those tornadoes? There's a thousand kinds of unbelief that's out there. You know, the Jews heard but maybe they can stand behind the excuse, I heard but I just didn't understand.

Paul's gonna take away that excuse too. And he's going to turn to the gospel as it relates to Jews and Gentiles. Israel pleading ignorance, we don't know. Verse 18, but I ask, have they not heard? Indeed, he quotes Psalm 19 here, verse four.

For their voice has gone out to all the earth and their words to the ends of the world applying that verse on natural creation now to specific revelation. He goes on to say in verse 19, but I ask, did Israel not understand?

First Moses says, Deuteronomy 32, 21, I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation. With a foolish nation, I will make you angry. Yes, they did understand because they're so full of understanding.

They're mad and jealous and envious that the Gentiles are now in. They understood it enough to know what was going on with the Gentiles believing. Then Isaiah is so bold to say, Isaiah 65, one, I have been found by those who did not seek me, Gentiles.

I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me. Israel's unbelief has no excuse. I could say it today because I want you to believe. If you're not a Christian, there is no excuse for not believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Oh, I met a lot of Christians and they're hypocrites. Oh, I could never call God my father because my father abused me. And the list could go on and you could go on and you could have all kinds of valid hurts in your life, but I'm telling you, the God who made you and gave you a conscience is telling you now through the scriptures, you're a sin fling.

You need a savior. Here's the savior, look and live. And finally, number nine, how not to be saved. Reject God's gracious invitation. Of course, God's sovereign, but look at the responsibility here of Israel and now I apply it to you as well.

God's Gracious Invitation and the Thief on the Cross

The graciousness of God. Who's a God like this who's slow to anger and forgives? If I was God, I sure wouldn't do this, but this is the God with whom you have to do, verse 21. But of Israel, he says, all day long I've held out my hands.

If he was Moses, he'd need somebody to hold up his arms to a disobedient and contrary people, quoting Isaiah 65, two. The emphasis here in the Greek is all day long, all day long. Isaiah 65 says in its fullness, I spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices.

A people who provoke me to my face continually, sacrificing in gardens, making offerings on bricks, who sit in tombs and spend the night in secret places, who eat pig's flesh and broth of tainted meat is in their vessels.

But he says in verse nine, I will bring forth offspring from Jacob and from Judah, possessors of my mountains. My chosen shall, excuse me, shall possess it. Extending his hands out. To think that even every person here who's not a believer, the first time you sin, you deserve death and hell and God's been patient with you, hasn't he?

Waiting for you to believe. One day you'll die. I read a book this week about death and the first sentence hooked me on the book because I needed to hear it. The first sentence of the book was, one day you will die.

Israel can't use God's sovereignty as an excuse. God is waiting. She's willfully rebellious. As I talked to Karen a little bit longer, she would say things like, yes, but you mean to tell me that if you wait till your deathbed and believe in Jesus, then you're gonna go to heaven even though you lived a wicked life?

I thought, well, she's heard that from Christianity someplace. And I said, you know, the thief on the cross, the scoundrel, the sinful man, the one that deserved death, looked at Jesus and he said, Lord, remember me when you come in your kingdom.

And what'd the Lord Jesus Christ say? Not when I come, but how about today? Isn't that just like the Lord, just abounding in loving kindness and just overdoing extravagant love. Today you will be with me where?

In paradise. Now later I did some research. I didn't know this when I talked to Karen. The thief on the right in Mooney theology, that sounds funny, doesn't it? Means capitalism. And the thief on the left, of course, left communists.

Communism, capitalism. But she didn't know it and I didn't know it, so it didn't matter. I just said, but the Bible says, Jesus said, I grant you forgiveness because I die for sinners like you. This is what essentially was going on.

And I'm gonna be raised for sinners like you. And that thief got it. I said, yes, it's true because Christ atonement is so great, but you're not supposed to wait till later. Believe today. She said, well, I've got to get going.

There was a big black van full of all kinds of other kids there and they would just descend on White City and then go someplace else. I thought, you know what, she's like my daughter, an 18-year-old girl.

And I just said, you know, there's a reason why we met today. Here's a little booklet by John Blanchard called Ultimate Questions, and it's gonna tell you more about Jesus because I know you have to go.

I want you to be forgiven. I want you to go to heaven. I said, what's your name? She said, my name's Karen. I said, Karen, and I got out of my car. I said, I'm gonna be praying for you. I'm gonna pray that God shows you the excellencies of Jesus Christ, the only way of salvation, because one day you're gonna die and then you're either gonna go to heaven or hell, and Jesus is the way.

You ought to repent and believe in this risen Savior. And she started walking away. She smiled and I said, I'm praying for you.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts. 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 8 .30 and 11 a .m., and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m. We're located on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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