Perseverance of the Saints (William Tennent Jr) | The Whole Counsel

Hi, welcome to the Whole Council Podcast. I'm John Snider and with me again is Chuck Baggett and we're looking at the book, Salvation in Full Color. 20 sermons by the Great Awakening preachers on the doctrine of salvation.

It really is quite a wonderful book. It does take some earnestness to make it all the way through. It's 20 chapters and they're not light and fluffy chapters, but it really does prove worth your time.

This week we're looking at the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. And this is a topic that we feel is very important, so we want to stop and talk about that a little bit more in a minute before we work through the sermon.

But Chuck, why don't you introduce.

Us to the preacher? Yeah, the preacher is William Tenet and this is not William I but William II. So it's William Tenet's son, brother to Gilbert, John, Charles and maybe others, but at least those who are also all preachers.

Their dad is the guy who had the log college and so they all studied under him. William Tenet also did, became earnest, I guess a Christian, and wanted to be in the ministry as a young man. So studied under his father, then went to study under his brother Gilbert.

And as he was studying, preparing for examination for ordination, he suddenly fell sick and they thought he had died. They were ready to bury him. And a friend who was a doctor, there's no evidence of life except for a tremor under his left arm, and so he pleads with them to wait.

And brother Gilbert's like, he's dead, he's stiff as a stake, you know, you tell me he's alive. And so the doctor urges them to wait, they wait for like four more days, come back, he's still out, they've tried whatever they can try.

The doctor pleads with them for another hour, hour comes and goes, pleads for half an hour, pleads for a quarter of an hour, and the quarter of an hour was almost up, and all of a sudden he stirred. And they got him something to drink, and he was alive.

Kind of remarkable. He forgot how to read and write and all past memories, but regained those things fairly quickly. And soon after that was able to preach for his brother, John, who had taken ill and eventually passed away.

He lived to the age of 72, and I believe pastored for like 44 years, so it's just kind of an odd situation there at the early stage of his life. But the folks who knew of him said that he hated sloth and was always in action.

Kind of a good sermon for him about walking and being persevering. Here's a man who was always busy,.

And evidently busy about the good things. The sermon is on the perseverance of the saint, and it is the kind of a doctrine I think that is, of all the doctrines in the book, other than the doctrine of regeneration, I think this is one that we could say that evangelicals today have, it's kind of like we have a near miss, which I think, we were discussing this earlier, I think is almost more dangerous than some of the doctrines in this book that people reject.

So maybe the doctrine of election, and they say, well, I don't agree with that. I didn't grow up believing that, or that's Calvinism or whatever, and so they reject that, and there are consequences when there are errors in our biblical understanding.

Just like there are wonderful impacts, every truth has a beneficial impact on the believer, and every error to some degree has a negative impact, but there are some errors that are heresies that you can't be a Christian and believe this.

You can't deny the deity of Christ, but there are some errors that aren't really heresies, but they are errors that are so close to truth that you don't know you have an error, and therefore I find them to be, in our church setting today, some of the most dangerous.

And we talked about this. Think of the Christian life as a race. We have a race, and the starting line, we get wrong, and the finish line, we're getting wrong. So the doctrine of regeneration is often almost correctly understood.

People say, well, you know, you have to be born again. Well, right, but when they go to define that, it's so far from what Scripture says. They think they have the truth, but they don't, so it's almost as if they're at a starting line of a different race, like, hey, guys, you think you're at the starting line.

It's not. And then the finish line, we say, well, once saved, always saved, and there is a lot of truth in that statement. The security of the believer, there's a lot of truth in that statement, and those are precious truths for the Christian, but if we're not careful, we can get really close to the right answer, but if we don't have the biblical picture of the perseverance of the saint, what if we don't end at the right finish line?

Yeah, if you think of the Christian life as a.

Marathon, but you line up to run a hundred-yard dash, you know, you may outpace the Kenyans and the Ethiopians in those hundred yards, but you stop at the wrong place, and you don't run the race that's been set before you.

You don't finish the course, and so you're in danger of being disqualified.

Yeah, really, you know, one of the dangers that we want to warn against, and I think that this chapter really is helpful. It's an antidote against every bad idea of this doctrine. Tenet really does a good job, but one of the dangers we want to warn against is kind of an either-or reaction.

Maybe we could say the pendulum's swinging too far one way or the other, so you know, as evangelicals, we might look at those who say, you can't know that you're saved. It's based on continuing to do good works all the way to the end, and we would say, we believe you have the wrong understanding of the foundation of our peace.

How can Paul say things like, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ? Am I in Christ now? Is there no condemnation for me? Then why would you say that I can't know that, you know, and I can't have any assurance?

So, we react against that kind of a works-based justification. Justified by faith now, but ultimately, if I add enough good works, I stay justified. But in reacting against that, have we gone so far to say that all that matters in Christianity is justification, or the initial act of faith running the race is optional?

Because Christ did it all. And in my opinion, it's almost like hyper-Calvinism, which says the death of Christ, the preaching of the gospel, the living of the Christian life, the prayer life of the Christian, all of that is, well, let's be honest, optional, because all that mattered was that in eternity past, God elected.

So, why is this even necessary? You know, and the same fatal flaw falls over, you know, in this category of, if Jesus has died for me, and I'm saved by grace, then pressing on all the way to the end.

Is just a nice option. Peter really deals with that in 2 Peter, where in the first chapter, he mentions that it is the divine power of God that has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness.

So, everything, you know, there's nothing that you add. And then he turns around two verses later and says, now, for this very reason also, applying all diligence in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.

And he talks about how if you have these qualities, and they're increasing, that you're neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of Christ. But not to have them is to be short-sighted. So, he's, you know, how can he both insist that Christ has given you everything that pertains to life and godliness, and then say, for that reason, supply these things.

Obviously, there's no lack if Christ has supplied them. So, he's not telling us to work for our salvation or add to our salvation, but because you have been saved, there's a response and a life to live in this walk that we're going to talk about.

So, he shows us that both are necessary, and we can't ignore one or.

The other. Well, Tennant does a good job of giving a balance here, and every time, you know, your pastor may speak about this, or every time you talk, you know, you think of talking to a person at work or in school, maybe if you have children talking to one of your children about Christ, it's not as if you have to always give everything that could be given.

Sometimes, you know, in the pattern of Christ, it's pretty clear, sometimes he only says enough to make the people think, and then he leaves them to think, and so sometimes we don't mention both sides of everything, you know, we don't always balance it perfectly.

But Tennant, because this is a chapter in a book, you know, and this is...I don't know how close his sermon was to this, you know, whether he kind of generally...a lot of the books that we have of old preacher sermons, they would have gotten their notes, and they would have kind of filled it out and made it more, you know, complete for print.

And so, it is a good balanced chapter, but he does emphasize persevering, our response, more than God's initiative. In the sermon, he gives kind of three points to open up the sermon, and here they are.

He says he wants to talk about the means of our steadfastness that is pointed to in Colossians 2 .6, that's the verse he uses, as you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, so walking.

And so, he says, well, what is the means of their steadfastness? Second, what is the manner in which they ought to use these means? And third, what is the argument that he gives to enforce the exhortation?

So, very quickly there, the means of perseverance is this walking, a daily simple choice is being made. The manner in which we walk, he says, it's in him, in Christ, and that's where he, you know, he does a good job of explaining to us, you know, don't forget that it is only by being united to Christ by faith that we are constantly supplied with what we need to live out the Christian life.

And then third, this is for those who have, in fact, actually received Christ. So, we can't skip the new birth and jump right, and we talked about this before, and jump right into persevering. So, we need to have the right starting line and the right finishing line.

So, then he goes on to give four major applications of his doctrine. So, here's the statement of the doctrine, it is the duty of all those that have received the Lord Jesus Christ to walk in him. And his four, we'll just go through them a little bit at a time.

The first one is this, he says, I shall inquire how everyone that has Christ does receive him. So, that's the first point, really, of his sermon. If this is true, that every believer must persevere or must walk in Christ all the way to the end, he said, well, how do you even get in Christ?

And under that first point, really, he kind of makes a couple of major emphases. One is, this is the Christ that's offered to you in the gospel. And so, I think that's important, and I'm glad he starts here because it ought to put kind of the nail in the coffin to legalism.

We are talking, as you mentioned, only to people who are alive in Christ, who have cast all hope upon Christ. Christ is not only their righteousness, he is their constant sanctification, and he will be their ultimate completion or redemption.

So, it is only those who belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to them, who live upon the truths of Christ, and they have embraced Christ as he's presented in the gospel. These are the only people that this sermon is for.

But he also gives a warning. You must embrace Christ as the gospel offers him, as scripture offers him, and not as you might think he should be offered to you. So, in other words, there is no room for us coming to the gospel to say, well, I like this and this and this about the Savior, but these are things I'm not really sure I'm ready to take on board.

So, I'm going to take Jesus kind of in pieces, or we could say, I'm going to offer Christ counter-proposals. So, here's the gospel call. Well, yes, but I have a counter-proposal. And so, he makes a strong argument there that if you have not embraced Christ based on Christ's stated terms in scripture, so not what your preacher says or your parents, if it is not based on Christ's declared terms, then you cannot receive him at all.

So, good opening. Then he goes on to say, when can we be said to be walking in Christ? And I think we both feel this is really where his sermon excels. I'm going to read the little headings that he gives, the subheadings, and then Chuck, we can talk about him.

So, when persons may be said to walk so as to comply with the design of the apostle in our text. And he describes, well, what does it look like when you are persevering? He gives these different points.

Number one, this they may be said to do when they walk in the way of God's commandments with diligence and activity, making religion their chief business and employment. Number two, this they may be said to do to persevere when they go on in the duties of piety or holiness with freedom and cheerfulness.

Number three, persons may be said to comply with the exhortation when they act in religion deliberately. That is, when their religious progress is the effect of due consideration and choice. Number four, such as walk in Christ are constant in their religious performances, the general tenor of their lives being spent this way.

And finally, number five, we know that we're persevering in Christ. He says, when we walk in Christ and our walk is progressive, we go forward in our journey zionward. So, with all those things, Chuck, what do you feel are some of the, you know, more important things that he points out there?

The second one that he mentions.

About happily doing what you're doing in the Christian walk. So, not just a list of duties that you're checking off. I think about when I was a kid in discipleship training, or training I think they called it then.

They would come around and ask, who read your Bible every day this week? And I don't remember if there are other questions, but I do remember that one, you know. And certainly there were people, surely there were people who read their Bible happily, but I'm sure as a kid there were times when I raised my hand, and I was very happy to raise my hand, and I hadn't read it to know the Lord, but I read it because I wanted to be able to raise my hand and say, I read my Bible every day, you know.

So, it was a duty, but there was no love to Christ in it. So, what he describes as walking in Him is not just a duty to check off and say, okay, I've done that. You can imagine doing that, you know, in a relationship with your wife.

Check off the list of duties as a husband. Well, there's not much love in that, and you're not going to really honor her by doing that. But for love of her, there are things that you do. For love of Christ,.

We walk in Him. Yeah. So, we cannot really call ourselves persevering in faith, persevering in our walk in the Lord if there is no love to Christ in our duties. Just doing the duties is not enough to be thought of as a Christian who's walking or running the race.

I like the first point that he makes when he says there has to be done with diligence, you know. And really, he presses that through all of these sub-points. There ought to be an intentionality and an earnestness.

And let me read you a quote. When he talks about how really walking with the Lord and really moving forward in that, you know, really pursuing the Christian life with earnestness, how that ought to make every other pursuit in life pale by comparison.

Here's what he writes,. "...all earthly things ought to be sought after with indifference when compared with the pains used in seeking Christ. So the apostle advises us to buy as though they possess not.".

1 Corinthians 7 .30. "...but alas," he writes, "...this is ordinarily practiced the backward way. They pray as if they prayed not. They hear as if they heard not. A spirit of indifference runs through all the veins of their religious performances.

Yes, while they are burning hot in pursuit of the world, they are as cold as stone in the service of God.". So merely going to church, as you mentioned, merely going through the duties with no love, that's not perseverance.

Merely going through these things with a lackadaisical kind of indifference level of energy, that's not what the Bible calls perseverance.

In his first major point that we've already covered, but he mentioned in that about how we come to Christ desperate, you know, there's no other cure, there's no other place to go, there's no other hope, and so we come as beggars to Him.

And maybe one of the reasons that we fail in continuing happily is because we lose something of that desperation, or we think that the cure that Christ has provided is one that leaves us no longer dependent upon Him, when the truth is He has changed us and made us a new person, but we continue to be dependent upon Him.

And we never really graduate from that. The difference might be illustrated in thinking about going to the doctor with some sickness. Maybe you have strep throat, and they give you a shot, and it takes care of the strep throat, and you don't have that anymore, and you don't have to keep going back to the doctor and keep getting a prescription filled.

The strep throat is gone. But you could then think about a different situation where, like we have in our family, I have a family member with a heart transplant, and with the heart transplant, there's been a radical change in this person's health, and so radical that like there are new antibodies that exist within this body that weren't there previously, and yet still dependent upon medicine so that your body doesn't reject that heart.

So not a perfect illustration, but the dependency, you know, there's not been a graduation from dependency upon medicine. There's an ongoing need, even though so much better than she was before, and really kind of a new lease on life, but still there's an ongoing dependence.

We don't graduate. We're not cured in a way that leaves us free of Christ. We're cured so that we are happily dependent upon Christ.

The rest of our lives and into eternity. Yeah. Another point he makes is that this is by a very deliberate choice that we will grow, and not, he says, just by kind of, you know, in a sense, or he says not by religion or custom or education or some good mood.

And I found that really convicting. You know, there are some changes that have occurred in my life in the last 20 years pastoring at Christ Church. Some of those are because of religious custom or my occupation.

So I've learned things by virtue of studying to help other people learn them. But if you were to corner John Snyder and say, what aspects of your Christian life are you seeing real growth in? How are you different in September than you were back in July?

Are you more Christ-like in any single area, even a little bit more? Have you put to death new sins or put to death sins in a new way? You know, have you added anything to your life that wasn't there six months ago because of a yearning to be more like your Lord?

And, you know, he says, and because I think, I felt it was very convicting because I think that a lot that I do as a Christian is by my mood. You know, I hear a sermon and it's very stirring. I read a passage, it's very stirring and, you know, and I'm caught up in a wave of maybe happy emotion, you know, that I belong to the Lord and I want to walk closer than ever.

But I wake up the next morning in a different mood. And do I just go through the motions? I guess maybe one of the ways we could describe his main point in this sermon is not just earnestness and diligence in our persevering, but persevering in the faith is not merely a matter of not apostatizing and not walking away from Christ.

It's not just not quitting. It is really growing and progressing in ways that you might be able to see. So when I think of progress in the Christian life, I have to ask myself, have I made plans to become more like Christ in the last months?

Have I changed my schedule to be more like Christ, you know, to grow? Have I looked back over the last couple of months to see, to check myself? Am I growing and not just assume I'm growing? Have I memorized new passages?

Have I shut off channels that old temptations want to come through? Have I closed more doors and windows against sin? You know, I mean, are there any concrete changes that we could lay before someone who, you know, who wanted to examine our progress so that we could say, by the grace of God, I see myself walking in Christ and not just not turning away.

I am progressing.

Yeah, so rather than just kind of accidentally wandering through the Christian life and thinking that somehow you're going to mature, actually making plans for it, and progressing because you are being intentional about following the Lord.

Yeah, so really convicting, but encouraging too because this is what we've been called to. I mean, there is a finish line. Every Christian will reach the finish line. It's not effortless, but it will happen.

And so if you love Christ and you want to run well to the end, it's very encouraging to realize I will be enabled to run well to the end. You know, there's no need to lay down, like on the sidelines, in a fit of despair, you know, in self-pity and say, oh, I've done such a poor job.

You know, why not look to Christ, repent, believe, run with Him. In another part of the sermon, he comes to talk about some improvements or some applications. And then, so he has what he calls a couple of improvements, and then he has a number of directions.

So two basic improvements, he said, that we will find walking with Christ, really walking with Christ in the way he's mentioned, so earnestly progressing, you know, being careful and intentional. He said, you will find this to be the most joyful, comfortable Christian life.

And it will greatly honor Christ if you live this way. I mean, obviously, if the picture we give of God is that He is kind of a stingy taskmaster, you know, like the Egyptians, make bricks without straw.

I mean, is that what we present to the world? I'm a Christian now, so in the future, there's this great thing, okay, heaven. But let's be honest, day to day, God makes me do a lot of things that are hard.

I have to be holy, and I have to deny myself, and I can't do all the stuff I really want to do. And then, well, how does He supply it? Well, I have a, you know, a 2 ,000-page book that was written a long time ago, and I'm supposed to use it.

And it's like, is that Christianity? Or is Christianity a delightful privilege of living with the King, by the King, for the King? And there is such happiness in His presence that it far surpasses any temporary happiness the world used to offer me.

So, that's one improvement. Another one He says is, make sure Scripture is your guide. So, again, if we're talking about assurance of salvation, or how do I move forward, or what is it in Christ I'm to live on today, go to Scripture again and again.

Well, in the last section, He gives us some directions. So, Chuck, of the directions, which one did you feel most helpful for you?

I thought several were very helpful, but one that caught my attention was about guarding your heart strictly. We know that, you know, the Bible tells us the heart is deceitful above all things. It's one thing to read the verse and to agree with that intellectually, but then to really believe it.

So that you do run to Christ and keep a closeness to Him and watch out for, you know, kind of invasive sins that would pop, that would come in and steal away your focus from Him and steal away your joy and His honor.

But I find it easy to agree with that intellectually and yet think that it's not that bad. That's a temptation to avoid. So guard your heart.

Yeah, the heart is not only deceitful, He says, so you can't really trust it. We can't look to our heart or to our moods or to our present desires and our impulses as the measure of our perseverance. But He also says the heart is the fountain from which every action will flow.

So another point He makes in this section is give great effort to increasing in your love for Christ. So really, I mean, that kind of is the simplest way of saying it. If you want to persevere, if you want to run the race well, then love Christ much.

Love Christ more, always more. And we talked about this last week, love to God. So if we will go back and look at those things that were suggested there, how do I grow in my love to my God? And I give great effort there, then basically persevering will be occurring.

You know, we will be intentional, we will be.

Careful, we will guard our heart. I thought that direction along with the direction to make sure that you're using Scripture as a guide went well together. How do we know that we're loving Christ well and increasing?

Well, we look to Scripture. So it's not just, you know, kind of be thinking that I'm loving Him well, but not really in the ways that.

He appreciates or wants. Yeah. Another key direction He gives is that we should shun every known sin. And He points out you cannot enjoy the sweet nearness of Christ on this Christian journey. You cannot really grow in Christlikeness if at the same time you are treasuring sin.

He says, if you say you are walking in Him, with Him, but treasuring sin knowingly, then all you have is a fiction. It's a fantasy. It's not real. First done one. Yeah. And He gives here a whole list of sins that you must be careful to avoid.

In a sense, at the very first sight of them, flee them. You know, don't let them come close and don't hold a conversation with them. You know, don't argue with them. Don't say, what are you offering me today?

I'm not so sure it's worth it. As soon as you see it, flee it. And let me just read the list of sins that He mentions because I find it quite unnerving that these are not sins that I might have listed here.

And, you know, I think His sermon here is really helpful because it gets behind our religious armor. So here's what He says. He says, here are sins in particular He would warn His people against, allowing harsh thoughts of God to remain in your heart and mind.

You just don't think about that. But if you do harbor harsh thoughts that God has treated you wrongly, that God has failed to be honest to you, you know, that He has not been all He said He would be, you will quit running.

You know, you just despair. Why would you? Doubting God's promises again, or He says, doubting God's threatenings or His warnings. You know, treating these as if these are wonderful words for church services, but they aren't as real as what happens Monday morning.

Third, make sure, He says, you guard your thoughts, but also your speeches and your actions, guarding them against any unclean thing. Unclean, careless talk will destroy any hope of walking intimately with a clean Savior.

Next, be swift to flee every temptation, He says. So in a sense, we could say the temptation is to kind of be sluggish, is to kind of delay in our response to temptation, but immediately, like Joseph, run, crying out, how can I do this great wickedness against God?

And then finally, He says, beware of cowardice. Again, not necessarily a sin that we would think. If you allow this sin to creep in and have a safe spot in your life, it will prevent you from persevering.

But spiritual cowardice is listed in the Bible as one of those damning sins. If a man will not trust God enough to risk everything, then he will not be able to follow Christ. You will always reach a place where eventually you say, I'm not ready to risk that, and the spiritual coward turns backward, you know, and leaves his profession of faith, so to speak.

Yeah. He also mentioned getting entangled with the everyday stuff of life, and that's such a trap. I find it so easy to get enamored with something, some idea or product or, you know, whatever, and start kind of going down this wormhole of researching it and trying to figure out is it better to do it that way or that way, and what are the accessories that go with that, you know?

And this stuff can just consume your mind and your heart. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we.

Were talking about this before the service. You're talking about me, aren't you, Chuck? So, yeah, so, I'm not talking about me. You're in the process of getting a house ready to sell and looking to move, and so that just has a lot of things that could just consume 24 hours a day, and we were talking about something that I was looking at on the internet.

I thought, well, I'd like to get one of those, but then, and my wife said to me, look, do me a favor, just get it. Do not talk to me about it, and I did exactly the opposite of what she said. I said, no, we have to research this, so, and then you look back and you think, where did the hours go, you know, last night?

Did I.

Waste those hours? Right, and that stuff that's wrong in itself, just the time wasted for me or thoughts given to that that should have been given to Christ. Yeah, or like William Tennant,.

To hate a slothful moment, you know? Well, he gives two final directions, and he basically says, stay in the scriptures and frequent the throne of grace in prayer, or else there is really no hope of persevering.

All that talk about progressing in Christ and running the race, well, it is all fluffy talk, you know? I remember early on as a preacher, preaching at a church where a man had passed away, and I don't know if the man was a Christian or not.

I didn't know him very well, but certainly his life was not a particularly encouraging example of a Christian, and when he died, I did the funeral, and someone came up to me afterwards immediately, and they just said what they felt was, you know, I think probably, maybe they believed it, or maybe they felt it was an appropriate thing to say, and they said, well, he ran the race well.

He fought the fight, and I thought, I didn't see any running, no sprinting, no fighting. I hope he was a believer. You know, we don't want to come to the end of our life, and people have to say, well, I mean, he didn't become a heretic.

He didn't leave his wife, you know. He didn't leave Christianity, but was he running? I didn't see him run, and we have had, even at the little church where we pastor, we've had some examples of people who have really run well to the end, and it is such a weighty testimony of Christ.

So helpful. I mean, I remember one, a man named Mike, in our church, a pastor who got cancer, and the decline was very quick, and the things he said about Christ in those final months to young people in our church, he preached a couple times, it really bothered my oldest son and led him to conversion.

He was so bothered to hear someone say such happy things about Christ on the verge of death. So don't underestimate the sweet and enduring impact that running all the way to the end has. Well, we want to give you this closing quote, but to conclude, dear brethren, I need not tell you that the eyes of men and angels are upon us, for we are, according to the apostle, a gazing stock to angels and to men.

Some are watching that they may find something whereby they may reproach us and the way of truth professed by us. Others are watching that they may learn by our example to walk in Christ. In both cases, a fall will be very hurtful to the observers.

To say nothing of the hurt we shall do thereby to our own souls and the dishonor to God, to whom we are bound by the most solemn covenant obligation to glorify. Therefore, let us watch and be sober, walking as children of the day, for our enemy goes about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.