Doubt vs. Unbelief

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In this episode of “No Compromise Radio”, Pastor Mike Abendroth dives into the profound themes of doubt and assurance in the Christian faith, drawing from Luke 7 and other scripture. Mike examines John the Baptist's moment of doubt while imprisoned, exploring the distinction between doubt and unbelief and highlighting Jesus' compassionate response. Through a blend of theological insight and personal anecdotes, Mike reflects on the struggles believers face in reconciling trials with faith. He emphasizes the unshakable assurance found in Christ's redemption and reminds listeners that God’s grace triumphs even in moments of questioning. The episode also features a discussion on the metaphor of triumph in scripture, parallels with Roman celebrations, and the ultimate vindication found in Christ. With humor and authenticity, Mike encourages listeners to persevere in faith, leaning on God’s promises and enduring love.   Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/LlbMBTjEigo [https://youtu.be/LlbMBTjEigo]  Produced/Edited By: Marrio Escobar (Owner of D2L Productions) 

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry. My name is Mike Abendroth, and I'm your host. Today, just a quick reminder why we're called
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No Compromise Radio. In the old days, it's because I saw a lot of compromisers and I didn't want to compromise.
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These days though, we've moved from a discernment ministry, discernment to a ministry more focused on the
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Lord Jesus Christ, in line with Colossians chapter one, verse 28, Luke chapter 24, and more, 1
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Corinthians chapter two, verse two, et cetera. So we try to talk about the one who never compromised. Can you imagine
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Jesus, the true man, the perfect man, never compromised. So that's the point of the show is thinking about the
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Lord Jesus and how he never compromised. If you want to write me, you can. Generally, info at nocompromiseradio .com,
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or specifically, if you want to email me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com. Don't forget two new books that are out,
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Cancer Is Not Your Shepherd, and also the new book, Law Gospel, A Primer.
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It looks like it's primer, but primer. And 40 questions about law gospel, super simple, super easy. On the left -hand side, it's got a question, what are the three uses of the law?
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Then I explain it very briefly. On the right side of the page, there'll be Beza and Calvin and Bavink and others quoted to describe what
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I just talked about, the three uses of the law. So that's on Amazon. If you want to order 10 or more, you can email me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.
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Well, we have kind of a different setup here today. My friend Mario's in the studio and we're working on just different vantage points and views on No Compromise Show.
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So we've got the audio. I tried not to wear old people's clothes. I think
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I'm young and hip and with it with the younger crowd until I see a picture of me, or I have a reference that's pop culture from 1965.
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So today it's a little different, but shout out to Mario. And I think
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Mario, you've been coming to the church here for, has it been 15, 20 years? Something like that.
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He's shaking his head. He's dressed like he's younger and hip, but I'm not. I've been talking a little bit on the show about doubt and assurance.
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And of course, if I think back to that book, Gospel Assurance that has J .C. Riles chapter on assurance and Thomas Brooks and others,
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Christians struggle with doubt. And so today on the show, I wanted to talk about doubt and assurance.
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As you know, I've been in Luke chapter seven, working through this whole issue of doubt. And can you imagine out of all people,
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John the Baptist was doubting. And before we're too hard on John the Baptist, people in Matthew chapter 28 saw the resurrected
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Jesus and there's doubt. Elijah on the run from Jezebel, there's doubt.
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There is doubting Thomas. He gets the name. I think kind of, it's a bad name for him. He did doubt, but the Lord was very kind after that and answered his request.
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And of course he's no longer a doubter, but John the Baptist doubted. And so you doubt,
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I doubt, what do we do with those doubts? That's the real question. But even more importantly, what does
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God think of you, the doubter? What does God think of a doubting child, a doubting son or daughter, a doubting
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Mike, a doubting Mario, what does he think about those people? And of course it's very surprising because in our world of law and transactional theology, we do bad things and bad things happen to us and vice versa.
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But God is very kind, very gentle, very patient with his children.
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And of course, if he has redeemed us and he has by the blood of the lamb, he's going to take care of every other need that we have and he will help us when it comes to doubting.
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And from the get -go, we need to be saying to ourselves, doubt and unbelief are completely different.
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I guess after a while doubt could lead to a resolute unbelief, but typically doubt and unbelief, especially as we're thinking about it today, doubt presupposes belief.
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How can you doubt something that you don't believe? You doubt something that in fact you believe. So doubt presupposes faith.
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Unbelief on the other hand is this refusal, this hard -hearted, as I said earlier, resolute, just I'm fixed on this,
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I am not moving anywhere. And so today with the backdrop of Luke 7, I want to talk again about doubt and assurance.
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So as you remember, Luke 7, verse 18, the disciples of John reported all these things to him.
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And John calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord saying, are you the one who is to come or shall we look for another?
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So Luke 7, verse 18 and following, John's in jail. Remember he was preaching against sexual sin.
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He's in the dungeon from Josephus' description, pretty gloomy dungeon, dead sea area.
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And John is wondering, are you the expected one? And you know why he's thinking this, don't you?
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Because if you think about what the Messiah would come and do, the Old Testament talks about certainly healing, certainly raising people from the dead, certainly taking care of people who are mute and blind and deaf, but Jesus is going to come back.
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The Old Testament teaches us even in Isaiah 61, strong, powerful, warrior, swords, chariots, and Rome is oppressing the
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Israelites, John's in jail. I thought when the Messiah comes, he's going to free the oppressed and free the captives.
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And so John has some doubt. Now, to be fair, people like Calvin and Luther and J .C.
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Ryle, they think John's not doubting, but his disciples are. But if you just read the text plainly, you'd say to yourself, the centurion earlier in the chapter has servants to go ask
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Jesus something. And those servants are really at the beck and call of the centurion. And so similarly here, John the
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Baptist sends those men. He can't get out of jail. Are you really the expected one? Are you the one that's going to come?
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And so what does Jesus do? As we've talked about on the show before, Jesus is kind and he's nice.
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And he didn't say, how could you, John? I tell John, he's a loser. You're weak, you're frail.
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I thought you were strong and courageous. And one minute you say, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
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The next minute you're in a jail doubting. No, the Lord's very kind and he has both actions and words.
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And so it says here in Luke 7, in that hour, he healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits.
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And on many who were blind, he bestowed sight. He graced sight. He gave a gift of sight.
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Can you imagine who could do that? And so we, the reader, along with Luke, the writer, are saying, of course,
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Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus is the coming one. He is the expected one. But it's a lot different when you're experiencing trouble and pains and doubt.
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And doubt comes up, I think, in two main categories. An intellectual doubt. Is the triune
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God really triune? Is Jesus really perfectly God and man? Is the resurrection real?
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Those types of things. And then more often, I think for the Christian, at least for me as well, circumstantial doubt.
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There's a health thing that goes on and you think, I know God's good, but how good?
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And so intellectual doubt, circumstantial doubt, and here John with a circumstantial doubt and the Lord Jesus comes and he says, let me show you that I'm the
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Messiah. I will authenticate that I am the Messiah by my actions and also by my words.
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And here Jesus pretty much quotes from Isaiah 35. John the Baptist would know the Old Testament. And he answered them saying,
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Luke 7, 22, go and tell John what you've seen and heard. The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up.
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The poor have good news preached to them and blessed is the one who is not offended by me.
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And so here Jesus helps John. The disciples go back to say those things.
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Jesus is healing like only the Messiah could. And he's quoting of course, Isaiah 35 with some
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Isaiah 61 mixed in. He's the right one. What's the difference between doubt and unbelief?
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Well, the next verse is very insightful. It says in verse 23, blessed is the one who is not offended by me.
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I think I just read that, but that's the key verse. Was John the Baptist offended by Jesus?
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Was he outraged by Jesus? Think about some of the trials that you've been in as a
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Christian. When I first received my diagnosis of prostate cancer, when I was in the hospital,
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I thought I was gonna die from COVID for 16 days. When I got the leukemia diagnosis, when my mother died, when other things happened to other people here in church.
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Thankfully, and this is to God be the glory. And I think you could identify with me. I wasn't angry with God.
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I wasn't mad at God. I wasn't offended by God. I was sad.
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I had questions, the why questions that pop into your mind. And it's almost like with the
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Psalmist. Unbelievers, they live without cancer and they're 95 years old and nothing bad ever happens to them.
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And they have riches and everything else. What about me, Lord? And so the Psalm 42 and the
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Psalm 43, why are you downcast all my soul? And in Psalm 77, those things go through your mind.
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But I wasn't offended and neither was John the Baptist. And so Jesus in Luke says, blessed are those who aren't offended by me.
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Just stop and think about it just for a second. Let's say you as a listener have doubts. Doubts pop into your mind.
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They run across the mural of your brain. Happens a lot.
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Maybe fleeting, maybe you fixate on them a little bit, but you have doubts. And by the way, you're not perfect.
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I mean, you're perfectly justified. We know that part. And the perfect Holy Spirit is in you, but you're gonna struggle with sin the rest of your life, see
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Romans 7. So if I don't have perfect things, I'm not perfect. I'm still in this fallen world.
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How can my assurance ever be perfect? Everything else in my life is less than perfect. And by the way, aren't you glad a less than perfect faith in the perfect object of faith the
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Lord Jesus is saving? What if you had to have perfect faith in the Lord Jesus to be saved? No, no, knowledge, assent and trust, childlike faith is enough.
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So back to the point here on No Compromise Radio. We are thinking about doubt and unbelief.
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John did not have unbelief. He was not offended. He was not mad that I could tell or angry or anything else, but he was just wondering because circumstances do that.
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It's no excuse to doubt. It's no excuse to have some questions like that. It's not righteous.
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I'm not saying any of that. I'm just saying it's normal. Aren't you glad to listen to just say, it's normal. I have those doubts and other people struggle like I do.
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Abendroth struggles, Escobar struggles, John Owen struggles. Mario, how'd you like to be put in that category of Mike Abendroth and John Owen?
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And so Jesus, how kind is he? How good is he? He gives a blessing. We think about the
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Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes and this word blessed. And if other people look at you, they want what you have.
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That's a nuance of the word to be blessed. I have such a great God, he blesses me. And here we have
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Jesus saying, you know what, John the Baptist, and of course, all those who would follow me by faith alone, they're blessed because they're not offended.
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They're not offended, but there are some people that are offended. And so today in the show, I'm trying to talk about doubt and unbelief.
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There are people that don't believe and we're gonna see those people right now.
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Luke 7, verse 24, when John's messengers had gone, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John.
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What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see?
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A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who dress in splendid clothing and live in luxury, they're in king's courts.
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What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, behold,
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I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way before you. I tell you, how about this?
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Jesus is going to vindicate John the Baptist in public. This is what he's going to say to people to make sure you realize that John the
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Baptist, while he had some doubts, is safe, secure, still a believer in Jesus, still the forerunner.
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Everything John the Baptist said about Jesus is true. I tell you, among those born of women, none is greater than John.
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Isn't that fascinating? I mean, I guess if I were God, I'd say something like, of those born of women, none have let me down more than John.
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I had high hopes for John and he dropped the baton. I handed him the baton and he just dropped it.
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He's supposed to prepare my way, and now he's doubting, his disciples are doubting, and all these people are doubting.
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But Jesus doesn't say that. Out of everybody that's ever been born, John is the greatest.
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Socrates, Alexander the Great. I mean, just Malachi, Isaiah, Moses, the greatest man who's ever.
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I thought he just got done doubting people, doubting Jesus rather. And Jesus said, he's the greatest ever.
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And isn't that amazing? He vindicates, he stands for. When God saves someone and God has a child by faith in Christ Jesus, a son or a daughter adopted into the family, this is vindication.
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This is, I will stand up for, I will protect. I am their mediator, Jesus says, I will stand between them.
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I'm their advocate, 1 John 2. I don't just stand between them and God, I stand next to them.
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I haven't been in court that much, but I do know this, if you're in court, you don't wanna be your own lawyer.
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They have names for that, and they kind of rhyme with idiot. They kind of rhyme with dunce.
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So who do you need for a lawyer when you stand before God and you're a sinner? You need somebody who's a mediator, that's true.
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You need a substitute, that's true. You need a representative, that's true. That's the advocate, the Lord Jesus.
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And here he's vindicating John. That is amazing. That is fascinating, and that is wonderful.
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Well, it's interesting if we skip ahead just a little bit, it says the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves.
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So John the Baptist, while doubting, gets assurance from the
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Lord Jesus. Here we have the Pharisees, they're not doubting, they're obstinately unbelieving people.
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They are rejecting, they're stiff -arming. You watch football a lot, it's amazing. Just even watching the playoffs last weekend, and somebody's gonna come and try to tackle you.
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And that running back, these days running backs are 6 '5", 240, they're all like Jerome Bettis kind of thing back in the old
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Pittsburgh Steelers days. And they'll stiff -arm that person and take their hand. The running back will take his hand and just put it on the face or the chin of that defender and just slam them down on the ground.
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That's the idea spiritually that these men, the Pharisees had about Jesus. It talks about the lawyers and the
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Pharisees have rejected the purpose of God for them. That's the unbelief. That's not
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John's doubt. This is stiff -arming in the face of God. If your arm was long enough to stiff -arm
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God, this is wicked. And so for me, when I, and I think about my own life and I say,
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Lord, I sometimes doubt and I sometimes have low assurance. And sometimes I just wish I walked by faith better and not by side as much.
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I am glad as I preach to myself. Thank you by the grace of God. I'm not a Pharisee.
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I'm not someone who's obstinately stiff -arming God. I'm hurting.
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I'm going through a trial. Questions go through my mind and I just start preaching to myself again.
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But I'm not rejecting the purpose of God. I know deep down, even though when I'm hurting, the purpose of God for me is to be a testimony of his grace and to keep believing in the
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Lord Jesus Christ come what may. I don't know who's looking at all this. I don't know what they're saying and doing.
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Remember Job, he didn't even know it was Satan. He didn't even know he was an object lesson for Satan.
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And that object lesson was, you know what? You can crush a man, but he's still going to believe in me because when I grant someone saving faith, they're going to believe to the end and he's going to endure to the end and he will be saved and nothing can stop him.
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And so if you ask yourself the question, how can I be a Christian in doubt? I don't want you to ask that question anymore.
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Christians doubt. I don't want you to doubt, repent of your doubt. Don't misunderstand me, but Christians doubt because you doubt what you believe because Christians aren't perfect.
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And under trial, sometimes these things happen. Then say to yourself, I'm going to rehearse the promises of God.
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No condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. If he ever loved me, he'll love me forever. He's loved me with an everlasting love, chosen in eternity past, redeemed, sealed by the
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Spirit of God to the day of redemption. All those things go through your mind. And then you say, and thankfully,
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I have not rejected the purpose of God like the Pharisees, like the lawyers.
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I think it was Ligon Duncan that said something like, is there a more terrifying statement in all the Bible? God creates you,
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God makes you, and you reject the purposes of God in your life. So when
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I look at this passage here today in Luke 7, I don't say to myself, well, we're going to learn about John the
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Baptist only. We're going to learn about how God deals with a man, how God deals with someone like John the
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Baptist. Now, Mario, we're just talking here. I don't have my clock in front of me. What are we up for time right now?
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18 minutes. So that means we have 10 more glorious no -co minutes right now.
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And he can edit that out if he'd like. We're not exactly sure what Mario is going to do.
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His job here is to make me look good. And that's why he gets paid a lot of money for this episode. So you can always write me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.
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I also want to talk a little bit more about this game that's being played by these
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Pharisees that speak more of unbelief. We're not talking about doubters.
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We're talking about unbelief. And so when I read this, I think how tragic it is.
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I also think I'm not doing that when I doubt. And so that's good news today. And I also think to myself,
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I did do that before God saved me. I mean, God can still cure unbelief, can
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He not? In an unbeliever, of course, you have somebody like Saul of Tarsus. And before you know it, he's crying out for his life on his face, on the
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Damascus road, as Jesus intercepts him and then claims him for his own.
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I don't know if you know this, but back in the Roman days, they would have something called a triumph.
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And so even if you watch the Gladiator 2 movie, you might see something in regards to that.
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So you'd have a great general and he would go out and conquer a foreign lands. And so he would bring back some of the spoils.
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And that would include people in the army, officers of the opposing army, elephants, peacocks, gold.
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And they would go and talk to the senators and the senators would then say, yes, this man deserves a triumph.
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And a triumph was this huge parade. And the man would be in the chariot. It'd be people up front throwing down rose petals and the chariot wheels would go over the rose petals and you'd smell this fragrance.
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And then there'd be people behind you and they were prisoners and you'd take them to the place where you would sacrifice them to the false
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God, Venus and all this other stuff. And so there's an aroma of life to life, the rose petals, death to death, people behind you.
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And there's this huge triumph. Everything was just celebrating this great king.
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Now, sometimes on No Compromise Radio, we talk about triumphs and then we forget why we were on the topic of triumphs.
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I'm not exactly sure why I was talking about triumphs, but there was some connection that I have. You should see
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Mario. Mario's so laughing. I'm happy to see it. Well, of course, if you wanna read triumphs, you can read
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Revelation chapter 19 about the real triumphal entry. We sometimes say the triumphal entry,
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Jesus going to Jerusalem on a donkey kind of thing, but the real triumphal entry is
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Revelation chapter 19. And 2 Corinthians chapter two talks about a triumph as well. Those are both true, but those have nothing to do.
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This is what happens when you do TV, when you do video and I don't wanna look down.
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I just wanna just talk off the top of my head, like I'm in your living room. I mean, American gospel, who?
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I mean, who are those guys? What do they know? So if you wanna study a triumph, there's a man named
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William Ramsey and you could study that. I don't know why. I'm sure you'll text me why I'm trying to talk about a triumph, but it'll be three weeks in advance and I won't remember.
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So it doesn't really matter. You pay for what you get here. So we're gonna talk more about unbelief.
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And unbelief here, it's gonna come to me, Mario. I know it's gonna come to me. There's another section here that Jesus begins to discuss so that you could say to yourself,
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I'm not like that person. It's good, it's Mario. What are we doing? Mario's like, why did
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I volunteer for this job? So back to point.
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And Mario, why don't you give me a, when we're about 26 minutes, you show me the number six. That would be awful since I can't do it.
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You know, Mario, I've got some bad ratings on iTunes because they said he sits in a room by himself and laughs at his own jokes.
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Does this look like I'm by myself? This is not my room. I'm not by myself. You're here. I am laughing at my own jokes.
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One guy, Mario, gave me two stars for the podcast. It said one star for the bad host and one star for Jesus.
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Well, that's more than I deserve. And one star for the triumph discussion.
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Matter of fact, since I'm, this is what I would do actually in the radio show if I couldn't figure something out. So since this is the radio show,
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I'm gonna talk about that triumph right now because then maybe it'll come back to me. Listen to this language about triumph in Christ.
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But this is what Paul said in 2 Corinthians. But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of Him everywhere.
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For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing to one a fragrance of death to death to the other a fragrance from life to life.
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And so it's interesting. Here's Jesus doing all these miracles and John the
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Baptist, of course, and his disciples and Jesus' disciples would say, this is like the fragrance of life.
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This is wonderful. Jesus is the Messiah. And to others, the exact same person, the exact same acts, the exact same preaching that is in the
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Lord Jesus. Unbelievers, those who have unbelief would just say, you know what? I will reject that. I cannot accept it.
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It's going to mean a change in my lifestyle. It's a change in my priorities, change in my income, change of everything else. I will not do it.
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And Paul goes on to say in 2 Corinthians, for we are not like so many peddlers of God's word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God in the sight of God, we speak in Christ.
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No wonder he says, who's sufficient for these things. So today on the show with a minor deviation from triumphal entry and the triumph found in Rome, we talked about doubt and assurance.
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When you doubt, don't fixate on your doubts. Go back to the Psalms, go back to Luke and say, this is the
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Messiah. I have nowhere else to go. Pray, pray things like, Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
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Say to yourself, God is kind to those who doubt like he was kind to John the Baptist. He personally ministered to John the
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Baptist and then publicly vindicated John the Baptist. He's the greatest person ever. And then
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Jesus goes on to say, but if you're not the forerunner and you're in the kingdom after that, you're even greater than John the
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Baptist in terms of position in the kingdom. And so when we struggle with doubt, be thankful.
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It's not unbelief. It's not something that's this resolute, stiff arm in the face of God. And then say,
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Lord, forgive me and restore to me, as the Psalmist said, the joy of my salvation.
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My name's Mike Ebendroth. This is No Compromise Radio Ministry. You can always write me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.
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And once again, those two new books, Jesus and Cancer and Law, Gospel, a Primer are on there.