Frankenstein

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.

My name is Mike Abendroth, and I just did something that I've hardly ever done in the last six years of shows.

I started the show, and I went about two minutes into the show and thought, this is a bomb. Usually, after about 90 seconds,

I just keep going, even if it is a bomb, because after all, you get what you pay for. Well, it's snowing.

Well, there's the snow that's outside. It was supposed to snow three to five inches, according to one report yesterday, and another four to eight inches, and it snowed a foot, and it's heavy snow.

It is Narnia snow. And I think it's

February 6th, real time, but this won't air for quite some time. You know, Fred. But, hey,

Fred, by the way, do you notice there's not too many reruns? I'm going to start putting some reruns back on Friday again, but there's new shows, new stuff.

There was so much snow yesterday, the schools canceled. I think it was the first snow day of the year here in central

Massachusetts. Kim and I, because the kids were home, we put them to work cleaning and making

Belgian waffles, et cetera. Well, we went out and ran some errands before the apocalypse, you know, took all the groceries.

We went to the library, and this is our town library. I like this library a lot. They've got all kinds of stuff, and you can order whatever you want, and they've got a good

DVD collection. I bought a Freud book yesterday there, a paperback book, 700 pages for $1.

Not that I like Freud, but I find it fascinating to study Freud. Zygmunt, and the ladies were talking about something about a meeting house.

What's the meeting house? Where's the meeting house? And they were looking at a computer, these two lady librarians. There's a man librarian there, too.

They had a librarian. Anyway, the two ladies were looking there, and they were talking about meeting houses, and I said, well, that's what the

Puritans would call, and other people call it, brethren and some other folks, that's what they call the building where the church meets.

It's the church. It's technically a group of people. You don't go to church.

You are the church if you're a Christian, and then she looked at me, and she goes, what if you're not a Christian? I said, well, the

Bible defines what a Christian is and church is, so it depends on if you take the

Bible or you don't take the Bible. She just looked at me, and she is a

Unitarian Universalist, which means you get tax write off for getting together and singing Kumbaya. Unitarian, no trinity,

Jesus isn't God, Universalist, everybody goes. Why bother? Have a good time on the way. I said, meeting house,

Puritans would go to the meeting, and then they would worship, and she said something more about,

I don't like it when churches split and break up, and I like it when churches get together. I said, well,

I feel your pain, but sometimes you have to split because of truth.

And I knew, of course, as a Unitarian Universalist, she wouldn't like that, but that's why I said it. But I was kind and nice, and hey,

I just helped them with what a meeting was. They were trying to find a location or something.

Well, I thought about it a little bit more and thought, you know what, it's time to press the issue a little bit, and so I got my iPhone out as I was looking for some other books, some other

Zygmunt books, and I opened it to Matthew chapter 10, verse 34, and I went over to the librarian and said, oh, in light of our conversation, look at what

Jesus said, because this is why I said what I said earlier about truth and unity in that order.

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword, for I have come to set a man against his father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter -in -law against her mother -in -law, and a person's enemies will be those of his own household.

Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.

Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

And she looked, and then she made sure it was the

Bible, and then she said something very telling. This whole lead -up is for this moment right here.

She said, I don't believe Jesus said that. I said, but he did.

I said, you can, you know, in my mind I said this, I was thinking to Peshemot, your own personal

Jesus, and if her name was Sheila, she has a Sheila Jesus, the

Jesus that Sheila has invented versus the Jesus revealed in holy writ. This is the

Jesus with whom we have to do, and he defines himself. He's the king. He is the one that discloses who he is, and Jesus is a take -it -or -leave -it

Jesus, not part of him, but all of him, and so he is Lord and Savior, and everything in between, and you either submit to that Lord and Savior as revealed in scripture, or you submit to an idol that you've created in your own mind.

I said, my own personal Jesus. As I've been thinking through the book of Hebrews, as I've been preaching through it slowly, yet surely, on Sunday mornings here at bbchurch .org,

it dawned on me, and I've thought about this in the past, but it was a new dawning.

It was the dawning of a new era, to quote the specials. Who creates something and then can't control it?

So, if you've got enough power to create, shouldn't therefore you be able to control?

Creation and control, making something and then guiding it or sustaining it, don't they go together?

Now, Hebrews chapter 1, it says that Jesus created the world, through whom also he created the world, or the eons.

I mean, he created the cosmos, but this word eons is more all -encompassing.

It is an all -encompassing, more all -encompassing, the most all -encompassing. It contains history and matter, everything that's in the world, and then the ages, the eons.

And so, Jesus is the creator, but it also says that he upholds all things by the word of his power.

ESV says the universe, upholds the universe by the word of his power. As we looked at the last couple shows, who creates but doesn't uphold?

Well, there's only one, I mean, maybe you can think of others, but what comes to my mind, at least with word association, creates but not sustains.

It's Dr. Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein. Dr. Frankenstein can make something, but then cannot control it.

Now, you remember the book of 2nd Frankenstein, 2 Frankensteins, Frankenstein had a subtitle when it was originally written,

Modern Prometheus. And remember who wrote Frankenstein? English author,

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. And she writes a story about this scientist, young scientist, young student scientist named

Victor Frankenstein, Frankenstein. And he creates this creature, a thinking creature, and it goes bad.

Now, the origin for the book of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley, she and Percy Shelley, her future husband, and Lord Byron and another guy named

John Polidori, they had a little competition. Who could write the best horror story?

And so she had a dream, Mary Shelley did, about this scientist who created life and was horrified by what he had created.

And that was the instigator for the novel. We often think of the word

Frankenstein, meaning the creature, but Frankenstein has never called that.

Victor Frankenstein was the doctor who made what was called in the book, a creature, monster, a demon.

The monster refers to himself as the Adam of your labors. That's interesting. Your Adam, I would have been, but I'm your fallen angel.

This creature is called devil in the book, fiend, wretch, it, vile insect, abhorred monster, wretched devil, abhorred devil.

Mary, when she told the story of the book of Frankenstein, she referred to the creature as Adam.

And I find it fascinating that she was influenced by Paradise Lost, John Milton's book, and even has

Frankenstein, in the opening pages of Frankenstein, the monster is reading

Paradise Lost. Now remember what God is called in Paradise Lost, often the victor.

So now we have Victor Frankenstein. All fascinating, isn't it? Very fascinating.

Modern Prometheus. Now what's that? That's the mythology, right?

Who creates mankind for Zeus, and then something happens between him and Zeus.

What's my point with all this? My point is, who creates something and doesn't uphold it?

Who creates but doesn't sustain? Who makes but can't control? The only person that I know of is

Victor Frankenstein. You make something, but you can't control it.

Friends, God the Son is the agent for creation. He makes all things.

He creates all things. He created the world. He created the eons, to quote first chapter of Hebrews, verse 2.

And then it says in verse 3, amongst other things, that he upholds all things by the word of his power.

So he creates and he upholds, and that includes all things.

We talked about that a little bit last time, that he creates and upholds all things.

And some people, they get a little frightened by this because, you know,

God upholds creation, God upholds history, God upholds minutiae like dice,

God upholds things like, you know, the ecosystem.

God is such an upholder of all things. Even our hairs, our number, the hairs on our head,

Matthew chapter 10, God is sovereign over calamity.

I was trying to put lie and calamity together, a calamity. And he is sovereign over the day we die and the day we're born.

Remember even Peter, he's sovereign over men like Cyrus and Nebuchadnezzar, the evil brothers of Joseph.

God meant those things for good. And so that leads me to think about how

God and how evil should be thought of as we mesh these two ideas together.

What do I mean by that? Well, God and evil, you know, there's no darkness in God. But how does

God uphold evil? He upholds all things. So how does evil fit into that?

That's what I want to talk about today. Yes, it's kind of a little theodicy, a study of evil and how

God could be all powerful, all knowing, all sovereign, all good and still allow evil.

How does God uphold all things, which includes evil? If God upholds all things and evil exists, how does it all work out in our minds?

So that's what we're talking about today on No Compromise Radio. See, we go from librarians to Frankenstein to now upholding all things.

I was reading some J .I. Packer and some Francis Turretin. They weren't around in the same century.

Packer is still alive. Turretin's a few hundred years in the grave. And I was reading those men as they were discussing this.

So I'm taking what they said, morphing it together, and then it's abendrothized, and then it comes to you.

So this is all to say I don't want to be accused of plagiarism. I'm not trying to plagiarize anything.

I'm just taking what these guys said and making it my own.

Info at NoCompromiseRadio .com. You can write us. Many of you do. But I want you to know if you write me, like on a

Wednesday, I probably don't get the email until Tuesday night, the next week, because Spencer takes care of all the emails and he doesn't send them to me on Monday.

This is my day off. He usually does it on a Tuesday. So just want you to know, I will respond probably within 24 hours of when

I receive it. And if, you know, it's an email that must be read by me immediately, you can always write me at Mike at Info.

No, sorry. Mike at NoCompromiseRadio .com. We'll just bypass Spencer. See? Does Todd Friel do that?

Do you get Todd's email? No, I have Todd's email, but I can't tell you because it's top secret.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just busting my friend's chops. How does

God uphold evil, even evil? Well, number one, He permits it. He upholds it by allowing it.

That's part of the factor here. He freely permits it. It's not an approval.

It's not an applause. But He allows people to act according to their natures, and He allows it.

Acts 14, 16. In past generations, He allowed all the nations to walk in their ways.

This is part of God's providential hand. He's providentially allowing it. Secondly, God upholds evil by punishing evil with evil.

He could do this in a judicial fashion of abandonment. He could withdraw grace.

He could withhold additional grace. He could desert those who are in their own sin, to use

Turretin's words. Psalm 81, 11, and 12. But my people did not listen to my voice.

Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts to follow their own counsels.

God is such an upholder of all things that even when it comes to evil, He not only allows it, but He also punishes it with itself.

The punishment of sin is often sin, as you'll hear theologians rightly say it.

How about this? Romans 1. For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature.

And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another.

Men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

God is sovereign over this and He sovereignly permits it. And then He punishes evil with more evil.

How else does God uphold and is sovereign over evil? Well, He brings good out of it.

He produces good out of evil. Turretin. God so orders providential circumstances that the inherent wickedness of men takes the particular course of action

He, God, has determined to permit. He overrules it and directs it for good.

We talked last time about Genesis 50 .20. You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.

How about Acts 13 .27? Have you considered this verse? For those who live in Jerusalem and their rulers, because they did not recognize

Him nor understand the utterances of the prophets, which are read every Sabbath, fulfilled them by condemning

Him. Even the condemnation of a council, people, rulers, would make prophecy fulfilled.

1 Corinthians 2 .7 and 8. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which

God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the

Lord of glory. I mean, isn't that the pinnacle of evil is the crucifixion of the Lord of glory?

And so can God bring good out of evil? Think of the cross. That solves a lot of problems if you think of the cross.

How does God uphold evil? How is He sovereign over it?

Does He bear all things, as the text would read?

Well, He uses evil to test and to discipline His children. There's a tough circumstance, an evil circumstance, and you can read

Hebrews 12 and find that out. You could read Matthew 4, where Satan is tempting the

Lord Jesus Christ. And what happens? It's a test to the one

He loves, His Son, His beloved one. And fifthly,

God upholds, is bearing, is sovereign over evil because one day

He's going to redeem His people from that power of evil and ultimately in heaven from the presence of any evil.

That's how we know He's sovereign over it because one day evil is kaput. Revelation 21, 27, but nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the

Lamb's book of life. And then in chapter 22 of Revelation verses 14 and 15, blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates.

Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

We know God is sovereign over everything. He created everything, yes, but He's also sovereign over those things, including evil.

You cannot have in your mind a God who's not sovereign over evil. If you do, I'm sorry for you.

I was going to say I pity you. Maybe I'm more sorry. I'm pastorally sorry for you because you don't have a

God who's really sovereign over all things. The text says in Hebrews 1, He upholds the universe, literally all things by the word of His power.

Now, I might be able to spin good for good, but who can take evil and make it for good?

It's only the Lord Jesus Christ. And He permits it. He uses it to punish people, to chasten people, to test people, makes good out of it, and then

He redeems people, His children, from the presence of it forever in heaven.

God is sovereign over all things. The text says in Revelation, no more sin at all in heaven.

Isn't that going to be a good day? I like what A. A. Hodge said, God having from eternity absolutely decreed whatsoever comes to pass and having in the beginning created all things out of nothing by the word of His power and continuing subsequently, constantly present to every atom of His creation, upholding all things in the being and in the possession and exercise of their properties.

Comma. I know it's a long sentence and it's difficult, but it's wonderful. He also continually controls and directs the actions of all

His creatures, thus preserved so that while He never violates the law of their several natures,

He yet infallibly causes all actions and events singular and universal to occur according to the eternal and immutable plan embraced in His decree.

There is a design in Providence. God has chosen His great end, the manifestation of His glory.

What a great, I think that might be one sentence. No, there's a few sentences, but that is a great truth.

Such a great truth that there's a snowplow outside beeping, telling me that is such a great truth.

Hodge says, by the way, to what extent do the scriptures teach anything as to the nature of God's providential government?

And he has his list that God's providence is universal. It's particular.

It's efficacious. It embraces the thoughts and volitions of men. It's propelling itself to the chief end of the universe.

That is the glory of God. The scriptures teach it everywhere. And God is sovereign over all things without exception concerning everything.

And that also means, as we're going to look at next time, God is sovereign and king over who goes to heaven.

And God is sovereign over who doesn't.

Maybe the stumbling block of all stumbling blocks is God's control over who goes to heaven and who goes to hell.

After all, it's God's heaven. After all, nobody deserves heaven.

After all, what do the scriptures teach? Well, you're going to have to come back next time to find out. I had no compromise radio.

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Because why? We think we're the best out there? No. We just think that it's a biblical truth and people should be coming face to face with what the

Bible says taught in a direct manner, a New England manner, a

Nebraska via California, now in a New England manner. We'll see you next time.