When Jeremiah was preaching to the people of Israel, he was not just directing his words to the ordinary people, or to the civic leaders. He targeted his denunciations on the religious leaders of the day. If anything, it was they who were responsible for the spiritual mess the people were in. As is often the case, the state of the world and society is a reflection of the real state of the church. It was so in Jeremiah's day, as it is in our own. We need look no further than the true state of the Christian church for an explanation of why the world and society are as they are. No one was seeking the Lord. They did not know how to handle the law of God. The very pastors transgressed willfully against God, the prophets, men who had been set apart and ordained to proclaim the true word of God, these men prophesied by Baal. The were also pursuing things that did not profit the work of God at that time, distractions, diversions. They saw more profit in these than in sticking to their God-given priorities.
We see the self-same thing happening in the church and among the religious leaders today. Some run headlong after ecumenism, while others give their time and energy to trying to reform para-church organisations that have no divine mandate or warrant. Some run their very lucrative music businesses while others involve themselves headlong into politics. Others are extremely big into denominationalism and the maintenance of traditions, while others could give give a toss about denominations, but spend their precious time loafing about, doing their own thing. It is a strange mix indeed. Yet they are all official and accredited church leaders!
Jeremiah's big question to the people was this: are they leading you aright? This pertinent question must also be asked today's leaders. Are they leading the people aright? Are they following God's word and way for the church? Has God commanded them to bring the world wholesale into the church in a bid to get the ear of the unbelieving masses? On the contrary, He has commanded them to "Go into all the world..." Don't bring the world into the church - send the church out into the world.
The answer Jeremiah gives to his own question is an emphatic NO. This was a daring thing for the prophet of God to, and he suffered dearly for so preaching. He ended up in gaol!
Today, the religious and church leaders do not want to hear such a clear and accurate message, so they conspire with the local 'mafia' to silence those men who are exercising a prophetic ministry. And when they have them out, they will not let them back in again! The church wants today, as much as in Amos' day, to be "at ease in Zion." Don't disturb us by bringing God's Word to us - that is more than we can bear. Let us go on in our blissful ignorance of God's message; maintain the 'feel good factor' in our congregations, but do not bring God into them! He messes things up! He causes annoyance; he divide former friends and family members. We prefer to remain in peaceful darkness rather than be exposed for what we are by the light of God's Word.
Monday, 28 November 2011
Church People The Most Unforgiving
This is truly amazing, is it not? The very people who preach forgiveness are the worst practitioners of forgiveness. Thankfully this is not true of all Christians because I now of shining examples of costly forgiveness amongst God's people. But the old adage comes to mind: If you want to sin, sin again God and not the church; for with God there is forgiveness, but not with the church."
What is the point of preaching forgiveness if it is not being practiced by the church that preaches it! Can anything be more hypocritical than this? Does this explain, to some extent, the falling away of many from the local churches? They hear what they say but do not see them doing it.
An unforgiving church is surely an abomination, like the many other abominations that are about. It is a monstrosity, an inconsistency, an irregularity. It is most offensive to God, and to the church's Lord, Jesus Christ.
I remember saying in church that there is more understanding down in the local public house than there is in the churches. That's why people have a greater interest in going to the 'pub' than to church. They are accepted as they are, are made to feel welcome and a part of the company, and can find a listening ear that the churches just do not provide.
And comments?
What is the point of preaching forgiveness if it is not being practiced by the church that preaches it! Can anything be more hypocritical than this? Does this explain, to some extent, the falling away of many from the local churches? They hear what they say but do not see them doing it.
An unforgiving church is surely an abomination, like the many other abominations that are about. It is a monstrosity, an inconsistency, an irregularity. It is most offensive to God, and to the church's Lord, Jesus Christ.
I remember saying in church that there is more understanding down in the local public house than there is in the churches. That's why people have a greater interest in going to the 'pub' than to church. They are accepted as they are, are made to feel welcome and a part of the company, and can find a listening ear that the churches just do not provide.
And comments?
Sunday, 27 November 2011
Nothing but Christ!
Isn't it simply wonderful being a Christian? A Christian is someone who believes in Christ alone for his salvation, without any dependence on works for his justification (though a professed faith without corroborating works is dead, says James). We sing hymns that elevate our saviour, and with great cause. we sing that "None but Christ can satisfy," and we mean it.
BUT! If Christ were to take us at our word, and strip off us everything else we cherish, would we still sing this hymn? I now of a man who had his regular ministry taken from him, his salary stopped, never invited to preach in his old denomination, had his home taken from him, lost virtually all his pension entitlements. His health suffered a serious breakdown, leaving him a mental wreck. His reputation was severely tarnished. And on top of all that, this was done to him by Christians and by church people.
Can he still sing that hymn? Yes he can, and with even greater gusto. God has taken all these things from him, and he is now living on a very meagre income, but he is still rejoicing in his Saviour, why? Because he now knows from experience that "None but Christ can satisfy, no other Name for me." They can take it all, but they cannot take me from Christ nor Christ from me. Indeed, there's not much you can do to, or about, a man who thinks like that!
When the reality of the full satisfaction of Christ to the believer hit him, he sang in a very new way, "Riches I heed not nor man's empty praise; Thou my inheritance now and always."
I know a man like that, and How I wish I was more like that! He knows contentment, deep, heart, real contentment. The devil has attacked him very severely on many occasions, but by God's sovereign grace, has come through it triumphantly.
BUT! If Christ were to take us at our word, and strip off us everything else we cherish, would we still sing this hymn? I now of a man who had his regular ministry taken from him, his salary stopped, never invited to preach in his old denomination, had his home taken from him, lost virtually all his pension entitlements. His health suffered a serious breakdown, leaving him a mental wreck. His reputation was severely tarnished. And on top of all that, this was done to him by Christians and by church people.
Can he still sing that hymn? Yes he can, and with even greater gusto. God has taken all these things from him, and he is now living on a very meagre income, but he is still rejoicing in his Saviour, why? Because he now knows from experience that "None but Christ can satisfy, no other Name for me." They can take it all, but they cannot take me from Christ nor Christ from me. Indeed, there's not much you can do to, or about, a man who thinks like that!
When the reality of the full satisfaction of Christ to the believer hit him, he sang in a very new way, "Riches I heed not nor man's empty praise; Thou my inheritance now and always."
I know a man like that, and How I wish I was more like that! He knows contentment, deep, heart, real contentment. The devil has attacked him very severely on many occasions, but by God's sovereign grace, has come through it triumphantly.
Order Reversal
In the reformed and biblical churches, it has always been the case that the observance of the sacraments of Christian Baptism and the Lord's Supper followed, not preceded the preaching of the Word. The preaching of the Word is what gives the sacraments their meaning. But now some evangelical churches are reversing this order, and without any reason being given for this.
Do those churches really accept the primacy of the sacraments - a form of evangelical sacerdotalism - rather than the primacy of the Word and it preached and heard? It appears so. Reformed church order has never the 'flavour of the month' in some minority evangelical denominations, and this is being pursued at great speed by ministers within the church.
Does anyone know why this is being done today?
Do those churches really accept the primacy of the sacraments - a form of evangelical sacerdotalism - rather than the primacy of the Word and it preached and heard? It appears so. Reformed church order has never the 'flavour of the month' in some minority evangelical denominations, and this is being pursued at great speed by ministers within the church.
Does anyone know why this is being done today?
Not Proper Church Order!
What is the Biblical basis for using 'deacons' for the administration of the Lord's Supper, and not the church elders? Are deacons ordained to deal with spiritual matters, or is this the sole domain of the church's eldership? Did Paul get this matter wrong? Are not the elders - provided of course these are truly converted and mature Christian men and not the servants of Satan masquerading as the servants of Christ - ordained for the spiritual oversight of the local congregation and the wider church, and surely in anyone's book, the Lord's Sipper is a spiritual ordinance and task?
Any answers?
Any answers?
Baptist Inconsistency
It is very interesting that Baptists, who believe in the practice of totally immersing adult Christian subjects in order for them to become members of the church, not recognising the rightness of covenant baptism of the children of believers. So for a Baptist church to give the Lord's Supper to a non-baptistically baptised Christian, is to indicate an incongruence because baptism is the initiatory rite into church membership and only church members can participate in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. However,when they accept those Christians who have been baptised as Christians to the Lord's table, they are, by default, accepting the validity of their infant, covenant, baptism.
Any comments
Any comments
Lloyd-Jones and PHILOSOPHY
DMLJ sees the church's drift
into philosophy as an evidence of “the wiles of the devil”[1]
and even goes so far as to describe philosophy as “the single greatest enemy of
the Christian faith and Christian truth,”[2]
the reason being its “final confidence in human reason, in the power of man’s
mind to arrive at the truth, to comprehend it, and to encompass it. The ultimate problem is always the problem of
authority.”[3] And it is this human authority that
challenges what DMLJ holds as axiomatic for the Christian Faith by denying what
the Scriptures clearly teach in Deut. 29:29.
Philosophers are
unable to say about something, “I don’t know!” Pride of intellect prevents them making this honest confession.
He sees as the
explanation for this the pre-occupation of philosophers with “vain deceit” and
“profane and vain babblings,”[4]
and proffers the view that the reason why the church in the nineteenth century
became “respectable” and better educated was that with these intellectual
advances, people required a more cultured ministry; proclaiming the simple and
unvarnished Gospel was not sufficient, and the sermons had to be laced with illustrations and
quotations from the Greek philosophers, the Latin classics, and the great
poets. In Mid-Victorian times, the
church wanted to be more intellectually respectable[5] so
she set about training men of culture and intellect for the ministry,
irrespective of whether or not they were true Christians.
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