Active Living Faith

Posted on May 3, 2024 by The Editor

James 2:14-18; Ephesians 2:10

What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): We read in the text, “Created in Christ Jesus.” We are the branches; He is the Vine out of which we grow. Your life, and all your fruit-producing power lie in your union to Christ. Beloved, if you are what you profess to be, you are one with Jesus by that vital union which cannot be dissolved; and good works follow upon that union. Joined to Jesus by faith in Him, love to Him, and imitation of Him, you walk in good works. Our good works must flow from our union with Christ by virtue of our faith in Him.

JOHN OWEN (1616-1683): Faith is the spring and cause of all obedience, for “without faith it is impossible to please God,” Hebrews 11:6; and the obedience that is accepted with Him is “the obedience of faith.”

THOMAS BROOKS (1608-1680): Till men have faith in Christ, their best services are but glorious sins.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES (1899-1981):  Without faith, you can’t begin―faith is the beginning, that’s essential.

THE EDITOR: It is significant that the entire chapter of Hebrews 11, after stating its initial definitions of faith, extensively describes its nature, and its effects, in acts of faith by the saints, as evidences of their faith.

ALEXANDER MacLAREN (1826-1910): If a man believes, then he will do “good works.”

C. H. SPURGEON: The faith which does not produce good works is not saving faith: it is not the faith of God’s elect: it is not faith at all in the Scriptural sense…Faith shows itself by good works, and therefore is no dead faith. God’s house is a hive for workers, not a nest for drones. Those who rejoice that everything is done for them by another, even the Lord Jesus, and therefore hate legality, are the best doers in the world upon gospel principles. If we are not positively serving the Lord, and doing His holy will to the best of our power, we may seriously debate our interest in divine things…If a man says he has faith, and has no works, he lies.

THOMAS MANTON (1620-1677): Faith is not an idle grace.

MARTIN LUTHER (1483-1546): Faith is a living, restless thing. It cannot be inoperative.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES (1899-1981): We have got to act on our faith. There is no point or purpose in reading the doctrine and understanding the teaching if we do nothing about it. We have got to translate it into practice.

HORATIUS BONAR (1808-1889): The faith which goes no further than the intellect can neither save nor sanctify. It is no faith at all. It is unbelief.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES: There is always an element of venture in faith. Faith is entirely different from a mere intellectual assent and belief. Faith is putting what we believe into practice and into operation. I am tempted to repeat a story to illustrate this point―a person was standing on one side of Niagara Falls, watching a man who could not only walk over the Falls on a tightrope, but who could actually trundle a wheelbarrow across as well. He turned to a man standing by and said: “Do you believe that I can not only take a wheelbarrow over to the other side, but that I can also take it across with a man sitting in it?” “Yes, I do,” said the man. “Well,” he replied, “take your seat in the wheelbarrow.” But he would not! The story represents the difference between intellectual assent and true faith. Faith gets into the wheelbarrow! It believes the message to such an extent that it begins to practise it. The proof of true faith is that it is practiced―that it shows itself in action. 

ROWLAND HILL (1744-1833): Faith is a mere imagination, unless it is proved by works; if we are believers, we have that “faith which worketh by love,” Galatians 5:6.

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): Faith, where it is true, is a working grace: it works by love, love to God and love to our brethren; and faith, thus working by love, is all in all in our Christianity…Here is the procuring cause of all, namely, Christ, who purchased the Spirit and His saving gifts and graces. All come through Him as a Saviour…“Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life, Titus 3:5-7.

JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): “Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end,” Hebrews 3:6. The word “hope” I take for faith; and indeed hope is nothing else but the constancy of faith.

WILLIAM GOUGE (1575-1653): Where there is no hope, there is no faith.

THOMAS BROOKS: A man full of hope, will be full of action.

MATTHEW HENRY: Paul says to Titus, “This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works,” Titus 3:8. This is a true Christian doctrine of highest importance, which ministers must most earnestly and constantly press, that those who have believed in God do not think that a bare naked faith will save them; but it must be an operative working faith, bringing forth the fruit of righteousness; they must make it their care “to maintain good works,” not to do them occasionally, only when opportunities come their way, but to seek opportunities for doing them.

JOHN GILL (1697-1771): To “maintain” these according to the significance of the word used, is to excel in them; to outdo others, by way of example, and so to provoke to love and to good works, to make them the employment and business of men’s lives; for which there should be a thoughtfulness, a carefulness, a studious concern in those who “have believed in God,” who are regenerated and renewed by the Spirit of God, and are justified by faith in the righteousness of Christ; who believe in Him for peace, pardon, righteousness, life, and salvation: these are under great obligations to perform good works; the love of Christ should constrain them to do them; and they are the only persons that are capable of doing them well, for they are sanctified—made ready for every good work; they are created in Christ Jesus to them; they have the Spirit of Christ in them, and the strength of Christ with them, without which they cannot be performed well; and they have faith in Christ, without which it is impossible to please God.

THE EDITOR: True believers do good works because they have eternal life, not to obtain eternal life. Good works show the world a visible evidence of the Christian’s faith.

JOHN BUNYAN (1628-1688): Faith is not a notional and historical assent in the head; it is a principle of life—a principle of strength.

ALEXANDER MacLAREN: Faith is the principle of works; works are the manifestation of faith, making it visible.

AUGUSTUS TOPLADY (1713-1778): If God gives you Paul’s faith, He will give you James’s works.

 

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What is True Saving Faith?

Posted on April 26, 2024 by The Editor

Ephesians 2:8,9; Hebrews 11:1-3; John 13:23

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

Now there was leaning on Jesus’ bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved.

CASPER OLEVIANUS (1536-1587): What is true faith?

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): It is “the substance of things hoped for.” Faith and hope go together; and the same things that are the object of our hope, are the object of our faith. It is a firm persuasion and expectation that God will perform all that He has promised to us in Christ…It is “the evidence of things not seen.” Faith demonstrates to the eye of the mind the reality of things that cannot be discerned by the eye of the body. Faith is the firm assent of the soul to the divine revelation and every part of it, and sets to its seal that God is true. It is a full approbation of all that God has revealed as holy, just, and good.

CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): Faith comprehends within its grasp the past, the present, and the future. By it, the Christian knows that the universe, but a few thousand years ago, had no existence, and that it was created out of nothing by the Word of God.

ZACHARIAS URSINUS (1534-1583): True faith is not only a certain knowledge, whereby I hold for truth all that God has revealed to us in His Word, but also an assured confidence, which the Holy Ghost works by the gospel in my heart; that not only to others, but to me also, remission of sin, everlasting righteousness and salvation, are freely given by God, merely of grace, only for the sake of Christ’s merits.

HULDREICH ZWINGLI (1484-1531): Faith is a matter of fact, not of knowledge or opinion; for it is born only when a man begins to despair of himself, and to see that he must trust in God alone. And it is perfected when a man wholly casts himself off and prostrates himself before the mercy of God alone, in such a fashion as to have entire trust in it because of Christ who was given for us. What man of faith can be unaware of this? For then only are you free from sin when the mind trusts itself unwaveringly to the death of Christ and finds rest there.

WILLIAM GURNALL (1617-1679): Faith is that act of the soul whereby it rests on Christ crucified for pardon and life, and that upon the warrant of the Word. The person of Christ is the object of faith as justifying: secondly, Christ as crucified. First, the person of Christ, not any axiom or proposition in the Word―this is the object of assurance, not of faith. Assurance saith, “I believe my sins are pardoned through Christ;” Faith’s language is, “I believe on Christ for the pardon of them.”

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): What is faith? Even those who know what faith is, personally and experimentally, do not always find it easy to give a good definition of it. They think they have hit the mark; then, afterwards, they lament that they have failed. Straining themselves to describe one part of faith, they find they have forgotten another, and in the excess of their earnestness to clear the poor sinner out of one mistake, they often lead him into a worse error. So that I think I may say that, while faith is the simplest thing in all the world, yet it is one of most difficult upon which to write.

JOHN G. PATON (1824-1907): For a long time no equivalent could be found for the word “faith” in the native language of Aniwa Island, and my work of Bible translation was paralyzed for the want of so fundamental a term. The natives apparently regarded the verb “to hear” as equivalent to “to believe.” I would ask a native whether he believed a certain statement, and his reply would be, should he credit the statement, “Yes, I heard it,” but should he disbelieve it, he would answer, “No, I did not hear it,” meaning, not that his ears had failed to catch the words, but that he did not regard them as true. This definition of faith was obviously insufficient.

I prayed continually that God would supply the missing link, and spared no effort in interrogating the most intelligent native pundits, but all in vain, none caught the hidden meaning of the word. One day I was in the Mission House anxiously pondering. I sat on an ordinary kitchen chair, my feet resting on the floor. Just as an intelligent native woman entered the room, the thought flashed through my mind to ask the all-absorbing question again, if possible in a new light. Was I not resting on the chair? Would that attitude lend itself to the discovery? I said, “What am I doing now?” “Koikae ana,” the native replied, “you are sitting down.”

Then I drew up my feet and placed them upon the bar of the chair just above the floor, and leaning back in an attitude of repose, asked, “What am I doing now?” “Fakarongrongo,” she said, meaning “you are leaning wholly, or you have lifted yourself from every other support.” “That’s it!” I shouted with an exultant cry; and a sense of holy joy awed me, as I realized that my prayer had been fully answered. To “lean on” Jesus wholly and only, is surely the true meaning of saving faith. And now “Fakarongrongo Iesu ea anea mouri,”—leaning on Jesus unto eternal life, or, for all the things of eternal life, is the happy experience of those Christian Islanders, as it is of all who thus cast themselves unreservedly on the Saviour of the world for salvation.

ALEXANDER COMRIE (1706-1774): It will mean that they rest their whole weight upon Him, upon the Christ. O! as long as a man leans and supports himself partly upon Jesus, and partly upon duties, for sure the left hand will be pierced by the broken reed of Egypt, by legal duties, and self-strength. Here we must lean upon Him and upon none other, else we shall ever be wrong in the exercise.

C. H. SPURGEON: It is essential that our faith rest alone on Jesus. Mix anything with Christ, and you are undone. If your faith stand with one foot upon the rock of His merits, and the other foot upon the sand of your own duties, it will fall, and great will be the fall. Recumbency on the truth was the word which the old preachers used. You will understand that word: Leaning on it; saying, “This is truth, I trust my salvation on it.” Now, true faith, in its very essence rests in this—a leaning upon Christ. It will not save me to know that Christ is a Saviour; but it will save me to trust Him to be my Saviour. I shall not be delivered from the wrath to come by believing that His atonement is sufficient, but I shall be saved by making that atonement my trust, my refuge, and my all. The pith, the essence of faith lies in this—a casting one-self on the promise.

MARTIN LUTHER (1483-1546): Many are lost because they cannot use possessive pronouns.

HUGH BINNING (1625-1654): To believe in Christ is simply this: that I, whatsoever I be, ungodly, wretched, polluted, desperate—am willing to have Jesus Christ for my Saviour. I have no help or hope if it be not in Him.

 

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When Nations Depart From God

Posted on April 19, 2024 by The Editor

Isaiah 3:4,5; Isaiah 3:8-12; Isaiah 29:10

And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them. And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honourable.

For Jerusalem is ruined, and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against the LORD, to provoke the eyes of his glory. The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves. Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him: for they shall eat the fruit of their doings. Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him. As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.

For the LORD hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed your eyes: the prophets and your rulers, the seers hath he covered.

JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564):  To show more clearly the source of this blindness, Isaiah attributes it to the judgment of God, who determined to punish in this manner the wickedness of the people. As it belongs to Him to give eyes to see, and to enlighten minds by the spirit of judgment and understanding, so He alone deprives us of all light, when He sees that by a wicked and depraved hatred of the truth we of our own accord wish for darkness. Isaiah adds that the people are deprived of those helps which ought to have imparted light to the understanding and given direction to others. Such was the office of the prophets, whom he describes by both of these names, “prophets” and “seers.” He means not only that men who are endued with reason and understanding will be deprived of common sense, but that their teachers also, whose duty it was to enlighten others, will be altogether senseless so as not to know the road, and, being covered with the darkness of ignorance, will shamefully go astray, and will be so far from directing others, that they will not even be able to guide themselves.

A. W. PINK (1886-1952): The present generation has, for the most part, been reared not only in an atmosphere of negative unbelief but of hostile unbelief—Doubt as to moral and spiritual truth is distilled through a score of channels. Our seats of learning are hotbeds of agnosticism.

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): Some are learned fools. Unconverted men, whatever they know, are only educated fools. Between the ignorant man who cannot read a letter and the learned man who is apt in all knowledge, there is small difference if they are both ignorant of Christ! Indeed, the scholar’s folly is, in this case, the greater of the two! The learned fool generally proves himself the worst of fools, for he invents theories which would be ridiculed if they could be understood—he brings forth speculations which, if judged by common sense would be scouted from the universe with a hiss of derision!

D. L. MOODY (1837-1899): What is taught in the schools, that all the earth we see now, and everything upon it, came out of a ball of fire. It is a great deal easier to believe that man was made after the image of God, than to believe, as some young men and women are being taught now, that he is the offspring of a monkey.

A. W. PINK: Even those brought up in Christian homes are being corrupted by the paganism of modern education, are bewildered by the conflicting teachings they receive from parents and the school, and are harassed by doubts. The vast majority in the English-speaking world are totally ignorant of the contents of the Bible, know not that it is a Divine revelation, yea, question whether there be any God at all.

C. H. SPURGEON: There are fools of all sorts. There are fools in colleges.

THE EDITOR: What else can we call university students barely able to read and write, who think gender is an individual choice from a multi-option “spectrum,” however perverse that may be. These unruly children seek “safe spaces” where they hide from censure, and yet, determined to rule over what others may think, attempt to silence anyone daring to speak against their insanity. Knowing nothing of history, or the Bible, such evil unnatural nonsense is now taught even to elementary schoolchildren!

JOHN CALVIN: This notion is wholly inconsistent with common sense and experience.

A. W. PINK: Modern skepticism is rarely candid, but is rather a refuge in which multitudes are sheltering from an accusing conscience.

JOHN CALVIN: It is incontrovertible that God will not approve or excuse what the common sense of mankind declares to be obscene; for, although lewdness has everywhere been rampant in every age, still the opinion could never be utterly extinguished, that fornication is a scandal and a sin. Accordingly, when men are blind, and especially in things so plain and obvious, we perceive His righteous judgment—God is said sometimes to inebriate men when He stupifies them, and drives them at one time to madness, and at another time deprives them of common sense and understanding, so that they become like beasts.

JOHN GILL (1697-1771): Wicked men are mad upon their lusts, and mad against the saints, and all that is good.

THE EDITOR: From kindergarten to university, North American schools have become indoctrination centres, where not only absurdities, but anti-Christian and anti-Semitic political agendas are promoted. The evil triad of Feminism, Multiculturalism, and the Homosexual Rights Movement, is an unholy political alliance whose real agenda is not equality, but dominance. Whatever they disagree about between themselves, they are completely united in being anti-Christian: Feminists hate Christianity, because what the Bible says about the role of women, directly contradicts their lust to “empower” women; Multiculturalism hates Christianity, because their lie that ‘all cultures are equal, and other religions are just different paths to God,’ is absolutely refuted by Jesus Christ, who says, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man cometh unto the Father but by me.” Homosexuals hate the Bible because it clearly condemns their perverse sexual lusts. Their insidious madness now permeates society—in the media, in governments, the courts and corporations.

D. L. MOODY: There is nothing at all in the Bible that does not conform to common sense; it is God’s truth. Let others reject, if they will, at their own peril, this imperishable truth.

WILLIAM GURNALL (1617-1679): As we deal with truth, so we deal with God Himself; he that despiseth that, despiseth Him. He that abandons the truth of God, renounces the God of truth.

MATTHEW POOLE (1624-1679): As the world grows older, it will grow more mad—very many that shall live in the world, yea, in the bosom of the church, “will not endure sound doctrine,” will not endure that preaching which hath any soundness in it, or is of any tendency, life, power, or efficacy, to recover their souls from the diseases of sin and lusts. “But after their own lusts,”—in favour of their own lusts, and to secure their satisfaction in them, “shall they heap to themselves teachers,” 2 Timothy 4:3,4; they will be finding out teachers, not according to God’s heart, but to their own hearts; and there will be plenty of them to be found.

THE EDITOR: Whenever nations depart from God, truth, and common sense—obviously, insanity prevails; without repentance, political, economic, and social chaos inevitably follows.

C. H. SPURGEON: That is common sense.

EDWARD PAYSON (1783-1827): Our republic, driven by the gales of faction, and hurried still faster by the secret current of luxury and vice, is following the same course, and fast approaching the same rocks which proved fatal to so many before us. In vain does experience offer us the wisdom of past ages for our direction: in vain does history point out the ruin towards which we are advancing…That blind accursed infatuation which ever appears to govern mankind when their most important interests are concerned, leads us, in defiance of reason, experience, and common sense, to flatter ourselves that the same causes which have proved fatal to all other governments, will lose their pernicious tendency when exerted on our own.

 

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Apostolic Evangelical Preaching

Posted on April 12, 2024 by The Editor

1 Corinthians 2:2

For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

WILLIAM JAY (1769-1853): If we turn to the first preachers of the gospel, we shall find each of them saying, with the inspired apostle, “We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord,” 2 Corinthians 4:5.

THOMAS GOODWIN (1600-1679): So Paul, in his Epistle to the Corinthians, seemed by the matter of his sermon to have “known nothing but Christ, and Him as crucified.” Thus, in his Epistle to the Galatians, he calls his preaching among them “the preaching of faith,” Galatians 3:2. And what was the main scope of it, but the picturing out—as the word is, of “Christ crucified before their eyes”? Galatians 3:1. So he preached Him, and so they received Him, and so they “began in the spirit,” Galatians 3:3. And thus also do the sacraments, the seals of the promises present Christ to a believer’s eye; as they hold forth Christ as crucified; their scope being to “show forth His death till He come,” 1 Corinthians 11:26; bread signifying Christ’s body broken in the sufferings of it; and the cup signifying the sufferings of His soul, and the pouring of it forth unto death.

JOHN NEWTON (1725-1807): The mystery of Christ crucified was a stumbling-block to the Jews, and was, by many of the Gentiles, accounted foolishness and absurdity; but the apostles proposed it simply and indifferently to all.

WILLIAM JAY: If they would persuade men by the terrors of the Lord, they were His terrors; if they spake of the wrath of the Almighty, it was the great day of His wrath: “Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way when His wrath is kindled but a little,” Psalm 2:12. Did they speak of the divine perfections? they made them shine forth in the face of Jesus Christ. Did they speak of providence? they placed the reins of universal empire in His hand, and made Him “Head over all things to His church which is His body,” Ephesians 1:23. Did they speak of heaven? they made it to consist in seeing His glory—in “seeing Him as He is,” 1 John 3:2; and in “being forever with the Lord,” 1 Thessalonians 4:17.

C. H. MACKINTOSH (1820-1896): The basis of “The Great Commission” is the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. This must never be lost sight of. “It behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day,” Luke 24:46. It is a risen Christ that sends forth His heralds to preach “repentance and remission of sins.” The incarnation and the crucifixion are great cardinal truths of Christianity—but let all preachers remember the place which resurrection holds in apostolic preaching and teaching. “With great power gave the apostles witness.” Of what? Incarnation or crucifixion merely? Not so; but “of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,” Acts 4:33.

C. E. STUART (1828-1903): “Repent ye and believe the gospel.” Regarding repentance, in the New Testament we meet with that call repeated. John the Baptist preached it, and the Lord called men to it, Mark 1:1,14,15. The apostles before His crucifixion went out to insist on it, and after His ascension continued to enforce it; as repentance forms so prominent a topic in the preaching of the apostles, it may well be a subject for inquiry, how far this element of apostolic preaching enters into the general evangelical teaching of the present day.

WILLIAM JAY: Did they speak of repentance? they never thought of fetching this water out of the millstone of man’s natural heart; they knew that the tear of penitence could only drop from the eye of faith, in sight of the cross; as it is written, “They shall look upon him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, and they shall be in bitterness as one that is in bitterness for his first-born” Zecharian 12:10.

H. A. IRONSIDE (1876-1951): Everything centers in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. “Jesus Christ, and Him crucified,”—that is, the person, and the work. The person of Christ was always presented in apostolic preaching. Men were not asked to believe a creed or to subscribe to a system of doctrine, but they were asked to receive a person—the Lord Jesus Christ.

WILLIAM JAY: Jesus Christ is all, and in all, in the gospel ministry. He is the grand theme. If they called upon persons to pray, it was to ask in His name. “Yea,” said they, “whatsoever ye do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him.” Colossians 3:10.

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): Whatever we do not preach, let us preach Jesus Christ. I have found, wherever I have been in England, that though there might not be a road to this place or that, there was sure to be a London road. Now, if your sermon does not happen to have the doctrine of election, or the doctrine of final perseverance in it, let it always have Christ in it. Have a road to London—a road to Christ—in every sermon.

H. A. IRONSIDE: Years ago a gentleman living in a country town in England went to London and while there heard some renowned preachers. Writing home to his wife, he said, “Last Sunday I went in the morning to hear Dr. so-and-so—he named one of the most eloquent men occupying a London pulpit at that time; and in the evening I went to the Metropolitan Tabernacle to listen to C. H. Spurgeon. I was quite impressed by both of them. Dr. so-and-so is certainly a great preacher, but Spurgeon has a great Saviour.” Do you see the difference?

JOHN NEWTON: We preach Christ crucified, Christ the end of the law for righteousness, and the power of God for sanctification, to every one that believeth. We preach salvation by grace through faith in His blood, and we are sure that they who receive this doctrine unfeignedly, will, by their lives and conversations, demonstrate it to be a doctrine according to godliness. They are not indeed delivered from infirmities, they are liable to mistakes and indiscretions, and see more amiss in themselves than their worst enemies can charge them with. But sin is their burden, they sigh to be delivered from it, and they expect a complete redemption.

THOMAS GOODWIN: Thus did the apostles also in their sermons…And so it follows, “We preach Christ crucified, unto them which are called, the power of God,” 1 Corinthians 1:23,24.

GEORGE WHITEFIELD (1714-1770): The Holy Ghost shall be sent down on you, if you do but believe; for Christ ascended up on high to receive this gift even for the vilest of men. Come then, all ye that are weary and heavy laden with the sense of your sins—lay hold on Christ by faith, and He will give you rest; for salvation is the free gift of God to all that believe. And though you may think this too good news to be true, yet I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not. This is the gospel, this is the glad tidings which we are commissioned to preach to every creature. Be not faithless then, but believing.

 

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Touch Me Not

Posted on April 5, 2024 by The Editor

Mark 16:9; John 20:11-17

Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.

But Mary stood without at the sepulchre weeping: and as she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulchre, and seeth two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him. And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.

Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.

J. C. RYLE (1816-1900): This saying of our Lord is undeniably a very “deep thing,” and the real meaning of it is a point which has greatly perplexed commentators.

MATTHEW POOLE (1624-1679): There are two no mean difficulties: one about the sense of the prohibition, when our Saviour forbade this woman to touch Him—when after His resurrection, He suffered the women to hold Him by the feet, Matthew 28:29.

JOHN GILL (1697-1771): Not that His body was an aerial one, or a mere “phantom,” which could not be touched; the prohibition itself shows the contrary.

RICHARD SIBBES (1577-1635): Mary was too much addicted to Christ’s bodily presence.

JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): She had caught him by the feet—as the Shunammite did Elisha—and there she would have held him longer, out of inconsiderate zeal. He takes her off this corporal conceit, that she may learn to live by faith, and not by sense; to be drawn after Him to heaven, whither He was now ascending, and to go tell His brethren what she had seen and heard.

ALEXANDER WHYTE (1836-1921): “Touch Me not.” Had He not said that, she would have been holding His feet there to this day.

THE EDITOR: But the text doesn’t say that Mary “had caught Him by the feet,” though that was probably her intent.

MATTHEW POOLE: The other difficulty is: What force of a reason there could be for her not touching Him because “He had not yet ascended?”

THE EDITOR: Jesus stated it as the specific reason He prevented her from touching Him.

ALEXANDER MacLAREN (1826-1910): His prohibition encloses a permission. ‘Touch Me not! for I am not yet ascended,’ implies ‘When I am, you may.’

THE EDITOR: Yes. So why was it permissible for the other women to touch Him only minutes later, but not now?

J. C. RYLE: The message which our Lord desires Mary to carry to His disciples is remarkable. He does not bid her say “I have risen,” but “I ascend.”

THE EDITOR: But why send a message to His disciples about an ascension into heaven forty days later? Jesus knew He would talk with them face to face later that same evening. Surely that present tense phrasing, “I ascend,” has an important immediate significance. A third difficult point here is also never considered—When Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, what was He wearing? Peter and John had seen the linen grave clothes which had wrapped Christ’s naked body for burial, lying in the tomb, John 20:4-7. Now Jesus wasn’t standing there naked when Mary mistook Him for the gardener! So what was He wearing?

ROBERT HAWKER (1753-1827): By comparing Scripture with Scripture, perhaps a light is thrown on the subject.

CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): The office of the High Priest was but half performed when he had slain the sacrifice: he must carry the blood within the veil, to sprinkle it upon the Mercy-seat; and he must burn incense also before the Mercy-seat, Leviticus 16:13,14. Now our blessed Lord was to execute every part of the priestly office; and therefore He must carry His own blood within the veil, and present also before the Mercy-seat the incense of His continual intercession. Agreeably to this we are told, “that by his own blood he is entered into the Holy Place, having obtained eternal redemption for us,” Hebrews 9:12—So, our Lord was under a necessity of rising again, that He might enter into heaven with His own blood, that He might there present it before the mercy-seat.

HENRY AINSWORTH (1571–1622): The burning of incense preceded the sprinkling of the blood, Leviticus 16:13,14.

CHARLES SIMEON: It was not till after the high priest had covered the mercy-seat with the clouds of incense, that he had any authority to bless the people. Thus was our Lord, not only to offer Himself as a sacrifice for sin, and to enter into heaven with His own blood, but He was to make intercession for us at the right hand of God. This was stipulated between the Father and Him as one part of the condition, on which the conversion of sinners was to depend; “Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for thy possession,” Psalm 2:8.

THE EDITOR: Leviticus 16 shows the procedure required of the high priest to go in and out of the Holy of Holies, although Christ needed no atonement for Himself, as did the Old Testament high priest: “He shall put on the holy linen coat, and he shall have the linen breeches upon his flesh, and shall be girded with a linen girdle, and with the linen mitre shall he be attired: these are holy garments; therefore he shall wash his flesh in water, and so put them on,” Leviticus 16:4. After burning incense and sprinkling the blood inside the Holy of Holies, then the high priest returned into the tabernacle.

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): The high priest must then put off his linen garments in the tabernacle, and leave them there—the Jews say never to be worn again by himself or any other, for they made new ones every year.

THE EDITOR: That signified Christ’s finished work, and His once for all atonement for our sins. Next, the priest changed his clothes again to “come forth” outside the tabernacle to perform the burnt offerings, Leviticus 16:23,24.

G. CAMPBELL MORGAN (1863-1945): It is significant that when the priest entered the Holiest of all he did not wear his gorgeous apparel, but was clothed in a garment of simple and pure white linen.

THE EDITOR: Yes. And it explains what Jesus was wearing when He appeared unto Mary Magdalene. He was wearing the pure white linen garment of His own perfect holy righteousness. Why? Because He must be perfectly “undefiled” to fulfill the Scriptures in entering the Holy of Holies, Hebrews 7:26,27. But Christ’s body had been truly dead, and though His body saw not corruption, any contact with a dead body causes a ceremonial defilement, Haggai 2:11-13. Also, according to that Levitical law, a washing with water to cleanse his body was required before the high priest put on the holy garments. Spiritually, that washing was fulfilled by Christ’s resurrection itself, as it is also in our own regeneration, 1 Corinthians 15:42-44; Titus 3:5.

A. W. PINK (1886-1952): This is a most striking detail not obvious at first sight, but which is clearly established by a comparison of Scripture with Scripture…How this illustrates the need of diligently comparing Scripture with Scripture if we would obtain the full teaching of the Word on any subject!

THE EDITOR: That same reference in Haggai also proves that contact with anything not perfectly pure is defiling. Therefore, if Mary had touched Him, being of sinful human flesh, she would have defiled Him and made Him unclean according to the law. I believe this explains the specific reason for Christ’s prohibition; and that His entry into the heavenly Holy of Holies was the immediate ascension which Jesus said had “not yet” happened—because in marvellously tender grace, He had tarried briefly to comfort a weeping Mary Magdalene. Thus these Old Testament Scriptures were fulfilled between His appearance to her, and His meeting with the other women shortly afterwards, who then were allowed to touch Him.

 

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Shall I Not Drink It?

Posted on March 29, 2024 by The Editor

John 18:11

The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): And Jesus did drink it, though it involved more suffering than we can imagine! Yet there was no resistance to that suffering. He suffered, but He never rebelled against it.

J. C. RYLE (1816-1900): Let us carefully remember that our blessed Lord suffered and died of His own free will. He did not die because He could not help it; He did not suffer because He could not escape. All the soldiers of Pilate’s army could not have taken Him, if He had not been willing to be taken. They could not have hurt a hair of His head, if He had not given them permission. But here, as in all His earthly ministry, Jesus was a willing sufferer. He had set His heart on accomplishing our redemption. He loved us, and gave Himself for us, cheerfully, willingly, gladly, in order to make atonement for our sins. It was “the joy set before Him” which made Him endure the cross, and despise the shame, and yield Himself up without reluctance into the hands of His enemies.

ROBERT HAWKER (1753-1827): When the Son of God appeared, and came to accomplish the full purposes of the covenant, every act of Christ, before the time arrived for His death, most fully proved that His entire consent was in it. “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me,” said Jesus, “and to finish his work,” John 4:34. “Wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business,” Luke 2:49. Yea, the zeal of the Lord’s house is said to have eaten him up, John 2:17. So that everything indicated how exceedingly His heart was engaged in this work.

A. W. PINK (1886-1952): Though what He did was done out of love for us, yet chiefly it was in subjection to God’s will, and out of love to Him. “But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave Me commandment, even so I do!” John 14:31.

THOMAS GOODWIN (1600-1679): He never showed any sign of reluctance, till in the garden He saw what was in that cup His Father did present Him—even His wrath, and being made a curse, Luke 22:39-42. And to show what the nature of a man in itself might in such a case do—namely, show His abhorrency of so high an endurance, and merely to let us understand so much that we might see His love—for it was meet we should by something understand how much He was put to, He thereupon cries out, “Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass.” And the whole mind of this passage is but to show, His averseness, as to the thing in itself simply considered, because of the bitterness of it; and, that the whole ground of His submitting thereunto was His Father’s will; and how that, His will stood to it as high as ever—yet only upon that ground, “Not my will, but thy will be done.”

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): The manner of expression bespeaks a settled resolution, and that He would not entertain a thought to the contrary. He was willing to drink of this cup, though it was a bitter cup, an infusion of the wormwood and the gall, the cup of trembling, a bloody cup, the “dregs of the cup of the Lord’s wrath,” Isaiah 51:22. He drank it, that He might put into our hands the cup of salvation, the cup of consolation, the cup of blessing; and therefore He is willing to drink it—because His Father put it into His hand. If His Father will have it so, it is for the best, and be it so.

A. W. PINK: Thus the “joy” that was set before Jesus was the doing of God’s will, and His anticipation of the glorious reward which should be given Him in return—He “endured the cross,” Hebrews 12:2.

JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): In the same manner, we too ought to be prepared for enduring the cross.

A. W. PINK: Therein we have the Commander’s example to His soldiers of heroic fortitude. Those words signify far more than that He experienced the shame and pain of crucifixion: they tell us that He stood steadfast under it all. He endured the cross not sullenly or even stoically, but in the highest and noblest sense of the term—with holy composure of soul. He never wavered or faltered, murmured or complained: “The cup which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?” And He has left us an example that we should “follow His steps,” 1 Peter 2:21; and therefore does He declare, “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross,” Matthew 16:24. Strength for this task is to be found by “looking unto Jesus” by keeping steadily before faith’s eye the crown, the joy awaiting us.

C. H. SPURGEON: When John the Baptist said “Behold the Lamb of God,” the two disciples followed Jesus, John 1:36,37; and we read of some, “These are they which follow the Lamb wherever He goes,” Revelation 14:4. The Lamb is our Guide. The Lord is a Shepherd as well as a Lamb, and the flock following in His footsteps is safely led. My Soul, when you need to know which way to go, behold the Lamb of God! Ask, “What would Jesus do?” Then do what Jesus would have done in such a case and you can not do amiss—in every moral question we are bound to be on Christ’s side. In every religious question we are not on the side of predominant thought, nor on the side of fashionable views, nor on the side of lucre, but on the side of Christ! Make this your slogan: “What would Jesus do?” Go and do that. “How would Jesus think?” Go and think that.

C. H. MACKINTOSH (1820-1896): If we only honestly ask ourselves the question, “What would Jesus do?” it would close all discussion on this point as well as on a thousand other points besides.

C. H. SPURGEON: Child of God, are you vexed and embittered in soul? Then bravely accept the trial as coming from your Father and say, “The cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?”

THOMAS MANTON (1620-1677): We should trust God’s potion. We are dearer to God than we can be to ourselves; He is more solicitous for our good, than we are for our own. God loves the lowest saint infinitely more than the highest angels love God.

A. W. PINK: There is no higher aspect of faith than that which brings the heart to patiently submit unto whatever God sends us, to meekly acquiesce unto His sovereign will, to say “the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” Oftentimes the faith which suffers is greater than the faith that can boast an open triumph. “Love beareth all things,” I Corinthians 13:7; and faith when it reaches the pinnacle of attainment declares, “though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him,” Job 13:15.

C. H. SPURGEON: Fear not, have confidence in God—all your sorrows shall yet end in joy and the thing which you deplore today, shall be the subject of tomorrow’s sweetest songs.

 

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God Governing the Nations

Posted on March 22, 2024 by The Editor

Proverbs 14:34; Psalm 22:28—Job 12:23; Jeremiah 18:7,8

Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.

For the kingdom is the LORD’s: and he is the governor among the nations—He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them: he enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again.

At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): “Verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth,” Psalm 58:11. The Lord may be known by the judgments which He executes, and that they may be taken as earnests of a judgment to come. He is a God—not a weak man, not an angel, not a mere name, nor as the atheists suggest, a creature of men’s fear and fancy—not a deified hero, nor the sun and moon, as idolaters imagined—but God, a self-existent perfect Being; He it is that judges the earth.

JOHN HINCKLEY (1617-1695): This judging here does not refer to the judgment to come, at the last day, when there shall be a general convention of quick and dead before the Lord’s dreadful tribunal—that is not the scope of this place. ’Tis in the present tense, ο κρινων, “that now judgeth, or is now judging” the earth and the inhabitants thereof; and therefore it must be understood of a judgment on this side of the judgment of the great day; and so God judges the earth, or in the earth, three manner of ways. First, by a providential ordering and wise disposal of all the affairs of all creatures. Secondly, in relieving the oppressed and pleading the cause of the innocent. Thirdly, in overthrowing and plaguing the wicked doers.

JAMES HERVEY (1713-1758): How can the justice of God, with regard to a wicked nations, be shown, but by executing His vengeance upon them, in temporal calamities?

EDWARD PAYSON (1783-1827): This, I conceive, is too evident to require proof, for how could God be considered as the moral governor of the world, if nations and communities were exempt from His government?

JAMES HERVEY: Consider, Sirs, the very essence of political communities is temporal, purely temporal. It has no existence but in this world. Hereafter, sinners will be judged and punished, singly and in a personal capacity only. How then shall He that is Ruler among nations, maintain the dignity of His government over the kingdoms of the earth, but by inflicting national punishments for national provocations?

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): There cannot be an eternal damnation of nations as nations, the destruction of men at last will be of individuals, and at the bar of God each man must be tried for himself. The punishment, therefore, of nations, is national. The guilt they incur, must receive its awful recompense in this present time state.

A. W. PINK (1886-1952): “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people” expresses a foundational principle and an unchanging fact. Right doing or walking according to the Divine Rule is the basic condition of national prosperity. A righteous administration of government and the public worship of God gives an ascendancy to a people over those where such things prevail not. Nothing so tends to uphold government, elevate the mind of the masses, promote industry, sobriety and equity between man and man, as does the genuine practice of piety, the preservation of the virtues and suppression of vice, as nothing more qualifies a nation for the favour of God. Righteousness is productive of health, of population, of peace and prosperity. But every kind of sin has the contrary tendency.

THOMAS SCOTT (1747-1821): The prevalence of vice and impiety is a nation’s reproach, conduces to disunion, weakness and disgrace, and exposes any people to the wrath and vengeance of God.

A. W. PINK: When sin has become a public “reproach,” then ruin is imminent.

JOHN KNOX (1514-1572):  The justice of God is such, that He will not pour forth His extreme vengeance upon the wicked, until such time as their iniquity is so manifest, that their very flatterers cannot excuse it.

A. W. PINK: The Lord is here depicted as the righteous Governor of the nations, dealing with them according to their deserts. In the exercise of His unchallengeable authority the Most High is pleased to act according to the principles of goodness and equity. There is no arbitrary caprice in the infliction of punishment: “the curse causeless shall not come,” Proverbs 26:2.

ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): “He enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again.” He often permits a nation to acquire an accession of territory, and afterwards shuts them up within their ancient boundaries, and often contracts even those. All these things seem to occur as natural events, and the consequences of state intrigues, and such like causes; but when Divine inspiration comes to pronounce upon them, they are shown to be the consequence of God’s acting in His judgment and mercy; for it is by Him that kings reign, Proverbs 8:15; it is He who putteth down one and raiseth up another, Daniel 2:21.

THE EDITOR: “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.” The Old Testament abounds with examples of this principle in God’s governing the nation of Israel.

CHARLES BRIDGES (1794-1869): As they were a righteous or sinful nation, they were marked by corresponding exaltation or reproach.

A. W. PINK: That these principles of the Divine administration apply to the Gentiles, equally with the Jews, is unmistakably clear from the case of Nineveh, a heathen city, concerning which the Lord said “their wickedness is come up before Me,” Jonah 1:2. Unto the vast metropolis the Prophet was sent, crying, “Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown,” Jonah 3:4. But note well the sequel.

THE EDITOR: When the people of Ninveh, including its king, repented and changed their ways, “God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not,” Jonah 3:10.

JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): Scripture wishes to distinguish the true God from all fictions, and it takes these two principles: First, God governs all things by His own hand, and retains them under His sway; and Secondly, nothing is hid from Him.

MATTHEW HENRY: The cabinet counsels of princes are before God’s eye, 2 Kings 6:11.

CHARLES BRIDGES: This is political wisdom on scriptural principles. If “righteousness exalteth a nation,” the open acknowledgment of it is the sure path to national prosperity. If it be not beneath statesmen to take lessons from the Bible, let them deeply ponder this sound political maxim—the Scripture records clearly prove this to be the rule of national conduct—not the wisdom of policy, extent of empire, splendid conquests, flourishing trade, abundant resources—but “righteousness exalteth a nation.”

WILLIAM JAY (1769-1853): Nations who depend for their protection and prosperity upon navies, armies, commerce, and forget God; they are idolaters.

THE EDITOR: Let all national leaders, and their citizens, whether to the right or left of the political spectrum, learn this Biblical wisdom, and repent of their wickedness, while a season of God’s grace remains; otherwise, national judgments inevitably must follow.

C. H. SPURGEON: For nations there is a weighing time. National sins demand national punishments. The whole history of God’s dealings with mankind proves that though a nation may go on in wickedness; it may multiply its oppressions; it may abound in bloodshed, tyranny, and war; but an hour of retribution draweth nigh. When it shall have filled up its measure of iniquity, then shall the angel of vengeance execute its doom.

 

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Berean Bible Study

Posted on March 15, 2024 by The Editor

Acts 17:10,11; Isaiah 8:20; 2 Corinthians 13:1

The brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.

To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.

In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.

CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): The Thessalonians would not so much as consider what they heard from the Apostle. The Bereans, on the contrary, made a diligent use of the means afforded them for solving their doubts: they “searched the Scriptures,” which they considered as the only standard of truth, and to which Paul had appealed; they “searched them daily,” that they might form their judgment upon the surest grounds: they would neither receive nor reject any thing which they had not maturely weighed.

WILLIAM GURNALL (1617-1679): Now, to help thee in thy search for the sense and meaning of the Word—First,  Take heed thou comest not to the Scriptures with an unholy heart. Second: Make not thy own reason the rule by which thou dost measure Scripture truths. Third: Take heed thou comest not with a judgment pre-engaged to any party or opinion—a mind pre­possessed will be ready to impose its own sense upon the Word, and so loses the truth by an overweening conceit of his own opinion. Too many read the Scriptures not so much to be informed by them, as confirmed in what already they have taken up! They choose opinions, as Samson his wife, because they please them, and then come to gain the Scriptures’ consent.

CHARLES SIMEON: The Bereans “inquired whether these things were so.” They did not conclude every thing to be false which did not accord with their preconceived opinions. This was a noble spirit, because it showed that they were not in subjection to their prejudices.

WILLIAM GURNALL: Fourth: Go to God by prayer for a key to unlock the mysteries of His Word. It is not the plodding, but the praying soul, that will get this treasure of Scripture knowledge. John got the sealed book opened by weeping, Revelation 5:5. God often brings a truth to the Christian’s hand as a return of prayer, which he had long hunted for in vain with much labour and study; there is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, Daniel 2:22. And where doth He reveal the secrets of His Word but at the throne of grace? “From the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words,” Daniel 10:12—for thy prayer. And what was this heav­enly messenger’s errand to Daniel but to open more fully the Scripture to him?

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): If you study the original, consult the commentaries, and meditate deeply, yet if you neglect to cry mightily unto the Spirit of God, your study will not profit you―but if you wait upon the Holy Ghost in simple dependence upon His teaching, you will lay hold of very much of the divine meaning.

WILLIAM GURNALL: Fifth: Compare Scripture with Scripture.

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): The readiness of mind of the Bereans to receive the Word was not such as they took things upon trust, and swallowed them upon an implicit faith: no; but since Paul reasoned out of the Scriptures, and referred them to the Old Testament for the proof of what he said, they turned to those places, read the context, considered the scope and drift of them, compared them with other places of Scripture, and examined whether Paul’s inferences from them were natural and genuine, and his arguments upon them cogent, and determined accordingly.

ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): They searched the Scriptures of the Old Testament to see whether the promises and types corresponded with the alleged fulfillment in the person, works, and sufferings of Jesus Christ.

A. W. PINK (1886-1952): Only by prayerfully and diligently comparing Scripture with Scripture are its exquisite perfections revealed, and only thus are we able to obtain a complete view of many a scene―only by comparing Scripture with Scripture can we rightly interpret any figure or symbol…No verse of Scripture yields its meaning to lazy people.

WILLIAM GURNALL: Now, in comparing Scripture with Scripture, be careful that thou interpret obscure places by the more plain and clear, and not the clear by the dark. “Some things hard to be understood, which they that are unstable wrest,” 2 Peter 3:16. No wonder they should stumble in those dark and difficult places, when they turn their back on that light which plainer Scriptures afford to lead them safely through.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES (1899-1981): We must remember that if our interpretation ever makes the teaching appear to be ridiculous or lead us to a ridiculous position, it is patently a wrong interpretation. And there are people who are guilty of this.

WILLIAM GURNALL: “He that is born of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not,” 1 John 5:18. This is a dark place which some run away with, and from it con­clude there is a perfect state free from all sin attain­able in this life; whereas a multitude of plain Scriptures testify against such a conclusion, as 1 Kings 8:38; Ecclesiastes 7:20; Job 9:20; 1 John 1:8-10, with many more. So it must be in a limited and qualified sense that “he that is born of God sinneth not.”

MATTHEW HENRY: Paul saw himself to be in a state of imperfection and trial: “Not as though I had already attained, or were already perfect,” Philippians 3:12…If Paul had not attained to perfection, who had reached to so high a pitch of holiness, much less have we.

A. W. PINK: Our purpose in calling attention to this, is to remind the reader of the great importance of comparing Scripture with Scripture, and to show how Scripture is self-interpreting.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES: We must remember that if our interpretation contradicts the plain and obvious teaching of Scripture at another point, again it is obvious that our interpretation has gone astray—there is no contradiction in Biblical teaching.

WILLIAM GURNALL: Sixth: Consult with thy faithful guides which God hath set over thee in His church. Though people are not to pin their faith on the min­ister’s sleeve, yet they are to “seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts,” Malachi 2:7.

JOHN ROBINSON (1575-1625): Make use of the commentaries and expositions of such special instruments, as God in mercy hath raised up for the opening of the Scriptures, and edifying the Church.

C. H. SPURGEON: Richard Cecil says his plan was, when he laid a hold of a Scripture, to pray over it, and get his own thoughts on it, and then, after he had so done, to take up the ablest divines who wrote upon the subject, and see what their thoughts were.

HULDRYCH ZWINGLI (1484-1531): I study them with the same feelings with which one asks a friend, “What do you understand by this?”

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES: We must not swallow automatically everything we read in books, even from the greatest men. We must examine everything.

C. H. SPURGEON: If you do not think, and think much, you will become slaves and mere copyists. The exercise of your own mind is most healthful to you, and by perseverance, with divine help, you may expect to get at the meaning of every understandable passage. So, to rely upon your own abilities as to be unwilling to learn from others is clearly folly; so to study others, as not to judge for yourself, is imbecility.

 

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Failing of the Grace of God; What Does That Mean?

Posted on March 8, 2024 by The Editor

Hebrews 12:14,15

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God.

CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): The riches of the Gospel are freely imparted to all who seek them by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Yet they quite mistake the nature of the Gospel, who imagine it to be inconsistent with solemn warnings. It offers every thing freely; but it does not dispense with the exertion of human efforts: it promises every thing fully; but not in such a way as to supersede the need of care and watchfulness on our part. It abounds with warnings and exhortations, to which we must take the utmost heed.

JOHN OWEN (1616-1683): This grace, under all their profession of the gospel, men may “fail of.”

CHARLES SIMEON: By “the grace of God,” I understand “the Gospel of the grace of God,” or that “grace of God which bringeth salvation.” And by “failing of the grace of God,” I understand, a falling short of it: the first part of our text being exactly parallel with that expression in the fourth chapter of this epistle, “Let us fear lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it,” Hebrews 4:1.

JOHN OWEN: The word ὑστερέω signifies sometimes “to want, or be deficient in any kind,” Matthew 19:20; Luke 5:14; Luke 22:45; sometimes “to come behind,” 1 Corinthians 1:7; 2 Corinthians 11:5; sometimes “to be destitute,” Hebrews 11:37; sometimes “to fail or come short of,” as Romans 3:23; Hebrews 4:1. It nowhere signifies to “fall from,”—so inquiries of men about falling from grace, as to these words, are impertinent; wherefore, to “fail of grace,” is to come short of it, not to obtain it, though we seem to be in the way thereunto.

CHARLES SIMEON: Now, we may come short of the Gospel by not submitting to its humiliating doctrines—the Gospel views all men as in a lost and perishing condition. Its provisions are made for all mankind without exception. It knows nothing of persons so good as not to need salvation, or of persons so bad as to be beyond the reach of the salvation it provides. It requires all to view themselves as “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked; and counsels them to come to the Lord Jesus Christ for eye-salve that they may see; for gold that they may be enriched; and for garments that they may be clothed,” Revelation 3:17, 8. It suffers none to bring any price in their hands, but requires them to receive every thing “without money and without price,” Isaiah 55:1.

But all this is very humiliating. Proud man does not like to be brought so low, as to depend wholly on another, and not at all on himself. We wish to have something of our own whereof we may boast. And to be reduced to a level with the vilest of the human race, so as to acknowledge ourselves as much indebted to Divine grace as they, is a humiliation to which we cannot endure to submit—when it is said, “Wash and be clean,” instead of accepting the tidings with gratitude, we spurn them like Naaman, and go away in a rage, 2 Kings 5:10,13. To all this however, we must “submit,”  Romans 10:3; for there is no other way of salvation, Acts 4:12; 1 Corinthians 3:11; and, if we will not come to Christ upon His terms, we must remain for ever destitute of the blessings He has purchased for us.

A. W. PINK: God has warned us plainly in His Word that “there is a generation that are pure in their own eyes and yet is not washed from their filthiness,” Proverbs 30:12. The call to careful self-examination receives its urgency from the very great danger there is of self-deception. Sin darkens the understanding, so that man is unable to perceive his real state before God. Satan “hath blinded the minds of them which believe not,” 2 Corinthians 4:4. The deep-rooted pride of our hearts makes us think the best of ourselves, so that if a question is raised in our hearts, we are ever prone to give ourselves the benefit of the doubt. A spirit of sloth possesses us by nature, so that we are unwilling to go to the trouble which real self-examination calls for. Hence the vast majority remain with a head knowledge of the truth, with outward attention to forms and ceremonies, or resting on a mere consent to the letter of some verse like John 3:16, and refusing to “make their calling and election sure,” 2 Peter 1:10.

JOHN OWEN: The duty prescribed is to “look diligently.”

CHARLES SIMEON: “Without holiness—radical universal holiness—no man shall see the Lord:” and we are cautioned to “look diligently,” lest, by coming short of the requirements of the Gospel, we fail to attain a possession of its blessings. We may come short of the Gospel by not obeying its self-denying doctrines. Though the Gospel gives salvation freely, it does not leave us at liberty to neglect good works; on the contrary, “it teaches us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world,” Titus 2:11,12. Indeed, the sanctification it requires of us is as offensive to our carnal and worldly hearts, as the humiliation it imposes on our pride. The object of the Gospel is not merely to save men from death and hell, but to bring them back to a state of holy allegiance to their God, such as Adam experienced in Paradise. It requires us to give up ourselves as living sacrifices unto God, to be as entirely dedicated to His service as the burnt-offerings which were wholly consumed on the altar, Romans 12:1. It enjoins us “neither to live unto ourselves, nor die unto ourselves;” but both in life and death to be altogether at the Lord’s disposal, for the accomplishment of His will, and for the promotion of His glory, Romans 14:7,8.

A. W. PINK: If I am not diligently and earnestly cultivating practical holiness, both of heart and life, then I shall never enter Heaven.

CHARLES SIMEON: Now, to this measure of holiness we have by nature a deep rooted aversion. We have many earthly sensual appetites which plead for indulgence: and when we are required to “cut off the right hand, and pluck out the right eye,” and to “be holy as God Himself is holy,” we reply, “This is an hard saying; who can hear it?” To “mortify our members upon earth,” and to “crucify the flesh with its affections and lusts,” is a work which, as the terms it is expressed intimate, is painful to flesh and blood: and to be told that without this we never can be Christ’s disciples, is most grating to our ears. But nothing less than this will suffice for the approving of ourselves upright in the sight of God. I beseech you then, brethren, to “look diligently” to this matter, and not to come short of what the Gospel requires of you; for if you comply not both with its doctrines and its precepts, you can never partake of its privileges and its blessings.

JOHN OWEN: The terms expressed in the Gospel are sure and none shall ever fail who embrace it on these terms.

 

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The Spiritual Danger of Pride in Gifts & Grace

Posted on March 1, 2024 by The Editor

1 Peter 5:5,6; Proverbs 29:23; Jeremiah 13:15

Be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.

A man’s pride shall bring him low: but honour shall uphold the humble in spirit.

Hear ye, and give ear; be not proud: for the LORD hath spoken.

JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): Pride is a weed that will grow out of any ground—like mistletoe that will grow upon any tree—but, for most part, it grows from the best. Like air in all bodies, it will have a being in every soul, and creeps into every action, either in the beginning, proceeding, or conclusion.

WILLIAM GURNALL (1617-1679): It is hard starving this sin; there is nothing almost it cannot live on—the Christian is prone chiefly to be puffed up with perfections suitable to his life. First, Pride of gifts. By gifts, I mean those supernatural abil­ities, which the Spirit of God doth enrich and endow the minds of men for edification of the body of Christ…Satan labours to do what he can, to taint these gifts, and fly-blow them with pride in the Christian, so he may spoil the Christian’s trade, which is mutually maintained by the gifts and graces of one another. Pride of gifts hinders the Chris­tian’s trade—at least its thriving.

MARTYN LLOYD-JONES (1899-1981):  The greatest of all the temptations that assail a preacher is pride.

WILLIAM GURNALL: Pride of gifts is the cause why we do so little good with them to others. So far as pride prevails, the man prays and preaches, rather to be thought good by others, than to do good to others; rather to enthrone himself, than Christ, in the opinions and hearts of his hearers. Pride carries the man aloft, to be admired for the height of his parts and notions, and will not suffer him to stoop so low as to speak of plain truths, or if he does, not plainly; he must have some fine lace, though on plain stuff. Such a one may tickle the ear, but is very unlikely to do real good to the soul. Second, pride of gifts is why we receive so little good from the gifts of others. Pride fills the soul; and a full soul will take nothing from God, much less from man, to do it good. And this is not the way to thrive. Pride destroys love, and love wanting, edification is lost.

C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): “Let him that thinks he stands,” with the proudest talents, “take heed lest he fall,” 1 Corinthians 10:12. Others have a pride of Grace. It is a curious fact. There is such a thing as being proud of Grace.

WILLIAM GURNALL: A Christian may be proud of grace, by trusting in the strength of his grace. To trust in the strength of grace is to be proud of grace…It is God’s method to give His children into Satan’s hands, when they grow proud and self-confident. Hezekiah was left to a temptation, “to try him,” 2 Chronicle 32:31. Why? God had tried him a little before in an affliction; what needs this? O, Heze­kiah’s heart was lifted up after his affliction. It was time for God to let the tempter foil him. Probably Hezekiah had high thoughts of his grace—O, he would never do as he had done before!—and God will let him see what a weak crea­ture he is. Peter makes a whip for his own back in that bravado, “Though all should forsake thee, yet will not I.” Christ now in mere mercy, must set Satan on him to lay him on his back, that seeing the weak­ness of his faith, he might be dismounted from the height of his pride.

ANDREW GRAY (1633-1656): Peter’s example may scare you. His confidence was high. Yet he was soon dismounted when he denied Christ with cursing.

WILLIAM GURNALL: All that I shall say from this is, to entreat thee, Christian, to have a care of this kind of pride. You know what Joab said to David, when he perceived his heart lifted up with the strength of his kingdom, and therefore would have the people numbered. “Now the Lord thy God add unto the people, how many soever they be, an hundredfold, but why doth my lord the king delight in this thing?” 2 Samuel 24:3. The Lord add to the strength of thy grace an hundredfold, but why delightest thou in this? why shouldst thou be lifted up? is it not grace?

ANDREW GRAY: Remember, pride is both a sin and a solemn sign of a diseased soul.

JOHN TRAPP: It is God’s care to cure His people of this dangerous disease, as He did Paul, who, if he had not been buffeted, “had been exalted,” and carried higher in conceit than he ever was in his ecstasy, 2 Corinthians 12:7.

WILLIAM GURNALL: The second way a Christian may be proud of grace, is by trusting on the worth of his grace—resting on it for his acceptance with God. Scripture calls inherent grace “our own righteousness”—though God indeed be the efficient cause of it—and opposeth it to the righteousness of Christ, which alone is called “the righteousness of God,” Romans 10:1-4. Now, to rest on any grace inherent, is to exalt our own righteousness above the righteousness of God; and what pride will this amount to? If this were so, then a saint when he comes to heaven might say, “This is heaven which I have built—my grace hath purchased;” and thus the God of heaven should become tenant to His creature in heaven. No, God hath cast the order of our salvation into another method—of grace, but not of grace in us, but grace to us. This is Christ’s work, not grace’s.

ANDREW GRAY: O beware of pride in grace—trusting in its strength or relying on its worth. Should a mud wall be proud because the sun shines on it? If you are proud in this way you will be delivered into the devil’s hands by some terrible fall. Your confidence will then be cut off.

JOHN TRAPP: “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall,” Proverbs 16:18. A bulging wall is near a downfall. Swelling is a dangerous symptom in the body; so is pride in the soul.

C. H. SPURGEON: A man says, “I have great faith, I shall not fall. Poor Little-Faith may, but I never shall.” “I have fervent love,” says another, “I can stand, there is no danger of my going astray. As for my Brother over there, he is so cold and slow, he will fall, I dare say.” Says another man, “I have a most burning hope of Heaven and that hope will triumph. It will purge my soul from sin, as Christ the Lord is pure. I am safe.” He who boasts of Grace, has little Grace to boast of! But there are some who do, who think their graces shall keep them, knowing not that the stream must flow constantly from the fountainhead, otherwise the bed of the brook shall soon be dry. If a continuous stream of oil comes not to the lamp, though it burn brightly today, it shall smoke tomorrow.

ANDREW GRAY: Your grace will wither and dwindle if you pride yourself in it.

MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): Pride makes a god of self…Ministers should not be proud of their gifts or graces; the better qualified they are for their work, and the more success they have in it, the more thankful should they be to God for His distinguishing goodness.

 

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