Back to sermon search

Full transcript

Three arguments are left, that is, three main arguments are left for our consideration, and they mostly cover ground that is well known amongst evangelicals, at least. The argument from the implications of false doctrine, of the false doctrine which Paul here rebuts. Argument ten, chapter five, two to twelve. Argument eleven, the argument from the fact that the gospel of justification by faith does make provision for holy living. And from what that provision is and involves. The final argument, which rests on an exposure of the unworthy motives of the false teachers, compared with the marks of true apostleship displayed by Paul. Very good. First of all, then, the arguments from the implication of the false doctrine. Begins in chapter five, verse two, goes down to verse twelve. Behold, I, Paul, say unto you, notice his apostolic authority, that if you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing. Now we have to read it in its context, of course, remembering again that Paul at one stage voluntarily circumcised Timothy, but not for salvation, of course. Here, when he says if anybody receives circumcision, that is with the idea that it helps him to gain eternal life, justification, forgiveness, and so forth. I testify unto you that if you receive circumcision from that motive, Christ will profit you nothing. It is not true that Christ comes alongside us and gives us a tremendous help to keep the law so that we can then gain salvation. That is not true. Christ refuses to help on those terms. When it comes to justification, forgiveness, eternal life, then our faith must be solely in Christ. If you're going to put your faith in other things as well, then you won't have the help of Christ. Christ will profit you nothing. Yeah, I testify again to every man that receives circumcision that he is a debtor to do the whole law. You can't pick, uh, uh, choose, pick and choose in the law, and so I choose to keep this one in order to help to gain salvation. If you're going to use the principle of law, it must be the whole lot. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law. You are fallen away from grace. Which verse was taken to support what has came to be known as the falling away doctrine. That is that true believers can, alas, fall away and lose their salvation. And because that is so, you can't be sure that you're saved until you're in glory. That seems to me to rise from a misunderstanding of what it says and what the point of the argument is. To show what is happening here, let me quote you what was happening in Corinth and is dealt with by Paul in one Corinthians fifteen. There were some dear believers in Corinth who had put their faith in Christ for salvation. But false teaching had arisen, and they now believed there was no such thing as the resurrection. And like a lot of dear believers, ourselves included, we can sometimes have funny ideas in our heads and don't realize that they contradict the very basis of the faith. The way that Paul dealt with that false doctrine, that there is no resurrection, was to show in detail to the Corinthians that if there's no resurrection, then the bottom is knocked out of salvation. There is no thing as such thing as salvation anyway. Christ is bodily risen. If not, you are still in your sins. There is no such thing as salvation. Now, believers can manage to hold those two contradictory things together in their heads. They don't see that the second contradicts the first. They are to be treated graciously and, uh, to have the point- thing pointed out to them. But if thereafter they p- persist in saying and believing there is no resurrection, what does that imply? They're not believers anyway. So with this matter, you can be a believer and think that, uh, well, perhaps I ought to be circumcised, that helps my salvation, and that so and so and so and so, and I must keep the law as best I can to get salvation, and not see that this contradicts the basic principle of the gospel. It therefore depends whether somebody has understood the matter. You see Paul's concern for these believers. Have I labored in vain? Because if now you're serious and understand what you do, and you really think that salva- that circumcision and the keeping of the law is necessary for salvation, if that's what you now really think, then you've missed the point altogether. And were you ever saved? Because to hold that doctrine, summed up in this matter of circumcision, to hold that doctrine, and hold it really and seriously and believe it, you are severed from Christ. You can't have both the gospel and that. That is the seriousness of this false teaching. You are estranged from Christ. You have fallen away from grace. That doesn't mean, in the context, you've gone into sin. That means that instead of holding fast to the fact that salvation is by grace, you've now fallen away from it because you're now saying that certain other things as well, your works in the religious works, are necessary for salvation. You can't mix the both. It's either by grace or it's by your works. It can't be by both. And if you insist on it being, uh, by your works of the law, so to speak, well, you're not being saved by grace. You are not believers. Notice the effect of doctrine, then, upon our relationship with Christ. You are severed from Christ, you are estranged from Christ. Bad doctrine at this level is very serious, isn't it? For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love. There's many a Protestant who would tell you that you don't get the salvation by keeping the Mass, who's not yet regenerate. And pride themselves that they don't go to the Mass. The question is a positive one. Have they personally repented and received Christ? The real issue is not circumcision or uncircumcision, but faith in Christ. Real, vigorous, lively faith in Christ. That, of course, is the motive power of the necessary following works. You were running well, who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth? The persuasion comes not of him that calleth you. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. Bring in the slightest mo- uh, idea that by your meritorious work you deserve salvation, and that ruins the lot. I have confidence in to you, ward in the Lord, that you will be none otherwise minded, but he that troubleth you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be. But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Well, he did practice circumcision, uh, uh, as we have before said, on Timothy. But please observe, he didn't preach it as a means of salvation. And if people had spread this, uh, this thing around him, but Paul is inconsistent, for he did, um, uh, uh, circumcise Timothy, and that shows at heart he believes that salvation is by works as well as faith. Then says Paul, the answer to it is, why do people still persecute me everywhere I go? That is the religious set. And now he says something very severe. I would that they which unsettle you would even emasculate themselves. You keep on telling people that salvation is by circumcision. Wow. For you, brethren, were called for freedom, only use not your freedom for an occasion to the flesh, but through love be servants one to another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. But if you bite and devour one another, take heed that you be not consumed one of another. The doctrine of salvation by faith is not a license to sin, of course. It leads to good works and provides the motive power for good works, as we shall see in this next argument. But as regard the law, it's not that we despise the law. Let Romans eight be a guide to us in this context. What the law could not do and that was weak through the flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemns sin in the flesh. To what end? That the righteous demand of the law should be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. Salvation by faith, then, is not a license to sin. Don't use it as an occasion to the flesh, but be servants one of another. For the righteous demand of the law, thou shalt love thy neighbor in thy s- as thyself, is fulfilled in them who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. And in the next place, verse fifteen, but if you t- bite and devour one another, take heed that you be not consumed one of another. Which is a very healthy reminder for us to distinguish between the penalty of sin and the consequences of sin. So let me point out what I mean by the difference between the penalty of sin and the consequences of sin. So I am a true believer, I repented and put my faith in Christ, and I have eternal life, and I believe, you'll see, there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. Marvelous, isn't it? No condemnation. The penalty of sin gone forever. Yes, yes. Well, I'm out with a friend. Uh, it's not me, uh, really. I was going to say in a plush hotel, so it's not me. But I'm out with a friend, you see, at a party, and it's been a marvelous party, and I'm taking the air on the veranda, you see, of this hotel. Dining room's on the first floor, you know. And uh, alas, I have given into temptation. True believer, you know, given into temptation. I have had too much to drink. In fact, I'm a bit tipsy, more than a bit tipsy. Fall over the veranda down onto the ground. Mercifully, my life is spared, but my right leg is so smashed up that even the best surgeons in the world have to decide there's no thought you'll have to have the right leg off. So I lose my right leg. And I come to the Lord and say, what a fool I was, Lord. I am sorry for this. What a fool I was. I really knew it was wrong, but I yielded to temptation, and uh, uh, uh, and uh, I did what is wrong. Please forgive me. Yes, the Lord will forgive me, surely he will. And assure me I shall still be in heaven, for there's no, um, no penalty. And then I'd say, Lord, life is difficult without this right leg. Please make the right leg grow again. Do you think he would? He might know somebody who could direct me to somebody who's very good at prosthetics and could make me a wooden leg or something. Most unlikely, I think, that God would do a miracle and restore the right leg. Well, he'll do it one day. You won't be hopping around glory on one leg. That's for sure. But for the time being, there are consequences of sin. And God may allow us to suffer them. Be it said that God will then take those consequences, painful as they may be and lifelong as they may be, and use them to help educate us and make us more like Christ, by the pain of it and the discipline of it. But just because we are justified by faith and there's no penalty, watch what happens in your assembly, won't you? For if you start biting and devouring one another, ooh. Don't say it doesn't matter because I, I'm going to heaven, I have eternal life and can never lose my salvation. The consequences, gentlemen. We shall meet that again. Then follows the long argument from chapter sixteen onwards. Verse sixteen, sorry, verse sixteen of chapter five onwards, down to the beginning of chapter six. And the argument is that the doctrine of justification by faith and salvation by faith does not provide us with a license for sin. It does in fact provide for a holy life. And you will see what that answer is. Verse sixteen, walk out by the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, for these are contrary to one to the other, that you may not do the things that you would. This is the provision of the Holy Spirit within us. But notice that verse eighteen, Because this provision of the Holy Spirit, Paul preaches it again, of course, in Romans eight, very strongly so. But it is part of Paul's argument here. Because if you be led of the Spirit, you are not under law anymore. This is a different principle. You are not trying to live right in order to escape the damnation of hell. You're doing it because you are energized by God's Holy Spirit. This, therefore, is an argument, still to show that the do- doctrine of justification, salvation by faith, not by works, is Is true. true. And Paul develops the work of the Holy Spirit, his description of the work of the Holy Spirit throughout the rest of that great paragraph. Notice what he has to say about those whose behavior is a constant unrepentant, unrepenting indulgence in the works of the flesh. Verse nineteen, now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, and he lists them, and then says in the middle of verse uh twenty one, of which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that they which practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Notice he doesn't say, I warned you that if you do those things, you will not inherit the kingdom of God. What he says is, I warn you that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. He's talking about people, therefore, that indulge in this kind of behavior quite unrepentantly, carry on doing it. Well, it's evident that they are not true believers. They are not born again. They do not have the Holy Spirit. They shall not inherit the kingdom of God. For they that are Christ's, verse twenty four, have crucified with the f- the flesh, with the passions and the lusts thereof. That doesn't mean that they are sinless or that they never fall into sin, but their attitude towards the flesh and its works is that they agree, uh, with God that these things must be crucified. They believe that Christ died for them in order to save them from the penalty. And therefore, positively and actively, they take the attitude that these things must be crucified, dealt with. And when I fall into sin, then I must confess it to God and seek God's grace and help not to do it again. My personal attitude and constant attitude must be that these things have to be crucified. It's a lifelong practice, gentlemen. We shall not be free of the exhortation to do it until we get home to glory. Moreover, it does not, being led by the Spirit, you see, doesn't lead to vainglory and provoking one another and, uh, showing superior graces and, and airs and graces and thinking we're better than other people. Even if a man is overtaken in a fault, that is not the fault overtakes him, but you come across him, actually catch him at it when he was doing his wrong thing. Oh, be careful how you treat him. Don't be too surprised, will you? You won't if you consider yourself. For if you were tempted, could you guarantee you wouldn't fall? Notice what Paul says, considering yourself, lest also you commit the same thing. No, no, lest also you be tempted. That might prove too much for you too. We need to show meekness and care for others and to help them. By contrast, verses twenty two and twenty three of chapter five, The fruits of the Spirit are such that they are beyond criticism. Verse twenty three: meekness, temperance, against such there is no law. But if we're led by the Spirit, it will have practical effects too, in this direction. Look at chapter six. But let him that is taught in the Word communicate unto him that teacheth in all things. It leads to a sharing between believers. It leads to gra- gratitude for what God has taught us, calls us upon us to help in the spread of that same gospel. For be not deceived, God is not mocked. Whatever a man sows, that he shall reap. Here come the question of consequences again, not penalty, but consequence. He that sows to his own flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption. That is true as a consequence. It's not a penalty, it's a consequence. But he that sows to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap eternal life. You say, I got mine as a gift. Yes, so you did. But this eternal life thing that you have, what on earth is it? Where do you keep it? And it is a life, isn't it? And you see it in physical life with natural talents. You see some men and women having a natural talent, put their back into it now and develop that talent, don't they? And there are others who have the talent. They can't be bothered, and they don't put their heart and soul into it, and waste their time and resources on futileing things, and they reap a very poor harvest from it. The same is true with the gift of eternal life. We can not lose it if we're true believers, but it's a life. It to be, is to be exploited, it is to be developed. And if we sow to the spirit, we have God's guarantee, who made the law of seed and harvest. It's not mocked, what we sow, we shall reap. So let's do good to all. The final paragraph, the argument, exposing the false motives of those who taught this false doctrine. They do it that they may glory in your flesh. Verse thirteen. Notice this is the very last argument, not the first, where now he impugns and criticizes the false motives of those that preached the wrong doctrine. But you say, isn't Paul priding himself and boasting about his gospel that he preaches? Listen to his answer. God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the means by which I have been crucified to the world, and the world to me. It's not my credit. The thing that has separated me from this world and all its evil is not my own attainment in which I could boast. It is the cross of Christ. That is the means by which I've been crucified to the world, and the world to me. You see. From henceforth let no man trouble me. I bear branded on my body the marks of Jesus Christ. So he did, very literally. When he thought that salvation was by works, he didn't suffer. He persecuted others. When he found that salvation was by grace through faith, he never persecuted anybody again, but bore extraordinary persecution, suffering, and spent himself to a frazzle to bring this free gift to others. He bore the marks of true apostleship. Being very generous, I've left you not just ten minutes, but eleven minutes for questioning. Uh, just from earlier, you were saying about how Peter and Paul both describe being under the laws of bondage. Mm. But yet, whenever you read the Psalms, sometimes David describes the law as honey and sweet and everything. So can you reconcile both them for us? Oh yes, yes. Quite so. One needn't deny that. And moderns who have called attention to it are right, of course. Uh, uh, uh, the law that God laid down is a delightful way of doing things, is it not? I consent to the law that it is good, says Paul. It is more so- moreover, it's holy and righteous and positively good. I delight in the law of God after the inner man, says Paul. Witness the Old Testament people, not all of them, of course, multitudes of Jews just broke the law, but even the godly rejoiced in the law, of course. But... Ah, but they sinned. And then how did they find salvation? Listen to Daniel confessing his sins. Listen to David confessing his sins. Watch Moses lose his temper and strike the rock, the lawgiver himself, and as a consequence, was not allowed to lead Israel into Canaan. He'll be in heaven, of course. Didn't affect his salvation. But then it became a, a, a, a, a, a bondage, didn't it, and a slavery. Slavery. Hi, sorry, I was also thinking of Paul's experience in Romans seven when he talks about the, about the law slaying him. Mm. And things, and I've never really understood at what point in Paul's life that was kind of happening, because before, you know, before, like, he di- he didn't really seem repentant whenever the Lord met him on the Damascus Road. It seemed like at that stage he would have still felt he was fulfilling the law, and it was only after maybe that experience that he started to see how much the law affected him. So was this after the Damascus Road, really, that Romans seven would be from Paul's experience? Maybe you can't really answer, but I'm only wondering. Well, it's certainly written after the Damascus experience, yes. Uh, how much was it his experience after he became a believer? Now, I personally think that that question, though a historically in- interesting and important question, is not perhaps the first order question to be asked, because this is in the part where Paul is explaining, uh, the gospel and how God saves us from the wreckage of Adam's sin. So he comes round to what is the point of the law, do you see? And the point that he cites now is that the law, however much you try to do it, will not deliver you. I delight in the law of God. That is my aesthetic judgment. It's a sensible way to live. It's beautiful. The things that I, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, will do, I want to do, that is his will. Intelligently, the wrong I do I know not, meaning I don't agree with it. Intellect, heart, ascetics, will, all combined. All wretched man that I am, says Paul. That is not enough. What is enough, what God's provision is, the Holy Spirit. And he's summing up in Romans seven verse six. But now we have been discharged from the law, having died to that wherein we were holden, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit and not in oldness of the letter. They are the terms of the New Covenant. The Old Covenant was written on tables of stone. The New Covenant is written by the Spirit of God on the tables of the heart. And the difference is between trying to keep the law by your own unaided effort. And being a lot- being empowered to keep it by the Holy Spirit dwelling within. That, I think, is the doctrinal side. In the practical side, then I think, uh, it is true of us all, well, it's true of me anyway, that we live in two worlds, if not at once, then alternatively. It is easy for us to lapse into the, uh, into behaving as though it were our own effort merely that enabled us, by sheer dint of will, to keep God's law as we should keep it. Whereas our most serious exercise of willpower will not suffice. At least certainly won't suffice by itself. The provision God has made for it, for us, is the power of the Holy Spirit writing the laws on our hearts and on our minds. In your discussion about the penalty and the consequences of sin, you talked about yielding to temptation and falling off a balcony and losing your leg, and you said, but of course that leg will be restored to me in the future. Could you discuss the physical consequences of sin as well as the f- as the spiritual consequences of sin in our lives and the difference between them? And the physical consequences of sin, will it be that we are, it'll all be restored back to us when we get new bodies? And what happens to the spiritual consequences of sin? Oh, yes, you've asked a very, very important question, sir. I was talking there, as you rightly say, about the physical consequences. The uh, the the illustration I gave is a physical thing that will be, uh, put right, we shall have new bodies. And believers who are mangled under torture will get new bodies, do see, with the physical side. What about the spiritual thing? Let me talk within this context, uh, and with bated breath. I think there are spiritual consequences that are eternal. Add in the power of your faith, add these qualities, says Peter. We have been given all that is necessary for life and godliness by the power of God. Alongside of that, we are to use all diligence. The two sides to the question, this is two Peter chapter one. We're to use all diligence and add these qualities to our faith. If you do these things, you shall never stumble. But in this way, there shall be richly supplied to you the entrance into the eternal kingdom. I take it the emphasis is on the adverb richly. Entrance into the eternal kingdom, mere entrance, if I may put it that way, entrance into the eternal kingdom is based for all believers alike on the blood of Christ, isn't it? Blessed are they that have washed their robes, that is, in the blood of Christ, that they may have right to the tree of life and enter into the gates in the city. The dying thief who hadn't the chance to add anything. That night he was in, in, in, in, in paradise, a rich entry, Peter makes dependent on not mere belief, but adding these things, so that we shall be fully grown up, to use another term. The believer that is neglectful to add these things and doesn't make progress when he could or she could, will be saved, of course, they'll enter. Ah, but when somebody says, uh, you must be talking nonsense because the Bible says that when we see him, we shall be like him. For we shall see him as he is. Yeah, let me say it. Every believer will be like Christ. But then let me add, to clarify what I do think in my own heart. We shall all be like Christ. What there is of us. Yes. The notion that you can be a believer and be careless to add, uh, do what Peter says and add in the power of your faith, add all these qualities to your character. And that you could go out, uh, uh, and never attempt to serve the Lord anyway. You're not interested, you're saved yourself, and you'll never perish, so why bother? Well, if you're genuinely saved, yes, he'll be in heaven. To suppose he's going to be just the same, exactly the same as a dear man or woman that for the last fifty six years has served Christ, has attempted to add, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, and to, uh, these qualities and develop a Christian character, and in this life even is is seen to be a great saint of God. Suppose there will be no difference between that person and the Christian that has just wasted his life and not troubled to add anything. I find that difficult to accept, really. I think there will be spiritual consequences. We shall be all be like Christ. In a family, you can see often, uh, four children here. One is seventeen, the other is, uh, uh, uh, 13, the other is eleven, the other is six. And if you look at them carefully, you can see a family likeness. But one has grown up a bit more than the others, you see. And is able to do more things. The youngster is still playing dinky toys on the carpet. Well, not dinky toys these days, uh, electronically, whatnot, but toys on the carpet. The other chap is helping to run the family business. They're all like their parents, but some have grown and are more capable of more things. That there will be difference in reward for work done is explicitly stated. That there will be differences in maturity of character and growth of character, I think is stated just as explicitly in two Peter chapter one. Mm-hmm. Uh... Does that seem to be a seriously false doctrine, uh, gentlemen? Well, you might, uh, like to, uh, because it's five past four, you might like, that's a very important question to be faced, very important. Eh, eh, you might like to go away and think about it, and if you think that I have erred from the truth, seriously, the next time, if there ever were a next time when I would be invited to come along to this seminar, you could raise it again. Put in an advanced question to the chairman to make sure I face it and answer it, or in the spirit of Galatians six, overtaking me in a fault. You could, in the spirit of meekness, come and help me get out of the fault.