The psalmist writes in Psalm 24, The earth
is the Lord's and all it contains, the
world and those who dwell in it.
For he has founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the rivers.
Who may ascend into the hill of the
Lord and who may stand in his holy
place?
He who has clean hands and a pure
heart, who has not lifted up his soul
to falsehood and is not sworn deceitfully, he
shall receive a blessing from the Lord and
righteousness from the God of his salvation.
This is the generation of those who seek
him, who seek your face, even Jacob.
Lift up your heads, O gates, and be
lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King
of glory may come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty
in battle.
Lift up your heads, O gates, and lift
them up, O ancient doors, that the King
of glory may come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The Lord of hosts.
He is the King of glory.
I cannot imagine anything on earth more precious
than the nearness of Christ.
I have been indicating to you that there
are two wonderful, wonderful things that always happen
in genuine revival.
Christ draws near to his people, and the
word of God spreads like a tidal wave
of blessing.
I don't know how others respond to that,
but I like that.
I believe that's exactly what we need in
our personal lives, in society, and certainly in
all the churches.
And isn't God gracious to have preserved for
us so many of the accounts of his
doing precisely that, drawing near, causing his word
to rush like a flood?
One of my favorite accounts is an account
of something that happened in the Principality of
Wales.
For those who haven't been before, I've justified
my frequent mention of Wales by simply saying
that's where my family came from.
And so I have greater retention of details
about Wales than, say, Ireland or Sweden.
But anyway, in one of the northern valleys,
now some have been to Wales, and perhaps
some of you don't know, that it's really
very mountainous, especially in the north.
In fact, people train for alpine climbing in
northern Wales all the time, although the mountains
are not nearly as high.
They are truly rugged.
At any rate, one of the great preachers
was preaching in a field, and a great
crowd had gathered, but suddenly, in the midst
of his sermon, he dropped his head for
a moment, and then he looked up, and
he said, What if you were to organize
the pilgrim prayer meeting?
What if you were to go from house
to house to house, starting on one side
of the valley and working up and coming
on down the other side?
What if you went to every house, knocked
at the door, and when the door was
opened, asked, Can we come in?
And when the homeowner said, Come in, for
what reason?
To pray.
To pray?
You want to come into my home to
pray?
Yes.
My.
Isn't that something?
Well, yes.
Come in.
And what if every home you entered, you
prayed, Lord, send your salvation to this household.
And then the preacher said, I dare to
say, before you have gone halfway through the
valley, God will come.
Among those who were present that day was
an elderly, poor, and not very good woman.
Very bad reputation in the community.
But she took to heart that notion of
a prayer meeting and coming to her home.
And so she went straight to her modest
dwelling after service and began cleaning and making
ready for the prayer meeting.
She went to work and stayed at it
until dark.
She went to bed in the dark, rose
early as soon as the light permitted, and
began again.
And when the local store opened, she went,
taking all the money in her possession, and
purchased two wax candles so that there would
be light when the pilgrim prayer meeting came.
And worked the rest of the day in
finishing her preparations.
But nobody came that day, nor the next.
Indeed, not even the next week or the
next month.
And after an entire year, and no one
had come, back in that shop where she
had purchased the candles in her own very
diffident way, she tried to talk to the
shopkeeper.
Get out with it, woman!
What is it?
Well, I'm wanting to ask, when will the
prayer meeting come to my house?
Prayer meeting?
Woman, are you completely out of your mind?
Well, she said, when the great preacher was
here, he said a pilgrim prayer meeting would
go to every home.
Oh, woman, that shows how dumb you are.
Nobody pays any attention to the preacher.
And she went home crushed.
For years, she had had a single ray
of hope.
Lit in that meeting.
And now, it was gone.
But in the providence of God, the shopkeeper
went to chapel that night and reported the
incident.
And right then and there, they organized the
pilgrim prayer meeting.
And they began, on one side of the
valley, knocking.
Can we come in?
Yes?
Oh, God, send your salvation to this household.
And before they had gone halfway up the
valley, God came.
And one of those glorious revivals of North
Wales occurred.
Does your own spirit respond by saying, do
it again, Lord?
Do it again.
But in most records of revival, it doesn't
take a great deal of difficulty to find
that it cost somebody something.
Organizing and pursuing pilgrim prayer meetings is hardly
an everyday event.
I expect some of you come from localities
where something very much like that could occur.
I told that story some time ago in
a valley in western Massachusetts.
And the people were stirred and moved.
And they organized the pilgrim prayer meeting.
And they began going from home to home.
And then the church started to fill up.
And conversions were taking place.
Then Satan, apparently, in great anger, somehow brought,
or Christ allowed, who am I to say
how it happened?
But a great many of the people took
very ill.
And the prayer meeting was discontinued and what
looked very hopeful kind of sputtered out.
But I want to ask you this morning,
are you doing what you can?
Now we all agree that we don't produce
revival.
No matter how many prominent figures of the
past or the present have tried to make
it sound as if we can make revival
happen, that's nonsense.
God does as He pleases.
But, wonderfully, God does please to draw near
to those who draw near to Him.
And He does please to answer the prayer
of those who truly pray.
No, Lord, here we are.
We've been together the days of this week.
We have looked at sobering passages from Your
Word.
We have felt challenged.
We have seen responsibility.
We have experienced a measure of conviction.
But being who we are and what we
are, we are very able at being stirred
and moved and helped and then turning right
back to where we were.
And unless Your grace solidifies matters in our
hearts and puts a whole new persevering spirit
within us so we will not let go
and will not leave unfinished that which You
have begun this week together may prove to
be of little consequence.
Oh, God, in Your wondrous mercy and grace,
grant that it shall not be in any
way a lost week, but the beginnings of
a wonderful fresh season of grace and mercy
of Your nearness, of the flow of Your
Word for each of us and multitudes of
others.
Help us as we turn to Your book
now.
Give us a fresh ability to pay enormous
attention to what You say.
Give us those two gracious and wonderful gifts
of repentance and faith so that Your very
will will be accomplished, we pray, in the
name of our strong and mighty Savior.
Amen.
We'll be looking at two passages this morning
if I'm able to pursue what I believe
God has put upon my heart.
And I like the way Dr. Schneider has
led us in the afternoons in the notion
of a break.
I always think it's a good idea because
we are so human and it does us
good to get up and move and tend
to business, but I always forget.
But will you be here all morning?
Will you remind me I promised a break
if I fail?
Thank you.
We have two passages, so it will be
easy to know when the break should be
called for.
And she won't fail, I know that.
But if you want to chip in with
her, go ahead.
All right.
The first of these passages, it might seem
like an odd passage for an occasion like
this, but indeed I think it's ideally suited
for this morning.
The Gospel of Matthew at chapter 23.
Now, not a very pleasant chapter.
A chapter describing some people we like to
throw mental stones at.
Have you ever observed that when somebody treats
you meanly and unjustly, your first reaction is
very noble and spiritual.
But then in time, you find yourself acting
as nasty as they were.
I know it's a hard thing to face,
but I've had a wee bit of difficulty
in my life.
People that haven't liked me and the things
I've said, and I've been so noble and
good in responding to their false accusations.
And then later have been very distressed to
find myself thinking as nastily about them as
they appeared to think about me.
Well, here's a chapter aimed at the scribes
and the Pharisees.
Did you ever have a good and a
pleasant thought about the scribes and the Pharisees?
When you hear those words, oh, what delightful
men they were.
I wish I could have known them.
My, my, my, what a privilege it would
have been to have known these men.
I don't think you...
Well, I...
Of course, I don't know.
Maybe you're unbalanced mentally.
And maybe you never had that kind of
a reaction, but I rather expect none of
us to feel very good about what we
know about scribes and Pharisees.
Now, in this chapter, I would like to
single out 15 matters about the Pharisees and
scribes that Christ pinpoints.
Not because I think it will do any
good to throw stones at them, but because
I fear there may be a whole lot
more of the scribe and the Pharisee in
us than we've ever honestly acknowledged.
And as I said already this morning and
certainly often enough prior to today, none of
us is so absurd as to think we
can make revival happen, but it would be
just as absurd to suppose that we could
never in any way be a hindrance to
revival.
And so what I'm really hoping is that
we will each have a heart-searching time
this morning to see if any of these
Pharisee-like traits mark us and have not
yet been brought under the grace of Christ
and purged from our lives.
But again, I don't want anybody to get
the wrong notion.
I'm not in any way implying we can
make revival happen, but we can, by the
help of the Word and the Spirit, eliminate
hindrances from our own personal lives, from the
church of which we're a part, from all
our contact and relationship, and this indeed could
be classified along with that Luke 3 passage
we studied this week and along with the
James 4 passage we looked at and along
with the psalm that Anthony read from this
morning, who shall ascend to the hill of
the Lord.
There is heart preparation that must be made
and must be maintained.
I bet you've found things like I have.
God has done a thorough work of cleansing
in your life and you breathe something of
a sigh of relief and of thanksgiving that
you were better, by God's grace, than you
were and then suddenly you realize some of
these nasty things have crept back in and
you're not nearly as clean before the Lord
as you ought to be.
Well, let's take this chapter and look at
it carefully and tenderly.
Do you think Christ hated the scribes and
the Pharisees or mourned over them?
Now, there are three parts in the chapter.
The first is really a series, by my
numbering technique at least, of seven statements, summary
statements, about them.
That would be chapter 23 of Matthew verses
1 to 7.
Then there are five verses, verses 8 to
12, of warning to us and then that
is followed from verse 13 to the end
of the chapter with Christ's woes upon the
Pharisees.
I am personally convinced that God does not
delight in woes.
I don't believe our Savior ever took any
pleasure in condemning anyone.
Holiness of being forced Him to do so,
but not pleasure in the delight of the
suffering and destruction of the wicked.
So it would be totally inappropriate for any
of us to take any pleasure at all
in the woes and I believe indeed we
would be making a dramatic mistake not to
keep such an open mind and heart so
that God could speak to us through the
failures of others.
Now we're not very good at that ordinarily.
As I said already, when someone sins against
us we compose ourselves with a nice, gracious
spirit, but before long we're thinking ill of
them.
But let us earnestly, personally, ask God to
so manage our thoughts and reactions this morning
that every one of these fifteen things that
ought to hit us between the eyes will
do so.
And everyone that ought to provoke a deep
spirit of repentance within us will be successful.
And in every case where the scribes and
Pharisees failed, God will enable us to succeed.
So as I said, three parts.
First, verses one to seven, a pinpointing of
the Pharisees' problems.
Let's read it together.
Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to
his disciples, saying, The scribes and the Pharisees
have seated themselves in the chair of Moses.
Therefore, all that they tell you do and
observe, but do not do according to their
deeds.
For they say things and do not do
them.
And they tie up heavy loads and lay
them on men's shoulders.
But they themselves are unwilling to move them
with so much as a finger.
But they do all their deeds to be
noticed by men.
For they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen the
tassels of their garments.
And they love the places of honor at
banquets and the chief seats of the synagogues
and respectful greetings in the marketplaces and being
called by men, Rabbi.
So let's take them just in the order
Christ gives them.
And let's weigh them from a personal perspective
and ask God whether in any measure at
all we stand guilty with the Pharisees and
the scribes of these grievous sins.
Jesus starts in verse 2 with their seizing
positions of authority and prominence.
He says the scribes and the Pharisees have
seated themselves in the chair of Moses.
The emphasis is not upon the fact that
someone sits in the seat of Moses but
that they put themselves there.
That position is very important to them.
Now I doubt that this is the great
plague upon this body of believers.
I haven't seen anybody jostling for position.
But that doesn't mean there isn't some secret
hidden sin here.
You may never knock anybody down and stand
on them to be taller.
But you could wish that you were taller.
And you could even imagine in your own
minds ways in which they could be brought
down so that you could be elevated.
So I don't think it would be quite
fair to only look at the literal and
to say, oh well, I'm not guilty of
that.
No, not me.
For after all, the greatest sins are not
the sins of the body but the sins
of the heart.
And we may have learned how to hide
our sins by conduct that is reasonably correct
and yet never have learned how to deal
with the inner man and the desires that
are so inappropriate to the plan and the
purpose of God.
So be honest.
Is there any inward longing for position and
authority?
Well, I have known a great deal of
this.
I have literally seen men clamoring for position
and abusing others to get there.
An awful lot of the tail bearing that
goes on in the church is not simple
ignorance but self-elevation.
If we can manage to make everybody else
look stupid and absurd, then we can shine
more brightly.
As I said, we're not concerned this morning
about throwing stones at anybody but of being
sure, by God's grace, that the blood of
Jesus Christ has cleansed us of all sin.
Well, that's number one.
Look, if you will, at number two.
Our Lord is not mincing words.
He's not avoiding hard issues.
He's hitting things face on.
Verse three.
He makes it clear that they are vile
hypocrites saying things and not doing them.
Therefore, says Christ, all they tell you, do
and observe, but do not do according to
their deeds.
Now, I must be especially direct and plain
to persons like myself, those of us who
stand in front of others and preach and
teach.
We're the ones in the greatest danger.
Not exclusively the ones in danger but the
greatest danger.
I observe the same essential thing happening with
parents and their children.
Parents will forbid children certain things, command their
children certain things.
And the things they forbid, they do themselves.
And I've known of a good many instances
where a child responds, say, to his father
and says, Dad, you do the very thing.
I'm very sad to tell you my own
children have said that to me when I've
given them a good sound rebuke for doing
the wrong thing and it was clearly wrong.
And then they made it clear, well, we've
seen you do that, Dad.
In fact, at one time, I was so
oppressed by that and even just the thought
of it to say nothing of the actual
fact occurring.
And I said to my kids one day,
my word, can you not find at least
one good thing about your father and imitate
that instead of all of his faults?
Do you ever feel that way as a
parent?
But this is a mighty serious thing, isn't
it?
Putting burdens on others that you do not
bear yourself.
Rebuking people for sins and yet perhaps secretly,
if not openly, practicing those sins yourself.
It is not my intention to try and
bring you under conviction, but only to convey
what our Savior says here.
And if indeed these things fit you, then
to hope and pray that by God's grace,
you will go carefully through your life and
reorder it according to the plan and the
purpose of Christ.
And the root of all of this second
issue is insensitivity and hypocrisy.
So that's what we're really dealing with.
Insensitivity.
Is there any of that in your behavior?
Either as an individual or as a leader.
Whole churches can be guilty of this very
thing.
Laying immense burdens on others and yet not
shouldering those burdens themselves.
Well, let's move to verse 4.
I told you that our Savior introduces at
least seven specific things.
In verse 4, they tie heavy
loads and they lay them on men's shoulders.
But they themselves are unwilling to move them
with so much as a finger.
Now, the second, verse 2, or verse 3
rather, was specifically addressed to giving orders and
commands.
And this third matter is focused upon burdens,
loads.
Now, some of you have worked somewhere where
you have been assigned all the dirty work.
And your boss never even soils his fingers.
Any of us who have been employed by
others have found what a lovely thing it
is to work with someone who never gives
an order that he's not willing to care
for himself.
Obviously, prudence sometimes makes it necessary for the
boss to assign a task to you and
not do it himself, because if he did
it all, he wouldn't do what he was
hired to do.
So Christ is not casting aspersions upon that
which is sensible and right, but upon that
which is indeed godless, insensitivity, hypocrisy, giving orders
and laying burdens on others that you will
not shoulder.
So again, has the Holy Spirit anything to
say to you personally on that particular matter?
And our Lord moves on with great tenderness
and care.
Verse 5.
They do all their deeds to be noticed
by men, for they broaden their phylacteries and
they lengthen the tassels of their garment.
In other words, they are the center of
their own lives.
Now this is a delicate subject.
As you know, I have been around quite
a spell and preaching steadily for more years
than most of you have lived.
Many years back, a man came to me
and he made an accusation against me that
wounded me very deeply.
When he came, he said, I believe this
is the hardest undertaking I have ever managed.
But he said, I am compelled to come
and tell you that you are two different
men.
I couldn't imagine what he was talking about.
He said, I have listened to you in
a large packed public auditorium.
I have listened to you in a small
room with a handful of people.
You are two different men.
In a large gathering, you are electrifying.
Your impact is huge.
In a little room, half full, you act
angry, disgusted.
Well, I said, that's your nonsense.
Well, he said, I told you how hard
it was for me to come.
I hoped that you would at least consider
what I said.
I would consider it if it made sense,
but it's silly.
And when he left in discouragement, I said,
Lord, it is silly, isn't it?
But the Lord didn't find it silly.
Indeed, the Lord enabled me to see that
it was exactly true.
If the crowd was large and growing, I
was thinking, man, I must have been good
yesterday.
If it was shrinking, I wonder what dumb
thing I did yesterday.
What I discovered was I was at the
very center of what I was doing.
I didn't want to be there.
That's just where I was.
And is not the Holy Spirit speaking directly
to your heart and asking, is it possible
that you are at the center of what
you're doing?
That when everything is said and done, it's
the approval, the applause of others that is
of very great importance to you.
Again, I'm not accusing you, my word.
How would I dare when a good man
had to accuse me to my face, and
I was so blind to the issues that
I denied and sent him away in sorrow.
And it wasn't until the Holy Spirit broke
through my hard heart that I saw the
accuracy of what he said.
And of course, when I saw the accuracy,
I was deeply wounded within.
I didn't start out with that in mind
to become the center of my ministry.
I really did have a passion for Christ
and holiness.
But somehow in the course of things, that
passion turned inward.
So what about you?
Again, we're not asking for public response, just
honesty with God.
Is this Pharisee-like tendency in you?
We don't know anything really experientially about phylacteries
or about robes with tassels.
That would hardly be something that would matter
here.
But we do know an awful lot about
pride, about longing for recognition and position, about
being regarded by others as very superior to
the masses.
And think of the church splits that occur
on this basis alone.
And think of the roaming Christians who are
never satisfied anywhere.
And they go from church to church casting
stones at every place they've been.
They come afresh to your church and you
think how fortunate you are to have these
people.
And before any time at all they're throwing
stones at you.
I had the group.
You know, I'll just back up a moment.
I haven't spent my life as a pastor,
but I did some work in that direction.
And we had this wonderful group come at
one time all at once, about a dozen
people.
And we felt so blessed to get that
nice shot in the arm, this group that
strengthened us.
And it wasn't but weeks before they were
throwing stones at me like they had thrown
them at the church they left.
Well, I'm not going to prolong it.
But I'm hoping the Holy Spirit will help
you to search your heart with honesty.
And let's say that in these matters we've
looked at thus far, numbers 1, 2, 3,
4, the Holy Spirit has given you a
star on each of the four.
What then?
Well, why not make the covenant with God
that you won't sink back in doing things
that God has graciously delivered you from?
Well, look at the tithe of these accusations
that our Savior makes against scribes and Pharisees.
Verse 6, They love the places of honor
at banquets, and they love the chief seats
in the synagogue.
Being elevated is very, very important to them.
You remember that story Christ told of the
one who took the low place in the
banquet hall, and then the host called him
up to the chief seat.
What's the difference between being elevated by others
and elevating yourself?
I've known men who could not exist without
office.
I was in a situation at one time
where time after time after time, this was
an elder-led church, time after time after
time, this man declared his eligibility as an
elder.
For years I had known him and felt
he was not eligible, but he kept clamoring.
And then finally he was elevated to the
eldership, and it was only weeks before he
had stirred up a great mess in everything.
I was one time pastor of a church
start, and by the Constitution we had seven
elders, and then for every 50 new members
another elder added.
We had seven godly good men, and for
about three years there was never a moment
of disharmony.
But the church was growing, and we had
more than 100 new people, and so by
the Constitution we had to add two new
elders.
Now deep in my heart I knew we
didn't have two new elder-worthy men.
I knew, had I said, let's cross that
part of the Constitution out for now, everybody
would have agreed with me.
That would have been the right thing to
do.
But I let them push through the election
of two new men unfit for office, and
that church never had a peaceful moment thereafter.
Our Lord knew what He was talking about.
Those who clamor for position, and those who
are unwise enough to let the clamor get
what He wants.
Number six.
Again, very plain and direct.
They love respectful greetings in the marketplace.
Verse seven.
They can't live without being respected by others.
Do you think Christ suffered that problem?
Is it not glorious that Christ's total liberation
from the need of honor from men is
what enabled Him to go all the way
to the cross and to purchase our salvation?
Oh, that we would imitate our Savior instead
of others.
But is it possible that someone here has
been or will be troubled by the need
of respect and honor?
And then number seven.
They distinguish themselves by titles.
Look at verse seven.
They loved being called rabbi by men.
Now, I want you to think of a
matter that is very real in our day.
Now, suppose, and may I speak to you
directly, sir, suppose that you were a judge
in a court of law and you and
I became acquainted and I had reason to
write to you and I said to the
honorable and gave you a name.
Would that be inappropriate if you were a
judge?
Not at all inappropriate because that is the
title of honor that does respectfully apply to
the judge.
Or if someone of you wanted to write
me a letter, I hope it won't include
these words, but if you wrote to the
Reverend Mr. Roberts, you wouldn't be out of
order.
I don't like the term.
I never use it, but it would at
least be suitable because ordained ministers have been
given the title reverend.
I think it's silly.
I don't like it one bit, but nonetheless
it is legitimate.
But suppose I stepped up to this brother
here and I said to him, I am
the Reverend Mr. Roberts.
Would that be appropriate?
It would be dreadfully wrong.
Some of these titles are acceptable when given
us by others if they fit, but to
use these titles ourselves is indeed a grievous
breach of ordinary ethics.
But our Savior is making it a bigger
problem than a breach of ethics.
He's talking about men who have got to
be recognized by their titles.
The doctors, the reverends, the Honorable Mr. I
mean, imagine a judge signing his letter to
you, the Honorable Judge Jones.
Some are dumb enough to do that, but
it's a great breach.
I get so disgusted when I get letters
from pastors saying, Dear Reverend so-and-so.
I, in first inclination, just want to dump
them in the wastebasket.
What do I want to do with a
man so stupid that he calls himself by
a title of honor?
I usually have more grace than that.
I'm just telling you how I would like
to respond.
I trust never do.
But we're not really concerned about those that
aren't here.
But are any of you requiring that type
of recognition, that title?
And again, I'm hoping that the Holy Spirit
will use this passage to help you to
resist that sort of thing at all times.
Why must Christians have titles?
I'm not speaking against titles.
I'm just speaking against the need of them
and the clamoring for them.
Now, as I said, there were seven verses
outlining in specifics these Pharisees.
But now we have five verses directed to
us, the readers.
Verses 8 through 12.
But do not be called rabbi, for one
is your teacher, and you are all brothers.
And do not call anyone on earth your
father, for one is your father, he who
is in heaven.
And do not be called leaders, for one
is your leader, that is Christ.
But the greatest among you shall be your
servant, and whoever exalts himself shall be humbled,
and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.
You see, what our Lord does is to
personalize to our benefit the great subject that
he has been dealing with in terms of
the Pharisee.
True humility.
And it's a very reasonable thing that he
does.
Why should you call me rabbi when there
is a great rabbi?
Why should we clamor to be called teacher
when there is one truly great teacher?
So, the issue in all of this is
genuine humility.
And that's what it comes right down to.
And so, dear friends, on this morning occasion
in a conference on revival, it is perfectly
plain that the greatest problem of the scribes
and Pharisees was pride.
And it's the greatest problem in today's church.
And it's that which absolutely guarantees revival can't
happen.
I hardly need to spell it out to
you again.
God holds at arm's length the proud in
heart.
And revival is God refusing to hold anyone
at arm's length but drawing near.
So it is utterly impossible to conceive of
proud people being revived.
And so the vast duty upon each of
us to humble ourselves before the Lord.
And what we have been taught in these
first seven verses and what is reiterated in
a fresh and provocative way in these next
five verses is at the very heart of
the issue of revival.
And it's hardly necessary for me to say
that in 2 Chronicles 7.14 where our
dear Lord has provided us some help in
knowing our part of preparing for revival.
If my people who are called by my
name will humble themselves.
And what's the sense of talking about the
rest if the first step has not been
taken.
And who would dare to say as I
earlier in the week commented that they had
humbled themselves sufficiently.
But most of us have some notion at
least of how well we're doing in humility.
And then God has very amazing ways of
bringing things into focus.
I have a packet an envelope one of
these manila envelopes in my office the contents
of which has never been read.
And I'm going to tell you why.
When it came in the mail I didn't
see anything on the outside that indicated where
it really came from.
It had an address but it didn't ring
any bell.
And so I opened it and I pulled
out this packet of material.
It was sent by the largest protestant denomination
in the nation.
And it was devoted to the subject of
the solemn assembly.
I sat down and began to glance through
this packet with one purpose in mind.
To see if they had recognized where they
learned about the solemn assembly.
Now it was an absolute fact that they
learned about it from me.
But there I am searching through this literature
to see if they gave name recognition.
Suddenly it dawned on me what I was
doing.
I was so thoroughly ashamed and disgusted with
myself that I stuffed the stuff back in
the envelope and never ever read it.
But not too long ago we thought we
were going to move and I was sorting
stuff in my office and up came this
packet and I didn't recognize it and I
pulled it out.
Oh no!
Not that!
And back in the envelope it went.
When we think we have made some progress
in humility, the Lord has very excellent ways
of bringing us to our senses.
But surely at the very heart of this
chapter is this issue of pride and humility.
Now let's move to the third section of
the chapter.
The section beginning with verse 13.
Our Savior's woes to the Pharisee.
There are eight of them in number.
If you don't trust my counting, count for
yourself.
Let me pinpoint them first.
By reading the section and just simply stressing
the woes.
Verse 13, woe number one.
But woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
because you shot off the kingdom of heaven
from men.
For you do not enter in yourselves, nor
do you allow those who are entering to
go in.
Number two.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because
you devour widows' houses even while for a
pretense you make long prayers.
Therefore you shall receive greater condemnation.
Number three.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because
you travel about on sea and land to
make one proselyte, and when he becomes one,
you make him twice as much a son
of hell as yourself.
Number four.
Woe to you blind guides who say, whoever
swears by the temple that is nothing, but
whoever swears by the gold of the temple,
he is obliged.
You fools and blind men.
Which is more important, the gold or the
temple that sanctified the gold?
And whoever swears by the altar that is
nothing, but whoever swears by the offering, he
is obliged.
You blind men.
Which is more important, the offering or the
altar that sanctifies the offering?
Therefore he who swears swears both on the
altar and by everything on it, and he
who swears by the temple swears both by
the temple and by him who dwells within
it.
And he who swears by heaven swears both
by the name of God and by him
who sits upon it.
Number five.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites who
you tithe mint and dill and cumin and
have neglected the weightier provisions of the law,
justice and peace and mercy and faithfulness.
But these are the things that you should
have done without neglecting the others.
You blind guides who strain out a gnat
and swallow a camel.
Number six.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites for
you clean the outside of the cup and
of the dish, but inside they are full
of robbery and self-indulgence.
You blind Pharisees first clean the inside of
the cup and of the dish so that
the outside may become clean also.
Number seven.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites for
you're like white-washed tombs which on the
outside appear beautiful but inside they're full of
dead men's bones and all uncleanness even so
you too outwardly appear righteous to men but
inwardly you're full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Number eight.
Woe to you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites for
you build the tombs of the prophets and
you adorn the monuments of the righteous and
say if we had been living in the
days of our fathers we would not have
been partners with them in shedding the blood
of the prophets consequently you bear witness against
yourself for you are sons of those who
murdered the prophets fill up the measure of
the guilt of your fathers.
Now this is obviously a very weighty passage
and all that each of us before the
Lord might know that in no way are
we like these Pharisees scribes and hypocrites honestly
I think that all of us have been
so blighted by sin in the past that
we cannot dare presume that in all the
days of the future we will not lapse
into some of these grievous things and so
at least from time to time we should
go back over lists of this sort and
be absolutely sure that we're not in any
way tainted by these things for every one
of us is capable of being Pharisee-like
scribe-like hypocritical as all of these men
were.
Let's take not a long time but just
sufficient time to feel deeply what our Savior
is pronouncing woe concerning shutting up the kingdom
of heaven against man.
Now those of us in the Reformed camp
run some danger here.
We could make things more difficult and impossible
for others than God himself does.
I don't wish to pursue this I don't
wish to make a big matter of it
but whenever we do anything that makes the
kingdom of God either more easily accessible or
more difficult to enter we have violated the
Lord.
Our task is to speak precisely what the
Lord himself said.
These Pharisees were no good at that.
They were extremely clever at making laws that
contradicted the Scripture than interpreting the Scripture to
fit their contradictions.
So I'm asking you to heed the words
of our Lord.
Don't you fall into the simply outrageous habits
of the scribes and the Pharisees.
The ninth in the total is the second
of the woes.
You devour widows' houses even while for a
pretense you make long prayers.
Therefore you shall receive greater condemnation.
Now I doubt that anyone here is guilty
of putting a widow out of her house
and appropriating to himself all that was rightfully
hers.
But we don't have to be guilty of
the exact illustration that Christ gives to be
guilty of covering evil deeds with a sanctimonious
outward appearance.
And most of you have, like myself, been
in prayer meetings where certain people pray in
public these long and even ornate prayers, but
it never seems to come from the heart,
though it's not ours to finally say.
But it does seem to be a cloak
of righteousness over an evil life.
As I've said, I haven't spent a large
portion of my life in pastoral ministry.
But I was in this church that had
had unitarian leanings for years.
And there was a mighty work of God
and we did pass through a lengthy season
of radical conversions week after week after week.
I was single, I was pouring my heart
and soul into it.
We had at that time in attendance the
man who managed one of the rental car
agencies for that entire district.
And he came to me one day and
he said, Mr. Roberts, I've got a number
of very nice vehicles that need to be
moved from Portland, Oregon to Los Angeles.
We can't rent them in Portland during the
winter, they're convertibles.
You look awfully tired to me and the
people tell me how hard you work.
I would like to give you a credit
card and the keys and I would like
you to drive one of these beautiful cars
to Los Angeles.
You can use the credit card for gas,
for food, for hotels.
He said if I had to have a
truck down there, it would cost me far
more than you will spend.
And would you do me a favor and
take a vacation?
Well, it was very appealing and I accepted
it.
But the concern I had was what about
the midweek meeting?
It was growing, it was becoming vital with
these new converts.
Well, we'd had a lawyer convert at a
perfectly glorious conversion and immediately he had taken
hold of the word and was just pushing
forward with immense strength and speed.
And so I thought, well, why not have
him give the Bible lesson?
And there was another man looking very hopeful.
Why not have him lead the prayer portion?
And the third man, who was indeed very
capable of leading the music.
And then the fourth man, one of these
that devours widow's houses.
So he was given no assignment.
When I came back on the Saturday, I
was told my friend, the lawyer, was in
the hospital dying.
I went straight to the hospital.
He was barely alive, just alive enough to
explain what had happened.
The fourth man, given no position, had pushed
the others aside and taken over the whole
meeting and completely ruined the occasion for everybody
but himself.
And the man assigned to teach had a
heart attack right in the church meeting.
And within very few days was in glory.
I think that's what our Savior is talking
about.
Men who are totally unfit but who don't
mind who gets hurt and what damage is
done as long as they get what they
want.
Number three, scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, you travel about
on sea and land, you make a proselyte
and your proselyte is even worse than you
are.
Now listen, one of the curses upon the
American church are the millions of people who
are called converts, who are as unsaved as
Satan himself.
And made converts by men who are so
Pharisee-like that it's a wonder they have
survived even three minutes in the ministry.
Our nation is under the curse of scribes
and Pharisee.
And I hope, by God's grace, that none
of you will ever, ever, at any time,
be guilty of making converts who are truly
children of the devil.
Our Lord moves on in verses 16 to
22 to talk about blind guides.
Those who swear by the temple and all
of those verses there from 16 to 22.
In other words, men who are so ridiculous
in their thinking that they make all kinds
of idiotic conclusions.
Now that's part of the curse of the
land.
Are you not yourself shocked at the absolute
stupidity of our leaders?
Throughout all of history, it has been proven
that immoral leadership leads to the destruction of
a nation.
And we go on electing immoral men.
And the only thing that decides the issue
is whether they are part of our party.
We would rather have an absolute reprobate totally
committed to the destruction of everything righteous if
he's in our party than a good man
if he's in somebody else's party.
We are not only in society, but in
the church behaving ourselves as idiotically as these
scribes and these Pharisees.
And we must ask, am I acting as
foolishly, as unwisely, as ridiculously as these men?
And then we have the statement in verse
23 about tithing mint and dill and coming
and neglecting the weight here matters of the
law.
I know a lot of churches that have
all kinds of rules and regulations, rules deciding
how long a woman's blouse sleeve must be,
how long the length of her skirt, whether
someone can wear jewelry or not.
Just rule after rule after rule after rule
and at the very core of everything is
evil.
Nothing godly at all, just all outward nonsense.
Elders, deacons, pastors, ungodly men quite capable of
issuing rules to others, but incapable of living
the glorious gospel of Christ themselves.
And if you in those categories now, or
are you in danger of running in that
direction in the future.
Verse 25, you clean the outside of the
cup, but the inside is filthy.
There is far too much outward religion and
far too little inward holiness.
Then, verses 29 to 31.
I know men in ministry today who honor
men like George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards and
the great men of the past that God
has used greatly, but they themselves wouldn't lift
a single finger to be like those men.
Indeed, if it came down to it, they
would be glad to put them in the
grave, if they were living today and superseding
their foolish notions.
Well, these are all big matters.
I'm determined to get to a second passage,
and I promised our friend here with permission
to remind me of the break, and we're
going to do that, and she's not going
to let me forget, but I am burdened
this morning that by the time we leave
here, by God's grace, we will be ready
for any blessing God sends.
And this chapter is wonderfully helpful, and the
thing I'm really urging, that having laid it
in front of you this morning, you will
now go back time after time after time
to be sure that you have done everything
appropriate in terms of what Christ laid before
us.
And just to end this session, look at
verse 33.
You hypocrites, you brood of vipers, how shall
you escape the sentence of hell?
And that was preceded by these very sobering
words in verse 32.
Fill up then the measure of the guilt
of your fathers.
Dear friends, Christ is not suggesting that these
scribes and Pharisees repent.
He's not holding out to them a ray
of hope.
After he gets through denouncing them with his
woes, he tells them, just go ahead now,
fill up the measure of your iniquity.
I know you're not going to change.
I know you love the traditions of men
more than the commandments of God.
I'm not going to waste any pity or
extend any false hope.
So go ahead, fill up the measure of
your sin and come under the wrath of
God to the utmost.
And just in case you've never made the
connection, in 2 Thessalonians 2 Paul speaks very
specifically about filling up the measure of sin
and coming under the wrath of God to
the utmost.
But here's the beautiful thing.
While Christ was not holding out hope to
the Pharisees, he is showing us what we
can do to make ready the way of
the Lord.
And how we can live day after day
throughout our future as men and women whom
God can draw near to and through whom
can flow in a mighty flood the word
of the Lord.
Grant, Lord, that for each of us nothing
will hinder but that we shall be men
and women to whom you do draw near
and through whom your gospel runs as a
mighty flood for Christ's glory.
Amen.
Now, Lord, we are all aware that it
is dangerous that we might reach a saturation
point and when there's an overload of helpful
information and we might just miss what you're
saying to us.
So we pray that in these last moments
of the morning that you'll give us each
a fresh ability to focus and to take
to heart what you say to us for
Jesus Christ's glory.
Amen.
I'd like to call your attention to a
passage that could never be genuinely described as
a revival passage but is very, very helpful
when looked at from this perspective.
So will you turn to the book of
Genesis and I'd like to call your attention
to a portion of chapter 28.
The book of Genesis and the portion of
chapter 28.
Now, if you don't find it in 28,
as I didn't, you might try 26.
Just a brief part.
Genesis 26 and we'll pick it up at
verse 12.
Now Isaac sowed in that land and he
reaped in the same year a hundred fold
and the Lord blessed him.
And the man became rich and he continued
to grow richer until he became wealthy.
For he had possessions of flocks and herds
and a great household so that the Philistines
envied him.
Now all the wells which his father's servants
had dug in the days of Abraham's fathers,
the Philistines stopped up by filling them with
earth.
Then Abimelech said to Isaac, go away from
us for you're too powerful for us.
And Isaac departed from there and he camped
in the valley of Jerar and he settled
there.
Then Isaac dug again the wells which had
been dug in the days of his father
Abraham for the Philistines had stopped them up
after the death of Abraham.
And he gave them the names of his
fathers or he gave them the names which
his fathers had given them.
But when Isaac's servants dug in the valley
and found there a well of flowing water,
the herdsmen Jerar quarreled and the herdsmen of
Isaac saying the water is ours.
So he named the well Esek because they
contended with him, etc.
Now as I said, it's not a passage
really dealing with revival.
But a long long time ago I had
the privilege of knowing slightly Dr. Martin Lloyd
Jones of London.
Someone at one point gave me a group
of audio tapes, you know the old fashion
cassettes I think we used to call them,
of 12 sermons that Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones
had preached in Westminster Chapel, London in commemoration
of the revival of 1858-59.
So they were sermons preached in 1958-59
and I just had great delight listening to
them and now those sermons are available in
the book some of you may have read
the book Revival by Martin Lloyd Jones and
it's well worth reading.
But one of his sermons was based upon
this Genesis 26 passage and as I said
it's not really on the subject revival but
using your imagination and as I've told you
already this week, I honestly believe a sanctified
imagination can be wonderfully used of God and
so I would never dare to urge anyone
to stop imagining things.
We have to put controls on our imagination
so they don't take us in the wrong
direction.
But here is a picture of Isaac growing
in great wealth, being so strong and influential
that he's being asked to leave the area
but finding it necessary to re-dig the
wells that his father had dug.
Because the wells, so to speak were filled
with Philistine junk.
So it's more a picture that I'm commending
to you than a passage that could be
legitimately pushed hard for the subject of revival
but it is very picturesque.
Can you not imagine a perfectly splendid well
with glorious water, ice cold, lovely in taste,
thoroughly refreshing, enjoyed over a season of years
and then filled with junk.
I don't know how to picture the church
any better than that.
Oh, the way the church used to lead
the nation.
The influence of the church.
Now it would be absurd to think that
there was no evil in past centuries and
decades.
Man has always been evil but evil was
committed under the cover of darkness and behind
closed doors because people were afraid to be
known for what they really were.
I've shared with some an incident in my
own life.
I had been as a college student preaching
in a Methodist church where they had not
had any gospel preaching for a long time
and there was a woman in the church,
her husband owned the largest car dealership in
the county and she hated me and my
preaching.
She went to the church her husband did
not but she went all around that area
denouncing me saying that the Methodist superintendent had
made a wicked mistake in putting some young
kid in the pulpit preaching and he was
terrible.
Nobody should go to hear him and many
came just to see if I was as
bad as she said.
And then one day this woman came just
in a flood of tears crying, you've got
to help me you've got to help me
and I said would you please leave me
alone don't bother me go on, go away
and she kept pleading help me, help me
help me, help me I said I don't
have time to waste on people like you
leave me alone oh I've got to have
help and finally in discouragement she turned to
go and I stopped her and I said
I can tell you who can help you
who I said Christ if you will seek
him he will be all the help you
need and she went out drooping and dragging
her feet but she sought Christ and she
was gloriously converted then she went even further
abroad telling people what had happened to her
and that she had to come and find
out if it might not happen to them
as well and the people came including her
husband who was a notorious reprobate and I
sought earnestly to help him by and large
he avoided me but once in a while
he gave me opportunity but then one day
out of burden for him I went into
his automobile dealership to see if I could
arrange time to meet with him he wasn't
there, no one in fact was in the
office at all I opened the door to
the shop and all of the mechanics were
over in a corner in the huddle laughing
one of them glanced up and I heard
him whisper oh oh the preacher has come
and immediately they all stood upright and said
sorry preacher we didn't intend for you to
hear that well I hadn't heard anything except
the whisper the preacher had come but I
mentioned that to say dear friends that there
was a time when the influence of the
church was so great and so real so
right that the people who were determined to
sin sinned behind closed doors and under cover
of darkness that's not true now so figuratively
can we not say the Philistines have filled
up the well isn't it wonderful to go
to that living fountain and to have your
own soul so thoroughly refreshed by Christ himself
but all across the land now there are
people who are going to mud pits they
get nothing nourishing or encouraging or helpful from
their church now as I've been making it
plain and all of you already knew it
I hope before I said it and certainly
brother John shares as does Anthony and brother
Paul in this conviction we don't make revival
happen but we can dig the wells and
I'd like you to think about this figure
here this picture, this illustration from the standpoint
of those of us who have come under
the burden of loving Christ which is a
joy but then the burden of intercessors for
those who can't pray for themselves and won't
pray for themselves and those millions and millions
of America who have no church that they
know of anywhere near them where they can
go and indeed be blessed you folks right
here in this church people coming all the
way from Knoxville, Tennessee because they are longing
for a word they haven't found anywhere in
their own area and that's only one I
know who knows how many others are coming
great distances when they can but let's think
about this well that has been stopped up
with Philistine junk and I honestly think that's
an accurate way to state it the church
has lost its ability to meet the thirst
of the world because Philistine junk has been
dumped into the well now just think of
some of the things that have happened we've
got a vast portion of the church that
has divided the Bible into chunks and said
this chunk applies to that period, this chunk
applies to this period you cannot say that
here because that belongs there, they've got things
so wildly confused that they end up acting
as if the Holy Spirit is dead and
what a tragedy to plug the well of
salvation and to prevent the Holy Spirit from
saying anything or at least to try by
saying that he no longer works today or
by dividing the church into nonsensical pieces now
I don't mean to say that these men
aren't trying hard but the last thing in
the world that is needed is another person's
opinion what we need is the word of
the Lord so the well has been stuffed
with nonsense in terms of doctrine I have
people rightly telling me Mr. Roberts your problem
is you were born at the wrong time
in history the way you talk would have
fit in 100 years ago but you're just
completely out of step well I know some
men who've been told they were out of
step and they couldn't stand it so they
got in step but I don't really care
if people think I'm out of step I
know I'm right where I belong I don't
mean a claim to perfection to that or
anything foolish but I do know that the
truth I speak is the truth and that
it is as valid today as it was
500 years ago and if Christ does not
come back and if there's any world left
in 100 years it will still be valid
isn't it wonderful how relevant the scripture is
isn't it wonderful how the scripture does fit
together here is in my mind a remarkable
thing I have been studying my bible for
well over 70 years and I haven't gotten
tired of it it hasn't worn out and
I'm not saying well now that contradicts this
and this is so absurd in the light
of that the more I study the more
amazed I am how gloriously it all fits
together but the well has been loaded with
junk including those things were alright in their
time but they don't work anymore but they
do work and I still find despite the
apathy that grips so many congregations that the
spirit of God still works.
You know one of the thrilling things that
happens to me with regularity I get lots
of invitations to preach in churches that might
be called liberal or modernist or that are
so caught up in their own ideas they've
forgotten God has spoken but it's a wonderful
thing to be preaching and you're looking in
a particular section of the congregation as you
preach and you see over there that face
that's in a cloud doesn't seem to be
any life in the face no joy and
then as you preach you see that countenance
begin to change and at the end of
the service that person rushes up and they
say something wonderful happened to me today and
you know the regenerating work of the Holy
Spirit.
It's not happening as frequently as I used
to see it happen it's not happening as
frequently as it will happen yet again as
the Lord draws near but it is happening
and I refuse to let the well of
salvation be messed up with that kind of
fallist junk that says these things don't work.
Now we got a lot of people who
are talking about conversion and they are reporting
converts not long ago I was in conversation
with a pastor who was telling me he
had baptized 600 people the year before and
I asked him what impact did that have
upon church attendance oh well the attendance is
smaller than it was the year before what
600 converts well we've got a lot of
nonsense being taught as conversion people signing the
decision card or coming forward or praying the
sinners prayer any and all of those could
be used of God but so often they
are a tool that Satan himself uses to
confound people.
I think I want to spend whatever strength
I have left digging out that well getting
rid of that stuff and if people don't
like it when I tell them they're wrong
well let them take their case to the
Lord and see what he says but I'm
asking you have you been conscious of the
Philistine junk in the well that's the issue
before us.
Does it trouble you that the world has
had more impact on the church than the
church has had on the world in recent
years whereas it used to be exactly the
opposite of that.
Take this nonsense that the church has been
waddling in concerning the subject of Lordship as
a young man many surprising things happen to
me.
I grew up from the time I was
10 in a Presbyterian church in a very
formal one turn around collar preacher always wore
a robe, all that and when I was
about 18 the elders of the church said
to me our pastor has been assigned by
the government to a six week tour among
the military and we've decided to ask you
to take his place Sunday morning Sunday night,
Wednesday night Bible class lots of other responsibilities
well in the prayer meeting there was a
woman who thought I was the greatest thing
that happened and she just loved to tell
this sensational young preacher then maybe about the
fourth Wednesday night I talked about that passage
in Romans to be carnally minded is death
to be spiritually minded is life and I
said there is an absurd notion that a
person can be a carnal minded Christian she
flew into a rage just the opposite of
the other story I told you started out
liking me ended up hating me now that
was my first exposure to this idea that
has been widely spread since then that a
person can accept Christ as their savior and
deny him as their lord and be saved
and that's a mighty big plug in the
well of salvation you're aware of these things
do you know what's going on in the
church world do you know why we are
in such a rotten mess it's not that
the politicians are leading us down it's that
the church has pulled the politicians down all
that's wrong in America was first wrong in
the church that's what I'm trying to say
the well of salvation speaking figuratively has been
clogged with fliston junk we've turned the love
of God into soft mush we've made obedience
to Jesus Christ an option you can obey
if you want but you don't have to
we've taken the commandments and turned them about
I mentioned this on Sunday when I told
you I wasn't going to rush because it
was the Lord's day not the Lord's hour
most of the churches I know have practically
a fit if you go over 12 o
'clock murdering the Pope would not be as
serious a crime as running past 12 o
'clock I remember so well an older woman
that sat in the congregation and there was
a clock on the back wall and when
it came about 2 minutes to 12 this
oversized woman turned around and she studied the
clock for 5 minutes I almost said something
but that time at least I restrained myself
but I've thought of her so many times
5 minutes to read the clock well of
course she wasn't reading the clock she was
giving the dumb preacher a message but how
can the Holy Spirit work in the framework
that the typical church has constrained him these
churches that have 3 services in a row
I was preaching in Wisconsin one time they
told me in advance we have 3 services
and this one has to end at 5
minutes so we can get to the next
group and so on and then I forgot
and didn't pay any attention and the people
were absolutely glued to their seats and paying
immense attention and then when I ended it
was 55 minutes past the appropriate time and
to my astonishment the deacons were fairly gracious
but they said to me we can't let
you do that again because we've got to
get the second service out you've only got
15 minutes this time you ran so late
the first time so I said well let
somebody in the back give me a signal
well a man stood in the back and
he went like this well that's enough I
just wanted you to get the sense of
some of the immense problems that we're struggling
with as a result of the activity of
the Philistines now let's think about this from
another standpoint let's think about it from the
standpoint of what we might do.
Now I obviously don't know most of you
by name even to say nothing of knowing
you in terms of who you really are,
what your home life is like, what church
you come from and so on.
It would be absurd for me to pretend
to know more than I actually do but
let's think now of what we ourselves can
do.
No sense talking about those who aren't here.
What can you do about the well being
clogged with Philistine junk well you can get
to work on the subject of holiness that's
an immense issue our Lord said be ye
holy as I am holiness that's not a
doctrine of a few small holiness churches that's
the doctrine of the whole church without holiness
no man shall see the Lord you can
start with yourself with a fresh determination to
be holy.
Then you can take your stand in your
church.
You may not be very influential, in fact
you may not even have the respect of
your congregation but you can take your stand
and you can with care with love with
the help of the Holy Spirit make it
clear that Christ has no place in his
kingdom for that which is unholy and you
can pray and you can witness and you
can make it clear that holiness is urgently
needed and you can set the example isn't
that the critical thing?
I'm so tired of men with a whip
trying to force other people to do what
they don't do themselves.
Obviously real leadership in the church of Christ
is to walk so close to Christ that
everybody who knows you said, I got to
walk right immediately with that person because they're
with Christ and if I'm not close I
might go astray.
Will you set your heart to walk truly
in the beauty of holiness.
May I ask you, did you ever have
a sense of the beauty of holiness?
This is very urgent.
Did you ever sit back and say, Lord,
I want for myself a picture for me
to start with of what it is really
like to be holy.
Now we know about snow-capped mountains.
We've seen their beauty.
We've seen some of these mountain lakes pure,
gloriously beautiful.
We know something of the beauty of an
antelope racing across the plain.
We've looked into the face of many a
flower and experienced its beauty.
We know something of the beauty even of
the human frame, but there is no beauty,
no beauty like the beauty of holiness.
Catch a fresh sense of the beauty of
holiness.
And set your heart again to be so
arrayed in the righteous robes of Jesus Christ
that holiness will radiate from your life.
We can't expect to get the foul junk
out of the well if we're unholy ourselves.
And what about passion?
I've spoken of it this week.
I was deeply moved last week when I
was preaching down in North Carolina on a
passage out of 1 Peter chapter 4.
A passage where there's a lovely arrangement of
seven truths and as I was thinking about
it, even as I was preaching, I was
thinking, oh, how wonderful.
God himself created us passionate beings.
And tragically, many of us have used our
passions to advance ourselves, our wishes, our desires,
often corrupt desires.
But oh, think of what it would be
like to have all of your passions channeled
in the direction of the plan and the
purpose of God.
The church is being killed by people who
don't have enough passion even to keep the
front row awake.
But what if your life was a passionate
life where everybody who saw you thought, oh,
wow, I would like to be on fire
for Christ that way.
Nothing unreasonable when the Philistines have clogged the
well with all this passionless absurdity.
Why not go for a well full of
passion, full of power, full of praise, full
of pardon?
In short, my dear friend, I'm asking you
to get a hold of the gospel shovel
and clean the well out and let the
grace of Christ flow.
Think of an artesian well clogged with Philistine
junk and unplugged by you and other godly
people so the well of salvation is springing
up to life eternal.
While our time is gone, help us, Lord.
Oh, help us.
Give us courage.
Give us power.
Give us passion.
Give us purity that once again the world
might see true Christianity for Christ's sake.
Amen.