Sunday, August 21, 2016
Thursday, August 18, 2016
Matthew 24 is Not the Rapture of The Church
As I've said before, it's hip to be post-trib these days and if you discuss the scriptures with a post-tribber , invariably you will find yourself in Matthew 24. For someone who is post-trib ( or if you prefer, pre-wrath) Matthew 24 is the 'proof text' that unequivocally spells out the timing of the great catching away promised to the church. The only problem is that Matthew 24 does nothing of the kind, and is instead the future description of an entirely separate event happening to an entirely separate group of people. Let me explain.
There is a very basic rule in Bible study that goes like this; things that are different are not the same. In fact, life itself is chock-full of things that are similar, but different. A cat has fur like a dog, four legs like a dog , and is kept as a pet like a dog, but is not a dog. It is the differences that are significant, not the similarities. The same is true in Bible study, and it doesn't take a great intellect to recognize the differences between Matt 24 and 1 Cor 15,/1 Thess 4; it merely take a side-by-side comparison.
1. Living or dead?
This is probably my weakest point. I reasoned within myself that I would put it out there first to save lazy people the trouble of reading the entire article before they dismiss me.
But first, the issue. In 1 Cor 15, the Bible says , starting in verse 51 "Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." I Thess 4 says, beginning at verse 13 "But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep." From these two passages something becomes very clear; dead saved people and living saved people will be raised up as a future event, with the dead being raised first.
Now take a look at Mathew 24. Verse 31 says "And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." Now we'll be taking a deeper look at verse 31 later on, but jumping down to verse 40, we read "Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left." A parallel passage in Luke 17 mentions also "I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left." Taking these verses at face value, we see that, at the time of this future event there will be people working in the field, people working at the mill, and people in bed. So my question to you is this; where are all the dead people in Matthew 24? Or Mark 13? Or Luke 17?
Now if your response is "Just because they aren't mentioned doesn't mean they aren't there", then I will acknowledge the point. Of course, if that was my only point, then this would be a much shorter article. In the meantime, just tuck it away in your brain that there are no dead people in Matt 24 , and we'll move on.
2. Who is the source of the 'trump'?
Returning to 1 Cor 15, we see in verse 52 "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." Verse 16 in 1 Thess 4 says "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:" Once again, something is happening and it is very clearly explained. The Lord himself will descend, and he will have as his possession with him a "shout", "the voice of the archangel" and "the trump of God". All 3 of these sources of communication are related to his voice. Cross reference Rev 1 and Rev 4 and you will see that the voice of Jesus Christ sounds like a trumpet, so it's possible that all 3 of the things listed in 1 Thess 4 are the same thing, but regardless of whether they are one thing or three things, the Lord Jesus Christ is the possessor of all 3, and the originator of all 3.
Now we run back to Matthew 24, where verse 31 tells us "And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." In Matthew 24, Jesus isn't the one blowing the trumpet. Now I will acknowledge that, grammatically, the case could be made that the trumpet is blown by Jesus, and it's the trumpet that dispatches the angels. Even so you wind up with an interesting quandary in that the Matt 24 trump dispatches the angels while the 1 Thess 4 trump directly raises the dead.
I submit to you that these two trumps accomplish two different things because they are two different trumps and are heralding two different events.
3. Who is gathering people up?
Taking yet another look at 1 Thess 4, we see "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord." These verses are, as the saying goes, hard to believe but easy to understand. Jesus Christ is returning in person for his church, and He will gather them up in a resurrection, with the dead rising first. We will go from whatever state we are in to being with Jesus, with no intermediary process mentioned in the verses. We find the same events and same sequence of events mentioned in 1 Cor 15 which says "Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." Both verses lay out the personal, intimate involvement of the Lord Jesus Christ in the resurrection of the saved.
Matthew 24 lays out a very similar scenario, but with a key difference. Verse 30 begins "And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." In Matthew, the ones caught up aren't summoned up directly by the Lord Jesus Christ; they are gathered up by angels. The 'gathering' in 1 Cor 15 and the 'taking' in Matt 24 are accomplished by two different methods because they are two different events.
4. What happens to the evil servant?
Tucked away at the very end of Matthew 24 are two men; the wise servant and the evil servant. Starting in verse 44, it says "Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh. Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season?Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.Verily I say unto you, That he shall make him ruler over all his goods. But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; And shall begin to smite his fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
I must admit, I don't have a whole lot of insight into who these men are supposed to typify. The wise servant has been put over the lord's household (past tense) and is promised more authority upon his lord's return, which is interesting. But if this wise servant is supposed to be a Christian, then who is he in charge of? He is in charge of a household, but it can't be the household of faith in Galatians 6 or else some Christians would be in charge of other Christians, and that doesn't appear anywhere else in scripture. Now we could be just silly and make the wise servant a pastor or something, but there's just not enough there to make the case, plus you run afoul of other scriptures. So although I cannot determine who the wise servant is, I think the case can be made for who he is not; he is not the church collectively or individuals within the church.
Of course the case of identity becomes even more problematic when you get to the evil servant. He can't be a lost man because he's a servant, albeit an evil one. Mark's gospel also seems to indicate that both servants enjoyed some authority, saying "For the Son of man is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch." He has access to other servants, and he beats them because he has convinced himself that his lord is not coming for quite some time. This evil servant , by all indicators , dies and goes to hell because he wasn't prepared for his lords return.
Now I am saved, and eternally secure in the Lord Jesus Christ. I have been made bone of his bone. I'm a joint heir with Jesus, and I have been sealed with the Holy Spirit. He who cannot lie has promised that he will never leave me nor forsake me. I literally cannot go to hell, and even if I forgot the rapture or was never taught the rapture or neglected teachings on the rapture , I still cannot go to hell. Ergo, whoever the evil servant is, he isn't me, and if you're saved he isn't you.
If Matthew 24 is about the church going through the tribulation, then who are these servants, and why can't we make them match up to anything that we know to be true about the church of the living God? Wouldn't it make more sense that these two servants typify some other group that experiences some other event that is not the catching away of the church?
5. Wheat and Tares?
We have established in previous points that, in both 1 Cor 15 and 1 Thess 4, the dead rise first. With that in mind, take a look at Matthew 13, another rapture-ish event. The Bible says "Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares? He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn."
Jesus explains later on that the reapers are angels and that the harvest is the end of the world, which seems to make it run parallel to Matthew 24. If that's true, then in Matthew 13, the lost are typified by the tares, and the tares are gathered first. Interesting, isn't it?
6. The fig tree?
In the middle of a discourse (according to post-tribbers) on how the body of Christ will go through the tribulation, the Lord Jesus Christ makes an interesting comment. He says in Matt 24:32-33
"Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors." I won't waste your time or mine using these verses to set some sort of 'date' for the blessed hope. Smarter men than I have fallen into that trap already, and there is no reason to compound their errors with my own. Suffice to say that in all of Jesus's parables, everything in the parable stands for something else. What does the fig tree stand for?
Well, by comparing scripture with scripture, we learn that the 'fig tree' stands for the Hebrew people. It's worth a study in and of itself, but the connection always seems to be a reference to Israel dwelling safely and prosperously in the land God gave to their fathers. Examples of this are found in Deut 8, Judges 9, 1 Kings 4, Psalm 105, Song of Solomon 2, Jeremiah 5, Jeremiah 24, Hosea 2, Joel 1, Micah 4, Zechariah 3, and Matthew 21, among other places.
Why, if Matthew 24 is the rapture of the church, would Jesus interrupt himself with a seemingly unconnected comment about Israel before he launched back into a warning to the church? I mean, I know I get off track and make unrelated comments while I'm preaching, but I assume Jesus doesn't have that problem. I suppose we could reverse-engineer our theology, making the church and Israel synonymous, but that would be just sloppy handling of the scriptures.
I offer as a much simpler, and more coherent explanation this missive; Jesus isn't interrupting Himself, he is continuing a thought directed towards the same group of people, and that group of people is not the church.
Now, I don't expect my post-trib brethren to be able to address or explain every little jot and tittle of what I've covered here, because frankly, neither can I. The whole story isn't contained in these three chapters, nor should anyone claim that it is. Some post-tribbers have some interesting takes on some of the outlying issues in all this, and as I told a friend of mine; "This is the biggest puzzle in the world, and I'm not sure that anybody has all the pieces.". But there are glaring differences between the events in Matthew 24 and the events in 1 Cor 15/1 Thess 4. I think those differences are both significant and fundamental in nature. If we fail to acknowledge these differences, we set ourselves up for a whole slew of faulty conclusions and extrapolations going forward.
Monday, August 15, 2016
Thursday, August 11, 2016
Tuesday, August 9, 2016
What I Would Have Preached at the Burlington Revival
(Note: I was not invited to the 11 week revival in Burlington NC orchestrated by C.T. Townsend, though I am personally acquainted with most of the principle players that were there. Believe it or not, I'm not bothered by that in the least. Many of the men involved in that event I happen to like personally, however much I may disagree with their methods. I have no reason to question their motives, and I am not mad at them. My phone did not ring, nor did I expect it to. There is a reason I call this blog 'Outside the Camp', after all. But had I been brought in as a speaker, this is what I would have said.)
Good evening. I appreciate the chance to share some things with y'all tonight. This meeting has been going on for some time now, and some pretty amazing things have been said about it.. I thank God for how God has dealt with people's hearts in what has been dubbed 'The Burlington Revival'.
What's interesting to me is that while we use the term 'revival', we don't have a very unified definition of what revival is, or much of an agreement on what it looks like. The word 'revival' isn't in the Bible, but the word 'Bible' isn't in the Bible, either. Some would say that 'revival' means people are getting saved, and that's certainly a blessing. Some would say that 'revival' means that saved people are getting excited, and I'm a big fan of excitement, and zeal. But since we don't have a clear biblical definition of revival, or even any real biblical examples of it, all of these definitions might be true, and none of them might be true. In fact, in the absence of any clear definition from the Bible, my definition is just as valid as yours. Here's my definition then: 'revival is acknowledging what's wrong, and fixing it'.
I got saved as a result of the ministry work of an independent Baptist church. I was discipled by independents, and I have to say, for better for worse, that's my crowd. I know not everybody here is of that flavor, and that's fine. If you're saved, then I am your brother in Christ, and you are stuck with me. Y'all are my family, and I speak to you as a member of that family. But since so many of the people here are independents, and that's the crowd I am most intimately familiar with, I think we owe it to ourselves , in the midst of all the excitement, to be honest, and talk about what's wrong with our crowd. We do that so that we can fix it. We do that so that we can honestly and sincerely seek God's help. The independents arose because a group of men and women saw the erroneous drift of mainstream Christianity and sought to separate themselves from it so that they might live lives pleasing to God. That is our heritage, and we are their legacy. But brethren, we are messing this thing up 9 ways to Sunday. We owe it to our forefathers, and we owe it to the body of Christ, and we owe it to our Saviour, to fix it, even if it means we rip out what we've been doing, and start over.
Hopefully you brought your Bible to church with you tonight, and if you did, turn to 1 Corinthians 3. The Bible says, starting in verse one, "And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able. For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?" The biblical definition of carnality is being unable or unwilling to get along with other Christians, and my brothers, we are thick with it.
Now let me cut some of you off at the pass. Biblical separation from erring brethren is a legitimate thing, and that certainly deserves a message all by itself, but that's not what we're talking about. I'm talking about the infighting and the bickering and the division that marks the independent Baptist crowd in the year 2016. I'm talking about how the Hyles crowd doesn't get along with the BJU crowd, and the PCC crowd doesn't fellowship with the PBI crowd. I'm talking about how good men slander and snub their brothers in Christ and , depending what crowd you fall in with, there is a tendency to reflect that prejudice even if you don't know what the issue is, or was. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. No seriously, I bought a t-shirt while I was there.
We made a trip to Pensacola years ago, and I had never been to PCC. That's because I was heavily influenced by Dr. Ruckman, and I had heard him lambast them for years as this horribly liberal and apostate place. But we were in town and my wife wanted to check out the bookstore. I'm telling you, based on my pre-conceived carnal notion, I expected everything just short of rock music and mini- skirts. My notion was wrong. Yes , PCC has taken some stands that I disagree with. Yes, I think they are wrong in some areas. But the Bible says "But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would." A lot of our separation isn't Biblical, its fleshy wicked carnality, and we need to repent of it.
Turn to Romans 15. In verse 4 it says "For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." I'm going to say this as nicely as I know how; as a group, our biblical ignorance is embarrassing. We spend an inordinate amount of time strutting and crowing about our precious King James bible, and scant time reading it, meditating on it, or preaching it. You men here that preach, please let me admonish you as a brother. There is a difference between preaching the Bible and merely using the Bible while you preach. If your messages are a mile wide, and an inch deep, you should repent. If the people you are preaching to aren't either learning something new about God or being reminded of something they already knew about God, you are wasting everyone's time, and should repent. I speak as one who has wasted peoples time, and as one who has had his time wasted.
The scriptures are sufficient in themselves. We say that, and then we use them as a launching pad to project our own issues onto God's people. The preaching that goes on in MOST independent Baptist circles is a reproach to the term. I could give you example after example of messages I've sat through that were no more messages from God than they were messages from Kermit the Frog. The root of that is laziness. We are biblically lazy. It's hard to preach correctly. It's hard to expound on a subject and give a balanced treatment from the scriptures, week after week, month after month, year after year. But it must be done.
I've said this before, that I think sometimes, in some areas, those of us that got saved as adults have a certain advantage. We have issues, and baggage, but we also have advantages. You see, when I got saved, I just assumed that everybody that was already saved knew all this Bible stuff, and that I was behind the curve. I felt like all these church kids were ahead of me, if that makes any sense, and that I had to work extra hard to catch up. So I read my Bible over and over again. I sucked up all the teaching I could find. It was years before I realized most church kids don't know any Bible, and all indicators are they are ok with that. Some of the blame for that must rest on the pastors of our churches, but some of that blame rests with the rest of us.
Church member, your pastor is not your priest. You need to read your Bible on your own, for yourself. You're not a baby anymore, feed yourself. You don't need to go to the next camp-meeting or gospel sing as badly as you need to read your Bible. You don't even need preaching as badly as you need Bible. If you have been saved 3 or 4 years and you still haven't read your Bible all the way through, what's the hold up? Be a grown-up Christian, and fix it!
Ok, take a look at 1 Timothy 3, starting at verse 1."This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach; Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity; (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?) Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. Likewise must the deacons be grave, not doubletongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre; Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.And let these also first be proved; then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless. Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things." In case you were wondering, 1 Timothy 3 is one of the reasons I'm not a pastor, and my hat is off to the men who day-in and day-out live 1 Timothy 3. I think you really are worthy of "double honor" like the Bible says. I also think you are very very rare.
But back to the passage. There is frankly, a ton in these verses, more than we have time to accurately expound, so let's zero in on this. The bishop is supposed to be an example , according to 1 Timothy 4, so the things that God requires of them God also requires of everybody else. The bishop is supposed to be "grave" and "sober". His children are supposed to be "in subjection with all gravity". His wife is supposed to be "grave" and "sober" and "faithful".
If all that's true, then where do we get this weepy, flaky, emotionally-driven Christianity so common in our circles? Where did we get the notion that running, shouting, screaming, wailing, etc..are the marks of the Holy Spirit? The mark of the Holy Spirit, according to the Bible at least, is self-control, and sobriety. I'm all for happiness, and I'm all for zeal, but what we are seeing more and more often in our camp-meetings and revival meetings and tent meetings is absolute foolishness. You may not like me very much, and I might even be inclined to agree with you, but you cannot take a Bible and justify any of that.
Hey, look up here. I get it that you're mad. But we need to fix this. We're supposed to be the ones that have the truth. We need to stop acting like clowns.
1 Corinthians 10 is our next stop. The Bible says, in verse 13 "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry." Now think about this for a minute. The Holy Spirit is talking to saved, blood-washed church folks about temptations that are common to man, and the first one he mentions is idolatry. You see, most of us don't connect those two verses, but there's a 'wherefore' right there at the beginning of verse 4. Idolatry. Interesting, isn't it?
We know from Colossians 3 that covetousness is idolatry, and we know that idolatry is listed in a pretty ugly list in Galatians 5. We know that some of the things that the nation of Israel did in the wilderness are called idolatry, including rising up to play. Part of idolatry is doing things your way instead of God's way. Part of idolatry is putting your desires above God's desires. I heard a man say once that we were guilty of 'worshiping the worship". You could do a whole study on that, which we won't, but let me just throw this out there; in our circles, we worship our emotions, and our experiences and our traditions, and our heroes, living or dead. We elevate them higher than they deserve, and they become the standard, instead of the Bible. I'm just going to leave that there for the two or three of you that aren't mad yet to think about.
My last point is found in Mark 16, verse 15, which should be very familiar to you. "And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." One of the things that my crowd, and your crowd needs to fix is we do not, as a group, practice biblical evangelism. Evangelism is not gimmicks. Evangelism is not church inviting. Evangelism is not having deacons swallow goldfish to boost attendance. Evangelism is not preaching to people who already agree with you. Evangelism is not an emotional sales job where the choir sings 37 verses of "He Knows My Name" until some weepy church kid hits an altar or hugs his moms neck or something. Biblical evangelism is dealing with lost men and women, on their own turf, about matters of sin, righteousness, and judgment to come.
Their own turf might be the gas station, or on the job, or even in your own house if you have kids. Lost people deserve a thorough, biblical explanation of the trouble they are in, and how Jesus Christ is the solution. The Bible calls that gospel "glorious". God gave a knucklehead like you something glorious. We literally have the cure for death, and we handle it so sloppily and so carelessly that we ought to repent of how we conduct the ministry of Jesus Christ.
We even have men who have taken the title of 'evangelist', and who run around on other peoples dime preaching to people who already agree with them, and they never once preach to a lost person that somebody else hasn't hand-delivered to them. We ought to be ashamed of ourselves for what we have turned the ministry into, and for what we've let it become.
Well, there you go brothers and sisters. A lot of you have driven a long way, and spent a lot of money to be here. This is my advice. You want revival? Repent of your foolishness. Fix your life, and then go back home to your community and live for Jesus Christ the rest of your days. Not only would that be revival, in my book, but it might qualify as a miracle.
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| Photo from the Burlington revival Facebook page |
Good evening. I appreciate the chance to share some things with y'all tonight. This meeting has been going on for some time now, and some pretty amazing things have been said about it.. I thank God for how God has dealt with people's hearts in what has been dubbed 'The Burlington Revival'.
What's interesting to me is that while we use the term 'revival', we don't have a very unified definition of what revival is, or much of an agreement on what it looks like. The word 'revival' isn't in the Bible, but the word 'Bible' isn't in the Bible, either. Some would say that 'revival' means people are getting saved, and that's certainly a blessing. Some would say that 'revival' means that saved people are getting excited, and I'm a big fan of excitement, and zeal. But since we don't have a clear biblical definition of revival, or even any real biblical examples of it, all of these definitions might be true, and none of them might be true. In fact, in the absence of any clear definition from the Bible, my definition is just as valid as yours. Here's my definition then: 'revival is acknowledging what's wrong, and fixing it'.
I got saved as a result of the ministry work of an independent Baptist church. I was discipled by independents, and I have to say, for better for worse, that's my crowd. I know not everybody here is of that flavor, and that's fine. If you're saved, then I am your brother in Christ, and you are stuck with me. Y'all are my family, and I speak to you as a member of that family. But since so many of the people here are independents, and that's the crowd I am most intimately familiar with, I think we owe it to ourselves , in the midst of all the excitement, to be honest, and talk about what's wrong with our crowd. We do that so that we can fix it. We do that so that we can honestly and sincerely seek God's help. The independents arose because a group of men and women saw the erroneous drift of mainstream Christianity and sought to separate themselves from it so that they might live lives pleasing to God. That is our heritage, and we are their legacy. But brethren, we are messing this thing up 9 ways to Sunday. We owe it to our forefathers, and we owe it to the body of Christ, and we owe it to our Saviour, to fix it, even if it means we rip out what we've been doing, and start over.
Hopefully you brought your Bible to church with you tonight, and if you did, turn to 1 Corinthians 3. The Bible says, starting in verse one, "And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able. For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?" The biblical definition of carnality is being unable or unwilling to get along with other Christians, and my brothers, we are thick with it.
Now let me cut some of you off at the pass. Biblical separation from erring brethren is a legitimate thing, and that certainly deserves a message all by itself, but that's not what we're talking about. I'm talking about the infighting and the bickering and the division that marks the independent Baptist crowd in the year 2016. I'm talking about how the Hyles crowd doesn't get along with the BJU crowd, and the PCC crowd doesn't fellowship with the PBI crowd. I'm talking about how good men slander and snub their brothers in Christ and , depending what crowd you fall in with, there is a tendency to reflect that prejudice even if you don't know what the issue is, or was. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. No seriously, I bought a t-shirt while I was there.
We made a trip to Pensacola years ago, and I had never been to PCC. That's because I was heavily influenced by Dr. Ruckman, and I had heard him lambast them for years as this horribly liberal and apostate place. But we were in town and my wife wanted to check out the bookstore. I'm telling you, based on my pre-conceived carnal notion, I expected everything just short of rock music and mini- skirts. My notion was wrong. Yes , PCC has taken some stands that I disagree with. Yes, I think they are wrong in some areas. But the Bible says "But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would." A lot of our separation isn't Biblical, its fleshy wicked carnality, and we need to repent of it.
Turn to Romans 15. In verse 4 it says "For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." I'm going to say this as nicely as I know how; as a group, our biblical ignorance is embarrassing. We spend an inordinate amount of time strutting and crowing about our precious King James bible, and scant time reading it, meditating on it, or preaching it. You men here that preach, please let me admonish you as a brother. There is a difference between preaching the Bible and merely using the Bible while you preach. If your messages are a mile wide, and an inch deep, you should repent. If the people you are preaching to aren't either learning something new about God or being reminded of something they already knew about God, you are wasting everyone's time, and should repent. I speak as one who has wasted peoples time, and as one who has had his time wasted.
The scriptures are sufficient in themselves. We say that, and then we use them as a launching pad to project our own issues onto God's people. The preaching that goes on in MOST independent Baptist circles is a reproach to the term. I could give you example after example of messages I've sat through that were no more messages from God than they were messages from Kermit the Frog. The root of that is laziness. We are biblically lazy. It's hard to preach correctly. It's hard to expound on a subject and give a balanced treatment from the scriptures, week after week, month after month, year after year. But it must be done.
I've said this before, that I think sometimes, in some areas, those of us that got saved as adults have a certain advantage. We have issues, and baggage, but we also have advantages. You see, when I got saved, I just assumed that everybody that was already saved knew all this Bible stuff, and that I was behind the curve. I felt like all these church kids were ahead of me, if that makes any sense, and that I had to work extra hard to catch up. So I read my Bible over and over again. I sucked up all the teaching I could find. It was years before I realized most church kids don't know any Bible, and all indicators are they are ok with that. Some of the blame for that must rest on the pastors of our churches, but some of that blame rests with the rest of us.
Church member, your pastor is not your priest. You need to read your Bible on your own, for yourself. You're not a baby anymore, feed yourself. You don't need to go to the next camp-meeting or gospel sing as badly as you need to read your Bible. You don't even need preaching as badly as you need Bible. If you have been saved 3 or 4 years and you still haven't read your Bible all the way through, what's the hold up? Be a grown-up Christian, and fix it!
Ok, take a look at 1 Timothy 3, starting at verse 1."This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach; Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity; (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?) Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. Likewise must the deacons be grave, not doubletongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre; Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.And let these also first be proved; then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless. Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things." In case you were wondering, 1 Timothy 3 is one of the reasons I'm not a pastor, and my hat is off to the men who day-in and day-out live 1 Timothy 3. I think you really are worthy of "double honor" like the Bible says. I also think you are very very rare.
But back to the passage. There is frankly, a ton in these verses, more than we have time to accurately expound, so let's zero in on this. The bishop is supposed to be an example , according to 1 Timothy 4, so the things that God requires of them God also requires of everybody else. The bishop is supposed to be "grave" and "sober". His children are supposed to be "in subjection with all gravity". His wife is supposed to be "grave" and "sober" and "faithful".
If all that's true, then where do we get this weepy, flaky, emotionally-driven Christianity so common in our circles? Where did we get the notion that running, shouting, screaming, wailing, etc..are the marks of the Holy Spirit? The mark of the Holy Spirit, according to the Bible at least, is self-control, and sobriety. I'm all for happiness, and I'm all for zeal, but what we are seeing more and more often in our camp-meetings and revival meetings and tent meetings is absolute foolishness. You may not like me very much, and I might even be inclined to agree with you, but you cannot take a Bible and justify any of that.
Hey, look up here. I get it that you're mad. But we need to fix this. We're supposed to be the ones that have the truth. We need to stop acting like clowns.
1 Corinthians 10 is our next stop. The Bible says, in verse 13 "There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry." Now think about this for a minute. The Holy Spirit is talking to saved, blood-washed church folks about temptations that are common to man, and the first one he mentions is idolatry. You see, most of us don't connect those two verses, but there's a 'wherefore' right there at the beginning of verse 4. Idolatry. Interesting, isn't it?
We know from Colossians 3 that covetousness is idolatry, and we know that idolatry is listed in a pretty ugly list in Galatians 5. We know that some of the things that the nation of Israel did in the wilderness are called idolatry, including rising up to play. Part of idolatry is doing things your way instead of God's way. Part of idolatry is putting your desires above God's desires. I heard a man say once that we were guilty of 'worshiping the worship". You could do a whole study on that, which we won't, but let me just throw this out there; in our circles, we worship our emotions, and our experiences and our traditions, and our heroes, living or dead. We elevate them higher than they deserve, and they become the standard, instead of the Bible. I'm just going to leave that there for the two or three of you that aren't mad yet to think about.
My last point is found in Mark 16, verse 15, which should be very familiar to you. "And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." One of the things that my crowd, and your crowd needs to fix is we do not, as a group, practice biblical evangelism. Evangelism is not gimmicks. Evangelism is not church inviting. Evangelism is not having deacons swallow goldfish to boost attendance. Evangelism is not preaching to people who already agree with you. Evangelism is not an emotional sales job where the choir sings 37 verses of "He Knows My Name" until some weepy church kid hits an altar or hugs his moms neck or something. Biblical evangelism is dealing with lost men and women, on their own turf, about matters of sin, righteousness, and judgment to come.
Their own turf might be the gas station, or on the job, or even in your own house if you have kids. Lost people deserve a thorough, biblical explanation of the trouble they are in, and how Jesus Christ is the solution. The Bible calls that gospel "glorious". God gave a knucklehead like you something glorious. We literally have the cure for death, and we handle it so sloppily and so carelessly that we ought to repent of how we conduct the ministry of Jesus Christ.
We even have men who have taken the title of 'evangelist', and who run around on other peoples dime preaching to people who already agree with them, and they never once preach to a lost person that somebody else hasn't hand-delivered to them. We ought to be ashamed of ourselves for what we have turned the ministry into, and for what we've let it become.
Well, there you go brothers and sisters. A lot of you have driven a long way, and spent a lot of money to be here. This is my advice. You want revival? Repent of your foolishness. Fix your life, and then go back home to your community and live for Jesus Christ the rest of your days. Not only would that be revival, in my book, but it might qualify as a miracle.
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