Monthly Archives: November 2011

Raising Hands in Worship and Praise?

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Raising Hands in Worship and Praise?

by Bob Burridge ©2011

(This article is based upon our online discussion from November 17, 2011)

We have many kinds of worship styles all claiming to be biblical.

The elements of worship are limited by Scripture to those activities God prescribes. His revelation to us is the only way we could know what pleases him in our times of gathered worship. This is what we call the Prescriptive Regulative Principle of Worship. (For a more detailed study of this we direct you to the article, “The Regulative Principle of Worship” in our on-line Syllabus.)

How the prescribed elements of worship are implemented should always support the revealed focus of worship. Its primary purpose is to express our appreciation for the revealed nature and work of God as preserved for us in his inspired word. We honor him as our Creator, Redeemer, Comforter, and King.

There are some differences in how God deals with his people in different periods of redemptive history. What was expected in the time before the finished work of the Messiah is obviously going to be different after his work was completed. There is however a unity in the general tenor and purpose of what God prescribes for worship in ever era of human history.

Differences also arise because an expression of humble praise in one culture might have a different meaning in another cultural setting. God used the languages common to the cultures historically when he gave his inspired word. We would expect that God’s revelation through the elements of worship would likewise adjust to communicate to the people engaged in the worship.

The conduct of worshipers varies as cultural norms differ. Music is strongly influenced by our cultural upbringing and by our historical heritage. Some display their emotions differently and to different degrees. How we show honor toward someone differs too. There are different outward expressions of submission and respect in Monarchies with royal families, Republics, Democracies, and so forth.

Culture is a big influence upon what people see as acceptable in worship. That does not make what is acceptable to us to be right in the eyes of God. In this article we take up one of the practices which differs from church to church in our present era. The raising of hands in worship is a growingly accepted practice outside the traditional charismatic groups where in recent centuries it was commonly practiced with a particular meaning attached.

Several Scripture passages are often cited
to support the practice of raising hands in worship.

There are very few references to this practice in the biblical record prior to the times of the Kings of Israel. The hand [the Hebrew word caph (כף)] is often used figuratively of coming under the authority of some authority, as being given over into the hands of a certain nation or people (Judges 6:1). Abram in his comments to the king of Sodom said that he raised his hand to Jehovah.

Genesis 14:22, “But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have raised my hand to the LORD, God Most High, the Possessor of heaven and earth”

It is not clear what was meant here. We do not know if the raising of the hands by Abram was an expression of praise, supplication, submission, or simply a raising of the hand to express his faithfulness to God as we would today in making a solemn pledge. It was a gesture understood at that time by both Abram and the king of Sodom.

In the time of Moses the lifting up of hands seems to have been an expression of coming to God to ask for divine care and help. In the context it is associated with prayer, or an approach to God.

Exodus 9:27-29, “And Pharaoh sent and called for Moses and Aaron, and said to them, ‘I have sinned this time. The LORD is righteous, and my people and I are wicked. Entreat the LORD, that there may be no more mighty thundering and hail, for it is enough. I will let you go, and you shall stay no longer.’ So Moses said to him, ‘As soon as I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands to the LORD; the thunder will cease, and there will be no more hail, that you may know that the earth is the LORD’s.’ ”

Exodus 9:33, “So Moses went out of the city from Pharaoh and spread out his hands to the LORD; then the thunder and the hail ceased, and the rain was not poured on the earth.”

By the time of the Kings and Prophets hand raising is a more commonly mentioned practice. It is noted by several historians that hands were raised by pagan nations then as they approached their deities in prayer and supplication. It seems to have signified a reaching out to receive something requested. It appears to have that significance among God’s people as well. It is not a suggested practice in any instructive portion of the Bible, but it is reported as something acceptably practiced and understood in the particular cultures of that time.

1 Kings 8:22, “Then Solomon stood before the altar of the LORD in the presence of all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his hands toward heaven;

2 Chronicles 6:12-13, “Then Solomon stood before the altar of the LORD in the presence of all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his hands (for Solomon had made a bronze platform five cubits long, five cubits wide, and three cubits high, and had set it in the midst of the court; and he stood on it, knelt down on his knees before all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his hands toward heaven);”

Psalms 134:2, “Lift up your hands in the sanctuary, And bless the LORD.”

Psalms 63:4, “Thus I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name.”

Isaiah 1:15,”When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood.”

Lamentations 3:41, “Let us lift our hearts and hands To God in heaven.”

In the New Testament under the new form of the Covenant, and in the First Century culture of the Jews and early church, it is not mentioned often. There is one reference in Paul’s first letter to Timothy that is often quoted in relation to this practice. The mandate there is not to lift up hands, but that hands lifted up in prayer should be holy.

1 Timothy 2:8, “I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting;”

Some Comments by Commentators

Several commentators cite references in pagan records of reaching out to God with outstretched hands. This is an understandable gesture based upon how people beg for things when they have a need. We see the universality of this when foreign envoys reach out their hands to God for mercy or surrender in Psalm 68:31, “Envoys will come out of Egypt; Ethiopia will quickly stretch out her hands to God.”

Several commentators and Jewish scholars interpret this practice as away of showing our purity to God by figuratively offering up hands which are washed so that no dirt or stains remain. The focus was upon presenting one’s self as innocent and undefiled to receive from the Lord. For those truly redeemed it was their profession of a righteousness that is not their own, but given them by grace through their hope in the coming promised Messiah.

The Rabbis had developed complex rules about raising hands in prayer and in worship. It was said that, “it is forbidden a man to lift up his hands above, except in prayer, and in blessings to his Lord, and supplications, …”

The highly respected medieval Jewish philosopher Moses ben Maimon (known as Maimonides) wrote, “cleanness of hands, how is it done? a man must wash his hands up to the elbow, and after that pray; if a man is on a journey, and the time of prayer is come, and he has no water, if there is between him and water four miles, which are eight thousand cubits, he may go to the place of water, and wash, and after that pray. If there is between him more than that, he may rub his hands, and pray. But if the place of water is behind him, he is not obliged to go back but a mile; but if he has passed from the water more than that, he is not obliged to return, but he rubs his hands and prays; they do not make clean for prayer but the hands only, in the rest of prayers, except the morning prayer; but before the morning prayer a man washes his face, his hands and feet, and after that prays.”

In John Gill’s commentary on 1 Timothy 2:8 he states, “The apostle alludes to a custom of the Jews, who always used to wash their hands before prayer;”

In the Notes of Albert Barnes he states that the lifting up holy hands means, “… hands that are not defiled by sin, and that have not been employed for any purpose of iniquity. The idea is, that when men approach God they should do it in a pure and holy manner.”

Adam Clarke reminds us that “it was a common custom, not only among the Jews, but also among the heathens, to lift up or spread out their arms and hands in prayer. It is properly the action of entreaty and request; and seems to be an effort to embrace the assistance requested.” He then adds an interesting conjecture that, “the apostle probably alludes to the Jewish custom of laying their hands on the head of the animal which they brought for a sin-offering, confessing their sins, and then giving up the life of the animal as an expiation for the sins thus confessed. … This shows us how Christians should pray. They should come to the altar; set God before their eyes; humble themselves for their sins; bring as a sacrifice the Lamb of God; lay their hands on this sacrifice; and by faith offer it to God in their souls’ behalf, expecting salvation through his meritorious death alone.”

Today, some see hand raising as evidence
of the moving of the Holy Spirit in the worshiper.

There is no passage of Scripture to support that interpretation. There is no question that the Holy Spirit works in our hearts to stir us to appreciate the awesome work of our Creator who is also our Redeemer and Good Shepherd. No where in the Bible is the raising of hands presented as an evidence of such a special work in an individual.

Outward displays of this sort, even when motivated by a sincere love for the Lord, should never stir us to see someone as spiritually more mature or blessed than others. On the other hand, we should not look upon those who raise their hands as spiritually immature or seekers of personal attention. Arrogance is a sin which can work on both sides of this issue.

What does this practice communicate
to people in various contexts?

What we do communicates things to those within a particular cultural setting. Not all common gestures or greetings mean the same to everybody. Raising hands in ancient times was to show attention to, submission to, and dependence upon some deity or authority figure. This was understood by pagans as well as by God’s people in those ancient settings. In our present array of cultures it is not a common expression of those same intentions. Within certain religious sub-cultures it continues to have that meaning. We need to be aware of how those around us understand our words and actions.

I remember going on a missions trip to the outer islands of the Bahamas back in the late 1960s. Before we had contact with the people who lived there we had orientation lessons to help us understand the way they interpreted gestures and idioms. Little things we do by our cultural up-bringing had offensive connotations to them. We had to be very careful that we didn’t miscommunicate unintentionally and insult the people we were there to help.

What is appropriate in some places my not convey what we are thinking to those around us. When our mission is to represent the truth God has communicated to us in his word, we need to know these distinctives.

While hand raising in prayer is obviously presented in a positive way in the Bible, it is no where commanded or recommended. It is an optional practice which should be used with great caution. It is not required and should not be practiced if this gesture does not express for us what it did in those ancient times.

In conclusion we suggest the following practical guidelines concerning hand-raising during worship:

  • Where it is practiced and understood in a humble God honoring way, it is an acceptable option.
  • Where it is not seen as a humble honoring of God, offense and confusion should be avoided.
  • Where it is perceived as a pagan practice, or understood as a sign of special spiritual sensitivity or status, it should be avoided.

(Note: The Bible quotations in this article are from the New King James Bible unless otherwise noted.)

The Abused Blessings of a Corrupt Church

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Lesson 33: Romans 9:3-4

The Abused Blessings of a Corrupt Church

by Bob Burridge ©2011

In chapters 9 through 11 in his letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul is dealing with the true nature of the church. This section of Romans presents a very different view of the church than the popular one both then and now.

When Paul became a Christian, he left behind the confusion of God’s word he had come to accept as a Pharisee. Some of his former Rabbi friends thought he had turned against God’s ancient church, but that was far from the truth. It was his love for the true church that troubled him so much. He called them back to what God had originally revealed about the coming Messiah.

He grieved deeply over their abandonment of the truth. The first 3 verses of Roman 9 say, “I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,”

Paul cared deeply for the family of God, and for the reputation of his Heavenly Father. He was calling Israel back to the terms and promises of the ancient Covenant.

Israel had been entrusted with great privileges and blessings, but she had not honored God with them. She had perverted them and confused them. Israel was set up by God to display his glory to the rest of the nations. She was to preserve the promises and covenant for the time of the coming of Messiah. By the time Messiah actually came, she had for the most part corrupted what God entrusted to her.

Paul got very specific about the advantages God had entrusted to his ancient church in the next two verses.

Romans 9:4-5, “who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen.”

1. The first thing he mentions that God had
entrusted to them was their adoption as sons.

The Israelites were adopted as the special people of God and pronounced to be his children. For example, God told Moses to tell Pharaoh “Thus says the LORD: ‘Israel is My son, My firstborn.’ ” (Exodus 4:22)

They were chosen as God’s family, by grace, above all the other nations. In Deuteronomy 14:2 it says, “For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.”

This did not mean that each Israelite was redeemed to new life and forgiven for his sins. The Covenant of God with the nation was external as a way of revealing his Sovereign glory. By circumcision each person identified himself with Jehovah and in a special way represented God in this world.

Some took on that covenant sign as if it meant far more. They assumed that simply by being a member of the ancient form of the church God would be bound to bless them, save them by their profession of his name only. However, they changed what God said, and by complex rules justified ways that offended God. They were rebellious children. As his family outwardly, they were specially held accountable.

This is one of the key ideas in understanding the whole Bible. It is central to understanding this next section of the book of Romans.

God establishes an outward church representing his blessings of grace. This outward organization of professing believers and their families is called the Visible Church. It is what we can see of God gathering a people to himself. It is the outward form God set up.

There is also an Invisible Church. This is made up only of those truly redeemed by Christ. These are those he saves from sin by the death of Jesus in their place. Since only God knows for sure who these are, and we cannot judge this without error, to us the boundaries of that membership must remain un-seeable, invisible. God gathers these saved ones into his visible church to live as a spiritual family, and there to represent him in the world.

All who are truly redeemed are commanded to join in the worship, fellowship, and discipline of the church. There is no biblical justification for believers refusing to be a part of the visible church. There is no biblical justification for thinking that all members of the visible church are redeemed.

The New Testament church continues that covenant body of believers. There is a new sign commanded to mark them out in the name of the Triune God. The sign of purification in the Old Testament has been fulfilled as it took the form of what we call “Baptism”. All who are baptized are marked outwardly as the children of God. God seals them as participants in his covenant. This does not mean that all who are baptized into the church are redeemed individuals. We must avoid confidence in the mere outward form of Baptism.

All Israelites were called to be part of God’s covenant nation, but not all Israel is true Israel (Romans 9:6). The members of the covenant are both those who receive its blessings, and those who receive its curses. A church is only honoring to God if it church honors God’s word and ways. The majority of Israel had abandoned its true spiritual family obligations in Paul’s day. There are those churches today which are a false family too.

Being called outwardly the sons of God is a wonderful privilege. However, we need to be legitimately adopted children of God, born again spiritually so that our profession is not just outward, but comes from a converted heart. We show evidence of this transformation by caring for the rest of the family, and respecting the truths our Father has entrusted to us.

2. God had given glory to Israel.

Jehovah had shown his glorious presence in the midst of his chosen people. He appeared on Mt. Sinai, showed himself as their protector in the fire and the cloud, and revealed his glory which filled the Tabernacle (Exodus 40:34) and the Temple (2 Chronicles 7:1-2).

The glory of Israel was the glory of God which was shown among them. His presence distinguished them from all other nations. Deuteronomy 4:33-36 says, “Did any people ever hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and live? Or did God ever try to go and take for Himself a nation from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great terrors, according to all that the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? To you it was shown, that you might know that the LORD Himself is God; there is none other besides Him. Out of heaven He let you hear His voice, that He might instruct you; on earth He showed you His great fire, and you heard His words out of the midst of the fire.”

Sadly, they turned his glory into something abstract and magical. They took comfort in the outward appearances, but ignored the spiritual realities they represented.

God’s glorious presence among us in the church today is shown in a different way. It is no longer shown in voices from heaven, pillars of fire, and clouds. It is shown in three basic ways. God is seen among us in the pure preaching of the Bible which is his holy word. He is seen in the elements of the Sacraments when rightly administered. And he is seen in the lives of his redeemed people as taught, led and comforted by the faithful shepherding of church leaders ordained to represent Christ’s headship.

The corrupted forms of the church today abuse these advantages. The Bible is used by some only as a source book for arguments, or as a book of inspirational stories and quotes. The sacraments are either reduced to mere symbols, or elevated to magical ceremonies. The church authority structure is modified to fit various political theories and business models. The glory of God’s presence is therefore obscured and turned into a mockery.

Being privileged to bear these signs of God’s glory among us, we need to make sure we preserve them faithfully to the honor of our Heavenly Father.

3. God made the Covenants with Israel.

The word “covenant” in the Old Testament is the ancient word berit (ברית). It means a solemn set of promises imposed by a Sovereign Lord upon the threat of death. There was always a symbolic shedding of blood when a covenant was ratified. It symbolized the just punishment deserved by covenant breakers.

God’s covenant to redeem some from the fallen human race was special. He would come as Messiah to suffer the punishment in place of his people. This is called the Covenant of Grace. There is only one such covenant in Scripture. God made it known in stages, each time revealing more about his plan, each time ratifying it with those he chose to bring it to his people: Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, then finally Jesus Christ and his Apostles. In each case it was the same Covenant of Grace, but an ever-clearer picture of Redemption.

Nothing more clearly marked out Israel as special to Jehovah than that in her era she was the special object of God’s gracious covenant promises. The Christian Church is the present form of that same covenant. We live in the predicted age of the Messiah’s Kingdom as promised and described by God through his prophets.

Israel had confused the meaning of God’s Covenant. She assumed that the outward advantages of living under God’s protection as a nation were all the covenant was about. However, the outward form was to illustrate what God does for individuals by grace. Being in the visible covenant nation of Israel no more removed a person’s guilt before God, than does being a member in the visible Christian Church today.

Those today who bear the covenant sign of Baptism, and who come under the care of the shepherds in a local church, and yet do not come to trust in Christ alone as their Savior and Living Lord, bring disgrace upon Jehovah and his covenant. They bring further condemnation down upon themselves.

As Covenant Children of God we need to restore the ancient promises and duties. We should trust in the amazing Grace that is ours by the love of God through Jesus Christ.

4. God had entrusted Israel with his written law.

The term used here is not just a reference to law in the narrow sense of rules and punishments. It encompasses all that God has revealed to us as a standard by which everything we believe and do is to be tested. These principles are not just to be looked upon as mere literature. Anyone from any nation could get a copy of the written word of God.

This verse has to do with God’s act of giving a revelation which was unique to Israel. God gave his word to his people through the prophets, and by his own hand on Sinai. Though they were the nation God trusted to guard his word, they had added their own ideas and corrupted its teachings.

The church today is also entrusted with the Bible as God’s revealed truth. Bibles are more available today than at any other time in history. They are sold in astounding numbers, and are electronically available free for home computers, smart phones, and tablets.

The church as a whole has not guarded God’s word as he has commanded. Some new translations change the text to fit man’s own ideas of what he thinks it ought to say. One current trend is to take out the male language about God so that he might be our Mother God as well as our Father. This misses the whole point of why male language is used, or why maleness even exists. They re-word the commandments to permit homosexuality, promiscuity, and divorce.

In many churches the preaching of the word is neglected. Instead of a systematic teaching from the Scriptures there are only brief homilies on morals, self-esteem, personal psychology, or social problems. At the other extreme the only message some hear preached week after week is how to be born again and do evangelism.

God has given his people a written word to love and obey. We need to learn and re-affirm the full range of teachings given to us in God’s word.

5. The services were entrusted to Israel.

The word translated here as “services” is latreia (λατρεια). It means the forms of worship God commands. By his word, God has always regulated how his is to be worshiped. Israel had desecrated the forms and attitudes God called for in gathered times of worship as a congregation. The Lord did not just prescribe what was to be done outwardly in the Temple. He made it clear in his word that only certain practices and motives please him when his people gather for worship at the call of the Elders.

The Jews had misrepresented the Sacrifice as a means of removing sin without a Savior. The creeds of Israel’s faith were no longer the biblical teachings, but the doctrines of Rabbis. The tithes and offerings were supplemented with other means of getting money for the ancient church. Their prayers had become proud declarations, instead of humble confessions of gratitude. Israel had so confused worship, that the temple itself would be destroyed in God’s judgment. The final destruction of this desecrated structure took place by the Roman armies in 70 AD during the ministry of the chosen Apostles.

Today the corrupted form of the visible church has turned worship into a time of entertainment, morality lectures, and mystical sights, sounds, and experiences. The goal is to get more people to come, instead of to give God glory in the ways he asks. Instead of the mandated reading of God’s word, prayer, psalms, creeds, sacraments, collections, benedictions, calls to worship, the leadership of Elders, and an atmosphere of holy respect, their worship includes new inventions added to the elements given in God’s word. Some of the new elements are outrageous. They have been known to bring in mimes, magicians, clowns, dance troupes, skits, film-clips, and pyrotechnics. Some do not even know that the Bible has a lot to say about the elements of worship. The current ignorance of God’s word is no excuse.

As those who are given the form God calls for in worship, our duty is to maintain the services God has given. Otherwise we will be like the popular, but unfaithful nation of ancient Israel.

6. God gave the promises to Israel.

There were many promises specially made by God to the Jews, particularly the ones about the coming Messiah.
The word “Christ” is our Western form of the Greek word Christos (χριστος) which means “anointed”. The Hebrew word for “anointed” is Mashiakh (משיח). In the time just before Paul, they had killed this Anointed One who was the greatest promise of all. In spite of the promises, they rebelled again and again to the disgrace of the God who blessed them.

Similarly, many in the church today redefine the promises made to them. They replace them with things they wish were true, things borrowed from paganism, humanism, and from a terribly uninformed reading of the Bible. Instead of God’s word about forgiveness of sin, inner peace, and the future hope of glory, people flock to hear a gospel that promises health, wealth, and fun. Gone from many churches is the gospel message of God’s amazing grace.

What God has promised is better than all the health, wealth, and emotional experiences one could imagine. Like unfaithful Israel, we need to return to the promises God has actually given us, and again behold the superior value of what our Creator said are the most important things.

7. Israel had the ancient fathers as their heritage.

It was from the Covenant People of the time before Christ that we have Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Elijah, all those ancestors who are the spiritual teachers of us all. Paul was reminding the faithless Jews of the blessed heritage God had given them. Tragically, just as their ungodly predecessors persecuted the Prophets, they were now persecuting the Christians, those continuing to put their whole trust in the promised Messiah.

We have a wonderful heritage as God’s people. We need to treasure that history.

8. And from Israel came the Christ, God’s Messiah.

This promised Savior came from the Jews. He was an Israelite according to the flesh, yet they turned from this great honor and crucified him. He was not only an Israelite as to his fleshly nature. He was also God by nature.

Romans 9:5b, “… who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen.”

These words strongly affirm the deity of Jesus Christ as the Sovereign Lord over all. No other interpretation of this fits the grammar, the flow of the context, or the argument Paul is laying out for them here.

Many who call themselves the Christian church today do not believe Jesus was the eternal God. They have stripped him of his deity, and made him a mere example of kindness, and a lonely martyr.

God had richly blessed ancient Israel with wonderful advantages, but she had traded them for superficial substitutes. The time had come for Israel as a people to give an accounting before God. Paul was not teaching that God was abandoning his true people. He was warning the corrupted ones in Israel that they had rejected God’s promised Messiah. He was calling them back to the principles and promises they had abandoned. As a nation they had drifted far from what they were called to be, so they were soon to lose that national privilege. The true church within the corrupted nation would grow beyond racial and national boundaries to include believers from all groups of people.

The churches today also have great advantages. To them is entrusted wonderful blessings as the called out visible body of Christ. But to those who bear the name of Christ’s church in vain, to those who re-write the promises to fit their own self-centered dreams, to those who would rather be comfortable than faithful, to them is promised the just and certain wrath of God.

We are called to represent God’s covenant family as those transformed by Christ. What kind of children are we in God’s family? Do we live to honor him? or to dishonor his name? The health of the church as a body is the health of the parts of that body. Each of us in our daily lives must appreciate, guard, restore, and represent the truths God has revealed to us in his word. We must strive in the power of our now Resurrected Savior to bring this gospel to those who are still in darkness. We ought to live as those who no longer belong to themselves, but to the Savior who bought them with the price of his own life.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Back to the Index of Studies In Paul’s Letter to the Romans

God’s Word as a Means of Grace

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God’s Word as a Means of Grace

by Bob Burridge ©2011
(watch the video)
(Westminster Shorter Catechism Questions 89-90)

God has communicated with us by giving us a Bible. One way he has promised to administer his grace to us is though our use of that special collection of books.

The Apostle Paul reminded Timothy about the importance of knowing what God says to us in those books. In 2 Timothy 3:15-17 he wrote, “and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

This means that the wisdom we find in the Bible, God’s own word, is profitable for us because it teaches us what is true, it reproves us when we do things that are wrong, it corrects us about what we should believe and practice, and it trains us in how to live so that we please the God who made and saved us.

Psalm 19:7-8 is very similar when it explains the great value of God’s word, “The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul; The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;”

2 Peter 1:19 warns us not to ignore God’s prophetic word in the Scriptures. Peter had seen the Lord in all his glory with his own eyes, yet he wrote concerning that written word, “… we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts;”

Westminster Shorter Catechism question 89 asks, “How is the Word made effectual to salvation?” It answers, “The Spirit of God maketh the reading, but especially the preaching, of the Word, an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation.”

We need to read God’s word.

Bibles have never been as available to us in the way they are today. In God’s providence we can read them in our own language, and have them with us all the time. Printed copies come in almost every form and size. They range from the ones in the dollar stores to the expensive leather-bound editions. We can even load them onto our computers, tablets, and smart phones. No era of history has had this kind of access to God’s written word.

There are many good translations of the Bible available too. Some are better than others, because they are more faithful to the original text. Some of the versions people read with great confidence are the King James, the New King James, English Standard, New International, and the New American Standard. These are translated by people who respect the Bible as God’s word, therefore they avoided changing the wording to make it fit better with their own ideas.

Having God’s word, and using it effectively are two very different things. Almost anything we need to do is best accomplished if we have a workable plan, and stay with it. The Bible is a big book filled with a lot of information. A hap-hazard approach where we dabble in Scripture now and then is of limited value.

We each have 24 hours of every day to budget so that we keep our priorities straight. We need to schedule our reading and studying of God’s word as carefully as we do the other things that demand our time. What we do with our time reveals what we really think is important. If we regularly read the sports or comics pages, or keep up with the news, hunt for coupons, and watch movies or regular TV shows, but we have no regular times to study our Bibles, something is seriously wrong.

There are many ways to go about daily Bible study. It can be as simple as just reading it through thoughtfully. One good plan is to read one chapter of the Old Testament, a Psalm, and one chapter of the New Testament each day. A chapter is usually shorter than most articles in a daily newspaper. There are several good reading plans available which have been organized by Pastors and Bible Teachers. Your church officers will probably be able to direct you to a plan they recommend.

Some keep a journal of God’s promises, or of lessons they learn in their reading. Some make outlines of the Bible books as they study. They could be detailed outlines, or just brief summaries of paragraphs or chapters. Others use simple underlining or highlighting methods and make notes in the margins. There is nothing wrong with making notes in the margins of your Bibles. Most of the earliest discovered copies of God’s word have marginal notations in them.

I like to read entire books of the Bible all the way through as I would read a good novel. That is the best way to get the flow of the author’s thoughts. A good goal is to read through all the books of the Bible every year.

Psalm 1 begins with a contrasts between the blessed man and those who are ungodly. It says in verses one and two, “Blessed is the man Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, Nor stands in the path of sinners, Nor sits in the seat of the scornful; But his delight is in the law of the LORD, And in His law he meditates day and night.”

Another good practice is to memorize verses that summarize God’s teachings. Psalm 119:11 “Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You.”

It is also very important that families read the Bible together, every day when possible. In our home we always ended our evening meal with the reading of a portion of the Scriptures, and a time of prayer.

God has given us a mandate: every believer should be daily, and responsibly learning God’s word. The Berean believers were commended as good examples for us to follow. In Acts 17:11 it says of them, “These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.”

What if a father came home from being off at war defending his family’s lives and freedom, and he had written letters home to encourage them and remind them of his love. What if when he returned he found that his wife and children had never read his letters? Maybe they read a sentence or two here and there, but never really read one all the way through? They explained that they meant to read them but they were too busy and never got around to it. How tragic that would be. Yet are we guilty of the same thing regarding God’s word to us in the Bible?

God our Father has told us what we ought to know. What he put in his letters to us must be important, or it would not be there. If we are only familiar with a few favorite portions of the Bible, we live as if God gave us a lot of unimportant material we can safely ignore.

We should attend to God’s word preached.

We should listen attentively to the teaching of God’s word every Sunday as we gather for worship on the Lord’s Day. This is the primary way God tells us to hear and to learn his word. In 1 Corinthians 1:21 the Apostle Paul wrote, “… it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.”

In Jeremiah 3:15 God attached his blessing to the work of pastors in teaching his word, It says, “And I will give you shepherds according to My heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.”

It is the duty of these trained, examined, and ordained Elders and Pastors to make sure the word is effectively taught to the people in the congregation. They need to plan so their sermons cover all the topics in the Bible. They are obligated to be certain of the meanings of the texts they present. They are to show how what God says applies to our lives practically. They should avoid the temptation of becoming entertainers or spiritual celebrities.

Regular and attentive congregational worship is crucial for every Christian. To bypass God’s commanded first avenue for learning his word is a rebellious and irresponsible rejection of what we are told to do in the Bible. There is no excuse for not being in worship regularly except those times when in God’s providence someone is prevented from being able to be there.

When Israel returned to Jerusalem after her long captivity and exile, Ezra gathered the people to listen to the preaching of God’s word. The people showed great respect for what God had to say. Nehemiah 8:5, “And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was standing above all the people; and when he opened it, all the people stood up.”

In the captivity few Jews had learned the Hebrew language, so Ezra and the other Elders explained what it said. Nehemiah 8:8, “So they read distinctly from the book, in the Law of God; and they gave the sense, and helped them to understand the reading.”

The individual Christian’s duty in worship is to listen attentively. The answer to the Westminster Larger Catechism’s question 160 says, “It is required of those that hear the word preached, that they attend upon it with diligence, preparation, and prayer; examine: What they hear by the scriptures; receive the truth with faith, love, meekness, and readiness of mind, as the word of God; meditate, and confer of it; hide it in their hearts, and bring forth the fruit of it in their lives.”

God’s word has great benefit for us.

By God’s promise and design, the reading of his word convinces us of its own truth. We need no proofs from the meager investigations of historians to confirm its certainty. Too often the findings of archeologists have been overturned as more findings correct earlier conclusions. The Bible stands upon its own authority as God’s word. It is the test of whatever else we know, rather than being tested by our fallible and always incomplete knowledge.

By the attending work of God the Holy Spirit the inspired word converts us who are born sinners, builds us up in holiness, and comforts our often troubled hearts. It is the means by which God works in us to strengthen our trust in the work of our Savior which is our only and sure hope of eternal salvation. We should not think of the reading and hearing of the Scriptures as works that earn us God’s blessing. They are works produced in us by his grace, not by our own natural efforts. When we engage this important duty, God fulfills his covenant promises to bless us as his rescued children.

We need to approach God’s word humbly,
submissively, trustingly, and prayerfully.

The Bible is God’s word. It is not merely good literature. Though many people read it as they would the writings of Caesar, Shakespeare, Bunyan or Luther, it is not like the writings of any human, even of any great human. It is a book that lets us see behind what our senses can see, hear, taste, smell, or touch. It shows us spiritual realities directly from the mouth of God.

We should pray for the Holy Spirit to guide and enable us as we study God’s Word. The prayer of Psalm 119:18 is a good model for us to use whenever we open our Bibles. It says, “Open my eyes, that I may see Wondrous things from Your law.”

Never let the word of God become neglected or pushed aside in your schedule. Make time for it every day. Make sure you are present and alert in worship every Sunday. Take advantage of good opportunities to study and read God’s word with others so that you can be mutually encouraged in this important means of God’s grace.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Index of Lessons in the Westminster Shorter Catechism

The Tragedy of the Superficial Church

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Lesson 32: Romans 9:1-5

The Tragedy of the Superficial Church

by Bob Burridge ©2011

While I was pastoring a church here in Florida, I took a sad phone. Unfortunately it was not all that unusual. A woman was looking for help from a church. She asked how our denomination (the PCA) differed from other Presbyterian denominations. I wasn’t sure at that point if she was concerned about certain issues, or if she just saw different designations in the phone book.

At first I gave her a rather simple answer. I explained that we have great respect for the Bible’s authority and teachings. I told her that we hold to the conviction that it is God’s word filled with encouragement and help for the lost through the work of Christ. We try to follow what God tells us there about what we should believe, and how we ought to worship and live. Then I added that by grace alone God forgives things we have done in the past, and makes us his children by his unfailing love and infinite power made possible by only one thing, the death of Jesus as our Savior.

She said she didn’t care about any of that. All she wanted to know was did we have a large budget and active committees. She said she wanted a church to care for her financially, particularly for a family member’s psychological care.

When I explained about pastoral care, the biblical counseling we offer, and the importance of a church family, she politely said that was not what she needed, and that she would keep looking. That ended the call. She was not interested in what the Bible had to say. She wanted material benefits. That is what she thought the church was all about. She reflected a tragic fact about what is often seen as “Christianity” today. The biblical concept of the church is to a large degree lost.

Confusion about how God deals with his people has existed in every era of human history since the fall in Eden. We see this sad distortion of God’s promises in the days of Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus, and the Apostles. It is tragically there today. Many churches which call themselves “Christian” simply are not according to how God himself defines it in his written word.

Four Kinds of Confusion


There are basically four major ways in which what is commonly called the church often becomes confused about itself. The same ancient errors Paul was addressing among the four sects of Jews in his era, are reflected in the world today. This is the focus of the section of Romans we now come to in this series of studies, chapters 9-11.

The first group is like the ancient sect called the Saducees.
Today, most of the large denominations believe the Bible is a flawed book. They say that we can find encouraging ideas in the Scriptures anyway. They see Jesus as just a great teacher, leader, and example of love, but not as God who took on human flesh to pay the price of sin for his people. They believe that social action and community involvement make up the real gospel. They see our belief in salvation as nothing more than bigotry and superstition. To them the most evil doctrines are those that teach that God holds us accountable for our sins, and that trust in Jesus Christ is necessary for salvation.

This is classic religious liberalism and post-modernism. They worship a god who is not much more than an undefinable cosmic force. They put their faith in the physical sciences, psychology, sociology, and politics, yet throw in enough mysticism to keep the congregations feeling they have spiritual help.

I remember talking with a young man studying for the ministry in one of the large main-line denominations. He said he did not believe there was a real God, but he would talk about God to his congregation because most people need that kind of belief to face their struggles.

These humanistic churches believe that man is the center of all values and concerns, not God. They empty religion of any real truth and spiritual life. Yet for some reason they like to call themselves “Christians.” They confuse the watching world, and desecrate the honorable name of the Savior.

A second group today is like the Pharisees.
They believe that man determines his own future by his choices and decisions. They see God as a beggar for our souls, pleading to make his work on the cross successful. They emotionally sing about the Holy Spirit, but to be consistent they ought to be singing about their own permission which is really why they believe God blesses some and not others. To them grace is a good word, but its meaning has been lost, because it goes against what they would rather believe about themselves and about God.

They are moralists, mystics, religious humanists believing that man dictates to his Creator. Yet they claim they are the true Christians. They confuse the watching world with a message that makes them feel in charge of their eternal future.

Today many openly reject most of what is revealed in the Old Testament by saying it was just for the Jews. That makes it easier for them to deny the plain meaning of the New Testament texts that go against their theology. They ignore the fact that Jesus, the Apostles, and the New Testament writers all quoted the Old Testament as God’s support for their teachings. To them it is as if God regretted his first attempts to reveal himself, so he instituted a new body of believers. They see the New Testament as one more attempt by God to succeed with lost mankind.

Some recent fundamentalist groups have gone way beyond the fundamentals. Like the Pharisees they make up long lists of sins, even longer than what God reveals in the Bible. Personal decisions and abstinence from a list of things forbidden replace the fruit of the Holy Spirit as evidences of regeneration. They have lost the idea of true religion as James describes it. Instead of hearts transformed by grace into being humble servants submitting to God’s revealed principles and provisions, they live for emotional mysticism set in motion by man’s own choices and material self-denials. They do not believe in a God who is the Sovereign Lord over all.

The third group is like the ancient cult of the Essenes.
They are the isolationists who will not submit to the church authority God himself places over them. They look to independent Bible studies, radio or TV preachers, and books for their spiritual guidance. They see membership in a local church as optional, or even hypocritical. They quickly and ignorantly dismiss biblical church order as mere “denominationalism”. They are left to disobey the many commands in the New Testament which require believers to respect and submit to Elders ordained to shepherd God’s church (Hebrews 13:17).

When they do come together to form churches, they use the methods of democratic-socialism. They water down the biblical offices to make them mere servants of the majority.

While saying they have “no creed but the Bible”, they have many man-made dogmas about the end times, what they consider worldliness, how to dress, and the arts, none of which are supported by a study of the Bible alone. Instead of being the salt of the earth, they fail to become involved in the world around them. They leave the movie industry to Hollywood, government to Washington, schools to the state, and TV to the Gallup polls.They form a closed culture, and just pull back ignoring the world as much as they can.

They are like the Essenes of Jesus time who went off into monastic desert camps. They are isolated cells calling people to come in, but then avoiding their duty to the world. Yet many see these extreme separatists as being Christians. They confuse the watching world about what Christianity is really about.

A fourth group is like the ancient Zealots.
Some have become violent revolutionaries. They become impatient with God’s timing and take the law into their own hands. They disobey police and defy the courts in illegal public demonstrations. They show anger and hatred but little mercy, no real humble repentance or trust in God’s grace. Some even set off bombs to kill unbelievers. They desecrate God’s holy law.

They justify breaking good laws because they want to protest bad ones. They will not represent the fruit of the Spirit toward those they perceive as the enemy. They will not even love their neighbor if the neighbor’s needs might inconvenience them. They judge others without biblical authority and reduce the glory of Christ’s kingdom to mere material victories limited to this fleeting world of our present age.

Yet these too are represented by the media and others as being “Christians”. They confuse the watching world and desecrate the honorable name of the Savior.

Many churches today are like those of the Jewish nation in the time of the first century.
Jesus contended with the popular preachers and the successful synagogues of his day. The Apostles were condemned, beaten, jailed and put to death by those who claimed to be the chosen people of God.

There are Super-Churches, growing in leaps and bounds. Tragically, many of them abandon God’s ways, trading them for what appeals to the values of those who will increase their numbers and budgets. They have the means to provide the programs and fun activities so many prefer over the true teachings of the word of God. They quote many portions of the Bible, but use them in ways that compromise their true message. They strongly appeal to expectations rather than to real spiritual needs. They are not super in honor or obedience when compared with God’s word. They are super in only one way, they are Super-ficial.

What is the True Church?


This next section of Paul’s letter to the Romans (chapters 9-11) deals with this problem directly. What is the true church? What is wrong with what most people think of as the church? What can we do to redeem the name of Christ from the disgrace of those who distort his church? What importance is the church to be in the lives of individual Christians and their families in very real daily struggles?

In Paul’s time Israel had fallen into a spiritually diseased condition. Though the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Essenes, and the Zealots had all twisted God’s truth in serious ways, there were also those who still hoped in a suffering Messiah who would redeem men from sin. They understood the message of the Bible as it was intended. They were scattered throughout the Jewish world, and were not very popular. It was these faithful Jews who were rapidly becoming Christians forming the early church.

The rest of the Jews strongly criticized Paul as he corrected their distorted views. Paul was originally a Pharisee,
a Jew by birth, and a rabbi by training. When he discovered that Jesus was the promised Messiah of the Old Testament, the large majority of the Jews thought he had rejected all that God had said before. This was far from the truth.

He was rejecting the artificial teachings of a superficial church. He rejected their twisting of the law and prophets which led to their cultish ideas and ways. He had discovered by God’s grace, the fulfillment of the ancient promises in Christ. Real Judaism had been lost by the majority. Paul had found it again. More accurately, it had laid hold of Paul by the work of God’s marvelous grace.

In the first 5 chapters of Romans Paul showed that according to Scripture all were lost, and in need of redemption, Gentiles and Jews alike. He explained how the human race had fallen when Adam, who represented them, sinned.

He then showed that the only hope of being restored to fellowship with God was that the promised Messiah had come as a perfect Redeemer, that he died representing those God promised to bless, that in their place he satisfied all that God’s justice demanded. He found that aside from these ancient promise, there was no other way to be made right with God.

In chapters 6 through 8 Paul explained how Jesus Christ gives victory in the believer’s continuing struggle with sin. It is not by the works of the priests and the keeping of the law, but by spiritual transformation of the soul by grace. Real spiritual change produces repentance, a true faith, and a desire to live in God’s ways.

This did not mean that Paul was now an enemy of the Jews. Far from it. He was calling them away from their corruptions back to the original promises. He wanted an end to the confusing sects and their distorted denominationalism. He wanted them to understand his passion for them to become Christians, followers of the promised Messiah.

Paul was struggling with a sincere and deep grief in his heart over their condition. He was about to tell them something very hard for them to accept. Their distorted ways were bringing down the condemnation of God. They were confusing the world about what God’s Covenant was all about. Soon God was going to end their national privilege.

Paul’s Sorrow for the State of the Church

Romans 9:1, “I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit,”

He begins this section of the book with a series of affirmations. The Jews needed to hear the truth. They needed to understand that there was something they had been missing, something good, something that could re-unite them around the gospel promise of a gracious covenant.

Paul wanted them to know how personal his compassion for them was.

Romans 9:2-3, “that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,”

Paul uses the Greek word anathema (αναθεμα) which is here translated “accursed”. Literally it means something separated from something. The most common use in the Bible is of something condemned and rejected as offensive.

Paul is not saying that he really expected to redeem them by his becoming accursed by Christ. The original grammar here sets up an hypothetical condition: If it was possible for him to give up the greatest blessings God gave him, he would do it for the Jews, because of his deep concern for them as God’s covenant people.

Words should not be pressed beyond their obvious intended use. It would be foolish to think that Paul actually considered such an exchange to be possible. The plain meaning is sufficient when taken for just what it says and no more.

God’s blessings had been corrupted by the covenant people

Romans 9:4-5, “who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen.”

Israel had been entrusted with great national privileges and blessings, but she had not honored God with them. She had perverted them and confused them. Israel was set up by God to display his glory to the rest of the nations. She was to preserve the promises and covenant to prepare the world for the coming of Messiah. However, by the time Messiah came she had for the most part corrupted what God entrusted to her. [We will look into the specifics of these blessings in our next studies.]

The same is sadly true of many who call themselves the Christians today. They promote a different gospel and a different God. They hold forth beliefs, agendas, and values other than what is revealed in Scripture by God. Yet this is what the media, educators, our neighbors, and the world at large think of as Christianity. This is tragic! The message is so confused.

What did Paul do in this situation? The masses of Jews had totally distorted the message and the worship of God. Did he get depressed and give up? Did he learn to live comfortably with the unbelief of the Saducees? Did he give-in to the Pharisee’s man made rules and dogmas that implied man’s ability to manipulate God? Did he withdraw like the Essenes to create a little community wrapped up only in itself? Did he turn to revolution and join up with the Zealots?

There is a better way. He told the truth with great compassion and persistence. That is what we need to do too. We need to work on reforming God’s church. It is not enough to guard our own worship, feed our own family spiritually, make correct statements about morality and spiritual birth. We must represent the transforming work of Christ with true compassion to the lost, to our neighbors, families, co-workers, and to others who are part of the family of the Redeemed at large.

If God calls his people his “family”, there must be similarities with our earthly families. We manage our homes to protect against things that will do harm to our loved ones . We do not defend germs that might creep in. We try to keep things clean and healthy. We guide chidren as they grow up, rather than let them take dangerous or foolish chances. We do not allow guests to bring illegal things into our homes. Similarly we should love the church so much that we do our best to guard against wrong beliefs about the Bible, or having teachers who have a poor understanding of God’s word and ways. We should not tolerate clearly sinful behaviors that go uncorrected.

The church is Christ’s family. It is to be organized and run for the benefit of the children he loves. It is to preserve the dignity of God, and the principles he teaches us as the Father of our spiritual family.

The True Church in Romans 9-11

In these next studies in Romans 9 through 11 we will see a view of the church which is very different from the one that most see today, perhaps different from what we ourselves expect to find.

Our goal and duty is to come to God’s word ready to be taught, ready to abandon every idea not found in his written testimony. We should be ready to faithfully trust in, and to boldly obey what ever we find in our Bibles, ready to improve our understanding of the wonderful message we have for the world.

Our job is to lead others to the shelter of the faithful church of Christ. That is where God promises to administer true peace and comfort to his children.

Our own little children do not need candy for food, lies to built their dreams upon, or pain killers instead of doctors to make them feel healthy when symptoms come. Neither do people need churches with entertainment instead of worship, false but comfortable doctrines, or promises that cater to their feelings only. They do not need churches considered to be good simply because they have big budgets and big committees. They need a gospel with a big Savior and a church that humbly trusts in him.

We do not help hurting sinners with promise God has never made. They need the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We cruelly deceive the lost struggling soul if we offer deadly pacifying substitutes. People may want to be entertained, but they need the blessings of the Covenant of Grace.

Let us make Christ’s church what God wants a church to be. We are commissioned to diligently call others to join us in a restored worship of Christ as a faithful and thankful family of God, upholding one another in the promises which cannot fail.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Back to the Index of Studies In Paul’s Letter to the Romans

The Means of Grace

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The Means of Grace

by Bob Burridge ©2011
(Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 88)
(to read or watch the video)

Did you have a good breakfast this morning? They say it helps you to be more alert if you have had a good healthy night of sleep, and something nourishing to eat in the mornings.

When I was in elementary school back in the 1950s the Birds Eye company sponsored a promotional offer with the schools. We had to keep track of our breakfasts every day for what I think was about two weeks. We had to have orange juice (Birds Eye brand was obviously recommended), and along with that there was a list of good breakfast menus to use. We turned in a report signed by our Moms certifying that we had one of their recommended breakfasts every day. Birds Eye supplied rewards which I believe were little metal buttons with pins on the back, and a certificate. The school benefitted because they knew that a good diet to start the day made for more attentive students.

God made us so that we need a minimum daily amount of certain basic nutrients. Doctors, commercials, and cereal boxes tell us that our diet should include a certain daily amount of vitamins, proteins, calories, fiber, minerals, liquids, and such things.

What if few pills could be made to satisfy your intake need for the whole day? They would supply a daily dosage carefully measured to meet all your personal needs by a doctor. You just had to wash the pills down with a sufficient amount of water two or three times a day. You would not have to eat a single meal ever again.

How long would it be before you started to crave some tasty foods? Before long you would be remembering the joy of a good burger or pizza. Maybe you would long for a hot refreshing cup of coffee, or a warm breakfast roll. There would be haunting visions of hoagies piled high with the quality coldcuts, cheeses and all the other things that make it a favorite food. God enabled the body to taste, savor textures, and appreciate good aromas. We were created to enjoy eating, not just to be nourished.

What about our daily spiritual nourishment?


God has provided the means by which we receive what we need for our spiritual health. The answer to question 88 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism is, “The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption are, his ordinances, especially the Word, sacraments, and prayer; all which are made effectual to the elect for salvation.”

These provisions are often called the “Means of Grace.” They are the means God uses as channels for his grace to be poured out upon his children. They are not the cause of God’s grace, nor are they things we do to qualify for God’s care. Grace is always an undeserved and unmerited gift of the Creator to those he redeems through the Savior. It was the work of Jesus Christ in his life and death that merits our blessings. In those who are given this spiritual life, he stirs the proper use of these means by which he has ordained to dispense life, spiritual strength, comfort, and hope.

We see a brief summary of the early Christian church in Acts 2:40-47. This section shows what followed Peter’s sermon when the Holy Spirit came in a special way on the Day of Pentecost.

Acts 2:40-47, And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.

Notice the means God used in blessing his people in those early days of the Post-Resurrection church. The word of God was spoken, the Sacrament of Baptism was administered, the people formed a mutually helpful community of believers, and they prayed. The standards of the Dutch churches add church discipline to the means of grace which we list as three in the Westminster Standards. If we take that dicipline both as the work of the Elders in dealing with matters of sin, and as the continuing work of the body of Christ to be encouraging and admonishing one another daily, we can see how God uses this as another channel through which he builds up his children and directs his church toward purity. It is all worked in us by his unfailing grace.

The next set of questions in the Shorter Catechism deal with God’s Word (89-90), the Sacraments (91-97), and Prayer (98-99). The questions that follow are a detailed study of each part of what we call “The Lord’s Prayer.” In the lessons about the Lord’s Prayer the issue of discipline and care for one another in the church is touched upon. We will cover the details of these sections in our continuing studies of the Westminster Shorter Catechism.

These means are to help us satisfy our spiritual nutritional requirements. Like our physical nutritional needs, there is far more than just a fast fix mechanically applied to get us through without giving it much of our attention. We are created and redeemed to enjoy the exercise of these Means of Grace.

When we feel deeply troubled we cannot simply take a quick spiritual prescription and expect the problem to be gone in the morning. Just grabbing a Bible verse, or saying a fast prayer, or a quick weekly visit to church on Sunday morning is not the way God made us to live.

Our fast modern life style centers around things like fast food, instant dinners, disposable utensils, and one-day surgery. We might come to think we can satisfy our spiritual needs with the same kind of simple-to-serve, easy-to-use, instant cure-all.

Man was made to be in fellowship with God, not just to be aware of him. The Bible could have been written as a simple devotional guide with a list of prayers and christian social activities to check off each day. But it was not designed that way. It was written to show us who God really is, and who we really are. It was written to show us how to have a living relationship with God to glorify him an all we do, and to enjoy him forever.

Satisfying Christian living is never achieved by some easy formula. So then, what do we do when the “life” has gone out of our walk with Jesus? If we seemto be lacking spirituial power, and our Christian daily walk seems bland? What can we do?

Properly Making Use of the Means of Grace

As we make our way through the last part of the Shorter Catechism we will expand upon each one of the important means God provides. By way of introduction it serves as a good challenge to consider them first generally, and to make sure we are engaging in them regularly for our spiritual health.

1. We need a daily time for reading the Scriptures.
Acts 17:11 the believers in Berea were, “… more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.”

We need a plan that will get us into the Bible every day. It helps to have a set time and place, and to schedule your reading and study so that it takes you through the whole Word of God.

Considering our remaining imperfections in this life before our future glorification, we will not be able to accomplish this on our own. The spirit may be willing, but the flesh is weak and given to excuses, procrastination, and neglect.

To begin with, it is crucial that you are a born again child of God. The Bible will have no real value to those without Christ. You must come in faith admitting to yourself and to God that you are an undeserving sinner. You must be sure that you place your only hope of being made right with God through full trust in Jesus, as the Messiah, that he died to remove your moral guilt. Until you are “born again” you will not rightly understand what is so special about the Bible.

1 Corinthians 2:14, “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

2 Corinthians 3:15-16, “But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart. Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.”

If we remain spiritually dead we cannot rightly understand spiritual truth. Jesus told Nicodemus that unless a man is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. (John 3:3)

Even after we become believers we will sometimes struggle with Bible study. We need to depend on the Holy Spirit when we read the Scriptures. Jesus told the disciples that He would send the Spirit for that purpose. In John 16:7 he said, “… It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.”

Jesus was about to finish the promised work of the cross. He was about to pay the penalty of sin for His people. When this work of atonement was finished, it was to be applied to the hearts of individuals by the Holy Spirit. If Jesus did not go away, then God’s justice would not be met. If there was no atonement made, then the Spirit would have nothing to apply in the conversion of God’s people.

They Holy Spirit is what brings conviction to our heart. Jesus went on to say in John 16:8, “And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” Without the Holy Spirit, there is no personal sense of our own need, of the provision of the cross, or of the defeat of Satan at the cross.

The Holy Spirit is what leads us to learn truth. In the 13th verse of that same chapter Jesus said, “… when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; …” God’s truth for us is in the Bible, but it cannot be rightly appreciated or known without the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

We need to call for the Holy Spirit in prayer when we read or hear Scripture. Bible reading is not just a reading exercise. It is a spiritual matter. Without the attending guidance and instruction of the Holy Spirit, we will miss the special value of the word of God.

Psalm 119:18 provides us with a good prayer to direct to God as we settle down to do our daily Bible reading. There the Psalmist prays, “Open my eyes, that I may see Wondrous things from Your law.”

We often prepare ourselves in outward ways when we sit down to read something. We take time to be sure we are comfortable, have enough light, and maybe have a snack or favorite drink while we make our way through our reading material. When you read God’s word, don’t forget to also prepare in prayer for the Holy Spirit to minister to you. Set your heart in full readiness expecting the instruction God the Holy Spirit. Prepare to have your eyes opened to behold wondrous things from God’s word.

2. We need a daily time of prayer.
The Bible itself is the best textbook on Prayer.

Matthew 6:6, “But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.”

Psalm 5:3, “My voice You shall hear in the morning, O LORD; In the morning I will direct it to You, And I will look up.”

What can we do to enliven our daily time of prayer and praise?

The same things can be said as for our Bible reading. Our private worship must be made effective by the Holy Spirit.
First, you need to be sure you are a redeemed child of God. Prayer and praise is a mockery and blasphemy if offered to a god of your own imagination. If you are not made right with the God of Scripture through faith in Christ, your prayer time will not have the power of the Holy Spirit. Your time alone with God will not be like walking with your own Heavenly Father.

Believers also need to depend upon the Holy Spirit during prayer. If your prayer time seems like just an empty exercise, then pray for you prayer time. Ask God to bless it to you. Call upon Him to be specially present with you and for His Holy Spirit to enliven your time with Him.

If you cling mechanically to prayer guides, lists, or formulas, but fail to make sure that your mind and heart are fully focused on the Person of our Heavenly Father, then the most important element is missing. Without consciously clinging by faith to the Triune God, Father, Son and Spirit you cling to nothing that can comfort you at all.

I once watched as a child absent mindedly let go of her mother’s hand in a crowd. The little girl was watching something that kept her mind off what she was doing. She fidgetted and in doing so she moved a little way from her mother but hadn’t noticed. While keeping her eye on what ever had attracted her attention, she reached out again to hug her mother’s leg. but it wasn’t her mother’s! The substitute leg was very similar and wore a dress something like the color of mommy’s, and the girl didn’t notice the difference. The other adult didn’t realize the mistake. She smiled gently, probably flattered thinking the little girl was just showing affection. As the girl got more and more fidgetty, something was wrong. Mom wasn’t comforting or correcting her as she was used to. Not suspecting what she would find the little girl glanced up, and saw an impostor. She didn’t just say, “oh, sorry. Have you seen my mother?” Instead she let out a horrifying scream and cut loose with tears that got everyone’s attention in the room. A confused, and somewhat disappointed stranger and a slightly embarrassed mother quickly got the child back to the right person. As suddenly as it all started, the tears ended with a long close motherly hug.

There is nothing as comforting as our own parent. No substitute, no matter how competent will do. There is also no substitute for the presence of the Living God for our comfort and security. As we come to him in prayer we must be sure we come to the right Person. If we have a wrong concept of God because we have not paid close attention to the teaching of his word, we come to no God at all. If we discover we are clinging to other hopes in our lives, to the false promises of a corrupted religion, we will find no satisfaction for our souls. We need to cry out to the true God to rescue us and to be near to us. This is one of the great promises of prayer.

That little girl may not have done what Emily Post would recommend for proper social conduct, but she settled the issue most efficiently. She cried out most urgently. She did not just hope that mom would happen by. She screamed with all she was worth and mom came immediately.

How seriously do we seek for the blessing of the Holy Spirit in our walk with God? Are we like the parable our Lord told in Luke 11:5-10? Do we come, even at midnight? Do we knock again and again without giving up? Do we make our hunger for His blessing known to the Lord again and again and again until He answers?

Enoch is a good example of one whose walk with God was personal. It tells us in Genesis 5:24 that he “walked with God.” His walk with God was not just ritual or a bland spiritual prescription. His walk did not begin with what he was doing, but with the One he was doing it with.

What if you need to grow in your prayer life and present spiritual weakness and can do no more than to call out to God for the blessing of His Spirit? Then so be it. Many examples in the Bible show us that you are in good company. Several of the Psalms center upon a crying out for God in times of broken-hearted need.

3. We need to partake of the Sacraments.
How can we improve our receiving of the Sacraments? Those truly redeemed in Christ need to understand what the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper mean. They need to appreciate the infallible promises God attaches to them, and come with confidence in those promises. We will examine these more closely when we come to that section of our study.

4. We need the regular ministry of the body of Christ
God placed the members of His church into intimate fellowship so that their various personalities and talents would meet one anothers needs and serve the cause of Christ. We encourage one another to do what God prescribes for us, and with the attitude that should attend those activities. We also need to lovingly and humbly correct one another when we disobey the ways God has told us to live.

Hebrews 10:25, “not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another …”

When we gather for worship, Bible study, fellowship, or Christian service our coming needs to be in the power of the Holy Spirit. It is his presence among us that makes our fellowship special. Not only is he there to seal us into the one true body of Christ, he is also there to create mutual encouragement and edification.

Philippians 2:1-2 “Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind.”

The power of the Holy Spirit is what makes God’s means effective.

To carry out what God calls us to do, and to be what he calls us to be, we need to rely completely upon the promises and power of our Redeemer.

Without the personal ministry of the Holy Spirit, our Bible reading may seem dead. Our personal prayer and worship time may seem empty. Our christian fellowship may seem shallow and unrewarding. Our corporate worship and partaking of the Sacraments may seem dull and routine. The promise of God is that there is something supernatural that ought not to be overlooked in the use of these Means of Grace.

The psalmist cried out in Psalm 42:2, “My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. …” In verse 8 of that Psalm God promises his blessing, “The LORD will command His lovingkindness in the daytime, And in the night His song shall be with me — A prayer to the God of my life.” Remember what the psalmist began with? “My soul thirsts for God …”

What is the hope promised to those who beg for and call out to God in prayer? Isaiah 40:31 says, “But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.”

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Index of Lessons in the Westminster Shorter Catechism

No Worthy Enemy

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Lesson 31: Romans 8:31-39

No Worthy Enemy

by Bob Burridge ©2011

We often become separated from the things we come to rely upon here in this world. I remember one day — and its indelibly imprinted on my mind forever — when I got the message that my house had been destroyed by a tornado. I almost lost, in that same moment, my wife, my greatest treasure in all this earth. That morning when I left for a meeting all was well. In a single moment, less than a minute I’m told, the structure that my family counted upon for protection was irretrievably twisted and crumpled. Just as quickly people lose their jobs, their investments, even their loved ones.

We know that we can be separated from anything in this world at any time. In the Book of Job we see a man who learned that lesson most tragically. Someone experiences losses like that somewhere every day.

We can only find true comfort in our losses when we learn to value what we have as first belonging to God, and then only ours as a management opportunity for the true owner’s glory. We who trust in Christ are not our own either. We belong to our Savior who gave himself to redeem us.

In the last study we saw God’s promise in the golden chain of Romans 8:29-30. There are those our Creator has foreknown as his own by eternal grace. He predestined them all to become conformed to the character of Christ. These are the ones he calls by his Holy Spirit, and justifies. All those he justifies he will also, most certainly, glorify.

While we struggle through daily challenges, personal lapses into sin, and occasional tragic losses, we are quite aware that there are things, forces, actions, and people that at times separate us from the things we think of as our own.

When we suffer losses, and know that we are not as holy as we ought to be, it is a common worry that somehow we will be cut off from the care and promises of our God. But this cannot be. There can be nothing, no enemy, able to destroy or to nullify the work of God to redeem his eternally loved children.

Paul shows us how illogical it is to imagine this loss.

Romans 8:31, “What then shall we say to these things?
If God is for us, who can be against us?”

First he shows us the main point he is trying to make. Since God is for us — no one, no force, no enemy, can be successful against us.

Then the Apostle shows us why such supposed enemies would stand no chance.

Romans 8:32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?

God demonstrated his love by sending the Son to die for those he has determined to redeem. He did that while they were yet sinners (5:8). Once the price is paid and they have become his own children, how much more would we expect him to care for them. Why would he send his son to die to give them life, then not also provide for the life he gives them in the Savior?

When people buy complex things like cars, copy machines, or computers they expect good support from the manufacturer to keep them in working condition, at least for the first few years of use. It would not be much of a company if it left its customers to figure things out and fix them on their own. God, the perfect supplier, always guarantees his workmanship. Those he redeems, he supplies with all they need as he advances them toward glory.

No one could lack what is needed to complete what God has begun in him. It is plainly impossible. Jesus Christ paid the infinitely huge price to redeem his beloved ones through his suffering to remove their guilt. Certainly his continuing care would not be withheld.

No accusation can stand up against those redeemed.

Romans 8:33, “Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.”

Since God is our judge, and has already declared us to be forgiven in Christ, who in all the universe could charge us with any remaining crime against God? There is no remaining guilt to condemn us.

See the list of evidences Paul gives to prove his case:
1. We are God’s elect.
This is what he had just explained in the previous verses. If we are known beforehand as his own children, loved by grace for all eternity, and predestined to be made more and more like Christ, then our security is a forgone conclusion. All true believers are as surely glorified, as the mind of God is sure.

2. God our Father is the one who has justified us.
He has declared us righteous in Christ who lived a perfect life in our place, and died an infinite death as our substitute. If the judge says we are innocent, then nothing can be charged against us. Any such accusation must be false, and have no legal foundation. However, the judge does not simply set justice aside. He satisfied justice by becoming our substitute. The penalty was paid. As the Lord said to Isaiah (43:25) “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake; And I will not remember your sins.”

The next four reasons for our confidence before the judge, rest in the detail of the work of Christ:

3. The death of Jesus fully satisfied the demands of justice for our sins.
Any condemnation would be unjust since the debt is paid in full. The court scene at the great day of judgment will not be to weigh evidence and argue the case. The verdict is already, eternally, known. If the wages of sin is death, and death has been served out to the only one appointed and able to represent us in the eternal plan of God, then the final disposition of the case is not in question. All that is left in that last day is the revealing of the verdict and the entry to glory for all those redeemed by the Savior.

4. The resurrection of Jesus proves that the curse is removed.
The sting of death is gone. Resurrection was not simply to demonstrate the power to bring life back to the dead. It demonstrated that the penalty of death was paid in full.

5. His power and glory are displayed again in the session of Jesus.
He sat down at the Father’s right hand in his ascension. Jesus never lost his power and glory, but he laid aside the full display of them while he accomplished his mission on earth. In his session in glory, he resumed the radiance of all that he is eternally. The rituals of the Old Testament were representations of the real removing of sin. The priests made sacrifices and sprinkled blood on the altar repeatedly, but Jesus did it once for all. He fulfilled the images of the past. Then he sat down showing that the work of atonement for sin was completed. Hebrews 10:12 describes Jesus’ work saying, “But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God,”

6. The intercession of Jesus continually applies the atonement.
His righteousness is ever credited to the believer’s account. No sin remains on the books. Nothing waits for us or the church to remove it. Jesus in heaven is ever testifying to his completed work on our behalf.

It is this work of Christ that gives us confidence. It’s not any thing we do, nor any attitude we develop. Salvation is the amazing union of justice and mercy. By mercy, the Savior of God’s people met the demands of divine justice completely. The greatest dread for anyone is to face God for the consequences of his sins. If that sin is removed, its consequences paid, then nothing should make us afraid of judgment.

So who can charge us or condemn us? Why should we worry that our sins somehow remain and make us unworthy? No one can find a single fault or sin in any of God’s children that is not paid for in Christ.

Paul next shows how secure we are in our fellowship with God.

Romans 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

The point is that no one, nothing, can cut us off from our Lord who has loved us. No power or calamity on earth can do that.

Separations are major factors in our lives. There are the separations from loved ones and friends, from our belongings when thieves take them, or from our high maintenance possessions when we can no longer afford to keep them. We may be come separated from homes and possessions that give way to fire, storms, earthquakes or mudslides. There is also the separation of soul from the body when we die. The greatest separation is of a person’s soul from God. Those loved by Christ from all eternity and by the infallible determination of God, cannot be separated from the Savior by any created thing or circumstance.

Paul lists a few examples to remind us of some causes for our outward struggles: tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, or sword. These certainly disrupt our earthly lives. But they cannot disrupt our fellowship with Christ.

Persecutions come because the world hates the message we represent.


Paul quotes from Psalm 44:22 to illustrate:

Romans 8:36, “As it is written: ‘For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.’ “

Even in the Old Testament, the Jews were hated and persecuted for God’s sake. Yes, some were even put to death for their faith. The world was glad to see them die. It is true also of the church in this era after Christ came. The early believers were accused of all sorts of wicked things by an angry world. They cried “The Christians to the lions!” The church today is accused of closed minded bigotry and prejudice for simply holding to what the Bible says. We are called “haters of individual freedom of expression,” “hypocrites,” “old fashioned,” and many other inaccurate labels which come from the real prejudice of those intolerant of those who believe the Bible.

The world may tolerate or even love religion — as long as it doesn’t make them feel uncomfortable, as long as it doesn’t bring them face-to-face with a Sovereign Creator and their need for redemption.

Paul’s point here is to encourage us and give us understanding and patience. We horribly fool ourselves if we expect to be exempt from trials, hatred, and prejudice, or if we think that our suffering is because we are not worthy of God’s love. No one is worthy. Every blessing anyone enjoys is not because they are more sincere, more diligent, or more deserving. All blessing and peacefulness in this life is ours only as a gift of God’s mercy.

We stand in good company when we are hated for Christ’s sake, or when we struggle as imperfect humans in a world belonging to a perfectly holy God.

We are not to give up in despair.

Romans 8:37, “Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”

What an amazing conclusion to draw! Not only do we endure and survive our losses and agonies. Not only do we in the end come out the victors. We are more than conquerors in Christ!

We can live above our earthly losses because we see them as part of a secret but good plan of God for our eternal benefit. We know that our sufferings strengthen us here, lift our eyes above the temporal to heaven, and prepare us for our eternal stay in glory. Instead of being discouraged by our sins, we are humbled to know they are paid for.

Pastor Gordon Girod writes, “How can I be certain that I am a child of God, and that He will never let me go? Have you ever wept for your sin? Have you ever felt deeply and agonizingly that you have failed your God? You see, it is only that man, that woman, who in the agony of their guilt before God – not once but a thousand times – have sought forgiveness, who can know with certainty that God will not allow them to be lifted from the hollow of His hand.” (Pg. 90 in The Deeper Faith)

The Paul lists the most feared powers imaginable.

Romans 8:38-39, “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We can have the same confidence Paul had when he said, “I am persuaded.” God implants a faith, a confidence, in us. It is not perfectly developed in this life, but it is there none-the-less. We know God’s promise is sufficient and trustworthy. What can separate us from the love of God?

  • not death – the great separator that thrusts all men into judgment. Jesus was already judged in our place.
  • not life – all the dangers and difficulties we face in life which some see as more unwelcome than death are no threat to the one redeemed in Christ.
  • not angels – no spirit beings of any sort can harm us.
  • not principalities – all that rule in this world, or in the invisible spirit world, are unworthy of our fears.
  • not things present – the trials, and afflictions we see striking around us in this fallen world.
  • not things to come – not even the unseen troubles of tomorrow which we worry about today.
  • not powers – those with strong abilities.
  • neither height nor depth – the highest or lowest danger is nothing before the Almighty God.
  • not any created thing – this encompasses all that is! Nothing is left out.

Nothing can prevail against us: no army, demon, devil, circumstance, or temptation. God is our Shield, our Fortress, our Captain, our King — our Father.

Isaiah 43:2 says, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, Nor shall the flame scorch you.”

Dr. Haldane writes, “Nothing does happen, nothing can happen, which, from eternity, He hath not appointed and foreseen, and over which He hath not complete control.” (P. 425)

The Apostle Peter assures us in 1 Peter 1:3-5, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.”

When we see tragedy closing in on us, when it grips our own lives, when we imagine our own sins to be so large that we wonder if God could love us at all, we are foolish to go to the counselor who helps us blame others, to our list of excuses, to our hiding place to anguish in despair and doubt. We go to the word of God with all its wonderful promises, and to the quiet place of prayer. There we remember the golden chain of assurance with which our God secures us by the promise of his own word. There we are reminded of the amazing grace by which we are kept by the hand of God.

Those who speak of the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints need to remember that it is not that some have such a good grip on God that they persevere, but that God has such a grip on all his tottering children that he will not let them go. God perseveres with us, so that we will persevere to the end.

There is nothing in all the created universe, nothing in ourselves, nothing in the angry world around us or in the invisible realm of spirits, that can nullify the work of Christ for his people.

The Psalmist wrote, in Psalm 73:26, “My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”

Jesus himself said, John 10:28-29< "And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand." (The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Back to the Index of Studies In Paul’s Letter to the Romans

Repentance and Godly Sorrow

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Repentance and Godly Sorrow

by Bob Burridge ©2011
(Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 87)
(watch the video)

People are often very regretful about having done something wrong, particularly when they have to pay the consequences. However, just wishing they did things differently, and regretting the results, is far from truly repenting for what they had done.

While sitting in jail, a convicted felon might be filled with regrets. He might wish he had planned and executed his crime better to avoid getting caught. He might wish he had been able to get away from the police better when they came after him. He might regret hiring the lawyer that got him convicted. When a person is sorry for his sins in this way, he is not repentant. It is nothing more than self-centered regret.

There is a godly kind of sorrow for sin.

Real repentance is not just concern about the personal consequences of mistakes we make. It centers upon the offense to God which our sins produce. 2 Corinthians 7:10 makes a contrast between these two kinds of sorrow. It says, “For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death.”

The world sorrows over the inconveniences caused by sin. This is a selfish kind of grief. The fact that it offends God only enters the picture in how God might punish the guilty party. When discipline in a society or home is only a matter of rewards and punishments, it trains people to weigh what they do against the cost of the personal consequences. So crime is avoided simply because it “doesn’t pay.” They figure that if they get caught and have to go to jail, it might not be worth taking the chance.

That is the attitude that makes people drive over the speed limit when the police are not around. They easily lie if they think they can get away with it, and if it helps them out in some way. They steal from their taxes, steal from God’s tithe, or shoplift things in stores. It’s why children often risk the consequences to break the rules their parents make.

There is a far greater reason to avoid doing what’s wrong.

Moral judgments should not be based upon what benefit we get from them. They should be measured by how they either please or offend God. We are not here for our own advancement. We advance so that God will be honored.

I often think of Eric Liddell, the Scottish olympic runner whose story was told in the movie Chariots of Fire. He clearly let his fans, friends, and opponents know that he was not running for his own glory. He ran for God, for his honor. In one of the race scenes another runner hands Liddell a scrap of paper. There’s a Bible verse on it: 1 Samuel 2:30, “…he who honors Me, I will honor…” Eric holds the paper tightly in his fist during the whole race.

This is why we should work hard and do our best when we scrub our floors, write our lessons or sermons, do our homework, produce our products, serve our customers, heal the sick, defend the accused, or whatever we’re expected to do here in this life. We owe all we are and have to God and to him alone. Our abilities to work, create, save, and produce are only ours because of God’s mercy.

When we do things that displease God, it ought to trouble us deeply. If we are redeemed in Christ, it ought to drive us to repentance.

Westminster Shorter Catechism question 87 asks, “What is repentance unto life?”
Answer: “Repentance unto life is a saving grace, whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of his sin, and apprehension of the mercy of God in Christ, doth, with grief and hatred of his sin, turn from it unto God, with full purpose of, and endeavor after, new obedience.”

True repentance is not natural in our fallen souls.
It is an evangelical grace.

Repentance is an ability implanted by God’s gracious work of regeneration. Along with faith in the redeeming work of Christ, and the beginning of real spiritual growth, God makes us able to see our sins for what they are, and to repent of them.

Contrary to popular thinking, the Bible does not teach that first we need to repent, then God steps in because of that to forgive us for our sins. The fallen heart cannot truly repent anymore than he can have a true faith. However, once spiritual life is implanted, repentance cannot be avoided. It is not our deep feelings about sin that save us. It is the work of Christ, and the faith in that work that begins when we are regenerated by his operation upon our hearts. The same grace that makes us believe also makes us truly remorseful to God for our sins.

This is the consistent teaching of the Apostle Paul.

Romans 2:4, “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?”

A. A. Hodge explains, “Every Christian duty is therefore a grace; for without him we can do nothing ( John 15:5). And equally every Christian grace is a duty because the grace is given to us to exercise, and it finds its true results and expression only in the duty.”

This means that if we truly repent of our sins, God is to be thanked for our repenting. However, we should not just wait around for God to overcome our moods and stubbornness. It is our duty to admit the depth of our sins and come broken before God in repentant confession. Only when we come can we discover that God has so graciously moved our hearts to do so.

It is important to know what a true biblical repentance is.

There are two main Hebrew words in the Old Testament that are translated as “repentance”, and two Greek ones in the New Testament.

The Hebrew word, nakham (נחם), is the key to understanding the word. Dr. Girdlestone explains that it means “to draw a deep breath.” It was used to express a deep feeling that makes us sigh. Sometimes it is that deep feeling we experience when we mourn or grieve in sorrow. Other times it is used for the deep compassion we have in our hearts when we see someone else suffering. The word came to be used for comforting or consoling someone. One of the things that can move us to deep sorrow is when we consider our sins against God.

The Bible sometimes uses this word in reference to what God does. Often it is translated that God repented of something he did or purposed. However, that is not a good translation of the word in that case. God never regrets what he has done or planned. He never makes inferior decisions he later finds out should have been different. He is, however, moved with deep compassion to console his people, and to grieve over their rebellion. It is better to use wording such as, “God grieved,” “God sighed,” or “God was moved with sorrow and compassion” concerning sinful actions that harm his people spiritually.

The other biblical words often translated as “repentance” mean the change in a person caused by the deep emotions of sorrow or compassion.

Latin gave us the word “remorse” which literally means “to bite again.” The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines remorse as “a gnawing distress arising from a sense of guilt for past wrongs”

When God changes a heart in regeneration
repentance is one of its fruits:

There is an intellectual change. The Holy Spirit uses God’s word to convince us about what is true. He points out through Scripture and by our renewed conscience what is right and wrong. He shows us where we would crossed the moral line. The unsaved only see rules with penalties. The believer sees moral principles that show us what honors God, and what offends him. That is a huge difference. Instead of figuring out which things we can get away with, our deep love and gratitude to God compels us to live for his glory, rather than to indulge our own pleasures.

King David showed this more mature understanding of sin. The Holy Spirit, by the prophet Nathan, opened his heart to understand his offense against God. We see his reaction in Psalm 51.

Psalm 51:3-4, “For I acknowledge my transgressions, And my sin is always before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned, And done this evil in Your sight — That You may be found just when You speak, And blameless when You judge.”

There is also an emotional change produced. When the nature of our sin is revealed, a believer’s heart responds with profound grief and spiritual pain to know how much he has offended his God.

When we repent as we should, God generates in us a relief and joy because of his assurance of forgiveness and comfort. This is what David meant in the same Psalm after he repented.

Psalm 51:14, “Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, The God of my salvation, And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness.”

There is also a volitional change. When a redeemed soul is informed about sin and convicted by the Spirit, his desires change. He wants his fellowship with the Lord to be restored. He is not just worried about his own punishments. He knows he deserves them. He also begins to desire to make choices that honor his Creator. David shows this transformation in other verses in Psalm 51.

Psalm 51:11-12, “Do not cast me away from Your presence, And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit.”

Psalm 51:15, “O Lord, open my lips, And my mouth shall show forth Your praise.”

It is sad that many evangelical churches
teach a watered down repentance.

Some define “repentance” as if it was only a change of mind about sin, but that it does not require a change in behavior. God does not divide us up as if we were disconnected puzzle pieces. When he redeems us, he does not just inform us mentally. He renews our dead souls. We begin to live spiritually for the first time.

A. A. Hodge says that repentance unto life is, “a change of mind including evidently a change of thought, feeling and purpose corresponding to our new character as children of God.”

If our regeneration is genuine it implants life into our lost souls. That produces a change we called conversion. That will include a true repentance, a deep sorrow over our sins, an awareness of how horrible it is to violate what pleases our loving and gracious God, and a change that makes us determine to stop sinning and strive to do what is right. The regenerate child of God is able to apprehend both the horrors of sin as an offense against God, and the wonders of grace which show the mercy of redemption through the Messiah.

He understands that sin is just plain wrong, not just because it produces unpleasant results in his life and circumstances, but because God is offended.

He sees the fleeting pleasures of sin as having no appeal to him at all when considered in the light of God’s honor (Hebrews 11:25). He understands his own inner moral weakness and wants it changed. He wants to be free from sin and its bondage, rather than just from its personal consequences. He sees his condemnation as just, and only removed by the merits of Jesus Christ in his place.

When we realize that the foolish and wrong things we do cannot possibly make us truly happy or help our loved ones, when we see that God alone is the one offended most by our every sin, we can only then understand the Apostle Paul’s cry in Romans 7:24-25, “O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! …”

Repentance is not just about confessing and avoiding what is bad. It is about wanting to learn to be good. It is a strong desire to please God at every opportunity, in everything we do.

In Chariots of Fire Eric Liddell says, “God made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure.”

The godly attitudes that grow in the heart of the repentant fill them with great pleasure to know that they do things God loves them to do. This is why we should love to live morally, to say no to sin, to turn away from temptation, to refuse to indulge our desires in wrong ways, and to give our all to Christ’s service and Kingdom.

The lost want to be free from the consequences of sin, but they care little about their offense to God. The believer will endure justly deserved consequences if he must. His joy is in the promise that he can be progressing out of his sinful ways, and becoming more and more free from offending the God he loves so dearly. He is driven to live every hour of his life for Christ — to please God.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Index of Lessons in the Westminster Shorter Catechism

Secured by the Golden Chain

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Lesson 30: Romans 8:29-30

Secured by the Golden Chain

by Bob Burridge ©2011

The book of Romans tells about God’s eternal plan for the salvation of his people. It shows an amazing plan that was accomplished by Christ, and is applied by the Holy Spirit. As Christians we are thankful for being forgiven and having our souls set free, but an agonizing struggle continues with the stubborn remains of sin in our lives. We live in a world full of lies, anger, and tragedy. Yet through it all, God lays out a way of life for his children, a way of Christian optimism. It is not the self-deceiving wishful thinking of the world’s optimism. It is based upon revealed reality: the unfailing and perfect promise of God.

Our last study was Romans 8:28 “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”

The “good” promised is not earthly riches, freedom from disease, or safety from crime. It is not that you will never lose a loved one, or have to endure some horrible experiences. There is while we endure these things hard times, an amazing inner peace from Christ that surfaces when we most need it. Also, there is the future hope Paul had just been writing about, our inheritance in glory.

God tells us that everything works together to produce this good. Our Sovereign God uses even our sufferings, weaknesses, and failings to help us grow in Christ. This makes us spiritually stronger here, and prepares us for our place in glory. This consolation through our times of suffering is not promised to everybody. This verse only assures it to those who love God, and are called according to his purpose.

In the next two verses Paul shows how sure that promise is. Romans 8:29 and 30 describe what is often called “The Golden Chain”.

“For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”

There are five links in this chain. They show an unbreakable connection that secures us to God’s blessing eternally. This certainty is anchored on one end in the eternal love and decree of God. It is attached at the other end to the promise of glory forever. The chain can never be broken. Each link is forged from the promises of God. This makes the chain infinitely secure. It binds each of God’s children to an infallible future, eternal glorification in Christ.

The chain begins with its anchor in God’s eternal decree.

29 For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.

It all begins in God’s foreknowledge of those he promises to glorify. The word “to foreknow” is a verb formed from the Greek root word prognosis (προγνοσις); We use it as a medical term. A prognosis tells a patient in advance how his condition will progress. However, there are different kinds of foreknowing in the Bible.

Sometimes it means simply knowing about something in advance. That can’t be what it means here. It would make no sense. God knows all things in advance. He knows all people in advance, but all people are not predestined to become like Christ. They are not all justified by Christ headed for glory in the last day. Paul did not write, “because of what God foreknew he predestined…” He wrote, “for whom he foreknew he predestined”

Besides, it would make no sense that God looked ahead to see what happens in time to decide what he should eternally purpose to happen. God knows all things eternally and unchangeably. There cannot be a time when God made up his mind based upon things that could only happen after his creation of the world.

What would God look for to decide who to predestine to Christ? Would he look ahead to see their faith? That could not be. In Acts 13:48 it says ” as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.” Therefore faith is the result of God’s appointment. It cannot be its cause. The cause cannot be based upon the result, or the result would be the cause. This would contradict Acts 13:48, and would make humans the determiners of the mind of God.

Would God look ahead to see their good works? That could not be either. Ephesians 2:10 says “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. ” Again, our works are the result of God’s preparing us before hand in Christ, not its cause.

Paul writes in 2 Timothy 1:9 that God “… saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began”

The meaning here obviously includes some kind of selection of certain ones only. God is often said to specially know his people in a way different than the way knows all others.

John 10:14 , “I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own.”

1 Corinthians 8:3, “But if anyone loves God, this one is known by Him.”

Romans 11:2, “God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. …” This is a special reference to Israel, God’s chosen nation before the time of Christ. Here his foreknowledge is defined as that special relationship that marked them out from other nations.

Matthew 7:23, “And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’ Certainly this verse does not mean that God was ignorant of the existence of unbelievers. It cannot mean that the all knowing God discovers that some existed he did not know about. It can only mean one thing. God has specially known some people in a way that makes them his own. Those who are not his own he does not know in this special way.

This first link in the chain means that God set his heart to know some specially as His own. He did this from the beginning, before anyone had done good or evil.

This means that God’s “foreknowing” is his loving us and choosing us by grace alone. That is how God has always expressed himself toward his people. In Jeremiah 31:3 the LORD said, “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.”

Those God has known specially beforehand he has predestined. Predestination is another of those words that people struggle with. I have heard Christians say that their church does not believe in predestination. How can that be? Here it is in our Bibles. The word appears in many other verses too. Most likely those who deny this statement of Scripture redefine the word to allow for certain assumptions they have made.

The word verse clearly means that God made a determination about the people he foreknew as his own. The purpose of this predestination is that his people would be conformed to the image of Christ.

Humans were originally created in the image of God to represent him in the world. When Adam sinned that image was badly marred in us all. Instead of subduing all things for God’s glory, humans began abusing things for their own pleasure. In this fallen condition they ignore the Creator’s glory and purpose in all things. Their power is used to advance their own agenda and interests instead of the Kingdom of God. Their morality, sense of justice, and concept of truth, are based upon standards contrary to those God has revealed to us.

God purposed that through Christ those he foreknew would be restored to being able to show God’s image to the world. Our predestination is not only to get us to heaven, or to make us believe. It is so that we might progress in holy living, shaped by the model of Jesus. In 1 Peter 1:1-2 the Apostle spoke of God’s foreknowledge and choosing with reference to how he makes them obedient. Peter addressed his letter , “… To the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.”

God brings his decree into the individual’s life by a special calling.

Romans 8:30a, “Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; …”

This is the third link in the chain. All those God has foreknown as his own, and predestined to be like Christ He calls to himself so that this sanctifying change will take place in them.

There are two distinct types of calling mentioned in God’s word. One kind of calling in Scripture is not just to those predestined to life in Christ. Jesus said, “many are called but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). The call Jesus spoke about there was the outward call that invites individuals to become believers. He makes it clear that God has not chosen all those who are invited in this way. The outward invitation saves no one, and is not the link in this golden chain. So the call here is the one by which those who are chosen beforehand are assured to also be justified.

In Romans 1-3 we saw that no fallen human can respond to the gospel call on his own. Men love to be religious, and to do things that improve their opinion of themselves. They will not admit they are offensive to God, or that their only hope to be avoid condemnation in the judgment is the death of Jesus in their place, and the grace of a sovereign God who alone can change them. As Jesus said in John 6:44, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

There is also this special call internally by the Spirit. It changes a person’s standing with God. When the Holy Spirit calls inwardly the person most gratefully comes. God in this special calling transforms the heart. He gives the person spiritual life, and the ability to know and to trust the words of God. This is “regeneration”. It is what the Bible means when it speaks of being “born again.”

When the Spirit gives us life, we can no more resist this call than a creature could resist his own creation.

The next link in the chain is justification.

Romans 8:30b. ” … whom He called, these He also justified; …”

“Justified” is a legal term. It is a declaration of innocence by a court. In this case it is the judgment of God that through Christ our debt is fully paid. This is the great theme around which Paul builds the whole book of Romans. In 1:17 he quoted Habakkuk 2:4 that “the just shall live by his faith”

God’s own holy nature makes it impossible for him to set aside guilt without its deserved punishment. That is what Jesus came to do for those God had foreknown as his own. When those called by the Spirit are justified, the work of Jesus Christ is applied to them. The righteousness of Jesus is credited to the sinner, and the sinner’s guilt is considered paid for by the Savior.

When the offense is removed, it removes the moral barrier between them and God. They are restored to fellowship with him, and are promised his blessing forever.

Then there is the final link in the chain.

Romans 8:30c, “… and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”

This is the great hope, the consolation that keeps us looking ahead while we struggle here. One day the work of God in our hearts will be completed. We who have been called to the Savior by grace will be received into eternal glory. We will be changed, in body and soul, to live in the presence of the Lord forever.

This is so certain, that Paul puts it in the past tense as if it is already a “done deal”. God who sees the end from the beginning assures us that our final blessing is assured. No believer will come short of this final blessing.

This is an unbreakable chain. Its links are more precious than gold. Who are those who are to be glorified? those same ones God has justified. Who are those God justifies? Those same ones he has called to himself. Who does God call? Those same ones he has predestined to become like his Son. Who does God predestine in this way? Those same ones foreknown by him from the beginning.

It is all by grace. Nothing of our own merit enters into it at all. There is nothing that should make us proud or secure in ourselves. The undeserved love of God has set us free through Christ. That is the plain truth of it.

Titus 3:5 says, “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit”

Have you experienced that call of God on your heart? Has his Spirit convicted you of your hopeless condition, and humbled you before your maker? Has he filled you with awe at the gracious sacrifice of Jesus Christ to redeem those totally unworthy? Has he stirred you to trust in that work of the Savior? Do you want to learn to be like him?

If so, that middle link assures you of that to which it is attached on both sides. You can be certain that God has loved you for all eternity. You would not experience those dispositions in your heart if you had not been called inwardly by the work of the Holy Spirit as the work of Jesus Christ brings new life to what was spiritually dead. It assures you that in God’s eyes you are now justified, and one day will be received into glory to live forever in the house of the Lord.

When you struggle with hard times, face tragedy and disappointments, When you falter and sin against the God you love — hang on to this golden chain. It is anchored in the ancient love of God on the one end of the chain, and is tethered on the other end to the promises of eternal glory. It assures you that what our heavenly Father brings us through works toward what is truly good. It helps you mature into the spiritual child God is making you to be, and it fits you for your place in eternal glory.

There is no suffering of this present world that can cast even a dim shadow when we stand in the light of this astounding promise. To hold on to your doubts you must assume the absurd, that God fails to justify those he predestined and called to be made like Christ. God himself rules out the possibility that anyone who is justified by his grace could fail to be ultimately glorified.

Dr. Haldane commented on this verse saying, “It is impossible to find words which could more forcibly and precisely express the indissoluble connection that subsists between all the parts of this series, or show that they are the same individuals that are spoken of throughout.”

From commencement to consummation, the promise of God stands sure. No greater consolation to the struggling believer is imaginable.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

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The Growth of a True Faith

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The Growth of a True Faith

by Bob Burridge ©2011
(Westminster Shorter Catechism Question 86 Part 3)
(watch the video)

Not everyone who hears the gospel, and discovers what the Bible actually says, believes it. Of those who say they believe it, not everyone really trusts in it sincerely and with confidence. The problem is not found in their lack of intelligence. It cannot be blamed on those who have influenced them or raised them. It has to do with the state of their soul.

In previous studies we have seen how the guilt and effects of Adam’s sin have infected and condemned the whole human race descending naturally from him. They are unable to do what is truly good by God’s definition of it. However, their moral inability to understand and to trust in what God said in his word does not make them excusable for their rejection of what is right and true.

The Parable of the Sower and the Seed in Matthew 13

Jesus had been teaching in Galilee. Crowds followed him wanting to hear more about what he had to say. From a boat along the shore he taught another of his parables about the Kingdom. Most of the teachings of Jesus during his time on earth centered around the Kingdom of God. However, the message was not going to take effect the same way in the lives of everyone who heard is lessons. Interest in the Kingdom of God would fade away in some who seemed interested at first.

In the parable of the sower, there are four kinds of soil that receives the seed. Jesus started the Parable saying, “Behold, a sower went out to sow.”

Matthew 13:4, “… some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them.”

Theses seeds fell in places on the side of the prepared fields. They landed on the path. The narrow foot paths that go through fields dividing the sections were made of packed down dirt from people walking on them. Birds would easily find these exposed seeds and eat them.

Matthew 13:5-6, “Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root they withered away.”

These seeds fell in areas where there was a thin layer of soil over an underlying rocky foundation. Seeds planted here would sprout and start to grow but would not be able to put down firm roots. The growth was superficial. Without a root system there was no supply of water and other nourishments. The rock under them would get hot in the sun. The heat from below and above would dry the young plants out, and they would die.

Matthew 13:7, “And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them.”

This third group of seeds fell in a place where weeds were growing rampantly. These thorns were weeds that took the nourishment away from the planted seeds. They also produced shade on the ground that blocked the sun from the seeds that fell under them. These seeds were choked by the unwanted wild growth around them.

Matthew 13:8-9, “But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!”

These seeds landed in soil which was rich with nutrients, and had the right consistency to support growth. These were the seeds that produced a good, healthy crop.

A few verses later, Jesus himself explained what his parable meant. He made it clear that the seed was the word of the Kingdom of God. The soil represented the hearts of those who hear that word. The growth of the seed depended upon the soil prepared for the seed.

Matthew 13:19, “When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside.”

Like the seed that landed on the hardened paths, the message about God’s Kingdom sometimes falls upon hardened hearts. The natural heart of every person lacks the ability to understand kingdom truths as they really are. They do not have confidence in the truth of God’s promises. They lack that saving faith which grows only in the hearts of those redeemed by Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:14 says, “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

In these hearts, the truth about God’s Kingdom and the ways it teaches us to think and to live are replaced by worldly habits and myths which are preferred by the hardened heart. The truth God reveals is distorted by spiritual blindness and confused understanding. The promises of the Kingdom are snatched away and never really take root.

Matthew 13:20, “But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles.”

Someone can appear to be a true child of God for a time, even if it is only superficial. They seem to receive God’s word with joy. They endure for a while but then turn away. They might be discouraged by persecution, trials, and temptations of various kinds. Since there is no real root to what they believe, they abandon their professed convictions. In difficult times a person’s true character is revealed. Some show that their faith was not the kind implanted by grace. It was a trust in their hopes of personal benefits, not a trust in the redeeming work of a Savior who calls us into service with the family of God.

1 John 2:19 makes it clear that this happens, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us.”

In Revelation 2:9 the Bible shows us where these false believers have their real church membership, “… I know the blasphemy of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.”

Matthew 13:22, “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.”

The thorns are the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of material riches. A heart set upon self-satisfaction is not dedicated to the service of Christ as Lord of his life. A person like that is shallow, and lacks evidence of a true Saving Faith. The person who receives the word among thorns lets his personal goals and comforts crowd out his service for God’s Kingdom. With no sound foundation, the truth is choked out in his life, and becomes unimportant to him.

This is the tragedy of many who put other values above the supreme value of trusting and honoring the Creator. There are many important responsibilities God gives us, and many wonderful blessings he bestows upon his children. They all must be handled with the right outlook. Our jobs are important to provide what we and our families need, but we should be careful to keep God’s priorities as we set up our budget and advance in our careers. Our families are important too, but we do the family no good if we elevate family fun or prosperity over helping one another grow into mature Kingdom workers in all we do, declaring God’s glory and living with a true trust in all he said is right and good. When our jobs or families are valued above God’s Kingdom Principles, they become a form of idolatry and a great evil. The same is true of education, social status, sports, hobbies .. all the good things God lets us enjoy in this life.

If the Principles of God’s Kingdom become secondary, then the weeds of this world are choking it out and the person is unfruitful. The word is choked out by foolish distractions, and their lives become spiritually unfruitful. In those who live this way, there is no evidence of a true saving faith.

It’s ironic that one of the greatest reasons given for people skipping worship and church involvement is family activities. As a Pastor I’ve seen some families stop attending worship, or avoid involvement in other activities of the congregation. I’ve seen some of those families break up horribly, or pay the sad price of children who have no interest in living for the glory of God. I remember one family where members became involved in illegal activities and were arrested shortly after a pastoral visit in their homes where they said they needed Sundays for family time, so they decided they were not going to continue to come to Sunday worship. We do our family no good, if we teach them that our own enjoyment is more important than obeying the ways our Loving Lord teaches us to live as his children. If our faith is not a firm confidence that God’s ways are the best ways for us, then we do not have the kind of faith that evidences the work of grace.

Finally, Jesus explained the seed that fell on good ground.

Matthew 13:23, “But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”

What made this soil good and productive? The soil was prepared for the seed. The good news of God’s Kingdom only takes root in hearts God has prepared to receive it. Only those transformed by his grace and given the quality of a true faith in God’s word, are made able to understand it, and to bear fruit in their lives to the glory of their Creator.

As we tell people the good news about being made right with the King of kings by grace, we have to remember that we cannot change the soil the seeds fall upon. We cannot prepare the hearts of those who need the gospel. That is God’s work. Our duty is to receive the word of God ourselves, and to sow the seed prayerfully where we can.

We are to live by what God says in his written word, and by putting those principles to practice in our lives above everything else. Not to do so is not just a poor choice — it’s tragic!

Knowing that success is all a matter of God’s grace, that we are not the ones who make it effective, does not mean we give up our efforts to proclaim the good news diligently. Just the opposite. Grace at work produces fruit in us. It makes us trust what God has promised, and it stirs in us a concern for the proclaiming of the Gospel of the Kingdom in Christ. Our concern should be a reason to rejoice over the evidence in us that we are prepared soil.

If we are prayerfully trying to live as God says we should, then we see evidence that a true saving faith is at work in us, growing in us, and that we can know that we are the objects of his grace.

In Philippians 1:6 Paul wrote, “being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;”

A true faith is a growing faith. Our confidence matures as we are made to conform more and more into the image of Christ. More and more we humbly realize that left to our own ways we will fail. As we strive to do what is right, it is by resting in what God has done, not by hoping in our own efforts.

Dr. Charles Hodge in his commentary on the Book of Romans calls it a “lamentable mistake” that we should ever assume that God loves us for our goodness. Nothing contradicts the gospel more than for us to make God’s blessing into something we earn. Hodge explains that this unbiblical idea leads us to believe that it is up to us to cling to God, and to maintain his love by our own efforts. We do not make ourselves worthy. The soil which represents our hearts produces fruit because it is prepared by our Redeemer.

When we see a concern in our hearts, when we sincerely desire to put God first, and when we strive to tear out the choking weeds, we have evidence from God’s own word that he loves us deeply, and has caused that concern and trust. It shows that the message of God’s Kingdom has fallen on prepared soil. It should humble us and make us all the more grateful for his undeserved love.

Rather than worrying over what kind of soil your heart is made of, focus upon getting your priorities right and getting busy doing what you say you believe is right. Put the principles of God’s Kingdom in first place, and fit the rest of your life around them. Then you will be demonstrating that you received the seed on good soil, and that God is busy at work in your heart.

When you bring the word of Christ’s Kingdom to others, when you challenge them to live as God commands, when you encourage them to put their eternal trust in the finished work of Christ on the Cross, be patient for this good work of God to do the convincing and convicting.

Good seed grows when it falls upon good ground with all the right conditions. The sower does not have to make it grow. He makes sure he has the right seed, then simply casts in on the good soil. Since this is not just literal seed, and God calls us to be part of his work in prayer, we also beg him to make our hearts and those we evangelize to be good soil.

Faith always has an object. A true saving trust rests in the promises of God, and shows that it is genuine by acting confidently and boldly upon what is claimed to be believed. This is what evidences a true saving faith.

(The Bible quotations in this lesson are from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted.)

Index of Lessons in the Westminster Shorter Catechism