Three Streams

On Sunday I preached at Renfrew Baptist Church. Here are the Sermon notes (because I just know your all desperate to read them! lol).

The The Centrality of the Cross

Philippians 3:18-19

 ¹⁸For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. ¹⁹Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.

Introduction: News Article

“Death wish: Why people ignore severe weather warnings

One reason people often ignore severe weather warnings is “optimism bias,” the belief that bad things happen only to other people. This is according to a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report released Monday, which analyzed the public’s response to the deadly February 2008 tornado outbreak that killed 57 people in the South.

In addition to optimism bias, some survivors thought the threat was minimal because February is not within the usual tornado season. Others said they spent time seeking confirmation and went to a safe location only after they saw a tornado. In all, two-thirds of the people killed in that outbreak were in mobile homes, and 60% did not have access to safe shelter (a basement or a storm cellar).

“Protecting life and property is not as simple as issuing a forecast,” says National Weather Service Director Jack Hayes. “A number of barriers often deter people from making risk-averse decisions, and we want to learn all we can to determine if there is more the National Weather Service can do to change this.”

The use of societal impact studies like this is useful for weather phenomena other than tornadoes, according to NOAA. In September 2008, dozens of people died when Hurricane Ike struck Galveston, Texas, even after the weather forecast office in Houston issued a dire warning to residents to heed evacuation orders. ”

• Its amazing how in the face of danger humans have an inbuilt ‘optimism bias’ which causes them to be careless

Other examples

• Smokers
• Experimenting with drugs
• People sleeping around

It’s amazing how many people have this ‘optimism bias’ towards the warnings of the Bible

• Bible is full of examples of people ignoring the warnings of God to their peril
• Every day we witness people living carelessly as if God does not exist
• Even in the church it seems as if many have an ‘optimism bias’ towards the warnings of the N.T- they neglect the warnings of the N.T thinking it somehow wont effect them
• Or perhaps they, like the people in the article, think the risk is minimum, based upon their current understanding ‘its not the usual Tornado season’ i.e Its not the judgement season, that was for the O.T, we are in the season of grace, these warnings cannot be valid for me today’
• Or perhaps they are waiting for confirmation- ‘I’ll wait to it happens- then I’ll deal with it- not realising its too late.’

“¹⁸For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ.”

Paul warned the churches constantly of the danger of false teaching

• He wanted them to be aware of the danger
• He wanted them to be able to discern it when they encountered it
• He wanted them to be prepared beforehand
• He knew what was at stake 1) life in Christ 2)Eternal Salvation

Many of Paul’s letters had similar warnings

Part 1: Warnings of false gospel’s within the New Testament

Galatians 1:6-9 

 ⁶I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel- ⁷which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! ⁹As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!

Jewish Christians were undermining the gospel of justification by faith alone and telling the church that faith plus works was the way to salvation.

2 Corinthians 11:3-4 

³But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. ⁴For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough.

• False teachers did not reject the gospel outright, they distorted it

2 Corinthians 11:13-15 

¹³For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, masquerading as apostles of Christ. ¹⁴And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. ¹⁵It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve.

Summary

The Early church continually battled with false teachers who made their way into the church and corrupted the message. Paul (and other N.T writers) continually warns them about the dangers of false gospels.

What’s at stake?

1 Corinthians 15:1-2

 ¹Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. ²By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

Part 2: Throughout church history the message of the cross has been opposed

• Constantine-Roman Church-Martin Luther-Reformation-a rediscovery of the cross
• Established Protestant Church-Rise of the Anabaptists- rediscovery of personal faith- persecuted by reformers
• Evangelical Revivals-George Whitfield, John Wesley- A rediscovery of the reality of the cross expressed in the new birth-

Mark Driscoll identifies that most churches (if not all) go through these three stages.  

Church Cycle: Movement-Institution-Museum

Traditions of men and false teaching pose a threat to the message of the gospel and the health of the church.

If the gospel suffers- the church suffers!

The battle with false teaching is expressed clearly in the hymn The Church’s One Foundation

The Church’s one foundation
Is Jesus Christ her Lord,
She is His new creation
By water and the Word.
From heaven He came and sought her
To be His holy bride;
With His own blood He bought her
And for her life He died.

Though with a scornful wonder
Men see her sore oppressed,
By schisms rent asunder,
By heresies distressed:
Yet saints their watch are keeping,
Their cry goes up, “How long?”
And soon the night of weeping
Shall be the morn of song!

Part 3: What about Today?

A few decades ago A.W Tozer observed

“If I see aright, the cross of popular Evangelicalism is not the cross of the New Testament.  It is, rather, a new bright ornament upon the bosom of a self-assured and carnal Christianity.  The old cross slew men; the new cross entertains them.  The old cross condemned; the new cross amuses.  The old cross destroyed confidence in the flesh; the new cross encourages it.”

• Evangelicalism was a movement of the cross
• As a movement it once fearlessly and passionately proclaimed the cross
• In recent years the cross is no longer in sharp focus
• It now seeks to preach a message which improves self esteem rather than a message which saves from sin
• Sin is unpopular
• God’s Holiness is unpopular
• God’s judgement and wrath is unpopular
• The idea that God crushed Jesus on behalf of our sin is unpopular

The evangelical church is in the midst of an identity crisis.

The Gospel Coalition: John Piper, Alistair Begg, etc

“We are a fellowship of evangelical churches deeply committed to renewing our faith in the gospel of Christ and to reforming our ministry practices to conform fully to the Scriptures. We have become deeply concerned about some movements within traditional evangelicalism that seem to be diminishing the church’s life and leading us away from our historic beliefs and practices”

James Montgomery Boice: Whatever Happened to the Gospel of Grace: Rediscovering the doctrines which shook the world, highlights

• 1) Rapid Church Decline
• 2) Research that shows that “a large percentage of ‘allegedly ‘born again people do not differ statistically in their beliefs and practices from their unbelieving neighbours”.

“These are not good days for the evangelical church, and anyone who takes a moment to evaluate the life and outlook of evangelical churches will understand that…Careful observers of the current scene perceive that evangelicalism is seriously off base today because it has abandoned its evangelical truth heritage…The evangelical church is either dead or dying because it has forgotten what it stands for.”

Key Causes

• Humanism: Mankind is the centre of the universe not God- Secular thinking has caused the church to be more man centred than Christ centred.
• Relativism: No Absolute truths- Church has lost confidence in the certainty of the revelation of God.
• Materialism: Finding meaning and purpose in material things-pursuit of material comfort over and above the kingdom of God
• Pragmatism: ‘If it works, its good enough for me’- fails to ask ‘is it true’ outward results seen as proof of success- all about numbers etc (Pastors are confused and at their wits end- desperate to find what will work for them-what will make their church successful. This is a curse!

Summary

Evangelical churches are becoming increasingly worldly in their

• Beliefs
• Thinking
• Goals
• Methods
• Living

Church has failed to apply Romans 12:2 

²Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is-his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Boice concludes “We need a modern reformation-to recover the gospel of grace”

Part 4: The Eclipse of the Cross

• In many ways what we are seeing to day is an eclipse of the cross

As the light of the sun is essential for life in the world so the light of the Son of God is essential for the life and existence of the church.

“It is the cross then, that is the key to Christ” P.T Forsyth

God is revealed through the cross of His Son. An eclipse of the cross- is an eclipse of the son-which ultimately leads to spiritual darkness and death.

“If the cross is not central in our thinking, it is safe to say that our faith, whatever it may be, is not the Christian faith, and our creed whatever it may be, is not the Apostles’ Creed.” John Stott

Part 5: Four Keys to preserving the gospel and reviving the church

•1)      Know the Gospel

Colossians 2:2-4 

²My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, ³in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. ⁴I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine-sounding arguments.

• The cross is both simple and complex
• Simple as “Christ died for our sins” and “Believe on the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved”
• Complex since the revelation of God is so deep, wide, high, and broad that we will never understand it fully. We “See through a glass dimly”.

It’s been described as “A pool in which a child can wade” as well as “an ocean in which an elephant can swim”

Recommend John Piper’s The Passion of Jesus Christ 50 reasons why Jesus came to die.

The Gospel makes known certain facts

•A)    About Us

• Created by God
• Fallen
• Lost
• Under God’s wrath
• Unable to change our condition

•B)    About Jesus

• Creator
• Redeemer
• Judge of the earth

•C)    What Jesus has achieved through the cross

• Satisfied God’s wrath
• Made us sinless before God
• Fulfilled our righteousness

“Because the sinless saviour died, my sinful soul is counted free, For God the just is satisfied, to look on Him and pardon me”

2) The Gospel needs to be experienced

• Conviction of sin
• Regeneration (New Birth)
• Repentance
• Faith

3) The gospel needs to be lived

• Not just a saviour from hell, but a saviour from sin
• Not saved by good works, saved for good works
• Not yet what we should be but were not what we once where

4) The Gospel needs to be proclaimed

• Its easier to proclaim when we 1) Know 2) have experienced 3) are living the glorious gospel
• Woman at the well

Closing

Example of plant: almost dead- needs light and water

• A dry and barren church needs the light of God’s word and the water of the Holy Spirit.
• The fountain of Christ is ever flowing. Come, drink and live.