Exegesis

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4 Marks of a Hell-Bound Man

John MacArthur – Grace to You

John 8:21-30

As I have been traveling across America this past week and ministering in a number of cities and encountering a number of people, I have been reminded again of the tragic reality that there is a world dying in sin. And as I was thinking about our brief meditation time this morning in preparation for the Lord’s table, my heart was drawn to John chapter 8. Would you open your Bible for a moment and look with me at one of the most tragic portions of Scripture reflecting the ministry of our Lord?

In John 8 Jesus says these tragic words in verse 21, “I go away and you shall seek Me and shall die in your sin. Where I’m going, you cannot come.” Then again in verse 24, “I said therefore to you that you shall die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am He, you shall die in your sins.” Three times Jesus makes that tragic condemnation…You shall die in your sin…you shall die in your sins…once in the singular, twice in the plural.

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By Faith Not Feeling

C H Spurgeon – Devotional
The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:17)

I shall not die, I can, I do, believe in the Lord my God, and this faith will keep me alive. I would be numbered among those who in their lives are just; but even if I were perfect I would not try to live by my righteousness; I would cling to the work of the Lord Jesus and still live by faith in Him and by nothing else. If I were able to give my body to be burned for my Lord Jesus, yet I would not trust in my own courage and constancy, but still would live by faith.

Were I a martyr at the stake

I’d plead my Saviour’s name;

Intreat a pardon for His sake,

And urge no other claim.

To live by faith is a far surer and happier thing than to live by feelings or by works, The branch, by living in the vine, lives a better life than it would live by itself, even if it were possible for it to live at all apart from the stem. To live by clinging to Jesus, by deriving all from Him, is a sweet and sacred thing. If even the most just must live in this fashion, how much more must I who am a poor sinner! Lord, I believe. I must trust Thee wholly. What else can I do? Trusting Thee is my life….

Source : http://www.spurgeongems.org/fcb4.htm

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Shoe-Leather Faith

John MacArthur – Grace to You

1 Thessalonians 4:9-12

It’s always a highlight of worship to turn to the Word of our God because His Word is His response to us, the Spirit applies it to our hearts. His Word is also the revelation of Himself so that we know His way and His will and His purpose and thus can worship Him more perfectly.

As you know, for many, many months we’ve been studying 1 Thessalonians and we have been interrupted a bit in the summer, but we go back to it this morning. Open your Bible to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 verses 9 through 12…1 Thessalonians chapter 4 verses 9 through 12.

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Sin has been put away!

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled “,” delivered.”

There is only one sacrifice for sin, there never was another and there never can be. All those offerings under the Aaronic priesthood which were presented because of sin were only representations of the One Sacrifice; they were that and nothing more. Jesus far excels them all. Beloved, if you want to see the lamb that Abel offered on the altar, the lamb because of which God accepted his faith, and had respect unto him, you must see Jesus Christ, for we are accepted in the Beloved. God hath respect unto any man who brings this sacrifice; but unto any who bring a bloodless sacrifice, such as the Cainites of Rome foolishly do when they offer the unbloody sacrifice of the mass, unto them God hath no respect, and never can have.
The blood of Jesus once presented has for ever put away sin, and no further sin offering can be brought.

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Bell’s Inferno

Grace to You Blog (a follow up) Friday, April 21, 2011

If anyone advocates a different doctrine and does not agree with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness, he is conceited and understands nothing; but he has a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words, out of which arise envy, strife, abusive language, evil suspicions, and constant friction between men of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that religion is a means of gain (1 Timothy 6:3-5).

No one in all the Scriptures had more to say about hell than Jesus. No stern messenger of doom from the era of the Judges, no fiery Old Testament prophet, no writer of imprecatory psalms, and no impassioned apostle (including the Boanerges brothers)—not even all of them combined—mentioned hell more frequently or described it in more terrifying terms than Jesus.

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The Significance of the Ascension

John MacArthur – Grace to You

Luke 24:50-53

December 21, 2008

Well, this is a special Lord’s day in the sense of our text of Luke because we have finally come to the final paragraph in Luke’s gospel, and we close out this great history with many wonderful memories of what we have learned in these ten years in Luke, many wonderful benefits spiritually to these great truths, this great account of Christ. Let’s look together at the final paragraph, verses 50 to 53.

Before I read them to you, just simply to make a comment. This is the brief account of the ascension of Christ into heaven, having completed His earthly journey and His earthly work. It is a significant event, maybe, in some ways, far more significant than most people give it credit for. In our culture we have a tradition of honoring the birth of people. We celebrate birthdays. When there is someone important, we make note of their birthday. Sometimes we even make national holidays out of the birthday of famous people, Presidents, and so forth. We do that not because their birth was significant, because none of their births were really significant. And when they were born, they had accomplished absolutely nothing. So at the risk of seeming a little bit odd, may I suggest another approach? That we begin to celebrate the death day of significant people which marks the culmination of their achievement.

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WHY DO WE MEET AS WE DO?

By J.R. Gill, 1926

“Father, Thy sovereign love has sought
Captives to sin, gone far from Thee;
The work that Thine own Son hath wrought
Has brought us back in peace and free.”

Hymn 331 (Little Flock)

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I have the thought before me, beloved Christian friends, of taking up a certain line of things that already has engaged the attention of some of us in one or two gatherings recently and would ask the indulgence of any here, in the matter, if what is before us has been rehearsed before. There are other persons present to whom these things are newer, and I trust I have the Lord’s mind in taking them up again. The subject before me is this: why do we, who are gathering unto the Lord’s name, meet as we do? Why do we?

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God’s Testimony to the Scriptures (Psalm 19) John MacArthur

Sermon preached at Geneva Cathedral (St Pierre) Geneva, Switzerland.

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The Fate of the Filthy (Revelation 22)

John MacArthur – Grace to You – Bible Q & A

Let the one who does wrong, still do wrong; and the one who is filthy, still be filthy; and let the one who is righteous, still practice righteousness; and the one who is holy, still keep himself holy. (Revelation 22:11)

The angel’s statement seems strangely out of place in this context: “Let the one who does wrong, still do wrong; and the one who is filthy, still be filthy; and let the one who is righteous, still practice righteousness; and the one who is holy, still keep himself holy.” Some may think its connection with the command that preceded it is not immediately apparent. But the truth it dramatically conveys is that people’s response to the proclamation of the truth will fix their eternal destinies. Those who hear the truth but continue to do wrong and be filthy will by that hardened response fix their eternal destiny in hell. On the other hand, the one who continues to practice righteousness and keep himself holy gives evidence of genuine saving faith. The adverb eti (still) may have the sense of “yet more.” In that case, the meaning is that those who do wrong and are filthy in this life will be even more so in eternal hell, where there will be absolutely no good influences to mitigate their evil. In contrast, those who are righteous and holy in this life will be perfectly holy in their glorified bodies in heaven.

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And who can praise Him?

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled “Golden Vials Full of Odors,” delivered May 19, 1872.

 

The prayers which the Lord accepts are not the chantings of functionaries, the litanies of priests, or the devout tones of a mechanical service; they must be the prayers of saints: in the life, the character, the soul, the sweetness lies — the acceptance comes not unless they be the prayers of saints.
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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 10 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrine of God’s Effectual Call

We have a wonderful subject to talk about tonight and I took up a little more time than I ought to have, in one sense, but wanted to share with you what I did, so we’re going to try to squeeze it in the time we have. I want you to open your Bible to Romans 8…Romans chapter 8 and let’s begin in Romans 8 with some very familiar revelation from God.

Verse 28 which is familiar to all of us is a good starting point. Romans 8:28, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose, for whom He foreknew He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son that He might be the firstborn among many brethren, and whom He predestined these He also called and whom He called these He also justified and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”

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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 9 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrine of Actual Atonement, Part 2

Those of you who have been with us know we are tackling some of the more challenging and profound and difficult doctrines in the Scripture. And I trust we’re having a wonderful time digging deeply into God’s precious truth.

Last Sunday night we began to look at the subject, “For whom did Christ die?” Or, “The Nature of the Atonement.” Or as I chose to call it, “The Doctrine of Actual Atonement.” And I want to go back to that. If you weren’t here last week, it really would be helpful for you to get the tape or the CD, whatever is best for you, and to listen to what I said and pair it up with what we’re going to say tonight because you’re going to get just a very abbreviated review of that important foundation.

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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 8 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrine of Actual Atonement, Part 1

Well, how many of you have always wanted to go to seminary?  You’re about to go tonight.  I’m going to challenge your thinking a little bit as we talk about this issue of the question, “For whom did Christ die?”  We have been looking over the last number of weeks at some very important doctrines, the doctrine of perseverance, or the preservation of the saints; the doctrine of sovereign election in salvation.  We have looked at the doctrine of total or absolute inability, that is the depravity of the sinner which renders it impossible for him to respond to the gospel.  And tonight I want to talk to you about what I’ve chosen to call, trying to give it a more accurate name, the doctrine of actual atonement…the doctrine of actual atonement.

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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 7 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrine of Absolute Inability

We have embarked upon a wonderful study of some very important doctrines on these Sunday nights. And from my viewpoint, it’s kind of open ended, I’m just kind of following the flow and seeing where it goes. But I’m having a wonderful time. As you well know through all these years, we predominantly, if not almost always, work through texts of Scripture and that way we are obligated to affirm what the Word of God says because it’s what it says. And there is always the, I suppose, potential accusation that when you leave the flow of expositional preaching and you embark upon a topical study or a doctrinal study, you ….you may be caught up in something philosophical, you may be caught up in something rational, something logical and you may be drawing conclusions that wouldn’t stand the test of Scripture. And so I want to affirm to you that everything I say I trust will be before your very eyes drawn out of Scripture, and I would encourage you, like the noble Bereans, to do a little work yourself and search the Scripture and see if these things are so. I certainly don’t want to bring to you a rational theology, although it’s not irrational. I don’t want to bring to you a philosophical approach to theology. I don’t want to follow the path of human reason to conclude the things we conclude. I want to bring you what the Word of God has to say and the Word of God does speak to these very, very important doctrinal issues.

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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 6 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrine of Election, Part 3

We have over the last couple of Sunday-evening messages been talking about the issue of divine election. Who chose whom? And I understand that this is not a small controversy when you talk about the doctrine of election. There are many people who feel, as I noted in our original message, that this is a dangerous doctrine, that this turns God into a monster, that this is an almost blasphemous, that this is a kind of heresy. And yet no matter how much human reason, human preference might rage against this doctrine, it is inescapably taught in Scripture. And we need to bow our knees to this great truth of divine election, and once we do it may become to us the most precious of all doctrines.

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