Grace

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The Doctrines of Grace (Part 1 of 10)

John MacArthur – Grace to You

The Doctrines of Grace sermon series

At some time in your Christian life, you may have struggled with questions like, When a sinner is saved, who chooses whom—does God choose the sinner, or the sinner choose God? Did Christ die for the sins of everyone, or just the people He saves?

The vast majority of those kinds of thorny, persistent, mind-boggling questions are directly related to the sovereignty of God, election, predestination, perseverance, and the question of “free will.” Those, of course, are doctrines associated with Calvinism. All are vital to a sound, biblical understanding of the gospel, but they are not without difficulty.

In The Doctrines of Grace, John MacArthur takes you to God’s Word and walks you through challenging truth that’s often neglected, maligned, or mischaracterized, but critical for every Christian to understand. This series will help you come to grips with what you believe about God, the gospel, and the nature of man.

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Why People Find the Bible Difficult

by A. W. Tozer

Chapter 6 from Man: The Dwelling Place of God (Camp Hill, Penn: Christian Publications, 1966).

That many persons find the Bible hard to understand will not be denied by those acquainted with the facts. Testimony to the difficulties encountered in Bible reading is too full and too widespread to be dismissed lightly.

In human experience there is usually a complex of causes rather than but one cause for everything, and so it is with the difficulty we run into with the Bible. To the question, Why is the Bible hard to understand? no snap answer can be given; the pert answer is sure to be the wrong one. The problem is multiple instead of singular, and for this reason the effort to find a single solution to it will be disappointing.

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Happiness Is . . .

John MacArthur – Grace to You – Drawing Near

“Blessed are the poor in spirit . . . those who mourn . . .the gentle . . . those who hunger and thirst for righteousness . . . the merciful . . . the pure in heart . . . the peacemakers . . . [and] those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness” (Matt. 5:3-10).

A quiz in a popular magazine characterized happy people as those who enjoy other people but aren’t self-sacrificing, who refuse to participate in negative feelings or emotions, and who have a sense of accomplishment based on their own self-sufficiency.

But Jesus described happy people quite differently. In fact, He characterized them as spiritual beggars who realize they have no resources in themselves. He said they are meek rather than proud, mournful over their sin, self- sacrificing, and willing to endure persecution to reconcile men to God.

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Rejoicing in the Lord

By Arthur W Pink

“Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice” (Phil. 4:4). How many there are today who make an entirely wrong use of this Divine exhortation. Let any servant of God faithfully trace out the inward experiences of a Christian, let him describe the painful discoveries of “the plague of his own heart” (1 Kings 8:38), and his daily conflict with his corruptions and the corresponding effect this produces in the dampening of his spirits. Let him point out how well-suited to his case is the humiliating lament of Romans 7:24, and the light-hearted and empty-headed religionists of the day will promptly (we do not say “quote,” but) hurl at his head these words—“rejoice in the Lord always.” Those who thus misuse our text suppose that its happy strains condemn all gloominess in a Christian, and that it goes to show that one who is groaning is living far below his privileges.

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Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith 2 Corinthians 13

John MacArthur – Grace to You – Bible Q & A

Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! (2 Corinthians 13:5)

The Corinthians, prompted by the evil insinuations of the false apostles, had demanded proof of Paul’s apostleship. He reluctantly defended himself, not for his own sake, but for the Lord’s, and so the Corinthians would not be cut off from the truth he preached to them. But in this passage, he turned the tables on his accusers and challenged them to test and examine themselves. The Greek text places the pronouns before the verbs for emphasis and literally reads, “Yourselves test to see if you are in the faith; yourselves examine.” Instead of arrogantly and foolishly challenging the genuineness of Paul’s relationship to the Lord, the Corinthians needed to examine the genuineness of their own salvation. The familiar New Testament terms peirazo (test) and dokimazo (examine) are used here as synonyms. They convey the idea of putting something to the test to determine its genuineness. The test was to see if the Corinthians were in the faith. Pistis (faith) refers here not to the subjective element of belief but to the objective body of Christian truth —the Christian faith.

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Faith and the Gospel (Part 3)

Horatius Bonar (The prince of Scottish hymn writers)

For ease of reading, I have divided this article into 3 parts. Please see further on this blog Parts 1 and 2. – Grant Swart

FAITH AND THE GOSPEL (PART 3)

“Shall we tell men that unless they are holy they must not believe on Jesus Christ; that they must not venture on Christ for salvation until they are qualified and fit to be received and welcomed by Him? This would be a forbearing to preach the gospel at all, or to forbid all men to come to Christ. He is well qualified to come to us, but a sinner out of Christ has no qualifications for Christ but sin and misery…. Shall we tell people that they should not believe on Christ too soon? It is impossible that they should do it too soon. Can a man obey the command of the gospel too soon or do the work of God too soon?… Continue reading →

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Faith and the Gospel (Part 2)

Horatius Bonar (The prince of Scottish hymn writers)

For ease of reading, I have divided this article into 3 parts. Please see further on this blog Parts 1 and 3. – Grant Swart

FAITH AND THE GOSPEL (PART 2)

But whatever view of faith we take, one thing is obvious; that it is from first to last “the gift of God.” Make it as simple as you please, still it is the result of the Holy Spirit’s direct, immediate, all-quickening power. Never attempt to make faith simple, with the view of getting rid of the Spirit to produce it. This is one of the most wretched devices of Satan in the present evil day. By all means correct every mistake in regard to faith, by which hindrances are thrown in the sinners way, or darkness thrown around the soul. Show him that it is the object of faith, even with Christ and His cross, that he has to do, not with his own actions of faith; that it is not the virtue of merit that is in his faith that saved him, but the virtue and merit that are in Christ Jesus alone. Tell him to look outward, not inward for his peace. Beat him off from his self-righteous efforts to get up a particular kind of faith or particular acts of faith in order to obtain something for himself — something short of Christ to rest upon. Simplify, explain and illustrate faith to such an one, but never imagine that you are going to make the Spirit’s help less absolutely necessary.

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Faith and the Gospel (Part 1)

Horatius Bonar (The prince of Scottish hymn writers)

For ease of reading, I have divided this article into 3 parts. Please see further on this blog Parts 2 and 3. – Grant Swart

FAITH AND THE GOSPEL (PART 1)

“For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Eph. 2:8).
“Being justified by faith, we have peace with God” (Rom. 5:1).

Scripture presents faith to us in more aspects than one. It is sometimes called hearing, sometimes knowing, sometimes believing, or receiving, or trusting. Strictly speaking, it is simply the belief of the truth, yet it is referred to throughout Scripture under these different names. These may be said to be its different stages, and it is useful oftentimes to lay hold of it at each of these and contemplate it under each of these views. They are not in reality the same thing, yet they illustrate the same thing, they point to one object. The things we hear, the truth we know, the tidings we believe, the gift we receive, the Being we trust may be different in one sense — yet in another they are the same.

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Forgiveness for the Past and Provision for the Present

 

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Photo by Elmarie

 

A W Tozer

. . . To offer a sinner the gift of salvation based upon the work of Christ, while at the same time allowing him to retain the idea that the gift carries with it no moral implications, is to do him untold injury where it hurts him worst. Many evangelical teachers insist so strongly upon free, unconditional grace as to create the impression that sin is not a serious matter and that God cares very little about it. He is concerned only with our escaping the consequences. The gospel then in practical application means little more than a way to escape the fruits of our past.

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Forgiving as You Are Forgiven

John MacArthur – Grace to you

“Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. . . . For if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions” (Matt. 6:12, 14-15).

It’s possible to confess your sins and still not know the joy of forgiveness. How? Failure to forgive others! Christian educator J. Oswald Sanders observed that Jesus measures us by the yardstick we use on others. He didn’t say, “Forgive us because we forgive others,” but “Forgive us even as we have forgiven others.”

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The Doctrine of Election (Romans 8)

Bible Q & A with John MacArthur – Grace to You


For whom He foreknew, He also predestined …. (Romans 8:29)

Redemption began with God’s foreknowledge. A believer is first of all someone whom He [God] foreknew. Salvation is not initiated by a person’s decision to receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Scripture is clear that repentant faith is essential to salvation and is the first step that we take in response to God, but repentant faith does not initiate salvation. Because Paul is here depicting the plan of salvation from God’s perspective, faith is not even mentioned in these two verses.

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Enemies of Humility: Partisanship

John MacArthur – Grace to You

“. . . That no one of you might become arrogant in behalf of one against the other.”
– 1 Corinthians 4:6

Genuine humility among Christians will leave no room for arrogant partisanship.

The Corinthian church was a notorious illustration of the sin of partisanship among believers. Its partisanship—some members claimed allegiance to Paul, some to Apollos, and some to Cephas (Peter)—was essentially caused by pride. Paul, as author of 1 Corinthians, vigorously opposed such pride of divisions, as Apollos and Peter would have.

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Never give up praying

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled “Pray Without Ceasing,” delivered March 10, 1872.

Never give up praying, not even though Satan should suggest to you that it is in vain for you to cry unto God. Pray in his teeth; “pray without ceasing.” If for awhile the heavens are as brass and your prayer only echoes in thunder above your head, pray on; if month after month your prayer appears to have miscarried, and no reply has been vouchsafed to you, yet still continue to draw nigh unto the Lord. Do not abandon the mercy-seat for any reason whatever. If it be a good thing that you have been asking for, and you are sure it is according to the divine will, if the vision tarry wait for it, pray, weep, entreat, wrestle, agonise till you get that which you are praying for. If your heart be cold in prayer, do not restrain prayer until your heart warms, but pray your soul unto heat by the help of the everblessed Spirit who helpeth our infirmities. If the iron be hot then hammer it, and if it be cold hammer it till you heat it.

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How do South African Christians relate to a government that is hard to live under?


Alan Lester – Grace Unlimited
From the sermon series Vanishing Beggar’s Gold 30 – Modern Truth to Ancient Rome

Mar 24, 2011

Romans 13:1-7; Acts 5:29

“Big Brother” has arrived. Security cameras everywhere – even on the freeways. Townhouse developments that look more like concentration camps have sprung up everywhere. Office complexes and even some clinics and hospitals now require your thumb-print for entry. Police stop and search vehicles arbitrarily, without warrants, and often expect a bribe in order to let you go. The banks decide how, when and where you will use your credit card, with new “security” measures in some establishments that prevent you from buying at the same place within a certain time frame. The media inundates us with bad news – encouraging a constant state of fear and desperation amongst the general populace and furthering racial tension. Governmental control of major media is more pronounced. Politicians are so arrogantly assured of their power that they do not always even try to hide their corrupt activities. — Oh, and we have a Presidential candidate with no education, a penchant for women (LOTS of women), reckons a shower will cure AIDS, keeps asking for a machine gun and thinks he’s Jesus.
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Why Biblical Christianity Is Intolerable in an Age of “Tolerance”

John MacArthur – Grace to You

Psalm 119:160, John 17:17, 2 Timothy 1:14, Acts 4:12

In these postmodern times, tolerance is the supreme virtue of the public square.  Tolerant people can be broad thinkers, open-minded, and charitable to every worldview—every worldview, that is, except biblical Christianity.  The authoritative demands of Jesus Christ are beyond the threshold of postmodern tolerance.

In this postmodern era, one virtue is esteemed above all others:  tolerance. As a matter of fact, tolerance may soon be the only virtue secular society will embrace. Many traditional virtues (including humility, self-control, and chastity) have already fallen out of public favor and in some quarters are openly scorned or even regarded as transgressions.

Instead, with the beatification of tolerance, what was once forbidden is now encouraged. What was once universally deemed immoral is now celebrated. Marital infidelity and divorce have been normalized. Profanity is commonplace. Abortion, homosexuality, and moral perversions of all kinds are championed by large advocacy groups and tacitly encouraged by the popular media. The modern notion of “tolerance” is systematically turning morality on its head.

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