Meadows

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Confronting Apostasy: Dealing With Scripture-Twisters

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part seven of a series. Read part six.

How will you respond when people twist Scripture to try to prevent you from doing what God’s Word commands you to do?

In our last article, we began considering a scenario that is becoming increasingly common in the church today. What would you do if you found yourself in this situation? You discover false teaching or even outright apostasy in your church. But others in the church – perhaps even your own pastor and church leadership – tell you to keep quiet about it, and they quote Scripture to back up their demand.

This is not some far-fetched scenario. It is very real. Many people in Evangelical and Reformed churches are facing this challenge today.

Over the past several years I have had the privilege of ministering to many people, literally from around the world, who are dealing with this kind of a situation. Many of them have asked for my advice because they know that I have faced such a situation myself. Two of my books, Christianity and Neo-Liberalism and A Denomination in Denial, described that particular crisis which unfolded in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. I am grateful to say that I was not alone in confronting apostasy in that case, although those of us who did so were a minority. By God’s grace I can say to you that I am thoroughly convinced that we who confronted that particular apostasy did so in a manner that was thoroughly Biblical.

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Dealing With Apostasy: Don’t Be Intimidated

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part six of a series. Read part five.

Some people in the church will try to prevent you from doing your duty when apostasy appears. Don’t let them.

Thus far in this series, we have discussed three of the five keys to a Biblical response to apostasy. Key number one is that you need to be able to define and identify apostasy. You must do that on the basis of Scripture alone. Key number two is that you need to be absolutely clear about the Biblical basis for the proper response to apostasy. The basis of that response is to exercise the proper motivation – genuine Christian love – and to employ the proper standard – Biblical truth alone. Key number three is that you need to understand why any other response to apostasy is a wrong response. Many people refuse to deal with apostasy because they say it is not the loving thing to do. But we saw that what those people call Christian love is really a counterfeit. It is not agape love at all.

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Men Of God: True Or False?

by Rev. John Edward Smith, Jr. on Friday, 16 September 2011 at 14:29

Hebrews 5:12 For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. 13 For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe.  14 But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

The Body of Christ in America is sorely lacking in male leadership. And it shows. It’s also lacking in poor to nonexistent proper biblical theology, period. These two things surely fuel the reality of the other.

I’m concerned with what goes on in this country in the name of Christ, and the spiritual void left by so-called Christian men who don’t know sound theology or biblical love (which acts and speaks in truth for the betterment of the other person, bringing glory to God; not this childish, sappy sweet, politically correct, worldly love which so many Christians adhere to) from a hole in the wall. This isn’t an off-the-cuff opinion; take a look at the state of the American Church, you who have eyes to see, and you can’t but come to the same conclusion. I ask, if a man doesn’t know the Word of God and if he doesn’t exhibit the love of God, does he actually know God?

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Why All Other Reponses to Apostasy Are Wrong

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part five of a series. Read part four.

Christ commended the church at Ephesus for its stand against apostasy, but warned them about the danger of doing the right thing for the wrong reason.

We have come now to the third of the five keys to a Biblically loving response to apostasy: You need to understand why other responses to apostasy in the church are wrong responses. Once again, this has to do with the Biblical definition of Christian love. What many people call Christian love is really a counterfeit. It is not agape love at all.

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Exposing Apostasy: The Right Motivation, The Right Standard

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part four of a series. Read part three.

The only Biblical motivation for confronting apostasy is love for Christ and His church, and the only standard for judging apostasy is the truth of God’s Word.

In this series our theme is an examination of five keys to a Biblically loving response to apostasy. In this article we shall focus on key number two: You need to be absolutely clear about the Biblical motivation for the proper response to apostasy. The proper response, the Biblical response, is based upon genuine Christian love – agape love.

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Understanding What Apostasy Is – And Is Not

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part three of a series. Read part two.

To properly confront it, you must understand what apostasy is, and is not, according to Scripture.

In our first article, I explained the reason for this series: Today, every Bible-believing Christian faces a disturbing reality. Survey after survey shows that there is a high statistical probability that you will, at some point, need to take a stand against apostasy within your own church.

We saw, in Colossians chapter two and 1 John chapter three, that the proper motivation for such an act of courage and faith is agape love. The Bible defines this as a self-sacrificial love that appreciates the preciousness of your fellow believers in the body of Christ, a love that demonstrates itself through active concern for their spiritual safety. Demonstrating such love may require you to make the self-sacrifice of putting your personal reputation on the line by sounding the alarm against apostasy.

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Five Keys to a Biblically Loving Response to Apostasy

By Dr Paul M Elliott

Part two of a series. Read part one.

According to the Word of God, what is the loving response to apostasy? To answer that question, five things must be absolutely clear in your mind as a believer.

A Disturbing Reality

As we noted in our first article in this series, every Christian needs to face a disturbing reality: In today’s postmodern church environment, there is a high statistical probability that at some point you will need to stand up and expose apostasy within your church. The time may well come when you will need to sound an alarm because the word of man is being substituted for the Word of God in the life and ministry of the church. The time may well come when you will need to wave a red flag because there is false teaching, because the one true Gospel is being watered down, or a false gospel has taken its place.

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Our Bible: The Most Critical Issue

By J Sidlow Baxter from the website of Dr Paul M Elliot

As J. Sidlow Baxter wrote, in a time when the most basic structures of civilized society are crumbling, “the crying need just now is for prophets, not just preachers; for ministers, not just managers; for men with a passion to put our dear old Bible back where it ought to be in the Christian faith, in the Protestant pulpit.”

Editor’s note: The late British pastor and evangelist J. Sidlow Baxter wrote the following article over twenty years ago, when he was in his late eighties. Some of the allusions are historically dated, but the message rings loud and clear. It is even more relevant under present world conditions than when it was first written. – Dr. Paul Elliott

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Enjoying God’s Creation — Charles Spurgeon

 

“Where the birds make their nests; The stork has her home in the fir trees. The high hills are for the wild goats; The cliffs are a refuge for the rock badgers.” — Psalm 104:17-18.

Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892)


Psalm 104 is all through a song of nature, the adoration of God in the great outward temple of the universe. Some in these modern times have thought it to be a mark of high spirituality never to observe nature; and I remember sorrowfully reading the expressions of a godly person, who, in sailing down one of the most famous rivers in the world closed his eyes, lest the picturesque beauties of the scene should divert his mind from scriptural topics. This may be regarded by some as profound spirituality; to me it seems to savor of absurdity. There may be persons who think they have grown in grace when they have attained to this; it seems to me that they are growing out of their senses. To despise the creating work of God—what is it but, in a measure, to despise God Himself? “Whoso mocketh the poor despiseth his Maker.”

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Judging Others: The Verse Pagans Love to Quote

Re-posting an old but important post.

Grace to You – John MacArthur

It should be noted that this passage has erroneously been used to suggest that believers should never evaluate or criticize anyone for anything. Our day hates absolutes, especially theological and moral absolutes, and such simplistic interpretation provides a convenient escape from confrontation. Members of modern society, including many professing Christians, tend to resist dogmatism and strong convictions about right and wrong. Many people prefer to speak of all-inclusive love, compromise, ecumenism, and unity. To the modern religious person those are the only “doctrines” worth defending, and they are the doctrines to which every conflicting doctrine must be sacrificed. Continue reading →

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What is it to Preach the Gospel?

Charles Spurgeon

For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel! — 1 Corinthians 9:16

The greatest man of apostolic times was the apostle Paul — no question about that. Paul was the greatest man in everything he did and if you go back to the time when his life was not lived in Christ, through Christ and for Christ, he was even great in what he did then. Someone said Paul was great in everything he did whether it was good or whether it was bad because he did nothing half way. If you consider him as a sinner, he was exceeding sinful — that’s what he said, ‘exceeding sinful.’ If you consider him as a persecutor, he was mad against Christians — he persecuted them even in strange cities. He was not content to persecute those at home — he had to travel even to Damascus with letters giving him permission to destroy the people of Christ. If you consider the apostle as a convert, his conversion was remarkable; he met Christ in a real and personal way on the road to Damascus, blinded by the light, falling into the dust, looking up into that light, crying, ‘Lord what wilt Thou have me to do?’ If you consider this man as a preacher of the gospel, he stands out as the prince of preachers, the greatest of them all, crying, ‘I am ready to preach the gospel to them that are at Rome also; I am determined to know nothing among you, save Jesus Christ and him crucified.’ ‘God forbid,’ he said, ‘that I should glory save in the cross of my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.’ Whatever Paul did, he did with all his heart; he did nothing halfway. if he was rebelling, he was rebelling; if he was bowing, he was bowing; if he was worshipping, he was worshipping; if he was preaching the gospel, he was preaching the gospel. There was no nonsense in anything he did when it came to speaking about God. When he wrote this text, ‘for though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of, for necessity is laid upon me, yea, woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel,’ he writes it with an unshaking hand; he writes it with a firmness, with a dedication and with a determination! ‘I preach the gospel. Yea, woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel.’ No nonsense in anything connected with the praise of God, with the worship of God, with the glory of God, or with the gospel of God. Now we need to learn this.

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The True Pattern of Love

~ J.C. Ryle

The love of the Bible will show itself in the general spirit and demeanor of a believer. It will make them kind, unselfish, good-natured, good-tempered, and considerate of others. It will make them gentle, friendly, and courteous in all the daily relations of private life, thoughtful for others comfort, tender for others feelings, and more anxious to give pleasure than to receive. True love never envies others when they prosper, nor rejoices in the calamities of others when they are in trouble. At all times it will believe, hope, and try to put to good use the actions of others. And even at the worst, it will be full of pity, mercy, and compassion. Would we like to know where the true pattern of love like this can be found? We have only to look at the life of our Lord Jesus Christ, as described in the Gospels, and we will see it perfectly exemplified.


Practical Religion, “Charity”, [Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1998], 171, 172.

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Do not reject His righteousness

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

entitled “The Lord Is Risen Indeed,” delivered April 13, 1873.

Men think that they are to be saved by keeping God’s commandments. They are to do their best, and they conceive that their sincere endeavors will be accepted, and they will thus save themselves. This self-righteous idea is diametrically opposed to the whole spirit of the gospel. The gospel is not for you who can save yourselves, but for those who are lost. If you can save yourselves, go and do it, and do not mock the Savior with your hypocritical prayers. Go and stumble among the tombs of ancient Israel, and perish as they did in the wilderness, for into rest Moses and the law can never lead you.

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Worth the Slammer!

Dr. Joshua Mack

24 July 2011

So lost in his glorious world, Paul sits back or a moment as he writes this letter. Something is heavy upon his mind. But what is on his mind is not the fact that he is in prison. What has inflated his heart is the glorious gospel of the blessed God. He wants his readers to come to appreciate it more and more. So as he grasps for words, it comes back to him that his is actually in prison for this gospel. Just as his incarceration is real, so the gospel is real! Not only is it real, it is also consuming, objective, and given to him by God.

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A Solemn Warning for All Churches

 

A Sermon
(No. 68)
Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 24, 1856, by the
REV. C. H. Spurgeon
At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

“Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white; for they are worthy.”—Revelation 3:4.

MY LEARNED and eminently pious predecessor, Dr. Gill, is of opinion that the different churches spoken of in the Book of Revelation are types of different states through which the church of God shall pass until it comes into the Philadelphia state, the state of love, in which Jesus Christ shall reign in its midst, and afterwards, as he thinks, shall pass into the state of Laodicea, in which condition it shall be when suddenly the Son of Man shall come to judge the world in righteousness and the people in equity. I do not go with him in all his suppositions with regard to these seven churches as following each other in seven periods of time; but I do think he was correct when he declared that the church in Sardis was a most fitting emblem of the church in his days, as also in these. The good old doctor says, “When we shall find any period in which the church was more like the state of Sardis as described here, than it is now?” And he points out the different particulars in which the church of his day (and I am sure it is yet more true of the church at the present day) was exactly like the church in Sardis. I shall use the church in Sardis as a figure of what I conceive to be the sad condition of Christendom at the present moment. My first point will be general defilement—there were but “a few names” in Sardis who had not “defiled their garments;” secondly, special preservation—there were a few who had not defiled their garments; and thirdly, a peculiar reward—”And they shall walk with me in white; for they are worthy.”

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