Sunday, October 05, 2008

( by Preaching he means on sunday by a preacher to a crowd or tuesday
by a normal Christian to a friend... and--i think--the way we talk to
our children about being right with God! )
The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always
leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it.
There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the
New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might
misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to
this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at
all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it
will redound all the more to the glory of grace. If my preaching and
presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that
misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel. Let me show you what I
mean.

If a man preaches justification by works, no one would ever raise this
question. If a man's preaching is, 'If you want to be Christians, and
if you want to go to heaven, you must stop committing sins, you must
take up good works, and if you do so regularly and constantly, and do
not fail to keep on at it, you will make yourselves Christians, you
will reconcile yourselves to God and you will go to heaven'. Obviously
a man who preaches in that strain would never be liable to this
misunderstanding. Nobody would say to such a man, 'Shall we continue
in sin, that grace may abound?', because the man's whole emphasis is
just this, that if you go on sinning you are certain to be damned, and
only if you stop sinning can you save yourselves. So that
misunderstanding could never arise . . . . . .

Nobody has ever brought this charge against the Church of Rome, but it
was brought frequently against Martin Luther; indeed that was
precisely what the Church of Rome said about the preaching of Martin
Luther. They said, 'This man who was a priest has changed the doctrine
in order to justify his own marriage and his own lust', and so on.
'This man', they said, 'is an antinomian; and that is heresy.' That is
the very charge they brought against him. It was also brought George
Whitfield two hundred years ago. It is the charge that formal dead
Christianity – if there is such a thing – has always brought against
this startling, staggering message, that God 'justifies the ungodly' .
. .

That is my comment and it is a very important comment for preachers. I
would say to all preachers: If your preaching of salvation has not
been misunderstood in that way, then you had better examine your
sermons again, and you had better make sure that you are really
preaching the salvation that is offered in the New Testament to the
ungodly, the sinner, to those who are dead in trespasses and sins, to
those who are enemies of God. There is this kind of dangerous element
about the true presentation of the doctrine of salvation.

This is from Lloyd-Jones commentary on Romans 6, pp 8-9, and was
quoted by Chuck Swindoll in his book The Grace Awakening, pp. 39-40.

"When all Thy mercies O my God,

My rising soul surveys,

Transported with the view I'm lost

In wonder, love & praise.

Unnumbered comforts on my soul

They tender care bestowed,

Before my infant heart conceived

From whom these comforts flowed.

When in the slippery paths of youth

With heedless steps I ran,

Thine arm unseen conveyed me safe,

And brought me up to man.

When worn with sickness oft hast Thou

With health renewed my face;

And when in sins and sorrows sunk,

Revived my soul with grace.

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