Jan 17
16
WHERE IS THE FEAR OF GOD TODAY?
Where is the fear of God today? Is this not what is wrong with us? Is not this the whole story? This present generation is so taken up with the idea of our own importance and so occupied with the dignity of man, that we no longer fear God, if we ever feared Him. We are presumptuous, self-willed, unruly and dying a slow but sure death, and on the verge of complete ruin.
If there is one word that describes this generation of religious people, it is “irreverence.” Sophistication will yet kill this present generation. Men go to church today to patronize God, not to worship God. The majority of church-going people, judging from their attitude, believe that in attending church, they are conferring a great honor upon God. Church attendance is an excuse for a fashion parade and a show of pride. Men go to church to be entertained and amused. They insist that the preacher be a good mixer, entertainer, actor, and pulpit clown. The preacher who dares to declare the gospel of Christ is one thought of as one being hopelessly out of date.
I hear everywhere I go this statement, “He sounds like an old country preacher,” whatever that means. Read through the whole sermon in Acts 2; there is nothing in it but the Word of God, not one thing except the Scripture. How embarrassing this man would be to this generation; he would be considered odd. He didn’t even have on a clerical robe. What did he preach? The sovereignty of God, the Lordship of Christ, and salvation by grace. By modern standards, this was a bad sermon; this man preached Divine election. The cry of this religious generation is that you must not preach election—you will confuse sinners. How are you going to confuse sinners when they are already confused? They are dead to God. The result of the preaching in Acts 2 resulted in God calling some, maybe enough to try preaching this way. Pastor Scott Richardson
The Fear of God
Without the fear of God a sinner cannot worship God. The fear of God is so important in worship, that throughout the Old Testament instead of saying “the worship of God” the scriptures call worship, itself, “the fear of God” and those who worship “those that feared God.” (Ps 5:7) Fearing God is worshipping God. The whole duty of man is to fear God. (Eccl 12:13; Lev 10: 3)
Natural Man Has No Fear of God
The naturally wicked man, by not even saying a word, has his transgression speak for him. It says, “There is no fear of God before his eyes.” (Ps 36: 1) By loving sin, by having no desire to hear Christ exalted, by refusing rebuke from the Lord, screams, “There is no fear of God before my eyes.” There is no reverential affection for God, only enmity against God, in all men as we are born the first time. This enmity is manifest in rebellion against those God has placed in authority: preachers, parents, and civil authority. Depravity is more than a doctrine; we are the depravity. Natural man has no holy, humble, obedient, loving fear of God, but is only hatred against God.
God Gives Fear in the Heart
God alone gives true fear in the heart. He promised to do so in the everlasting covenant of grace. (Jer 32: 39-40) Therefore, in time, God implants his fear in the heart in regeneration by the Spirit of God. It is through the gospel that God gives this wisdom. Our text says, “Come ye children, hearken unto me, I will teach you the fear of the LORD.”
Some may think the preacher is being mean or even legalistic by demanding you learn to show reverence while the gospel is being preached, at least outwardly. But it is so that you can hear this gospel. The reason for every practical word in the New Testament is to keep each of us, individually, from being a distraction from the gospel of Christ. It is because through the word, God makes his elect wise giving us fear in the new heart. “Come ye children, hearken unto me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord.”
Clay Curtis.
The Fulfillment
Matthew 5: 17
When the religious leaders questioned the Lord Jesus concerning the scriptures, what they missed was that everything written by Moses and the prophets was given to glorify the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 1: 1-4; John 5: 39, 46; Luke 24: 27.) Search the scriptures seeking what God the Father and God the Holy Spirit have written concerning the person of Christ Jesus the Son of God. He is the fulfillment of all that is written.
Clay Curtis.
What Does God Require?
Henry Mahan
If a person has concern and doubts about his hope of grace and eternal glory, he might consider the following questions.
1. God requires perfection. Am I perfect? No! Then do I have ONE who is perfect to stand for me, and I in Him?
2. Do I have a righteousness that can stand the test of God’s holy law and presence? No! Then is there ONE who will give to me such holiness?
3. Will God hear my weak and sinful voice before His throne? No! Then is there ONE He will hear who shall be my advocate and intercessor?
4. Do I have an acceptable blood atonement and can I act as a suitable high priest before His presence? No! Then do I have ONE who is a great High Priest in the heavens with one sacrifice for sins forever?
5. The scriptures declare, “He that hath clean hands, a pure heart, who hath not lifted up his soul to vanity, nor sworn deceitfully” shall stand in His holy place. Can this be said of me? No! Then do I have ONE in whom all the fullness of holiness, power, and truth dwells who will love me, take my case as His, and bring me to God?
“Yes, there’s ONE, only ONE,
The blessed, blessed Jesus, He’s the ONE:
When afflictions press the soul,
And waves of trouble roll,
And you need a friend to help you,
HE’S THE ONE!”
Who can Charge us
Here is what every believer knows from the testimony of scripture and from the experience and conviction of his own heart (John 16:8-11). We know, recognize and confess the problem and plague of our own heart, is sin (Rom. 3:9-12; 5:12). But thank God, we also know the solution for sin, Christ and Him crucified (1Cor. 2:2), Christ our propitiation for sin (Rom. 3:25). Christ Jesus crucified (Rom. 4:25), the Substitute (2Cor.5:21), Surety (Heb.7:22), Satisfaction (1John 4:10) and Saviour (Matt. 1:21) is our only answer to every just charge against us, “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.” (Rom. 8:33-34). Tom Harding.
Faith in Christ is NOT TO WORK but to cease from our labor and to rest in Him for all things. Faith in Christ is NOT TO DO ANYTHING, but to believe and own that ALL IS DONE in Him, by Him, and is imputed to us so fully that we are rewarded as literally done by ourselves! – Henry Mahan
Christ Jesus came to Fulfill
Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil–Matt. 5:17.
Clearly, the Lord Jesus Christ is setting before us the reason of His coming into this world as the sinner’s Substitute and as Jehovah’s Messiah. He came to fulfill, which means: to finish, furnish, satisfy, execute, accomplish and complete all things written of Him in the law of Moses and all the prophets. “These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me” (Luke 24:44). The Lord Jesus came to fulfill and furnish all the predictions of the prophets (Acts 10:43). Moreover, He came to fulfill and satisfy all the types of the ceremonial law becoming the great and only sacrifice for sin (Isa. 53:4-6; 1Peter 3:18). In addition, He came to fulfill and accomplish the demands of the moral law, by yielding perfect obedience to it (Rom 5:19). The Lord Jesus Christ, God manifest in the flesh, living perfectly as our representative and dying effectually as our Substitute for sin is our very justifying righteousness before God’s just throne (2Cor. 5:21; Rom. 10:1-4; Gal. 3:10-13). In all things Christ Jesus magnified, satisfied and honored the law of God for us in all its precepts and penalties (Isa. 42:21).
Furthermore, we read that He came to call sinners to repentance, “I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Matt.9:13). He came to save the lost, “For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost” (Matt.18:11). He came to give His life a ransom, “Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. (Matt. 20:28).
He came to give eternal life to His sheep, “The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly (John 10:10).
I can only think of one thing the scripture says the Lord Jesus came to destroy, “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb. 2:14; Gen. 3:15).
“He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. (1John 3:8).
Now, this is every believer’s hope, thank God the Lord Jesus Christ came and fulfilled all things for us (Psa. 57:2; Col. 2:9-10; Rom.10:1-4). Tom Harding.
Judged by Christ
The Lord Jesus Christ did not replace the law of God (the demands of God for righteousness), He fulfilled (satisfied the demands of Divine Justice) the law for everyone whom God the Father predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, therefore providing for them and to them a righteousness fit for eternal glory. Hence, the righteousness of Christ is imputed, and in ultimate regeneration imparted, to all who believe.
God judges men’s hearts as to faith in Christ and His righteousness. No matter who we are (Jew or Gentile), or what we have done or have not done (morally good or evil), if we have not God given faith in Christ and we continue to trust in our own righteousness we shall perish without Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ is the Righteous Standard by which all men are, and shall be judged.
The gospel sets forth not the law of God for justification, but rather the Christ of God for righteousness and justification. All the law can do is condemn because we all come short of the glory of God. Christ our Lord glorified the Father rendering perfect obedience in His flesh. The elect of God is not only judged by Christ’s righteousness, we are judged in Christ because He is THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS! “And be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith” Php 3:9.
The believer’s justification is traceable not only to faith, not only to the cross, yea, even to the eternal council, decree, and purpose of God’s predestinating grace which is revealed in Christ and His accomplished redemptive work. The secrets of the heart is who we really are and why we do what we do.
True heart-faith in Christ, or not, will be revealed. Tommy Robbins.