Jun 20
6
“Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.” Genesis 6:8
What sad consequences there are to sin! That horrible, heart-hatred of God, which resides in the hearts of each of Adam’s sons and daughters — works havoc in the earth and will bring us all down to Hell in the end — unless God intervenes to save. The only hope there is for fallen, depraved, helpless sinners — is the omnipotent intervention of God’s irresistible grace!
The whole world was lost. The whole world was corrupt. The whole of Adam’s race was degenerate and walked in wickedness, provoking the wrath of God. But God, in great pity, mercy and compassion — showed Himself gracious to one man. “Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.” God spared Noah. God saved Noah. Through Noah, God preserved his family, preserved our race and thus preserved His elect for all generations to come!
Blessed be His name, God does intervene to save! He does not have to save. No mortal will ever seek salvation from Him — until first he is sought by Him. But God has, in indescribable, infinite mercy, chosen to save a people for His own glory — and save them, He will!
“I have loved you, My people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love I have drawn you to Myself!” Jeremiah 31:3
Don Fortner
The religionists of the day
(J. C. Philpot, “Faith’s Standing-Ground” 1862)
“And everyone will hate you because of your
allegiance to Me.” Luke 21:17
Professors of religion have always been the
deadliest enemies of the children of God.
Who were so opposed to the blessed Lord as the
Scribes and Pharisees? It was the religious teachers
and leaders who crucified the Lord of glory!
And so in every age the religionists of the day
have been the hottest and bitterest persecutors
of the Church of Christ.
Nor is the case altered now. The more the children
of God are firm in the truth, the more they enjoy its
power, the more they live under its influence, and
the more tenderly and conscientiously they walk in
godly fear, the more will the professing generation
of the day hate them with a deadly hatred.
Let us not think that we can disarm it by a godly life;
for the more that we walk in the sweet enjoyment of
heavenly truth and let our light shine before men as
having been with Jesus, the more will this draw down
their hatred and contempt.
“And the world hates them because they do not
belong to the world, just as I do not.” John 17:14
The touchstone…
-Spurgeon, THE NECESSITY OF INCREASED FAITH
“He that believes on the Son of God has eternal life abiding in him.”
It becomes each of us more earnestly to inquire
whether we have true faith or not.
O, my brethren, there are a thousand shams in the world-
a thousand imitations of faith; but there is only one true
vital saving faith.
There are scores of “notional” faiths- a faith which consists in
holding a sound creed, a faith which bids men believe a lie,
by wrapping them up with assurances of their safety, when
they are still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity,
a faith which consists in presumptuously trusting to ourselves.
There are scores of false faiths; but there is only one true one.
Oh! as you wish to be saved at last; as you would not be
self-deceived and go marching to damnation with your
eyes shut, take your faith in your hand this morning and
see whether it is genuine sterling coin.
We ought to be more careful concerning our faith than of
anything else. True, we ought to examine our conduct,
we ought to search our works, we ought to test our love, but,
above all, our faith: for if faith is wrong all is wrong;
if faith is right, we may take that as the touchstone
of our sincerity.
Such is the effect of the grace of God in the heart of a pilgrim; while on one hand he sees the propensity of his evil nature to every sin which has been committed by others, and is humbled. He also confesses, that, by no power of his own, is he preserved—but ever gives the glory to the God of all grace, by whose power alone he is kept from falling. John Bunyan
THE GOSPEL OF GOD’S GRACE
by Don Fortner–
“However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I
may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has
given me– the task of testifying to THE GOSPEL OF GOD’S
GRACE.” Acts 20:24
Grace is the solitary source from which the goodwill,
love, and salvation of God flow to his chosen people.
Grace is completely unmerited and unsought.
It is altogether unattracted by us.
Grace cannot be bought, earned, or won by anything in us or done by us.
If it could, it would cease to be grace.
Grace is bestowed upon sinners without attraction,
without condition, without qualification.
When God’s saving grace comes to a sinner, it comes as a
matter of pure charity, unsought, unasked, and undesired.
If you search the Scriptures, you will find that there are five things
which always characterize the grace of God. Whenever men speak contrary
to these five things they deny the grace of God.
1. The grace of God is eternal (Rom. 8:28-30; 2 Tim. 1:9).
2. The grace of God is free (Rom. 3:24).
3. The grace of God is sovereign (Rom. 9:16).
4. The grace of God is distinguishing (1 Cor. 4:7).
5. The grace of God is in Christ, only in Christ (Eph. 1:3-14).
Grace is not something God offers to sinners.
Grace is the operation of God in sinners, by which he
effectually saves the objects of his everlasting love.
The gospel of God is the message of grace.
To the self-righteous religionist, it is a stumbling block.
To the learned, philosophical worldling, it is foolishness.
Why?
Because there is nothing in the gospel to gratify the pride of man.
The gospel of God declares that man can never be saved,
but by the grace of God. It declares that apart from Christ,
the unspeakable gift of God’s grace, there is no salvation,
and that the state of every human being is desperate, hopeless,
and irretrievable.
The gospel addresses men and women as depraved,
guilty, condemned, perishing sinners.
It puts us all upon one level-
The gospel declares that the purest moralist is in the same
condition as the vilest profligate, that the zealous religionist
is no better than the most profane infidel.
Without Christ, without grace, all are lost!
The gospel addresses every descendant of Adam as a fallen,
polluted, hell-bent, hell-deserving sinner, utterly incapable
of changing his ruined condition.
The grace of God in Christ is our only hope.
All men, by nature, stand before God’s holy law as justly condemned
felons, awaiting the execution of his wrath upon us (John 3:18,36;
Rom.3:19).
Our only hope is grace!
“Grace is a provision for men who are–
so FALLEN that they cannot lift the ax of justice,
so CORRUPT that they cannot change their own nature,
so AVERSE TO GOD that they cannot turn to him,
so BLIND that they cannot see him,
so DEAF that they cannot hear him,
and so DEAD that God must himself open their graves
and lift them into resurrection” (George S. Bishop).
The only hope any sinner has of salvation and eternal
life is the grace of God freely bestowed upon sinners
through Jesus Christ, the sinner’s Substitute.
The only bestower of grace is God the Holy Spirit,
who is called “the Spirit of grace” (Zech. 12:10).
He is the One who applies the gospel to the hearts
of chosen, redeemed sinners by his effectual, saving power.
He QUICKENS God’s elect while they are yet spiritually dead.
He CONQUERS the rebel’s will, MELTS the hard heart,
OPENS the blind eye, and CLEANSES the soul.
He gives ears to hear, eyes to see, and
a heart to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
“And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead.” Ephesians 1:19-20
J.C.Philpot
Man needs to be roused by a mighty and effectual power out of his state of sleep and death. It is not a little pull, a gentle snatch at his coat, a slight tug of his sleeve, which will pull him out of his sins. He must be snatched from them as a person would be snatched out of bed when the house is on fire, or pulled out of a river when sinking for the last time. Let us never think that the work of grace upon the heart is a slight or superficial one. Indeed, there needs a mighty work of grace upon a sinner’s heart to deliver him from his destructions. We always, therefore, find the work of grace to begin by a spiritual sight and sense of our ruined condition before God. But this alone will not suffice to make us true-hearted disciples of Jesus. It is a preparation, a most needful preparation for a sight of the King in his beauty, but it is not the same thing as to see and believe in the Son of God unto eternal life. We must have something far beyond any convictions of sin or any sense of our lost and ruined condition. We must have by faith a view of the blessed Lord more or less manifested to our souls by that Holy Spirit whose office it is to take of the things of Christ and to reveal them to the heart so as to see his suitability, his grace, his glory, his work, his blood, his obedience; and to so see these divine and blessed realities by the eye of faith, as to know and feel for ourselves that they are exactly adapted to our case and state; that they are the very things we require to save us from the wrath to come; and that so far as we have a saving interest in them we are saved from the floods of destruction.
Wherever this believing sight of Christ is given to the soul, it creates and maintains a faith that works by love. Thus wherever there is a view of Jesus by the eye of faith, wherever he manifests and makes himself in any measure precious to the soul, love is the certain fruit of it; for we love him because he first loved us, and, when we begin to love the Lord, love gives us a binding tie which creates union and communion with him. As, then, he unveils his lovely face, and discovers more and more of his beauty and blessedness, it gives him a firm place in the heart’s warmest, tenderest affections, and then he comes and takes up his abode in the soul and rules there as its rightful Lord.
The following things therefore are indispensably necessary to true discipleship; first, a spiritual sense of our lost, ruined condition; then a knowledge of Christ by a gracious discovery of his suitability, beauty, and blessedness; and thirdly, a faith in him that works by love and purifies the heart, overcomes the world, and delivers from death and hell.