Our heavenly Father often sends his tender mercies on the black horse of trouble.
• Bro. Milton Howard will be here to preach for us on Tuesday, March 18th.
Your Love, O God, not Ours for You — Don Fortner (Tune: #342 — Must Jesus Bear the Cross Alone — CM)
1. Your love, O God, not ours for You, Inspires our hearts with praise; Your faithfulness, Lord, not our faith, Sustains us in life’s maze.
2. Your work for us, O Christ, our Lord, Your righteousness and blood, Your saints extol in heart and song, And not our works thought good.
3. Your grace to us, O Holy Ghost, And not the fruit it brings, Things known and felt, revealed within, The ransomed sinner sings.
4. To God, the triune God, alone, Eternal Three-in-One, Who saved us by free grace through blood. Give praise to God alone!
Mr. Spurgeon observed, “Little pots soon boil over: and I have known some professing Christians, who are such very little pots, that the smallest fire has made them boil over. When you never meant any thing to hurt their fillings, they have been terribly hurt. The simplest remark has been taken as an insult, and a construction put upon things that never was intended, and they make their brethren offenders for a word, or half a word, ay, and even for not saying a word.”
“Why baptizest thou?” — John 1:25
John the Baptist was the first Baptist preacher in the world, the first immerser of men in the name of Christ. That is what his title, “Baptist,” means — Immerser. Just as Isaiah had prophesied, John appeared in the wilderness, preaching Christ, calling sinners to repentance, because the Messiah, the Christ had come, and the kingdom of heaven was at hand. Multitudes heard him and were moved to repentance by the Spirit of God, and being converted by the grace of God, John immersed them in the Jordan River. All of this caused no small stir among the people and no small disturbance among the religious elite in Jerusalem. So the priests and Levites asked John, “Why baptizest thou?” That is a question every preacher ought to be required to answer. I will give you my answer to it directly from the Word of God.
The question I am answering is not, “How do you baptize?” It is, “Why?” There can be no question about how baptism is performed. Baptism is immersion. Anything else (sprinkling, pouring, etc.) is not baptism. — “Why baptizest thou?” John answered…“I baptize with water: but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not.”
The word “with” in our King James version is a very, very poor translation. The Greek word “en” is a preposition indicating position. John did not say, “I baptize with water.” He said, “I baptize in water.” There is a huge difference. Before I show you the answers given in the New Testament to this question, “Why baptizest thou?” I call your attention to the fact that John immediately focuses our attention, not on the ordinance, but upon the Savior (vv. 26-28), because the ordinance is meaningless apart from the Savior. “Christ is all,” not baptism, not the church, not you, and not me. In all things, he must have the preeminence!
“Why baptizest thou?” Countless heretics answer, “We baptize because baptism is a means of regeneration.” Many who deplore such an heretical statement as that answer, “We baptize because it is a sacrament, by which grace is conferred upon the one baptized.” Others answer, “Baptism seals the one baptized in the covenant of grace.” But such answers are all without the slightest foundation in Holy Scripture.
Does the Word of God give us specific answers to this question, — “Why baptizest thou?” Yes, it does. In fact it gives us four specific answers.
Christ’s Command
(1.) We baptize believers upon their profession of faith in Christ, because our Lord commands it (Matthew 28:19). We do not immerse infants, let alone slosh a little water on their faces and call it baptism, because our Lord specifically forbids it, requiring that before any are baptized they must personally believe (Acts 8:37).
Righteousness Fulfilled
(2.) By baptism we show how all righteousness was fulfilled for us by the obedi-
ence of Christ, our Substitute, unto death (Matthew3:15). Baptism itself does not fulfill righteousness, but it does portray it. Being buried in and rising from the watery grave, we attest that righteousness was fulfilled by our Redeemer’s death, burial and resurrection.
Sins Washed Away
(3.) In believer’s baptism the child of God shows, by vivid symbolism, how his sins were washed away by the sin-atoning death of Christ, that we might receive the Spirit of life (Acts 2:38; 22:16; Galatians 3:13-14). Any fool, who is not deluded with false religion, knows that water cannot wash away sin. The believer, by his baptism, testifies to the world that his sins were washed away by the sin-atoning sacrifice of Christ, his Substitute.
Avowed Commitment
(4.) By baptism, the believer publicly identifies himself with Christ, his people and his gospel, and publicly avows his commitment to his Lord. As we have been raised together with Christ representatively (Ephesians 2:5-6) and raised from spiritual death to spiritual life in Christ by the power of his grace (John 5:25), we rise up out of the waters of baptism declaring to all the world that we will henceforth walk with our Lord in the newness of life (Romans 6:1-7).
The Salt Room
“Every oblation of thy meat offering shalt thou season with salt; neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from thy meat offering: with all thine offerings thou shalt offer salt.” (Leviticus 2:13)
Every minute detail both in substance and service in the ceremonial law ordained by God for the nation of Israel in the Old Testament points to and is a picture of our blessed Redeemer. The significance of salt is obvious in this verse and is no less than required hereafter with every meat sacrifice offered. Salt has at least two outstanding and beneficial uses. One is to give desirable and satisfying flavor to food. Another is to preserve food from perishing. Not only is the meat offered a type of our Substitute, the salt is as well. He is the Salt of the everlasting Covenant of Grace. Without Him there would only be a covenant of works and it would be tasteless and even less satisfying and consequently a ministration of death. As we eat of Him, He is that meat which is salted with all of His graces in His accomplished work as He is our Redeemer and satisfies His Father and the taste of the inward man. — “Can that which is unsavoury be eaten without salt? or is there any taste in the white of an egg?” (Job 6:6). It is “Christ in you” that makes His people the salt of the earth. — “Ye are the salt of the earth” (Matt. 5:13). The Lord Jesus Christ is our preservation as well. The Covenant of Grace is an everlasting covenant because Christ is the salt, or Surety of that covenant. As long as He endures we will endure. — “Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed” (John 6:27). A message without Christ is a message without salt. It has no desirable taste and absolutely no enduring benefits. In the “Salt Room” there was an abundance of salt to saturate the sacrifice. In the gospel there is an abundance of Christ. By God’s grace may we labor for that Meat which satisfies the soul and endureth unto everlasting life. — Pastor Tommy Robbins
GRACE BULLETIN
March 9, 2008
GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH of DANVILLE 2734 Old Stanford Road-Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438 Telephone (859) 236-8235 - E-Mail don@donfortner.com
Donald S. Fortner, Pastor
Schedule of Regular Services
Sunday 10:00 A.M. Bible Classes 10:30 A.M. Morning Worship Service 6:30 P.M. Evening Worship Service
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