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GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH of DANVILLE February 15, 2009
If one sinner may be lost for whom Christ died, all for whom he died must be lost, because the sinner has nothing to contribute to Christ’s sacrifice by which it might be made satisfactory and effectual.
• I am preaching today for Fairmont Grace Church in Sylacauga, AL, where Bro. Tommy Robins is pastor. Bro. Larry Criss will preach the gospel to you in my absence. Tuesday evening, I plan to preach to you from Exodus 26 on “The Veil of Separation.” • On Wednesday evening, I am scheduled to preach for Todds Road Grace Church in Lexington, where Bro. Todd Nibert is pastor.
None, but Jesus! — Don Fortner (Tune: #291 — Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah — 87.87.47)
1. Sinners sunk in degradation, Guilty, ruined, base and vile, What can give you consolation? How can you be reconciled? None, but Jesus, Man to God can reconcile. 2. Thund’ring loud your condemnation, Hear the broken law of God! Flee to Christ (He’s God’s salvation!) Trust His sin-atoning blood! None, but Jesus, Can do guilty sinners good. 3. Christ obtained a full salvation For the objects of His love. He is Israel’s consolation. Trust Him now; His mercy prove! None, but Jesus, Can your load of guilt remove. 4. Lord, receive our adoration; Let the heav’ns Your praise resound Everlasting, full salvation In the Son of God we’ve found! None, but Jesus, By His ransomed ones is crowned!
Raising Christian Children?
“But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.” (Jonah 2:9)
I read an article this week by this title: “Raising Christian Children”. What an absurd subject and title for an article in a magazine that claims commitment to the gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace!
What could be more contradictory to the revelation of God in Holy Scripture than to tell mere mortals that they are responsible and have the ability to raise Christian children. Can a creature create? The author seems to think he can. He begins his article by telling how a Sunday School teacher managed to get little girls in her class of three year olds to become new creatures in Christ by deciding to move from one side of the room to another!
Absurd as both the illustration and the article were, there are multitudes who, while claiming to believe the gospel of God’s free grace (not openly professed Arminians and will-worshippers) practice the kind of “evangelism” implied in the title and the illustration.
What multitudes today will be talked into a profession of faith in Christ, and will be convinced that they are Christians, because they have given assent to certain truths revealed in the gospel! Like the deluded three year old babies, they will decide to move from the damned side of the class to the saved side!
Multiplied millions are convinced that they are raising Christian children because they had their children sprinkled with water as babies, and promised to raise them as Christians, or because they have their children in religious schools. And the children, (the poor, deluded sons and daughters of those deluded parents), foolishly imagine that they are Christians because they were raised as Christians!
A decision not to go to hell is not salvation. A choice to accept the doctrine of the gospel is not a new creation. A religious education is not a resurrection from the dead. Morality is not life. Reformation is not regeneration. How many ways can it be said? — Salvation is not something you do for God; but something God does for and in you!
I cannot give you eternal life. Your parents cannot bestow it upon you. And you cannot will or work your way into it. It really is a new creation; and the only Creator is God. “Salvation is of the LORD!”
It is our great privilege and responsibility to proclaim the gospel to sinners, to train our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and to seek God’s mercy in Christ for them. Having done that, we can do no more; and must do no more. We will wait for God to do his work in his chosen at his appointed time of love. When he does, the sinner saved by omnipotent mercy will find himself trusting Christ. And if you trust Christ, you do not need me or any other man to tell you that you do, or tell you that you are saved.
While it is altogether right and good to declare to sinners, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31), we rejoice to know and declare that all who believe have been saved. Else they could not and would not believe (John 3:36).
God’s Ice, God’s Cold and God’s Thaw — Psalm 147:15-18
Last week God sent his commandment upon the earth; and his word ran very swiftly. Most of the State of Kentucky was suddenly covered with ice. We spent eight days without electricity. Many were without it longer. For many in our church family, and for thousands in our community and across the state, things were difficult. Eight days without light, or heat, or running water in your home in the dead of winter is not pleasant. Trees are broken down everywhere.
During that time, I frequently read the 147th Psalm. As I did, I found striking parallels between the things I saw in God’s creation and providence and the things we experience in his grace. In fact, I am convinced that everything in God’s creation is designed by infinite wisdom to portray something about the new creation of grace. Let me show you.
“He giveth snow like wool” (v. 16). — What a strange way to speak of snow! Can cold snow be compared to warm wool? Though the snow is cold, freezing cold, it forms a blanket like wool to protect the unseen vegetation beneath the earth. In fact, the freezing snow is necessary to protect the life and health of the vegetation hidden within the earth that it may revive and thrive at God’s appointed time. How often have you asked, “Lord, Why do I find such coldness in my soul? Why do such times of lukewarmness engulf my heart? Why am I so often hardened, frozen, like the ground covered with snow in the winter?” I really do not know how to explain what must be understood in this regard. — This, too, is according to the wise design and decree of our God. It is necessary to preserve the life he has planted within, to keep us clinging to Christ as our only Life and our only Salvation. God our heavenly Father gives the snow like wool! “He scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes” (v. 16). — There is a black frost that brings death. You look out at the late spring frost with sadness, because every plant in the garden and every bud in the tree is black with death. The early frost has killed the tender life springing out of the earth. But the hoarfrost, though it burns, it makes everything sparkling white. So it is with our times of spiritual adversity. The more we are compelled to abandon all hope in self and trust our blessed Savior, the more we acknowledge and confess our sin and hope in his righteousness, the more beautifully we sparkle in his whiteness!
“He casteth forth his ice like morsels” (v. 17). — What ice is this? Is it the light snow that is like a blanket of wool to the earth? Is it the driving sleet that is so painful to feel on your face that you are forced to seek refuge from it? Is it the beating hail that destroys every crop of human planting? Or is this ice the hard freeze of gradual accumulation that breaks weak limbs from the mighty oaks and dead branches from living trees? The ice here refers to every form of ice. Our Father casts it out of the windows of heaven, not as an instrument of destruction, but as morsels of bread for our souls.
“Who can stand before his cold?” (v. 17) — When God withdraws his light, nothing is left but darkness; and when the Lord God withdraws the heat of the Sun of Righteousness, nothing is left but a coldness that cannot be thawed by any activity, a coldness that we cannot resist! But blessed be his name forever, that is not the last word about the matter!
“He sendeth out his word, and melteth them. He causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow” (v. 18). — At the time appointed, as surely as he sent the cold, our faithful God and Savior will send his Word to melt our hearts again before him. He will cause his wind (his Spirit) to blow upon his garden and make it spring forth with life, that the spices may flow out, that he may eat his pleasant fruits!
GRACE BULLETIN
February 15, 2009
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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