Which doctrines are not important?

"What sins can I commit, and yet still be saved?" I hope you recoil in horror from such an ungodly sentiment. But many "Christians" today have this very same attitude when they say, "What is the least I must believe correctly, and yet still be saved?" It's like saying, "I don't really care about God at all, but I'd like to not go to hell."

Every child of Satan wants to be saved from hell, but we don't want to be saved from sin, because we love our sin - unless we are regenerated by the Holy Spirit of God.

People are just looking for a cheap ticket to heaven, to avoid hell, but what they don't realise, or don't think about, or simply refuse to believe, is that the Holy One who cannot abide sin is in heaven, and heaven is not an escape from Him. Hell is to be in the presence of God without Christ.

Is truth and righteousness unimportant? Then God is unimportant. One cannot love God, without loving truth and righteousness. God is truth. God is righteous.

People misuse the words, "Oh, I don't believe in religion, I have a personal relationship with God." You have a personal relationship with God do you? Yet you don't care about doctrine, or living a holy life according to His commandments? How absurd. As if doctrine and obedience belonged to "religion" and not also to "relationship", and as if "religion" was necessarily devoid of "relationship"!

But as for the saints, "we love Him, because He first loved us." - I John 4:19.

Real reasons why the KJV is superior to modern translations

This was said to a friend and brother of mine recently who was criticising the NIV:

"All translations are corrupt. KJV is messed up, especially in 1 Jn according to proper cannon. Discernment is the key. Don't go throwing away your NIV's. A good expositor can weed this stuff out."

But not everyone in the church knows Greek and Hebrew, that's why we need a trustworthy translation from the right textual sources.

The KJV is not perfect, but it is based on the right manuscript tradition, using biblical methods of textual criticism understanding God's sovereign providence and the preservation of His Word for His church in all ages (rather than what is popular with scholars, i.e. antiquity = best), and it is translated using a biblical translation approach (literal rather than interpretive thought-for-thought, since then we have only a commentary rather than the Bible), and it is in readable, understandable English. It was translated by trustworthy men who were also excellent scholars. It is the mature fruit of the Reformation's Bible translation work. It has served the English-speaking churches for 400 years across denominational boundaries, tried and tested.

It is still the best English translation.

Modern translations cannot hold a candle to it on all these counts. Instead of bringing more consistency or clarity or certainty they cause endless debate and confusion and uncertainty. The great proliferation of modern translation in our modern age is a terrible evil, more stimulated by the love of money than the love of God's truth and His people.

Recognising a true church requires objective criteria!

A friend recently brought this article to my attention: http://www.insight.org/library/articles/church/how-to-recognize-a-healthy.html?t=Church

What follows is my rather blunt response.

Recognising a true church requires objective criteria!

The translation of Acts 2:43 is very wrong! It's says, "And fear came upon every soul:" That's the reverent loving fear of God which is a mark of every Christian, and the beginning of wisdom. It is seen not in emotional experiences but in obedience to His commandments, as Christ said, if you love me, obey my commandments. In this verse in Acts, Luke is not talking about a sense of awe in their worship services - he's talking about the godly obedience in the hearts of these early Christians.

The first point only begs the question: what is it that glorifies God? To this question, every Tom, Dick, and Harry has a different answer. The only way to judge this is by asking, is this church faithful to SCRIPTURE.

The instruction here is imbalanced because it immediately speaks of the important of good application without insisting upon what must come first - correct sound biblical doctrine. The biblical presentation is different - right knowledge of God always manifests itself in right practice in the lives of believers (otherwise they are hypocrites!). Paul's prayer for the Ephesians begins with this petition for them - heavenly wisdom, knowledge and understanding of God. II Peter sums up the Christian life, "grow in the grace and knowledge of Christ". John 17:3 says, eternal life is this, to know God in Jesus Christ whom He has sent. The Bible is the revelation of Jesus Christ, so that knowledge of the Scriptures is the only source of knowledge of God.

Unbelievers also show seemingly genuine concern for one another, as the saying goes, birds of a feather flock together. They may be very warm and naturally affectionate towards one another, united in their rebellion against God. Again, Scripture must be the judge, objectively. We cannot tell what love is in people's hearts except in the expression of it, which we may not be able to distinguish from the "love" of hypocrites!

Furthermore, we must not confuse the healthiness of believers with the healthiness of the church. Obviously the two are related, but remember that there are always hypocrites in the church, and the saints are filled with all manner of weaknesses too, even though there may be nothing wrong with the church. We must not blame the church for all of our own failings and weaknesses. Often there is some blame there, but not at all always!

Historically this subject was dealt with, especially when the church was coming out of apostate Rome. Then it became necessary to establish more clearly how the Bible teaches us to objectively judge what is a church and what is not, because it is not enough for an institution to take to itself the name "church". The Mormon "church" does this (as does Rome) but judged by the Bible, they are not churches at all! So, how do we judge, and how did Christians historically learn to judge this? Again, look at their confessions, where they tell us how the judge, and bear witness of the wisdom that the Spirit worked in their hearts. Guido de Bres, who was martyred for his faith wrote a confession for the Belgian Reformed churches while in prison, which was recognised as so biblical, indisputable, and helpful, in time of great controversy, that the continental European Reformed churches universally approved of it, and began to use it as their official confession. In it, Guido explains what the Bible displays as the three marks by which a church can be recognised. The healthiness of the church is directly related to the church's faithfulness to these.

First, is the pure preaching of the biblical Gospel. That stands to reason for anyone who knows the Bible even a little. It cannot be a church which doesn't preach the true Gospel. The biblical Gospel is simply the good news about Jesus Christ, what He has done to save us. It is not, therefore, instruction about how we may save ourselves by our own will or work, or how to make the world a better place to go to hell from, or how to be successful in life, or any number of other popular false gospels!

Second, is the sacraments that Jesus Christ instituted for His church. A group which doesn't have these two sacraments of the Lord's Supper and baptism, can clearly not be called a church. It is not a church which replaces the sacraments with corruptions that have no bearing to what Christ instituted, such as the Eucharistic sacrifice of the Mass, or which add to these sacraments many more which Christ never authorised!

Thirdly, is biblical Christian discipline. Christ instituted this too in His church, and gave authority to the church to carry out this discipline with the keys of the kingdom. Naturally, this implies that a church has ruling officebearers (elders who meet the biblical requirements) who can carry out this discipline, according to the biblical mandate and readmit repentant brethren (which also implies official church membership!). This implies also that the elders have the rule over the administration of the sacraments, to refuse those who are impenitent and unbelieving. That which does not have this rule, and corrupts the sacraments by allowing all and any to take part asking no questions cannot be considered a manifestation of the kingdom of God - the church.

Finally, in these, the long-confessed attributes of the church are maintained. Unity, so that we have the same Lord, and believe the same Gospel and so on; catholicity, so that none are excluded or discriminated against on the basis of anything other than impenitence in life or doctrine; holiness maintained by Christian discipline; and apostolicity, doctrinal faithfulness to the teaching of the apostles.

I don't get why this article ignores these long-established doctrines concerning the church.

Acceptable Worship in Christ Alone

The only thing acceptable in God's sight is what proceeds from Him alone. God is holy, and the highest good and only source of all goodness. The human heart is always filled with pride, and all kinds of malice, idolatry, wickedness, and envy. There is such evil in the human heart by nature that we cannot fathom it. Nothing good can possibly come from the heart of those fallen in Adam. And though the life of Jesus Christ is present in every Christian, there is only a small beginning, and the totally depraved, vile, and abominable sinful nature remains.

It is entirely evident to me now, as despite myself God has graciously taught me by His glorious law of light and liberty, more of how deceitfully wicked we really are at heart, that for a man to get the insane notion into his head that he can write a song that is worthy to be brought into the presence of Holy God in the congregation of the saints as pure, true, and spiritual worship to the Holy One, is nothing but rotten, foul, and stinking pride of the worst sort - spiritual pride.

David, and the others inspired writers of the Psalms were inspired by the Holy Spirit of God to pen the 150 Psalms, and God has not added to them, nor ever will, because His Word is sufficient, and perfect. Some say that this is a lack of diversity and is unworthy of the God who created millions of species of insect, but He eternally decreed 66 books of the Bible, and every word of it, and all the history recorded therein, all the commandments, who should write them, all the prophecy, and the lives of all those mentioned in the Bible, and of those who penned the books. And He decreed 150 Psalms to be perfectly inspired by His Spirit, to proclaim the praises of the redemption of His elect church by the promised Messiah, for His glory and honour. And He is worthy, not of the lame and blemished to be brought to Him (Mal. 1:6-14), but only for that which is perfect, as He is perfect, to be offered as praise before Him.

First of all, this tells us that Christian worship can only ever be acceptable, by being sanctified in Jesus Christ. The beloved Son of God covers the filthy rags of our pathetic worship to make it acceptable in the sight of God. He atoned for all the impurity, weakness, and carnality of our worship. But does such grace give us license to be proud before the Holy One, and lift up our hearts as if we were acceptable of ourselves? That is what we say (whether we realise it or not) to God, when we offer up the ridiculous writings of mere men as worship. Even the holy Psalms become filthy rags as we try to offer them as worship, so how much more the products of proud hymn-writers, no matter how much derived (or distorted) from Scripture (which God did not appoint to be sung, but to be preached). Such hymns may indeed be edifying, and helpful in their place, but that place is not in worship. It is not a matter of greater and lesser, but of appointed for worship, and not at all.

Shall we sin that grace may increase? By no means. Rather we must, in holy reverence granted by the Spirit of God, repent of our spiritual pride, and seek to worship with what God Himself has given approval, and to do so in spirit and in truth more and more as He causes us to grow by the powerful preaching of the Gospel. Considering our depravity, it is utter foolishness to expect that our own carnal imaginations and reasoning about what God desires in worship should ever be anything other than completely wrong and even abominable in His sight. Instead, we must humbly seek His wisdom, and ask of God in His Word revealed to us, how we ought to worship, just as we must learn from Him how we must pray. Naturally, all our own ideas about spiritual things are nonsense, and worse than folly; even directly opposed to what is godly and righteous.

Furthermore, since Christian worship can only be acceptable in Jesus Christ, knowing that there is one Mediator between God and man, and that He is the only way to the Father, we should know that anything not appointed as worship in His Word is as vain and idolatrous as seeking God outside of Christ. Again, it is idolatry to worship God according to our own ideas about what is acceptable. The Lord Jesus alone appoints how we must worship, just as He alone directs and governs all things in His church. And the church that refuses to submit to His rule, is not His bride, but a whore with which the world commits fornication. To offer anything other than the Psalms of Holy Scripture as worship is nothing less than disobedience to Christ, and seeking to have fellowship with God apart from the Mediator, Jesus Christ, by whom we were given the Psalms.

The starting principle of the godly is that he humbles himself before God, and forsakes his own thoughts, and inquires carefully of God how it is that He must be worshipped. Those who come to the Scriptures with this Christian attitude of humility, and this question, cannot escape the conclusion that there is nothing else apart from the Psalms of Scripture that God ever appoints for us to sing in worship to Him. And so all other notions and objections, no matter how persuasive must be utterly rejected as deceitful and devious lies and temptations of the devil who always seeks to corrupt the worship of God, and whose greatest ally in the church is the sinful heart of man, with all its proud natural reasoning.

"Because the carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So they that are in the flesh cannot please God." - Rom. 8:7-8. 

The most blind argument that can ever be made against singing the Psalms only, is that it is proud. The idolatry of offering worship that has not been appointed by God is proud. And it is natural that a church which loses the doctrine of the depravity of man, and the holiness of God, and of Christ the Mediator, and in short where Christ is no longer heard in its preaching, and the sacraments are carelessly profaned, and there is no spiritual discipline to remove the leaven of adulterers (for example), that such a lump becomes more and more leavened, so that the worship too is utterly corrupted, in that proud man-made worship is proudly offered, and the sincerity, holiness, purity, richness, and worthiness of the Psalms are no longer heard at all. The voice of the Bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, are no longer heard in such false churches. Where you hear the voice of the Bridegroom however, there you will also hear the voice of His bride, singing joyfully to her Saviour, with the words given to her by God Himself.

Pharisees think that Sabbath-keeping is legalistic

Perhaps there is no other thing which modern Evangelicals associate more with the Pharisees and their legalism, than Sabbath-keeping. But was it not the case that they distorted what true Sabbath-keeping was about? Listen to this compelling argument from Walter Chantry's "Call the Sabbath a Delight!"

"At this time in our Lord's earthly ministry [Matthew 12:1ff and Luke 6:1ff], Jesus was pledged to fulfill all righteousness even under the Mosaic judicial and ceremonial laws. It was He alone who perfectly lived by the system given under Moses. He and His disciples could not sweep away any Old Testament law as irrelevant if Jesus were to fulfill His mission as Messiah. Our Lord is not suggesting to the Pharisees that it is permissible to break the law because the law must be changed.
"To the contrary, Jesus is accusing the Pharisees of a fundamental misunderstanding of the Sabbath law. Their views were entirely mistaken and could not be defended from Old Testament Scriptures. They had blundered seriously in handling Biblical passages on the law. Our Prophet is defending His practice because it is in complete harmony with Old Testament standards. He had not in any way disregarded the Sabbath!
"This observation is of the highest significance in our day. It is important because some breathe the spirit of the Pharisees and would reintroduce their stern demands within the modern church. However, even more shocking than those who wish to reconstruct a Pharisaical attitude toward the Sabbath are those who wish to abolish the Sabbath in our day. These people suggest that the Pharisees were right, not Jesus. They try to persuade us that if one day in seven must be kept holy to the Lord, it is inevitable that we will take up the Pharisees' way of doing so! They imply or declare that the only possible way to keep the fourth commandment is in the way of Pharisaical strictness. Their opinion is that the only alternative to the rigidity of the Pharisees is total abolition of the day. Such a position leads to the conclusion that the Pharisees were correct in accusing our Lord and His disciples of Sabbath-breaking. This approach toward rescinding the fourth commandment is an intolerable sacrilege! Jesus' pattern of behaviour is in full compliance with the Sabbath law."

In this masterful book, Chantry also powerfully brings Scripture to bear against some of the most common, and superficially convincing arguments against keeping one day in seven holy to the Lord:

"Some of the Continental Reformers and Reformation creeds reason something like this. Christians have ceased from seeking God's favour by good works and have instead relied upon the works of Jesus Christ to save them. This rest of the Christian from a works way of salvation is akin to God's ceasing from his works at creation. The Old Testament weekly Sabbath prefigured this resting upon Christ. Now we have the reality and no longer need the shadow. However, Christians, too, need a day of worship; but the Lord's Day is not identical with the fourth commandment Sabbath.
"At best this is a jumble of poorly worked-through ideas. At worst some of the Reformers have misled us at this point. It appears that some Reformed thinkers could not escape the influence of one of their leading doctrines even when it did not apply to the subject which they were handling.
"Some who are newly come to the doctrines of grace find God's sovereignty in every Bible verse and feel compelled to expound that theme in every message. A few Reformers seemed to feel compelled to discuss justification by faith when defining the nature of Sabbath-keeping. To them ceasing from works could only mean to cease to rely on works religion to be saved. However, the parallel does not hold in Biblical passages on the subject.
"God ceased from glorious and righteous works when He entered His rest. He entered rest satisfied and delighted in the work He had done. When the Jews were called to work six days and rest on the seventh in imitation of their Creator, it was not being suggested that they try to earn salvation by their obedience to the law. Such a course was nowhere recommended by Moses! Galatians 3 explicitly denies such a position. All mankind was given six days to do all his own legitimate works. On the seventh he was to cease from these (good) works to worship and serve the Lord. Man is to share God's delight in divine works. He is to enter God's rest, which has nothing to do with a former miserable works religion."

Throughout this short, yet thorough book, the common New Testament passages misused to deny that the fourth commandment is applicable to Christians are explained. Romans 14:5-6, Col. 2:16-17, and Gal. 4:9-10, all speak against Christians keeping the ceremonial and judicial laws which were shadows and have been fulfilled with the coming of the reality which is Christ. He proves that the fourth commandment was not included in these ceremonial or judicial laws, and that these passages have in question the feast days and special sabbaths pertaining to them. Rather, the fourth commandment is a moral one, and was laid down, not by Moses, but by a creation ordinance as was marriage.

He also proves conclusively from various passages (and especially with a watertight exposition of Hebrews 3:1-4:11) that not only is the fourth commandment still applicable to Christians today (as with all the other moral commandments), but also that the day has been changed by the Lord of the Sabbath, Christ, to the first day of the week (which was the day Christ entered His rest), instead of the seventh (on which God entered His in the beginning). The book demonstrates the grievous error of antinomianism proving that the moral law of God was not abolished. It also traces much of the attitude against Sabbath-keeping to the Scripture-dividing heresy of dispensationalism which says that most of the Bible is not really applicable to the church in the New Testament. In connection with this, he proves that keeping the law was never a means of salvation; rather, salvation by grace through faith has always been the way (his simple clear arguments on this point are stunning). Positively, Chantry patiently explains the purpose of the law, both the moral law, and the ceremonial and judicial laws.

Besides this essential framework, he gives wonderful pastoral instructions regarding the motive of all law-keeping - not in order to merit or earn anything, but out of the overflow of sincere gratitude in love for God. He exposes in detail the error of the Pharisees and gives wise and pastoral warnings against it, using the clear examples given by Jesus Christ. These parts of the book make it especially a worthwhile read, and also very beneficial even for those who may already be convinced that "there remaineth therefore a Sabbath for the people of God." - Heb. 4:9. If you are not convinced of this doctrine yet, then read the book, and I doubt you will have an argument remaining - indeed if your authority is Scripture alone, you will most likely "Call the Sabbath a Delight". :)

The book is available on Amazon here. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Call-Sabbath-Delight-Walter-Chantry/dp/0851515886/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297080652&sr=8-1

Which doctrines are not important?

"What sins can I commit, and yet still be saved?" I hope you recoil in horror from such an ungodly sentiment. But many "Christians" today have this very same attitude when they say, "What is the least I must believe correctly, and yet still be saved?" It's like saying, "I don't really care about God at all, but I'd like to not go to hell."

Every child of Satan wants to be saved from hell, but we don't want to be saved from sin, because we love our sin - unless we are regenerated by the Holy Spirit of God.

People are just looking for a cheap ticket to heaven, to avoid hell, but what they don't realise, or don't think about, or simply refuse to believe, is that the Holy One who cannot abide sin is in heaven, and heaven is not an escape from Him. Hell is to be in the presence of God and not hidden in Christ.

Is truth and righteousness unimportant? Then God is unimportant. One cannot love God, without loving truth and righteousness. God is truth. God is righteous.

People misuse the words, "Oh, I don't believe in religion, I have a personal relationship with God." You have a personal relationship with God do you? Yet you don't care about doctrine, or living a holy life according to His commandments? How absurd. As if doctrine and obedience belonged to "religion" and not also to "relationship", and as if "religion" was necessarily devoid of "relationship"!

But as for the saints, "we love Him, because He first loved us." - I John 4:19.

I don't want your empty music anymore

"Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream." - Amos 5:23-24.

These verses make me think back to the time I spent in a kind of broad, wishy-washy, shallow, and worldly Evangelicalism.

Music to stir the emotions was always a big deal, but I think that was just trying to compensate for the lack of real depth and genuine spirituality. It was as if there was an unspoken philosophy that maybe if people's senses are distracted enough with excitement they won't notice the superficiality of it all.

I say this because there was a disinterest in the truth of God, even sometimes an active attempt to keep it vague and unclear. There was an apathy differentiating between right and wrong, and godliness was seen as an optional extra; maybe even inadvisable since it might make the worldlings feel uncomfortable in their worldliness.

Well, whatever they might think, God is not pleased with such hollow worship. He is righteous, and loves righteousness, and demands that we judge between true and false, right and wrong, good and evil. We must set ourselves apart from everything that is against His good and beautiful standard of His own infinite moral perfections, and devote ourselves entirely to Him in loving gratitude for what He has done for us - and especially for Christ's sacrifice for our sins.

If only Scripture was more treasured in the heart:

"Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy? But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up." - James 4:3-10.