Category Archives: Religion

The Church Is God’s People, Not Anything Found in Nature

Posted on by
2

I saw this bilge on Facebook and made the simple point that the true church is not nature, a place or a building, but the people of God who are redeemed by Jesus Christ. OK, I wasn’t as clear in my responses to that photo on FB, after all, it was FB, the hallowed ground of random thoughts and random responses.

I get the idea of the shot. The one that posted it prefers to be outdoors, worshipping nature because nature is so beautiful. The problem with this is that is it nothing short of pure idolatry. The moment you worship nature, which is what the statement is indicating, is the moment you enter into breaking the First Commandment: “Thou shalt have no other gods besides Me (YHWH is speaking).” Worshipping God’s creation is breaking of that commandment for we are to worship the Creator only.

One of the respondents tried to make the claim that they felt “closer to God” while in such spots than anywhere else. This should send up red flags for every believer in Christ. The moment we start letting our feelings dictate our beliefs and actions is the moment we move from Sola Scriptura to Solo Scriptura… in other words, idolatry and heresy. Our faith is to be built upon God’s word, not our feelings.

I love spending time out in God’s creation as well. But never is that “my church,” or any church at all. God’s creation is God’s creation. We can applaud Him, as Psalm 19 says we should do, but never should we worship the beauty of God’s creation. That is idolatry.

The second problem with this statement, as if the first one wasn’t enough, is that it is based upon the idea that we can worship God apart from His word. True worship of the Triune God is always, and let me stress, alway based upon God’s word being proclaimed. It is not based upon our feelings, something we see, or something we think. It must always come in conjunction with God’s word, the declaration of truth, and our response to that Truth in our adoration of Jesus Christ and Him alone.

I know that many Christians will claim to worship God because of His creation. But again, true worship must always be with His word, not creation. The pastor doesn’t proclaim creation. He proclaims God’s truth. It is through God’s truth proclaimed that the sinner comes to know Christ and is saved by Him. It is through this proclamation that the believer is fed spiritually. It is through the word that we are rebuked, encouraged, and built up so that we may do the work of the ministry. It is only when the word has been proclaimed that true worship has occurred.

Creation, as awe inspiring as it may be, cannot bring this about. This happens only in the true church, where those who have been redeemed by Christ, gather to hear His word proclaimed. In fact, the only place true worship ever takes place is among the people of God, for only those redeemed by the blood of Christ, have any right to enter into the presence of God. All others, have His wrath resting on them and are not admitted into His presence because they enter through the broad road to destruction and apart from the only Mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ.

Yes, they may “feel” close to god in their own estimation. But they are far and distant from the living and true God of Creation. His children know better than to look to His creation and … worship. For we are to worship the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, not their creation.

Moral Conformity?

Posted on by
3

Every time I listen to the White Horse Inn radio broadcast I’m reminded that what we want in the church for our congregation is not moral conformity, but regeneration. I know this may come as a shock to many, since they believe the church to be a place with lots of rules to live by.

Many of you know the rules: Do not smoke, cuss or chew, or go with girls who do. There are many more unspoken rules that are placed upon those of us of faith that are found nowhere in Scripture. For instance, I once has a step-grandfather show moral outrage toward me because me and my father toasted Sam Houston at the dinner table during Thanksgiving one year. I guess there is a little book of rules for pastors that says that pastors shall never show any sense of joy, humor, or camaraderie while dinning with smug moralists. I guess I failed his test for righteousness.

Yet, we all fail all tests for righteousness no matter what rules may be placed before us. This is why the church should not be a place of rules, especially the unspoken ones like: a woman should never wear white shoes after Labor Day! This is really important in high-fashion churches. Another rule I became aware of in the South was that pastors are never, ever, ever, to grow facial hair. Apparently, Jesus wouldn’t be acceptable in such established and righteous churches.

The point is that while we may conform to a lot of spoken and unspoken rules, that is not what we want for our members. We want regeneration for our members. We want our members to be participants of the first resurrection, to be born again, to be made new again by the Holy Spirit. None of those things can happen in a church full of man-made rules.

This is why it is so important that our pastors preach the gospel. This is what is necessary in our churches because the gospel in it’s fullness shows us our inadequacy in living the perfect life. When I say the “perfect life” I do not mean perfect life in some human standard which many may think we have obtained, such as having the perfect job, with a beautiful wife, and 2.5 children, a BMW, a timeshare in the Rockies and one down in Destin, Florida, along with plenty of stocks and bonds for retirement along with a bunch of gold in the closet, and plenty of guns and ammo in preparation for armageddon. That is not the perfect life I’m referring to.

The perfect life I’m referring to means that we are living in complete conformity to God’s Law and His revealed will. This means that we have not sinned at all, not even once, not even a tiny bit. We have been in perfect conformity to all Ten Commandments and have not erred once.

Given that most of us have broken the Seventh Commandment alone, just in our lust of the opposite sex, shows that we don’t measure up in this regard. All it takes to break all Ten Commandments is to break one alone.

The gospel shows us this reality: we are condemned by the Law and the Lawgiver. Yet, there is ONE who did keep the Law perfectly, and did have the perfect life before the Father. He told us He was in perfect communion with the Father and perfect in His obedience to the Father. John 5:30 I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.

There is quite a bit of truth in that statement. Jesus is in a dispute with the Jews who have accused Him of breaking the Sabbath by healing a man on that day, and by making Himself equal with the Father, which was blasphemous. Jesus doesn’t deny that He healed on the Sabbath. He also doesn’t deny that He is equal with the Father. In fact, He confirms both by saying that He does what the Father directs Him to do with perfect obedience to the Father. For this reason, He is given authority to judge all mankind and give eternal life to those who believe in His word. He has a right to heal on the Sabbath and claim equality with the Father. While the Jews recognized these two realities, they failed to understand them correctly.

To believe these truths about Christ take a converted heart. In other words, we must be born-again in order to believe in Christ for salvation. All the morality in the world cannot bring this about. In fact, morality itself is a hindrance to the gospel because when we obey the moral codes of whatever society in which we live, we are under the illusion that we do not need the gospel, or conversion, or salvation. Morality actually hinders us in seeing our need for Christ. It makes us believe that we are OK in the culture in which we live and therefore, we are OK with God.

We are not OK with God. We all stand condemned as sinners and if we do not believe in Jesus Christ for salvation, we will remain condemned for all of eternity (read John 5:24-30). This is why it is so important that pastors do not preach moralism, but preach Christ crucified. To preach moralism hinders the gospel, and weakens the church. Preaching moralism makes those inside the church think they can do it on their own. But we cannot. We cannot save ourselves. We cannot convert ourselves. We cannot make ourselves morally clean before the Father. We cannot cause ourselves to grow spiritually. We cannot do anything for ourselves.

Only Christ can save us. He is the giver of life. He is the One that we look to be cleaned up and changed. Moralism cannot do this, only Christ alone. This is why the church cannot be a place for moral conformity. It must be a place of humility where we see our true moral bankruptcy, which leads us back to Christ, time and time again. We may be moral in the end, but that is not the goal. The goal is the gospel and the gospel doesn’t need our moral conformity.

Four Things the Gospel is NOT

Posted on by
1

I was listening to a sermon by Voddie Baucham of Grace Family Church down in Houston and he pointed out four areas that people make when it comes to the gospel. They were so good I had to incorporate them into my sermon this past Sunday. Here they are:

  1. People think the gospel is the plan of salvation – People think the gospel is a plan or steps we take to become saved, such as the four-spiritual laws. But that is not the gospel and by saying that it is it leads to two errors. The first is that it truncates the gospel leading to the belief that the gospel gets us saved… and then we need to do the rest. No, the gospel saves us, sanctifies us and glorifies us. The second error is that it leads to the belief that the gospel is something that we do. The gospel isn’t something we do, it is what Jesus has done.
  2. Secondly, people think the gospel is the Greatest Commandment – these people boil the gospel down to love God/ love people. On the surface, this sounds great but what they fail to realize is that the Greatest Commandment is an an encapsulation of the Law. In Matthew 22:34-39, Jesus is saying that the first commandment is a summary of commands 1-4, and the second commandment is a summary of commands 5-10. The Law does not lead to salvation, faith in Christ does. By saying the gospel is the Law, we are binding people’s consciences to do what they are incapable of doing. This is why knowing the Gospel of Christ is so important. It’s not more Law, it grace. Romans 3:28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law. The gospel empowers us to do these things, but we are not saved by doing them: Romans 3:20 Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight.
  3. People think the gospel is the Great Commission – This groups believes the gospel is actually doing the Great Commission and teaching people to do whatsoever I’ve commanded you. Again, sounds good, but this is just another form of the Law. The gospel is not teaching people to do everything that Jesus told us to do. The gospel is not moral teachings or proclamations, but the proclamation of the good news that He was the One who did do these things.
  4. People think the gospel is our personal testimony — Just look at how many evangelism programs teach people to share their testimonies. What they fail to realize is that we are no in the process of becoming the gospel ourselves. In other words, we are replacing His story, with our story. We are not the gospel, Jesus is. This is just a variation of St. Francis of Assisi’s statement: “Preach the gospel at all times, use words when necessary.” It sounds good, but again, we are not the gospel, Jesus is. Read my post on St. Francis state here.

What is the gospel?

The gospel is an announcement of the person and work of Jesus Christ. It is the fact that He died on the cross and was raised again on the third day. It is that He was sinless and took on our sin and satisfied the wrath of God on our behalf. The gospel is not the Law, but the fact that Jesus satisfied the Law, earning righteousness in a way that we cannot earn righteousness. When we believe in Jesus for our salvation, all the benefits of His ministry are given to us. We no longer rest in our failed works of the Law, but rest in His perfect satisfaction of the LAW. God no longer looks at us as sees us as children of wrath, but He sees the righteousness of His Son, and sees us as His children. This is the gospel.

You can hear the full sermon that contained this intro here.

Speaking of Islam: Refuting Chrislam

Posted on by
Reply

David Dollins has a good piece at the Christian Post on Chrislam, an attempt by daft Christians who are trying to find common ground with Islam. There is no common ground with Islam. Christianity is the one true religion because it is the only one in which God saves man. All other religions are man’s attempts to save themselves. To try and find some common ground is pointless because you are affirming the beliefs of those in false religions. The loving response to all religions besides true Christianity is to reject them outright and show those in other religions why they need Christ as their savior.

For example, in my previous post on Islam’s accepted practice of child abuse, we can see that even Mohammed, the founder of Islam, is in need of a savior for his sins. His propensity for child abuse shows him to be a sinner, therefore he needs someone to atone for that sin. The only name by which anyone can be saved is Jesus Christ (Acts 4:12). No matter how sincere Muslims may be in their faith, whether they are being true to their religion by marrying little girls, or flying planes into the side of buildings, they do not earn any level of righteousness with God. Remember God’s word: all fall short of the glory of God, and there is no one righteous, no not one (see Romans 3). The point being that the leaders of all other religions are in need of redemption by the atoning sacrifice of Christ just as much as the rest of us. Even if they do live perfect lives according to their own religion, they fall dreadfully short of God’s glory and will spend eternity in hell.

This is what they need to be told, not that they have some common ground with Christianity. They do not.

Here are four points that Dollins shows is the spirit of anti-christ, which is abundant in our society today, and thoroughly saturating Islam:

‘Chrislam’ – A Spirit of Antichrist

What I am about to show you are the characteristics that the Apostle John himself used to describe the Spirit of Antichrist:

1) The Spirit of Antichrist denies that Jesus is the Christ. In 1 John 2:22, it says, “Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is Antichrist…” The word ‘Christ’ in the original Greek means ‘Anointed One’. In other words, it is a declaration of Jesus as Messiah. Islam rejects that Jesus is the one and only true Messiah. They believe He was a prophet and maybe a type of Messiah, but not the Anointed One. If that’s not enough, John goes further by calling them liars.

2) The Spirit of Antichrist denies that Jesus is the Son of God. In 1 John 2:22, the Apostle continues, “He is Antichrist, who denies the Father and the Son”. Islam rejects that Jesus affirmed He was the Son of God. Furthermore, one well-known Bible teacher said that Muslims believe that the Mahdi is the future leader and that Jesus will return and follow the Mahdi to Jerusalem where He (Jesus) will deny He is the Son of God. Again, in this same verse, John said those who reject His Sonship were liars.

3) The Spirit of Antichrist does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. In 1 John 4:3, again the Apostle states, “And every spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that Spirit of Antichrist…” Did you catch that? Any spirit that rejects God as coming in the flesh is ‘not of God’. If it didn’t come from God, then it is a doctrine of devils according to the Apostle Paul himself, as stated earlier. Islam rejects that God came into this world in the flesh. This also tells us that the Christian God, who is Jesus Christ, is not the same as the Muslim god, Allah. It also proves that Allah is a false god.

Finally, the following are some of the last words the Apostle Peter would write before, according to tradition, he was crucified upside-down. “But there were false Prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord Who bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction” (2 Peter 2:1). For these Church leaders, who are blind watchmen, to bring Islam and the reading of the Quran into the Church is to deny the Lord himself, it is to deny who He is, and it is to deny what He accomplished at Calvary’s Cross 2,000 years ago, when He gave His life for the sins of the world! Just as bad, it is an open acceptance of the Spirit of Antichrist, which John said will bring swift destruction and ultimately, yet sadly, the damning of the soul.

He points out that what we need to do as Christians is proclaim the truth, not try and find common ground. There is no common ground between light and darkness. Therefore as those called by Christ, let us proclaim His name to the world.

The Religion of Peace OKs Marrying and Raping Children

Posted on by
1

Yes, the religion of peace, otherwise known as Islam, has said that it is OK to marry young girls and have sex with them even before they reach puberty. According to Raymond Ibrahim, a fatwa has been issued by one of the religions top clerics. His defense is the fact that the main prophet, Mohammed, married a girl when she was 7 and had sex with her when she was 9. This shows us that the origins of the religion were based in wretched sin, and it continues today. Ibrahim writes:

Muslim “child-marriage”—euphemism for pedophilia—is making headlines again, at least in Arabic media: Dr. Salih bin Fawzan, a prominent cleric and member of Saudi Arabia’s highest religious council, just issued a fatwa asserting that there is no minimum age for marriage, and that girls can be married “even if they are in the cradle.”

Appearing in Saudi papers on July 13, the fatwa complains that “Uninformed interference with Sharia rulings by the press and journalists is on the increase, posing dire consequences to society, including their interference with the question of marriage to small girls who have not reached maturity, and their demand that a minimum age be set for girls to marry.”

Fawzan insists that nowhere does Sharia set an age limit for marrying girls: like countless Muslim scholars before him, he relies on Koran 65:4, which discusses marriage to females who have not yet begun menstruating (i.e., are prepubescent)  and the fact that Muhammad, Islam’s role model, married Aisha when she was 6-years-old, “consummating” the marriage—or, in modern parlance, raping her—when she was 9.

The point of the Saudi fatwa, however, is not that girls as young as 9 can have sex, based on Muhammad’s example, but rather that there is no age limit whatsoever; the only question open to consideration is whether the girl is physically capable of handling her husband/rapist.

I’m trying to figure out how anyone could defend this religion as moral on any account. They not only want to kill those who disagree, but they rape their own daughters. Wretched.

One of the marks of a false religion is how they view sex. If it is anything other than a man and woman who are lawfully married then it is outside of God’s lawfully ordained prescription for sex. This includes cults who have more than one bride or teach that sex in all situations is a sin and should be avoided (i.e., see the Shakers… which are almost extinct now because of this practice). God has blessed us with the gift of sex, but it is only a blessing when it is confined to marriage, which God also defines as between a man and a woman. Not a man/man, woman/woman, man/little girl, man and a dog, etc. Anything else comes from the base and perverted mind and is outside of God’s declared will.

Those who adhere to Islamic principles will say that Allah has said that it is OK to marry little girls. I agree that this may be true. However I do not agree that Allah and the Triune God are one and the same. God would not and cannot contradict Himself, and has made His will known to us through the 66 books of the Bible and in the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ. Islam rejects Christ. They claim He is a prophet, but anything less than full submission to Christ is a rejection of Christ. To reject the Son is to reject the Father, this is why I say they worship a different god all together. The god of Islam and the Mormons are probably closer in origin than they are with the living and true God.

The point is that Muslims are so far out of God’s will that we are seeing the fruit of their wickedness: a declaration that it is OK to marry and rape little girls. Sick.

I hope and pray that those of us in Christian circles will quit trying to understand them, and preach the gospel to these people. They need Christ as much as anyone.

Col. Allen West on Understanding Islam’s Intent of Destroying Us

Posted on by
5

The reason so many of us like Col. Allen West is because he is so willing to speak the truth concerning our enemies, specifically Islam. In this video he gives historical evidence as to why Islam continues to be a religion of violence. It is not because extremists have taken over the religion, it is because the religion itself is about destroying its enemies. The reason they attack us is because this is part of their belief system. Those who claim Islam is a religion of peace are either fooled or are liars. It is not about peace, but of destruction.

Please do not buy into the lie that Islam is a religion of peace. It is not nor has it ever been.

West mentions the Battle of Tours in his rebuttal against Islam. It truly was an important battle because it stopped the Islamic horde from advancing into  Europe. While I give Wikipedia any real authority, they did have this to say about that particular battle:

Later Christian chroniclers and pre-20th century historians praised Charles Martel as the champion of Christianity, characterizing the battle as the decisive turning point in the struggle against Islam, a struggle which preserved Christianity as the religion of Europe; according to modern military historian Victor Davis Hanson, “most of the 18th and 19th century historians, like Gibbon, saw Poitiers (Tours), as a landmark battle that marked the high tide of the Muslim advance into Europe.”[10]Leopold von Ranke felt that “Poitiers was the turning point of one of the most important epochs in the history of the world.”

The point is that Islam was advancing as they always do, through the use of the sword and Christians had to stand up against them in order to stop that advancement. It is also very important for Christians to know of this battle because Muslim are always quick to accuse Christianity as the violent religion due to the ill-advised Crusades. But notice the date of this battle: 732. The first Crusade was in 1092. That is a good 360 years after the Battle of Tours. Muslims are banking on our ignorance in referring to the Crusades, trying to imply that we were the first to draw the sword against them. Never mind their continued attacks from the moment of Islamic inception, the Battle of Tours in 732, which stopped those attacks, and the fact that the first Crusade was called for because of Islamic attack on the Christians in the area modern-day Turkey.

As Christians, it helps us to not only to be students of the word of God, but of history as well. It shows us that God was working in history and continues to work for His glory today.

Allen West on Co-exist Bumper Sticker

As you know from my previous post on this, I can’t stand the bumper sticker “coexist.” It’s mindless liberalism. Allen West cannot stand it either. Listen to his reasoning:

Allen West on Obama’s Lack of Leadership

And one more… to give you a great taste for Allen West. I love his straight forward and truthful responses to the issues that concern us.

501 3c and the Pulpit

Posted on by
6

One of the problems that arise from time to time with churches is the threat of losing 501 3c status when it comes to what they say from the pulpit. The threat goes that if a pastor becomes too political, that the church will lose it non-exempt status and have to start paying taxes. This really is a threat by the Left to silence those of us on the right, when it comes to issues morality and politics. This should never be allowed to happen because what is said in the pulpit is between the pastor and God, not the pastor and the state. The state has no right to interfere with the message being preached, even if that message enters into the realm of politics.

I do admit that the primary responsibility of the pastor is to preach the gospel, or the full counsel of God, as the Apostle Paul put it. But we have to admit that there are times when the pastor must speak on issues of morality and politics. The church has the right and responsibility to criticize the state. By placing itself under the state, to receive this non-exempt status, is to subject itself to the state instead of God.  It places the state as the final authority, not God.

By submitting itself to the state, the church now is the subordinate in culture and the state has control. This should never be the case. Pastors should be able to speak freely from the pulpit in matters of religion, conscious and politics. Christianity comes to bear on every aspect of our lives, including politics and matters of conscious.

For instance, just imagine what our country would be like if the pastors during the founding days of our country, remained silent on the political issues at hand. We would still be sending our taxes overseas to England and bowing to the Queen. Or imagine what the world would be like if pastors remained silent concerning the issues of slavery. We would still have slave owners and worse, slaves in our country (granted, there were pastors who were arguing for maintaining the institution of slavery, but there are always opposing views on every issue).

The point is that pastors have a responsibility to apply the gospel to culture as well as to our individual lives and that means that at times we must criticize the state and actions of the state. Remember, the state is not without error. Slavery was wrong. Had the church remained silent, the institution might still be with us today.

The Left does not want us thinking in such ways. We must resist every aspect of the state’s encroachment upon the pulpit and the pastor in the pulpit. The church is not to submit itself to the state on any level, otherwise, we become subjects and servants of the state, not servants of the living God.

Some might ask: “But what about Romans 13 and the command to submit to the government?”

As individuals, we are to submit to the government and obey the laws of the land as long as these laws are just. In other words, there are times for civil disobedience  when the laws of the land requires that which God forbids, or forbids what God requires. During such times, we must accept that God has ordained periods of persecution for believers as we stand for righteousness sake. But we must not grow silent when we should speak and we must not be cowed into what we should and should not say from the pulpit over this threat to lose some tax-exempt status.

Rev. Franklin Graham Slams Obama for Giving Islam a Pass

Posted on by
5

For those of you who don’t know, the Pentagon has dis-invited Rev. Franklin Graham to speak at the National Day of Prayer. The claim is that Graham was dis-invited for saying that Islam is an evil religion. Graham made this statement 9 years ago shortly after members of that religion attacked our country by flying hijacked airplanes into the Twin Towers in New York City and the Pentagon. When that was brought up in the following interview, it’s nice to see that Graham does not back down. He said Islam “is what it is.”  I agree. Islam is evil.

He also points out that there are those minority members of that religion who get to observe Ramadan at the Pentagon, so why is he being excluded? You might even ask, what about all the Imans of Islam that teach that Christianity is filled with infidels. But alas, any of that are lost on the politically correct, leftist reporter from CNN.

Kudos to Graham for standing up for the truth. Islam is evil and Graham should be allowed to speak at the Pentagon. Just because his views may be controversial to some, should not bar him from access especially since he is the honorary chairman of the National Day of Prayer.

Now, I know in an earlier post I said I really don’t care about the National Day of Prayer. That has not changed. But I do care about the freedom and rights of fellow believers. Since the Pentagon is going to have a celebration, I don’t believe it is right to exclude Graham because of his views of Islam. He has a right to those views and it should not be the Pentagon’s right to exclude him because of those views. While it is not right for government to endorse a particular religion, it is also not right to exclude a particular religion, or one who holds to it.

Just a further thought. Graham is really being honored for his stand for Christ, by Christ. Any time we face persecution because of the name of Christ, we are truly blessed. The world rejected Christ, therefore we should expect to rejected as well. Not that we don’t stand up for our rights, but we count the blessing in the midst of it as well.

A Better Religion — Part 1

Posted on by
Reply

On the way to church two weeks ago, one of the local radio hosts was talking about how Christianity was the best religion there was. Sadly, the best he could do is say that it was best because it was his religion. I wanted to call in the show because I could think of several reasons just off the top of my head, but I had to go to Wednesday night services. I don’t know if he ever got a satisfactory answer, but I thought I would compile a list of reasons for him and others so as to fully understand why Christianity is superior to all other religions.

First, it is the only religion in which God comes to man for man’s salvation. All other religions force man to try and attempt to approach God based upon man’s own merits. Please note that all men know that they need to be saved from something. Even the atheist will attempt some level of righteousness even though he refuses to accept the reality of God and judgment. But religion in and of itself, is an attempt by man to be reconciled to God and to be ready for judgment day even when those religions do not specifically point back to the living and true God. Even the Hindus are trying to achieve something, even if it is the ridiculous quest of becoming a cow.

What sets Christianity above all other religions is that Jesus becomes a man on our behalf. This is why the incarnation of Christ is so vital to Christianity. Jesus becomes flesh and dwells among us (John 1:14), in order to be the righteousness of God for us (Romans 3:10-27). Instead of standing off at a distance, (apologies to Bette Midler), Jesus steps out of glory and joins us in the human condition here on earth. He becomes the righteousness that we need because of our sinful nature.

No other religion comes anywhere near this wonderful truth in providing a Savior for us, in the person of God Himself. He becomes our Mediator between us and God (1 Timothy 2:5).

Why is this necessary?

It is necessary that we have a Mediator because our sinful and fallen nature separate us from God. The sin that Adam brought into the world (Genesis 3), affected all mankind (Romans 5:21). Therefore we are all at enmity with Him by nature (Romans 8:6-8). The sin nature we were born with means that we were automatically born at war with God. We were already in rebellion the moment of conception. We may not have been able to act out on that rebellion or even realized it when we did, but it was there.

The beauty of Christ becoming flesh for us, is that He did what the first Adam could not do by living the perfect life (Romans 5). Jesus lived perfectly on our behalf so that we might be partakers of His righteousness and be reconciled to God (Ephesians 2:14-16). This is what His life and His death on the cross brings His followers, reconciliation to God.

By Jesus dwelling among us, He also removes all arguments men may have against God in saying that God did not fully understand our condition. No matter what man may say, we cannot say that God did not understand the human condition or experience what we experienced. Jesus experience everything we did, with one exception. He did not experience sin. Thank goodness. Now, I know immediately there will be some who say, “But Timothy, then He did not experience everything we did.” Yes He did.

He did not experience sin from the stand point of committing sin Himself. Had that happened, we would not have a Mediator. This means that no one would be saved at all. All of humanity would be destined for eternal damnation and rightfully so for an acceptable sacrifice for us would not be available.

But He did experience the effects of sin on the cross. Hebrews 9:27-28 He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. 27 And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, 28 so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.

The point being that Jesus did bear our sins on the cross, dealing with our sin in a way that no other religion can offer. One might say, “But if we do enough good works, then our good works will cancel out our sin.” Yes, if you could do enough good works this would be true. The problem with this notion is that we do not do good works. Again, let Scripture speak to this truth. When Jesus was approached by the rich-young ruler, he said, “Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?” So He said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God.” (Matthew 19:15-17). For those of you who like to trust only the red letters in our Bible, meaning the words that Jesus speaks, then let His words convict you. There is no one good but One, that is, God. If we just listened to Christ alone on this issue and went no further on the topic, we stand condemned already. How are we, who are not good, to do good works?

The Bible speaks on this issue in other places as well: Isaiah 64:6 But we are all like an unclean thing,And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags; We all fade as a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, Have taken us away. The idea is that our works are like filthy rags, which are the rags used by women during their menstrual cycle. Since this is true, where are our good works?

Paul even weighs in our inability to do good works as well: Romans 3:9-

For we have previously charged both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin.
10 As it is written:
“ There is none righteous, no, not one;
11 There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God.
12 They have all turned aside;
They have together become unprofitable;
There is none who does good, no, not one.”
13 “ Their throat is an open tomb;
With their tongues they have practiced deceit”;

“ The poison of asps is under their lips”;
14 “ Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.”
15 “ Their feet are swift to shed blood;
16 Destruction and misery are in their ways;
17 And the way of peace they have not known.”
18 “ There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

The point is that we cannot do good works on our own behalf. We need a Savior, and Christianity is the only religion that brings the that Savior to us in the person of Christ. He willingly laid aside all the comforts of heaven to humble Himself on our behalf, and to dwell among us.

The Year of Our Lord at Trinity University — UPDATE

Posted on by
4

SEE UPDATE BELOW

Al Mohler does an excellent job of pointing out the absurdity of students who are graduating from Trinity University. These student, who are Muslim, want the term “year of our Lord,” removed from their diplomas. They see the term as offensive because it is a reference to Jesus Christ, in whom they do not believe. But the odd thing is, why don’t they remove the name “Trinity” from their diplomas as well since it also refers to Jesus Christ?

The controversy at Trinity University tells us so much about the loss of Christian conviction in colleges and universities, the insanity of secular revisionism, and the contradictions of Muslim students who are offended by the words “the year of our Lord,” but seem perfectly happy to have the name “Trinity University” printed in bold on their diplomas.

One thing is clear — the university will have to decide quickly what to do in this situation, and they will make their decision in — you guessed it — the year of our Lord, the two thousand and tenth.

My question is: what happens if there are students who desire to have “the year of Our Lord” on their diplomas because they are Christians and find it offensive to remove it? Is Trinity U. going to accommodate those students as well, or just a few outspoken Muslims? Also, as Mohler points out, what about the actual date itself? Even if they remove the term “year of Our Lord,” the date itself still points back to something. What is it that it points back to? Christ’s birth!

And what would the removal of the words “the year of our Lord” accomplish? That system of calendar dating can be traced back to Dionysius Exiguus, an abbot who in the year 525 constructed a new chart of Easter tables, changing the numbering of the years from the year one starting in 284, the year that Emperor Diocletian ascended to the throne, to what Dionysius calculated to be the year of Christ’s birth. Dionysius referred to the years after the birth of Christ as anni Domini nostri Jesu Christi (the years of our Lord Jesus Christ).

Thus, even when modern secularists try to change the language and dating customs from “A.D.” to “C.E.,” for “common era,” the date itself remains fixed with reference to the birth of Jesus Christ. Instead of “B.C.” for “before Christ,” these new agents of “tolerance” prefer “B.C.E.,” for “before common era.” But, once again, this does nothing to remove the fact that the number of the year points directly to the assumed date of the birth of Christ.

In other words, the only way to fully secularize the dating system is to renumber all the years with some other point of historical reference. Perhaps they would prefer we start with the year of Charles Darwin’s birth, then renumber the years as “B.C,” for “before Charles,” and “A.D.,” for “after Darwin.”

We are seeing all this true silliness because the leaders of Trinity have no real moral bearing or grounding in history. As Mohler points out, they are embarrassed by Christianity even though their school was started by Christians. This embarrassment is born out of the belief that we have, once again, advanced pass the need for Christianity. We no longer need saving because sin is really just a made up term to scare people and control people with religion. At least, this is what they believe.

Yet, sin still reigns in our culture and in our lives, all the denying of this truth will do nothing to eliminate it. In fact, all the education, science, technology and preaching from the Left will do nothing to alleviate our sinful nature and that nature will continue to become more and more emboldened. This leads to a more debauched culture and one that is less free in the end.

The board of Trinity U. would do well to actually go back and look at their roots. Even though they were started by a bunch of preachers out of the Cumberland Presbyterian denomination, they would be far better off than they are now. Other wise, they will continue to behave like utter fools, and remove terms like “the year of Our Lord,” leaving the date the same and the name of their school the same. Both still point a Christ and are subtle reminders that even when we ignore the facts, we still need Him today as much as ever.

UPDATE

KUDOS to the Board of Trinity University which voted to uphold the use of the term “In the year of Our Lord” on diplomas. Here is what they wrote:

“The Board’s decision reflects its desire to continue a Trinity tradition, and the words ‘in the year of our Lord’ are appropriate for the diploma given Trinity’s history and heritage,” said Walter R. Huntley ’71, ’73, vice chairman of the Trinity Board of Trustees and an Atlanta businessman.  The Board also affirmed the University’s mission as a liberal arts and sciences institution, where future leaders are prepared for life in a global society and are informed and fortified by diversity.