‘Christ loved the church.’

(Eph 5:25) 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, ESV

     The story’s told of a mother, who woke her son one Sunday morning and said, ‘Get up – you’re late for church!’ He replied, ‘I don’t want to go. I’ve no friends there, the music’s awful, and the sermons are boring!’ The woman replied, ‘You’ve got to go – you’re the pastor!’ Seriously, why should you go to church? Because ‘Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish’ (vv. 25-27 NIV 2011 Edition). Pastor and President Emeritus of Taylor University Dr Jay Kesler gives us five reasons for going to church: 1) It’s the only organisation that still deals with issues like salvation, death, judgment, grace, purpose, heaven, and hell. 2) It adds value and dignity to human life. We live in a secular culture that contributes to our sense of inner worthlessness. The church counteracts this negative message by preaching God’s love and acceptance. 3) It provides a moral and spiritual compass. Society has revised, resisted, and rejected absolutes, embracing relativism, but the church stands on the timeless bedrock of God’s Word. 4) It’s where you find compassion, healing, and community. There – we’re all on par. There – God’s Spirit is working to knit us together as believers, guaranteeing us all ‘equal access to the Father’ (Ephesians 2:18 MSG). 5) Unlike other institutions, it has motivated the most lasting, unselfish, essential, courageous endeavours on earth. Things like missions, schools, hospitals, food pantries, rehab centres, and orphanages. Why go to church? Because Jesus loves the church – and so should you.

     A member of the Continental Congress, he was the only clergyman to sign the Declaration of Independence, and he lost two sons in the Revolutionary War. He was President of Princeton and taught nine of the men that wrote the Constitution, including James Madison. He served on over one hundred and twenty Congressional Committees. His name was Reverend John Witherspoon, and he died this day, November 15, 1794. Rev. Witherspoon wrote: “A Republic must either preserve its virtue or lose its liberty…. Whoever is an avowed enemy of God, I scruple not to call him an enemy of his country.”

     Chapter 6

     I can’t remember exactly what I said about not making the petition for our daily bread too "religious," and I'm not quite sure what you mean-nor how ironically-by asking if I've become "one of Vidler's young men"!

     About Vidler. I never heard the program which created all that scandal, and naturally one wouldn't condemn a dog on newspaper extracts. But I have now read his essay in Soundings and I believe I go a good deal further with him than you would. Much of what he quotes from F. D. Maurice and Bonhoeffer seems to me very good; and so, I think, are his own arguments for the Establishment.

     At any rate I can well understand how a man who is trying to love God and his neighbor should come to dislike the very word religion; a word, by the way, which hardly ever appears in the New Testament. Newman makes my blood run cold when he says in one of the Parochial and Plain Sermons that Heaven is like a church because, in both, "one single sovereign subject-religion-is brought before us." He forgets that there is no temple in the new Jerusalem.

     He has substituted religion for God-as if navigation were substituted for arrival, or battle for victory, or wooing for marriage, or in general the means for the end. But even in this present life, there is danger in the very concept of religion. It carries the suggestion that this is one more department of life, an extra department added to the economic, the social, the intellectual, the recreational, and all the rest. But that whose claims are infinite can have no standing as a department. Either it is an illusion or else our whole life falls under it. We have no non-religious activities; only religious and irreligious.

     Religion, nevertheless, appears to exist as a department, and, in some ages, to thrive as such. It thrives partly because there exists in many people a "love of religious observances," which I think Simone Weil is quite right in regarding as a merely natural taste. There exists also-Vidler is rather good on this-the delight in religious (as in any other) organization. Then all sorts of aesthetic, sentimental, historical, political interests are drawn in. Finally sales of work, the parish magazine, and bell-ringing, and Santa Claus.

     None of them bad things. But none of them is necessarily of more spiritual value than the activities we call secular. And they are infinitely dangerous when this is not understood. This department of life, labeled "sacred," can become an end in itself; an idol that hides both God and my neighbors. ("When the means are autonomous they are deadly.") It may even come about that a man's most genuinely Christian actions fall entirely outside that part of his life which he calls religious.

Mere heathen morality,
and not Jesus Christ,
is preached in most of our churches.
--- George Whitefield
ISBN-13: 978-1619700611

                What is that to thee?

     Lord, what shall this man do?… What is that to thee? Follow thou Me. --- John 21:21, 22.

     One of our severest lessons comes from the stubborn refusal to see that we must not interfere in other people’s lives. It takes a long time to realize the danger of being an amateur providence, that is, interfering with God’s order for others. You see a certain person suffering, and you say—‘He shall not suffer, and I will see that he does not.’ You put your hand straight in front of God’s permissive will to prevent it, and God says—“What is that to thee?” If there is stagnation spiritually, never allow it to go on, but get into God’s presence and find out the reason for it. Possibly you will find it is because you have been interfering in the life of another; proposing things you had no right to propose; advising when you had no right to advise. When you do have to give advice to another, God will advise through you with the direct understanding of His Spirit; your part is to be so rightly related to God that His discernment comes through you all the time for the blessing of another soul.

     Most of us live on the borders of consciousness—consciously serving, consciously devoted to God. All this is immature, it is not the real life yet. The mature stage is the life of a child which is never conscious; we become so abandoned to God that the consciousness of being used never enters in. When we are consciously being used as broken bread and poured-out wine, there is another stage to be reached, where all consciousness of ourselves and of what God is doing through us is eliminated. A saint is never consciously a saint; a saint is consciously dependent on God.

                Semi-Detached

  I am given to slum
clearance; I have thrown my images
outside where they accumulate
in a huge pile. It is not true
I am the house of prayer.
I am neither a voice
asking, nor is there an ear
that attends. If the best they can do
is to say I am the ghost
in the machine, I will lay
that ghost.
The facts are
these: I live in a contemporary
dwelling in country that
is being consumed. Nature regards
me with a distrust that is
well-founded; there is no room
for us both. Small and compact
the house I occupy sustains
pressures as of the air's
fathoms, but I am not
at the bottom of them. I am
neither down here, nor
up there. I am where
I am, a being with no
view but out upon the uncertainties
of the imperatives of science.

     Maimonides supports his understanding of sacrifices by showing how the Bible gave expression to different levels of religious worship:

     I return to my subject and say that, as this kind of worship—I mean the “sacrifices”—pertain to a second intention, whereas invocation, prayer, and similar practices and modes of worship come closer to the first intention and are necessary for its achievement, a great difference has been made between the two kinds. For one kind of worship—I mean the offering of sacrifices—even though it was done in His name, may He be exalted, was not prescribed to us in the way it existed at first; I mean to say in such a way that sacrifices could be offered in every place and at every time. Nor could a temple be set up in any fortuitous place, nor could any fortuitous man offer the sacrifice: “Whosoever would, he consecrated him.” On the contrary, He forbade all this and established one single house [as the temple], “to the site that the Lord will choose,” so that sacrifices should not be offered elsewhere: “Take care not to sacrifice your burnt offerings in any place you like.” Also only the offspring of one particular family can be “priests.” All this was intended to restrict this kind of worship, so that only the portion of it should subsist whose abolition is not required by His Wisdom. On the other hand, invocation and prayers are made in every place and by anyone whoever he may be.

     The Bible weaned man from his attachment to idolatry by restricting the first form of worship—sacrifices—to the specific location of the temple and to specific persons—the priests. Along with communal worship by animal sacrifices there also existed verbal prayer practiced by individuals able to transcend pagan forms of worship. Since the restrictions of place and persons only applied to sacrifices and not to verbal prayer, Maimonides inferred that at the time of the Bible verbal prayer represented a higher form of worship.

     Maimonides states in the Mishneh Torah that verbal prayer was individualistic and spontaneous during the biblical period. It lacked the formal structure of fixed times and texts which would have enabled verbal prayer to become a communal form of worship.59 After the exile of the community from its land, verbal prayer became formalized and emerged as the system of worship for community. The same relationship between communal and individual forms of worship which was present in the biblical period is present also when verbal prayer becomes the dominant mode of communal worship. In the Guide, Maimonides only claims that it would be as difficult for the prophet, in his time, to demand of the members of community that they serve God in contemplative prayer as it would have been for the prophet, during the biblical period, to insist on verbal prayer. At this stage in history, Maimonides suggests, the individual who can transcend the communal form of worship gives expression to his spiritual capacities through silent, contemplative prayer. Such silent, contemplative prayer at the time of exile reflects the same capacity of unique individuals to transcend the influence of their social environment as did verbal prayer at a time when the community was habituated to offer sacrifices.

     Maimonides’ description of communal prayer in the Mishneh Torah suggests that the core element of verbal prayer is petitional:

     The first three blessings consist of praises of God, the last three of thanksgiving to Him. The intermediate benedictions are petitions for the things which may stand as categories of all the desires of the individual and the needs of the community.

     The thirteen petitional blessings reflect the needs of community and the outpourings of the Jew who turns to God out of crises. The important concern of the rabbinic period was to sustain the community’s relationship to God in spite of political exile and suffering; petitional prayer reinforces rabbinic refusal to interpret Jewish history from the secular perspective of brute power. Teshuvah and petitional prayer give expression to the belief that God has not abandoned Israel and that He is responsive to its suffering.

     Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” --- John 20:27.

     How are we to deal with those who are in intellectual difficulty?  Classic Sermons on Faith and Doubt

     First, we make all the concessions to them that we conscientiously can. When doubters first encounter you, they pour out a deluge of abuse of churches and ministers and creeds and Christians. Nine-tenths of what they say is probably true. Make concessions. Agree with them. It does them good to unburden themselves of these things, and they are startled to find a Christian who almost entirely agrees with them. We are of course not responsible for everything that is said in the name of Christianity—a person does not give up medicine because there are quack doctors, and people do not have a right to give up their Christianity because there are spurious or inconsistent Christians. We ask them to accept Christ and the facts about Christ and the words of Christ. These people are in revolt against the kind of religion that we exhibit to the world—against the cant that is taught in the name of Christianity. And if they have never seen the real thing—if you could show them that, they would receive it as eagerly as you do.

     Second, beg them to set aside, by an act of will, all unsolved problems such as the origin of evil, the problem of the Trinity, and so on—problems that have been investigated for thousands of years without result—as insoluble. In the meantime, just as a person who is studying mathematics may be asked to set aside the problem of squaring the circle, let them go on with what can be done and what has been done and leave out of sight the impossible. That will relieve the skeptic’s mind of a great deal of unnecessary cargo that has been in the way.

     Third, talking about difficulties only aggravates them. Entire satisfaction to the intellect about any of the greater problems is unattainable, and if you try to get to the bottom, there is no bottom there; therefore you make the matter worse. Say what is known and what can be honestly, philosophically, and scientifically said about one or two of the difficulties that doubters raise, just to show that you are not merely groping in the dark yourself, but you have found whatever basis is possible. It would be a pity if all these problems could be solved. The joy of the intellectual life would be largely gone, and the whole intellectual world would be stale and unprofitable if we knew everything.
--- Henry Drummond

     Oswald Chambers wrote one of Christianity’s greatest books, but he never knew it.

     He had early displayed the gifts of an artist, and his future seemed assured by a scholarship to the leading art centers of Europe. But, being won to Christ by Charles Spurgeon, he declined the scholarship and enrolled in Dunoon Bible Training College, telling his family, “Do not be sorry that I cannot go for a university curriculum, maybe I shall be best without it. I will to the limit of my power educate myself for His sake.” He further explained in his diary: “From my childhood the persuasion has been that of a work strange and great, an experience deep and peculiar.”

     While at Dunoon, Chambers heard Dr. F. B. Meyer speak about the Holy Spirit. He returned to his room feeling he knew nothing of spiritual power, and he was miserable. “Nothing but the grace of God and the kindness of friends kept me out of an asylum,” he said. “I knew that if what I had was all the Christianity there was, the thing was a fraud.”

     Then he found a verse of Scripture—Luke 11:13: As bad as you are, you still know how to give good gifts to your children. But your heavenly Father is even more ready to give the Holy Spirit to anyone who asks.

     “I claimed the gift of the Spirit in dogged committal on Luke 11:13,” he said. “I had no vision of heaven or angels. I was dry and empty as ever, no power or realization of God. Then I was asked to speak at a meeting, and forty souls came to the front.” Chambers had found a power and peace in ministry that impacted the world both during and after his life.

     He died suddenly in Egypt on November 15, 1917 while serving British troops during World War I, and was buried in Cairo under a headstone bearing the words of Luke 11:13. Only later did his widow, Gertrude Hobbs, compile his manuscripts, notes, lectures, and sermons into the classic My Utmost for His Highest, a book that challenges Christians to this day.

     Which one of you would give your child a scorpion if the child asked for an egg? As bad as you are, you still know how to give good gifts to your children. But your heavenly Father is even more ready to give the Holy Spirit to anyone who asks.
--- Luke 11:12,13.

          Morning - November 15

     “The Lord’s portion is his people.” --- Deuteronomy 32:9.

     How are they his? By his own sovereign choice. He chose them, and set his love upon them. This he did altogether apart from any goodness in them at the time, or any goodness which he foresaw in them. He had mercy on whom he would have mercy, and ordained a chosen company unto eternal life; thus, therefore, are they his by his unconstrained election.

     They are not only his by choice, but by purchase. He has bought and paid for them to the utmost farthing, hence about his title there can be no dispute. Not with corruptible things, as with silver and gold, but with the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord’s portion has been fully redeemed. There is no mortgage on his estate; no suits can be raised by opposing claimants, the price was paid in open court, and the Church is the Lord’s freehold for ever. See the blood-mark upon all the chosen, invisible to human eye, but known to Christ, for “the Lord knoweth them that are his”; he forgetteth none of those whom he has redeemed from among men; he counts the sheep for whom he laid down his life, and remembers well the Church for which he gave himself.

     They are also his by conquest. What a battle he had in us before we would be won! How long he laid siege to our hearts! How often he sent us terms of capitulation! but we barred our gates, and fenced our walls against him. Do we not remember that glorious hour when he carried our hearts by storm? When he placed his cross against the wall, and scaled our ramparts, planting on our strongholds the blood-red flag of his omnipotent mercy? Yes, we are, indeed, the conquered captives of his omnipotent love. Thus chosen, purchased, and subdued, the rights of our divine possessor are inalienable: we rejoice that we never can be our own; and we desire, day by day, to do his will, and to show forth his glory.


          Evening - November 15

     “Strengthen, O God, that which thou hast wrought for us.” --- Psalm 68:28.

     It is our wisdom, as well as our necessity, to beseech God continually to strengthen that which he has wrought in us. It is because of their neglect in this, that many Christians may blame themselves for those trials and afflictions of spirit which arise from unbelief. It is true that Satan seeks to flood the fair garden of the heart and make it a scene of desolation, but it is also true that many Christians leave open the sluice-gates themselves, and let in the dreadful deluge through carelessness and want of prayer to their strong Helper. We often forget that the Author of our faith must be the Preserver of it also. The lamp which was burning in the temple was never allowed to go out, but it had to be daily replenished with fresh oil; in like manner, our faith can only live by being sustained with the oil of grace, and we can only obtain this from God himself. Foolish virgins we shall prove, if we do not secure the needed sustenance for our lamps. He who built the world upholds it, or it would fall in one tremendous crash; he who made us Christians must maintain us by his Spirit, or our ruin will be speedy and final. Let us, then, Evening by Evening, go to our Lord for the grace and strength we need. We have a strong argument to plead, for it is his own work of grace which we ask him to strengthen—“that which thou hast wrought for us.” Think you he will fail to protect and sustain that? Only let your faith take hold of his strength, and all the powers of darkness, led on by the master fiend of hell, cannot cast a cloud or shadow over your joy and peace. Why faint when you may be strong? Why suffer defeat when you may conquer? Oh! take your wavering faith and drooping graces to him who can revive and replenish them, and earnestly pray, “Strengthen, O God, that which thou hast wrought for us.”

          DOXOLOGY

     Thomas Ken, 1637–1711

     I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify Your name forever. (Psalm 86:12)

     The lines of the “Doxology” have been the most frequently sung words of any known song for more than 300 years. Even today nearly every English-speaking Protestant congregation unites at least once each Sunday in this noble overture of praise. It has been said that the “Doxology” has done more to teach the doctrine of the Trinity than all the theology books ever written.

     Instead of being merely a perfunctory hymn that is sung each week, the “Doxology” should be regarded by Christians as an offering or sacrifice of praise to God for all of His blessings in the past week (Hebrews 13:15). True worship always involves an offering. In the Old Testament period, Levitical priests offered blood sacrifices to God on behalf of their people. In this New Testament era, God wants our sacrifice of praise. Other sacrifices desired by God of New Testament believer-priests include: Our bodies (Roman 12:1); the service of our faith (Philippians 2:17); our material gifts (Philippians 4:18); our good works and communication (Hebrews 13:16).

     The author of this text was a bold, outspoken 17th century Anglican bishop named Thomas Ken. Ken’s illustrious career in the ministry was stormy and colorful. He served for a time as the English chaplain at the royal court in the Hague, Holland. He was so outspoken, however, in denouncing the corrupt lives of those in authority at the Dutch capital that he was compelled to leave after a short stay.

     Upon his return to England, he was appointed by King Charles II to be one of his chaplains. Ken continued to reveal the same spirit of boldness in rebuking the moral sins of his dissolute English monarch. Despite this, Charles always admired his courageous chaplain, calling him “the good little man.” The king rewarded Thomas Ken by appointing him to the bishopric of the Bath and Wales area. The historian Macaulay gave this tribute to Bishop Ken: “He came as near to the ideal of Christian perfection as human weakness permits.”

     Praise God, from whom all blessings flow; praise Him, all creatures here below: praise Him above, ye heav’nly host; praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.

     For Today: Psalm 97:1; 100; 150:6

     It has been said that a Christian’s theology must become his doxology. As a believer-priest, are you offering to God the sacrifices that He desires? Give Him your praise even now as you sing the “Doxology” ---

     Prop. II. God’s holiness is not blemished by enjoining man a law, which he knew he would not observe.

     1. The law was not above his strength. Had the law been impossible to be observed, no crime could have been imputed to the subject, the fault had lain wholly upon the Governor; the non-observance of it had been from a want of strength, and not from a want of will. Had God commanded Adam to fly up to the sun, when he had not given him wings, Adam might have a will to obey it, but his power would be too short to perform it. But the law set him for a rule, had nothing of impossibility in it; it was easy to be observed; the command was rather below, than above his strength; and the sanction of it was more apt to restrain and scare him from the breach of it, than encourage any daring attempts against it; he had as much power, or rather more, to conform to it, than to warp from it; and greater arguments and interest to be observant of it, than to violate it; his all was secured by the one, and his ruin ascertained by the other. The commands of God are not grievous (1 John 5:3); from the first to the last command, there is nothing impossible, nothing hard to the original and created nature of man, which were all summed up in a love to God, which was the pleasure and delight of man, as well as his duty, if he had not, by inconsiderateness, neglected the dictates and resolves of his own understanding. The law was suited to the strength of man, and fitted for the improvement and perfection of his nature; in which respect, the apostle calls it “good,” as it refers to man, as well as “holy,” as it refers to God (Rom. 7:12). Now, since God created man a creature capable to be governed by a law, and as a rational creature endued with understanding and will, not to be governed, according to his nature, without a law; was it congruous to the wisdom of God to respect only the future state of man, which, from the depth of his infinite knowledge, he did infallibly foresee would be miserable, by the wilful defection of man from the rule? Had it been agreeable to the wisdom of God, to respect only this future state, and not the present state of the creature; and therefore leave him lawless, because he knew be would violate the law? Should God forbear to act like a wise governor, because he saw that man would cease to act like an obedient subject? Shall a righteous magistrate forbear to make just and good laws, because he foresees, either from the dispositions of his subjects, their ill-humor, or some circumstances which will intervene, that multitudes of them will incline to break those laws, and fall under the penalty of them? No blame can be upon that magistrate who minds the rule of righteousness, and the necessary duty of his government, since he is not the cause of those turbulent affections of men, which he wisely foresees will rise up against his just edicts.

     2. Though the law now be above the strength of man, yet is not the holiness of God blemished by keeping it up. It is true, God hath been graciously pleased to mitigate the severity and rigor of the law, by the entrance of the gospel; yet where men refuse the terms of the gospel, they continue themselves under the condemnation of the law, and are justly guilty of the breach of it, though they have no strength to observe it. The law, as I said before, was not above man’s strength, when he was possessed of original righteousness, though it be above man’s strength, since he was stripped of original righteousness. The command was dated before man had contracted his impotency, when he had a power to keep it as well as to break it. Had it been enjoined to man only after the fall, and not before, he might have had a better pretence to excuse himself, because of the impossibility of it; yet he would not have had sufficient excuse, since the impossibility did not result from the nature of the law, but from the corrupted nature of the creature. It was “weak through the flesh” (Rom. 8:3), but it was promulged when man had a strength proportioned to the commands of it. And now, since man hath unhappily made himself incapable of obeying it, must God’s holiness in his law be blemished for enjoining it? Must he abrogate those commands, and prohibit what before he enjoined, for the satisfaction of the corrupted creature? Would not this be his “ceasing to be holy,” that his creature might be unblameably unrighteous? Must God strip himself of his holiness, because man will not discharge his iniquity? He cannot be the cause of sin, by keeping up the law, who would be the cause of all the unrighteousness of men, by removing the authority of it. Some things in the law that are intrinsically good in their own nature, are indispensable, and it is repugnant to the nature of God not to command them. If he were not the guardian of his indispensable law, he would be the cause and countenancer of the creatures’ iniquity. So little reason have men to charge God with being the cause of their sin, by not repealing his law to gratify their impotence, that he would be unholy if he did. God must not lose his purity, because man hath lost his, and cast away the right of his sovereignty, because man hath cast away his power of obedience.

     3. God’s foreknowledge that his law would not be observed, lays no blame upon him. Though the foreknowledge of God be infallible, yet it doth not necessitate the creature in acting. It was certain from eternity, that Adam would fall, that men would do such and such actions, that Judas would betray our Saviour; God foreknew all those things from eternity; but, it is as certain that this foreknowledge did not necessitate the will of Adam, or any other branch of his posterity, in the doing those actions that were so foreseen by God; they voluntarily run into such courses, not by any impulsion. God’s knowledge was not suspended between certainty and uncertainty; he certainly foreknew that his law would be broken by Adam; he foreknew it in his own decree of not hindering him, by giving Adam the efficacious grace which would infallibly have prevented it; yet Adam did freely break this law, and never imagined that the foreknowledge of God did necessitate him to it; he could find no cause of his own sin, but the liberty of his own will; he charges the occasion of his sin upon the woman, and consequently upon God in giving the woman to him (Gen. 3:12). He could not be so ignorant of the nature of God, as to imagine him without a foresight of future things: since his knowledge of what was to be known of God by creation, was greater than any man’s since, in all probability. But, however, if he were not acquainted with the notion of God’s foreknowledge, he could not be ignorant of his own act; there could not have been any necessity upon him, any kind of constraint of him in his action, that could have been unknown to him; and he would not have omitted a plea of so strong a nature, when he was upon his trial for life or death; especially when he urgeth so weak an argument, to impute his crime to God, as the gift of the woman; as if that which was designed him for a help, were intended for his ruin. If God’s prescience takes away the liberty of the creature, there is no such thing as a free action in the world (for there is nothing done but is foreknown by God, else we render God of a limited understanding), nor ever was, no, not by God himself, ad extra; for whatsoever he hath done in creation, whatsoever he hath done since the creation, was foreknown by him: he resolved to do it, and, therefore, foreknew that he would do it. Did God do it, therefore, necessarily, as necessity is opposed to liberty? As he freely decrees what he will do, so he effects what he freely decreed. Foreknowledge is so far from intrenching upon the liberty of the will, that predetermination, which in the notion of it speaks something more, doth not dissolve it; God did not only foreknow, but determine the suffering of Christ (Acts 4:27, 28). It was necessary, therefore, that Christ should suffer, that God might not be mistaken in his foreknowledge, or come short of his determinate decree; but did this take away the liberty of Christ in suffering? (Eph. 5:2) “Who offered himself up to God;” that is, by a voluntary act, as well as designed to do it by a determinate counsel. It did infallibly secure the event, but did not annihilate the liberty of the action, either in Christ’s willingness to suffer, or the crime of the Jews that made him suffer. God’s prescience is God’s provision of things arising from their proper causes; as a gardener foresees in his plants the leaves and the flowers that will arise from them in the spring, because he knows the strength and nature of their several roots which he under ground; but his foresight of these things is not the cause of the rise and appearance of those flowers. If any of us see a ship moving towards such a rock or quicksand, and know it to be governed by a negligent pilot, we shall certainly foresee that the ship will be torn in pieces by the rock, or swallowed up by the sands; but is this foresight of ours from the causes, any cause of the effect; or can we from hence be said to be the authors of the miscarriage of the ship, and the loss of the passengers and goods? The fall of Adam was foreseen by God to come to pass by the consent of his free will, in the choice of the proposed temptation. God foreknew Adam would sin, and if Adam would not have sinned, God would have foreknown that he would not sin. Adam might easily have detected the serpents fraud, and made a better election; God foresaw that he would not do it; God’s foreknowledge did not make Adam guilty or innocent: whether God had foreknown it or no, he was guilty by a free choice, and a willing neglect of his own duty. Adam knew that God foreknew that he might eat of the fruit, and fall and die, because God had forbidden him; the foreknowledge that he would do it, was no more a cause of his action, than the foreknowledge that he might do it. Judas certainly knew that his Master foreknew that he would betray him, for Christ had acquainted him with it (John 13:21, 26); yet he never charged this foreknowledge of Christ with any guilt of his treachery.

     Prop. III. The holiness of God is not blemished by decreeing the eternal rejection of some men. Reprobation, in its first notion, is an act of preterition, or passing by man is not made wicked by the the act of God; but it supposeth him wicked; and so it is nothing else but God’s leaving a man in that guilt and filth wherein he beholds him. In its second notion, it is an ordination, not to a crime, but to a punishment (Jude 4): “an ordaining to condemnation.” And though it be an eternal act of God, yet, in order of nature, it follows upon the foresight of the transgression of man, and supposeth the crime. God considers Adam’s revolt, and views the whole mass of his corrupted posterity, and chooses some to reduce to himself by his grace, and leaves others to he sinking in their ruins. Since all mankind fell by the fall of Adam, and have corruption conveyed to them successively by that root, whereof they are branches; all men might justly be left wallowing in that miserable condition to which they are reduced by the apostasy of their common head; and God might have passed by the whole race of man, as well as he did the fallen angels, without any hope of redemption. He was no more bound to restore man, than to restore devils, nor bound to repair the nature of any one son of Adam; and had he dealt with men as he dealt with the devils, they had had, all of them, as little just ground to complain of God; for all men deserved to be left to themselves, for all were concluded under sin; but God calls out some to make monuments of his grace, which is an act of the sovereign mercy of that dominion, whereby “he hath mercy on whom he will have mercy” (Rom. 9:18); others he passes by, and leaves them remaining in that corruption of nature wherein they were born. If men have a power to dispose of their own goods, without any unrighteousness, why should not God dispose of his own grace, and bestow it upon whom he pleases; since it is a debt to none, but a free gift to any that enjoy it? God is not the cause of sin in this, because his operation about this is negative; it is not an action, but a denial of action, and therefore cannot be the cause of the evil actions of men. God acts nothing, but withholds his power; he doth not enlighten their minds, nor incline their wills so powerfully, as to expel their darkness, and root out those evil habits which possess them by nature. God could, if he would, savingly enlighten the minds of all men in the world, and quicken their hearts with a new life by an invincible grace; but in not doing it, there is no positive act of God, but a cessation of action. We may with as much reason say, that God is the cause of all the sinful actions that are committed by the corporation of devils, since their first rebellion, because he leaves them to themselves, and bestows not a new grace upon them,—as say, God is the cause of the sins of those that he overlooks and leaves in that state of guilt wherein he found them. God did not pass by any without the consideration of sin; so that this act of God is not repugnant to his holiness, but conformable to his justice.

     Prop. IV. The holiness of God is not blemished by his secret will to suffer sin to enter into the world. God never willed sin by his preceptive will. It was never founded upon, or produced by any word of his, as the creation was. He never said, Let there be sin under the heaven, as he said, “Let there be water under the heaven.” Nor doth he will it by infusing any habit of it, or stirring up inclinations to it; no, “God tempts no man” (James 1:13). Nor doth he will it by his approving will; it is detestable to him, nor ever can he be otherwise; he cannot approve it either before commission or after.

     1. The will of God is in some sort concurrent with sin. He doth not properly will it, but he wills not to hinder it, to which, by his omnipotence, he could put a bar. If he did positively will it, it might be wrought by himself, and so could not be evil. If he did in no sort will it, it would not be committed by his creature; sin entered into the world, either God willing the permission of it, or not willing the permission of it. The latter cannot be said; for then the creature is more powerful than God, and can do that which God will not permit. God can, if he be pleased, banish all sin in a moment out of the world: he could have prevented the revolt of angels, and the fall of man; they did not sin whether he would or no: he might, by his grace, have stepped in the first moment, and made a special impression upon them of the happiness they already possessed, and the misery they would incur by any wicked attempt. He could as well have prevented the sin of the fallen angels, and confirmed them in grace, as of those that continued in their happy state: he might have appeared to man, informed him of the issue of his design, and made secret impressions upon his heart, since he was acquainted with every avenue to his will. God could have kept all sin out of the world, as well as all creatures from breathing is it; he was as well able to bar sin forever out of the world, as to let creatures be in the womb of nothing, wherein they were first wrapped. To say God doth will sin as he doth other things, is to deny his holiness; to say it entered without anything of his will, is to deny his omnipotence. If he did necessitate Adam to fall, what shall we think of his purity? If Adam did fall without any concern of God’s will in it, what shall we say of his sovereignty? The one taints his holiness, and the other clips his power. If it came without anything of his will in it, and he did not foresee it, where is his omniscience If it entered whether he would or no, where is his omnipotence (Rom. 9:19)? “Who hath resisted his will?” There cannot be a lustful act in Abimelech, if God will withhold his power (Gen. 20:6); “I withheld thee:” nor a cursing word in Balaam’s mouth, unless God give power to speak it (Num. 22:38): “Have I now any power at all to say anything? The word that God puts in my mouth, that shall I speak.” As no action could be sinful, if God had not forbidden it; so no sin could be committed, if God did not will to give way to it.

     2. God doth not will directly, and by an efficacious will. He doth not directly will it, because he hath prohibited it by his law, which is a discovery of his will: so that if he should directly will sin, and directly prohibit it, he would will good and evil in the same manner, and there would be contradictions in God’s will: to will sin absolutely, is to work it (Psalm 115:3): “God hath done whatsoever hes pleased.” God cannot absolutely will it, because he cannot work it. God wills good by a positive decree, because he hath decreed to effect it. He wills evil by a private decree, because he hath decreed not to give that grace which would certainly prevent it. God doth not will sin simply, for that were to approve it, but he wills it, in order to that good his wisdom will bring forth from it. He wills not sin for itself, but for the event. To will sin as sin, or as purely evil, is not in the capacity of a creature, neither of man nor devil. The will of a rational creature cannot will anything but under the appearance of good, of some good in the sin itself, or some good in the issue of it. Much more is this far from God, who, being infinitely good, cannot will evil as evil; and being infinitely knowing, cannot will that for good which is evil. Infinite wisdom can be under no error or mistake: to will sin as sin, would be an unanswerable blemish on God; but to will to suffer it in order to good, is the glory of his wisdom; it could never have peeped up its head, unless there had been some decree of God concerning it. And there had been no decree of God concerning it, had he not intended to bring good and glory out of it. If God did directly will the discovery of his grace and mercy to the world, he did in some sort will sin, as that without which there could not have been any appearance of mercy in the world; for an innocent creature is not the object of mercy, but a miserable creature and no rational creature but must be sinful before it be miserable.

     3. God wills the permission of sin. He doth not positively will sin, but he positively wills to permit it. And though he doth not approve of sin, yet he approves of that act of his will, whereby he permits it. For since that sin could not enter into the world without some concern of God’s will about it, that act of his will that gave way to it, could not be displeasing to him: God could never be diseased with his own act: “He is not as man, that he should repent” (1 Sam. 15:29). What God cannot repent of, he cannot but approve of: it is contrary to the blessedness of God to disapprove of; and be displeased with any act of his own will. If he hated any act of his own will, he would hate himself, he would be under a torture every one that hates his own acts, is under some disturbance and torment for them. That which is permitted by him, is in itself, and in regard of the evil of it, hateful to him: but as the prospect of that good which he aims at in the permission of it is pleasing to him, so that act of his will, whereby he permits it, is ushered in by an approving act of his understanding. Either God approved of the permission, or not; if he did not approve his own act of permission, he could not have decreed an act of permission. It is inconceivable that God should decree such an act which he detested, and positively will that which he hated. Though God hated sin, as being against his holiness, yet he did not hate the permission of sin, as being subservient by the immensity of his wisdom to his own glory. He could never be displeased with that which was the result of his eternal counsel, as this decree of permitting sin was, as well as any other decree, resolved upon in his own breast. For as God acts nothing in time, but what he decreed from eternity, so he permits nothing in time but what he decreed from eternity to permit. To speak properly, therefore, God doth not will sin, but he wills the permission of it, and this will to permit is active and positive in God. 4. This act of permission is not a mere and naked permission, but such an one as is attended with a certainty of the event. The decrees of God to make use of the sin of man for the glory of his grace in the mission and passion of his Son, hung upon this entrance of sin. Would it consist with the wisdom of God to decree such great and stupendous things, the event whereof should depend upon an uncertain foundation which he might be mistaken in? God would have sat in counsel from eternity to no purpose, if he had only permitted those things to be done, without any knowledge of the event of this permission.

     God would not have made such provision for redemption to no purpose, or an uncertain purpose, which would have been, if man had not fallen; or if it had been an uncertainty with God whether he would fall or no. Though the will of God about sin was permissive, yet the will of God about that glory he would promote by the defect of the creature, was positive; and, therefore, he would not suffer so many positive acts of his will to hang upon an uncertain event; and, therefore, he did wisely and righteously order all things to the accomplishment of his great and gracious purposes.

     5. This act of permission doth not taint the holiness of God. That there is such an act as permission, is clear in Scripture (Acts 14:16): “Who in times past suffered all nations to walk in their own ways.” But that it doth not blemish the holiness of God, will appear, 1st. From the nature of this permission.

     1. It is not a moral permission, a giving liberty of toleration by any law to commit sin with impunity; when, what one law did forbid, another law doth leave indifferent to be done or not, as a man sees good in himself. As when there is a law made among men, that no man shall go out of such a city or country without license, to go out without license is a crime by the law; but when that law is repealed by another, that gives liberty for men to go and come at their pleasure, it doth not make their going or coming necessary, but leaves those which were before bound, to do as they see good in themselves. Such a permission makes a fact lawful, though not necessary; a man is not obliged to do it, but he is left to his own discretion to do as he pleases, without being chargeable with a crime for doing it. Such a permission there was granted by God to Adam of eating of the fruits of the garden, to choose any of them for food, except the tree of “knowledge of good and evil.” It was a precept to him, not to “eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil;” but the other was a permission, whereby it was lawful for him to feed upon any other that was most agreeable to his appetite but there is not such a permission in the case of sin; this had been an indulgence of it, which had freed man from any crime, and, consequently, from punishment; because, by such a permission by law, he would have had authority to sin if he please God did not remove the law, which he had before placed as a bar against evil, nor ceased that moral impediment of his threatening: such a permission as this, to make sin lawful or indifferent, had been a blot upon God’s holiness.

     2. But this permission of God, in the case of sin, is no more than the not hindering a sinful action, which he could have prevented. It is not so much an action of God, as a suspension of his influence, which might have hindered an evil act, and a forbearing to restrain the faculties of man from sin; it is, properly, the not exerting that efficacy which might change the counsels that are taken, and prevent the action intended; as when one man sees another ready to fall, and can preserve him from falling by reaching out his hand, he permits him to fall, that is, he hinders him not from falling. So God describes his act about Abimelech (Gen. 20:6); “I withheld thee from sinning against me, therefore suffered I thee not to touch her.” If Abimelech had sinned, he had sinned by God’s permission; that is, by God’s not hindering, or not restraining him by making any impressions upon him. So that permission is only a withholding that help and grace, which, if bestowed, would have been an effectual remedy to prevent a crime; and it is rather a suspension, or cessation, than properly a permission, and sin may be said to be committed, not without God’s permission, rather than by his permission. Thus, in the fall of man, God did not hold the reins strict upon Satan, to restrain him from laying the bait, nor restrain Adam from swallowing the bait: he kept to himself that efficacious grace which he might have darted out upon man to prevent his fall. God left Satan to his malice of tempting, and Adam to his liberty of resisting, and his own strength, to use that sufficient grace he had furnished him with, whereby he might have resisted and overcome the temptation. As he did not drive man to it, so he did not secretly restrain him from it. So, in the Jews crucifying our Saviour, God did not imprint upon their minds, by his Spirit, a consideration of the greatness of the crime, and the horror of his justice due to it; and, being without those impediments, they run furiously, of their own accord, to the commission of that evil; as, when a man lets a wolf or dog out upon his prey, he takes off the chain which held them, and they presently act according to their natures. In the fall of angels and men, God’s act was leaving them to their own strength; in sins after the fall, it is God’s giving them up to their own corruption; the first is a pure suspension of grace; the other hath the nature of a punishment (Psalm 81:12): “So I gave them up to their own hearts’ lusts.” The first object of this permissive will of God was to leave angels and men to their liberty, and the use of their free will, which was natural to them, not adding that supernatural grace which was necessary, not that they should not at all sin, but that they should infallibly not sin: they had a strength sufficient to avoid sin, but not sufficient infallibly to avoid sin; a grace sufficient to preserve them, but not sufficient to confirm them.

     3. Now this permission is not the cause of sin, nor doth blemish the holiness of God. It doth not intrench upon the freedom of men, but supposeth it, establisheth it, and leaves man to it. God acted nothing, but only ceased to act; and therefore could not be the efficient cause of man’s sin. As God is not the author of good, but by willing and effecting it, so he is not the author of evil, but by willing and effecting it, but he doth not positively will evil, nor effect it by any efficacy of his own. Permission is no action, nor the cause of that action which is permitted; but the will of that person who is permitted to do such an action is the cause. God can no more be said to be the cause of sin, by suffering a creature to act as it will, than he can be said to be the cause of the not being of any creature, by denying it being, and letting it remain nothing; it is not from God that it is nothing, it is nothing in itself. Though God be said to be the cause of creation, yet he is never by any said to be the cause of that nothing which was before creation. This permission of God is not the cause of sin, but the cause of not hindering sin. Man and angels had a physical power of sinning from God, as they were created with freewill, and supported in their natural strength; but the moral power to sin was not from God; he counselled them not to it, laid no obligation upon them to use their natural power for such an end; he only left them to their freedom, and not hindered them in their acting what he was resolved to permit.

The Existence and Attributes of God

Acts 7:1–17
Stephen’s OT Defense of Christ 1

Acts 7:18–53
Stephen’s OT Defense of Christ 2

Acts 7:54-8:1
Stephen’s Victorious Death

Acts 8:1–8
The Power of Persecution

Acts 8:9–24
The First False Convert

Acts 8:25–40
Saving Power of Scripture

John MacArthur

Acts 6:1-7
Finding And Focusing Your Gifts
Jon Courson

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03-15-1992

Acts 6:1-5
The Church: A Place For Programs?
Jon Courson

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03-22-1992

Acts 6:1-7:21
Jon Courson

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03-25-1992

Acts 8:5-39
Avoiding An Unexpected End
Jon Courson

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03-29-1992

Acts 7:22-60
Jon Courson

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04-15-1992

Acts 8:1-8
Jon Courson

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4-22-1992

Acts 8:8-40
Jon Courson

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05-06-1992

Acts 6-7
Jon Courson

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07-11-2018

Acts 8
Jon Courson

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07-18-2018

Jon Courson

Acts 3:1-12
Instantaneous Healing
Andy Woods


04-26-2023

Acts 3:13-18
Israel Rejects Her King
Andy Woods


05-03-2023

Acts 3:19a
What Does ‘Repentance’ Really Mean?
Andy Woods


05-10-2023

Andy Woods

Acts 7
Skip Heitzig

Acts 8
Skip Heitzig

Skip Heitzig | Calvary Chapel

Acts 8
From Bitter to Better
Gary Hamrick


April 17, 2023

Gary Hamrick

Acts 6:9 thru chapter 7
The Martyrdom of Stephen
Paul LeBoutillier

Acts 8
The Gospel Comes to Samaria
Paul LeBoutillier

Acts 8 Part Two
Learning to Hear God's Voice
Paul LeBoutillier

Acts 9:1-32
The Conversion of Paul
Paul LeBoutillier

Acts 9:32-43
The Ministry of Peter
Paul LeBoutillier

Paul LeBoutillier

Brett Meador | Athey Creek

Synopsis | Stephen’s profound sermon begins with a brief history of Israel. This Sunday’s teaching allows us a chance to examine the history of God’s chosen people from Abraham to present-day Israel. God’s faithfulness and His promises are evident as we take time to consider the miraculous preservation of the Jewish people throughout the course of human history and the incredible plans He has for their future.

Palestine or Israel?
Acts 7:2-8
s1-490 | 06-06-2010

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Acts 7:1-43
m1-505 | 06-09-2010

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Just Like Jesus
Acts 7:59-60
s1-491 | 06-13-2010

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Acts 7:37-8:3
m1-506 | 06-16-2010

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Philip the Evangelist
Acts 8:26-40
s1-492 | 06-20-2010

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Acts 8
m1-507 | 00-00-0000

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