Blood of Sprinkling That Speaks

In this part of the sermon: The speaking of the blood is a figure of speech, rooted in Genesis 4 where Abel's blood cried out from the ground for vengeance. This establishes the concept of blood having a…

The story of Cain and Abel's sacrifices and Cain's subsequent murder of Abel is used to establish the Old Testament concept of blood speaking, specifically Abel's blood crying for vengeance.

Chapter 4 begins with the account of the birth of Cain and then subsequently the birth of Abel. And they went into different fields of endeavor as they grew up. One was a tiller of the ground and Abel was a keeper of the sheep. And as Adam and Eve passed on to their sons that the God who placed them perfect in the garden against whom they rebelled and sinned and who had come and torn away their fig leaves of attempted covering and clothed them with the skins of an animal.

17:59 - 18:36 Read in full sermon

The point: As we take the cup, let's hear its voice reminding us that wrath has been absorbed and a relationship restored.

The analogy of putting the Lord's Supper cup to one's ear is used to encourage believers to 'listen' to what the blood of Christ speaks to them personally: expiation, propitiation, reconciliation, and cleansing.

It speaks to us a word of expiation propitiation those are big words but they are biblical words and vital concepts. That blood shed for us which our Lord said we are to take the fruit of the vine and we are to connect what we see in that cup with that blood of the new covenant this blood this is the new covenant in my blood do this in remembrance of me and we are to hear the voice of that blood as we take the cup the symbol of that blood shed for sinners and in a sense we are to put that cup to our ear and listen to what it says not only to God but what it says to us and it speaks a word of c...

26:56 - 28:25 Read in full sermon

The point: Hear the joyful invitation of the blood to you who are not in Christ, that all who come will be received.

The hymn 'There is a fountain filled with blood' is referenced as a metaphor for the saving power of Christ's blood, illustrating the joyful invitation it extends to sinners.

Not just show forth, but you preach forth the Lord's death till He come. And what we preach as we sinners who are helpless and vile and weak, what we say when we take that cup is that there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins. And sinners plunge beneath that flood, and they will not lose all their guilty stains. And how did we come to enter in to the virtue of that blood?

31:24 - 31:56 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not treat Christ, God's final word, with scorn, indifference, or unbelief, lest you be exposed to God's wrath.

Martin uses the metaphor of God being turned into a 'nice big fuzzball' by some contemporary Christian music and theology to illustrate the dangerous trivialization of God's holiness and wrath.

into just a nice big fuzzball. This whole passage concludes with the words, For our God is, not was, at Sinai a consuming fire. And now the new covenant in Jesus and the blood of sprinkling have turned God into an innocuous fuzzball whom we can trifle with. That's the concept many have.

38:05 - 38:34 Read in full sermon

The point: Young men and women, don't let the devil float low views of God into your soul through music; guard against 'fuzzball God' theology.

A quote about the power of ballads over constitutions is used to warn young people about the subtle influence of music, particularly 'fuzzball God' music, on their theology and spiritual state.

Now don't go out and say, Pastor Martin, blanket condemned all contemporary Christian music. I didn't do that. And if you're tempted to say that, it's probably because you're listening to the fuzzball God kind of contemporary music and I've touched a raw nerve. One man said, I care not who writes the constitutions of the nations.

39:24 - 39:44 Read in full sermon