How to Maintain & Increase

Driving home: I serve a precise God.

A Puritan was asked why he lived such a precise life. His answer: 'Sir, you ask me why I live a precise life — my answer is simple. I serve a precise God.' Martin uses it to defend the pursuit of specific rules as a means of grace.

I serve a precise God. Why should we be concerned with discovering specific rules and guidelines for maintaining the fear of God? because the God who has made us and the God before whom we walk has given us these principles in order that we might know how better to increase his fear in our hearts. So I hope that takes away any sense that this is self-effort in the sense that we are negating the grace of God.

12:30 - 13:06 Read in full sermon

The point: Make your interest in the new covenant the explicit ground on which you plead for an increase of God's fear — 'Lord Jesus, on the basis of your shed blood, I plead for more of your fear.'

The nominal churchgoer is pictured as the heathen who rings the head off a chicken and sprinkles the blood on an altar. Many professing Christians 'ring the head off an hour or two a week and sprinkle it at the foot of some altar' — and live devoid of fear.

The fact of who God is and his claims over you is not the dominant governing principle of your life. That's true of every one of us by nature. Many of us can think back with shame of years in which we live that way. Just like the heathen rings off the head of his chicken and sprinkles a little blood on his altar, We rang the head off an hour or two a week and sprinkled it at the foot of some altar in some church and gave a little time and a little money.

16:32 - 17:00 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not cut corners on either the private or public intake of Scripture — those corners are the exact places the devil softens you up for decline.

Not a deliberate break with the Bible but a little extra pressure that cuts corners, a few extra responsibilities, a few distractions — until after a week or two you no longer feel the absence and the Christian life breaks down. Martin traces the decline to a specific chain.

Not as though you came up to a certain day and you said, all right, from this day forward, the Bible and me will have nothing to do with each other. No, no, it wasn't that at all. Just a little extra pressure that maybe cut corners on my stated time with God. Just a few extra responsibilities the next day, and a few added distractions the next day, until after a week or two of that pattern, you no longer felt your absence from the Scriptures.

25:25 - 25:50 Read in full sermon

Pastor Martin quotes Faber's hymn at length as an example of literature that feeds the fear of God by combining majesty and tenderness in single stanzas. 'Majestic sweetness sits enthroned upon the Savior's brow' is the governing image.

My God, how wonderful thou art. Thy majesty, how bright. How beautiful thy mercy seat in depths of burning light. How dread are thine eternal years.

39:33 - 39:48 Read in full sermon

The point: Deliberately choose as your intimate associates those who walk in the fear of God — bind yourself to them as in a covenant, not a common-law arrangement.

You will become like those with whom you most intimately associate — 'the companion of fools will become a fool.' Martin uses it to justify Psalm 119:63 as a deliberate discipline for cultivating the fear of God.

psalmist understood the psychology of personal relationships. There is a power of imitation, of absorption, of contagion, one individual to another, so that all things being equal, you will become like those with whom you most intimately associate. There's a built-in law, That's why scripture says the companion of fools will become a fool. It's why God warns us about intimate associations with evil men lest we become like them.

47:49 - 48:20 Read in full sermon

Martin draws a pointed analogy: some Christians want all the privileges of the people of God — a stable ministry, a climate of worship — without binding responsibility. 'Are you a common-law Christian, or are you married to Christ and his people?'

They've always been the thing, but it's sort of been an out thing. But now it's the in thing, particularly with the student generation who think marriage as an institution will be passé. And one of the terrible things about common law relationships is the philosophy that undergirds them. Whether they'll admit it or not, here's the philosophy most people have.

54:00 - 54:20 Read in full sermon