No Crisis Experience #3

Driving home: It is the passion to get rich quickly and without the pain, the planning, the restraint, and the wise use, and the use of money associated with the honorable accumulation of wealth. What is true in the material realm is …

Martin uses the widespread desire for quick, effortless wealth through lotteries and casinos to illustrate humanity's natural aversion to the slow, disciplined process of accumulating wealth, drawing a parallel to the spiritual realm and the desire for instant spiritual wealth.

Have you ever wondered what it is that drives millions of Americans every day to buy their lottery tickets and then anxiously to await the projection on the television screen of the winner of the lottery? Have you ever wondered what it is that drives millions of Americans every day to buy their lottery tickets and then anxiously to await the projection on the television screen of the winner of the lottery? Have you ever wondered what it is that drives millions of Americans every day to buy their lottery tickets and then anxiously to await the projection on the television screen of the winner o...

1:57 - 2:50 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And the sense of this verb is that they take the scriptures, and rather than allowing them to be brought before the minds of men in their God-intended shape and form...they put them on a torture rack, and they stretch th…

He uses the vivid image of a torture rack to explain the Greek verb 'wrest' (2 Peter 3:16), conveying how some distort and stretch scriptures out of their God-intended shape to fit their own doctrines.

in are some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant and unsteadfast rest, W-R-E-S-T, as they do also the other scriptures. Now because they are out of any saving relationship to God, it says they do so to their own destruction, but it is this phrase, the ignorant and unsteadfast rest, as they do the other scriptures. It renders this phrase, the ignorant and unstable, to the other scriptures. The New English Bible, the ignorant and unstable, they do also the other scriptures. And the Greek verb itself is the verb you would use were you to describe what was happening to a man whose arms...

14:56 - 16:06 Read in full sermon

The point: Follow the exposition of Scripture diligently to be preserved from error and to be able to help others.

Martin recounts his personal experience as an 18-year-old new convert, being taught by an Assembly of God pastor who used the four Pentecost passages to advocate for seeking the baptism with speaking in tongues, highlighting the real-world impact of this teaching.

And the first category is the four Pentecost passages in the book of Acts. And here I want you to take your Bibles with me and follow as I read without comment the four Pentecost passages in the book of Acts. And if you read any literature on the subject of the availability of scripture, the availability and desirability of a post-conversion crisis experience, you will almost invariably come across one or more, if not all four, of these passages. I can remember as an 18-year-old kid, just a few months old in the Lord, and the local Assembly of God pastor sitting down with me and a few of my re...

22:50 - 24:07 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin identifies four common denominators in the Acts passages that contradict the claims of a post-conversion crisis experience: the entire group received the Spirit, there was…

Martin contrasts the group experience of receiving the Spirit in Acts with his observation of modern meetings where only a few out of many at the altar might claim to receive the 'baptism,' highlighting a discrepancy in the pattern.

Acts 8, they laid their hands upon them and they, and they were all included in this coming of the Spirit upon them. Acts 10, the Spirit came upon them all. And in Acts 19, I said to myself, wait a minute, what he's talking to me about, I go to their meetings and there's 15 people at the altar praying and maybe one of them will get the baptism. Maybe none will get the baptism.

60:35 - 61:05 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Don't substitute psychological, self-induced gibberish for the sovereign work of the Holy Ghost in redemptive history, proving to men that Jesus Christ now imparts full salvation to everyone under the new covenant.

He shares his experience of being coached to 'let your jaw loose' and 'just start saying, praise the Lord,' to induce speaking in tongues, contrasting this with the unsought and unexpected nature of tongues in Acts.

I've had people coach me, folks. I know what I'm talking about. At your jaw loose, just start saying, praise the Lord, praise the Lord, praise the Lord, praise the Lord. Just forget yourself.

62:55 - 63:04 Read in full sermon

The point: Be admonished against the careless use of the Scriptures and continually cultivate the Berean spirit to search the Scriptures and let Scripture interpret Scripture.

Martin uses the analogy of Christ's birth—where the star and angelic chorus were initial signs, but belief later rested on the record—to argue that God doesn't repeat extraordinary signs once a point is proven, warning against seeking signs in an 'evil and adulterous generation'.

Same thing you'll find in Acts chapter 11, with the work of God up at Antioch, the subsequent work of God at Corinth, the work of God in the later chapter of Acts 19. Once God proves the point in a new area, he doesn't repeat it again and again and again and again and again. Will you not believe Christ came in the manger of Bethlehem, unless there's a special star in the sky and an angelic chorus? Long after the star went wherever it went and the angels went back to wherever angels go, he was there.

64:31 - 65:14 Read in full sermon