Albert N. Martin – Personal Testimony

The Occasion for a Personal Testimony

0:04 This sermon was preached on Sunday morning, April 29th, 1984, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:16 Now you may wish to follow as I read in your hearing two texts of Scripture, one from the Old Testament and one from the New. Our Old Testament text is Psalm 66 and verse 16. Psalm 66 and verse 16, in which the psalmist issues a summons to the people of God in these words, Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He has done for my soul. Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He has done for my soul. Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He has done for my soul. And then in the New Testament, the text that is printed on the bottom of our church, stationary, Romans 11 and verse 36. Romans 11 and verse 36, at the conclusion of this great doctrinal section in which the apostle is traced out, the method of grace to sinners, his great conclusion is this,

1:36 For of him, and through him, and unto him, are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen. Now those of you who are members of this congregation and others of you who frequent this place of worship know that as an integral part of our regular worship on the Lord's Day is the systematic.

2:08 Exposition and application of the word of God and in keeping with that overall perspective, which is a matter of biblical conviction to us, I had fully expected to say to you this morning. Now, let us turn to Mark's gospel chapter two, and I ask you to follow as I read verses one to twelve, for we are making our way through verse by verse the gospel according to Mark. However, in the life of this. Particular preacher, an epical event has come and gone, and as most, if not all of you know, a couple of weeks ago, I celebrated, if that's the proper word to use, my fiftieth birthday.

2:53 I have lived out half a century, and this event has drawn forth many, many surprising and unexpected expressions of love, of gratitude, of goodwill, from so many of God's people, not only here in this congregation and in this country, but even across the puddle, as we affectionately say, over in the United Kingdom. And as I have lived in the past two weeks under this tremendous deluge of visibly and tangibly expressed goodwill and gratitude and love, I have found that all of those expressions have forged. Velvet-lined, golden chains that have so held my heart that it simply cannot break free to think of anything else but the goodness and mercy of God to me. And as I sat at my desk and attempted to do what I always do at the start of preparing a message, the careful, exegetical work in Mark's gospel, every few minutes my mind was drawn back again to what God has been pleased, to shower upon me in these past couple of weeks, and I would find myself sitting at my desk or my reading chair,

4:16 just overcome with uncontrollable emotions of gratitude, of a deep sense of humiliation before God. I would find myself spontaneously and at times unexpectedly weeping. And my heart has so fell to this pressure that I simply could not preach to you this morning from Mark's temple, that I simply could not preach to you this morning from Mark's temple, that I simply could not preach to you this morning from Mark's temple, Mark's gospel, because true preaching is not an exercise only of the mind. True preaching engages the whole man. And I could not preach to you with all my heart on the healing of the paralytic let down by his four friends into the house in Capernaum, while my heart was still bound by these velvet-lined chains of the many expressions of love and goodwill. And as I prayerfully considered how best to seize this opportunity, I decided to do something I've never done in 32 years of preaching, give a testimony sermon. But I plan to do that this morning. And this is why I've read in your hearing Psalm 66 and verse 16, Come and hear, you who fear God, and I,

5:29 I will declare what great things he has done for my soul. And I wish in the presence of God and you, his people who fear him, to declare what God has done for my soul. And my only purpose in doing this is that we might sense afresh the great truth of Romans 11.36, that of him, in terms of his own sovereign decree and purpose and grace, through him, by his own sovereign power and mercy, and unto him, in praise and adoration, are all things, and to him and to him alone be the glory. Amen. And as I've sought to collate my thoughts, it's been no easy matter, because again, when the heart is under tremendous pressure emotionally, it's very difficult to make the mind think in logical categories. That's why many of the Psalms are written in the same way. And I've written them in the same way. And I've written

A Monument of God's Grace: Saving, Keeping, and Guiding

6:30 very difficult to outline, because they are the pouring forth of a heart under tremendous and often varying emotions of true Christian experience. But I do believe God has helped me to collate my thoughts. And I wish, first of all, to assert as a testimony to God's faithfulness, that my standing before you today, first of all, as a Christian man, and secondly, as a minister of the word of God, is supremely, whatever else it is, it is supremely a monument of the grace of God. That I, Albert N. Martin, age 50 and two weeks, should stand here in an assembly of the people of God as a Christian man, and as a Christian minister, is supremely a monument of the grace of God. And a text which captures this perspective, so forcefully, is 1 Corinthians chapter 15, the great resurrection chapter from which we read last Lord's Day, in which the apostle is giving a record of those who are the eyewitnesses of the risen Christ. And in the course of that account, he writes, verse 9, for I am the least of the

7:54 apostles, that am not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But, by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace, which was bestowed upon me, was not found vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. You will notice in this passage that the apostle is very careful to say that whatever he was as a man, he was by grace. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am.

8:33 I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I am. I'm. I am. I am. I am.

8:33 What I am, by the grace of God. And he could not forget what he once was. He went to his grave with an open wound in his soul. And it was the wound of remembering of what he once had been. I persecuted the church of God. I forced people to blaspheme. I took people's lives who would not blaspheme and deny Christ. never forgot what he once was.

9:07 Therefore, he always remembered that what he now was was solely by the grace of God. And then with respect to what he was as a minister, he says, and that grace that came to me transforming me and my manhood was grace that worked mightily through me in the work of the ministry. But, he says, though I labored more abundantly than them all, I'm not boasting of myself, for it was not I, but the grace of God which was with me. So as to what he was as a man and a servant of Christ, Paul says, whenever you look at me, look upon me as a monument of the grace of God. And though I do not claim to be an apostle, and though I do not claim to have one thousandth the part of grace that the apostles, I do not believe it is wrong for me to take his words and make them my own and say here in your presence that whatever I am as a Christian man and whatever I am as a minister of the gospel, I am by the grace of God and therefore I stand before you as a monument of that grace. Now specifically, that grace cutting three channels. First of all, I'm a monument to the sovereignty

10:36 of saving grace. Then secondly, a monument to the certainty of keeping grace. And thirdly, a monument to the constancy of guiding grace. First of all then, a monument of the sovereignty of saving grace.

10:57 The grace that God confers in salvation is likened to many things in Scripture, but three of the dominant images of God imparting spiritual life are these. Birth, except a man be born again. John 3, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Resurrection, Ephesians chapter 2, you have he quickened or made alive when you were dead.

11:26 And creation, Ephesians 2.10, we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus. Second Corinthians 5, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. Now, what is the common denominator of those three images of the impartation of spiritual life?

11:47 Birth,

11:50 resurrection, and creation. What is their common denominator?

11:56 You see, the common denominator of each one of those images or analogies is this. That which is born is born due to powers outside of itself. You and I were conceived and born and we had nothing to say about it.

12:15 When someone is raised from the dead, he does not cooperate in his own resurrection. When Jesus spoke into the very face of death in Lazarus' tomb and said, Lazarus, come forth, Lazarus did not pick a nearby daisy and begin to pluck it and say, shall I or shall I not? He was dead. But the voice, the voice that spoke imparted life.

12:43 And likewise with creation. That which is created does not share in its own creation. God said, let there be light and there was light. And 2 Corinthians 4, 6 picks up that very imagery.

12:59 God who commanded light to shine out of the darkness. There was nothing but darkness. Darkness did not cooperate with God in creation. If anything, it sought to fight against it.

13:10 But he spoke and there was light. And Paul says, the same God who commanded light to shine out of darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. As I look back upon these years of youth and early manhood that have passed, how grateful to God I am that God spoke that creative word, that resurrection, that life-giving word to my soul somewhere toward the end of my 17th year of existence. And I don't know precisely when I was brought to faith and life, being reared in a Christian home, having by nature a sensitive conscience, and being in a context where there was constant encouragement to flee to Christ. I made many false starts. God alone knows how many. And many of them with tears and with earnestness.

14:17 But they all petered out after a week or two, three, four, five months. But God did something somewhere near the end of my seventh year from which I ain't got over yet. And I'm not going to get over it for eternity. God imparted life.

14:38 God enabled me to behold glory in the face of Jesus Christ that capitalized and structured a heart hitherto taken up with itself and with its sin and with its own lusts and pride and ambitions. And into that heart God gave the light of the knowledge of his own glory in the face of Jesus Christ and brought me to life and to salvation, subdued my rebel will and caused me from the heart to say, What will this be? What will thou have me to do? Cause me from the heart to rest solely in Jesus Christ as my only hope of life and salvation. Now granted, that work did not occur in a vacuum. There had been the years of godly nurture. There had been the fervent parental prayers.

15:35 There had been the other influences of the word of God brought to bear upon life and conscience. God did not work in a vacuum, but the point I'm making is this, that all of those means could have been exerted with a hundred-fold intensity to this very hour. And you know what I would be as a fifty-year-old man if God had not sovereignly, graciously imparted life? If I were alive at all, I'd be a foul-mouthed, filthy-minded, unclean, abominable, wretched son of Adam.

16:11 That's exactly what I would be. And God alone knows what the manifestations of that could have been. And so if I stand before you today as a Christian man, I stand before you in that capacity as a monument of the grace of God. First of all, the sovereignty of His saving grace.

16:36 But then, secondly, I'm also a monument of the certainty of His keeping grace. The Bible makes it plain that there are many who begin the Christian race only to fall by the wayside. Jesus, in the parable of the sower, speaks of those who believe for a while, but in time of temptation they fall away. And there are even ministers who accompany the apostles who fell away.

17:07 Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present age. And we read those shocking words this morning. Judas, one of the twelve, many of his disciples went back and walked with him no more. John chapter 6.

17:30 There are many who begin and who apparently begin well, but there seem to be so few who continue and press on. And if I stand before you today as a Christian man, thirty-two years after that initial work of grace, it's because I'm a monument of the certainty of the keeping grace of God. Two key texts which ought to be special treasures to every believer. Philippians 1 and verse 6, the apostle says, being confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on until the day of Jesus Christ. If it is God who puts us into the way, it is God who will keep us upon the way, and it is God who will bring us to our journey's end. And then in 1 Peter 1.5, one of the great blessings of salvation in Christ, Peter describes in this way, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.

18:50 He who began the good work will perfect it until He doesn't begin it, take His hands off, and then leave us in a so-called black-slidden state for forty years, and then thirty seconds before our birth, continue it. That's not what the text says. It says, He who begins the good work will continue to carry it on until He begins it, He carries it on until the consummation. And Peter says, we are kept by the power of God, yes, but it's through faith.

19:25 We're not kept by God's power irrespective of whether or not we continue to believe, but it's His very operation of power that sustains us in the way of faith. Kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. And to look back over thirty-two years to this present hour has been a very humbling thing, as I have dared to face honestly the frightening reality of certain periods in my own life when there was an inward coldness, when there was an estrangement from God, a declension from secret prayer, when on the other hand, known only to God and my own soul, there were literally raging fires of evil passions and imaginations that it would be unrighteous to confess to any ear but the ear of God Himself. And I'm not indulging in excessive rhetoric when I say that. That's the truth. And knowing something of what is yet in this heart, the fact that I stand here today, in the threshold of my fifty-first year, as a Christian man and a minister of the gospel, is not only a monument

20:51 to the saving grace that comes sovereignly on the threshold, but to the certainty of the grace that keeps all those who are truly brought within its orbit. And what a wonderful thing it is to know that beneath that keeping work of God is that fourfold strand that cannot be broken, God's own eternal, immutable purpose spoken of in Romans 8, 29, whom He did foreknow, He did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. God in eternity committed Himself to take this fallen Son of Adam and so to work in Him by His grace and so to keep Him that one day, one day, this fallen Son of Adam will be a perfect image bearer of the glorified Lord Jesus Christ. And that's the first great strand by which that keeping grace operates. It is embedded even as those great cables of the suspension bridge, the George Washington Bridge and the Verrazano Bridge, those great cables that hold the bridge are embedded deeply in the rocks of the palisades. In the case of the George Washington Bridge, and literally in thousands of tons of concrete in the case of the Verrazano Bridge.

22:16 So that which keeps us, God's keeping grace is embedded in His own eternal, sovereign, unchanging purpose. Then it is also embedded in the purpose of the very death of Christ. Why did He die? Ephesians 5 tells us, He gave Himself for us that He might do what?

22:41 That He might eventually present Him, present us to Himself without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. He died to have a presentation. He died that He might present His own bride to Himself. And because Christ will not be robbed of the fruit of His death, there is the certainty of God's keeping grace.

23:09 And then there is His constant intercession. This, as it were, takes the certainty secured by divine purpose and purchase and brings it into a very personal realm. Hebrews 7.25, Wherefore He is able to save to the uttermost, to the consummation, all who come unto God by Him.

23:31 Why? Seeing He ever lives to make intercession for them. The intercession of Christ, some of which, at least in part, is given to us in John 17. Father, keep them whom Thou hast given Me.

23:46 Keep them, He prays. And His intercession is efficacious before the Father. And then there is the indwelling of the Spirit, Ephesians 4.30.

23:57 Grieve not the Holy Spirit by whom you are sealed unto the day of redemption. What a fourfold cord is the very ground of our security. God's immutable, eternal purpose to conform us to the image of His Son. The death of Christ, the intercession of our Savior, the indwelling of the Spirit.

24:21 And as I stand before you as a Christian man, I stand not only as a monument of the sovereignty of saving grace, but the certainty of keeping grace, but further, as a monument of the constancy of guiding grace, the constancy of guiding grace. You children who have memorized the 23rd Psalm, you remember that one of the most precious phrases in that Psalm is this, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He what?

24:53 He leads me beside the still waters. He guides me in paths that lead to heaven. He guides me in paths that lead to heaven. He guides me in paths that lead to heaven.

25:08 He gives me the means of righteousness for his name's sake. You see, it is the responsibility of the shepherd whenever he takes a sheep into his flock, the onus for guidance is upon the shepherd. Sheep are dumb creatures, vulnerable creatures, creatures liable to go astray, and that's why they need shepherds. And the shepherd takes upon himself to guide his sheep, and how I thank God as I stand in your presence today, that if I'm If anything at all, I'm a monument of the constancy of that guiding grace.

25:44 For Proverbs 16.9 reminds us that many, many times what we purpose is not what God has planned. And God wonderfully overrules what we have purposed to accomplish what He has planned. Proverbs 16.9, a man's heart devises his way, but the Lord directs his steps.

26:05 We make our plans, even prayerfully at times, carefully weighing all the factors and commit ourselves to what we believe to be the will and purpose of God. But then it all turns out backwards. And then we look back and we see how wisely and graciously, though we were purposing in one direction, God was ordering in another. He leads us in paths of righteousness for His name's sake.

26:36 Amen. Amen. These past days I've reflected upon that as it has touched such vital matters of my own life and ministry. This whole matter of preparation for one's life's work.

26:48 What a marvelous thing it has been to trace out all the ways that God, long before I had a notion of what my life's work would be, was preparing me. For example, because they are here, I feel even more liberty to say it. I've had people ask me, they say, Pastor Martin, I notice that, you pronounce your words so distinctly and you enunciate so clearly that even though I'm hard of hearing, I can hear you. And I notice that you always have your face up when you speak.

27:18 So if I need to read lips a little bit, I can do that. Have you had some professional speech training? I said, well, yes and no.

27:27 I was born into a home with a mother who was afflicted with a serious hearing loss. And to make life a little more tolerable for her, I had to learn how to look directly at her face and to use all of this apparatus when I spoke. God trained me by means of my mother's affliction that I might learn to speak distinctly and to enunciate clearly. And if you wonder why I always have to drink that water, when you use all of that apparatus when you're speaking, it gets dried out very quickly.

27:57 You've got to lubricate it. It runs out of oil.

28:02 And then I think of the wonderful relationship God has given me to you, dear children. And people have asked me, they say, Pastor Martin, how is it you get along so well with children? Well, you see, God put me at the top end of a family of ten, not the bottom end. I don't know what it's like to think of home without little brothers and sisters.

28:22 And then watching my mother and father in their interaction with the children, my father being the more reserved and the steadying factor, my mother being a bit on the, what shall I say respectfully, on the abandoned side with the children, she would be the one that would sing more of the silly songs and ditties, and I'd pick that up from her. And God was training me to be a pastor of a church that one day would have the majority of its members young families with little ones. God knew what he was doing. I didn't have a clue, but he knew what he was doing.

28:57 He knew what he was doing. And I stand as a monument of the constancy of his guidance in preparing me for my life's work. And I could trace out so many other areas as I've been doing in recent days. But then also with reference to the whole, the whole matter of my life's partner.

29:17 I didn't have one hundredth of the understanding many of you young people have of how you go about seeking a wife in a godly manner. I just thought you waited till you got zapped, you dated a while, and if everything seemed to be all right, you got married. It was very simple back in those days.

29:34 That's right. And I see some of you shaking your head. Well, in a sense, maybe it was too simple. But God takes us where we are.

29:44 And how I thank him, that in spite of my ignorance about how to go about it the right way, and perhaps even the most biblical way, God wonderfully guided in giving me a life's partner who has on the positive side been such a support in all of my life and ministry, and from the negative side has never given me occasion to be embarrassed that I chose her to be my wife. Then in terms of theological understanding, I look back over the years of wandering from one school of thought to another, trying one philosophy of the Christian life after another, wondering, Lord, where does reality lie? Does your word in any way fit in the goodness of God by a very strange path leading me to an understanding? And when I came to some self, some conscious awareness of what that understanding was and looked over my shoulder, I saw that it was mainstream historic Christianity embodied in all the great creeds and confessions that came out of the Reformation and have come down to us this day as a wonderful heritage. And then in terms of my place of labor, that's a humbling, very humbling thing. God said to David, never forget it, David, when you're king, I called you from tending sheep.

31:07 Well, God called me to be your pastor from shoveling manure, literally. Literally! Literally! I was in an itinerant ministry, and a friend of mine had started a new work some 30, 40 miles from here, and they bought out an old Catholic retreat center, and it had a home with a chapel and had a big barn.

31:29 They were going to turn the barn into a youth center, but the problem is they had no bathrooms. So the section that used to keep the bulls, literally bull pens, not the kind they have for baseball games where the guy warms up, but I mean real bull pens where bulls were kept in a pen. And there was dung dried on three to four inches thick. And he said, we've got to somehow get that off.

31:51 I'll pay you 15 bucks a day if you'll soak that stuff to get it activated enough to shovel it. And that's what I was doing to earn an honorable wage between meetings when God first led me into this area. How strange are the ways of God. We could trace out many of the other details, but I only give you that much that I hope it will help you to rejoice with me in the God of grace, who is not only the God of sovereign saving grace, the God who is committed to the certainty of keeping his people, but who is constant in guiding his people into paths of righteousness for his name's sake. That's all I want to say about the grace of God. There's so much more that could be said. But now I want to turn to a second category.

Four Crucial Spiritual Perspectives

32:51 If you were to ask me, Pastor Martin, in the light of God's goodness to you that you've been speaking about, from the human side, what are the inner perspectives of the word of God in the Christian life that are really the driving force of your walk with God and your attempt to serve him as a servant of Christ? And while acknowledging, as I've already done, that it is all of grace, from the human side, I would bear witness to four very crucial spiritual perspectives that have dominated my Christian life and my Christian ministry. Under the constraint of love to Christ, these four principles have dominated. Number one, a determination to give priority to life and character over gifts and service. The determination to give priority to life and character over gifts and service. And where did I ever get that notion?

34:07 Straight from the Word of God. 1 Timothy 4.16, Paul says to Timothy, Take heed unto yourself, first of all, and then to your teaching. He says to the Ephesian elders, Acts 20.28, Take heed unto yourself, to all of the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you an overseer. He says to Titus in Titus 2.7, In all things, showing yourself an example. Again he says to Timothy, Be thou an example of the believers.

34:46 Yes, he says, stir up the gift of God that is in thee. Yes, he says, these things command and teach. Yes, he says, Do the work of an evangelist. Fulfill thy ministry.

34:58 I'm fully aware of that. But the Bible speaks of a priority of life and character over gift and service.

35:08 Jesus said in the last day, There'll be people with tremendous claims to gift and service who'll be sent to hell. Matthew 7.21 Many will say in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied? Have we not cast out demons?

35:24 Have we not done? Many mighty works. Gifts and service abound.

35:31 But he said, depart from me, you workers of iniquity. Life and character were deficient. There's not a record anywhere in the Bible that anyone will come in the last day and say, But, O Lord, did you not give me an attachment to your Son that made me jealous to be as holy as a redeemed sinner could be? Did you not give me a desire to trample underfoot the lusts and passions of my, and to live a holy life, to be as holy in the inner chambers of my mind as I am in the outer corridors of my life?

36:05 You don't find any record of Jesus saying to someone claiming that, Depart from me, I never knew you. The Bible teaches that gifts and service can operate devoid of grace. But nowhere does the Bible say inner character and true grace can operate without grace. And God, God burnt that into my spiritual fiber very early in my Christian experience.

36:35 If it meant, as a high school kid who's still a hollow leg coming home when I'd have to preach on a Tuesday night at the little mission there in Stanford, Connecticut, if it meant I had to skip my meal in order to spend an hour praying before I spent another hour or two preparing the sermon, praying for the needs of my own soul, had to come first. And God, taught me by a strange, but I thank Him, blessed discipline, by the pressure of unusual responsibility all through my college days and on into the itinerant ministry that His greatest concern did not have to do with my mouth. It had to do with my heart and with my character. And you don't understand this, preacher, unless you understand that that conviction by the grace of God burns within his breast to this day. Some have asked me at times, Pastor, wasn't that hard for you to stand up and confess to the whole congregation that you lied right in the service? Well, frankly, no.

37:40 I don't find that too hard.

37:43 I find something far more hard to think what God will say if I dare to use my mouth in His name while I'm knowingly tolerating sin in His presence. He killed a couple of people in the book of Acts for that.

38:00 Didn't He?

38:02 Our God is a consuming fire. And He's far more concerned with life and character than gifts and service. And then a second perspective that has been very fundamental and through which I trust the grace of God has operated is this, the determination to have a good conscience at any cost.

38:28 Acts 24.16 Herein do I exercise myself to have always a conscience void of offense to God and to man. Herein do I exercise myself to have at all times a conscience that is clear and uncondemned and blood-washed in the presence of God and a conscience uncondemned in horizontal relationships.

39:00 And again, God burnt that determination into me very early. And living in a large family, very easy to have many occasions when you need to fess up. Now, I thank God. That's one thing we were made to do as children, to say I'm sorry.

39:15 And as I indicated a few weeks ago, we even get spanked if we said I'm sorry with the lips, but it was evident there was no sorry in the spirit. But I can never forget when God saved me. And some of my brothers and sisters would do things that were wrong to me and they didn't apologize. And I'd want to rationalize and say, well, look, they've done you wrong here.

39:34 They haven't said them right. And the issue was this. My child, do you want to get on your knees and pray and have a good conscience? Then you go say I'm sorry.

39:41 I'm sorry. You confess your sin. Regardless of whether they acknowledge theirs, that's not the issue. What is that to thee?

39:49 Follow thou me. That determination to have a good conscience at any cost. Many times in college it would mean bowing over my books, asking God to bless my studies, and then God would bring to remembrance that I'd exaggerated something at the table a few hours before at the dinner table. Or maybe out in the ball field I'd allowed a spirit of anger to surface and God would start dealing with me.

40:14 Go seek that person out. Make that thing right. Confess it. But Lord, I've got studies to do.

40:19 Yes, you do. Yes, that's right. But then I'd have to go seek them out and find them. Ask forgiveness.

40:27 Humble myself. Why? There was the determination to have a conscience void of offense to God and man at any cost.

40:37 Thirdly, there was the determination and is to do the revealed will of God at any cost. The determination to do the revealed will of God at any cost. And the revealed will of God, I mean God's will as revealed in Scripture. For Jesus said in John 14, 21, He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me.

41:07 Again he said, if you love me, you'll do whatever I have commanded you. And again the Apostle Paul could say, I count not my life, as dear unto myself, in order that I may do what? That I may finish the course that God has mapped out for me. And that determination to do the revealed will of God at any cost has earned me with some people the reputation of being very stubborn and intransigent.

41:34 Well, I'm not naturally a stubborn person. And I say these things in the presence of my parents. I hope it adds a little more validation. I don't know if I've heard my dad say this, but I've heard my mother say I was the easiest of all the kids to discipline.

41:49 That I broke the quickest and the easiest. So I don't think I'm naturally stubborn. And I do know that I was very naturally timid in many social relationships.

42:00 What some regard as stubbornness of temperament is not that. It's the inlay of grace. The inlay of grace that has brought this natively self-centered sinner to the place where he's convinced that the only way I can truly validate my professed love to Christ is to live by His Word and to minister by that Word.

42:31 And then in the fourth place, God was pleased to implant in me very early in grace the determination to fear no man's face, but to fear only God. The determination to fear no man's face. And why is this so vital? Because Paul says in Galatians chapter 1 that, that if he should yet fear men, he should cease to be the servant of God.

42:58 The moment a man-fearing spirit in any way regulates the manner in which we relate to people, particularly when it comes to divine truth, at that point, we cease to be Christ's bond slaves. And that's why Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 7.23, you've been bought with a price. Do not become the servants of men.

43:23 I have been purchased to be Christ's free man and in obedience to the Word of God to say to any man, any woman, in any situation, this is what Almighty God says to you.

43:38 And be prepared for the consequences.

The Approbation of Conscience

43:43 And I stand before you today to bear witness to the fact that God in His goodness, though at times some of these things have flickered, other times they've burned more brightly, I believe I can say God, being witness to my conscience, that these great principles were wrought in my soul very early in my Christian experience. And I've never had occasion to regret that God worked them into the fabric of my inner life, on the threshold of my manhood. And as I look back over these years, that's what's been so humbling, that God should have done that. When I sat and opened up cards for my brothers and sisters yesterday, you'll understand why I found it difficult to study Mark 2. One of them wrote, saying, as I reflected upon the words of this text, be an example of the believers, I immediately thought upon this verse, through the years, you've been such an example to me, not necessarily in personalized instruction, especially for me, but by your steadfast, faithful, persevering desire to be God's man, to be God's man, and that example of which 1 Timothy 4.12 speaks. The light from your life has shone brightly upon my path when my own light has gotten so dim

45:11 I thought it might go out. I'm so thankful to God for the encouragement I've received through those times. May God continue to be praised through the many lives your life has touched. I know that is you.

45:28 I know that is you. I know that is you.

45:31 I know that is you. To have that testimony from one's own blood sister and similar testimonies from those who know me best, I believe I can say before God, I wouldn't exchange that for all the money piled up in Wall Street tomorrow morning. I wouldn't trade that for any throne upon the face of this earth. To have the approbation of the consciences of those who know me best to say, there is a man, in whom grace has wrought what only grace can do.

46:09 If I can have that testimony from my brothers and sisters and earthly mother and father and my fellow elders and you, the dear people of God, then in a sense, the world can do what it will.

Concerns: Indwelling Sin and Stunted Growth

46:22 One lives and dies a wealthy man. But then, I do not only stand before you a monument of grace and a reflection of someone who's been molded by those principles, but in the final place. I stand before you here on two weeks after my 50th birthday with a measure of heaviness of heart. And I don't like to end on a sour note, but I'd be less than honest because there are some deep concerns that burn within my breast.

46:58 And I want to share those concerns with you briefly and hopefully they will give direction to your own prayers, both with me and for me. In the days to come. And what are those concerns that cause me grief? Well, the first and foremost is the measure to which my own indwelling sin still finds so many expressions.

47:22 What a horrible thing it is to think that 32 years of living under the canopy of God's special saving mercy has in so many ways resulted in so little change in all of us. altogether too many areas, to find angry and impatient passions still cropping up, and to find the other dark, ghostly shadows of one's own remaining corruption often lurking in the heart. It's a horrible thing. And as I look back, I have to say, I think I understand a little bit more what the Word of God says, that you will remember your sins and blush and never again open your mouth. People say, well, when you receive the kind of tribute you receive from your relatives and fellow ministers, doesn't that tend to puff you up?

48:21 I believe I can honestly say that doesn't gender pride. It's like Peter when the great draft of fishes was brought in and he knew he was unworthy of a miracle. He fell down at the feet of Jesus and said, Lord, depart from me. I'm an unclean man. I say, how would my sister ever write that letter? If she knew what was in here, if she even once happened to put her ear by the place where I pray and hear some of the things I have to confess to God that are known only to Him, would she be able to say that? And my deep concern as I face whatever years yet remain to me is that I may make progress in grace, that I may ripen in grace, that I may not, as so many recorded in Scripture and how I was thrilled when Pastor Nichols told me that that the burden of your prayer for me when I was in England, that in this last segment of my life,

49:18 I would not undo by spiritual carelessness all that's been done in the previous years. David did. Solomon did. Isaiah did. Others recorded in Scripture who began well, who ran well through the middle of the race, but they barely made it to the finish line. And when they did, they did at the expense of God. In God's glory and the undoing of so much good, I ask you to plead with me that I may above all else guard my heart, for out of it are the issues of life. But then there's a second cause for real heaviness. I look back over these 50 years, and I contemplated afresh that 20-plus of those years

50:06 have been spent in this area preaching the Word of God, 22 years to be exact. You know what frightens me? I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm afraid that I'm not going to be able Some of you were lost and in your sins when I came here from the bullpen 22 years ago. To my knowledge, you're still as lost now as you were then. What a horrible thing. All the preaching you've heard, and it hasn't been just take it or leave it preaching. There's been an earnest appeal that you might forsake your sins and flee to Christ. There has been earnest entreaty that you flee from the wrath to come, and yet you sit wedded to your sins. Some of you it's not been 22 years, but it's been a good 10 years, 5 years.

51:02 Some of you young people, you've come from pre-teen into puberty, and now on the threshold of your manhood and womanhood, and you've heard the entreaties and the pleas from the Word of God.

51:16 And I thought of those words this morning when God said to His people, You know, all the day long I stretch out my hands to a gainsaying and disobedient people. And I thought of the words of the prophet Elijah when he said, How long, how long will you go limping between two opinions?

51:37 And that which makes my heart less than 100% glad today is that I must say those words to some of you. How long go ye limping? How long limping, limping, limping, limping between two opinions? If God is God, serve Him.

51:56 Why linger? Why cling to the sins that increasingly blind and bind you and will ultimately damn you when a gracious and a willing Savior is freely offered? My heart is not only made heavy by my own remaining corruption and the impenitent among us, but by some of you whose growth has been so stunted. You remember the writer to Hebrews says, The time when you ought to be teaching, teachers of others, you have need that one teach you again the first principles of God's truth.

52:32 What a tragedy to see some of you flourishing under the preaching of the Word while others have such stunted growth.

52:41 You know the cause of the stunted growth. Perhaps only you and God know that cause.

52:50 The apostle Paul again and again pleaded with his writers, Make my heart glad. And what was his appeal? Not by giving Him something, but by becoming something. And that is by becoming obedient, fruitful servants of Jesus Christ.

Concerns: National Decline and Gospel Impact

53:07 And then finally, my heart is heavy as I think of the state of our nation, and as we contemplate as a congregation the erection of that second phase of our building program. Think of our longing to have a greater impact upon this community. We think of our precious children, the little ones, and realize that they can no longer go to the corner store as we did as kids and look through a glass pane and pick out little penny candy. What cost a penny then cost 25 cents now, but that's not the only difference.

53:44 We dare not send them to the corner store because there next to the candy rack is all kinds of glossy filth, pornography, just screaming out at their precious little minds, waiting to capture them. We didn't have that to contend with. The erosion, the pornography, the constant slaughter of unborn infants in the wombs of mothers, the constant erosion of the standards of morality, and this framing iniquity by statute. No man who has been, as it were, part of both generations can be anything other than pain.

54:29 I'm old enough to have lived long enough to have remembered a better day. Sin was always sin, and unconverted people were always unconverted people, yes. But there was a level of restraining grace all the way from what you found on a magazine rack to what you found in the textbooks in the school. Much of that has been eroded.

54:58 And though we give God thanks for all that we've seen Him do in our day, we cannot be content until God so comes upon the preaching of the Word with power and there is such an impact of the Gospel upon the grassroots of our own society that we begin to see the porno shelves cleared and the abortion racket stopped and the rank humanism takes its throne. How can we be content simply to nestle together in this common faith and life and the security of knowing we share these biblical perspectives while the world out there doesn't share them? And our Lord Jesus Christ is robbed of glory in the world that's been made by Him and for Him. And I trust if God is pleased to answer my prayer and the prayer that many of you have said you are praying that God would give us many more years to labor together. May we labor under that common vision that we shall see the Gospel of God triumph in our own community and beyond that, that God will raise up through our academy and other institutions mighty preachers of the Word of God, men who utterly fear, fear no one but God and are utterly committed to preaching

56:24 the whole counsel of His truth and that we would see God in our generation own the preaching of the Word to a turning away from ungodliness and the blatant rejection of God's laws and precepts and through the influence of the Gospel once again see a standard of righteousness in common grace that would affect the entirety of our society. Well, I said it's difficult to order one's thoughts under the tremendous pressure that I felt in recent days but I trust in some little measure as I have attempted to declare what great and gracious things God has done for my own soul that you will rejoice with me before God, that He's been good to an unworthy sinner, He's been gracious to one who is a sinner still and pray that by the grace of God in the years to come it may please the Lord to give me the privilege given to Pastor Clark to pass the three score and seventy mark and then to be able to speak of the grace of God that has kept for an even additional length of time and may the Lord Himself be praised as together we seek to proclaim that grace to our own needy generation.

Prayer of Thanksgiving and Supplication

57:50 Let us pray. Our Father, we do in Your presence acknowledge that it is grace and grace alone that has taken us from the ranks of vile and lost humanity and separated us unto Yourself. How we thank You for that grace. We hear You say to us in Scripture what do You have that You've not received and the answer of our hearts is nothing, Lord.

58:30 We acknowledge ourselves to be the recipients of kindness and mercy undeserved and we pray that under the pressure of that grace we may with all our hearts seek to follow You and serve You. We pray for those that are not yet within the orbit of that grace. O God, draw them even this morning that they may not have to look back over a wasted life. We know that Your grace can save at the very last hour.

59:00 But, O Lord, we pray that You would so move upon these dear children and young men and women that they would not have a wasted life. But, O God, a life lived to Your praise and under the power of Your grace. Seal then Your word. Bless, we pray, the effort to extol Your mercy in the company of Your people this morning.

59:26 Write, we pray, upon our hearts these vital principles of the Christian life that we may live in their light as we seek to walk in Your fear. Hear us and receive our thanks as we offer it in Jesus' name. Amen.