Content, Part 2

Recap of Preaching Principles and the Law's Centrality

0:00 Now, as Dr. DeWitt has indicated, brethren, and as your schedule of the week of conference has already informed you, we do take up again tonight the very weighty and vast theme of the preaching that quickens. In our initial study last evening, and I know there are a few of you who were not with us on that occasion, and so for your benefit I will just briefly underscore what we attempted to set before the minds of the brethren gathered in this place. We began by highlighting three very basic principles that must condition all of our

0:41 thinking with respect to the subject of preaching in relationship to quickening and revival. And I call those principles, first of all, the centrality of preaching in the work of quickening. And because we believe the...

0:59 Scriptures clearly teach that revival is essentially an intensification, an expansion, an augmentation of the ordinary work of the Holy Spirit, our view of the relationship of preaching to revival grows out of that understanding. And no one who is serious with the Scriptures would debate the fact that preaching is central in the accomplishment of the ordinary. And therefore, since revival is but the intensification, the augmentation of that ordinary work, it

1:41 should not surprise us to find that preaching is also central both in the precipitation, the sustaining, and the extending of the blessing of divine quickening. And then we concentrated in the second place upon the principle. The first principle is the sovereignty of the Spirit in conjunction with the preaching that quickens. We must always remind ourselves that the Spirit is free and sovereign in His working, even in conjunction with the most biblical preaching.

2:18 The most focused, concentrated statements of divine truth, the most searching, penetrating applications of that truth. Will not, in and of themselves, produce quickening, sustain, or extend the quickening influence of God. God is utterly free and sovereign in terms of His working in connection with the preaching that quickens. And then finally, we concentrated our attention upon the principle that I call the general congruity between divinely appointed ends.

2:59 So-called滬mél envie au Sugar . Tho we take second place to none in our affirmation of conviction in the sovereignty of the Spirit, I trust we take second place to none in our equally firm affirmation that God who has appointed His own ends has appointed means to those ends, in most cases very congruence or suitable to those ends. 0.28.

3:29 work capriciously. And if we understand that, then we will not feel that we are entering into the realm of manipulation or a humanistic view of revival if we give ourselves to a lifelong examination of the very subject we are considering. What kind of preaching is it that God has most frequently owned in bringing the blessing of divine quickening to men? Now, with those principles conditioning our thinking again this evening, we want to proceed to take up the second, the third,

4:08 the fourth, and hopefully even one or two more of those truths which God has most frequently owned in bringing quickening to his people. We are examining those centrally, The central truths of the Word of God, which though not preached with equal emphasis in every awakening, are nonetheless the basic patterns of truth which God has most frequently owned in seasons of revival.

4:41 We touched upon the first one last night, the preaching of the strictness and the spirituality of the law of God. And I'm not going to go back and re-preach that material, but because I've become aware even today that some of you are wrestling with this whole issue of the place of the law in conjunction with evangelism and the work of sanctification, may I urge upon you not only a serious consideration of the biblical materials,

5:11 but if anyone rejects the position espoused and declared from this pulpit last night, based particularly upon Romans chapter 3, Romans 7 and 1 Timothy 1, he has the embarrassing task of somehow explaining why the most solid and pure revivals in the history of the church have almost without exception been marked by that very emphasis. It means that if that emphasis...

5:43 It means that if that emphasis is a reversal to a sub-Christian perspective and is antithetical to the freeness and power of the gospel, that God has most effectually blessed men with the freeness and the power of that gospel when that perspective has been central in the preaching, namely the strictness and the spirituality of the law of God. So I leave that with those of you who still may be wrestling with the issue. Don't...

6:14 Don't jettison the position which is not only patently biblical, which has been the historic mainstream confession of those bodies who love the truth of the word of God, but has also been that to which God has borne witness in his own works through history. Now then we move on to a second of these truths which God has indeed frequently owned with power in bringing...

The Necessity, Nature, and Fruits of the New Birth

6:45 Now then we move on to a second of these truths which God has indeed frequently owned with power in bringing... ...and has been quickening to his church.

6:48 Frequently this truth has been central in the midst of seasons of awakening. And it is the truth that I am calling the necessity, nature, and fruits of the new birth. Now since our brother Randy Pizzino is to preach to us on the doctrine of regeneration, I am not concerned to expound that doctrine, but simply to underscore the fact that it has...

7:15 ...has been the preaching of this doctrine, particularly with respect to its necessity, its nature, and its fruits, which has frequently been owned of God in seasons of quickening.

7:30 John Owen has perceptively stated that the two greatest religious lies by which multitudes are undone to their eternal ruin are these. Number one, to think that...

7:46 ...that one is prepared for heaven while he is a stranger to the new birth.

7:53 And then secondly, to believe that one has been a recipient of the new birth while his life has not undergone a radical, ethical, and moral transformation.

8:07 Owen's wise pastoral perspective brought him to the conclusion that these two errors, perhaps more than any others, ...that these two errors, perhaps more than any others, ...that these two errors, perhaps more than any others,

8:17 ...and the souls of multitudes, to assume that they were prepared for heaven while strangers to the new birth, ...and to assume that they had received the new birth while there was no evidence of a radical, ethical, moral, and religious transformation.

8:39 Now it is precisely to these areas of delusion that John, in particular, addresses himself. And the third chapter...

8:48 ...the chapter of John, particularly John 3, 3, 3, 5, and 3, 7, are texts which bear down upon this very issue of the absolute necessity of the new birth.

9:04 Except a man be born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Marvel not that I said unto thee, ...ye.

9:18 ...he must be born again.

9:22 And it is our Lord's words opened up and pressed upon the consciences of men as to the necessity, nature, and fruits of the new birth, ...which under the blessing of the Holy Spirit will undercut that delusive notion that men are prepared for heaven while strangers to the new birth.

9:43 And then it is in a very special way, the book of 1 John, which attacks... ...secondary, here are people who claim to be recipients of divine life and who have come to the knowledge of God by virtue of God's work in them and for them.

10:01 And in the book of 1 John, the emphasis falls upon those things in the realm of the ethical and moral transformation attendant upon the new birth. And perhaps for many of you, preaching through the book of 1 John would be the instrument God would use...

10:18 ...to bring, if not a general awakening, hopefully at least some out of this second delusion.

Conquering Foes with the Doctrine of New Birth

10:27 Now in the history of the church, several formidable foes have continually arisen and have periodically crippled the life and, of course, subsequently or consequently, the testimony of the church. And some of these foes can best be conquered...

10:48 The doctrine of the new birth, properly expounded and applied, is pressed upon the consciences of men. For instance, the church has often been brought into a moribund state through the cancerous influence of sacramentalism. Now a layman's definition of sacramentalism is simply this. The assumption that a religious ritual has placed one in a position of safety.

11:20 For some, if they have water and wafer, all is well. Sacramentalism. They had water from the hands of a duly constituted priest. They regularly have the wafer placed upon their lips by a duly consecrated priest.

11:37 And having water and wafer, all is well. But you see, we won't get a chance to preach to masses of Roman Catholics in Roman Catholic churches, at least as things now appear. If we have to. If we have the opportunity, seize it.

11:52 Not in an ecumenical service, brethren. But I mean that seriously. If you ever get invited to preach in a Roman Catholic church, not in conjunction with an ecumenical service, and have it understood that you're free to preach whatever you want to preach, then seize that opportunity and be a herald of God and go after the terrible, tragic lie of sacramentalism. There is a crippling sacramentalism in our own circles.

12:18 The sacramentalism that says that... That if there has been the raising of the hand, the exercise of the legs down an aisle, and the bowing of the head and the mouthing of a prayer, all is well.

12:31 You see, we have a sacramentalism not of water and wafer from the sacred man, but we have a sacramentalism in many of our churches, which is born of the raised hand, the walked aisle, and the parrot-like repeated prayer. And if people can remember...

12:52 Remember that the hand has been raised, the aisle has been walked, the head has been bowed, the prayer has been prayed, all is well. That is nothing but naked, ugly sacramentalism. There is nothing calculated to cut to the heart of it, like biblical preaching on the new birth. Because, you see, the emphasis in biblical preaching on the new birth does not fall upon what you have done, or what the sacred man has done, but whether Almighty God...

13:24 God has done something which bears the stamp of His own gracious omnipotence upon the soul of man.

13:35 And there is another ugly foe, that of formalism. And I'll give you a layman's definition of formalism. The assumption that all is well when one is engaged in religious activity, that is, he's at the right place, at the right time, with the right people, doing the right thing.

13:58 Right place, right time, right people, doing the right thing. And whether or not there is any engagement of the mind and of the heart, whether or not there is any genuine relish in the things of God, never enters the mind of the formalists. His conscience is so conditioned that if he can look back and assure himself that on enough occasions he has indeed been in the right place, at the right time, with the right people, doing the right things, then all is well. Do you see how calculated is the doctrine of the new birth to cut to the heart of that?

14:42 Particularly when preached in the context of John chapter 3. For if ever there was a man who was always at the right place, at the right time, with the right people, and doing the right...

14:59 The teacher in Israel. Every time the temple doors were open, for appointed feasts, he was there. And no doubt involved in all of the other rituals. And yet he was a mere formalist.

15:17 Brethren, let's not assume that we cannot, in our own churches, where there is solid biblical and reformed preaching, fall prey to this vicious foe of the souls of men called formalism.

15:32 And this is why we need to preach the necessity, nature, and fruits of the new birth to attack this enemy of the souls of men. Not only sacramentalism, but formalism. And then there is a third great foe who has often stalked through the church and left devastation in his wake. And that foe I am calling notionalism.

15:54 The assumption that religious notions clearly understood and gladly confessed constitute the essence of true religion.

16:10 Notionalism is the idea that clearly perceived religious truth, even orthodox truth, being confessed, is of the essence of saving religion. Whereas the Bible clearly teaches that it is possible to draw near with the lips, while the heart is far from God. The Bible clearly teaches it is possible to have very accurate, high, and elevated views of divinity, the divine truth. These things are open for the inspection of all.

16:52 And yet to be a total stranger to the inward perception of that truth by the illumination of the Spirit of God. I would not go so far as Hodge goes to say that the very essence of regeneration is divine illumination. Some of the theologians have taken that position. But surely one of the major factors in the work of God in regeneration is the importance of the divine truth.

17:17 The impartation of that ability to perceive divine truth, not in the abstract, but in its perfect suitability to the state of my own sinful soul, and so to perceive it as to give myself up to the love and the power of it. There is the difference between a regenerate soul as it looks at truth and the unregenerate. Paul could say of the Romans, chapter 6 and verse 17, God be thanked that you who were the slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to that form of doctrine literally unto which you were delivered.

17:59 And he describes their conversion as a work of God in which they were delivered into the mold of divine truth so that after God delivered them, all the lineaments of their lives were drawn from the shape of the Gospel. It was the mold into which God was delivered. It was the mold into which God was delivered. It was the mold into which God was delivered.

18:18 It was the mold into which God was delivered. It was the mold into which God was delivered. They were cast. And notionalism, my dear brethren, can easily become a cause and a source of deadness as the excitement of coming to a discovery of truths long buried in the rubble of ignorance.

18:38 That excitement passes, and people no longer discover the truth of election as though for the first time they had seen something beautiful and something awesome, and as we have our second and third generation reformed Christians coming along, and we ought to have them more and more, we will be prone to fall before this dread enemy of vital godliness, this enemy of notionalism, and nothing, or perhaps few things, more than powerful, pointed preaching on the necessity, nature, and fruits of the new birth will counteract that great enemy.

19:23 And then I must mention another one. That's the whole enemy of presumptionalism. I've coined the word to give you all isms. Now, presumptionalism is simply the thinking that if I have the right bloodlines and the right associations with people who are in a state of grace, then I must automatically be in a state of grace.

19:51 And I was so glad that our brother Daniel Ray, as a convinced, pedobaptist, sounded that note today. That note that in his last paragraph, in treating the subject of Zwingli and the sacraments, Cunningham in his masterful work, The Reformers and the Theology of the Reformation, says as a convinced pedobaptist, that until we see in our children the positive evidences of regeneration, we are to treat them and preach to them, and pray for them, as those who are under the wrath of God.

20:33 That's why experimental Calvinists of Baptist and pedobaptist persuasion can meet in such intimate bonds of fellowship and shared ministry, because we abominate any doctrine of presumptive regeneration, presuming for whatever reason, presumptive regeneration in Baptist circles, where many don't have infant baptism, but they have toddler baptism. And as soon as the kid can raise his lily white and pray his little prayer in the Bible Club afternoon session, he's rushed into a profession and dunked under the water, taken into the membership,

21:17 and everyone assumes all is well. So this danger of presumptive regeneration is not only a danger of those who hold a view of God's covenantal administration, which regards the church as composed of the believing seed, I'm sorry, believers and their seed, but it is also a danger of those who hold a different view of the nature of the church as composed of only confessed disciples. And I commend to you, brethren, in this day when there is so much cheap and tawdry talk about being born again, don't be bullied away from a biblical subject

22:01 because of the abuse of biblical terminology. If you're like me, I've almost been embarrassed to use the term, born again, because one can just think of a former president with his big grin talking about being born again. Half-converted athletes desecrating the Lord's day before millions! While smiling, did he help them back somebody's head on the 40-yard line because they're born again?

22:51 Meaning, who obviously are either pitifully ignorant while having perhaps some slight dimensions of the root of the matter in them, use the term so glibly, or alas, I feel in most cases, people who've been utterly deceived are using sacred biblical terminology in a way that is totally foreign to the intention of Holy Scripture. It is said of the great Whitefield that during the course of his lifetime, that he preached on the text, he must be born again, no fewer than 300 times. And someone apparently who had heard him preach on the text many times asked him on one occasion, Mr. Whitefield,

23:35 why? Why do you constantly preach, ye must be born again? Ye must be born again! Why do you thunder this nose again and again and again?

23:47 To his inquirer, Whitefield answered, because, sir, ye must be born again. In other words, he was saying, the emphasis I lay upon that truth grows out of my conviction that it is true. And brethren, do we believe that those dear people who sit before us week after week, in the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing, amongst the right people, we see precious little, if any, almighty work of God in them. Do we believe

24:31 that they are born again? Yes, they bring forth the positive fruits of the new birth. They have no grounds to regard themselves candidates for heaven. They are born again.

The Reality and Centrality of Justification by Faith

24:47 The very voices raised in doxology on Sunday morning will join the chorus of the damned who weep, who wail, and who gnash their teeth with holy passion and compassion and with incisiveness, and with the ability to get into the consciences of men. Oh, that we may thunder with renewed energy the biblical doctrine of the necessity, the nature, and the fruits of the new birth. But then there is a third category of truth which God has graciously owned

25:31 again and again in seasons of quickening. And it is the truth that I am calling the reality and centrality of justification by faith as an immediate gospel privilege. The reality and the centrality of justification by faith as an immediate gospel privilege. Now, I am aware that amongst the more elite scholars there is considerable debate as to the precise intent

26:12 of Paul in sending his letter to the church at Rome. But surely this much is clear from the first chapter and also from the concluding chapters that Paul intended many times to go to Rome but he was hindered. And he intended to make Rome a stopover as he engaged in further gospel enterprises in the regions beyond. And it is most likely, and this position is taken, by many commentators, that never having been to Rome Paul is anxious to set before them in clear form the gospel as he preached that gospel

26:55 as he would preach it if he were at Rome as he had preached it again and again throughout the Roman Empire. And he announces his theme in the well-known verses of chapter 1 verses 16 and 17. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For therein now he is going to intimate that which constitutes the heart of the good news which is God's dunamis God's power unto salvation to all who believe.

27:38 For therein is revealed a righteousness of God from faith unto faith. And according to this statement the heart of the gospel which is God's power unto salvation is the declaration of divine righteousness. Now I'm fully aware that according to 2 Corinthians 5 the emphasis falls there upon a reconciliation in conjunction with the provision of that righteousness. I'm fully aware of the other terms that are used by which the gospel is exemplified

28:21 certain aspects of its privileges are described. But surely in this text the apostle is telling us that the heart of that gospel is the setting forth of the way of righteousness from God a righteousness received by faith. Packer makes a statement that I don't know if I'd be willing to be as bold as he is but since his scholarship is much broader and deeper and far more credible than mine I will hide behind him. In his introduction to Buchanan's classic work on justification Packer says this A further fact to weigh is that justification by faith

29:05 has been the central theme of the preaching in every movement of revival and religious awakening within Protestantism from the Reformation to the present day. The essential thing that happens in every true revival is that the Holy Spirit teaches the church afresh the truth of justification by faith both as objective truth and as a living experience. This could be demonstrated historically from the records of revivals that we have and it would be theologically correct to define revival simply as God the Spirit

29:48 doing this work in a situation where previously the church had lapsed if not from the formal profession of justification by faith at least from any living apprehension of it. For the doctrine of justification by faith is like Atlas now you've all seen the picture of Atlas bearing the world upon his back. It bears a world on its shoulders the entire evangelical knowledge of saving grace. The doctrines of election of effectual calling regeneration repentance adoption prayer the church the ministry and the sacraments have all to be interpreted and understood in the light of justification by faith.

30:33 Thus the Bible teaches that God elected men in eternity in order that in due time they might be justified through faith in Christ. He renews their hearts unto the word and draws them to Christ by effectual calling in order that he might justify them upon their believing. Their adoption as God's sons is consequent on their justification indeed it is the positive aspect of God's justifying sentence. And then he goes on to demonstrate that the whole Christian life then grows out of this grand and glorious doctrine concluding with the statement when Atlas falls

31:16 everything that rested upon his shoulders comes crashing down also. Brethren if any truth is desperately needed in our day and if God is pleased to bless those truths which lie closest to the center of the whole world then surely our prayers for revival and quickening our longing to see a divine visitation must be attended with a fresh and powerful and careful and earnest and living imaginative proclamation

Justification's Relevance to Contemporary Challenges

32:01 of this glorious truth the reality of it the centrality of it and the wonderful immediacy of its availability in Jesus Christ to all who believe. Now I say it has peculiar relevance in our day and that for three or four reasons. Number one some of you are ministering in a climate that has been conditioned by liberalism with its horizontal theology. Liberalism the whole religious experience of which never thinks in terms of vertical dimensions.

32:41 Liberalism is preoccupied with horizontals. What we do to our fellow men to help them to advance them to encourage them to be nice to be better to reach out a helping hand to them. And in such a context the concept that as man created in the image of God and fallen in Adam they are accountable to God as their creator and lawgiver and judge those whose consciences have been dulled by the soupy sloshy sentimental notion that God is one amorphous glob of unprincipled love.

33:24 How desperately does this generation influenced by the mentality of liberalism need to have justification preached and the moment you begin to preach it you see you're back to the first line of truth. You've got to preach the strictness the severity the spirituality of the law for the grace of God in justification through Christ as the divine answer to the problem that we have no righteousness of our own righteousness understood in terms of the objective categories of God law accountability in all of its biblical categories.

34:09 And so if any of you are ministering in situations that have been conditioned for a long time by liberalism could it be that God would own with power and some measure of quickening a fresh and concentrated proclamation of this great truth. You remember that the revival that broke out under the ministry of Haldane broke out when he was expounding verse by verse the epistle to the Romans. It's been my privilege to stand in that very building where the spirit of God came upon that man and upon those students to whom he was ministering. Secondly many of us minister in a situation where the charismatic movement

34:53 with its crass subjectivism has taken its toll upon the thinking of multitudes. There is little concern for the objective realities to which the gospel is the divine answer. Everything is sweet Jesus and everything is communion and fellowship and love and feeling oriented in the major charismatic movement. Thank God for some of the exceptions but by and large just turn on the 700 Club and listen for a half an hour if you have the fortitude to do so.

35:30 I try about every three weeks to take in 15 to 20 minutes is about all I can stomach. I don't want to get out of touch with what's going on. And this emphasis comes through again and again and again and again the subjectivism the internalization of the great realities of religious faith. And what more than this doctrine will wrench people's thinking loose from that and set them upon the objective realities of God above them and outside of them to whom they are answered.

36:09 A law that is objective the remains of it the work of it are shown in the hearts is shown in the hearts of men but it needs to be thundered in all of its length and breadth into men's ears. And that standard of righteousness which they have failed to attain is the very righteousness which God in grace in the perfection of the obedience of His own beloved Son has made available to the neediest of sinners. And then of course there is in the third place neo-orthodoxy with its incipient or sometimes blatant universalism. And into such a situation this doctrine must come declaring

36:52 that justification is the blessing of those who believe. It's the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. It is not the power of God unto salvation whether they believe or not. And then fourthly to what I would call an uncertain evangelicalism.

37:11 It's a pathetic thing to see brethren whom we have every reason to call brethren nervously sticking their finger into the water and continually lifting it to see where the latest breeze is blowing. What's the latest evangelical fact? Is it body life? Then we jump on that.

37:29 Is it social consciousness? Well then we must prove to the liberals and all the rest we have a social consciousness. So then everybody starts making pronouncements about social consciousness amongst evangelicals. Is it the church growth movement?

37:41 Putting the finger in the water? Feeling for the slightest zephyr? Jumping as it were on the crest? My brethren, how desperately we need to set a standard and help some of our brethren to see that in any age under any circumstance man's fundamental problem is this the wrath of God is upon us.

38:03 There is nothing but justifying grace in Jesus Christ which can avert it. Therefore I plead with you my brethren if you would amen your prayers for revival with actions that are congruous with those prayers and hopefully would be owned of God then set forth consistently the reality and centrality of justification by faith as an immediate gospel privilege. But then I want to touch quickly upon several other categories and I will move much more quickly through these.

The Necessity, Nature, and Urgency of Repentance and Faith

38:46 In the fourth place a truth often owned of God with unusual power in seasons of quickening is that which I am calling the necessity nature and urgency the necessity nature and urgency of repentance and faith as gospel duties. The necessity nature and urgency of repentance and faith as gospel duties. The scriptures are very clear

39:27 that the hinges on which the door of salvation turns are repentance and faith. From the human standpoint the sinner walks into the wide room of the blessings of God's salvation in Christ when he passes through that door which is Christ as I may say it without being irreverent and we never pass through him who is the door come to embrace him but what there are two hinges repentance and faith. Acts 20.21 Mark 1.15 and 16

40:03 Acts 26.20 and a host of other texts and what needs to be pressed upon men is the necessity as well as the nature but then not only necessity and nature brethren but the urgency of repentance and faith as gospel duties. This is how Paul preached these things on Acts in Acts 17.30 and now God commanded all men everywhere to repent because here's the urgency he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained

40:47 and hath given assurance unto all in that he raised him from the dead. 1 John 3.22 and this is his commandment that we believe in the name of his only begotten son and when the Philippian jailer cries out of the agony of his soul Sirs what must I do to be saved? Thank God Paul and Silas had not been in some schools of theology they would have turned to him with a sober look and said Ah my jailer friend there is a fatal word in your question repeat the question

41:30 Sirs to be saved there it is again the fatal word in your question is the word do my friend you must come to understand there is nothing you can do and then take him to the book of John and read the story about the stirring of the waters and say you are like that impotent man you must simply wait for the stirring of the waters of God's efficacious grace there is nothing you can do and if we give you the impression there is anything you can do we will make an arming of you at midnight and that will never be done

42:11 now brethren I don't say that to be humorous but do you see the thrust of what the apostle said with a verb in the imperative mode he said believe thou shalt be saved and thy house he goes into his house and preaches to this man and to his house the same message the entire household comes to faith and to rejoicing

42:56 in God and his salvation the necessity nature and urgency of repentance and faith as gospel duties and for some of you there may not be much problem in the thinking of your people as to the necessity and even the urgency but the problem lies in the nature of saving faith and true repentance and that's where your work has to be done the Bible gives us a doctrine of differing kinds of faith it speaks in James 2.19 of the faith of the demons in James 2.26 of a dead faith in Luke 8 of a temporary faith

43:39 how long has it been since you preached to your people some discriminating sermons on the nature and distinguishing marks of the faith that is unto life and salvation simply to say believe, believe, believe, believe God has given us in his word the standard by which to proclaim the nature of true and saving faith and likewise with repentance there is the repentance of a Judas which is obviously only remorse and self-recrimination there is the repentance of others that is obviously only a surface repentance we must preach to our people

44:24 the nature of true repentance and often often in seasons of revival and one marvels particularly at the wisdom of a man like Nettleton and Edwards or men like Nettleton and Edwards in this regard the more the ground swell opened up and the revival increased in intensity recognizing that there is an element of a human phenomenon in this matter that is that an element of a human phenomenon in this whole area of revival there is a natural contagion of feeling and emotion these men recognizing that the more the revival advanced the more discriminating they became in their preaching to try to separate the wheat from the chaff

45:07 rather than riding the crest of that excitement and as it were bypassing the discriminating preaching and staying with broad generalities and simply as it were pumping more empty enthusiasm into the religious movement they sought to cut through to the heart of issues and I say brethren this is our great task among many may God grant that we shall be found those who continually thunder into the ears of our people who weep as it were into the hearts of our people the necessity the nature

45:51 and the urgency of repentance and faith as gospel duties and brethren let me say just a word about the urgency you remember that woman that said of Mick Shane he preached as if he were dying to have you converted he preached as if he were dying to have you converted when's the last time an unconverted person sat in your congregation or mine and said to himself well I don't understand what that fool preacher's talking about but one thing is clear

46:31 upon getting me to repent and believe and that's why true preaching is costly it is nothing less than the ringing out of your soul upon your people but what God may come and take those feeble efforts and make them effectual to at least some degree of quickening and reviving now the other three heads I'm just going to give you with a line of emphasis or two and then I'll be done or I'll be done

The Availability and Sincerity of the Inviting Savior

47:15 number five a truth often owns itself a truth often owned of God in seasons of revival is this the availability and sincerity of the inviting Savior and I've chosen my words carefully the availability and sincerity of the inviting Savior again the scriptures are very very clear that Christ in the gospel is available to all who will have him whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved whosoever will let him come and take

48:00 and our Lord's words come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden him that comes to me I will in no wise cast out what is this but a statement of the availability and the sincerity of the inviting Savior himself and according to Romans 10 it is Christ who invites in his own person through by the Spirit through his servants how shall they call on him whom they've not heard Paul can say in Ephesians 2 and 12 he came Christ came to you Ephesians he came and preached peace when did Jesus go to Ephesus

48:45 when a hook-nosed Jew who once despised him came to Ephesus and through that instrument Christ came and preached peace oh brethren listen to me if our gospel preaching shows any less of the sincerity and the availability of the inviting Savior than the Savior himself did in the days of his flesh we miserably misrepresent him there isn't a sinner who stood there in the record of Matthew 11 and could get any other notion when he heard Jesus say

49:28 come and I will give you take my yoke is easy any sinner standing there would have but one conviction he is sincere in his availability and if I come precise impression they must receive under your preaching and under mine and especially if God is pleased to bless our preaching of the law and then begin to experience something of true Holy Spirit conviction

50:12 the thought that God would do anything other than damn them almost becomes a form of obsession and though the great truth of justification by faith a justification based upon the doings and the dying of another plus nothing else it seems too glorious and too far removed and the only way under God to bring smitten sinners from here to the joyful embrace of this is to set before them the inviting Savior himself in all the plenitude of his grace and here is the glory of the gospel

50:54 that the sinner in all the nakedness and destitution of his need and the Savior in all the glory and plenitude and magnitude of his saving power come together in a direct when they take the offered as he so freely presents himself in the gospel I remember preaching in a certain situation where I suspected a few young men had gone a little bit to seed with their Calvinism and I traced some seeds of hyperism in them and in their eyes I was acceptable

51:37 up until that point my Calvinism was unquestionable in their judgment but I said to myself if these fellows have begun to be tinged with hyperism at this formative time in their lives they'll never become earnest pleaders with sinners so I'm going to flush them out tonight so I was to preach evangelistically in the church where they were attending I was having theological lectures during the day so that night I said if they've got any hyperism I'll flush them out so at the end of the sermon I had expounded Isaiah 55 I believe it was Isaiah 53, 6 or 55, 6 and 7 one of those rich gospel passages in the book of Isaiah and then at the end God enabled me to say

52:22 I trust with some degree a felt earnestness to any sinners who were present I was able to say this Christ this Christ has been set before you in the preaching He is yours and I repeated it and sure enough the meeting was no sooner over and I was in the side room and in came the three young men Mr. Martin did we understand you alright tonight? I said I don't know what's troubling you? well we thought we heard you say that Christ is yours

53:05 if you will have them but you were listening while the ascension I handed my Bible and said show me from this book where there is anything unorthodox about that statement when the Savior said him who comes to me I will in no wise cast out when John said as many as received him when Jesus said come and I will give you rest he was saying I am yours if you will have me and oh brethren in our reaction against this Christ dishonoring

53:48 augmentation of man's supposed abode and man's supposed free will let us not be so afraid that someone may suspect that we have a cell or two of Arminianism left in us that we become more fastidious than the Bible I know a few things that bring greater joy than to preach a free unfettered gospel and to believe and to say with Whitfield who was no charismatic to believe to preach a felt Christ in all the freeness of his grace could it be brethren

54:33 could it be I do not accuse I only ask the question and leave the question with your conscience and God could it be that one of the causes why we have not seen more conversions is that we have not yet felt fully comfortable with our new framework of theology let me share with you something in the way of a personal testimony I don't often do this but in the intimacy of this fellowship I think it's warranted it took me a full five years to feel comfortable down to every last cell of my internal being with my new understanding of the word of God to get election effectual calling definite atonement and all of these glorious truths

55:17 sorted out in the light of the scriptures their interrelatedness was one thing that was a journey of about ten years and I'm not I'm not again exaggerating it was a journey of some ten years already being in the ministry I knew anything I saw as truth well I was going to preach it and if I preached it there were others who were going to believe it and God helped me if I jumped at anything quickly and that's one of the things that disturbs me with some of the winds blowing around in our day people so quickly in such a cavalier way shift positions on fundamental issues then as I became convinced of the truths and tried to begin to preach in the light of them I went through tremendous struggles because my tongue and my thinking

56:02 and my emotions my whole being that preaches were conditioned by other perspectives by so long it took a while to feel comfortable with this new and glorious armor but oh my brethren it's been the most comfortable ten years of my life the past ten to say with no tongue in cheek to all men indiscriminately Christ is yours if you will have him not a week effeminate Jesus but the whole Christ in all of his offices in all of the glory of his person as the God-man incarnate crucified risen exalted offered to us in all of the plenitude of his grace

56:47 and all that he purchased is in him and having him it is all ours in you a bit fearful of having someone who may be visiting think that we still have the grave claws of our Arminianism upon us oh may God make us into a body of holy pleaders of gentle entreators a gentle word breaks the bone could it be that the bones of some sinners in your midst are just waiting to be broken by the overtures of the availability and the sincerity of an inviting savior

The Necessity of Holiness

57:31 well then I'll have sat here to do isn't it an enriching meal as the composite picture of a true child of the kingdom.

58:14 And set before your people that this is not an optional mask that they may wear occasionally. It's a description of what they are if grace has invaded their heart.

58:27 Preach Hebrews 12, 14. Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord. Preach the many texts which clearly assert that without holiness, no man shall see the Lord. And often in seasons of revival, it is this truth that has cut through the deadness that has caused the church perhaps to swell its ranks with numbers, but to be dead and lifeless and no impact upon the world because it was no different from the world.

58:59 And oh, if any generation needed this, ours does. The whole idea, the way to win the world is to be like it. And so you see evangelicalism trying to conform to the overall patterns of worldly thought when the world imbibes its anti-Christian, feministic theology. What does the church do?

59:22 Within this very institution, it's happened!

59:26 The church suddenly discovers a new hermeneutic which can stand every pivotal text on assigned roles completely on its ear and make them say the exact opposite. The church suddenly discovers a new hermeneutic The church suddenly discovers a new hermeneutic which is the exact opposite of what they obviously say and mean.

59:42 And so suddenly the evangelical church has discovered its own feminism. And this could be multiplied point after point. What is this but an attack upon the biblical norms of what holiness is? What is holiness for a woman?

59:58 Embracing her identity as a woman with joy and then working out in the power of the Spirit in love to Christ the implications of that identity as a woman with joy. That's delineated in the precepts of the Word of God. What's holiness for a man? It's exactly the same thing.

The Possibility and Desirability of Well-Grounded Assurance

60:19 And brethren, we need to put teeth into our preaching on holiness that it does not consist in fits and feelings but in practical, radical, ethical conformity to the Word of God. And then finally, we need to set forth another truth which has often been owned of God in seasons of revival. The possibility and desirability of a well-grounded issue of holiness. The possibility and desirability of a well-grounded assurance of grace and salvation.

60:54 According to Galatians 4.6, Romans 8.16, many other passages for the most part assurance was simply a fact in New Testament Christianity.

61:07 And it is not honoring to God to have congregations full of doubters and in times of revival one of those congregations of the truths most frequently owned of God has been the proclamation of what constitutes a well-grounded assurance of salvation. Now some have gone so far as to say revival is nothing more or less than many people who are in a state of doubt coming to this assurance all at once. I don't accept that definition but the element of truth in it is this that in places where assurance has been considered some kind of an exotic thing for an elitist group when such people have come to the biblical view

61:50 that assurance is the norm for believers and they ought not to rest content with anything less than a well-grounded assurance the preaching of the nature and possibility of the well-grounded assurance when it is owned of the Spirit to bring many out of vacillation and doubt has in turn been productive of such joy and zeal and holy enthusiasm because the conscience is liberated that indeed the world and often there is a contagion and we have what is traditionally called an awakening or a revival. Well brethren these are not the only truths

Call to Diligent Preaching for Quickening

62:34 that God is blessed in seasons of revival but I suggest that they are some of the major truths which God has indeed blessed and if we would engage in preaching that under the blessing of God may be used to question and to question and to question dead sinners to life quicken a lifeless church or a church that limps and is halting in its testimony and in its service then by specific and topical and textual treatment let us seek to cover these truths with some degree of regularity in the course of our preaching and then as we are preaching through verse by verse expository ministry where these truths

63:18 are there in the text let us be sure that if we highlight anything these strands of truth are lifted out and set forth with clarity and passion and power from God in the understanding and in the consciences of our people. Well may the Lord help us brethren that as we consider the preaching that quickens we may be willing to pay the price of doing our homework you can't preach freely and joyfully on a doctrine that is not clear in your own mind and you can't have it clearly established in your own mind unless you do your homework and you say

64:02 oh it must be wonderful to preach in seasons of revival and you read of men who with no preparation stood on their feet and preached like incarnate angels for two or three hours and if you check the history of those men there were many many hours Whitfield's trips across the Atlantic those were his storing up times when he poured over his books and over his Greek Testament and prepared many of his sermons that under the power of God were instrumental when he hit the shores and hardly had time to breathe or sneeze between preaching four and five times a day. Brethren the Holy Ghost never came to put a premium

64:46 upon laziness or to be a substitute for our own labors but oh that he may come upon our labors. and he may come upon our labors. and through our labors and do that which only he can do and bring quickening to our congregations and to our needy generation. Let us pray.

Prayer for Passionate and Effectual Preaching

65:17 Our Father in speaking of these truths tonight we have not merely been speaking of those things needed by our people but we stand before you as sinners confessing that our only place of solid comfort and refuge is the blood and the righteousness of your beloved son we would confess as a body of men nothing in our hands we bring simply to his cross we say to you Lord Jesus Jesus

66:00 your blood in righteousness our beauty are our glorious dress we pray that these truths would come alive that we may be equal to you Jesus the Lord alive in our own hearts. Oh God, may they burn like fire within our own breasts. May we be able to say like Elihu that our hearts are like new wineskins about to burst. Though we must preach in the midst of opposition and misunderstanding, bringing us to the place where we vow we'll never speak again.

66:36 Oh God, make us like Jeremiah who had to confess thy word was in my heart as a fire shut up within my bones and I was weary with forbearing and I could not stay. Oh, may we preach as men possessed, not by strange fire but by the truth and by the spirit of truth. Deliver us, Lord, from passionless preaching. Deliver us, we pray, from preaching that has no barbs and hooks.

67:08 Oh, teach us how to grapple with the truth of the world. Teach us how to grapple with men's consciences. How to reach the vulnerable parts in their thinking and in their affections. Oh God, teach us how as whole men to preach to whole men and then so come upon our feeble labors that we shall yet see the quickening for which our hearts long and for which we now together cry.

67:35 Hear our prayer. Answer us, oh God, for the honor of your dear Son. Surely, oh God, you have not given to him from our generation the full reward of his sufferings. We pray, be mindful of your promise to him and for his name's sake, hear and answer us, we plead.

67:59 Amen.