Sermons and Biblical Studies

One of the serious weaknesses of present-day evangelicalism is the mechanical quality of its thinking. A utilitarian Christ has taken the place of the radiant Savior of other and happier times. This Christ is able to save, it is true, but He is thought to do so in a practical across-the-counter manner, paying our debt … Continue reading “JESUS
CHRIST: INTIMACY WITH”

Christ is enough. To have Him and nothing else is to be rich beyond conceiving. To have all else and have not Christ is to be a cosmic pauper, cut off forever from all that will matter at last. Psalm 73:25; Mark 8:36–37; John 6:68; 1 Corinthians 1:30–31 The Set of the Sail, 89.

One thing the resurrection teaches us is that we must not trust appearances. The leafless tree says by its appearance that there will be no second spring. The body in Joseph’s new tomb appears to signify the end of everything for Christ and His disciples. The limp form of a newly dead believer suggests everlasting … Continue reading “JESUS
CHRIST: HIS RESURRECTION; DEATH: TRIUMPH IN”

The glory of the Christian faith is that the Christ who died for our sins rose again for our justification. We should joyfully remember His birth and gratefully muse on His dying, but the crown of all our hopes is with Him at the Father’s right hand. Paul gloried in the cross and refused to … Continue reading “JESUS
CHRIST: HIS RESURRECTION”

We would suppose that God in stepping down would step down just as little as possible. We would think that He would stop with the angels or the seraphim—but instead He came down to the lowest order and took upon Himself the nature of Abraham, the seed of Abraham. The Apostle Paul throws up his … Continue reading “JESUS
CHRIST: HIS INCARNATION”

Now don’t interrupt me by saying, “Jesus is our model.” I know that He is our model—He ought to be our model. But the simple fact is that He is not. He ought to be the model for the churches, but Jesus Christ has about as much authority in the average Protestant church as I … Continue reading “JESUS
CHRIST: HIS AUTHORITY”

Looking beyond the household to Jacob’s own person, we observe that he matured with many moral flaws. There were weaknesses in his character beyond the normal. There was duplicity, there was dishonesty, there was greed. He cheated his own brother. He cheated his father. And he went on to cheat his father-in-law. Jacob seemed to … Continue reading “JACOB:
MORAL FLAWS”

Probably it would be difficult to find anywhere in history a more miserable or more lonely man than Jacob as he left mother and father and home. Knowing the lives of Abraham and Isaac, we can surely believe there had been religious teaching in Isaac’s household. Jacob must have known about the covenant-making God of … Continue reading “JACOB:
LONGING AFTER GOD; LONGING FOR GOD; COMPLACENCY”

If we had been neighbors to the household of Isaac and Rebekah and dependent only on our human judgment, we very probably would have selected Esau above Jacob as the brother more likely to succeed. We would have agreed that Esau was a good and promising young man. To be sure, he had some rough … Continue reading “JACOB:
LONGING AFTER GOD; JACOB: MORAL FLAWS; LONGING FOR GOD; COMPLACENCY”

In fundamental circles a generation ago we had a hierarchy that was just as powerful and just as tough as the hierarchy that controls the Roman Catholic Church. Of course, they never had been elected; they just appointed themselves. And if you said anything that didn’t jive with the notes of the Scofield Bible you … Continue reading “INTOLERANCE;
PHARISAISM”