Covenant of Grace

Posted on September 2, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

What is the Covenant of Grace? We have been studying the Westminster Shorter Catechism in our Wednesday evening prayer meetings for the last few months. After understanding the scathing effects of the Fall on all of humanity. It seems that man is left utterly helpless, and according to the Bible, he is!  And so question 20 of the catechism asks;

Q. 20. Did God leave all mankind to perish in the estate of sin and misery?
A. God, having out of his mere good pleasure, from all eternity, elected some to everlasting life, did enter into a covenant of grace to deliver them out of the estate of sin and misery, and to bring them into an estate of salvation by a Redeemer.

However, many Christians today do not even concede that there is such a thing as the “Covenant of Grace.” Is this idea Biblical? I believe that it is unequivocally so. Take a few minutes to listen to the lesson from Wednesday, September 1 and it is my hope that you will see it clearly as the overarching principle of of God’s redemptive work.

Click the link to hear audio of the lesson

The Covenant of Grace – Genesis 12-22, Galatians 3

In Christ!

Kevin

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Blind Leaders, Vain Worship and Me

Posted on August 29, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

Matthew 15:14 “Let them alone. They are blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.”

These are the words of Jesus as He responded to a statement of concern from the disciples that He has offended the Scribes and Pharisees. Apparently He was not concerned about the offense. This hardly sounds like the compassion usually associated with the Savior. It seems that as we follow Jesus through the Gospels that His only object of disdain is the self-righteous. The Pharisees are the subject of an entire chapter, Matthew 23:23-33, where He pronounces “woe’s” against them for their blind, hard, self-righteous hearts.

In Matthew 15 they have come to investigate Him as He preaches and heals people around the area of the Sea of Galilee. After walking 80-some miles to have their encounter, what would you suppose their first question for this famous teaching, healing, miracle working Rabbi would be?  How about, Matthew 15:2 “Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.” This resulted in a stern rebuke from Jesus.

Matthew 15:3 He answered and said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition?

Jesus proceeds to chastise them for their substitution of their own commands for the commands of God. The Jews had devised an elaborate system of “fencing” the Law. That is, they were so concerned about breaking the Law that they actually invented many other laws of their own to keep themselves at a safe distance from it. It seemed like a reasonable solution since their forefathers had been judged so harshly for violating God’s Law in Old Testament times. However, it did not work as they had thought. Instead it caused them to focus on their own laws to the disregard of God’s Laws.

God’s Word is indeed sufficient for what God has given it for. If we try to add to it, standards that God did not see fit to put in it in the first place, we are demonstrating a lack of faith. Jesus says of the Scribes and Pharisees who had done this, Matthew 15:8-9 “‘THESE PEOPLE DRAW NEAR TO ME WITH THEIR MOUTH, AND HONOR ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEART IS FAR FROM ME.  9  AND IN VAIN THEY WORSHIP ME, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE COMMANDMENTS OF MEN.’ ” And so, according to His application of Isaiah 29:13 , it makes worship worthless.  No matter how much we say we love Jesus if we substitute our word for His, it renders that worship vain.  Here is where Jesus put His foot down, so to speak.

Jesus tells the disciples that outward rituals are worthless for making men right with God. Corruption is inside of man and it cannot be fenced off.   Matthew 15:10-20 Jesus had no concern for those who would try to deal with sin by outward rituals. To the point where He said to His disciples; Matthew 15:13-14 “But He answered and said, ‘Every plant which My heavenly Father has not planted will be uprooted.  14  Let them alone. They are blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.’ ” He is literally telling them through a parable that there is nothing to be done with the one who rejects the Word of God in favor of his own system of righteousness. Their rejection of the Word of God is a demonstration of their reprobation, so there is nothing that can be done for them.

How many in good churches do the very same thing as they judge other Believers and look down their noses because of man-made standards that they impose on others without biblical warrant? Music, Clothing, Bible Translations…. The list goes on. Failure of others to meet our standards causes us to neglect the clear command of Jesus Christ that all Believers “love one another.” 2 John 1:5-6 . Thus we have made the command of God of no effect by our own rules as well. Where does that put you?

I pray that as you listen to this message that you are compelled to examine your own heart on this issue and then to be obedient to the commands of Jesus rather than your own idea of what is right.

Blind Leaders – Matthew 15:12-14

In Christ!
Kevin

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Sandwiches or Salvation?

Posted on August 15, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

If you have been in church for any length of time you know the story of Jesus and His feeding of the 5,000. You have probably heard many sermons on that event as recorded in all four of the Gospels. I am sure that you have heard messages on Jesus’ walk across the Sea of Galilee that night. But did you know that that was all set up by Jesus to create an opportunity to communicate a message of life and death importance to the people of Israel and that once Jesus preached that message to them, the Bible tell us that many of His disciples walked away and ceased to follow Him?

John 6:66 From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.

The miracles are truly amazing! However the message is the important part. The miracles are just there to authenticate the message and even as Christians, we can get lost in the wonders and miss the Word that they are signifying. In this text Jesus is portrayed as the “Prophet” that Moses foretold who would come from among the nation of Israel and who would speak the Words of God to the People ( Deuteronomy 18:15 ). Like Moses who announced bread from heaven, Jesus fed the people in the wilderness with miraculous bread from a boy’s lunch. Like Moses who parted the Red Sea for the Israelites to walk across, Jesus walked across the water to Capernaum. Jesus did this in order that the people might listen to His teaching, but in their hard hearts and political mindedness they failed to see Jesus for who He was.

Once Jesus had done these miracles the Jews followed Him across the sea to get more bread. We see also in the text that they would have made Him their King after He fed them but Jesus went away up into the mountain to avoid them. Now that they found Him Jesus actually rebukes them and tells them that the bread that they had eaten was insignificant and that they really need to labor to know Him ( John 6:26-27 ). Unlike the bread that only preserves life for a short time on this earth, He is the True Bread from Heaven who will give them eternal life if they will but trust Him ( John 6:32-59 ).

Like most of the world today, the Jews only wanted enough from Jesus to achieve their own personal goals. Jesus was to them a means to their own end rather than the Means to God’s end. He is often promoted as a self-help program in the Church today; as a life improver or catalyst for change. Jesus did not die on some bloody Roman cross to make your life better! He died because you are a sinner who has offended a Holy God are are rightfully deserving of His judgment. Rather than writing you off and sending you to Hell, which would have been the right thing to do, He of His own volition chose to take on human flesh and reconcile you to Himself through that bloody sacrifice!

Romans 8:3-4 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh,  4  that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

This message was not what the self-righteous Jews wanted to hear. Jesus told them again and again. Political freedom and personal prosperity was on their minds rather than the promise of God to forgive their sins. Christian, you too are prone to this way of thinking. There are false systems of the Christian Faith built around this error! (i.e. The Word of Faith Movement and even much of the Christian Right)  Jesus came to save you from your sin and then to use you as a means to reach out to other sinners who need to be saved. Politics are not taboo in the Church, but we are not a political action committee either. Our focus is on the sinners and we should not be surprised when a sinner rejects the Word of God in favor of their own agenda. We all did that at one time! ( Ephesians 2:1-3 )

Jesus used the mindset of His audience to challenge them to think differently. He challenged them with the idea of eating His flesh and drinking His blood in order to get the nutrients required for eternal life which both they and we desperately need. Eating bread only sustains you for so long. A vital connection to Jesus is what is required for eternal life. That is what the Gospel is all ab0ut!

John 6:47-51 Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life.  48  I am the bread of life.  49  Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead.  50  This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die.  51  I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.”

So the challenge for you today is, What are you trusting in Jesus to do for you? If He is merely a “life-improver” then you have missed Him entirely as the Jews of His own day did.  If however, He is the Giver of Eternal Life, the ONLY means of being right with a Holy God whom you and I have offended then you are on the right track.

Listen to the audio of the message by clicking on the link below. I pray that you are challenged to see through your presuppositions all the way to what Jesus said about Himself.

Sandwiches or Salvation? – John 6:47-59

In Christ!

Kevin

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How Long Shall I Bear With You?

Posted on August 10, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

“O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you and bear with you?” – Jesus.

Have you ever been fed up with someone? Jesus expresses anguish over the state of belief in His disciples and the culture at large in His own time. The problem with jumping right in and saying, “Oh yeah, I know all about those people who don’t trust God like they should.” is that we are those people too! This event is given to us in all three of the synoptic Gospels and it comes on the heals of Jesus’ descent from the Mount of Transfiguration. Much like Moses as he came down from Mt. Sinai to find the people in rebellion, Jesus comes down to those nasty old Scribes disputing with His disciples who have failed to cast a demon out of a boy and heal him. Jesus is immediately met by the boys father;

Luke 9:38-40 Suddenly a man from the multitude cried out, saying, “Teacher, I implore You, look on my son, for he is my only child.  39  And behold, a spirit seizes him, and he suddenly cries out; it convulses him so that he foams at the mouth; and it departs from him with great difficulty, bruising him.  40  So I implored Your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.”

All of these people have God’s Word that tells them what the Messiah will be like. All of them have a knowledge of Jesus and His ministry; healing, teaching, helping the poor and the sick. Likewise all of them have something that keeps them from fully embracing who He is and what He has come to do.

The Scribes: They “sit in Moses’ seat” and are the ultimate authority in the land. They make their living and gain their reputation by interpreting the Mosaic Law. They use their status and position to defraud people out of their property for personal gain (See Matthew 23). Jesus opposes them at every turn and calls their sin, sin. Their Flesh kept them from believing in Jesus.

The Disciples: They know the “Word of God” in more ways than one. They understand that it teaches about the Messiah and that He comes to heal and set the captives free. They have sat under Jesus’ teaching for two years and have also been commissioned by Him to preach the Gospel and to heal and cast out demons (Mark 3:13-15) But now they encounter a difficult situation and cannot manage to do the job. Instead they end up in an argument with the Scribes (Mark 9:14) The problems of life, i.e. the World, kept them from the faith they needed to get the job done.

The father of the boy: Again he has a knowledge of both the Bible and of Jesus though certainly not as intimate of a knowledge as the Scribes or the Disciples. In His situation the devil has plagued his family and afflicted his only son and when the disciples failed to remedy the situation he too is losing his faith. He says to Jesus; “But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.” (Mark 9:22)  And so the devil has brought his faith to the crisis point.

We are all like one or more of these people or groups of people, we are faithless and perverse at times. We allow our situation to obscure our faith just as each of these did. Whether we are worried about what the world thinks of us, confronted by a difficult situation or afflicted by the devil we let our faith get twisted, which is what “perverse” means here in the text, and fail to trust God appropriately. That said I am pretty sure it is safe to say that Jesus could say the same thing about you and me.

The Good News is the answer to the rhetorical question that Jesus posed in our text, “How long shall I be with you and bear with you?”

John 13:1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.

Jesus stuck it out to the very end even though He was disappointed at times. Even though He felt frustrated, He finished the job and didn’t leave the disciples or the rest of the world to deal with the situation alone. This should humble us and encourage us to strengthen those who are weak in the Faith that we know. We should all be praying with the father of the boy, Mark 9:24 “Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, “‘Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!’”

Jesus has promised those who believe that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). Our faith is insufficient, our bodies are weak, our wills are disposed to the honor of men rather than the honor that comes from God.  Yet if we have believed we must remember that His strength is made perfect in our weakness and continue on even when we cannot endure in our own strength, for when we are weak, then we are strong.

I encourage you to listen to the audio of this message by clicking on the link below.

How Long – Luke 9:41

In Christ!

Kevin

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Unless You Are Converted…..

Posted on August 3, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

As we continue to examine the things that Jesus said as recorded in the Gospels we have come across a rather startling statement; Matthew 18:3 ….. “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” What does Jesus mean by this? Is He implying that we must be be without discernment and blindly trust as a child does? Some have interpreted this passage in that way. However the Bible never calls men to a blind trust, but to rely upon a God who has faithfully communicated and kept promises to His covenant people throughout human history.

What Jesus is actually saying is that we must trust Him implicitly and put no stock in our own ability to save or to keep ourselves even as a little child, here a suckling infant, relies completely upon the love, care and provision of its mother. We contribute nothing to our salvation but the fact that we are sinners. God is a loving Father who chooses to set His love on the unlovable, the rebellious sinner who has set himself contrary to God’s commands and fails to recognize that He is the Creator and Sustainer of all. God chooses to save sinners not because they are good, but because He is good!

In Matthew 18:3 Jesus is not calling the disciples to blind or reckless faith, rather He is calling them to recognize their own inability to come to God and to trust completely in Him for their eternal well being.  So much of Christian (so called) teaching today is just another form of self-help, self-improvement psychology that it is difficult even for many Christians to get their minds around this truth. Self-worth and self-esteem are the order of the day and this teaching really flies in the face of all of that. Jesus says that  you have nothing to contribute to this except to recognize your inability and fall upon the loving care of your Heavenly Father. If this idea sounds strange to you, whether you are a Christian or not, I encourage you to listen to the message by clicking on the link below. I would love to hear your feedback on this. This is the historic Christian faith. This is the message that we need to hear and to heed

Unless You Are Converted – Matthew 18:1-3

In Christ!

Kevin

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The Anatomy of Faith

Posted on July 28, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

Does faith have an “anatomy?” you may ask. Doesn’t it just happen? It happens when we understand and accept a certain truth or proposition. But every time we say, “I believe,” that is not to say we have fully embraced that truth or proposition. Evidence of this is given in several places in the New Testament. We began in John 8:28-31 where Jesus was preaching to the Jews during the Feast of Tabernacles. He was speaking to them of His crucifixion and of His deity and we read in John 8:30 “As He spoke these words, many believed in Him.”

What was Jesus’ response to this “believing” of the Jews? Did He immediately take them by the hand and say, “Well then, repeat this prayer after me and you will be saved?” No. As a matter of fact it seems that He did quite the opposite,

John 8:31-37 Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.  32  And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”  33  They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How can You say, ‘You will be made free’?”  34  Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.  35  And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever.  36  Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.  37  “I know that you are Abraham’s descendants, but you seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you.

Jesus challenged these “believers” at the point that they professed faith. He began to talk about sin and their need to be freed from its bondage and they did not like the rest of His message and went from believing to being ready to kill Him. Did Jesus blow it with this group of potential converts? Could He have coaxed a profession out of them that would have gotten them saved? Many modern Evangelical Christians might think so. But Jesus knew that there was more to faith than just mental assent or agreeing with the facts. There must be three aspects to saving faith as we see it in the Bible. Historically in Protestant Theology these are known as Notitia, Assensus and Fiducia.

Notitia is the information that needs to be believed. It is our message. We see that the Jews were willing to believe a part of the message, but they were not willing to believe one of the most important parts of it. Believing that Jesus was from God and that He would be “lifted up” or crucified was comfortable enough for them, but being accused of sin when they were so meticulous to keep the Law of Moses was unacceptable to them. Many modern people, though far less scrupulous in their religion are much the same way. The have no problem that Jesus came as God in the flesh or that He died and was raised on the third day, but when it comes to their dire need for this service that He rendered they cannot abide with the idea that they are desperate and hopelessly lost without His atoning sacrifice. So, the message must be complete, that is the responsibility of the one who preaches.

Assensus, that is understanding the truth or proposition and mentally saying, “I understand and agree.” Many stop here and say well, what more can you ask for? But the Bible says that this is not enough. James 2:14 “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him?” James teaches us that a “said faith” is not a saving faith. Faith must motivate us to action. True faith is demonstrated by the life of faith that is lived.

John 2:23-25 Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did.  24  But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men,  25  and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.

You see, Jesus understood what superficial faith was. People began to believe in Him early on in His ministry but as they “believed” in Him, He did not “commit” Himself to them. “Commit” in verse 24 is the same in the Greek as “believe” in verse 23. The word pistuo is also often translated as “faith.” Even though the people believed in Jesus, at this point He did not believe in them, John 2:25 “and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.” They needed to move on to the next level.

Fiducia, that is absolute trust. It is easy to get the sense of this word as it is used in the English language. Fiduciary is used in the banking industry as related to the handling of other people’s money. There is not much more concern than what someone will do with your cash. Trust is the key word here, and so we often see the words Bank and Trust together.  This often falls short as an illustration with the banking industry as it stands, but you understand why that word is used in this situation. It comes down to the question, Can I rest all of my hope upon this thing that I believe?

Titus 3:4-5 But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared,  5  not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,

Am I trusting in something that I have done to repair my relationship to God or completely resting in His mercy and grace? Do I think that I need to add my own righteousness to the equation or is His sacrifice and resurrection sufficient for all of my hope? You see, I can believe that Jesus is God and that He died and rose again as the payment for sin, but if I add the slightest bit of me to that equation it is not the kind of faith that saves.

Truly resting in the righteousness of Jesus Christ will indeed provoke me to live differently, this is evidence that my faith is real as James points out in the second chapter of his epistle. But I do not count on those works to satisfy the justice of God in any way.

I encourage you to listen to the message and I pray that as you do you see clearly what faith is and what faith does.

The Anatomy of Faith – John 8:28-31

In Christ!
Kevin

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What is the Task of the Evangelist?

Posted on July 19, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been my passion since I first believed it about 18 years ago.

As we have been looking at the Sayings of Jesus in our Sunday Morning messages we have come to the need of understanding what it means to preach or to share the Gospel. What is the Gospel? What is its main point? As we saw in the morning message from Matthew 10:34 we are all (if we call ourselves Christian) to preach the Gospel no matter what the response to our message is. (see yesterday’s post)

My ministry in preaching the Gospel and teaching others to do so is in a significant way, fueled by a study I did in the book of Job many years ago. I know, Job and evangelism may not seem like a likely combination in the minds of many Christians. I am not trying to come up with something new here or the twist the Scriptures to fit my own preconceived notions. Think about it for a moment. What is the story of Job really about?

Job is a “righteous” man. As a matter of fact even God says, “There is none like him in all the earth.” But let me ask, is one saved by being good? If you know what the Bible says about this you must immediately say no.

Romans 3:10-11 As it is written: “THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NO, NOT ONE; 11  THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS; THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS AFTER GOD.

God allows and even instigates Job’s bout with suffering. Read Job 1-2 and see it for yourself. God challenges the devil to assault Job, but God has an ultimate purpose in the assault. As it all transpires Job’s friends come and rather than comfort him they antagonize him and increase his misery. What should be a time of mourning and comforting becomes a shouting match and a vexation to Job. (Job 3-31)

All the while in the background there is a silent and solitary figure, a young man who hesitates to speak his piece.

Job 32:1-4 So these three men ceased answering Job, because he was righteous in his own eyes.  2  Then the wrath of Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram, was aroused against Job; his wrath was aroused because he justified himself rather than God.  3  Also against his three friends his wrath was aroused, because they had found no answer, and yet had condemned Job.  4  Now because they were years older than he, Elihu had waited to speak to Job.

When Elihu does finally come forward he corrects both Job and his friends. He corrects the main flaws that are present in the human understanding of God and His relation to fallen humanity.

(1) Job’s friends believe that God is chastising Job for some great hidden sin. He might just as well “fess up” and get it over with. This is the view of many people in this world. God is a God of retribution and every “bad” thing that happens is due to His retaliatory nature. When I was a kid, surrounded by an unbelieving family, some of few remembrances of discussions of God were at the point was when I would trip or stub my toe or something like that. It was always said, “You must have been bad and gotten away with it an now God got you for it.”

(2) Job’s view, “I am a good person and God should always be nice to me.”  Another common misunderstanding of God. This is the complaint of the atheist, “If God is loving and all-powerful then there should be no suffering in the world.” Here we deny or forget that we live under the curse of sin. God did indeed make the world perfect, but man rebelled against the command of God and brought judgment upon himself and the whole of creation.  Calamity is one result of the Fall. Remember, as good as Job was, “There is none righteous, no not one….”

So, what is the point of Job’s suffering then?

James 5:11 Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord–that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.

It was, according to James in the New Testament, to be “compassionate and merciful.” I can hear you saying now, “WHAT? You call that compassion and mercy? God took away his family, his wealth and his health and then tortured him with abuse from his friends and his wife. How is that compassion and mercy?” It is at this point in the Life of Job that he is ready to hear the words of the young man Elihu. This is the mercy of God. He brings Job to the end of himself and humbles him to be corrected by a young man. And so from Job 32-37 he guides Job and his friends to the point where they are ready to receive the truth about God in their situation. In Job 38-41, the Lord begins rebuking Job for his pride and puts him in his place and in Job 42, Job responds very differently;

Job 42:5-6 “I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, But now my eye sees You.  6  Therefore I abhor myself, And repent in dust and ashes.”

Job goes from a superficial knowledge of God to a real face to face encounter with Him. He acknowledges his sin and ascribes righteousness to God in his situation. This is due to the ministry of this man Elihu. Listen to how he describes his ministry to Job and his friends;

Job 33:23-24 “If there is a messenger for him, A mediator, one among a thousand, To show man His uprightness,  24  Then He is gracious to him, and says, ‘Deliver him from going down to the Pit; I have found a ransom’;

Elihu is a messenger to Job, He delivers to him the message of God. He is also a mediator or an interpreter. He makes sure that Job understands the message. He is one among a thousand and so there are not many who understand the message and can communicate it to others. Finally he gets to the content of the message, “To show man His uprightness.” That is to prove to man that whatever his situation is, God is still righteous.

The Gospel is ultimately about the righteousness of God. He is rightly offended by our sin and our nature of sin as inherited from our first father, Adam. If everyone in the world went to hell God would still be just and loving. He created us, gave us food, clothing and other people to love. We rejected His Law and His provision for restoration, yet in His patience He still gave us rain and sunshine and people to love, happiness and contentment when He might have just been done with it and sent us all straight to hell. Being Just by nature He cannot overlook our sin and rebellion and yet He made a way to maintain His justice and yet extend His mercy;

Romans 3:24-26 being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,  25  whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed,  26  to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Patiently putting up with our sin, He sent His only Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and on account of sin, and He condemned sin in the flesh,  that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Romans 8:3-4) In Jesus Christ, sin was properly judged as He willingly took our sin upon Himself, the only sufficient Sacrifice to atone for the sins of the world. It was a Sacrifice of Ultimate value because it was God of very God who was sacrificed. It was a real sacrifice in that God was in the form of a man when it happened. The Justice of God was met, the mercy of God was served and the offer of salvation was given to the world.

You say again, “Wait a minute, Job lived over 1,500 years before Jesus.” Yes he did, yet he looked forward to the same Redeemer we look back to.

Hebrews 4:3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: “SO I SWORE IN MY WRATH, ‘THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST,’ ” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.

The work of redemption is eternal. God planned it before the world was made and God’s plans are as good as done. Jesus said to the pharisees, “Abraham rejoiced to see My day and he saw it and was glad.” In Job’s story we see a man that was a truly good man but seemed to rely upon his own righteousness a little too much. We see God bringing calamity upon him in His mercy to help him see things more clearly. We see God providing the right man at the right time to communicate the message of God clearly, that God is righteous and it is Job that has erred. And then we see the grace of God bring restoration and grace to Job and his friends. The Gospel is the Righteousness of God. It is none other. It must be communicated to a world that is self-righteous and does not get it. If you know Christ you are called to be 1 in 1000.

You can listen to audio of this message by clicking the link below

The Evangelist

In Christ!                                                                                              Kevin

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Not Peace, But a Sword

Posted on July 18, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

An interesting saying of Jesus was our topic this Sunday, “Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth. I did not come to bring peace but a sword.” (Matthew 10:34)  This really does not sound like “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” as the Gospel is often portrayed in our day. This saying of Jesus is recorded as He is instructing the 12 after their commissioning. He is sending them out to preach and heal and he tells them to expect great opposition as they do. We saw last week that Jesus’ ministry brought on the accusation from the religious leaders of the Jews that He had the power of the devil. Jesus begins his “pep talk” by saying to them, “If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more will they call those of his household!” (Matthew 10:25)

The Gospel, if preached truly confronts people with their sin and is naturally offensive to them. It is a message of Good News yet it is most commonly rejected by people because the idea of reconciliation has in it by nature the idea of alienation. The need to be reconciled means that I have messed up somewhere in the past. This idea is odious to anyone who does not see themselves as sinful or sin as a big deal. What Jesus teaches His disciples should come as no surprise to us if we understand human nature and what the Bible says about it.

The important thing is to realize that Jesus did not say to them, if it gets tough just give up. He did not say, if someone offends you, smack them upside the head, belittle them, or talk about them rudely behind their backs. He said;

Matthew 10:26 “Therefore do not fear them. For there is nothing covered that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.  27  “Whatever I tell you in the dark, speak in the light; and what you hear in the ear, preach on the housetops.  28  And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”

That is, their issues with the Gospel are not your concern, just preach the Gospel that I have been sharing with you! Your fear of God should exceed your fear of man. If God has given you the charge of preaching a man has no authority to stop you. Do you fear men? Does what people think of you stop your mouth when it should be proclaiming the wonders of God’s grace and mercy to the people He has placed around you? We are called yo love and proclaim truth people whether they respond positively or not. If you think it is tough you should see what is going on in the rest of the world! Check out the Voice of the Martyrs Website to see what is happening all around the world.

If you know Christ as Savior then you are the means that He has chosen to reach the world with the message of the Gospel. Many people often say things like, “I wish so-and-so would get saved. He or she has such great influence and would be so useful to the church to reach people.” Think about it this way; if there are 300,000,000 people in the US and just 10% of them are truly saved people and if each of them were serious about sharing the Gospel a Billy Graham crusade would be peanuts to the influence of those people!

I want to challenge you today, if you know Jesus Christ and even begin to understand what He has done for you, though conflict is probably going to be the result, the command of Christ that He gave to His disciples is also pertinent to you.

Matthew 10:32 “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven.  33  But whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven.”

Whoever, not just the pastor or the apostle. It’s time to get busy!

You can listen to audio of this message by clicking the link below.

Not Peace, But A Sword – Matthew 10:34

In Christ!
Kevin

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UNFORGIVABLE!

Posted on July 11, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

Today we looked at a passage of the Bible that makes many Christians and would be Christians uneasy. What is the “Unpardonable Sin?” How do I know whether I have committed it? Can I commit the Unpardonable Sin if I am a Christian? Questions that have been answered in various ways by various traditions within Christianity. The Bible is very clear on what that sin is;

Mark 3:28 “Assuredly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they may utter;  29  but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation”–

Okay, the Unforgivable Sin is “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.” Blasphemy is to speak evil against or to slander. The Holy Spirit is the third Person of the Trinity.  Incidentally, if the Holy Spirit is really just God’s “active force” in the world and not a Person within the Godhead as the Jehovah’s Witnesses teach, how could “it” be blasphemed. Can I insult or slander an active “force?” 

Well, what does this sin comprise? There is a lot of context here. Jesus is talking to the scribes, a group of religious Jews who are part of the ruling party and the guardians of God’s Word. They are arguing with Him that He is able to do miracles and cast out demons by the power of the Devil rather than that of God. It is the Holy Spirit that Gave Jesus His power while He was in the form of a man and ministered on the earth. So, learned men, who knew better, or at least should have, insulted Jesus and the Holy Spirit, through Whom He performed His miracles by attributing the power to the devil rather than God. This is not something that can be done by the average Joe. They had to reject the testimony of the Old Testament in places like,  Zechariah 13:1 “In that day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.  2  “It shall be in that day,” says the LORD of hosts, “that I will cut off the names of the idols from the land, and they shall no longer be remembered. I will also cause the prophets and the unclean spirit to depart from the land.”  and Isaiah 61:1 “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, Because the LORD has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound;  2  To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, And the day of vengeance of our God; To comfort all who mourn,“  They rejected what the Bible teaches about the nature of the Messiah and His ministry as the Spirit bore witness to the Word of God in their midst.

Sinners reject and deny the Holy Spirit all of the time. It is really their job description. Stephen, the first martyr of the Christian Church told the Jews as a whole, Acts 7:51  “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.”  The difference it that those who have sufficient knowledge and evidence, as the writer to the Hebrews tells us, “were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit,   and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, (Hebrews 6:4-5) and then reject it are doomed. This is not a description of someone losing their salvation in Christ. That is evident from the context. Rather a description who was once a part of the larger covenant community who chooses to walk away. 

If you have been a Christian for any length of time you probably know someone who fits this description, or maybe you fit this description.  What should our attitude be to one in this position? There is always the question that needs to be answered as to whether this person has had sufficient knowledge before the first question can be answered. Then the next question is whether the individual in question has rejected the Gospel of Jesus and the witness of the Holy Spirit unequivocally; do they care at all about their sin? The one who desires to be right with God and is concerned about his sin has in no way sinned this sin. The evidence of it is a hardening as we see in Romans 1:21 and following.

If this post has raised questions in your mind I encourage you to listen to the audio of this sermon to get the longer version.

You can hear it by clicking the link below.

UNFORGIVABLE ! – Mark 3:29

In Christ!
Kevin

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Freedom and Truth

Posted on July 4, 2010 by Kevin Hoffman

FREEEEEEEEDOM!   The cry of the human heart. We all love to watch Braveheart and feel the quest for personal freedom in our own breast when we hear William Wallace cry out. It is part and parcel of our nation and the sole basis of many a patriot’s call to action. What is freedom? How do we get it? Where does it come from? 

Freedom is really a relative term. We are all free in some sense and bound in another. Can there be such a thing as total freedom? Freedom carries with it obligation, the need to act a certain way in order to preserve that freedom, the need to preserve the freedom of others so that my freedom will not be infringed. But this is political freedom.

As we consider the idea of FREEDOM today, on the 4th of July, let us consider what true freedom is. Our country, as great as it is, is just a country. It may be a symbol of freedom to many in the world, but it is also a symbol of vice and corruption to many others. This is because we, even as Americans, do not understand what freedom is. Freedom is not being able to do whatever I want. That is a huge error. Freedom is being free to act as God has created me to act, according to TRUTH, which is His Word. In John 8, Jesus is talking to the Jews at the Feast of Tabernacles. This is much like our 4th of July; a celebration of their deliverance as they lived in tents in the wilderness following their emancipation from Egypt. The feast is coupled with the ingathering of their fall crops in order to tie their prosperity to God’s deliverance. Jesus is teaching at this feast and telling the Jews that He is the source of the water that gives life, that He is from heaven, that His words are the words of God and that ultimately He is God Himself. The Jews reject Him completely saying that He is a Samaritan (the ultimate derogatory remark for a Jew) and that He is demon possessed.

As they celebrate their independence (while under foreign domination by Rome) they scoff at Jesus and His words. They reject the true Deliverer while celebrating their deliverance!  Jesus tells them: John 8:31 “Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.  32  And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”  33  They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How can You say, ‘You will be made free’?”  34  Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.  35  And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever.  36  Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.” 

The Jews of Jesus’ day, much like the rest of us have a wrong idea of what freedom is. We think in terms of political freedom or personal freedom. The Apostle Paul tells the Romans that this is not the way Christians are to live, Romans 6:19 “I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness.  20  For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.  21  What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death.  22  But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life.  23  For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Autonomy (i.e. self-rule) is not freedom, it is bondage to desire, culture and sin. Autonomy is what true freedom is free from! True freedom is freedom from sin’s power and penalty. This is only had through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Once we are free from the performance trap of other religions and the pull of sin that comes from our fallen nature we are FREE to serve God with our whole heart, with body, soul and mind. This is where and only where, true freedom can be experienced. This was the desire of the pilgrim’s that first came to the American continent, to be a “City on a Hill” for the Gospel. Certainly they sought the freedom to worship God according to their conscience. This came from a wholehearted commitment to the Gospel.

Celebrate your freedom today! But remember as you watch the fireworks and listen to the National Anthem that the freedom that you have, political or spiritual, is a gift of the God of Heaven. Thank Him for it and use it to worship Him in Spirit and in Truth! Ahhhh TRUTH, that is another matter altogether. We will talk about that next time!

You can hear audio of this message by clicking on the link below.

Freedom and Truth – John 8:31-36

In Christ!
Kevin
 

 

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