Welcome to The Truth Pulpit with Don Green, Founding Pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Hello, I'm Bill Wright. Thanks for joining us as we continue teaching God's people God's Word. Don begins a new message today, so without further delay, let's join him right now in The Truth Pulpit. Our text this morning comes from Matthew chapter 7, and I would just invite you to turn there. We'll start and read the text, and I'm going to go a few different places here this morning.
Not literally geographically, but mentally and in the content of what I say. Matthew chapter 7, verses 1 through 5 is what I will read for preparation for our time in the Word. Jesus said, Judge not that you be not judged, for with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye when there is the log in your own eye?
You hypocrite. First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye. Now in the Lord's timing and in the unfolding of the Word of God as we go through the Sermon on the Mount, verse by verse, providentially, we have been considering the serious and sobering topic of judgment, eschatological, final judgment at the end of time. And we have considered two very significant events that are certain to come. We have seen the final judgment on the lost and contemplated the horror of standing before God unsaved and unredeemed. And we, in our thinking, in our kind of a picture of the fullness of the teaching of the Word of God, we went as it were to the very final judgment seat and saw a man being cast into hell after he gave an account of his sinful life to a holy God. And we watched as the gate to hell was opened and the smoke and the screams ascended from that deep, dark pit, and we saw one cast into it and the lid shut down again, realizing that this one was entering into an eternal judgment, which the Bible describes as torment and gnashing of teeth and weeping, realizing that he was cast in and with a recognition that what had just begun was about never to end.
There would be no end to that eternal punishment. And then we contemplated the awful possibility that, you know, one of us would step up and be next in that line of accountability. I used a statistic that is really just, and it's a familiar way of assessing differences and things like that, the old 80-20 rule, that if 80 percent, if you've got a group of people under a certain statistical category, 80 percent generally will fall in one way and 20 percent will fall in another way. It has nothing to do with Scripture, but it's just a helpful metric for us to think about things within the room here today. And a number of people commented on it to me in different ways, and so I want to just remind you of what was said there, that in a room of this size, 200, 300 people, the numbers fluctuate and who cares what they are. But if you apply the 80-20 rule in a most favorable way to the spiritual condition of the number of souls that are in front of us, and say 80 percent are saved and 20 percent are not, in a room of this size, looking on faces that those... It's not statistics to a pastor, it's faces and souls that you may never see again.
You realize that if there are 20 percent that are not saved, that that means that by the math, 200 to 300, you're talking about 40 to 60 people that are sitting together today and there will be a parting. When I talk about a fork in the road, there will be a time of separation when the Lord separates the wheat from the chaff and the sheep from the goats, and it just pains me. It physically pains me to say and to recognize and remember, even as I stand here, that we're talking about dozens and dozens of people that we rub shoulders with, that we talk to, that we laugh with, that we talk about, talk with, and to realize that there's a separation taking place, and that 40, 50, 60 people, conservatively speaking, would be among those that will not be with us around the throne of Christ, and instead will be suffering unimaginable eternal torment as the just punishment from God for their sins. And so that makes all of this very, very sobering and something that we need to contemplate, and it does no good, look, beloved, it does us no good whatsoever to say that's too awful to think about. Well, apparently God, apparently the Lord Jesus Christ didn't think it was too awful to think about because he teaches it explicitly so clearly in his Word as we saw in our teaching last Sunday.
We also contemplated on Tuesday, and if you're not, you know, if you're able to be with us on Tuesday and you choose not to, I would encourage you to reassess your life priorities because a lot of important things happen in this room on Tuesday evenings at 7 o'clock. We contemplated the fact that even Christians will stand before God and give an account of their lives. It's a different kind of judgment. It's not a judgment on sin, but an assessment of our lives as believers for God to evaluate our lives, for us to give an account to him, and then he will measure out reward to us that will echo throughout eternity, and that that will become the measure somehow of our reward. And we saw that God in an inscrutable way, in a way that we are given very few details about Scripture, is somehow going to judge us individually according to a most righteous and unassailable standard. He says, as you've judged, as you measure out, so it will be measured to you. In verse 2 of Matthew 7, if you'll look at that with me there, this is just by way of review, Jesus says, for with the judgment you pronounce, meaning the pattern of the way that you judge other people in your lives during your earthly life, that is the standard by which you will be judged before the throne of God. And if you are strict and critical and very difficult to please with other people, that is the standard somehow that God is going to use, and your rewards will be reduced and restricted because God will use the standard that you lived by, take out the sin from it, and in your strict, unbending, uncaring, unforgiving way, God will use a strict standard of judgment and your reward will be narrowed as a result. And somehow that will echo throughout all of eternity, even though you stand saved and redeemed by Christ. On the other hand, those who are gracious and generous and forgiving will find that their judgment is gracious and generous and forgiving as well.
And so it's all, we said, borrowing from R.C. Sproul, this means that right now counts forever. The way that we live, the patterns of thought, the patterns of interaction and relationship and what we do, it matters forever. And so either way, whether you view yourself on the 80% side of the shore or on the 20% side of the shore, either way we are dealing with matters of great eternal consequence from the Word of God in these days in the life of our church. And so it's all very, very important. Now, providentially we have the Lord's Table here, and what I want to do today is kind of use the Lord's Table as almost a second point to today's message, to the theme of the morning here. And I just want to point you in two directions as you respond to that teaching on judgment and as we anticipate the Lord's Table. There are two things that it seems to me are the inevitable consequence of a right contemplation of these themes of judgment. Number one, it is obvious for 100% of us that this would be a time to call us to self-examination.
It would be only a fool, and the world is full of fools. Only a fool could hear these things of truth from the Word of God about coming judgment and the guaranteed certainty that a day will come very quickly where we are before Him and giving an account. Only a fool would hear about eternal judgment and just say, it doesn't bother me, no concern to me, and just shrug it off and not contemplate the condition of his soul.
That to me is just unspeakably foolish and irresponsible just for your own sake. And then also for a Christian to say, you know what, I want to maximize my reward in heaven. I want to glorify God to the fullest extent possible. I want to have the fullest experience of joy in heaven, however that looks like and whatever that looks like. I want to maximize that, and so I want to consider what Jesus says about my attitudes and my critical attitudes so that I can have the opportunity to maximize that and to make it as glorious as possible throughout all of eternity. Now who wouldn't want that? Why would anyone say, nah, that's not for me. You know, concern about hell and judgment, that's not a concern of mine.
Well, it will be soon enough. And for a Christian, you know, of course we want to contemplate these things. We take these things earnestly.
But here's the thing. Here's another aspect of it that I'm very, very much aware of as a pastor, and that only the Holy Spirit, honestly, can help us avoid the danger that is right here as we talk about these things right now. There is a danger, a serious danger of passing impressions. I know that when, and I've received so much feedback, I know that the contemplation of being at the throne of final judgment, you know, impacted a number of people. Life changing, some people said.
And I appreciate that feedback. But the truth of the matter is, beloved, that every one of us are in danger of just giving in and being satisfied with passing impressions. The impression that's created by a public discourse on these things without really taking it to heart, without really repenting, without really taking an understanding and letting it have a lasting effect.
You know, it's like a stiff breeze, a stiff wind blows through and it kind of shakes things up, but then things return to normal. What every one of you should be praying is, Lord, don't let me just return to normal unchanged as a result of these things. Let this take serious deep root in my heart. Now, speaking corporately, I know I'm kind of all over the place here, but that's the way it is these days. Corporately speaking, I want to tell you that this teaching on eternal judgment, this teaching on the believer's judgment, what's known as the judgment seat of Christ, these things of self-examination and all of that. Beloved, I want to tell you that it is a useless waste of time if there are not certain spiritual consequences that flow from it. See, we're not just doing this to go through the motions. We're not doing this so that I can teach from the Sermon on the Mount. I've taught on the Sermon on the Mount before.
I don't need to do it again for myself. And so corporately, we need to understand and be moved in our hearts, stimulated to prayer, stimulated to self-examination, to understand that it's useless if we have this teaching from the Word of God and no one is converted by it. Number one, if we look at final judgment and we think about that and we contemplate it and we're stirred in our hearts by it at one level or another, but to realize that if that's all that comes, if it's just a passing mental impression, a passing mental reaction to truth that doesn't genuinely be used by the Spirit to convert someone from death to life, to see someone pass from judgment into eternal life, that's a waste of time. We're really wasting our time, and none of us, certainly the membership of Truth Community Church should not at all be satisfied with that, but that we would be moved in this time of enlightenment and this time of unity to be moved and say, Lord, give us souls. Lord, change the proportions.
Change it from 80, 20 to 90, 10 in our case. Give us 10, 20, 30, give us 40 souls as a result of this consideration of eternal matters. If there's not something in our Christian hearts that stimulates us in that direction, somehow we're wasting our time and all of this teaching is useless. I don't know about you, but I want to see eternal fruit born from these things. Along with that, beloved, as we contemplate, you and I contemplate standing before the judgment seat of Christ, you know, it would be useless, it would be worse than a waste of time if you and I as believers walked away from this without an increase in our sanctification, without a deepening of earnestness and seriousness and prayerfulness and, Lord, make me holy as you are holy.
Conform me to the image of my Lord Jesus Christ and then actually see our lives and our attitudes and our relationships changing as a result. And even if we walk through the valley of the shadow of death or we walk through the valley of adversity and trials, you know, that we can do so with a sense, Lord, use this to sanctify me. Use this to sanctify us and make us what you would have us to be.
Prepare me for that judgment seat of Christ. I've been reading a biography of a man who was instrumental in revivals in the 19th century by the name of Asahel Nettleton, just about to finish it up. And one of the things that's striking about his ministry in contrast to the histrionics, the showy emotional reactions that are sometimes accounted for revival, and certainly in our day and even in his day, you know, and the dramatic climax of a service and music plays and people come up front to manifest that they want to accept Christ or, you know, all of that stuff that we know so much about.
Lots of music, lots of emotion, you know, you put you put celebrities on the platform in order to make it seem more impressive to the human mind. And, you know, that's that's what today when the word revival is used, that's what people associate it with. It wasn't always that way. And that's not the real thing that generates a lot of false conversions and it generates a lot of temporary actions that don't have long lasting effect on lives or upon churches. And so this is a very serious matter.
Now, the whole point about raising the name of Nettleton is that he stood for and he represented a whole different thing, which is what I identify with. And here's the thing. This is this is unavoidable. You can't avoid the implication of what I'm about to say. If there is a hell and there is, if there is a judgment seat of Christ and we are all going to give an account before God of our lives, then that should have this effect. It should have the effect of creating within us a serious, sober minded, earnest response to biblical truth in a way that that that is can be recognized in part by the atmosphere in which we relate to each other. If church is just about entertainment and emotion and things like that, trying to think of the other E word that was in my mind and it's not coming to me, entertainment, emotion and whatever the third E was. If it's only about that and if we can just gather around these things and just have light hearted interactions that never reach into a deeper level, then we're really missing the point. And the ministry of Nettleton was marked by the serious, quiet response that was made to it as people contemplated the eternal realities and it contemplated the state of their soul.
That kind of serious contemplation doesn't lead us to laughter and frivolity. It leads us to a sense of what about me and how am I to respond? And so all of these things about God's judgment and giving an account to him lead us to two kinds of response that I want to bring out here in our time here this morning.
First of all, it's inevitable if we're understanding these things at all, it brings us to the first section here today of self-examination. What about me? What about my heart? What about my soul? There's a lot of deception.
Jesus said if possible, even the elect would be deceived and so what about me? I have other things I want to say about that if I don't forget. And then secondly, in addition to self-examination as we come to the table, we're going to talk about the concept of satisfaction.
Satisfaction. That we look at ourselves in self-examination in response to these things and having been helped by the Spirit to do that, then we look to the person and work of Jesus Christ and realize that a satisfaction has been made that secures our safety throughout all of eternity and so those two things are what we want to look at here today. And that's in keeping with Scripture. In 2 Corinthians 13 verse 5 it says, test yourselves to see if you are in the faith, examine yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves that Christ is in you unless indeed you fail the test? So to contemplate eternal hell is a chance to examine yourself to see if you're in the faith, if you're really in the faith. When the 80-20 rule tells us to look, the Scriptures warn us about self-deception, it's really important for us to do that. But then also, as we come to communion, this whole idea of examination is taught to us in Scripture when in the specific context of the Lord's table, the Bible says, let a person examine himself then and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. And so self-examination is an appropriate way for us to respond to all of these things.
And then as we get closer to the Lord's table, we'll consider some thoughts on the satisfaction that the Lord has made on our behalf. Let's talk first of all about self-examination in light of Matthew 7 verses 3 to 5. And in this theme of self-examination, I want to give you a question to consider and then also a command from our Lord. Self-examination, a question to consider, and then a command from our Lord is how this will go.
And so in that first part of self-examination, as a subset here, a subpart here, I want to give you the question that you need to answer. And the question is, where is your focus? In light of these things that we talk about with coming judgment and all of that, the question that each one of us needs to deal with is, where is your focus?
Where is your focus? And here's the problem in the Christian church today and the risk that every one of us runs. I want to go from the individual to a broader societal consideration, I guess. It's easy for us, especially those of us that live in families, that we're married, we've got kids, you know, and we're affected and impacted by the sin and the foolishness of people that are closest to us. Maybe they've sinned against us and hurt us deeply. And when that happens, to take an outward approach to examination and say, oh, you know what, I wish Bob could hear this message. I wish my kids would hear this and listen to it and have this response on, in response to all of these things that says, that's, and the idea is that that's for someone else.
That's for other people to hear and to bypass an examination of our own hearts. One of the things that I've said and not said often enough, and it's not so much an issue in our church, but I would share a sympathetic pastoral warning to others outside of our church. One of the things that is so very common, and every one of you, if you haven't done this in the past, you will know people that have talked this way when people are trying to find and make a decision about a church. Parents making a decision for their church. All the time, you will hear parents say, I want to find something that's got good things for my kids.
Now think about that. That sounds so noble, doesn't it? Oh, he's concerned for the spiritual well-being of his children, so he looks for programs that cater and make his kids happy and want his kids to be, you know, to enjoy church. Well, you know what? I don't buy that. When I hear that as a pastor, red siren lights go off in my mind for this reason, because a couple, especially a young couple that is thinking and talking that way, there is an element of self-satisfaction in their hearts, at least certainly a risk of it, that says, well, I'm okay. Of course I'm okay.
We just need something for my kids. And there's no sense that as the parents saying, you know, I've got to have something to feed my own soul. I need to be growing in Christ myself. I don't know God's word like I should. I struggle with sin. I need something that will help me grow in Christ. And yet, when parents are talking about, well, I just want something for my kids, they're passing it off, saying it's not that important for me.
It's for my kids' sake. And there's that subtle self-righteousness that says, I'm okay, that totally bypasses all of the scriptural warnings that I've already laid out for you here today. Well, my friend, before we go after today's broadcast, I just want to invite you to look me up on Facebook, Don Green on Facebook. I often make original posts. I make comments about ministry and other matters of biblical importance there that do not make their way into this broadcast. And so if you are on Facebook, I invite you to join me. Look for Don Green and join us on Facebook for another way to connect with our ministry. That's Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Thank you so much for listening to The Truth Pulpit. Join us next time for more as we continue teaching God's people God's Word.
Whisper: medium.en / 2025-01-16 04:10:22 / 2025-01-16 04:19:47 / 9