mind with reference to just what
might be his word for us as we met tonight. I confess I went
through great trauma of spirit. I had hoped that I would be able
to take out something that had been of help to the Lord's people
in some other situation and refresh my own mind with that truth and
share it with you. But as the hours drew near to
our gathering tonight, I had no rest in my spirit, and about
2.30 this afternoon began to get panicky before the Lord with
reference to the responsibility. And we had no conferring on this
matter, and I think it was at least some indication of a kind
providence that the thrust of what's on my heart has already
been introduced by the two hymns, one that we've sung and one that
has been sung in our hearing. I would direct your attention
to Paul's letter to the church at Philippi, Philippians chapter
2. Bob had suggested that perhaps
I share some thoughts, some observations relative to a recent trip I was
privileged to make to some mission fields in Pakistan and in the
Middle East, and that just went dead in my hands. I had no sense
of the thing gripping my own spirit, and so I said, no, that's
not what we need to deal with tonight. And then my mind was
directed to this portion of the Word of God, Philippians chapter
2, verse 12. So then, my beloved, even as
ye have always obeyed, not as much in my presence only, but
now much more in my absence, Work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling, for it is God who worketh in you both to
will and to work for his good pleasure. Do all things without
murmurings and questionings, that ye may become blameless
and harmless children of God without blemish in the midst
of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom ye are seen as lights
in the world. holding forth the word of life,
that I may have whereof to glory in the day of Christ, that I
did not run in vain, neither labor in vain. Yea, and if I
am offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I
joy and rejoice with you all, and in the same manner do ye
also joy and rejoice with me." Now it is not my concern to give
a careful exposition of this portion, as would be the pattern
in a regular service of worship. But I want to say some things
based upon the perspective of the Apostle, articulated particularly
in verses 14 and 15, to say some things that I would imagine are
not said too often in the normal church situation, but things
which need to be said to us as the servants of Christ, serving
Him in our respective callings, And the perspective is that suggested
by Paul's direction to the Philippians, do all things without murmurings
and questionings that ye may become blameless and harmless
children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and
perverse generation among whom ye are seen as lights in the
world. And here it's obvious that the
Apostle Paul is calling the Philippians to a lifestyle that will be in
such marked contrast to that lifestyle of the world that it
will be the contrast between light and darkness. For I remind
you of something you've heard many, many times, you've read
many, many times, that the same Savior who said of himself, I
am the light of the world, said of his own, ye are the light
of the world. And in this passage, the emphasis
is upon the responsibility of the Christian to shine as light
in a world that has been described in these terms, crooked and perverse,
which are simply more synonyms for the general description of
a world that lies in the power of the wicked one, that lies
under the grip of darkness. And I'm thinking particularly
of certain areas in which there is unusual necessity for us to
shine as lights because, in a very special way, the powers of darkness
are seeking to inundate our whole society with facets of the kingdom
of darkness. Now, this exhortation to shine
as lights in the world can be carried out to apply to every
single area in which the lifestyle of the child of God is diametrically
opposed to the lifestyle of the worldling. What I want to do
is to reach into certain areas that I think are of peculiar
importance to us in the context of our own particular generation. I think of a word that Luther
spoke as he thought of the crisis of his own generation. He said,
and I quote Luther, if I profess with the loudest voice and clearest
exposition every portion of the truth of God except precisely
that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment
attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may
be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there
the loyalty of the soldier is proved, and to be steady on all
the battlefield besides this is merely flight and disgrace,
if he flinches at that point. Now, I believe there are certain
areas on the battlefield between the kingdom of darkness and the
kingdom of light where the battle is raging with unusual fierceness
at this precise hour in human history. And I would like to
exhort you, my brothers and sisters, as those who meet tonight under
the canopy of a common experience at some point in your spiritual
development associated with Columbia Bible College, but more so, we
meet as those who have a common identity with our Lord Jesus
Christ, and we're jealous for the honor of His name. Any other
human name, any other human institution eventually goes to the dogs,
and with it the name goes to the dogs. But there is but one
name, there is but one institution that God is committed to uphold. That's the name of his dear son,
and that's the church which he purchased with his own precious
blood. Now we pray, and we use every influence possible to see
that whatever we can do to preserve the spiritual integrity of an
institution such as CBC. We do seek to exert our influence. The churches in which we labor,
either as pastors or as members of those assemblies, but history
tells us that every single institution has its day and that it passes
into oblivion or it really merely remains as the shadow of a great
man or a great movement and the soul goes out of the thing and
there's nothing but the carcass left. But there is one cause,
one name, to which God is committed, and it's the cause of His own
dear Son, and it is the church which He purchased with His blood. So I speak to you, then, out
of that. I trust common identity of concern for the honor of Christ.
And, Bob, when should we aim at being done here? Half an hour
would be all right? I've got enough things to keep
us busy for a lot longer than that, but I'll aim at half an
hour. All right? Because I know all of you have
responsibilities. Now all of us carry out our lives
basically in three spheres. There is our general contact
in society, the people with whom we work, the schools in which
we teach or administrate, the office, the shop, the neighbors
with whom we have social intercourse, the people whom we meet down
the street. We carry out our lives in the
general sphere of contact with society at large, then we carry
on our lives within the domestic sphere, our homes, and then the
third major sphere, of course, is that of our churches. And
I should like to exhort and challenge you, as I've exhorted myself
in preparation for these thoughts, to remember the words of the
Apostle, that we are to shine as lights in the midst of a crooked
and perverse generation, that in these three areas or spheres
in which we carry out our witness, We are to make it evident that
we stand out in bold relief against everything to which the world
is committed, and in particular, those specifics that I'm going
to touch upon. All right, let's take the first
broad area, society in general. If you and I are to shine as
lights against the peculiar manifestations of darkness in our day, we must,
by word and deed, bear witness to the dignity of human life. There is a concerted effort to
undermine everything that the Scripture teaches concerning
the dignity of human life, and this is being manifested in two
very critical areas. The wholesale slaughter of unborn
fetuses, and the refusal to put to death murderers. And both
of these are a frontal attack upon the dignity and the sanctity
of human life. It's strange that the generation
that produces bumper stickers, be careful, I stop for animals,
is the generation that has produced legislation that butchers human
beings by the millions. Isn't it strange? The generation
that deifies a flower will treat an unborn life as though it's
nothing but the collection of a few cells. And the biblical doctrine of
redemption, so precious to us, has its taproots in the biblical
doctrine of creation. And the biblical doctrine of
creation is a doctrine that sets forth the dignity of human life
because man is an image-bearer of God. In the beginning created
He then, male and female, in His own image. And you remember
in Genesis 9 and verse 6, it is this very thought that causes
the writer to enunciate the principle, Whosoever sheddeth man's blood,
by man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God created
he him. In other words, human life has
such inherent dignity as being an image-bearer of God that anyone
who will take upon himself violently to snatch away the life of another
must, by the forfeiture of his own life, be an eloquent testimony
to the dignity of the life that he took. And I believe, as Christians,
God calls upon us Not to be campaigners, not to put on signboards and
to walk up and down Fifth Avenue and have the right-to-life bumper
stickers plastered on our foreheads, no, no. But I'm saying in the
spheres in which God has given us opportunity to have contact
with people, that we will not be silent. It's not enough to
say, well, what does this have to do with the gospel? Well,
everything. Because you see, it's only as man recognizes that
he is an image-bearer of God, accountable to God, a moral creature,
that the doctrine of sin and salvation and grace and redemption
will make any sense whatsoever. And we're called upon to be lights
in the midst of darkness, bearing witness to the dignity of human
life, wherever we can, by whatever means we can. writing, our legislators
where possible, doing what we can to make something of our
Christian concern manifested. And the second area in which
I believe we're called upon to be lights in the midst of darkness
in society in general, we must by word and deed bear witness
not only to the dignity of human life, but to the validity of
constituted authority. In every single area of our own
national life, there is an attitude of blatant anarchy that has as
its watchword human rights. It's an interesting thing that
our founding forefathers did not talk so much about human
rights as they talked about human responsibilities and duties before
God. And 2 Peter 2.10 is perhaps the
most apt description of the whole spirit and the mentality of our
generation. Peter describes a people that
walk after the flesh in the lust of defilement and despise dominion. Daring, self-willed, they tremble
not to rail at dignities. They despise dominion. Daring, self-willed. In such a situation, We as the
people of God are called upon to manifest our subjection to
the clear teaching of the Word of God expressed in such portions
as Romans 13. When Paul wrote to the Roman
Christians and says, there is no power but the power that is
ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth
the power resisteth the ordinance of God. That was not an elected
president who had the power of government in his own hand. wasn't
a Christian, but he speaks even of the existing Roman government
and says to the Christians at Rome nearest to the seat of that
pagan government, the powers that be are ordained of God,
and whosoever resists them resists the ordinance of God. Peter writes
along the same line in 1 Peter 2.13, submitting to every ordinance
of man for the Lord's sake, whether unto the king is unto supreme,
unto governors that are sent by him, right on down through
to verse 18. So in the whole area of our relationship
as employees, In our relationship to those who are over us, in
any structure of constituted authority, it is essential that
we shine as lights in the midst of darkness and make it evident
that we respect the biblical norms concerning the validity
of constituted authority. And then a third area in society
in general is what I'm calling the sanctity of human sexuality. Need I remind any of you? that
we're living in a day when the sanctity of human sexuality is
being attacked from every single quarter, particularly in two
ways. The sexual identity as fixed
by God. There's a sense in which there's
one area where you can't fight God. He caused you to be conceived
a male or a female. And essentially, the unisex movement
in clothing, and with reference to the obliteration of distinctive
domestic roles, etc., it's man's last ditch stand against God,
saying, even in the area where I cannot deny that I'm male or
female, I'll do all within my power to absolutely gloss over
any marked evidence that I recognize that distinction. Now, I am not
saying that every person who wears clothing or adopts fashions
that have their roots in the unisex clothing styles is consciously
doing this. I'm not saying that. That would
be both ignorant and untrue and unkind and everything else. But
I am saying that the whole move that undermines the movement
in that direction is a blatant affront upon this very principle. And first, Corinthians chapter
11 is the classic statement of the fact that it is God who has
established the sexual differences and assigned to them specific
roles and relationships And the essence of Paul's exhortation
in 1 Corinthians 11 is, if anyone should make it evident that he
embraces his God-given identity, it is the Christian. Therefore,
Christian men, be masculine, whatever that means in the context
of your society. Christian women, be feminine,
whatever that means. And of course, the second area
in which the sanctity of human sexuality is being undermined
is with reference to sexual activity itself. There was a day when
homosexuality was called sodomy and was judged so by the courts.
Then it became sickness. Then it became viable lifestyle. Now, the latest evangelism of
the gay movement is to say it is the most desirable lifestyle. Some of you people got hang-ups.
You're only heterosexual. You can only relate to those
of the opposite sex. Well, if you just go the next
step and become homosexual, now you are bisexual, and you've
attained to your fullest development. Now, if you're not aware that
this is what the world's saying, I don't know where you've been.
I don't know where you're carrying out your witness. This is what's
being said, and it's being promoted aggressively and evangelistically,
not by some kooks on the corner somewhere, but by people who
have their M.D.' 's and their Ph.D.'s. All due respect to my
brother. But this is being said, and we're
called upon to shine as lights in the midst of darkness. And
how do we do so? We do so by making it evident
in all of our demeanor, in all of our attitudes, in what we
snicker at and what we refuse to snicker at, that we accept
the sanctity of human sexuality, not only in terms of our identity
as men or women, but in terms of the activity that we will
approve of as being of God. It's a sad thing to read in the
secular magazines that Maribel Morgan's book, The Total Woman,
they can't keep enough of them on the bookshelves in the evangelical
bookstores. It's a form of pop hedonism.
It's Playboy stripped of the glossy pictures. Maribel Morgan
is teaching Christian wives how to be little playthings who,
by being little bunnies, Christian bunnies to their husbands, can
manipulate them to get what they want. That's exactly her thesis. And the Christian bookstores
cannot keep the bookshelves full of them. We're to shine as lights in the
midst of darkness. Even the world has picked this
up. Time Magazine Newsweek has run articles, some of the women's
magazines, on Maribel Morgan's book and others like them. And
they've seen right through it. And yet they know that the, quote,
professing Christian world is running crazy after this stuff.
We're called upon to show that we're in the realm of light,
not in the realm of darkness. Well, The last thing I'll touch
on very quickly in this whole area of our general relationship
to society is what I'm calling the necessity of labor and industriousness. The Bible's attitude to labor
is that it is given by the appointment of God to man in his innocency. God gave Adam a job to do not
after he fell, but before he fell. He put him in the garden
to dress it and to keep it. And when he fell, work was not
the punishment, but there were to be discomforts attached to
the work that was the punishment in sweat. He says, you'll now
cause the earth to bring forth. Part of the fourth commandment,
you see, is six days shall thou labor. We usually put the emphasis
on this one day in seven cycle of rest, but the commandment
to labor. Work is honorable in itself.
Apart from what you're able to do with the proceeds of your
labor in supporting the work of God, it is honorable to be
found engaged in your legitimate calling in life. And oh, how
we need desperately to bear witness to this by our attitude to work.
Because the average American has the idea that work is a necessary
evil to be indulged in for only so long a time as is necessary
to get enough money to play. That's right, that's the whole
view of work, that's the work ethic of the 1970s in America. Work is a necessary evil to be
indulged in only so far as is necessary to get enough to go
play. No, no, not so the Christian.
So if you're one of these that stretches your coffee break beyond
the legitimate time, you're not shining as light in the midst
of darkness. It's interesting that the thing
that introduced this was the word, do all things without murmurings
and questionings. And all the murmurings and the
questionings that go on with relationship to legitimate work
responsibilities. Well, I call upon you, my brothers
and sisters, to shine as lights in the midst of darkness in our
general interaction with society in these four areas. Now I hurry
on and I'll just give you the main headings because my time
is half gone. I want to say a few things about
the domestic sphere. If we are to be light shining
in the midst of darkness, then there must be absolutely no hedging,
absolutely no equivocation whatsoever in these three areas. Number
one, submission to the divine order for the roles of husbands
and wives. Submission to the divine order
for the roles of husbands and wives. We do not take the position
that is being blatantly and again aggressively propagated in our
day that our present mentality with reference to the wife having
a distinctive role and the husband having a distinctive role is
simply a cultural conditioning business. I heard one of these
women just the other day and she was really hot under the
collar. She says, it sickens me. She said, the minute you
turn the kids loose in the nursery school, where do they put the
little girls? Over to play with the dolls.
And where do they put the fellas? Over to play with the trucks.
You see, they condition them to think that way. There's absolutely
no reason why the girls should not be thinking trucks instead
of dolls. The whole concept that she should be conditioned to
think of motherhood, she said, is terrible. She was serious,
dead serious. You could see her jugular vein
standing on the side of her neck, and boy, she was really going
at it. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Don Ritter, missionary,
a graduate of CBC, and his wife Liz, whom we now fully support
and for whom we have the direct responsibility as a church in
Sweden, they share with you what's happened there with this experimentation
of role reversal. taking it serious. Well, what
an opportunity to shine as lights in the midst of darkness. Why
do we believe that there is a distinctive role for wife and mother? Because
marriage is not an accident in the evolutionary process. It
is the expression of the wise, loving design of the Creator
God. It was God who said, I will make
and help answering to his needs. It was God who brought her to
the man. It is God who says, husbands,
Love your wives as Christ loved the church. Exercise a headship
that is characterized by tenderness, being solicitous for every need
of your wife. Oh, they say that's feminine.
No, it's scriptural. You see, the man who really exemplifies
the tender, sensitive, nourishing love of Christ to his church
and his relationship to his wife, he'll be accused of fawning over
his wife. Well, thank God Christ fawns
over his church, or I wouldn't be standing here tonight. He
nourishes and he cherishes his church. Husbands, that's how
you're to love. And in that context, you're to
exercise an administrative kinship. over that domestic circle. Wise
as the church is subject to Christ. A trustful, loving, abandoned
subjection. Isn't that the submission you
render to Christ? I hope it is. If you're a Christian,
you do. You don't cower in the corner
before your Lord. He's moved towards you in his
redemptive love and the response of a heart quickened by the Spirit.
It's here, Lord, I give myself to you. It is all that I can
do. As the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be
to their husbands in everything. And I say if we're to shine as
lights in the midst of darkness, what opportunities we have. You
women, talking with other women in the neighborhood, they don't
have any concept like this. What an opportunity for you by
your attitude and where you can judiciously slip in a word concerning
that which lies behind your attitude and your demeanor. were to shine
as lights in the domestic sphere, evidencing no equivocation at
all on our submission to the divine order in our roles. Secondly, in the implementation
of the divine directives for the rearing of our children.
It was a sad thing when a year ago this past January, Dr. Spock wrote his article in Red
Book and said, Maybe you see that article, maybe
you hear of it. It was sad. The radical generation of the
60s was called the Spock generation, and now the poor old man says,
I goofed. I missed it. I missed it. And you know, when
I've been teaching on the Christian home and expounding principles
from the book of Proverbs, I've had Christians ready to fight
me and tar and feather me. They didn't prove my exegesis
wrong. But I dared to say that Solomon
was not culturally conditioned when he used such terminology
as, he that loveth his son chasteneth him diligently. Thou beaten with the rod he shall
not die, thou shalt deliver his soul from hell. And I've dared
to tell Christian parents, all your prayers that God will save
your children are mockery until you begin to apply the rod firmly
with principle and in love. God says the rod is a means of
grace to deliver your soul, the soul of your child, from hell. Had a young woman here at the
back of the church just last week. How old is the little R
baby, honey? Here, not here yet. And all he
was exerting is Adam. Very obvious. And he was slapping
someone. And the young mother said, well,
Pastor, I don't understand it. How can I teach him he's not
to slap when I slap him for it? I said, let me ask you one question.
Does he have authority from God to slap anybody? She said, no.
I said, do you have authority from God to spank him? She said,
yes. I said, all right, whether you
understand it or not, in the name of the Lord, you exercise your
God-given authority and responsibility and God will honor it. I don't understand. I don't understand
the psychology of the relationship between firm, loving, consistent
discipline that brings some very sharp awareness
to nerve endings and various parts of the anatomy and the
formation of soul and character, but I've seen with my own eyes
the blessing of God upon that kind of simple faith and obedience
that does what God says. We need to shine His light in
the midst of darkness. by the implementation of divine
directives for the rearing of our children in the area of discipline.
And we could go into Ephesians 6, 4 and its application to Christian
schools and the rest, but time will not permit. I want to touch
one third area, namely the exemplification of biblical priorities in our
whole lifestyle and oh how necessary this is. We've heard it until it becomes
a truism that this is an affluent society, inflation and deflation
all together notwithstanding. You spend a few weeks in a country
like Pakistan and you realize we could have our money devalued
five times over, have our income cut in half and have inflation
soar ten times more and we'd still be wealthy compared to
those poor folks. A week and a half to two weeks
wages for a pair of shoes. Now you figure that out in terms
of your earning power. A third of a day's wages for
a dozen oranges. Half a day's wages for a pound
of rice. And yesterday's luxuries have
become today's conveniences and tomorrow's necessities. And we
need to shine as lights in the midst of darkness. And the Lord
said, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,
and every necessary thing will be added to us. And the writer
to the Hebrews says, Having food and raiment sufficient for the
meeting of our basic necessities, let us therewith be content.
That's the admonition of God. Food and raiment. Content. But no, we're bombarded. There's
the constant bombardment by the media to say, Well, you shouldn't
be content. All you've got Is that old eight-year-old
range? Well, that doesn't have the latest
clean yourself feature, and that doesn't have this and that. It's
calculated to create discontent with such things as she has.
Now, we've got to shine as lights in the midst of darkness. This
is no neutral influence. No, no. That's the influence
of a world that has no God, so it's made things its God. And
we are called upon to shine as lights in the midst of that darkness. And what a blessed thing when
a family can stand in the midst of a sea of affluent materialism
and know something of that wonderful release from itching for more
things. It's a common saying in our house
that the kids say, you know that so-and-so got such-and-such and
such-and-such down the street? I say, hmm, isn't that interesting?
What does that have to do with us? I just look real stupid. What's that have to do with us?
Well, I say, what's that have to do with us? It has nothing
to do with how this house runs. We operate on a totally different
basis of perspective and ambition. And then we just begin to enumerate
what we have that they don't have in terms of those values
that can't be touched with moth and with rust. We had a classic
example of it just recently. One of our keen young men, one
of the deacons in our assembly, was offered a position that would
have meant a doubling of his salary and it wouldn't have shot
him from $5,000 to $10,000, I'll tell you. He had a whole group
of engineers under him. It would have meant prestige, the thing
that a lot of men 15 years older than he would have sold their
souls for and they couldn't understand it when he said, no, I see the
price tag is too high and he bailed out of the company. He
said, the most important thing to me is my own walk with God,
my own family and my And they looked at him, they can't figure
out guys like this. But the next day, when the boss
knew he would not be dissuaded, he said to him, calling him by
his first name, so-and-so, he said, 20 years ago, I think that's
the time limit, 15, 20 years ago, he said, I stood where you
stand now. And I made a decision. And everything that's been offered
to you, I wanted and I took it. But the price I paid is, I've
lost my wife and my kids. So I have a woman at home and
people at home. But I don't have a wife and children
that I feel I know. Here was light in the midst of
darkness. You see, showing a totally different
set of priorities. And that's what God calls upon
us to do at every stage. Well, in the five minutes that
are left, let me touch the last area, in the area of our churches. And it would be a wonderful thing
if we could say that the visible Church of Christ was immune from
the influence of the spirit of darkness, but it isn't. And I
want to say a couple of things very quickly, and I'll have to
guard them with some qualifying statements lest I be misunderstood,
because time will not permit any extensive treatment. But
there are several areas where I believe we need, as God's people,
professing subjection to the Scriptures, to shine as lights. The first one is this, in the
area of our church relationships. We must insist upon the supremacy
of the institutional church. Now let me explain what I mean.
By institutional church, I do not mean decadent ecclesiastical
graveyards, but I mean visible communities of saints organized
and functioning as a living organism after the biblical pattern. That's
what I'm talking about. I'm talking about what Paul meant
when he wrote and said, to the church which is at Corinth, the
visible, organized, functioning body of believers, the assembly
of God at Corinth. Now why do I say we need to insist
upon the supremacy of the institutional church? For the simple reason
that in 1 Timothy 3, one of the most pointed letters in the New
Testament dealing with the subject of the local church, Paul says
this to Timothy, These things I write unto you, hoping to come
shortly. But if I tarry long, that you
may know how men ought to behave themselves in the house of God,
which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of
the truth. Here Paul calls the church the
pillar and ground of the truth. Now he's not talking about the
church universal. He's not talking about the church
invisible. He left Timothy there at Ephesus, verse 3 of chapter
1, in order to assist the churches in Ephesus, to assist them in
ridding themselves of these heretics who are teaching wrong doctrine
based on a perversion of the law, He was there to guide them
in their public worship, chapter 2, the place of men and women,
chapter 2, verse 8 to 15, the election of deacons and elders,
chapter 3, and he says, now, if I do not come, I want you
to have a manual of behavior in the church. Now, the church
there is obviously, the church is local, the church is visible,
the church is organized and functioning, and he calls them the pillar
and ground of the truth. Now, God has constituted but
one pillar and ground of his truth, and that is the Church.
Now, the Church is perfectly warranted in establishing organs
to carry out some of her functions. Her function is to evangelize,
to baptize, to teach, and the Church, in carrying out her mission,
at times must establish certain organs to carry out her functions. When these organs become organisms
that bleed off the life from the church itself, something's
wrong. For instance, let me illustrate.
It's possible for someone in our present setup to come right
through from being converted to being a full-time Christian
worker and never once have been a vital part of a visible, functioning
local church. He gets converted in a non-church
youth movement. And his camaraderie with these
other young people is such that going into a place where you've
got some old people and some not-so-sharp-looking people,
and some will look a little dull, and some will dress a little
dowdy. He's been with the kids that are all with it, you see,
and the youth leader who's always got the latest styles and all
the rest, you know, right with it. So that becomes his intimate
tie of fellowship. Well, he isn't there very long
before someone says, look, you've got the gift of gab, you ought
to get trained for the work of the ministry somewhere. So he
goes off to a Bible school or a Bible college. And what happens,
why is it Bible college? Well, that becomes his closest
association. And generally speaking, if the
Bible college is interdenominational, it doesn't teach any definitive
doctrine on the church because that cuts off some of your constituency. So there are no deep ties with
the church. Then, lo and behold, while I was at Bible college,
the missions representative comes to chapel and says, oh, he gave
a good pitch for his mission. I'll apply to his mission. And
he applies to the mission, gets accepted by the mission. And
the only time he sees the church is when he needs to beat the
woods for some money. And I'm not caricaturing. And then he goes out to the mission
field. having never seen that the church
is the pillar and ground of the truth. He's never been part of
the church. I confess to my shame this was true of me for years.
I confess it to my shame. And I believe we're seeing the
fruits of this on the mission field. And one of the things
that has struck me, as God has been privileged to open doors
of ministry among missionaries and pastors and Christian workers
in other countries, is to see the confusion over the doctrine
of the Church. And if the devil hates the truth,
you know what he's doing? He's going to try to undermine
that which God has made the pillar and the ground of the truth.
So my exhortation is, if we would shine as lights, Let us give
due place to the supremacy of the institutional church. Secondly,
the centrality of preaching in the church. And oh, how I'd love
to just take off for about an hour now. We're in the day of
dialogue, the day of drama, the day of discussion, the day of
group sharing. And added to all this, the day
of charismatic flights into revelations and fantasies of all. No, no, my friend. God has given
to preaching a central place that will never be replaced,
both in the calling out of His sheep and in the building up
of His own. It is the Scriptures that are able to make us wise
unto salvation and to furnish us unto every good work. But
they must be opened up, they must be applied, they must be
shown in their proper use for doctrine, reproof, correction,
instruction in righteousness, 2 Timothy 3 and verse 16. But you see, we live in a day
that doesn't like the idea of authority, because you see, preaching is
not a man sharing his own notions. Preaching, the mystery of it
is that it's a fellow mortal standing in the name of God,
declaring the Word of God in the authority of God, so that
you're having dealings with the God before whom you'll stand
in judgment. And I believe we need, at any level, I don't care
what your responsibilities are in your church situation, don't
allow any erosion of the centrality of preaching and sit by silently.
If you've got to be an old crank in the corner, you be over there
and squeak, and squeak good and loud, and thump or whine or do
something. but seek to call the attention
of your church leaders to the fact that God is ordained by
the foolishness of the thing preached, is a literal translation
of 1 Corinthians 1.18, by the thing preached, which has reference
both to contents and to form of communication, to say them
that believe. It is by speaking the truth in
love that we are built up into Christ in all things, Ephesians
4. And then we need to insist upon the necessity of knowing
and receiving the whole counsel of God's truth. We live in a
day when we have the minimizing mentality. What can we take as
the minimal common denominator and call it evangelical faith?
Whereas God has given us the whole of his word. to our prophet. All scripture is God-breathed
and profitable. Paul could say as a missionary,
I have not shunned from declaring unto you the whole counsel of
God. Acts 26 and verse 20. And then finally we need to insist
on the validity and authority of biblical norms for church
life. This whole matter of the ordination
of women, this is no tempest in a teapot. This is a death
struggle concerning the issue who will rule in his church,
Jesus Christ or present fads. Nothing could be plainer in the
word of God that the woman is excluded from the teaching, preaching
office of a mixed assembly not because of intellectual inferiority,
not because of a lesser spiritual dignity, no, no, not at all. In terms of creative dignity,
in terms of native ability, There's equality across the sexes. But
God roots this in the order of creation and in the order of
the fall in 1 Timothy chapter 2. And it's flying into the face
of what God has clearly revealed. And people say, oh, it's a little
thing. My friend, listen. If King Jesus can be snubbed in
this area, where he speaks so clearly, it won't be long before
he'll be snubbed in every area. We're to be lights in the midst
of darkness. Luther says it's where the battle rages, but there
the loyalty of the soldier is tested. Oh, a man can be polishing
his brass and, you know, whistling up a storm looking like a brave
soldier over there where no fighting's going on. But where there's hand-to-hand
combat, here's the issue. Now, I had to run that risk tonight,
you see, not knowing you personally, and this is what made it so difficult
to get to know the mind of the Lord in this. Some of you may
not like what I've said, but I only plead with you to judge
it in the light of the Scriptures. That's my only plea. You claim
to believe the Bible is the final court of appeal. I plead with
you. I plead with you that as God's people, we should be light
in the midst of darkness, shining in those spheres in society where
the darkness would press in upon us, shining in those spheres
domestically, shining in those spheres in the realm of the Church. Well, may the Lord take these
thoughts and be pleased to bring some good out of them to our
prophet, and I trust to the prophet of others with whom we may have
opportunity to discuss these things. Thank you, Bob, for the
opportunity of coming, and thank you for your patience in listening.