Welcome, friends, to another
broadcast of Morsels for Zion's Poor. In the book of Judges we
read that the Gileadites were in the process of destroying
the Ephraimites. It was not easy to discern who
the Ephraimites were by sight, so a means of positive identification
was needed. By asking them to say the word
Shibboleth, they could be easily identified because the dialect
which was spoken by the Ephraimites caused them to pronounce the
word as Sibboleth. Thus they were identified by
their speech habits. Today there are clichés and catchphrases
which are in use by many Christians that also have an identifying
effect. If one is to be accepted in today's mainstream Christianity,
one is expected to use these shibboleths. In traveling about,
I'm astounded by the virtual explosion in the use of signs
in front of church meeting houses to capture people's attention
with catchy slogans and trendy sayings. I even find some of
them amusing and informative, but for the most part, the message
is extremely shallow and man-centered. Now, we certainly find nothing
wrong with proclaiming the gospel, even if it be on a lighted sign,
but we are troubled at the trend of substituting cliches for truth. It seems difficult for some to
grasp the fact that the Word of God itself is sufficient to
accomplish whatever task the Lord requires. With these thoughts
in mind, I want to present several shibboleths that are commonly
used among many. My purpose is not just to be
critical, but stems out of conviction that we should examine all things
we say about the Gospel in the light of what the Scripture says
about the Gospel. Now, we have all probably used these clichés,
but are they an accurate representation of what the Scripture says and
means? The first one is, Give your heart to Jesus. Now, this
comes as close to having a scriptural foundation as any of the catchphrases
we will look at. For the Scripture does say, My
son, give me thine heart. But the Lord is speaking to those
who are already his children, for they alone are his sons.
The only thing that is in the heart of man in his natural state
is wickedness and sin. And the Lord has plainly stated
that sin is the very thing which has separated us from Him. When
the Scripture speaks of the heart, it has reference to the innermost
desires and intentions of men. And the Lord indicated that it
was the seat and fountain of man's sin. Nowhere in any of
the preaching of the gospel by the Lord or His disciples does
anyone ask men to give the Lord their hearts. The heart of man
needs to be changed by a work of saving grace, not presented
as some offering on an altar of sacrifice. The second one
is the plan of salvation. This is a cliche which has deep
roots in the mechanism of soul winning. The common mindset is
that God has laid out this wonderful plan for men to obtain salvation
by following a few simple steps. A plan represents an unfinished
project. One of the underlying errors
of the idea of a plan of salvation is that God has a part and man
has a part in it and together salvation becomes a reality.
Man doesn't need a plan, he needs a solution. The preaching of
the gospel is about that solution, the finished work of Christ.
As Christ is exalted in that proclamation, he will draw men
to himself. Preaching the gospel is not trying
to get men to acknowledge something or do something. It's about glorifying
the one who has done everything necessary for the redemption
of his people. Whenever we see the gospel preached
in the scriptures, no mention is made of a plan for men to
follow. Rather, the declaration of Christ as Lord and Redeemer
is made plain. None of the apostles ever asked
men if they wanted to be saved, but when the gospel was preached
in the power of the Holy Ghost, those whom the Lord awakened
asked the apostles what to do. The third one of these cliches
is, he or I got saved. We hear this so often that few
people ever stop to even think about it. No one in scripture
ever refers to having been brought to a saving knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ by such terminology. In fact, the concept of getting
saved is foreign to the Holy Writ. This shibboleth conveys
the erroneous notion that salvation is something man can obtain by
his own power or in his own time, and often in the minds of the
deluded that is something he can lose by the same. The scripture
refers to salvation as something we have been appointed to receive,
something we have been given, and something that we shall have
in the future. But it nowhere refers to salvation
as something man gets. The fourth one is make him the
Lord of your life. One thing that we're certain
of is that he is the Lord of our lives with or without our
permission. Nowhere in the scripture is there
the faintest notion of man's ability to install him as or
prevent him from being Lord. For it is God which worketh in
you both the will and to do of his good pleasure. Does he work
in you For a free CD containing 15 of these radio broadcasts,
send an email to forthepoor at windstream.net.