The following message was delivered
on Sunday evening, September 26, 1993, at the Trinity Baptist
Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now as we pray for God's blessing
upon the ministry of the Word here, let us also remember our
brother Ken Harris, who is preaching in an entirely different setting.
I can assume on good grounds and on solid evidence that the
vast majority of you sitting here sit here as those who love
Christ and love his word and come expecting that word to come
to your heart with grace and power. Can ministers in a setting
where there are men who look upon their place there in the
mission as a convenience? as a means to have a place to
sleep and a meal to fill their bellies. And let us cry to God
that as Ken seeks to seize their ears and to hold them with the
Word of God that the Spirit of God will greatly assist him even
as we trust him for his assistance here. Let us pray together. Our Father, we thank you that
you are never weary. when your people come to you
in sincerity and in truth. We find nothing in your word
to discourage us from coming again and again and again and
again so long as our coming is the outcry of our felt need and
our believing acknowledgement that your ear is open to the
cry of the righteous and you delight to come to their aid.
Lord, it is in that spirit that we come tonight. We come to plead
as a congregation for our brother Ken Harris. and to plead that
as he stands and even now preaches to those men at the mission,
you would be with his mouth, even as the apostles sought the
prayers of the Ephesian Christians, that utterance would be given
unto him, that he might open his mouth and speak boldly as
he ought to speak. So we plead this for our brother
Ken. Oh God, be with his mouth. Help
him to seize the ears of those men. and may your word fasten
itself upon their consciences, and this night may some be brought
out of darkness and into your marvelous light. And then, O
Lord, we again plead for those aspects of the ministry of the
Spirit which we both need as much as those men need, and without
which our time in the word will be to no profit. Come then and
help preacher and listener alike that we may know what it is to
have your word fastening itself upon our consciences, gripping
our wills and directing our lives. Hear us, we plead, through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen. Now if you will please turn with
me to the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 24, as we come this evening
to our final meditation in these two verses, found in Matthew
24, verses 12 and 13. In the midst of what is commonly
designated as the Olivet Discourse, our Lord Jesus speaking says,
And because iniquity shall be multiplied, the love of the many
shall wax cold. But he that endureth to the end,
the same shall be saved. We have considered this text
on three previous occasions under the title of the Christian's
Danger and Duty in an Age of Abounding Lawlessness. In our initial message, I sought
to unpack the basic content of the text. It begins with the
condition described. because iniquity or lawlessness
shall be multiplied. Our Lord envisions a season when
there will be not the mere presence of iniquity or lawlessness, but
when the presence of lawlessness shall be greatly heightened and
increased. And after the condition is described,
the declension is predicted. As a result of the influence
of that abounding lawlessness, the love of the many shall wax
cold or it could be rendered. The love of the many shall be
extinguished. Many who profess love as the
fruit of their professed faith to Christ will find that love
extinguished, and with it all of the fruits of that professed
love will be swept away. They will become apostates. But then our Lord sets before
us the resistance demanded, but He that endureth, he that perseveres
to the end, the same shall be saved. Personal perseverance
in the way of faith and love and its fruits in spite of the
pressure that comes from abounding lawlessness is demanded of all
who would find themselves saved at the end of their own lives,
at the end in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. And though
it is absolutely certain that every child of God in whom the
root of the matter has been planted by the regenerating work of the
Holy Spirit will persevere to the end, it is a certainty, it
is nonetheless a necessity that we persevere to the end. Then we went on to see that if
the grace of love to Christ is to be kept burning hot amidst
the chilling rain in the context of abounding lawlessness, that
that love must first of all be properly rooted in our hearts. That love that we profess to
have to Christ must be the result of a powerful operation of the
grace of God in our hearts. It is only those whose professed
love to Christ is the fruit of His own supernatural work in
the heart that will see that love continue continuing to increase
and maintain itself in the midst of abounding lawlessness. But not only must it be properly
rooted in our hearts, as we saw in our communion meditation two
Lord's Day evenings ago, it must be properly nurtured in our hearts. That love which God plans must
be nurtured. And again, while the Lord Jesus
is committed in His life of intercession, and the Holy Spirit is committed
by the mysterious but powerful operations of His indwelling
presence, and the Father is committed by His immutable, unchangeable
purpose, that the love of Christ in our hearts should be nurtured,
we are nonetheless responsible for the nurturing of that love. And I sought to set before you
this simple but crucial principle that our love to Christ must
be nurtured by the frequent, Bible-based, believing contemplation
of Christ's love to us. Such texts as 2 Corinthians 5.14
and Romans 12.1 illustrate and enforce the principle that our
love to Christ is always responsive, and reciprocal. It is never self-initiating
or self-perpetuating. And how often have we sung this
in some of the well-known hymns in our Trinity hymnal. The third
stanza of 397, I find, I walk, I love, But, O the whole of love, is
but my answer, Lord, to thee. For thou wert long beforehand
with my soul, always thou lovest me." That's what we see. Yes,
we find We walk, we love, but we acknowledge that our love
is responsive, reactive, reciprocal. Oh, the whole of love is but
my answer, Lord, to Thee. We sing it in that well-known
hymn, majestic sweetness sits enthroned upon the Savior's brow. After the two initial standards
focus upon the glory of Christ in His person, stanzas three
through five speak of His work on our behalf. He saw me plunged
in deep distress and flew to my relief. For me He bore the
shameful cross. and carried all my grief. To Him I owe my life and breath
and all the joys I have. He makes me triumph over death
and saves me from the grave. To heaven, the place of His abode,
He brings my wandering or weary feet, shows me the glories of
my God, and makes my joys complete. Now what's the response? of the
heart of a believer to the contemplation of those expressions of the love
of Christ, stanza six, since from his bounty I received such
proofs of love divine, had I a thousand hearts to give, Lord. They should
all be Thine. There is the reaction. There
is the reciprocation. There is the response. Our love
kindled by the contemplation of His love. So we must frequently
meditate upon that love in its past supreme manifestation in
the events surrounding the cross. in its present manifold manifestations,
his constant intercession and nurturing and caring for his
own, and in its glorious future manifestation, when we as the
sons and daughters of God shall be like him, seeing him as he
is. So then, if our love to Christ
is to be kept hot and vigorous in an age of abounding lawlessness,
it must not only be properly rooted in our hearts, it must
be properly nurtured in our hearts. But now tonight in this final
meditation, I want to set before you a third part of the answer
to the question, how can love to Christ be kept hot in an age
of abounding lawlessness? And I answer not only must it
be properly rooted and properly nurtured, but it must be properly
protected. Like an exotic plant that can
never grow unless it is rooted well in proper soil with the
right pH balance and then is nurtured by right amounts of
sun and moisture and fertilizer but you see that exotic plant
will not last long simply if it is well rooted and properly
nurtured it must also be protected It must be protected from the
bugs and aphids that have a peculiar propensity to fasten themselves
upon that particular plant and to eat away its life. It must
be protected from the plant diseases to which that particular exotic
plant is more peculiarly liable, and it must be kept from blistering,
withering heat and killing and killing frosts. That exotic plant
must not only be well rooted and well nurtured, it must also
be well protected. And so it is with our love to
Christ. If we would persevere to the
end in love to Christ and all of its fruits, without which
we shall not be saved, but become part of the many who under the
pressure of abounding lawlessness, the love is extinguished. then, dear people, we must be
utterly committed to the protection of that grace of love. And though, again, the Scriptures
make it plain that God who has begun the good work in us will
perfect it until the day of Christ, and no little part of that ongoing
perfecting of that work is the nurturing, the nourishing, and
the protecting of the grace of love to Christ in our hearts.
The Bible makes it plain that though it is God's work, it is
also our work and our responsibility. For we read in Jude 20, that
ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying
in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God. Keep yourselves
in the love of God. It doesn't say in your praying
in the Holy Spirit, trust God to keep you in His love. Praying
in the Holy Spirit must be joined to an active endeavor to keep
ourselves in the love of God. The principle that is in that
text is applicable to the subject before us. We must Keep the love
of Christ, that is, our love for Him, not only continually
nourished in the way of God's appointment, namely by the contemplation
of His love to us, but we must seek to guard it from everything
and anything that would weaken its vigor, And so tonight as
we open up this subject of protecting that grace of love, I want to
assert that the duty of every Christian in an age of abounding
lawlessness is to properly protect his love to Christ from any and
all influences that would weaken its vigor. It is the duty of
every Christian in an age of abounding lawlessness to properly
protect his love to Christ from any and all influences that would
weaken its vigor. And as I have sought to search
the scriptures and search my own heart and be sensitive to
this particular congregation in the peculiar manifestations
of abounding lawlessness in this peculiar society in which we
live, I want to set before you four very clear, explicit warnings
with reference to things that will dampen your ardor for Christ,
that will weaken the vigor of your love to Christ. And you
and I must be committed with all the energy of our soul and
in the use of every divinely appointed means to guard ourselves
from the painful influence of these things. Number one, Beware
of any human relationship which weakens the vigor of your love
to Christ. Beware of any human relationship
which weakens the vigor of your love to Christ. According to
such passages as Luke 14, 25 and following, In the parallel passage in Matthew
chapter 10, 34 and following, no one becomes a true Christian
until by the operation of the Holy Spirit all idolatrous human
relationships are shattered at the feet of Jesus Christ. For our Lord Jesus said to the
vast multitudes in a day when it was popular to be found in
his company, If any man comes unto me, and hates not his own
father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and
sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. Christ will not take into the
ranks of His own anyone who is not prepared to give to Him the
place of supreme affection. He will not share that affection
which is due to Him with anyone who would rival that measure
of affection which is His due as God and as the only Redeemer
of sinners. As one of the Puritans said,
the great work in conversion is to win the heart to Christ. That's the great work in conversion. That was the struggle with the
rich young rulers. His heart was enmeshed and entwined
with his riches. And when Jesus said, you must
part with that idolatrous rival affection to your riches, if
your heart would be attached to me, disentangle your heart. Go, sell that thou hast, give
to the poor, thou shalt have treasure in heaven. Come, follow
me. He could not. bring himself to do that. He
went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. We could well
render it, great possessions had him. But they had his heart! And Christ wanted his heart!
And he wanted all of his heart! And he would be satisfied with
nothing less than that. And alas, he went away sorrowful. And if the winning of the heart
is the great work in conversion, the Puritan said, so the great
work in the Christian life is keeping the heart with Christ. The great work in conversion
is winning the heart to Christ. The great work in the Christian
life is keeping the heart with Christ. Now God has made us social
beings with social needs. Before the fall, every single
relationship increased man's love for God. And had Adam and
Eve not sinned, all of their progeny, and all of the extended
family, and all of the various social relationships that would
have developed in a holy, well-ordered, unsinful society, every single
relationship at every level, fully meeting every social need,
would have contributed to man's love to God. But one of the tragedies
of sin is that all of those relationships, while man still remains a social
being with social needs, sin has so insinuated itself into
the totality of man's being that there is not a human relationship
that cannot become the occasion of idolatry. Hence, when the
Lord Jesus calls disciples, he said, I will brook no rival to
your heart. You must love me more than father,
mother, brother, sister, in the parallel passage in Matthew 10. And if you are not prepared that
I shall have a place of unrivaled and supreme affection and attachment
in your heart, then I will not own you as my disciple. in the light of our text. Because
iniquity shall abound, lawlessness shall abound, the love of the
many shall wax cold. In an age of abounding lawlessness,
one of the marks of that lawlessness is that people are prepared to
break the first commandment with reference to their social needs
and to otherwise legitimate social relationships. What is the first
commandment? Thou shalt have no other gods
before thee. The God who acknowledges social
structures very explicitly in commandment number four and five
For in the Sabbath institution he assumes that each man as Lord
over his household will not only himself remember the Sabbath
day to keep it holy, and in it do no work, but he will see to
it that that standard extends to all who are within his extended
household, his servants, his family, and even the strangers
that come within his gates. You see, there are social dimensions
to the implementation of the Fourth Commandment. Then, of
course, when we come to the Fifth, it recognizes the existence of
that intimate social tie of parent and child. Honor your father
and your mother. But you see, whatever that means,
it does not mean there is any right to violate the First Commandment. and turn the honoring of parents
into a form of idolatry and then in the other commandments the
social dimensions stand on the very surface and what has happened
because of sin and particularly in an age of abounding lawlessness
Man takes these God-given social needs and these God-ordained
social structures and totally breaks the boundaries of God's
commandments and makes idols out of human relationships. When that happens on every side
there is a tremendous temptation for the people of God subtly
to be sucked into the vortex of such a society and because
iniquity abounds, iniquity in which human relationships become
idolatrous, the love of the many grows cold. In any society In any age, Jesus
Christ will be satisfied with nothing less than the whole of
the heart of all of his people. Now I want to be specific in
my application. Dear parents, if you are not
prepared to take God's side against your children, listen to me carefully. The fear of alienating your children
could be the door out of the Christian faith and into apostasy
for some of you. I have lived long enough to see
it, where people refused to take God's side against their children. Fathers who were so fearful of
having their daughters angry with them that they would not
demand a standard of reasonable modesty in the dress of their
daughters while they're under their roof. There's not a man here that does
not have a sense of what is unnecessarily provocative in the developed
body of a young woman. I don't believe such a man exists
in Trinity Church. Then in God's name, fathers,
why don't you monitor what your daughters wear at the pool, at
the beach, and in Trinity Church? Is it because you're afraid they'll
pout and frown and shout? What about Christ's smile and
Christ's frown? There are spouses unwilling to
take God's side against husband or wife. Unwilling at those points
where the expectations of the spouse lead not into an orbit
of distasteful but nonetheless legitimate accommodation that
you might, by that accommodation, keep peace in the home and seek
to win an unconverted spouse. Oh no. Your bottom line is, I'll
bend and I'll capitulate at any line that is drawn which says
if I go beyond that line or stay back of that line, my spouse
will leave me and I can't live without him and without her. My friend, you can live without
him or her, but you cannot live nor die nor dare you go to judgment
without Christ. And if your love to spouse and
the human relationship of marriage with its multilevel intimacy
has become a form of idolatry, beware, it can only dampen and
weaken the vigor of your love to Christ. I say to you young
people, this is the test you must put to all of your same-sex
relationships? You girls, what young women should
you seek to cultivate more intimate friendships with? You guys, what
guys ought to be your closer buddies? If you name the name
of Christ and profess to love Him, here's the text, here's
the test, beware of any human relationship which weakens the
vigor of your love to Christ. Ask yourself when you spent an
afternoon at that gal's home, your closest girlfriend as a
young woman, do I come away more sensitive to the voice of Christ,
more pliant to the word of Christ, more excited about the church
of Christ, and the people of Christ, and the ways of Christ,
and the work of Christ, and the will of Christ? Or does my time
with that friend cause me to draw back and have less appetite
for my Bible, for church, for obedience to my parents, you
must answer the question, young women. You name the name of Christ,
you beware of any human relationship that weakens the vigor of your
love to Christ. You guys, the same thing. It's
not enough that you're a sports nut, and your closest buddy shares
your involvement in sports. That may be legitimate in itself,
but ask the question. When we've spent an afternoon
together, when we've spent a Saturday together, and I come back to
my home, am I looking forward more to the Lord's Day, to my
Sunday school class, to the preaching of the Word, to the worship of
God, because I've been with that guy? Or do I find myself digging
my heels in saying, Sunday again. Now you've got to be the judge,
I can't be. But if you want to be found persevering
to the end, and you claim to be attached to Christ in faith
and love, in an age of abounding wickedness, you must beware of
any human relationship which weakens the vigor of your love
to Christ. And then it extends from parent-child
spouse to spouse, same-sex friendships, and it's the acid test of opposite-sex
friendships and romantic pursuits, it's not enough that she stirs
your hormones and your hemones and your hormones. Not enough! The question is, does my interest
in that young man, that young woman, does the cultivation of
that interest find me more vigorous in my love to Christ? Or does
it make me more preoccupied with my face, and my eye shadow, and
my lipstick, and my bust, and my behind? Come on, gals, get honest! You could be let clean out of
any professed, present attachment to Christ! Because you make an idol of your
face and your bust and your body. Because the guy you're interested
in, that's what he makes it known, is the thing that he's most interested
in. It's not your love to Christ,
which he seeks to nurture. which he fastens on to as the
thing most attractive in you. Unite! He knows it! Remember Samson? He never learned
this lesson. If God didn't put Samson among
the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11, none of us would think he
had the root of the matter in him. You'd never know it. Every gal he looked on that caused
his juices to flow, he had to have her. You read the story. The Bible is very blunt in its
description. But it's not just Samson concerning
whose state we have questions if God didn't settle it by putting
him in Hebrews 11. But look at David, the man after
God's own heart. When he first cast his eyes upon
Bathsheba, his thought was not Will the second look intensify
my ardor for my God and my Redeemer? But will the second look please
my flesh? If you're going to make it in an
age of abounding wickedness, you and I must beware of any
human relationship which weakens the vigor of our love and you
know it is not shameful if you've gotten quite far in the relationship
to break it off for no other reason than this judgment day
honesty demands that I say from the time I started dating this
guy or this gal my love to Christ has waned and waned and the relationship
has weakened its vigor for no other reason than that I break
it off as a relationship that is not in the interest of my
soul's salvation. I said, Pastor Martin, that's
radical. Well, I'll tell you, missing
hell and going to heaven is radical. You don't get a second chance.
Cutting off right hands and blocking out right eyes is radical. But
Jesus said, it's necessary if we'd enter But then secondly,
second warning with reference to protecting the vigor of our
love to Christ. Beware of any pursuit of the
things of this world which weakens the vigor of your love to Christ. Beware of any pursuit of the
things of this world which weakens the vigor of your love to Christ. And here I ask you to turn to
Mark chapter 4 and verse 19. When our Lord Jesus is interpreting
the parable of the soils and the sower and the seed, he says
in Mark chapter 4 and verse 19, verse 18, And others are they which are
sown among the thorns. These are they that have heard
the word, and the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness
of riches, and the lusts, the desires of other things entering
in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful. the love of the many
shall wax cold." Here is someone that is in proximity to the ministry
of the Word. There seems to be some measure
of a faith response, a plant of what appears to be gospel
planting begins to grow, but long before it can have anything
that we could call ripe fruit, it is choked and withers and
brings forth in the parallel passage that which Luke says
no fruit to perfection or to maturity. Why? Because the weeds
grew with it and the weeds choked its life. And what are the weeds? Look, not drunkenness and immorality
and debauchery. and thievery and homosexuality
and lesbianism, no! The cares of this age, the things
that come upon us living in this present age, legitimate cares
that have to do with making a living, putting bread on the table, and
preparing the bread before it comes to the table, and the care
of making sure that we've got our snow tires on, and we've
changed the oil, and the car's been serviced, and all that goes
into living life as life must be lived in this present age.
The cares connected with this present age the deceitfulness
of riches. Riches you see that promise what
they can never give and give what they never promise. Withhold
But they never tell us they will withhold. And the lust, the desires
of other things entering in, choke the word. I say, beware
of any pursuit of the things of this world which weakens the
vigor of your love to Christ. Remember Demas? All that we are
told about him in 2 Timothy 4.10 is this. Demas hath forsaken
me, having loved this present age." It doesn't say he ran off
and shacked up with somebody else's wife. It doesn't say like
a Judas he grabbed the bag and was a thief and embezzled apostolic
funds. It says he forsook us, having
loved this present age. You remember in Pilgrim's Progress,
one of the bits of advice that Evangelists gave to Christians
was this, let nothing, this side of the world to come, get within
you. Evangelists knew that Christian
had to be in constant contact with many things that would be
consumed with this world when it goes up in the fires of the
final conflagration at the coming of the Lord Jesus with his mighty
angels. He understood that Christian
had to be en rapport, in contact with, and constant interaction
with this real world. But he said, Christian, let nothing,
no thing, this side of the world to come get with you. Keep all
of your relationship to it an external Receive the things of
God's bounty with an open and a thankful hand, but never close
your hand around them, and then press them into your heart. Don't let them get within you. The warning of 1 Timothy 6, 6-10
needs to be sounded in an age of abounding lawlessness that
is joined to abounding materialism. And all of the moaning and groaning
about the state of our economy notwithstanding, we are glutted
to death with bounty. The scripture tells us, here's
the divine standard. Verse 6 of 1 Timothy 6, Godliness
with contentment is great gain. For we brought no thing, nothing,
no thing into the world. All we brought was the cry that
made our mothers feel glad that we were alive and breathing.
We brought nothing into the world, for neither can we carry anything
out. But having food and covering,
we shall therewith be content. Having what many would call now
a borderline poverty subsistence existence, we'll be content.
We have enough food to keep us from hunger pangs and nourish
our bodies, enough raiment to protect us from the elements,
so that we are not exposed to unnecessary disease and sickness
and personal danger. There is to be contentment. So my Bible says, I'm sorry,
I didn't write it. I believe it. By the grace of
God, I seek to obey it. Having food and covering in these,
we shall have enough. Let us therewith be content.
But, now notice, they that are minded to be rich, and in the
context, what is it to be rich? It's to have a cushion in all
the areas of our basic needs. That's a rich man. It's to have
more than a mere subsistence existence. It's to have so much
that it's really hard to pray the Lord's Prayer. Give us this
day bread for the day. How often I've been convicted
that I can't pray that prayer with any earnestness, because
when my wife comes back from the supermarket, bread for the
weak is in the cupboards and in the fridge and in the freezer. They that are minded to be rich,
those that are determined to have things beyond food and It
doesn't say those who have it, but those that are minded to
be. Providence has not placed them in any other circumstance
but that of a basic subsistence existence. They are minded to
be rich. They've set their hearts on making
it. What happens to them? Fall into
a temptation and a snare and many foolish and hurtful lusts. such as drown men in destruction
and perdition. My dear people, that is the love
of the many waxing cold, extinguished under a pile of things. The love of money is a root of
all kinds of evil which some reaching after have been led
astray from the faith, and have pierced themselves through with
many sorrows, and they'll be piercing themselves with the
sorrow of eternal darkness." Dear people, this is serious
business. I know a lot of you will go out of here and say,
oh well, Pastor Martin was on his ranting and raving thing
again, but my friends, this is Bible. You say you believe this
book? Are you going to become another
living monument that the Holy Ghost is speaking the truth to,
Paul? Getting the itch for something
more? And the price you pay is an absorption,
an involvement that weakens the vigor of your love to Christ? You certainly know that I am
not saying we should not have career goals and should not seek
to work as diligently as we can to provide for our own and have
wherewith to give. I'm familiar with all those passages. I preach them and I'm not negating
them, but I am seeking to do justice to this passage. And
to what Jesus says are the network of thorn bushes that choke the
word and there's not a gross sin in the whole list. They're
the kinds of sins that can be pursued and indulged in in the
most respectable Reformed Baptist congregation. And I tell you
one of the things that has stirred me in my preparation On my so-called
day off on last Monday, I did some cleaning up. That's usually
one of my projects, Monday mornings, to tidy up my study. Books all
over the place and notes and papers from preparation for the
academy and on into the Lord's Day. And I wanted to do some
extra cleaning. Somewhere in a little storage
area, I've got buried an old reel-to-reel tape of our wedding. I don't even know if the thing
will still play because it's been in the hot and cold extremes
of that storage area. So I was rooting around in there
and I found that picture that we took of the church family
in 1975 over at the Grover Cleveland Park. And I tell you, we talk
about highs and lows in one hour or one half hour. I looked across
that picture at some who were little children. The unfolding
history has been nothing short of what one would call a living
tragedy of the folly of turning away from gospel invitations
and gospel warnings and gospel entreaties and everything many
of those young children were told. They are now the living
monuments of what happens when people stop their ears and say,
it's not for me. And then there are others, full
grown adults, Some who've left us for one reason or another,
and we still have reason to believe they are Christians, but there
are others who have utterly repudiated the Christian faith. And in some
cases, it is clear that the issue is right here. They began to
pursue the things of this world in a way that patently weakened
the vigor of their professed love to Christ for you see in
an age of abounding lawlessness the first command is broken with
impunity you shall have no other gods before me and the book of
Colossians says covetousness is idolatry the setting of the
heart upon things is a breaking of the first commandment as well
as of the tenth Dear people, if we would persevere unto the
end in an age of abounding lawlessness, if we would know the increasing
vigor of that love to Christ, the spring of all other graces,
then beware not only of any human relationship which weakens the
vigor of your love to Christ, but beware of the pursuit of
any of the things of this world which weakens the vigor of your
love to Christ. And then thirdly, and here I'm
going to unload what has been a growing burden. This is not
something I say hastily or carelessly or thoughtlessly. I say it as
the built-up pressure of what I trust is genuine pastoral concern. Beware of any form of so-called
recreation or entertainment that weakens the vigor of your love
to Christ. Beware of any form of so-called
recreation or entertainment that weakens the vigor of your love
to Christ. Now again, I am fully conscious
that embedded in the very commandments of God given on Sinai, There
is God's recognition of a weekly cycle of six days of labor and
a day of holy rest. I'm fully aware of that. And
I thank God for each recurring Lord's Day Sabbath. My Savior,
whom I am to imitate with you, took naps in the middle of the
day when he needed them, even in the unlikely place of a storm-tossed
ship in the midst of a sea. Our Savior sat on a well midday
while he was weary with his journey. Our Savior said in Mark 6 31,
come ye apart and rest a while. And the context is clearly their
need for recreation, but not entertainment in that context.
It says they didn't have time even to eat. There was such pressure
upon them. And so he says, come apart. You
need to be recreated. You need to refurbish your strength
and energy. Furthermore, 1 Timothy 4, 1-6
condemns every form of asceticism as having its origin in the activity
of demons. Asceticism is demonic, for it
is an attack upon man as man, not man as sinner. To say that
I'll be more holy if I deny the indulgence of God-given appetites
in a God-appropriate way, that's asceticism. I'm more holy if
I don't eat certain meats. More holy if I abstain from the
intimacies of the sexual relationship and marriage and remain celibate.
That passage says that commanding to abstain from meat and marriage
is rooted in the doctrine of demons. Demons who are out to
destroy man as man! God's grace attacks only that
in man which is sinful, not that which is man. My dear people,
that's the matrix out of which I'm speaking. I believe those
things. However, one of the marks of
a lawless age is its obsession with fun and games. Look at our
age. How does it manifest its lawlessness? Sunday has become National Fun
Day. And all across our country today,
stadia have been packed with 60, 70, 80,000 people who of course have to
come for what they call their tailgate party before the game. That's a chance to booze it up
and get half blown out of your mind on beer and liquor and then
go in and act like a fool and stomp and holler for three to
three and a half hours on God's sacred day. No regard for that day. It's fun day. Sunday is the great
reaping day for the obsession with sports in our lawless age. Fifth commandment. the lawlessness
spawned by the musical forms that have set children and young
people against their parents and set young people against
the proven structures of decency and the norms of societal restraint
and the Sixth Commandment, the murderous blatantly hate film
rock music that thunders into the ears of millions day after
day and hour after hour and then how could anyone expect to have
a sitcom a humor show a movie of any kind without a gratuitous
sex scene without some structure in the plot in which the decency
and the normalcy of heterosexual marriage and commitment for life
and children who are the fruit of that union form the matrix
of that plot. I'm thankful for what they did
in the most recent TV Guide, not the one that came out this
week, but last week. They had four previews and all
the new sitcoms. They had a summary of who the
main actors were, what the basic storyline was and the structure,
and then an assessment. And as I read through those paragraphs,
there was only one exception. All of the structures are abnormalities
that represent a violation of the fifth or the seventh commandment.
For example, you've got a young lawyer who's divorced his wife
and moves in with his father with his son. You've got another where you've
got two divorced mothers moving together with their kids. It's
all of these things that for fun and entertainment, the lawlessness
is screamed out at a nation. And what I'm saying is this,
if you can look at a structure, the very structure of which is
a defiance of God and His law, and laugh in the midst of that
structure, you know what's happening? Your love for God and His law
is being eroded. And your susceptibility to be
vulnerable to the very thing you can look upon with tacit
approval, and the very thing you can laugh at, will one day
be the thing you contemplate indulging. And I am frankly shocked And
I hear on the lips of members of Trinity Baptist Church, oh,
that's not a bad movie. Only 10 curse words, only one
sex scene. In God's name, my brother, sister,
where are you coming from? Do you really believe that the
devil is that respectful of you? That you can deliberately expose
yourself to that as entertainment? where you're coming not with
your discerning spiritual faculties alert, believing on an enemy's
ground, and you have some compelling God-given reason to expose yourself
to that, but you're doing it for entertainment? The very concept
of entertainment is you're throwing your spirit over to the thing
that is entertaining you. Be not deceived. evil companions
corrupt good morals, whether the companions are at your side
in a flesh and blood relationship, or whether they are your companions
on the dots that form the pictures on the TV screen, or at the local
sixplex theater. I know some of you are going
to go out of here and say, oh, Pastor Martin's gone back to
old Fundy. No, no, my friends, no. I'm not
saying no Christian under any circumstances can go to a commercial
motion picture theater. Christ bought a liberty for every
Christian to make that decision. I won't touch his blood-bought
rights. Nor yours. But what I'm saying
in the name of the Christ who said, because iniquity shall
abound, the love of the many shall wax cold, you beware of
any form of so-called recreation or entertainment that weakens
the vigor of your love to Christ. And entertainment and recreation,
it is obsessed with breaking violating the sacred day, denigrating
sacred relationships of father and mother and family, casting
aspersions on the sanctity of the sexual union to be enjoyed
only within the bounds of life-long marital commitment and fidelity. God have mercy on you, you'll
be a statistic that'll fit into Matthew 24, 12 before it's You'll be part of the money that
you've been warned. But I don't want you just warned.
I want to see you safely to heaven. And then fourthly and kindly, beware, beware of any conscious
controversy with God which will weaken the vigor of your love
to Christ. You see, the moment I sin, and
conscience by the word makes me aware of my sin, and I do
not run to the fountain open for sin and uncleanness, at that
point I am grieving the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 4.30 says,
And greed not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed
unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath
and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all
malice, and be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one
another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you. It is
only the Holy Spirit who can keep alive and vigorous, burning
brightly in the imagery of the coals, but now in the imagery
of tonight, that can keep that exotic plant of love to Christ
healthy. It is He who continually takes
of the things of Christ and makes them real and precious. It is
He who as I gaze upon Christ as revealed in the Scripture,
2 Corinthians 3.18, transforms me into that likeness. It is
the Spirit who enables my heart to know anything of love to Christ
and devotion to His person and cause. But when you grieve Him
by not dealing with the controversy that you have with God, then
the moment you so grieve Him there is immediately a measure
of a weakening, a waning of the vigor of your love to Christ. You simply cannot go around with
your spiritual system conned up with unresolved controversies
with God and have a growing vigorous love to Christ. Dear people,
If we would have our love to Christ kept vigorous, we must
have a conscience, Acts 24, 16, void of offense at all times
to God and to man. You say, well, Pastor, that's
an awfully strict way of walking. Yeah, it is. That's why Jesus
said, narrow is the way that leads to life and few there be
that find it. That word narrow means compressed! It is not an easy, laid-back,
stick-your-hands-in-the-pocket whistle dixie and look-at-the-clouds
trip to heaven, dear folks. Bunyan didn't describe it that
way. There were bogs and there were ditches and there were the
enemies of Apollyon and giant despair. and all the other things
that Christian and his companions met with in the way. I conclude
to let you know that that great, perhaps the greatest preacher
of free grace and the beauty and the glory of Christ since
the days of the Apostle Charles Spurgeon, and I have fed my soul
for two years now on his morning and evening having recommended
it for years, and my wife having worn out her leather-covered
copy, I said, it's about time I read what I've been recommending.
And I've been doing it much to my profit for the past two years.
And he had a meditation on August 29 on the Nazirite vow. Now the Nazirite who was to eat
nothing made of the vine tree from the kernels even to the
husk. And he takes the principle that this illustrates a life
of separation unto God. Strict walking is much despised
in these days. But rest assured, dear reader,
it is both the safest and the happiest. The safest and the
happiest! He who yields a point or two
to the world is in fearful peril. He who eats the grapes of Sodom
We'll soon drink the wine of Gamora. A little crevice in the
sea bank in Holland lets in the sea, and the gap speedily swells
till a province is drowned. Worldly conformity in any degree
is a snare to the soul, and makes it more and more liable to presumptuous
sins. Moreover, as the Nazarite who
drank grape juice could not be quite sure whether it might have
endured a degree of fermentation, and consequently could not be
clear in heart that his vow was intact, So the yielding, temporizing
Christian cannot wear a conscience void of offense, but must feel
that the inward monitor is in doubt of him. Things doubtful
we need not doubt about, they are wrong to us. Things doubtful
we need not doubt about, they are wrong to us. Things tempting
we must not dally with, but flee from them with speed. Better
be sneered at as a Puritan than be despised and exposed as a
hypocrite. Careful walking may involve much
self-denial, but it has pleasures of its own which are more than
a sufficient recognance. And what greater pleasure can
there be than the conscious enjoyment of the presence of Jesus? and
the increasing confidence that I am his and he is mine, yea,
I to the end shall endure as sure as the promise is given,
more happy, but not more secure, the glorified spirits in heaven. He who takes these admonitions
seriously And by the grace and strength of Christ, out of the
motive of a growing love to Christ, the fruit of the contemplation
of His love to us, such a one will never be numbered amongst
the many whose love is extinguished. May God help us then by His grace
throughout all of our days, not only to be sure that our love
is properly rooted, that our love is properly nurtured, but
that love to Christ properly protected. As we, by the grace
of God, beware of everything and anything in human relationships
that would weaken our love to Christ, any pursuit of this world
that weakens the vigor of our love to Christ, any form of recreation
or entertainment that weakens the vigor of our love to Christ,
and any conscious controversy with God that weakens our love
to Christ. If that standard is extreme,
tell me, on what biblical grounds would you accept a lesser standard
for yourself? And for you who know nothing
of love to Christ, If you've learned nothing else, I hope
you've learned this tonight. To be a Christian means you're
going to have to have dealings with Christ. Dealings with Him
in such a way that no longer is your own will and your own
goals for your life your God that you pursue. But the Christ
who loved and died for sinners and lives to guide and take a
host of sinners safely to heaven must become the object of your
trust in the supreme object of your devotion, may you cry to
him for mercy, may you know his grace, and may you, with all
the saints of God, be such as persevere even unto the end. Let us pray. Our Father, we thank you again
for your holy words. We remember the celebration of
your word by the psalmist who exclaimed, Moreover, by them
is your servant warned, and in the keeping of them there is
great reward. O Lord, as we have been warned
by your word, may we find in the keeping of those warnings
there is indeed great reward. the reward of a growing, vigorous
love to your son, the reward of increased communion with him,
increased usefulness for him in our generation, and then the
final and glorious reward of being taken home to be with him
when our earthly pilgrimage is over and being found glorified
with him at his return. O Lord, we ask you, bring this
word home with power to every heart and every conscience. Hear our cry. Dismiss us with
the blessing of your gracious presence continually abiding
with us and where necessary bringing pressure to bear upon us until
at the point of controversy with you there is a blessed submission. Hear us and answer us, we plead,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.