Well, you remember a few years
ago, a few weeks ago at the start of the year, we looked at the
book of Ecclesiastes, and we had four messages from that book
showing us that life without the gospel of God is futile,
vanity. And then we went on to say, well,
okay, we need the gospel, the truth of God, we need to know
God, but what is my gospel? What is the gospel I believe?
Is it God's gospel? Is it authentic? Does it, this
is key, does it have the currency of effectual salvation? Or will
Jesus reply to those who come with their gospels and say, depart
from me, I never knew you, your gospel was fake. And so we're
told to try the spirits, whether they be of God, to examine what
people preach to see whether it's true, not for the sake of
being critical and negative, but for the sake of knowing the
truth. Now we've examined against the scripture we've examined
because why scripture to the law and the testimony the scripture
if they speak not according to this word there is no light there
is no truth in them and we've looked at one evangelical christian
gospel called alpha course universalism it's all around us it's all around
us it's just down the road great big church just down the road
from us And then we examined reformed legalism. Oh, no, no,
these are the aristocrats of the evangelical world, because
they've got all the doctrine correct, and they know what they're
doing. And they've got the great confessions, the Westminster
Confession and the 1689 Confession. But they say that a believer,
having believed Christ and having been saved, is to live under
the law. And we looked at that, and we
examined it against the scripture. And you know, strangely, we found
that the scripture said you are not under law, but under grace. we found that the scripture said
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believes. And so we've said that they've
got significant serious aspects that deny the true gospel of
scripture. And to deny the true gospel of
scripture, remember, You need the currency of eternal life.
You need the currency that will assure the salvation of your
soul. And that's only the true gospel of Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. Nothing else. The blood of...
What can save a sinner? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. That's it. That's it. So we've
got two more evangelical gospels to examine. One this week, one
next week. This week, I want to look at
Pentecostalism. the charismatic movement. Then
next week, I want to look at free offer duty faith, which
you'll say, what's that all about? Well, you have to wait till next
week. Now, let me stress, because I know there's a tendency to
take it the wrong way. My aim is not to be critical
and negative, but to warn. You know, now in these internet
days, We constantly hear of scams. Deceitful people are everywhere.
And you'll receive an email, and it looks like it's from PayPal,
telling you that you've got money in your account. Click on this
button and, oh gosh, I've got money in my account. Oh, I'll
just click on this button then, because it looks like PayPal. It smells like PayPal. It sounds
like PayPal. I'm going to assume it is PayPal.
And you click on it, and before you know it, some scammer has
got your personal details and is raiding money out of your
bank account. And that's not fiction, you know, it happens
all the time. Well, we're talking about spiritual scams here. That's
the point. We need to show the error of
these things. But look, this is my objective.
I don't just want to be negative and show the error, but I want
to compare it with the true biblical gospel. and show how much more
superior is the true biblical gospel. I don't just want to
demolish that which is false, I want to show that which is
true. And when you grasp that which
is true, all the false things will demolish, they'll just fall
away. Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice and follow me. They
will not follow a hireling. They won't follow a religious
scammer. They won't follow a religious
cheat, a fraud. They hear his voice. Now then,
let's come to Pentecostalism. because time is short. What is
Pentecostalism? Well, I imagine most of you know
what I mean, the charismatic movement. It's superficially
evangelical. It talks language that sounds
evangelical Christian. They talk about salvation in
Jesus. They talk about Jesus dying for
the sins of people. But they add to it all sorts
of things. They manifest miraculous spiritual
signs, or at least so they claim. They claim that the miracles
and wonders that we read about in the Acts of the Apostles are
still happening today, the charismatic gifts. They say that after you're
converted to Christ, at a later stage of maturity, you need a
thing called the baptism of the Spirit. And we'll know that you've
had the baptism of the Spirit because then you will speak in
tongues, unknown languages. unknown sounds. Whether they're
real languages, I believe in the first century they only were
real languages for very good scriptural reason to do with
the Tower of Babel and the confusion of the languages there. But I
think most of what happens today in the name of charismatic tongues
is just meaningless babble. You mathematically, you can subject
it to analysis and you can prove. There's no information content
in it. It's just meaningless babble. It's just like ripples
on a seashore. Ripples on a seashore are not
the same as writing. They're not. They're just not.
They're just noise. They talk about new prophecy.
They've got new prophecies. I remember when we lived in Barrow-in-Furness,
there was a man that claimed that the Spirit of God had told
him that he, the Spirit of God, was going to come down the A591,
which was the road to Barrow-in-Furness, the 35 mile long. He's told,
I've had a prophecy that the Spirit of God is coming down
the A591. Well, if any of you have driven
down the A591, you will realize what a stupid notion that is.
How on earth people really take it seriously? But more than that,
they have healing of sickness. You know, they have healing meetings.
All sorts of people come out to the front. They have a thing,
a lady wrote to me about our church in the week and she said,
do we believe in slaying in the spirit? And they have this thing
called slaying in the spirit. You know, people get overcome
by the emotion of the meeting and they come out to the front
at what they call the altar call, very Billy Graham. and people
grab hold of their heads and then they collapse on the floor
and they're slain in the spirit. All sorts of other... There was
one guy who told us once about the gift of sweating. I've got
the gift of sweating when I do too much gardening, or when I
try and walk too fast. But they seriously talk about
the gift of sweating, as if it's a manifestation of the Holy Spirit.
Now I know you're laughing, and I laugh, I've never taken this
seriously. But this is what these people
believe. And their worship is more akin to popular music. There's a very big, you say,
what's it got to do with us? You know, there's a universalist
alpha church a quarter of a mile away, half a mile away. You all
pass it when you come here. When you come around Bundles,
great big church in an office block, half a mile from here,
charismatic church, Pentecostal church. I looked at their website
the other day. The worship looks more like a
rock concert than it does the worship of God. I don't make
any comment about rock concerts, I've probably been to one or
two myself. But the point is that's not the worship of God
by the Church of God. But they have their rock band
and there's hand-waving and they have team, you know, they always
worship, they think you can only worship if your hands are waving
in the air. Team ministries, many, many women preachers, the
team ministry there is predominantly women. Predominantly women. And
meanwhile, theology, the teaching of scripture, the doctrine of
Christ, is rejected and relegated, and fleshly experience is exalted. They claim that the Bible alone
is not sufficient to make the man of God. This is what 2 Timothy
3, 17 says. All scripture is given of God,
and it's able to make the man of God thoroughly furnished unto
all good works. What do you need to grow in the
Christian? The Bible. What more can he say
than to you he has said? But no, like the Mormons, the
Charismatics, add their own prophecies, and their extra revelations,
and things that they have apostles today. There are no apostles
today, the apostles died out when the apostle John died, the
writer of the last book of the Bible. No. They're like the Mormons
in that they add extra revelation. They say, what more can he say
than to you he has said? Oh, all the revelations of their
apostles and their prophets, that's what he can say. And he
does say, and without it you're lacking, that's what they say.
That is not true. So, yes, there are very large
churches like the one just down the road, but do you know, it
isn't restricted to those that are openly, overtly charismatic. there are charismatic papists,
Roman Catholics, Baptists, Anglicans, and if you go around general
evangelicalism all around this country particularly that universalist
alpha course type you won't find a solitary one of them who says
that the charismatic gifts are not possible today even if they
themselves don't practice them. They accept it as valid. So what's
the biblical basis then for this Pentecostalism? It's claimed
that it's based on Pentecost, the day of Pentecost, when the
Holy Spirit came. You know, they were told, go and wait in the
upper room, and the Holy Spirit will come. And tongues and flames
of fire appeared on their heads, and they spoke with other tongues,
and they went out and they preached in Jerusalem. And there was a
great movement of the Holy Spirit, and 3,000 people were saved,
were added to the church in that one day when Peter preached in
Acts chapter 2. And then you go on through Acts
and there's all the manifestation of miracles. Paul performed miracles. All of the miraculous things
constantly happened and accompanied the apostolic ministry. And they
say, well look at 1 Corinthians 12, 13 and 14, it's all about
these charismatic gifts. Surely they're relevant to the
church today, else why would they be in the Bible? And look
back at the great revivals that they've been in history. Every
revival was marked out by the charismatic gifts. It's a popular
movement. They've got large, enthusiastic
congregations. Very large. And they have this
notion of two-tier Christianity, so you can be simply saved, a
believer, on one level, but then when you've had the baptism of
the Spirit, you're living on a higher plane. You're baptized
in the Holy Spirit, and you manifest spiritual gifts of tongues and
prophecy. So that's what they claim is
their biblical basis. So let's put it to the Berean
test. Berean test? The noble Bereans,
in Acts. Yeah? What marked out the noble
Bereans? Instead of dragging Paul and
Silas and Barnabas and stoning them, the noble Bereans searched
the Scriptures daily, whether these things be so. Let's search
the Scriptures, whether these claims be true. Now, a few words
about miracles in the Bible. First of all, The world around
us today, more than ever before, is totally based on materialistic,
scientific rationalism. You listen to Professor Brian
Cox, and many, many others like him, you are only, only, only
allowed to say that everything is just mindless working of physical
law. that's what they say, there's
a radio four program the infinite monkey cage which the BBC blazons
as one of their star shows for modern thinking and it is this
idea that everything can be explained without any thought of God or
any spirituality everything is just purely the laws of physics
as we know them today so then in that context What are miracles? Do we believe in miracles? I
believe in miracles, yes. I believe in miracles, definitely.
Why? Why? Because the scripture talks about
them. What is a miracle then? A miracle is the temporary suspension
of natural law for a purpose, for a spiritual purpose. It's
a temporary, so that things don't work. I'll give you an example. In the book of Judges, in one
of the battles, they prayed and God caused the sun to stand still
for many more hours. The day was much, much lengthened
so that they could complete their battle. Miracle. Things didn't
go on as they always say, we don't believe that. I do believe
it because it's in the word of God. I believe it. Why do I believe
it? Who upholds all physical law?
Who upholds it? The Bible tells us God upholds
all things by the word of the power of Jesus Christ, the manifestation
of himself to this creation. But here's the point about miracles
in the Bible. They're very rare. Relatively,
they're very rare. They only occur in what we might
call times of crisis. Basically, apart from the odd
one like the sun standing still, they occurred in the time of
Moses, when he was showing by the plagues to Pharaoh that he
must let the people go. Lots of miracles were performed.
Then in the time of Elijah and Elisha, there were miracles.
Remember, Elijah goes to the widow, And she's about to starve,
and he said, no, make me a cake. Believe me, she made him a cake. And what happened? The cruise
of oil and the barrel of meal didn't run out for three years.
It just kept going. Miraculous, miraculous. And what
did she say? The woman. The widow, the non-Israelite
widow, the Syrophoenician woman, what did she say? She said, now,
because of this, now I know that you are a man of God. Now I know
that what you, he raised her dead son to life. Now I know
that you are a man of God. You see, the miracles were for
the purpose of authentication in times of crisis. In the Babylonian
captivity, Daniel was thrown into a lion's den. And they should
have torn into pieces, because they used to keep the lions hungry.
But God stopped the mouths of the lions. And other things happened
in that time, miraculous things. And then, in the time of Christ,
because when he came, the Old Testament said, when Messiah
comes, he will heal the sick. He will raise the dead. The lame
will walk. The deaf will hear. The dumb
shall speak. All those sorts of physical things,
that the poor shall be fed. And he came and he did all of
those things. Why? To authenticate who he was. And it continued with the apostles.
The apostles performed miracles. Silver and gold have I none,
said Peter and John to the lame man. But such as I have, give
I thee, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and
walk. And he went walking and leaping,
the lame man, and praising God. Why? Why? Just to show off? Just to make people bet? No,
to show that what Peter and John were preaching was the truth
from heaven. That's what it is. That's what
it was for. Authentication. But very rare. Very rare. And all the miracles
of Christ authenticated his message and his person. And all of them
spoke not of physical improvement, but of spiritual. His healing
of the sick showed how he heals, you know, Jehovah, Rapha, remember
last week? His raising of the dead showed,
I am the resurrection and the life. His feeding of the 5,000
and of the 4,000 showed, I am the bread of life that comes
down from heaven. Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. In the
beginning was the word and the word was with God. It's him. It was all to authenticate him.
But miracles don't produce saving faith. Did you hear me? Miracles,
tongues, charismatic gifts do not produce saving faith. Let
me turn you to Luke 16 and verse 28. This is the story, the parable. It's not
literal, but it's what Jesus told about eternal things and
how it shall be. And there's a rich man who is
in hell. And there's a poor man who was
so poor in this life and he's in heaven. And that poverty is
not just because all poor people go to hell. No, it's talking
of his spiritual poverty. And now he's in heaven. But the
man that was rich in his own self-righteousness is in hell.
And Abraham is there and is speaking and it's not literally true but
it's to teach us, it's to teach us eternal truth. And the man
in hell in verse 28 says this, please send someone to them,
I have five brethren, send someone that he may testify to them lest
they also come to this place of torment, hell. And Abraham
said unto him, they have Moses and the prophets, let them hear
them. They've got the Bible, let them
read the Bible. Ah, he said, nay, Father Abraham.
They won't listen to the Bible, but if one went to them from
the dead, if they saw somebody rise from the dead, then they
would repent. And Abraham said to him, if they
hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded
the one rose from the dead. If they won't hear the scripture,
then they won't be persuaded whatever happens miracle wise.
So this claim that miracles are essential for people to believe
is completely false. There are warnings regarding
false miracles in the Bible, and I'm not going to spend time
on looking at it now but we're always told to test them we're
told about lying signs and wonders read 2 Thessalonians chapter
2 verses 7 to 10 lying signs and wonders we haven't got time
to look at it now Matthew 24 verse 24 Jesus said there shall
arise false Christs and false prophets and shall show great
signs and wonders insomuch that if it were possible they shall
deceive the very elect deceive the very elect, but it isn't
possible, of course. But the reason, see, in less
than twenty minutes I've tried to show that there is no sound
scriptural basis underpinning the Pentecostal movement, the
charismatic churches, those practices, they're not scriptural at all,
they really aren't. What they claim is denied by
the Word of God. But here's the real reason. If
you're a true child of God, that you should stay away from all
such charismatic delusion. It's not just that it's patently
wrong, as we've just seen, but much more that God's revelation
of the truth is so much better. What God has revealed is so much
better. Now I do want you to turn to
2 Peter and chapter 1. 2 Peter and chapter 1. You see, I could spend weeks,
bit by bit, taking apart the Pentecostal charismatic movement
and proving from Scripture that it's an absolute lie, an utter
delusion, and don't be conned by it. I think I've said enough.
Let's see the real reason, child of God, why you should just dismiss
it. If you're a true child of God,
you dismiss it anyway. It's just nonsense. like you
don't want to be associated with anything where people say you
must be mad you know we read that in 1 Corinthians 14 before
if it's just a charismatic babble people are going to say you're
all mad in verse 16 of 2 Peter chapter 1 Peter says this for
we have not followed cunningly devised fables when we made known
unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ but
were eyewitnesses of his majesty for he received from God the
Father honour and glory. When there came such a voice
to him from the excellent glory, this is my beloved Son, in whom
I am well pleased." Now, what's Peter saying there? Peter is
telling those that he's writing to, the dispersed Christians,
he's saying, you know, if you want a charismatic experience,
let me tell you about one. I was on the Mount of Transfiguration.
Peter, James and John were taken with Jesus. who just looked like
an ordinary man, up onto a high hill, a mountain, and there,
when they were all alone on the top of this mountain, probably
in darkness, it had probably gone dark by then, the Lord Jesus
Christ, the man, was transfigured with his heavenly glory, and
he shone. You know you see pictures of
him shining, well this is the one occasion You know, you see
pictures, the artist drew him with a halo around his head.
He didn't have a halo around his head. But on the Mount of
Transfiguration, he shone like a brilliant light. He shone.
And Peter said, I was there. Oh boy, wouldn't you have loved
to have been there. Wouldn't the charismatics of
love to have been, what a stupendous sight to see the man Jesus transfigured
into heavenly glory and shining with heavenly glory. And they
heard this voice, this is my beloved son, in whom, oh Peter,
you've been right there. Peter, James, you were right
up there. Oh, how could anybody, how could
anybody not have longed to have been there? And he says in verse
18, and this voice which came from heaven we heard, Really
did, physically, when we were with him in the Holy Mount, the
Mount of Transfiguration. But listen, verse 19. Isn't that
good? Can't we always go back to that
mountain, Peter? No, he says, verse 19. We have
also a more sure word of prophecy. Whereunto ye do well that ye
take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until
the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts. What's
he talking about? The Bible. The written word of
God. What you have in your hand now,
or on your phone or wherever it happens to be, that is a more
sure word of prophecy than the word that Peter and James and
John heard on the Mount of Transfiguration. Charismatic gifts? No. The more
sure word of prophecy. No prophecy of scripture is of
any private interpretation. No. It's breathed out by the
Holy Spirit. for prophecy came not in old
time by the will of man, but holy men, set-apart men of God,
spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit." This book is the
word of God, a more sure word of prophecy. This word is supreme. God has exalted it above all
His name. Why would He want to add charismatic
nonsense to it that's finished that was for a time of authentication
so let's think about the end of the apostolic signs go back
to first corinthians twelve thirteen and fourteen first corinthians
twelve thirteen and fourteen this is the definitive passage
on charismatic gifts very very high level view, obviously we
haven't got time to read it all or study it in detail, and we
have done at other times. 1 Corinthians 12 is about the
diversity of gifts in the church. Remember this is the first century
church. What marks out the first century church is different from
now. There were apostles, there were prophets, but there was
not a completed scripture. There was the Old Testament,
and there were the Gospels as they were written, and there
were the epistles that were added to it, right through until in
about A.D. 95, John completed the book of
Revelation, and that was the last thing that was written.
But at the time of this letter to the Corinthians, scripture
was not complete, and so there were gifts to make up the difference
and 1 Corinthians 12 is about the diversity of gifts but also
what's it saying above all else is don't squabble over them mutually
respect one another in the body of the church then I'm going
to jump chapter 13 and come to chapter 14 because 1 Corinthians
14 we read 25 verses of it earlier and the point of it you have
to admit is that understanding Understanding with the mind,
objectively understanding, is so much more superior and in
the purposes of God than mere physical experience. It's about
written truth being preached and expounded. That's God's way
of calling and feeding his people. That's his way. That's how he
does it. By the foolishness of preaching.
Preaching what? Preaching the written word of
God. It pleased God. Not by the manifestation of miracles
and tongues. It didn't please God by the manifestation
of miracles and tongues to save his people. It pleased God by
the foolishness of preaching the written word. But while scripture
was still being written, there were charismatic gifts of prophecy,
and tongues, and knowledge, and all these other things. But did
you notice in verse 19 of chapter 14, we read that prophecy is
so much better than tongues because it involves the understanding.
It also tells us, in verse 22, that tongues are assigned not
for believers, but for unbelievers. It's all to do with the Tower
of Babel. You know, at the Tower of Babel,
God confounded the languages of the people. And then his truth
was only given to the people of Israel, the descendants of
Abraham. His truth was only given to them,
and the rest were left to themselves. But he says that his church is
going to be composed of every tribe and kindred and tongue
language. And so, on the day of Pentecost,
there are foreigners in the city of Jerusalem, and Peter speaks,
and the people, the apostles, speak with other tongues. Now,
what were these other tongues? They weren't vain babblings,
they were languages! The languages of the foreigners
that were there, because, we read in Acts 2, We all hear them
speak in our own language, the words of God. This is what the
gift was for. It was the undoing of that confusion
of the language. In 1 Corinthians 14 the gifts
were extant, they existed, but they had to be used rightly and
with caution. Verse 33, God is not the author
of confusion but of peace. You go to these charismatic meetings,
no don't, don't go to them, but let me tell you, if you do, you
would see confusion, a complete cacophony and babble and disorder. You hear women speaking, Verse
34, let your women keep silence in the churches for it is not
permitted unto them to speak. And he goes on to say, and do
you think that you've got authority over God? This is what God has
said. Are women better than men or men better than women? It's
not the point. In the things of the people of God, the order
that God has ordained is that the men must lead and the women
must not preach. And yet you go there, as I said,
the ministry team down the road is predominantly women. No. Now
go back to chapter 13, because in chapter 13, Paul shows how
these things are coming to an end. You see, he talks in chapter
13 about the superiority of what he calls charity, by which he
means Christian love, by which he means self-denying love to
God and to Christ and to fellow saints. and he says that is so
much better that gift above all others is so much better than
anything else that everything else pales into insignificance
he says I can have the best gift of prophecy and understand all
mysteries and have such spiritual knowledge and have tremendous
faith but if I have not this love which is the love of Christ
of God where does it come from not yourself it's the gift of
God this love to God, which is the result of the new birth.
He says, if I don't have that, it doesn't matter what else I
have, I am nothing. If I'm such a generous, charitable
person, I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and I give
my body to be burned as a martyr, if I haven't got that basic,
saving, Christian love that comes from the new birth, it profits
me nothing. There's only one thing that will
profit you on the day of judgment, As Paul says to the Galatians
about their adding law works, he says, Christ will profit you
nothing. It's only Christ that will profit you. Only Christ
is currency that has value. He says, he extols the virtues
of this Christian love. It's long, it's kind, it doesn't
envy, it doesn't vaunt itself, doesn't behave unseemly, and
so on and so forth. Verse eight. This love, this
gift of love from on high, never fails, but listen. If there are
prophecies, they shall fail. If there are tongues, they shall
cease or dwindle away, peter out. Whether there be knowledge,
it shall vanish away. What in the church? Yes, in the
church! This is what Paul's saying. Those gifts that were for the
first century before Scripture was completed will vanish. He
says, we know in part now. We don't have the full picture.
And we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect
is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. What's
that which is perfect? It's the Word of God. It's the
completed Scripture. James says, when he says, whoso
looks into the perfect law of liberty, what's that? The scripture.
And continues therein, is blessed. When the completed scripture
comes, all those other things will be finished. And so this
is why he exalts the word of God above all his name. All those
childish, immature, temporary gifts are replaced by the Word
of God, which is complete and reliable. And it's guarded at
its very end, at the end of Revelation. Anybody that adds anything, he'll
bear responsibility for all the plagues that are pronounced in
this book. Anybody that takes anything away, you see, it's
complete as it is. There's a warning there against
adding anything to it or altering it in any way. But you know,
this is where, and I've nearly run out of time, but I must get
to this bit. There's something much more important than these
manifestations of physical gifts. It's the marks of true salvation,
because look right at the end, verse 13. 1 Corinthians 13, verse
13. This is what remains when those
other gifts have ceased. This is what is now. Now abideth faith, hope, charity,
love. These three. But the greatest
of these is love. The key question is this. It's
not do I have the charismatic gifts, but do I have biblical
faith, biblical hope, biblical love. I could spend an entire
sermon on each one of these easily, but I won't. I'll try and summarize
very quickly. Faith. What is it to have faith? Faith, that gift which abides
when all the others have ceased as they have. It's God's gift
focused on Christ alone. Because what's the key question?
Jesus said, what think ye of Christ? That's the test, what
think ye of Christ? The faith of God's elect, true
faith from God, is a willing trust. It's characterized by
emotion. Not loss of control, but yes,
emotion, of course. The faith of God's elect touches
the heart, touches the emotions. It's characterized by devotion.
You know what it is, some of you, most of you I hope, know
at some time in your life what it is to be in love, to be touched.
This is devotion for Christ. and submission, willing submission,
bond-servant submission to the end of life. Because the just,
says the scripture many times, the just, the justified ones,
shall live, how? By faith. The just shall live
by faith. Faith, you must have that. Forget
tongues and prophecy, irrelevant. You must have faith. Hope. What's
the hope? It's not the hope that, oh, you
know, I hope the premium bonds are going to come up next month.
It's not that kind of hope, because in all probability they won't.
By far the overwhelming probability is that the main jackpot will
not come up. It's not that kind of hope. But I got a message
from DPD, the delivery service on Friday, telling me that something
we've ordered is going to be delivered tomorrow. Now, this
is that kind of hope. It's an anticipation. I anticipate
that this thing will be delivered tomorrow. I've never known them
fail yet. I anticipate. This hope is an
anticipation of eternal glory. That's our eternal goal. Based
on what? Accomplish salvation. on the
fact that Christ has done everything. In his shed blood on Calvary,
in his bearing my sin, being made sin and bearing it that
I might be made the righteousness of God in him, I've got an anticipation
of eternal glory. Faith, hope, and love, these
remain. The love of Christ Love of Christ
and love for Christ and his people. A self-denying love. And why
is that love better than faith and hope? You see, there's only
one of the gifts that's going to remain eternally, and it's
the gift of love. Why? Because that's the only
one that is taken into heaven. Because we don't need hope. When the thing's delivered tomorrow,
I don't need to anticipate that it will be delivered, because
I'll have it. It'll be there. When we see Christ face to face,
I don't need faith, because all my senses will know I'm there.
But love will continue into heaven. Spurgeon said this, this love
is the common everyday livery of the people of God. It is not
the prerogative of a few, it is the possession of all. It
is put before you not only as a thing greatly desirable, but
absolutely needful. For if you excelled in every
spiritual gift, yet if you had not this, all the rest would
profit you nothing whatsoever, you must attain it. or you cannot
enter into eternal life. Now, do you see how much claimed
charismatic gifts pale into complete insignificance? If you have this
love, you have God's spirit, and a new man of faith, born
of God within, what more can he say than to you he has said? What more than his word of truth
and the gospel of his grace can he say than to you he has said?
What more do you need Do you need these other gifts to be
thoroughly furnished for service as 2 Timothy 3 17 says? No. Well we'll leave it at that
point.