To the Poor the Gospel is Preached

Q: What does the Bible say about preaching the gospel to the poor?

The Bible teaches that the gospel is preached to the poor in spirit, highlighting their need for spiritual redemption (Luke 7:22). In Luke 7:22, Jesus responds to John the Baptist's inquiry by stating that the gospel is preached to the poor. This reference is rooted in Isaiah 61:1, where the good news is proclaimed not merely to those who are materially poor, but to those who are poor in spirit—those who recognize their spiritual need and destitution. This aligns with the broader biblical theme that God shows favor to those who humbly acknowledge their unworthiness and seek redemption. The gospel is therefore good news for sinners who are broken and in need of grace, emphasizing that Christ came to save those who are spiritually needy.

Q: How do we know that Jesus is the Messiah?

We know Jesus is the Messiah through His miracles and fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies (Luke 7:22). In response to John the Baptist's doubts, Jesus pointed to His miracles—the blind see, the lame walk, and the dead are raised—as evidence of His messianic identity. These acts not only demonstrate His divine power but also fulfill the prophecies outlined in the Old Testament concerning the coming Messiah. Through His ministry, Jesus confirmed His role as the Savior of His people by performing works that no mere human could accomplish, thus validating His claim to being the anointed one sent by God to redeem His creation. Reflecting on His wonders encourages believers today in their faith, as the same Christ who performed miracles is the one who saves and sustains us.

Q: Why is it important for Christians to understand the concept of being poor in spirit?

Being poor in spirit is vital for Christians as it signifies humility and the recognition of our need for God's grace (Matthew 5:3). The Beatitude of being poor in spirit, as outlined in Matthew 5:3, is foundational to the Christian faith. This concept underscores the necessity for believers to recognize their spiritual poverty apart from Christ. Acknowledging our utter dependence on God's grace opens the door for true repentance and faith. It reflects an understanding that we cannot earn salvation, but rather it is a gift of grace from God. Understanding this doctrine fosters humility, combats pride, and leads us to rely fully on Christ for our hope and righteousness. This realization also produces a greater appreciation for the gospel, prompting believers to share the good news with others who recognize their own deficiencies.

Q: What should Christians do in times of doubt about their faith?

In times of doubt, Christians should turn to God's Word and seek assurance directly from Christ (2 Corinthians 13:5). When faced with doubts, believers are encouraged to follow John the Baptist's example by seeking assurance from Jesus Christ and His Word rather than relying on human sources or experiences. In 2 Corinthians 13:5, we are instructed to examine ourselves to see if we are in the faith, looking to Jesus as the object of our faith. This means reflecting on His promises and the truth of the gospel. It's essential to recognize that fluctuating feelings and experiences do not define our standing with God; instead, the assurance lies in who Christ is and what He has accomplished for us. By turning to the Scriptures, believers can reaffirm their faith and find comfort in God's unwavering grace and truth.

And I'm going to use for a topic
and text the last line of verse 22, to the poor the gospel is
preached. Now the Lord Jesus had raised
the widow's son, raised him from the dead. And many people who
witnessed the miracle began to say, a great prophet has risen,
and God has visited his people. Now evidently some of John the
Baptist's disciples were in the crowd. They were among those
who witnessed the miracle, and they visited John who was in
prison. John was about to be executed
But these disciples, having witnessed this tremendous miracle, went
to the prison where John was being held, and they related
to him what they'd seen. Now in verse 19, John called
unto him two of his disciples, maybe the same ones, it doesn't
say. But he sent them to Jesus, saying,
Are you he that should come? Or do we look for another? Are
you the Messiah? Are you the Redeemer of Israel?
Are you the one whom God has sent to take away our reproach? Are you the consolation of Israel?
This is the same man who, just a few months prior to this, down
by the River Jordan, pointed to Christ and said, Behold the
Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the The one to whom
our Master said, baptize me, but Lord, I have need to be baptized
of thee. Suffer it to be so, to fulfill
all righteousness. I'm not worthy, John said, to
stoop and unlatch his shoes. He must increase, I must decrease. Now, nearly all of the old writers
I hate to be in disagreement with men like John Gill, Giants,
disagreement with men like Charles Haddon Spurgeon, and others,
but nearly all of the old writers are quick to say that John was
not asking this for his own assurance, but he was asking for his disciples. Now this is the interpretation.
I think it's only fair to our congregation and what I do when
I preach. I ask people to examine the word. I'll be happy to give you the
various interpretations and translations and you go home and search the
scriptures to see if these things be so. I must preach the word
as God lays it on my heart. I've got to be true to the calling
he gave me. I've got to preach it as the
Holy Spirit reveals it to me. If it's not in accordance with
what some of the old writers say, if it's not in accordance
with what I formally have been taught, if it's not in accordance
with what the congregation believes, well, that's neither here nor
there. I've got to declare it like God reveals it to me. And
many of these old writers are quick to defend John the Baptist.
They're quick to rush to his side and They're quick to say
that he wasn't asking this for his assurance. He knew who Christ
was. He'd supernaturally been brought
into this world and of all men, the greatest man. But I would
have you remember he was still a man. He was still flesh. And our Lord, he was the forerunner
of Christ. He was the forerunner of the
Messiah. He witnessed the confirmation of his message at the baptism
of Christ when the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove. But it doesn't say here that
he was asking this for his disciples' benefit. It doesn't say that
at all. And in Matthew chapter 11, when we have another account
of this same thing, it's not revealed there either. The disciples
came back to him and told him what they'd seen, and John, it
says, John the Baptist hath sent us to thee, saying, Art thou
he that should come, or do we look for another?" And I would say this, that while
John was the forerunner of Christ, and while John was supernaturally
sent, and while John was endued with great knowledge and gifts,
John was still human. And John was not amused. from
human doubt and human fear. Never been a greater apostle
than Peter, who personally walked with the Master three and a half
years, who was with that inner circle when our Lord went to
the Mount of Transfiguration. He saw Moses and Elijah. He saw
them. He saw the glory of Christ. He
was with that little inner circle that went to the Garden of Gethsemane
when our Lord wrestled and prayed and sweat great drops of blood.
And yet this same man sat by fire and three times denied what
he knew. He knew Christ. He loved Christ.
He said, Lord, you know all this. You know I love you. But yet
here he was under severe trial and going through under great
under great pressure and going through great fears human fears
and They said well you're one of his disciples. He said no,
I'm not Why they said your speech betrays you so he thought he
had Dressed it up a little bit and he cursed and swore and said
I never I never met the man That's no harder for me to reconcile
than John the Baptist sending a messenger to Christ and saying,
Art thou he for whom we look, or do we look for another? I
don't think these men, Peter, John, Thomas. Thomas was with
the Master. Thomas was one of his select
few, one of his chosen twelve. And yet, when they came and told
Thomas the good news of the resurrection of the Son of God, he said, I
don't believe it. And I'm not going to believe it unless I
can put my finger in the print of the nails in his hands and
thrust my hand into that awful wound that I saw them put in
his side. I will not believe it. It's no harder for me to
reconcile John's doubts and fears than it is Thomas. Probably this
notion of a Messianic kingdom was in the mind of John the Baptist.
What did John the Baptist know of the cross? Even the disciples tried to keep
our Lord from going to the cross. You must remember that these
men were prior to the cross. And so many of the Old Testament
prophecies of Christ, Messiah, the work of the Messiah, Messianic
office, so many of these Old Testament illustrations can be
taken either way, of his first visit or his second coming. And
one old writer said this, that back here in the Old Testament,
and John was the last of the Old Testament prophets. Back
here in the Old Testament, as they look forth to the coming
of the Messiah, there are two mountain peaks. There's his first
coming, prophesied throughout the Word. There's his second
coming. And as you stand back and look
at these mountain peaks, his first coming as the Lamb of God,
we know it, but look where we are. We're here reading about
what did happen. They were reading about what
was going to happen. It's a lot easier to look back
and talk about what happened than to look forward and talk
about what's going to happen from prophecies and types and
shadows and pictures. And these two mountain peaks,
His first coming and His second coming, when you're standing
off at a distance, these two mountains look like one. And
that's what many of these disciples thought. James and John said,
when you come into your kingdom, what about letting one of us
sit on your right hand and one of you left hand? They could
see the glories of David again for Israel. They could see the
glories of Solomon. They could see the glories of
a Messianic reign. They could see the Roman yoke
taken off their neck. They could see the nation of
Israel once again elevated to its position of glory and power
and recognition. Majesty! They couldn't see the
cross, the hatred, the shame. And here was John sitting in
prison. He talked about, he talked about,
let the low places be raised, let the rough places be made
smooth, let the mountains be brought down, and get ready for
the King, the Lord, from glory! And here he was sitting over
there in prison, nothing to eat, nothing to drink, waiting on
to cut his head off. And this man Jesus out there
that he said was the King of the Jews, the King of Kings,
and Lord of Lords, looked like anything but a king. He looked
like anything but the Lord of Lords. Why, he was brought up
in poverty and reared in a carton to shop, and the folks that were
around him were just a bunch of ragged beggars, publicans,
and harlots, and sinners. He was unwelcome in any political
circle, or social circle, or religious circle. Nobody wanted
him. Everybody who was anybody turned
thumbs down on him, he was despised and rejected and hated by everybody. John sitting over there in prison. And I believe these things were
going through his mind. Is this our master? Is this our
king? Is this the Messiah? Is this the son of David? Walking about wearing a a robe,
eating with publicans and sinners. John wasn't immune from these
doubts and fears. And I'll tell you, my friends,
I think, I believe the Lord puts these things in his Word to encourage
you and me. I don't have any doubt about
his glory. It's all behind me. I see what
he's revealed in his Word. I don't have any doubt about
his I see the cross. I see that our Lord was born
in poverty and obscurity to be identified with me, who am a
poverty-stricken, obscure beggar. He was born so low that the lowest
can identify with him. He was a carpenter. He earned
his bread by the sweat of his brow to fulfill the Scripture. He was despised and rejected
and hated, taking my place, identified with me in my transgression,
went to the cross and bore our iniquity and went to the right
hand of God where he now reigns and sits in glory. But I'll tell you, I feel like
John. John said he looks like anything but a king, and the
Lord has said, I'm a king and I look like anything but a king
sometimes. And my doubts and my fears are
not regarding his power, and his authority and his sufficiency,
but my doubts and my fears being identified with John have to
do with my relationship with him. It's not, is he a king,
but am I the king's son? It's not, is he the great high
priest, but am I a priest? It's not, is he able to save,
but has he saved me? It's not any doubt at all in
his ability to redeem, but the doubt is in my ability to clean. And I think like John. John went
to the right place, didn't he? He sent the messengers to the
Lord. He didn't go to some preacher and say, what do you think? Do
you think he's the king? No, he sent word right to him.
I want to know right from the word of your mouth, are you the
Messiah? Are you the Messiah? He never
went, he never called a council, he never got his disciples around
him and said, now let's just figure this thing out, let's
study together and see if we can find out whether he's the
king or not. No sir, he went and sent the
messengers right to the master. Are you the Messiah? And I think
that's what we need to do, we need to come to him for assurance.
We need to come to his word for assurance. His word. My friends,
we're not the only ones that have struggles and fears and
doubts about our interest in Christ. I want you to listen
to John Newton. And you know, incidentally, the
television people have done a lot of damage to the memory of John
Newton. They've had some things about
slavery on the television lately and included John Newton. with
people who hauled slaves from Africa and had him up topside
reading his Bible while he had slaves chained in the hole. That's
not true. That's not true. They had John
Newton selling slaves. That's not true. John Newton
at one time in his life before he met Christ was associated
with slave traders at one time. Now you must remember that John
Newton was brought up in the Church of England, in the establishment. And when a baby's born to a family
in the establishment, in the Church of England or an Episcopalian
church, they're sprinkled when they're infants and regarded
as children of the covenant. They're regarded as children
of the covenant or children of God. And in that way, John Newton
had religion. When he was dealing with slave
traders and when he was associated with slave traders, he was religious,
that's true, and he might have read the Bible. And he might
have gone to an established church, but he wasn't a believer, he
wasn't a redeemed man. You'll read that in his life
story, Out of the Depths. He met Christ when he was a full-grown
man. He went to the depths of depravity
and corruption and rebellion and all manner of evil. Yes,
identified with and associated with slave traders, but not after
he met the Lord, Charlie. That was before. Yes, he was
in the establishment. Yes, he was a church member.
Yes, he was in religion. But he was forced there by his
parents, who sprinkled water on his head as a baby and called
him a child of God. And that's what's wrong with
that. But even after John Newton came
to know the Lord, and John Newton wrote that great hymn, Amazing
Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once
was lost, but now I'm found, was blind, but now I see." There's
confidence and assurance, there's mountaintop experiences. But
now listen to him here. Dear Lord, if indeed I am Thine,
if Thou art my sun and my song, then why do I languish in pain,
and why are my winters so long? O drive these dark clouds from
my sky, Thy soul-cheering presence restore, Or take me unto thee
on high, Where winters and clouds are no more." That's honesty. And then he wrote this, "'Tis
a point I long to know, Oft it gives me anxious thought, Do
I love the Lord or no? Am I his or am I not? Let me
love thee more and more if I love at all, I pray. And Lord, if
I have not loved thee before, help me to begin today. Now my friends, I want God to
deliver me from despair. I don't want to go around with
my head hanging down. all the time. I don't want to
go around without any assurance or any confidence of my interest
in Christ. I don't want to go around always
in the depths of despondency. I don't want you to. I want to
have a gladness of heart, and I know I can't have that all
the time. There's no way that we can live
on the mountaintop all the time, because we're in the body, we're
in the flesh. There's no way that any individual
can have perfect assurance any more than an individual can have
perfect faith. There is no such thing as perfect
faith or perfect love or perfect assurance in an imperfect body. And I would not have, I don't
want to myself, there are times that I have as much confidence
in my interest in Christ as I have confidence that this Bible is
the Word of God. I think you can say the same thing. There
are times when I have to go to him and I have to turn to this
Word for some assurance. But I'm not going to another
human being and try to find assurance. I'm not going to a counselor.
I'm not going to a preacher. I'm not going to another believer
and measure my experience by his or my feelings by his or
my faith by his. I'm going to this Book. And I'm
going to say like John the Baptist, are you the Messiah? But that's
not what I'm going to ask. Lord, if I hadn't loved you before,
I'm going to start right now. If I hadn't leaned on you before,
I'm going to lean on you right now. I'm going to go to this
book. Now, I want God to deliver me
and you from despair. I think we should have assurance.
But I'll tell you this, I also want God to deliver me from that
awful, awful ditch, that horrible, terrible fleshly refuge, that
false refuge of presumption. I know I'm saved because I had
an experience. Experiences do not save. Christ
does. Well, I know I'm saved because
God answered my prayer. If you'll go through the Word,
you'll find that God, for His glory, for His glory to accomplish
His purpose, will answer the prayer of an unsaved Well, I
know I'm saved because I feel saved. Feelings cannot give assurance. Faith cometh by hearing, and
hearing by the Word of God. So there are two ditches to avoid.
There's the ditch of despair. That's not honoring to God. It's
not honoring to your parents for you children to keep coming
and asking, well, do you love me? Do you love me? I don't believe
you love me. I'm just no good. I don't believe you love me.
After a while, he's gonna say, well, maybe you aren't any good. Why
don't you take a ride somewhere, you know? It's honoring to a
parent to have confidence in their love, to accept their gifts
graciously, to depend upon them, to look, not to take them for
granted, but to look to them with appreciation and know that
they love you, and accept it that way. And it's dishonoring
to God for me to go around all the time with my head hanging
down, mourning and groaning over my sins. He said, my grace is
sufficient. Thank you, Lord, I'll accept
it. I'll forgive you of all your sins, of all your debts. I'll
put them behind my back. I'll remember them, Lord. I'm
sure. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. I appreciate it. I
know you will. My mercy is from everlasting
to everlasting, and I'm sure glad to. He committed his love
toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for
us. I'm glad of that. I wouldn't have a hope if he
didn't die for sinners. You see what I'm saying? But all this
terrible, terrible security of the believer, and I hope none
of our dear Baptist brethren froze in your seat then, but
it is a terrible, terrible, terrible doctrine. The Bible does not
teach the security of the believer. If you go through the Bible,
I'm not trying to shock anybody, I'm just telling the truth. If
you go through the Bible, there are all types of believers. There
are miracle believers, there are mental believers, there are
temporary believers, there are all kinds of so-called believers.
The devil is a believer, that's what it says. The devil believes
and trembles. And that doctrine, in that way,
should have never been presented in the Baptist church, the security
of the believer. And the old-time Baptists didn't
preach it that way. They preached the perseverance
of the saints. And that's different. The Bible
teaches that everyone who has come to Christ by the regenerating
work of the Holy Spirit, not everybody who's walked an aisle,
but everybody who has been resurrected from the grave, not everybody
that's been gone out and button-holed and brought into the church,
everybody that has been crucified with Christ, not everybody who's
been baptized, everybody who has been given a new heart and
a new nature, not everybody whose name's been put on the church
roll, but everybody whom God hath called by His Spirit Not
everybody whom the preacher has knocked on the door and called
upon, but those whom God has saved will persevere. They may have their downs and
their ups and their failures and their falls and their fumbles
and all of these things, but they will persevere. They will
continue in the faith. They will not depart from Christ.
The Bible exhorts us to examine our faith. Not examine our experience, not examine our feeling, not
examine our obedience to the law. See, you're not going to
find any assurance of your interest in Christ by going back and examining
experience. Because everybody whom God saved
had a different experience. Suppose that these three blind
men whom the Lord healed, one of them, he just spoke and the
man could see. Another one, he spit on the ground
and made some mud and put it on his eyes, and told him to
go wash it off. When he did, he could see. Another
one, he reached out and touched him. Now suppose these three
men met, and all three of them said, well, the Lord gave me
sight. And one of them said, well, how'd
he do it? Well, he made mud and put it on my eyes. The Lord didn't
give you sight. He didn't put any mud on my eyes.
I know he didn't put any mud on my eyes, so therefore you're
not safe. If you didn't grieve for six months and mourn for
six months, and if you weren't a church member for twenty years
and finally had an experience, then you're not saved. Yes, the
Lord healed all three of them. And the Lord saved the Philippian
jailer, and the Lord saved Lydia, and the Lord saved that young
woman in Acts 16. It was possessed of demons, but
they all had different experiences. So we don't examine our experience
to see if we're in Christ, we examine our faith. Turn, if you
will, to 2 Corinthians 13. Now this will help you if you
look at it. 2 Corinthians 13, when the Apostle
Paul told the people to come and partake of the Lord's table,
he told them to examine themselves and then to eat. And here in
2 Corinthians 13, verse 5, examine yourselves whether you have broken
the law this week. That's not what he says. Examine
yourselves whether you were saved when you were baptized, or whether
you were baptized after you were saved, or whether you had the
right experience, or whether you heard a Calvinistic preacher
or an Armenian preacher. Examine yourself whether you
be in the faith. You see that? What is the faith? Well, the object of faith is
Christ. The object of faith is Christ. You can't put your faith
in an experience. Examine yourself whether you
feel saved. No sir, examine yourselves whether
you be in the faith. Prove your own self. Watch this.
Know ye not your own selves how that Jesus Christ is in you? Is he in you? Is he your Lord?
Do you love him? Do you trust him? Do you believe
on him? If I were to ask you tonight, what is the hope of
your calling? What is the hope of your profession? Give a reason for your hope.
Well, I'll tell you what my hope is. My hope is that when Christ
Jesus came down here into this world, that He obeyed the law
for me, that He gave me, by His obedience, a perfect standing
before the Heavenly Father, and He went to the cross and died
for my awful, hell-deserving sin. And He was buried and rose
again, and right now, He's praying for me, He's interceding for
me. That's my hope. Then you're in the faith. Whatever
you're feeling, Whatever your experience, whatever the appearance,
you're a child of God. Now you go back over the life
of this man David, whom God said was a man after his own heart,
and you'll find some experiences of this man that lead you to
believe that he didn't know God. He had his mountains, and he
had his caves, and he had his falls, and he had his doubts,
and he had his fears, but he was God's man. And the same thing
is true of you and I. And I say if David examined his
feelings and his experiences, there would have been time when
he says, me a king? Well, I look like anything but
a king. I talk like one time he was going down and killed
everybody in a village. He was so angry. He was so put
out. This man, he rescued the fellow's
sheep and cattle and saved his servants and he asked the fellow
for a handout to feed his soldiers. And the fellow said he wasn't
going to give it to him. David said to his soldiers, buckle on your
swords and we'll go down there and don't you leave a male in
that whole village. Kill the babies lying in the
cribs, every one of them. And he's on his way to fulfill
that awful Experience, when this man's wife met him, was it Abigail?
She said, don't do that, David. Don't do that. Prevenient grace. God's restraining hand. And I'll
tell you, you can take the child of God that's nearest glory,
and if it's not for God's restraining hand. Ronnie sang about it. Show
me where you brought me from and where I could have been.
And not only show me where you brought me from, but where I
could be. if it wasn't for his restraining hand. My hope is
not in my sufficiency. My hope is not in my faithfulness. My hope is in Christ! And it'll
stay there. That's the faith. You examine
yourself whether you be in the faith. All right, let's look
here at our Lord's reply now. I'll get to my message. I'm like
James Faust, Brother Charlie. I've got my introduction now.
I'll get around to the message, but I'm not going to be here
that long. I think God's speaking to me So Barnard one time got
up and I said, where are you going to preach on? Well, he
said, I got me an outline. I hope I don't have to use it.
And that's who I am tonight. I haven't got around to this
outline yet, but I believe God's speaking to us. And here was
the answer our Lord gave to John. Now we're going to bring this
in because this is important. Verse 22, he said to them, you
go tell John. what you've seen and heard, how
the blind see, how the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the
deaf hear, the dead are raised, and to the poor the gospel is
preached." Where did this come from, this statement? It came
from Isaiah 61, verse 1. And where have you heard it before?
When our Lord was down in Nazareth preaching in his home synagogue
He said this very thing. He quoted. Now turn to Isaiah
61. But it's worded just the opposite
of the way he said it here. Turn to Isaiah 61. Here is the
Messianic prophecy which our Lord quoted down in Nazareth
and which he quotes again here to John. And what's the first
thing he says? This is what I want to look at
for a moment. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. Isaiah 61
verse 1. Because the Lord hath anointed
me to preach good tidings to the meek." Now our translators
have translated it to the poor. Good tidings to the poor, the
gospel to the poor. And when you read it that way,
the King James translation, the authorized version, the gospel to the poor. What's
the first image that you have in your mind when he preached
the gospel to the poor? You know the first image? I'll
tell you what it is. The first image that you have in your mind
is a fellow who has no job, who has several children at home
with nothing to eat, who has nothing to wear, who's living
on a handout on charity from friends, And I'm sure the Lord
has a people among those. I'm sure of it. But the word
here has not reference at all to material possessions, it has
reference to heart condition. That's what this is. He has anointed
me to preach the gospel to the poor. To the poor in spirit,
not the poor in possessions. Actually, some of the most wicked
people on earth are the poor. materially. Some of the most
diabolical and evil people on earth are the poor, and some
of the nicest folks on earth are the wealthy. That's right. And our God is not, he's not
has reference here to a condition of a man's body, he has reference
to the condition of his heart. The gospel is good news to whom?
to the man who has nothing to eat. Not physically, soul. I'm hungry. Hungry. Thirsty. The gospel is good news
to the man in rags. Not the man who has on physical
rags, but the man who realizes that his self-righteousness is
filthy rags. That he feels so unworthy of
the presence of God because of his rags. The gospel is good news to those
who are in debt. Not those who are in debt to
the 2nd National or the 3rd National or the Bank of Ashton, to those
who are in debt to God's law, to God's justice. The gospel
is good news to those who are in debt and have nothing to pay.
Lord, I've sinned against thee, and my burden, my debt, is too
heavy to bear. I have nothing to pay. I see
my poverty, I acknowledge it. I see my sins, I grieve over
them. I see my iniquity, I mourn. God, be merciful to me, a sinner."
And that's who Christ is talking about. He said, you go back and
tell John that the good news of the gospel is preached to
the poor in spirit, to those whom God hath brought low. What
is this good news? Ruined by the fall. Old Roland
Hill one time said the three R's of spiritual education is
ruined by the fall, regeneration by the spirit, and redemption
by the blood. That's the three R's. He saw
me ruined in the fall and yet he loved me notwithstanding all.
He came and regenerated me by his Holy Spirit. His Son came
and redeemed me by his blood. And the poor have the gospel
preached to them." Now quickly, there's another translation of
this. John Calvin translated it this way. The poor receive the gospel.
The poor receive the gospel. Well, I feel that the first translation
is best, but what the Geneva translation declares is true. The gospel is preached to the
poor in spirit, to the meek, to the man who's spiritually
hungry and spiritually in rags and spiritually destitute and
spiritually poverty-stricken. As Arthur Pink said, he has nothing,
is nothing, knows nothing. But this is true too. Those who
are poor will receive the gospel. It's good news to him. John Gill
said the gospel of grace not only reaches the poor man's ears,
but it reaches his heart. The gospel of grace not only
meets his his need, but he receives it with gladness and embraces
it with joy and says, that's just what I need, it's prepared
for me. Why do men have no interest in
the gospel of grace? Do you know why? You see your
family and loved ones and friends, and they're not interested in
this gospel of grace, this gospel of the cross, this gospel of
redemption. Do you know why they're not interested? For the same reason that verse
you quoted the other day, the full soul loatheth the honeycomb. I don't care how sweet honey
is and how good it is, if a man's already full, he's not interested
in it. But I'll tell you, if a fellow's
hungry, famished, oh, he's so hungry, you lay out for him on
the table of the Lord the broken bread and the blessed wine of
his Lord's crucifixion, and just move out of the way and let him
have it. And that man who's naked and cold and weary and threadbare
and ragged, if you take him to the Goodwill store, he'd be glad
to get a second-hand suit. But there's not anybody here
that would be interested in that type of suit, would you? Because
we're clothed pretty good. It all depends on your need,
and that's the reason the gospel to those who are in need is good
news. That's what our Lord said. Now
we'll give you one more translation and I'll let you go. Our Lord
said to the poor in spirit the gospel is preached. John Calvin
says the poor receive the gospel. And Wycliffe, in his translation,
said this. This is the way he translated
it. Poor men are taken to preaching the gospel. Poor men. I'm not sure that he has the
principal point, but he sure has a good point. Poor men preach
the gospel. God is able to use any man for
his glory, I know that, the preaching of the gospel. We wouldn't have
the Bible translated if we didn't have great learning and great
education, and I take my hat off to those who have that. But
I'm still saying this, that this treasure is an earthen vessel.
And God didn't send angels down here to preach the gospel. He
sent somebody to preach the gospel who had experienced it personally. That's right, who had experienced
it personally. You can't tell what you don't
know. A man can't preach repentance who hasn't repented. A man can't
preach faith who doesn't believe. A man can't preach assurance
who doesn't have it. A man can't preach the glory
of Christ who hasn't seen it. And when our Lord, He says, to
the poor the gospel is preached. And the poor in spirit receive
it. And then the poor go out and
preach it. And they tell others what God
has done. They don't tell others about
themselves. They don't tell others about their experiences. They
don't tell others about their feelings. They tell others about
their Lord. Namaste. He met my need. He met my need. Our Father we are grateful for
thy word how encouraging these frail fleshly forms In my flesh
dwelleth no good thing. We cry with Job, I abhor myself. With Isaiah, I'm a man of unclean
lips. With the Apostle Paul, wretched
man that I am. But then we also know that our
victory is in Christ. Christ is the object of our faith.
Christ is the rock on which we build. Christ is the refuge in
which we hide. Christ is the cover that covers
us and blots out our iniquity, and his blood is the blood that
cleanses us from all sin. And he is our life and our hope.
Make him more precious to us. And Lord, deliver us from presumption.
Deliver us from claiming what is not true. Deliver us from
a false appearance. Deliver us from an idle profession that lies only in
word. But Lord, deliver us from despair.
Keep us from falling into that pit of despair and looking to
our own selves and looking to our flesh and our feelings and
our experiences. Turn our eyes on Christ. Give
us a revelation of His goodness and His glory and His grace and
His mercy. That we may have confidence,
not in ourselves, but in Him. For we pray it in His name, Amen.

To the Poor the Gospel is Preached

What does the Bible say about preaching the gospel to the poor?

How do we know that Jesus is the Messiah?

Why is it important for Christians to understand the concept of being poor in spirit?

What should Christians do in times of doubt about their faith?

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To the Poor the Gospel is Preached

What does the Bible say about preaching the gospel to the poor?

How do we know that Jesus is the Messiah?

Why is it important for Christians to understand the concept of being poor in spirit?

What should Christians do in times of doubt about their faith?

Sermon Transcript

About Henry Mahan

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