When God Calls His People to Suffer
By John Fast
“But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.” – 2 Timothy 3:1
Everyone likes to hear good news. I do not know of anyone who is not cheered by some good and encouraging news, especially in a time when all looks bleak and foreboding, “Anxiety in the heart of a man weighs it down, but a good word makes it glad” (Pv 12:25). The gospel of Jesus Christ is called “good news” because that is the meaning of the word euangelion, from which we derive our word “gospel”. But is it good news for the bulk of those who hear it? Does it commonly find a ready welcome in the world as good news? Is it good news for those who feel the need to corrupt and adulterate it; to accommodate it to the carnal minds of worldly people; to round off all the sharp edges of its distinctive and convicting doctrines until it is made as smooth as a bowling ball? Is it considered good news by those who hold and cling to one of the many false gospels and forms of godliness that abound today? People cannot invent a more sure and speedy way to their own ruin than to take what God has given as good news and corrupt it with their own inventions, thereby devising their own forms of godliness and inventing their own message, worship, and church that disagree “with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness” (1 Tm 6:3).
Was the gospel received as good news by the Jews when it was first told them by the Maggi? Was it received as such when John the Baptist pointed Jesus out as the Lamb of God who would take away the sin of the world? Did their hearts rejoice that at long last their hopes and expectations for the promised Messiah were now realized? Was it received as good news when proclaimed by Jesus Himself? Oh no, to the contrary. Christ’s message proved a matter of offence, distaste, and trouble to them. They stumbled over the stumbling stone. They treated the news of His birth with the utmost apathy and trepidation (Mt 2:1-5). Herod treated the news as if he were being invaded by an enemy, not a Savior (Mt 2:16). The religious leaders saw it as a threat to their own self-interests. Even when proclaimed by Jesus Himself, and validated by all manner of genuine miracles, even raising Lazarus from the dead, they persisted in their obstinate and hard-hearted unbelief and totally rejected Him, “But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him;” (Jn 12:37). Even the people in His own home town took offence at Him (Mk 6:3). His own brothers did not believe in Him (Jn 7:5). Even though the Scriptures that they professed to believe and adore bear such a thorough witness of Christ, they remained unwilling to come to Him that they might have life (Jn 5:39, 40).
But why did not everyone who heard this good news believe it? The answer is they saw no need of it. They had the wrong view of righteousness, particularly the righteousness which justifies a guilty sinner in the sight of a holy God, “For not knowing about God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God” (Rm 10:3). It was eternal life they sought and wanted, but not on Christ’s terms. They would rather lose their life than come to Jesus Christ for it. They would rather invent different Jesus’ and different gospels; ones that allowed them to retain their lusts and life in this world rather than submit their heart and mind to the person and gospel of Jesus Christ (2 Cor 11:4; Gal 1:6; 2 Pt 2:1; 1 Jn 2:19; 4:1; 2 Jn 7; Jude 4).
Has the world now become more receptive? Has it amended its hostility and opposition to the true gospel of Jesus Christ? Does it now meet with a kinder welcome from the mass of those who are exposed to it? Is it received with greater warmth by those who have trusted in a man-centered system of religion that bases salvation on some act of human effort or choice, or that relies on being a basically good person? Are its message, commands, and demands any more cherished by people who are Christians merely by birth and not by new birth, or who say they are spiritual but not religious, or who define faith in terms of mere assent and decision? Is it good news to those whose self-interests are wed to a mere form of godliness without its power and to a Jesus of their own imagination? No, but it is other news that people generally want to hear. The good news of the gospel and the life which it demands is like a foreign country to them – the people there think and live differently. People expect to hear their best news from the world, and which concerns their self-interests in this world. Sadly enough, the gospel does not accommodate their self-righteousness and worldly desires, rather it teaches us to deny them (Tit 2:12). It does not tell them of any earthly prosperity and self-fulfillment it has to offer, but tribulations, crosses, and self-denials. It does not entice sinners with promises of worldly honors and pleasures, but promises us the scorn and hostility of the world (1 Jn 3:13). It does not flatter human pride by affirming some inherent and natural goodness within them, but it charges everyone alike, the religious and moral along with the irreligious and immoral, with being totally depraved, slaves to sin, incapable of doing anything to affect their own salvation, enemies and haters of God, hostile in mind, darkened in their understanding, and by nature children of His wrath (Rm 3:9-18; Eph 2:3; 4:17, 18; Col 1:21; Tit 3:3).
If Jesus Christ in His gospel had only promised to gratify a few of the fleshly lusts and cravings of men, even though it meant promising them less for eternity, His gospel would have been much better received by those who hear it. This is why lately so many fleshly enticements have been added to the gospel, especially in the last few decades. This is a gospel perfectly suited to the age in which we live. It is a pragmatic age where people are not really concerned with truth, but with results. Truth does not interest them unless it can be watered down to fit on a Tweet or a bumper sticker. The one question is not, “is it true”, but “does it work”; “does it personally help, profit, and benefit me”? So when old truths no longer “work”, then it is assumed that people have needs that can only be met by something new. This is why we now have a gospel without repentance, a justification that produces no holiness, obedience, self-denial, or separation from the world, and a Christianity without its commands, its warnings, its judgments, and its Christ. This is the only kind of gospel that will fill churches; a carnal, worldly gospel for carnal and worldly “Christians”; a gospel that, in one way or another, promises your best life now; a gospel that looks inward, not outward; a gospel that consists exclusively of forgiveness of sin and the promise of heaven when they die.
This is the only gospel that is commercially, culturally, and politically viable among people who are first and foremost lovers of self. And the cause for this is always the same, “they stumble because they are disobedient to the word,” (1 Pt 2:8). They are unwilling to come to Christ on His terms. They refuse to submit their hearts and minds to the good news of the gospel. To them it is not good news. Truly, there are but a very few who rejoice to hear the true, pure gospel enough to receive it on its terms without all the added inducements, embellishments, and pride-saving modifications, and who will submit to its commands and receive the love of it in the heart. Such a reception by any person is now enough to incite the scorn, suspicion, and even hostility of all who know them, no matter how well they may have been loved by others before.
Those who reject the offer of a pardon because it does not meet with their terms either deny they have done anything which requires one, or what is worse, they work to defend and justify their wrong, “Behold, I will enter into judgment with you because you say, ‘I have not sinned’ ” (Jer 2:35; cf. 1Jn 1:8). How can anyone rationally expect to be reconciled and at peace with God who argues, disputes, negotiates, and contends with God over His manner of saving sinners; who complain that His way is too hard, humbling, self-abasing, and narrow and His demands are too strict; who insist on playing some role in their own salvation; who charge God with being unfair and unjust in electing some and not others to salvation; who demand a forgiveness without repentance, separation from the world, and practical holiness? Would you wrangle with God and negotiate your own terms of peace as if you were His equal? “Those who contend with the Lord will be shattered;” (1 Sm 2:10), not pardoned and saved; “who are you, O man, who answers back to God?” (Rm 9:20).
Oh yes, pardon and forgiveness they would have, but only on their terms, and while remaining wholly ignorant of God and Jesus Christ. They would have God to be at peace with them while they cling to the things that make a separation between them and God and an enemy to Christ, “But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He does not hear….They do not know the way of peace, and there is no justice in their tracks; and they have made their paths crooked; whoever treads on them does not know peace” (Is 59:2, 8). God is willing to be at peace with sinners, but not with their sin. What evidence can you give to Christ of your love for Him if you will not renounce the very things that separate you from Him? No, God will not be mocked. He will not waver from His terms for peace, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon” (Is 55:7).
No Justification without Conviction
God has issued severe warnings and threats against those who would keep guilty sinners from fleeing to Christ in saving faith by flattering them with a false gospel that produces no deep conviction of sin, no sense of guilt and fear of the punishment due to sin, requires no repentance, imparts no new principle of spiritual life, and is only temporary. This is called, “you…have encouraged the wicked not to turn from his wicked way, and preserve his life” (Ezk 13:22). This is to heal “the brokenness of My people superficially, saying, “Peace, peace,’ but there is no peace” (Jer 6:14). Only those who have never experienced this deep conviction for sin can come up with a definition of faith, a gospel, and a form of godliness that excludes the preparatory work of the law of God. The law cannot make a person godly; rather it convinces them that they are ungodly, thereby showing them their need for Christ. Only those whom the Holy Spirit through the law have been alarmed with their guilt, and with their danger, and made humble, meek, and submissive by the law of God, are willing to be taught of God, “It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught of God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me” (Jn 6:45). The rest in their pride and self-importance think to teach, instruct, and dispute with God.
The Apostle Paul expressed the good opinion that all unregenerate people have of themselves before conversion, “I was once alive apart from the Law” (Rm 7:9). They are full of false hope, carnal security, and presumptuous confidence of their spiritual state. Their conscience never bothered them, nor did they understand the serious and deadly nature of sin. Being sick they think they are spiritually healthy. Being blind they think they see. Being condemned by the law they think they are basically good and see no reason why God should be especially angry with them. But when the law of God comes with power and conviction, “sin became alive, and I died” (Rm 7:9). No doubt Paul had heard and read the law of God before, but he had never understood it in its spiritual nature. He had never been taught of God and had the law applied with divine power to His heart with that conviction of conscience that killed all his self-righteousness and carnal security, and left him naked, trembling, speechless, and exposed to the wrath of a holy and offended God. He now saw that he needed a righteousness apart from the law and one greater than that of the scribes and Pharisees (Phil 3:9; Mt 5:20). The only people that God justifies are those who know and feel themselves to be ungodly (Rm 4:5). Therefore, a person must have a sense and conviction of being ungodly before they can be justified. They must be brought by the law to see themselves as they really are; vile sinners under the wrath of a holy, just, and offended God (Eph 2:3; Col 1:21: Tit 3:3). One respected theologian wrote not so long ago,
“Apart from regeneration our thought of God, of ourselves, of sin, and of righteousness is radically perverted. Regeneration changes our hearts and minds; it radically renews them. Hence there is a radical change in our thinking and feeling. …It is very important to observe that the faith which is unto salvation is the faith which is accompanied by that change in thought and attitude. Too frequently in evangelical circles and particularly in popular evangelism the momentousness of the change which faith signalizes is not understood or appreciated. There are two fallacies. The one is to put faith out of the context which alone gives it significance and the other is to think of faith in terms simply of decision and rather cheap decision at that. These fallacies are closely related and condition each other. The emphasis upon repentance and upon the deep-seated change of thought and feeling which it involves is precisely what is necessary to correct this impoverished and soul-destroying conception of faith.” [1]
It is this soul-destroying conception of faith that now dominates the mass of professing Christendom. But this weakened and watered down definition and conception of faith is not the faith that justifies, but is a cheap counterfeit. It is the law of God that convicts of sin and its due punishment, and it is conviction that makes a soul flee to Christ to be saved from the wrath to come, “for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin” (Rm 3:20); “I would not have come to know sin except through the Law” (Rm 7:7). Today the nature of sin is defined primarily by psychology and the culture, not the law of God. People think of sin in terms of actions, not what they are by nature. Yet it is the law, and only the law, that is a tutor to lead people to Christ (Gal 3:24). It teaches them the true nature of sin, and convinces them of their need of a Savior. It brings sinners to the knowledge of sin, condemns them for it, puts them under the sentence of death and divine wrath, and convinces them of their danger, so they then see and feel their need of a Savior. Without this work of the law, people are not brought to see that they stand in need of Him. If they are never brought to the knowledge of sin, they will never desire the knowledge of a Savior. If they are never made to see and feel their deserving of the first and second death, they will never come to Christ that they might have life. If we lose the understanding of the nature of the law, then we lose the best guide to the nature of the gospel. No one can understand the gospel if they know nothing of the law. When the law of God ceases to be the standard for good and evil, and its lawful use (1 Tm 1:8-11) is despised and disparaged, then Jesus and His gospel must be made to serve another purpose; one that serves man’s self-interests, not God’s, and one that exalts man, not the grace of God in Christ Jesus (Eph 1:4-6; 2:7; 3:21).
It is impossible for anyone to be really convicted of sin if they have no dislike of sin and themselves for sinning, or suffer no shame and sorrow for it. No one who is not affected by sin can really be convicted of it as sin. Where the fear of punishment for sin is never felt, then there has never been any real conviction of sin. The law has never done its perfect work. If there is no fear of the wrath to come then it is impossible that anyone would flee to Christ to be delivered from it. It is this conviction of sin, its guilt, its shame, and its due penalty that the world has always worked to pacify and avoid and now they have an ally. It is this conviction that most modern preaching and teaching not only seeks to avoid, but absolutely rejects as judgmental, unloving, intolerant, heartless, and psychologically and emotionally harmful, not to mention commercially impractical and counterproductive to church growth. Messages which are encouraging, uplifting, motivational, inspirational, educational, “relevant”, soothing, entertaining, pacifying, and self-affirming find a ready and willing audience, but heaven help the person who would be so insensitive and judgmental as to cause anyone to be convicted of sin.
Satan delights in inventing various forms of almost Christianity. The beloved 18th century pastor and hymn writer John Newton wrote to a friend concerning Satan as an angel of light,
“he is always dangerous, but never more so than when he pleads for Gospel doctrines in order to abuse them, and when he tries to pass his counterfeit humility, zeal, and sanctity upon us for pure gold. No coiner can equal him for imitation….He has something that comes so near the Gospel, that it is called by St. Paul another gospel, and yet in reality it is no gospel at all. He deals much in half convictions, and almost Christians, but he does not like a thorough work. He will let people talk about grace as much as they please, and commend them for it, provided talking will satisfy them. He will preach free grace when he finds people willing to receive the notion, as an excuse and cloak for idleness….he is never more a devil than when he looks most like an angel.” [2]
These people who teach another gospel and preach another Jesus are kissing-cousins to Judas who was a thief and had charge of the money box. These people have their own money box also, into which they put more money that their false doctrines bring them than Judas ever had in his. Though the pure gospel of Jesus Christ would bring more souls to Christ, their false doctrines and practices bring more people into their churches, more praise and admiration from the world, and more money into their coffers. This lies at the heart of all their forms of godliness which the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Bible, and all must bow to. In God We Trust is printed on the god in whom they trust and worship. Like the Ashdodites, they set up their Dagons on which their own self-interests depend (1 Sm 5:3). These people and the false doctrines and forms of godliness which they propagate are like the physicians who treated the woman who had a hemorrhage; those who resort to them are not helped at all, but rather they grow worse (Mk 5:25, 26).
There are many today who think that there is some sort of absolute mercy in God that compels and requires Him to forgive those who have sinned against His law. But such a god is not the God of the Bible, but an invention of the mind of man. This is not the character of God revealed in the Bible which reveals Him as the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth, having absolute authority to enact laws for the government of His creatures, over whom He rules with unerring and impartial justice. Justice is the ruling attribute of the supreme Lawgiver. As all His laws are just, so are all its prohibitions and penalties. It is equally just for Him to punish transgressors as it is to reward obedience, because the Judge of all the earth can only deal justly (Gn 18:25). Whether He can show mercy to the guilty is not the question, but whether God has made any provision in His law for showing mercy, and He most certainly has not. God is not described in the law as a God of mercy, but as a sovereign Judge whose wrath, not His mercy, is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men (Rm 1:18), “for the Law brings about wrath” (Rm 4:15). If the law makes no provision of mercy for the sinner, does it then leave him without hope? Yes! It can show him no mercy, nor does it hold out any hope for mercy. Must he then despair? Yes! He must despair of any hope of finding any mercy by any means of his own, any effort of his own, any works of his own, any faith of his own, any spirituality of his own, any sorrow and repentance of his own, any amendment and reformation of his own, or any righteousness of his own. Only when he finds himself in such a guilty, hopeless, and helpless state will he be glad to hear of a Savior who can save him from the condemnation of the law, for there is no condemnation for those who flee to Him, submit to His terms of salvation, earnestly ask and humbly receive His mercy, and thereby are in Christ Jesus (Rm 8:1).
O, what will God do with this degenerate, self-loving, and Christ-despising age we live in! When such good news as the gospel brings is rejected, especially where it has been previously known and received, then bad news cannot be far away, the worst of which is a departing gospel. God never gave His gospel to any people that He could not also blind them to it and remove it from them, “but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you” (2 Chr 15:2); “or else I am coming to you, and will remove your lampstand out of its place – unless you repent” (Rv 2:5; cf. Am 8:11, 12; Jn 12:40). Do we see any signs of repentance today? Do we see any large-scale effort to recover and reclaim the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ? Do we see people today who “in their distress they turned to the Lord God of Israel,” (2 Chr 15:4)? If any turn to God today in a time of distress it is mostly to a god of their own invention, not to the one true God that has revealed Himself solely in His written word; not to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, “If you would return, O Israel,” declares the Lord, “then you should return to Me” (Jer 4:1). Returning to church, to religion, to spirituality, and to forms of godliness is by no means the equivalent of returning to, recovering, and reclaiming the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ, and fleeing to Him from the wrath to come (Jer 7:8-10; Rev 3:17, 18).
No Exaggeration
I know that many who read this will think that I am exaggerating and making things out to be worse than they really are. Surely, they say, there is still a remnant of true believers who embrace the message of the gospel, submit to its truths, and who are grieved by the contempt thrown upon it by the sinful lives and counterfeit Christianity of insincere people. Surely your fears and warnings are unfounded; we are not in such imminent danger of losing the gospel and plunging into total darkness. To this I answer, that if there were not a remnant according to God’s gracious choice still sprinkled among us, our case would indeed be horrible. These are the ones among us who have remained valiant for the truth and held fast to the true gospel. Christ always preserves a faithful remnant in the darkest of times, who cry to Him day and night, entreating Him to stay and once again send His Holy Spirit to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. But let me provide you with just a couple of thoughts which, if seriously considered, cannot help but instill some trembling of heart.
First, consider what a small proportion it is of those who embrace the gospel and all of its commands in comparison with those who continue to corrupt, adulterate, prostitute, and reject it. Consider who the icons are today of popular Christianity; those who are the most worldly, carnal, and who accommodate, condone, and affirm the most immoral and ungodly lifestyles of others, and who advocate for their full acceptance within the church as fellow Christians. Consider the proportion of those who wish to have their own lives ruled and governed by Christ and His word with those who desire to be rid of Him and would be glad to see Him gone if their peddling of Him was not so profitable. Can anyone doubt that if it were to be put to a vote that those who care whether there is a gospel or not would win by thousands and thousands, if not millions? Does it not bode badly when the number of professing Christians who have a sincere love for the truth continues to dwindle? Look around, you cannot help but see the state of things. The prospect is alarming. Our national sins have long been crying out for God’s justice, but His long-suffering has withheld it. And what has been the effect of His kindness and forbearance and patience? Has it led to repentance (Rm 2:4, 5)? Oh no, but rather guilt beyond that of Sodom and Gomorrah and beyond that of Nineveh (Nah 1:1-8), Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum (Mt 11:21-24), and more innocent blood shed than what was shed by Manasseh (2 Kgs 21:16; Jer 15:4). The gospel is corrupted and rejected, a presumptuous security fills the professing church, and false teachers and heresies abound along with all their poisonous and noxious fruits. Thanks be to God there are still a few who have not bowed their knee to Baal. Thank God there are a few who have heeded the warning to flee to Christ from the wrath to come. Jesus has not left Himself without a witness, but how few are they.
In all the departures of God from a people, there have always been some true saints mingled among the clamor of sinners and false professors. The church in Sardis, though dead, still had their few “who have not soiled their garments”, and it was only these few that Jesus affirmed, “will walk with Me in white; for they are worthy” (Rv 3:4). All they could get was a promise for themselves in particular, but there was no protection for the church in general. The church in Sardis is no more. Its lampstand was removed. God can abandon the house and still care for His few saints that He finds there. A few voices are easily drowned out by the shouts of a multitude. A few true Christians can do little toward the saving of a wretched people who tenaciously cling to their forms of godliness (2 Tm 3:5), whom God has given over to a depraved mind (Rm 1:28), and who have “made their hearts like flint so that they could not hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets; therefore great wrath came from the Lord of hosts” (Zech 7:12).
Secondly, consider how many of these true Christians that embrace the gospel and all its commands, who have a love for the truth, and that yield their hearts and minds to the authority of Scripture, are new converts. I believe you will find that this little remnant of disciples consists primarily of old saints; those who by a sound and thorough work of the law came under the true conviction of sin and fled to Christ from the wrath to come. No doubt, if they may pass for true converts who have climbed in by another way than the true gospel; who have baptized themselves into a new form of godliness and worship, one that, under the cloak of “acceptance”, “love”, “tolerance”, “inclusiveness”, “diversity”, and “relevance” condones what God has condemned; or whose profession never conforms their life to godliness; or who are Christians by birth and not new birth, and whose faith consists of nothing more than mere assent, then we have a great many new converts among us. But how few are sincerely converted and become as helpless and dependent as children (Mt 18:3); how few come out from among the world (2 Cor 6:17); how few have their thinking, reasoning, feelings, and lifestyles profoundly changed (Rm 12:2; Eph 4:17, 18). How rare is a sincere convert, especially among people who have lived for any period of time under a wrong conception of faith and false persuasion that they are a Christian.
It cannot be denied that God is still saving a people for His own possession, yet it is but here one, there one. When a tree that used to be thick with fruit now only bears one on this limb and one on another, do we not consider it a dying tree? When our burials become more than our new births we must be in a state of decline. As the good and godly go to their promised rest, and those who remain continue to be bad – yes and even become worse and worse – we have reason to fear that God is preparing the way for judgment. When a nation that has been the recipient of unprecedented mercies and blessings of God, then abuses, corrupts, and plays the harlot with those blessings, and ascribes them to their own self-effort, should they not expect to receive unprecedented judgment (Nah 1:3)! When there has been such a great departure from the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints, this is a sure indication of great judgments and sufferings yet to come, especially when lesser judgments, rather than producing repentance, have only hardened people in their sin and forms of godliness.
Are not the most precious truths of the gospel now covered in the mire and filth of errors, falsehoods, and blasphemies that have been dredged up out of every polluted stream of old and new heresies? Is not every new theological fad milked for all its worth before it fizzles out and is replaced by the next one? Can the bulk of professing Christians give any biblically based reason and evidence for their hope? Do we see more than a scant handful whose hearts are valiant for the truth so as to risk suffering the loss of all things for the cause of Christ? If there is anything of this kind, it is so faint and feeble, and meets with such apathy and opposition, that rather than curtailing the heresy, the heretics and false teachers gather confidence from it. Like the preaching of Stephen, it elicits their rage and hostility rather than guilt and repentance (Ac 7:54-60). Like the preaching of Jeremiah, it hardens their hearts against the truth rather than softens and convicts them (Jer 20:7, 8). Like the preaching of Ezekiel, it evokes the response, “The way of the Lord is not right” (Ezk 33:20). Like the preaching of Jesus it draws scorn and scoffing (Lk 16:14). The demand on the part of the mass of professing Christians for teachers and churches that are in accordance with their own selfish and self-centered desires only deepens and intensifies, not weakens (2 Tm 4:3). When the good news of the gospel is rejected as it is today, then the bad news of the gospel cannot be far away, making our last state worse than the first (2 Pt 2:20-22). “And if it is with difficulty that the righteous is saved, what will become of the godless man and the sinner” (1 Pt 4:18).
Looking in the Wrong Direction
All too often we seek that which only Christ can give from things that have no ability to give them, because they do not possess them. They cannot give what they do not possess. People today are continuously looking, striving, inventing, and implementing, in one failed attempt after another, man-made solutions for spiritual problems, “In our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save” (Lam 4:17). Whether it is man-made gospels, man-made systems of ethics, man-centered systems of religion, man-made laws, or man-exalting systems of education, all are doomed to failure. History is littered with the atrocities and ruins of all such attempts to build a civilization apart from God, His word, and His gospel. With all the senseless violence today, open immorality, addictions, lawlessness, anarchy, and the heightened emphasis on a perverted social gospel, people are calling for an end to “hate.” Many are complaining of all the strife, violence, hatred, and evil in the world, but they are unwilling to hear what God says about the cause of all this evil – our fallen sinful nature – or to the only solution to all this evil – the true gospel of Jesus Christ. At the same time they are calling for an end to hatred, they are hostile toward any suggestion, and completely unwilling to admit, that the greatest form of hatred is the hatred for God and His word that they express by their words and actions every day.
When God’s law and commands are rejected as thoroughly and violently as they are today, then there is nothing to prevent people from rejecting man’s laws. The natural and unavoidable consequence of increased lawlessness is “most people’s love will grow cold” (Mt 24:12). When people are primarily “lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,” then they are also “unloving” (2 Tm 3:2, 3). It is irrefutable evidence that God has given a people over to a depraved mind when what characterizes them is they are “filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful;” (Rm 1:29-31). It is impossible to sow the wind and not reap the whirlwind (Hos 8:7); it is impossible to sow to the flesh and not reap corruption from the flesh (Gal 6:7, 8). When a people live in open rebellion against God and His commands they cannot expect to have peace among themselves. This is part of the curse for sin. Before there can be any hope of a true, solid, and lasting peace among people, this curse must be removed, and the gospel, and only the gospel has the ability to do that. People who are haters of God and His word cannot love their neighbor as themselves, and until a person is made to love God by the Holy Spirit the supreme object of their love will always be SELF. It is precisely this love of self that is encouraged not only by our culture (as if such love is in need of encouragement), but it is the only message which the mass of professing Christians will endure.
When the authority of God’s revelation is rejected or compromised, either actually or practically, in whole or in part, then what we are left with is the abolition of Christianity and the substitution for it of forms of godliness and natural religion in which mankind is the ultimate authority. We are simply substituting our own subjective and temporary impressions, interpreted as inspirations, for the one final and authoritative revelation of God as the only rule and guide of life. Christianity is reduced to humanitarianism, tolerance, and mysticism. All the objective truths of Christianity – the good news of the gospel, the necessity and nature of the new birth, the true nature of man and salvation – all is gone, because all this rests on the authority of God’s written word. Ignored is the fact that faith in God is inseparable from faith in His word. Instead, people will content themselves, will be compelled to content themselves, with their own conceptions of God (which are remarkably like themselves) and their own notions of religion which exalt no one but themselves, and which (it is hoped) will be expressed with tolerance and charity. When people are told to worship their own conceptions of God and Jesus Christ, this must inevitably result in their worshiping themselves. Of all the horrible religions the most horrible is the worship and exaltation of self. People may be mystics or they may be Christians, but they cannot be both, and the pretense of being both is merely a cloak to veil a defection from and rejection of Christianity. Apostasy that still clings to the name of Christian is not thereby made Christian.
It is the height of arrogance and an exalted pagan view of man for any people to think they can reject God and His word, yet live in a society not characterized by lawlessness, violence, lovelessness, and hate. It is impossible to avoid the conscience-numbing, degenerative, destabilizing, and soul destroying consequences of sin. It is an indisputable fact of history that only the pure and true gospel, the religion of the Bible, has ever proved powerful enough to control public and social life, to influence it for good, and to mold it. In the dangerous age in which we now live there is nothing more important to bear constantly in mind than that all the Christianity of Christianity rests solely and completely on the authority of God’s revealed written word. Religion and forms of godliness we can of course have without the authority of Scripture, but not Christianity. True Christianity, the only thing that will save the soul of a sinner from the wrath of God, rests exclusively on the authority of the Bible, and that for the very good reason that it is not the product of man’s religious nature, but is a gift from God. To say that we must reject the authority of Scripture as a rule for life, either in whole or in part, is to revert to the pagan practice of seeking to find a righteousness that originates from within ourselves; it is to tell us to discard Christianity and resort to natural religion and all of its inevitable, horrible, and disastrous effects; effects from which only the good news of the gospel is able to deliver.
We live in an age when the dominant philosophy ascribes everything to second causes and virtually denies the existence of the first, thereby excluding the God of man and nature from the works of man and nature, and refusing to acknowledge Him as the author of national calamities and judgments, and willful sin committed against His gospel, commands, and divine Majesty as the reason for them. Such thinking as this is today the object of the utmost scorn and ridicule, and dismissed as the ignorant rantings of a religious fanatic. Instead, man’s self-deification and self-worship has reached the point where man is attempting to not only claim for himself the ability to alter the climate, for better or worse, but even the prerogative to determine what the ideal climate should be. We are told that so-called “natural” disasters will only grow worse unless we change the climate for the better, as we have done for the worse, not unless we repent of our sin and rebellion and return to God with a sincere heart. It has reached the point where people think they can not only redefine God’s ordained institution of marriage, but even reject the fact that God made people male and female, “male and female He created them” (Gn 1:27; 5:2). This attempt proves the infidelity, apostasy, and evil of the times in which it is made.
There are only two alternatives facing mankind; either the judgment of Sodom, or the good news of the gospel and the way of the Cross. Sadly the bulk of not only the culture, but of professing Christendom today, has chosen the path, and therefore the judgments, of Sodom, “Yet you have not merely walked in their ways or done according to their abominations; but, as if that were too little, you acted more corruptly in all your conduct than they” (Ezk 16:47). Like Lot’s wife, they have looked back to the world and its ways. The god of this world has blinded their minds to the true and pure gospel of Jesus Christ with another gospel, a counterfeit faith, and an almost Christianity. It is impossible to assimilate and thereby participate in the world’s values, tastes, thinking, reasoning, religions, and practices and not receive of its judgments, “Come out of her my people, that you may not participate in her sins and that you may not receive of her plagues;” (Rv 18:4). The judgments which God has promised for rejecting and corrupting His person, His word, and His gracious gospel will expose even His true children to severe and serious trials, hardships, and sufferings, “For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God” (1 Pt 4:17)? The purpose of the furnace is to refine the gold.
A Timeless Principle
The whole nature of a believer’s affliction turns on the character of the divine Person who afflicts. Is it in wrath or love? Does He punish as a Judge, or discipline as a Father? His love does not change even when His providences do. He is always a Father to His adopted children. He sends His fiery trails for their testing (Rv 2:10), not for their destruction; to purify, not terrify them; to draw them near, not drive them away. An infinitely holy God cannot condone sin, especially among those who profess to be members of His household. Even members of His own family stand under His disciplinary judgment (Hb 12:5-11). This biblical principle has today not only been virtually eradicated from the thinking of the mass of professing Christianity, but is vigorously opposed if such a thing should even be suggested. But Jesus Himself taught differently, “For everyone will be salted with fire” (Mk 9:49). All will experience a fiery trial for the purpose of purification; to separate the gold from the dross, the wheat from the chaff, the good from the evil, and mere professors from true believers.
In the hearts and minds of true believers these trials will kill indwelling sin, destroy self, crucify them to the world and their own understanding, separate them from mere professors and forms of godliness, humble them under the mighty hand of God to submit to His sovereign will, and cause them to trust in by faith nothing but the word and strength of Christ, and to walk by faith and not by sight, causing them to be a convicting and preserving rather than a corrupting influence, “that you may prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among who you appear as lights in the world,” (Phil 2:15). A will resigned to God’s will is not a will in which there is no rising of the flesh against God’s will, but one where the Spirit has victory over and subdues the will of the flesh (Gal 5:16, 17). These are the ones who will deny self, deny the world, and follow Christ wherever He goes. All others will yield to and indulge the carnal and worldly lusts and desires of the flesh and mind, attempt to justify them by giving them different names, and eventually die in their sins friends of the world, slaves to sin, and enemies of God.
Truly, the mercies and compassions of God toward His children are fatherly, loving, and tender, “For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His lovingkindness toward those who fear Him…Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him” (Ps 103:11, 13), but His mercy and compassion do not render Him indifferent or indulgent to sin. One ancient philosopher, Seneca, though a pagan, when he witnessed the persecution of the primitive Christians could say that God loves His people with a masculine love, not with a womanish indulgence and tenderness. It is to be feared that the feminization of our culture has produced a corresponding effeminate conception of God. The emasculation of men in general has resulted in an emasculated understanding of God. Christ had rather have His people cling close to Him under trials and sufferings than be worldly, carnal, vain, and careless under ease, accommodation, and prosperity. The worthiest saints have been afflicted with the sharpest sufferings. The apostles after being flogged, “went on their way from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer shame for His name” (Ac 5:41). God showed the Apostle Paul “how much he must suffer for My name’s sake” (Ac 9:16). In a time of judgment, “The Lord is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble, and He knows those who take refuge in Him” (Nah 1:6, 7).
The eleventh chapter of Hebrews is a catalog of the sufferings of the early Christians, “others were tortured…and others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated” (Hb 11:35-38). Roman emperors and citizens entertained themselves with the horrible deaths of the early Christians. Nero dipped them into wax, tied them to stakes, and set them on fire to light the filthy orgies he held in his gardens. They were packed solid into houses which were then sealed tight until all inside had suffocated. To what sufferings did God give up those faithful servants of Christ who were burned at the stake by Bloody Mary, or tortured during The Inquisitions following the Reformation. Some were beaten with iron rods, others were made to drink molten lead, and others made to endure the rack for days on end. What God has done in the past, He is able to do again. Read what is happening to Christians in India, in Muslim nations, in Asia, and in hundreds of other places in the world today. We are no better than they. What makes us think we are immune? The fact that Christians in this nation have never suffered such persecutions should be cause for concern, not complacency. What grounds do we have for expecting to avoid a storm that other saints have had to endure? Surely we cannot imagine that the rage of Satan is any less, or that his servants are any less cruel and malicious. By His personal sufferings Christ completely satisfied the wrath of God, but the sufferings of His children have not yet satisfied the hostility and wrath of those who hate God. There is still plenty of suffering left for all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus (2 Tm 3:12).
Unavoidable
It becomes evident that God has called His true people to suffer when, by His providences, there is no way to avoid suffering except by sinning. Such was the case of those burned by Bloody Mary. It was deny Reformed doctrines and affirm Roman Catholic ones, or burn. This is the choice which many believers in Muslim countries are now confronted with; either renounce their faith in Jesus Christ and return to Islam, or be killed. Now, we may not be called to such extraordinary suffering as this, but when our way is so restricted by God’s providences that we cannot avoid sinning except by compromising God’s word, accommodating the world, and stepping over the command of God, then God would have us consider this as His call to suffer for His name’s sake. As more and more pressure is brought to bear to conform to the culture, and to affirm and celebrate every deviant, sinful, and worldly lifestyle, then there will be no way to avoid suffering except by sinning. As more laws are enacted that outlaw God’s laws, God’s people must obey God rather than man. The more people attribute God’s judgments to natural and second causes, the more believers will be scorned when they attribute them to the judgment of God for our national sins. As more and more professing Christians and the churches to which they belong assimilate with the world and corrupt God’s word and worship, true believers must separate themselves from them, worship God in spirit and truth, “and in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh” (Phil 3:3). Why a loving and merciful Father will often, by His providences, make a suffering path unavoidable for His people, we can know that He does so,
First, to demonstrate His own glory, and
Second, to promote His people’s holiness and happiness
First, in the suffering of His people God in His wisdom will demonstrate the glory of His nature by vindicating the righteousness of His ways and commands. By this the world will see that no matter how much God loves His own, He will not indulge or condone their sins. There is nothing of which God is more jealous than His own glory. If they will be so careless and negligent as to abuse His blessings, He will be so just to make them suffer the temporal consequences of their sin. What then is the effect of being placed into this blessed furnace? It is to bring more real good to His people from their trials than from all the comforts and blessings that they ever had. Perhaps it is an uncommonly great trial, the furnace is heated seven times hotter, but this is not to destroy faith, but to refine it and exalt God’s glory in it. In the Father’s hands the furnace is intended to test and prove faith, and to improve it. Rather than proving to be a stony ground faith, their sufferings cause God’s true children to cling tighter to Him; they trust more in Him and His promises and less in self. His strength and not their own must be their safety. They see that His trials of faith are acts of love, not anger. They are for their good, not their harm. They are designed to invigorate the life of faith and deaden the life of leaning on our own understandings and placing any confidence in the flesh. Their severe trials bring them to abhor more and more their love of independence, self-sufficiency, ease, and comfort to which they cling when they see how much it shuts out the manifestations of their Father’s loving care.
By exposing His people to such dreadful sufferings, God is able to manifest the glory of His almighty power engaged on behalf of His people for their support, and to enable them to endure their trials (1 Cor 10:13). He displays the glory of His wisdom in the wonderful ways He fashions for their escape, deliverance, and provision. It is one of the greatest wonders of this world how the people of God have survived under such fierce and frequent assaults by their enemies. No people are so protected, so well provided for, so strengthened, so disciplined, and so delivered as the children of God. Much less opposition has overturned, and totally destroyed some of the mightiest rulers and nations in the world. Satan, the flesh, and the world are mighty foes, but one Almighty is much more than many mighties. And no less glorious is the wisdom of God in frustrating the plans of the wicked, overturning all the crafty and deceptive designs of hell, and causing all things, even evil things, to work for the good of His dear children. Whatever others purpose for evil against His people, God intends it for their good (Gn 50:20). He ensnares the wicked in the works of their own hands (Est 7:9), and works out such marvelous deliverances that they fill His people with awe, wonder, and praise. “For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our affliction which came upon us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength,” (2 Cor 1:8). And why were Paul and others so excessively afflicted? It was “in order that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead; who delivered us from so great a peril of death, and will deliver us, He on whom we have set our hope” (2 Cor 1:9, 10). This trust in God alone rather than in ourselves only comes when we are brought to the end of our own strength and wisdom, and despair of any hope or help from man. This brings glory to God.
Second, just as God glorifies Himself in the suffering of His people, so He also by those sufferings promotes their holiness and happiness. In today’s contemporary, man-centered Christianity the notion that God would intentionally inflict suffering on anyone, much less His own people, is utterly foreign, but to say that He does so out of love in order to promote their happiness and best interests is without question incomprehensible and totally incompatible with their conception of God. The person who claims to be spiritual, but just not religious; that professes to believe in God, just not the God of the Bible; that acknowledges a general absolute God, but denies God who is three-in-one – three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with one divine essence – and who has revealed Himself, His will, and His nature only in His written law and gospel, is as guilty of idolatry as if they worshiped fifty-thousand gods. What is the difference between the one who has no god and the one who worships a false god and a false Christ? Both alike are without the true God in the world. Both alike have turned away from the truth and turned aside to myths. The god they love is one of their own invention because the love of God is dependent upon the true knowledge of God. Nevertheless, the fact that God does at times inflict His people with suffering, sometimes severe suffering, is the uniform and consistent teaching of Scripture, “Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction” (Is 48:10), and He does so because,
First, these trials, tribulations, and troubles are sent as the means to crucify and kill the corruptions that are in their hearts. Noxious weeds grow in the best of soils and require a harsh season to kill them at the root. If we consider a dependent faith, humility, submission to the will of God, separation from the world, fervent prayer, suffering for the sake of Christ and His truth, and a longing desire for heaven to be in our best interest, and the most advantageous for the church, then nothing promotes these so well as a suffering condition (Phil 1:29).
We are not to be surprised at fiery trials and ordeals as if they were some strange thing and an anomaly and intrusion into the Christian life (1 Pt 4:12).Trials, tribulations, and crosses are proclaimed as common occurrences to all the saints, and in them consists a significant portion of our fellowship and communion with Christ (Phil 3:10). The sufferings of Christ belong to the saints in abundance so they may know the comforts of Christ in abundance (2 Cor 1:5). There is a sweet divine causality to the saint’s trials, and that is Christ’s presence and comforts when they are for His cause. It is “through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Ac 14:22). “And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Rm 5:3-5). Notice the progression which Paul delineates; the love of God in our hearts begins with tribulations. The testing of faith produces perseverance and endurance (Jm 1:3) Hardships, trials, tribulations, crosses, and adversity kill the corruptions which ease, comfort, prosperity, and accommodation breed.
Second, by these trials their sincere faith is tested and proved; they produce “proven character” (Rm 5:4); “that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Pt 1:7). Many doubts and fears which some believers live under will be removed when their faith stands the test of a fiery trial. One sharp and prolonged trial in which the strong arm of God helps them to persevere and be faithful and not shrink back to destruction will do more to bolster our assurance of salvation than all the “once saved, always saved” sermons in the world could ever do. “The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord tests hearts” (Pv 17:3).
Third, these seasons of suffering and tribulation are designed to rid the visible church of counterfeit Christians and to make a clear distinction between the true and the false church. These fiery trials will separate true believers from the mass of empty professors. They will drive true believers away from false guides, leaders, and churches because these would rather sin than suffer. They would rather assimilate and integrate with the culture, make friends with the world, and accommodate the gospel to their lusts and the spirit of the age, all under the guises of love, tolerance, inclusiveness, diversity, evangelism, and acceptance rather than suffer for the truth. They will continue to congregate in mass, call themselves Christians, trust in themselves that they are righteous, and encourage each other that so many others, even their leaders, could not be wrong. Prosperity, ease, and accommodation will fill the church with hypocrites, whereas opposition, adversity, and public censure will drive them from it. Affliction, even the thought of it, is a furnace that will separate the dross from the gold, “and I shall purge from you the rebels and those who transgress against Me;” (Ezk 22:38). Prosperity, ease, entertainment, fleshly enticements, and flattering preachers draw multitudes of hypocrites into the church like flies to honey, but a season of suffering, like cold winter weather, kills them. There is nothing like a suffering season for making the distinction between the children of God and the children of the devil obvious (1 Jn 3:7-10). Many professing Christians grow up in the sheltered greenhouse environment of the visible church where they flourish under the controlled climate of peace, prosperity, and religious tolerance, under which they are bold and brave, but when they are exposed to a cold blast of winter or the scorching heat of summer they either wither away to nothing or find a church that will nurture and keep alive their fragile Christless Christianity. A thunderstorm can be very dangerous and frightening, but it is very effectual in washing all the pollution out of the air. The foundation on which anyone’s faith is built is tested by the severity of the storm that beats against it (Mt 7:24-27). Even a shallow superficial faith can withstand a mild storm, but when “the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house;” (Mt 7:25), then the foundation on which it was built becomes obvious.
Fourth, by these crosses, troubles, oppositions, and distresses believers are awakened to their biblical duties and responsibilities, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep Your word….It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I may learn Your statutes” (Ps 119:67, 71). They are taught to pray more frequently, fervently, biblically, and spiritually. They are taught to wait on God and not faint and lose heart (Lk 18:1-8). When they are made to feel their helplessness, then they learn a helpless dependence upon Christ and His promises. O, what apathy, self-sufficiency, formality, presumptuous security, worldliness, and complacency is prone to creep into the hearts of even the best saints in a time of prosperity, accommodation, comfort, and ease. But when the storm rises, and the wind and the waves become ferocious, now they cry out as did the disciples, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing!” (Mt 8:25).
For these and many other good and holy purposes the Lord permits, orders, and sends persecutions, trials, sufferings, and tribulations upon His people. O, what is to become of a people who deny they are in the furnace, or who when they feel its heat turn to man and forms of godliness for relief. They are consumed in the furnace, but not melted; burnt, but not purified; the dross is not removed, but remains in them. In the furnace they complain, fret, dispute, and faint, but what is even more strange is they sleep on in a dreamy false security, “The bellows blow fiercely, the lead is consumed by the fire; in vain the refining goes on, but the wicked are not separated” (Jer 6:29). They have no painful sense of the sinfulness of sin, nor any appreciation for their danger; therefore they show little interest in the good news of the gospel or in a Savior for their souls. But the less they are concerned for themselves, the more should those who know their danger be concerned for them. They should preach the law of God to them, through which comes the knowledge of sin, and to lay before them their guilt and corruption, and make them aware of the misery and judgment they are under. They should look to none but the Holy Spirit to apply the law of God to their conscience and convict them of sin, righteousness, and judgment. And when and only when He has convicted them of their guilt, helplessness, hopelessness, and the dangerous state in which they live, then preach to them the good news of the gospel. Anyone who thinks that such a message will be received any better than it was received by those who heard it from Jesus Himself are in for a shock. “For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart” (Hb 12:3). It is a day in which the good news of the gospel is no longer endured by the mass of professing Christians; much less the bad news under which every sinner that has not fled to Christ from the wrath to come stands condemned. Reader, have you ever been convicted by the law so as to feel and know your danger? Have you ever been brought by the law to the knowledge of sin and its just punishment? Have you ever fled to Christ from the wrath to come? I leave you to God to deal with your conscience.
In our next study I will show that God usually alerts His people of approaching trials and sufferings, along with an account of how and some reasons why He usually forewarns them.
[1] John Murray, Redemption Accomplished and Applied (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1955), 114.
[2] John Newton, The Letters of John Newton (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 2007), 64.