2013 7-28 ‘The Lordship Controversy’ – Part 2 (Selected Scriptures)

“THE LORDSHIP CONTROVERSY – PART 2”
SELECTED SCRIPTURES

I. Introduction
Ask yourself this: If the Lord Jesus Christ is so committed to you that He willingly died for you, is it unreasonable for the Lord to expect you to follow Him, be His disciple, and live for Him? I closed with those words last Sunday morning.

I want us to begin with that thought today. That’s why we just sang “Living for Jesus.”
That is what a true Christian does, isn’t it – lives for Jesus? Listen to the refrain one more time.
“O Jesus, Lord and Savior, I give myself to Thee;
For Thou in Thy atonement, didst give Thyself for me.
I own no other master; My heart shall be Thy throne.
My life I give, henceforth to live, O Christ, for Thee alone.”

That sounds like commitment. That sounds like someone who has recognized the lord-ship of Jesus Christ. They’re the words of a person whose heart is set on following Him. They’re the words of a person who has denied himself, taken up his cross, and then set his course to follow Christ. They’re the words of a true disciple.

In 1917, when Thomas Chisholm wrote the words to “Living for Jesus,” the gospel was, for the most part, still being preached with an emphasis on the lordship of Christ and the subsequent discipleship of the Christian. There were a few exceptions, a few places where the so-called “modern gospel” was beginning to rear its head, but it had not yet worked its way into the mainstream of the true church.

That’s because for nearly nineteen hundred years the true church knew what the good news of true gospel actually was. It was a call for sinners to repent, to put their faith and trust in Christ alone, and to submit themselves (turn themselves over) to Him as the Lord of their lives. The good news was that Jesus would save their souls, their sins would be for-given, and they would be born again to eternal life.

That was the gospel then, and it’s still the gospel. Many things were clearly understood because they were clearly preached and regularly taught. Here are two of those things.
Mark 8:34
34 “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself (his old priorities and desires), and take up his cross (die to his old life), and follow Me.”
2 Corinthians 5:17
17 …if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature (life); the old things passed away (died); behold, new things have come.

These are not minor or insignificant truths wallowing in the backwaters of some stale old theological pond. They are core truths. They are central to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
New life in Christ just naturally brings with it new priorities and new desires. That is because the old life with its priorities and desires is nailed to the cross. That is what hap-pens when you take up your cross. The old man is crucified and the new man follows after Christ. Now to be sure, the new man is still in the flesh, and the new man will still battle the flesh and its priorities and its desires as long as he lives. But the new man is in Christ, and Christ is in the new man.
Galatians 2:20
20 “I (the old man – the old life) have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I (the old man – the old life) who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh (the new man – the new life) I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me.”

Historically, all of this was clearly understood. Why? I’ll say it again. All of this was understood because, historically, all of this was consistently preached and taught.
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II. Text
But with the dawn of the twentieth century, a turning away from the teaching of doctrine began to work its way into the church. The result was inevitable, and precisely what you would expect. Christians’ understanding of the Scriptures began to wane.

As the teaching of sound doctrine began to lose its central place in the church, it had to be replaced with something. Back in the first century the Apostle Paul told us what would replace it. He told us what would happen if doctrine took a back seat to something else – anything else.
*2 Timothy 4:3-4
3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but want-ing to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires;
4 and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.

There is a remedy for this problem that so deeply infects the professing church today. Paul told those who shepherd the church what it is. Just back up four verses.
*2 Timothy 4:1-2
1 I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom,
2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.

But today, in the second decade of the twenty-first century, relatively few in the church take those instructions seriously. The teaching that a transformed life is the inevitable and necessary outcome of true salvation has fallen out of favor. Those who teach it today are often called fundamentalists and told that they’re out of touch with the demands of a modern culture. Many argue that such a culture demands a “modern gospel.”
They argue that the modern world is accustomed to thirty second sound bites. If you can’t say what you want to say quickly, people won’t listen. That is the way the world works today. However, the church is not the world. It never has been and it never will be. The fact is that preaching the word, reproving, rebuking, and exhorting with great patience and instruction, takes time. And it takes effort. But who will listen? Those who are to receive eternal life will listen. They will hear. God’s elect, those whom He has chosen, will listen.
Ephesians 1:4-5
4 …He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him.
5 (In love) He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will…

Romans 8:29-30
29 For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren;
30 and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

This answers the question of who will receive the preaching of the gospel, and who will listen to the teaching of sound doctrine. So do you see? God’s own people will listen to the truth. In fact, God’s own people will hunger for the truth. And God’s own people will know the truth when they hear it!

Now let me say this very carefully. The popular gospel that is so often being preached today contains truth. There is truth in it. But the popular gospel is not THE truth. It is not the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The gospel that is popular today is little more than a series of sound bites designed to sell a product. If the masses can’t be cajoled with one sound bite, another will quickly take its place.

• “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” But doesn’t the Bible tell us that we will be persecuted for our faith?
• “Just believe in Jesus.” All right, but what does that mean? Believe in what about Jesus?
• “Ask Jesus into your heart.” Yes, but how does He get there?
• “Make Jesus your Savior.” You cannot make Jesus anything!
• “Accept Jesus.” That’s not the issue. The issue is on what basis will Jesus accept you?
• “Come to Jesus.” But the Bible says we cannot go to Jesus unless God permits it.
• “Make a decision for Jesus.” You don’t make that decision. God makes it.
• “Say the sinner’s prayer and you’ll be saved.” Can anyone tell me precisely what the ‘sinner’s prayer’ is…and where I can find it in the Bible?

Can you picture Peter preaching on the day the church was born and asking people to say the sinner’s prayer so they could be saved?

Can you see Paul preaching on Mars Hill in Athens and telling people that God has a wonderful plan for their lives?

Can you see Martin Luther or John Calvin or Charles Spurgeon trying to coax and cajole people into raising their hands if they want to accept Jesus? And then admonishing the others in attendance to keep their heads bowed and their eyes closed so the new believers won’t be embarrassed by their decision for Christ? That’s standard procedure today.

But none of that was known for the first nineteen hundred years of the church. Listen, God doesn’t want your hand raised high up and your feet taking a walk down to the front of the church while everyone’s eyes are closed. What God does want is a life that is sur-rendered to Him, and a life that will be obedient to Him and do His will.
John 3:36
36 “He who believes (faith-trust) in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”

Saying that you are a Christian is simply not the truth if you refuse to obey Christ.
Matthew 7:21
21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven.”

Saying that you are a Christian is meaningless if you don’t do God’s will.
Luke 9:23
23 “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.”

Saying that you are a Christian is meaningless if you haven’t turned your life over to the Lord and submitted yourself to Christ.

God doesn’t want our man-made religion with its traditional rites and rituals no matter how whole-heartedly we may practice them. He wants our hearts to be filled with His Spirit and our whole life transformed by Christ. But why does He want that?
*Colossians 1:10-14
10 …so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the know-ledge of God;
11 strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience;
12 (joyously) giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.
13 For He delivered us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,
14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
How much of this did you do yourself? Can your good works bear fruit if Christ isn’t in them? No! Can you learn more about God if the Spirit of Christ isn’t your teacher? No! Can you strengthen yourself by your own power? No! Can you share in the inheritance of God’s people if God doesn’t adopt you into His eternal family? No! Can you forgive your own sins? No! Can you walk in your own light and deliver your-self from darkness and Satan’s kingdom into Christ’s kingdom? Not a chance?

You and I cannot do any of those things. But the Lord Jesus Christ can. Therefore, we preach the lordship of Christ. It is all about the lordship of Christ. So God wants us to preach the gospel the way Jesus and the apostles preached it, and the way the believing church always preached it – an uncompromised call for sinners to repent, to put their faith and trust in Christ alone, and to submit their lives to Him as their Lord and Savior. Not Savior and Lord. The NT never puts them in that order. It is always Lord and Savior.

In the only way we understand and count time, Jesus was Lord of all creation before He was ever Savior of anyone. He is ever and always Lord over the very least part of His creation. In 1984 Twila Paris wrote a song called “We Bow Down.” She got it right.
“You are Lord of creation and Lord of my life,
Lord of the land and the sea.
You were Lord of the heavens before there was time,
And Lord of all lords you will be.”

Listen, Jesus Christ is Lord of all, but He is only Savior of those who have repented of their sins, trusted Him, and submitted themselves to His eternal lordship. That is what the Scriptures teach. In times past the thought of Jesus as a person’s Savior without being their Lord was simply unknown to biblical Christianity. The idea of Jesus giving His life for people who have no intention of committing themselves to Him, and submit-ting to Him as Lord of their lives, was not taught because it has no scriptural basis.

It would be like being justified without any thought of being sanctified. That is to say, a person could be declared righteous by God, and then left to live the life he always led with no commitment to Christ and no interest in growing in the grace and knowledge of the very One who died for him and saved his soul. Then, whenever his life was over, he would just automatically be glorified in heaven with Christ, the One whom this person had no desire to know and learn to love in this life.

“Just believe in Jesus now and then you can decide later if you want to make Him Lord.” Few people actually say that (some actually do), but that’s the message that is sent by far too many preachers and evangelists today. It’s not just wrong; it borders on blasphemy. But that message, or some variation of it, fills churches with people who think they are Christians, but are not. They’re not being sanctified because they’ve not been justified.

The road between justification and glorification is sanctification. It’s a straight line. There are no shortcuts. Jesus made it clear.
Both the gate that leads to justification and the road along which we are sanctified is nar-row. Jesus said, “For the gate is small, and the way is narrow that leads to life, and few are those who find it (Matthew 7:14).” Listen, if you are justified you will be sanctified. You must be.

You must be sanctified because from the moment you are justified by faith, God begins the work of sanctifying you (making you holy) so that you will be ready for heaven. Paul said, “…He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus (Philippians 1:6).” That perfecting is your sanctification. It is the process by which you and I are being made ready for that day when we see Jesus; that day when our sanctifica-tion is complete, and we will stand in His presence.
1 John 3:2
2 Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is.

Isn’t that what we all long for – to see Jesus just as He is? The tragedy is that so many have been lulled into believing that they will see Him, but they will not because they’ve never been told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. They’ve never heard the truth that has been handed down through the centuries since the birth of the church.

So listen to what the early church fathers, the reformers, and some of the great preachers of the last three hundred years have said about all of this.

Clement of Alexandria (150-215) – on the use of the word “Lord”:
Clement was one of the first “Christian scholars.” He said, “Let us not merely call (Christ) Lord, for that (in itself) will not save us…let us acknowledge Him by our actions…This world and the world to come are two enemies. This (world) means adultery, corruption, avarice, and deceit, while the other (world) gives them up.”

Martin Luther (1483-1546) – on belief vs. faith:
Luther said, “If (good) works and love do not blossom forth, it is not genuine faith, the gospel has not yet gained a foothold, and Christ is not rightly known…when they hear the gospel, they miss the point; in their hearts, and out of their own resources, they conjure up an idea which they call ‘belief,’ which they treat as gen-uine faith. All the same, it is but a human fabrication, an idea without a corre-sponding experience in the depths of the heart. It is therefore ineffective…”

John Calvin (1509-1564) – on the relationship between faith and works:
Calvin said, “We deny that good works have any share in justification, but we claim full authority for them in the lives of the righteous…where zeal for integrity and holiness is not vigor(ous), there is neither the Spirit of Christ nor Christ Him-self; and wherever Christ is not, there is no righteousness, nay, there is no faith…”

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) – on the evidence and assurance of true salvation:
He was probably the greatest theologian this country has ever produced. Edwards said, “It is not God’s design that men should obtain assurance in any way other than by mortifying (the death of) corruption…Assurance is not obtained so much by self-examination, as by action (deeds/works). (The Apostle Paul) obtained assurance more by running (doing) than considering (believing).”
Edwards’ point was that while the reality of salvation is obtained by faith and not good works, the assurance of salvation is obtained by good works and not by faith. (repeat) Think about that. If so-called good works could save, the Pharisees would have been saved to highest possible degree. And didn’t they think they were? Yet Jesus told them that their father was the devil, that they did Satan’s work, and that they committed the unforgivable sin against the Holy Spirit. So much for good works ever saving anyone.

J. C. Ryle (1816-1900) – on “no-lordship salvation”:
He was an English pastor and theologian. His monumental work, Holiness, writ-ten in 1879, is one of the strongest arguments against the idea that a person can have Jesus as Savior but not as Lord. Ryle said, “I doubt, indeed, whether we have any warrant for saying that a man can possibly be converted without being conse-crated to God!…If he was not consecrated to God in the very day that he was con-verted and born again, I do not understand what conversion means.”

Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892) – on the Christian and personal holiness:
Spurgeon was known as the “Prince of Preachers.” No one railed against the idea that a person could have Christ as Savior but not Lord more forcefully than Spurgeon did. He said, “Too many (professing believers)…refuse to put on the garment of obedience, they reject the white linen which is the righteousness of the saints. They reveal their self-will, their enmity to God, and their non-submission to His Son. Such men may talk what they will about justification by faith, and salva-tion by grace, but they are rebels at heart…”

– on faith vs. works, accepting vs. receiving, and the “no-lordship” doctrine:
“There are some who seem willing to accept Christ as Savior who will not receive Him as Lord. They will not often state the case quite as plainly as that; but, as ac-tions speak more plainly than words, that is what their conduct…says. How sad it is that some talk about their faith in Christ, yet their faith is not proved by their works!…I cannot conceive it possible for anyone to truly receive Christ as Savior and yet not to receive Him as Lord…If it were possible for sin to be forgiven, and yet for the sinner to live just as he lived before, he would not really be saved.”

D. L. Moody (1837-1899) – on the meaning of repentance and being born again:
Moody said, “If you ask people what (repentance) is, they will tell you, ‘It is feeling sorry.’ If you ask a man if he repents, he will tell you: ‘Oh, yes; I generally feel sorry for my sins.’ That is not repentance…Repentance is turning right about, and forsaking sin…If a man (doesn’t) turn from his sin, he won’t be accepted of God; and if righteousness (doesn’t) produce a turning about…it isn’t true righteousness.”

R. A. Torrey (1856-1928) – on the lordship of Christ:
Torrey was the first president of Moody Bible Institute. He said, “It is not enough to know Jesus as a Savior, we must know Him as Lord also…Are you willing to accept Him as your Divine Lord, the One to whom you will surrender your heart, your every thought, and word, and act (deed)?”

Harry Ironside (1876-1951) – on the evidence of true salvation:
Ironside was pastor of Moody Memorial Church in Chicago from 1929-1948. He said, “The moment one believes the gospel, he is born again and receives a new life and nature – a nature that hates sin and loves holiness. If you have come to Jesus and trusted Him, do you not realize the truth of this? This is evidence of a new nature. And as you walk with God you will find that the daily power of the indwelling Holy Spirit will give you…deliverance from the dominion of sin.”

A. W. Tozer (1897-1963) – on the modern gospel:
Tozer was one of the great Christian intellects of the twentieth century. He said, “Salvation comes not by ‘accepting the finished work’ or by ‘deciding for Christ.’ Salvation comes by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, the whole, living, victorious Lord who, as God and man, fought our fight and won it, accepted our debt as His own and paid it, took our sins and died under them, and rose again to set us free. This is the true Christ and nothing else will do. But something less is among us, nevertheless, and we do well to identify it so that we may repudiate it. That some-thing is a poetic fiction, a product of the romantic imagination and maudlin reli-
gious fancy. It is a Jesus, gentle, dreamy, shy, sweet, almost effeminate, and mar-velously adaptable to whatever society He may find Himself in. He is cooed over by women disappointed in love, patronized by celebrities and recommended by psychiatrists as a model of a well-integrated personality. He is used as a means to almost any carnal end, but He is never acknowledged as Lord. These quasi (false) Christians follow a quasi (false) Christ. They want His help but not His interfer-ence. They will flatter Him but (they will) never obey Him.”

Arthur W. Pink (1886-1952) – on “easy-believism” and modern evangelism:
Pink’s work, The Sovereignty of God, debunks the gospel of “easy-believism,” as it had come to be called in his day. It was anathema to him. He preached and wrote against it with a vengeance, calling it, “…superficial and radically defec-tive.” He said, “…how far, far below the New Testament standard is this modern way of begging sinners to receive Christ as their own personal ‘Savior.’ If the reader will consult his concordance, he will find that every passage where the two titles are found together it is always ‘Lord and Savior,’ and never vice versa.”

“The terrible thing is that so many preachers today, under the pretence of magni-fying the grace of God, have represented Christ as the Minister of sin; as the One who has, through His atoning sacrifice, procured an indulgence for men to con-tinue gratifying their fleshly and worldly lusts.
Provided a man professes to believe…he may pass for a real Christian almost anywhere today, even though his daily life may be no different from that of the moral (man) who makes no profession (of faith) at all. The devil is chloroforming thousands into hell by this very delusion. Jesus asks, ‘…why do you call Me, “Lord,” and do not do what I say?’”

And time escapes me or we could hear from still others who all taught that becoming a Christian and living like one could not be separated. These were all men who proclaimed the lordship of Jesus Christ in salvation. Who were some of them?
• In the 1500’s the reformers taught it.
• In the 1600’s the Puritans taught it.
• In the 1700’s men like George Whitefield taught it.
• In the 1800’s the likes of Charles Hodge and Benjamin Warfield taught it.
• In the 1900’s the lordship of Christ was consistently and uncompromisingly taught by Oswald Allis, Donald Grey Barnhouse, James Montgomery Boice, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, D. James Kennedy, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, William MacDonald, and Gresham Machen, just to name a few.

Now to be sure, the men I’ve quoted as well as those I’ve just mentioned did not always see eye-to-eye on every detail of theology. For example, they didn’t all agree on the various modes of baptism. And they didn’t all agree on the order of events of the last days. That isn’t particularly surprising since they came from such a wide variety of religious traditions. Among them were Anglicans, Baptists, Lutherans, Methodists, Plymouth Brethren, Presbyterians, Reformed, and even those like Pink and Tozer who were largely self-taught. But they all agreed on the Lordship of Christ in salvation. They got the gospel right!

That conviction goes on today in the teaching of men like D. A. Carson, John MacArthur, Albert Mohler, J. I. Packer, and R. C. Sproul, to name just a few of those who still cling to and preach the lordship of Jesus Christ.
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III. Conclusion
The gospel is free, but it costs everything. However, the modern gospel is ever so careful to avoid that truth. As a result, the modern church is filled with “almost Christians.” But the historic gospel, the gospel that was retrieved by the reformers, and the gospel that has been taught by the true church ever since, calls for us to not merely receive Him as Savior, but submit to Him as Lord. And as we have seen today, the two go together. Just like that old song, “Love and Marriage,” that said, “You can’t have one without the other,” neither can you have Jesus Christ as Savior, but not Lord.

Have you considered the cost and responded to Jesus words? “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me (Luke 9:23).”
That is my prayer today for me and for all of you. ~ Pray ~