TWENTY-FIRST SERVICE A Field of Five Battles 1. INVOCATION JAP APPROACH thee, Father in heaven, with reverence, and pray that I may be graciously received and blessed in this hour of communion with thee. Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer. Amen. 2. HYMN: "I love to steal awhile away.' 3. SCRIPTURE LESSON Psalm 98. Romans 8:1-18, 28-39. 4. PRAYER I look unto the hills, O Lord, from whence cometh my help. I pray thee, make bare thine arm in my behalf. For I am very needy. I need, above all things, thy pardoning grace; and, blessed be thy name, thou hast promised it. I need the sanctifying influence of thy Spirit that I may grow in spiritual stature; and thou hast said, "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children how much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him." I need strength for the hour of temptation; and thou hast promised to be a strength to the poor and needy in his distress. I need patience in suffering and comfort in the time of sorrow; and thou hast said, "I will not leave you comfortless." I need a better equipment and a more willing spirit for service; I need more love, more faith, more of everything, Lord, to make me more like thee; and I put thee in remembrance of thy great, all-embracing promise, “Ask, and it shall be given unto you." I want to take thee at thy word; wherefore, having asked, help me to expect the things I have asked for. And all that I desire for myself, I desire also for those who are nearest and dearest to me. Bless my kinspeople, my intimate friends and neighbors, my fellow church members. Bless the people of this community. Bless our Country; and enable its rulers to rule in the righteousness and the fear of God. Bless all the nations of the earth. Let thy Gospel have free course and be glorified, until wars shall cease, thy Kingdom be established among all nations and thy love prevail everywhere among the children of men. And to thy name, blessed Saviour, shall be glory forever and ever. Amen. 5. HYMN: "Jesus, I my cross have taken." 6. OFFERING 7. THE SERMON A Field of Five Battles "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose; for whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren; moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? (Rom. 8:28-31.) This text is fighting ground. The swords of parties and partisans have here been crossed in the controversies of the ages. But the man who wrote this passage did not so intend it. His hope was to encourage the Christians of his time, struggling against a sea of troubles, by the assurance that God could not be thwarted in his great purpose of saving them and ultimately delivering the world from its bondage of sin. It is clear that when God created Adam he designed him to be the progenitor of a race of saints; but Adam betrayed his trust and, falling, became the progenitor of a race of sinners. Thus the beneficent plan apparently came to naught; but sooner or later God always has his way. In the fulness of time there came Another to carry out the plan. "The first man is of the earth, earthy, but the second man is the Lord from heaven." He lived, suffered, died and triumphed over death; and thus became the firstborn among many brethren. In him the prophecy was fulfilled, "When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied." So the eternal plan and purpose of God was not a failure after all. Sinners are being converted, the world is being saved. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?" As I said, this passage, so irenic in its intent, has been an Esdraelon of conflict. Here are five words-Foreknowledge, Predestination, Vocation, Justification and Glorification-every one of which contains a bugle-call. I. "Whom he did foreknow." The word Foreknowledge is the keynote of the controversy between Deism and Theism which has reference to the personality of God. The question is, Does God know? If he knows, then he must be a self-conscious Person. Law does not know. Energy does not know. Is God like an image of Buddh with a heart of stone, eyes that see not and arms that help not? But assuming the omniscience of God, the question arises, How does he know? By the processes of thought, as we do? We jot down an idea, another follows it, then comes an ergo; and thus we arrive at a conclusion. But God does not reason that way. He never thinks. He always knows, and he knows all. And knowing thus, he must foreknow as well. The past and future are alike to him, since with him there is no succession of thought. We know as one turning the pages of an almanac in which day follows day; but God knows as one who faces a calendar where all the days are at once before him. Eternity with all its years Stands present to thy view; To thee there's nothing old appears, II. "He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son." The word Predestination suggests the long-continued controversy between Calvinism and Arminianism. The question is, Did God predestinate because he foreknew, or vice versa? The hyper-Calvinists have been accustomed to say that God predestinated before he foreknew, thus apparently making our destiny dependent solely on the divine decree; while the hyper-Arminians, by affirming that God foreknew before he predestinated, have sought to relieve God of responsibility as to the destinies of men. |