April 10, 2011
SOVEREIGN GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH
LOCATION
Rocky Hill Firehouse, 2nd Floor
150 Washington Street
Rocky Hill, New Jersey, 08553
Telephone: 615-513-4464
Schedule of Services
Sunday 10 AM Bible Class
Sunday 11 AM Morning Service
Thursday 7 PM Midweek Service
The Implanting of the Enduring Word
1 Peter 1: 23-25; Isaiah 40: 6-8
According to Peter, although the flesh withers, and the flower thereof falls away, [because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it] yet in the children of God there is an unwithering something of another kind. “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.” “The Word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the Gospel is preached unto you.” The Gospel is of use to us because it is not of human origin. If it were of the flesh, all it could do for us would not land us beyond the flesh; but the Gospel of Jesus Christ is superhuman, Divine, and spiritual. If you believe a Gospel which you have thought out for yourself, or a philosophical Gospel which comes from the brain of man, it is of the flesh, and will wither, and you will die, and be lost through trusting in it. The only word that can bless you and be a seed in your soul must be the living and incorruptible Word of the eternal Spirit. Do you receive it? Then the Holy Spirit implants it in your soul. And what is the result of it? There comes a new life as the result of the indwelling of the living Word, and our being born again by it. A new life it is; not the old nature putting out its better parts; not the old Adam refining and purifying itself, and rising to something better. Wherever this new life comes through the Word, it is incorruptible, it lives for ever. C. H. Spurgeon
The Living Stone and Living Stones
1 Peter 2: 4: To whom coming, as unto a living stone,…5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house,…
When a brick mason bricks a home the foundation is already laid. The builder brings the stones to the foundation. Those bricks were once just dirt. The dirt had to be dug out of the earth, made into bricks and brought to the foundation. A skilled mason fits the bricks in place and there they remain. The bricks are built up.
This is the case with those God makes living stones and builds up a spiritual house. Christ is the Living Stone. The work of building the house which God inhabits was entrusted to his Son, typified in David’s son, Solomon (1 Chronicles 17: 11-14.) Christ has fulfilled all righteousness on behalf of those given him and each one is made alive and built up in his house by Christ through the Holy Spirit. “I, if I be lifted up,” says Christ, “will draw all men unto me” (John 12: 32.) He comes to where each of his redeemed are, sending his messengers with his word.
Through the word preached the Spirit enters in unaided by the dead believer, creating spiritual life within, making his people living stones. He fitly frames each believer together laying us plum on Christ our Foundation—corner to corner, middle to side, fully, flatly, squarely upon Christ our Foundation and there we rest never to be moved for all eternity (Ephesians 2: 20-22.) Our Lord shall finish building the house when each chosen, redeemed, sanctified child has been framed into his building, not by the might and power of man, but by his Spirit. He shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it. The hands of Christ have laid the foundation of this house; his hands shall also finish it (Zechariah 4: 6-9.)
FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT
Experiences are very well in their way; but they are never well, nor ever properly in the way, when we put them in Christ’s way, and in the place of Christ. And whoever sends men to form a judgment of their state as they stand before God by consulting what they call the gracious dispositions of their own hearts instead of sending them to the enjoyment of God’s perfect approbation of the Church in Christ is sending them to the shadow instead of the substance: so that, when at any time an intervention takes place to the substance, the shadow is instantly lost…The child of God who looks at those fruits, more than as fruits, and overlooks the cause in the effect, taking comfort from evidences, instead of Christ alone, is by so much going off the ground of real firmness in the faith. It is looking at Christ second-hand when we look at him through our evidences…In Christ’s Person may my whole confidence center. With the Person of Jesus, do thou, O Lord, cause my soul to be so enamored that I may behold in him a greater and more perfect righteousness to make me perfect before God than all the righteousness of the whole creation of God. Let this view of Jesus give firmness to my faith which nothing can shake. And, while the Lord, the Spirit, enables me to mortify the flesh with its affections and lusts let all the fruits of the Spirit testify whose I am, and to whom I belong, as sweet testimonies and effects, while Christ alone is the cause of all my salvation and all my desire.
Robert Hawker
SERMONS
After clicking on the following sermon links you will go to sermon notes where you will find an option at
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God’s Race
Where Are Thine Accusers?
The Goodliness of the Flesh
ARTICLES
A Holy and Royal Priesthood
How Much More
The Golden Rule
Beware of False Prophets