Solus Christus Reformed Baptist Church

I. The dictates of their darkened understandings are inconsistent with themselves. II. Their wills are inconsistent with their reason. III. Their wills are inconsistent with themselves. IV. Their outward show is inconsistent with their hearts. V. Their profession is inconsistent with their practice. VI. Their practice is inconsistent with their hopes. VII. Their practice is inconsistent with itself.

I have known trades-people attend church for the mere sake of getting the custom of those who went there. I have heard of such things as people knowing which side their bread was buttered, and going to that particular denomination, where they thought they could get the most by it. Loaves and fishes drew some of Christ's followers, and they are very attracting baits, even to this day.

Our eternal blessedness consists in the future enjoyment of the present objects of our spiritual affections. All men who are convinced of a future eternal condition desire, when they depart from here, to enter into blessedness and glory. However, what that blessedness is, even as to its general nature, they know nothing at all; and if they did, they wouldn't know how to desire it. For heaven or blessedness is nothing but the full enjoyment of what we are here to love and delight in above all, of that which is the object of our affections as spiritually renewed. In this they have neither interest nor concern.

We might...flee from Your face if we only remembered our sinfulness. Lord! we do remember it with shame and sorrow; we are grieved to think we should have offended You, should have neglected so long Your sweet love and tender mercy; but we have now returned unto the "shepherd and bishop of our souls." Led by such grace, we look to Him whom we crucified, and we have mourned for Him and then have mourned for our sin.

Apostasy From the Gospel Chapter 11 By adding appointments of our own to the worship, inconsistent with and destructive of that which he hath ordained: — I. In the first way we have some among ourselves who are fallen off from the worship of the gospel It is true, they will do some things which have an appearance of being what Christ hath commanded; such are their first- day's meeting, and their prayers, with speaking in them; — but they neither observe the Lord's day, nor pray or speak in obedience unto any institution of his.

Apostasy - From the Gospel Chapter 10 In these things consisted the mystery of iniquity, the springs and occasions of that great apostasy which was in the world under the Papacy. 1. The doctrine of the gospel (as to its peculiar nature, the causes, motives, and ends of it) was generally lost, partly through the horrible ignorance of some, and partly through the pernicious errors of others, whose duty it was to have preserved it.

Another thing that some ministers have been greatly blamed for, and I think unjustly, is speaking terror to them who are already under great terrors, instead of comforting them. Indeed, if ministers in such a case go about to terrify persons with that which is not true, or to affright them by representing their case worse than it is, or in any respect otherwise than it is, they are to be condemned; but if they terrify them only by still holding forth more light to them, and giving them to understand more of the truth of their case, they are altogether to be justified.

The great interest of man's present peace, and eternal happiness, is most nearly concerned in religion. And all true religion, since the fall of man, must be taught by divine revelation, which God, by diverse parts, and in a diverse manner, has given to his Church. He caused this light to gradually increase, until the whole mystery of His grace was perfectly revealed in and by Jesus Christ. In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Col 2.3 And that God to whom all his works were known from the beginning, has in all ages disposed and ordered the revelation of his Will to men.

The story and bibliography of how I was brought off from a false foundation, a false profession.

Men may be greatly affected with the outward part of divine worship, and the manner of its performance, who have no delight in what is internal, real, and spiritual in it: Joh 5.35, "He was a burning and a shining light: and you were willing for a season to rejoice in his light." So, many were delighted in the. preaching of Ezekiel, because of his eloquence and the elegance of his parables, chapter 33.31,32.97 This gave them both delight and diligence in hearing, for which they called themselves the people of God, though they continued to live in sin; their hearts went after covetousness. The same may befall many at present with reference to the spiritual gifts of those by whom the word of God is dispensed.

The first thing I would take notice of is, censuring professing Christians of good standing in the visible church, as unconverted. I need not repeat what I have elsewhere said to show this to be against the plain, frequent, and strict prohibitions of the word of God. It is the worst disease that has attended this work, most contrary to the spirit and rules of Christianity, and of the worst consequences.—There is a most unhappy tincture that the minds of many, both ministers and people, have received that way.

Rules Concerning Spiritual Meditation - A continual watch is to be kept in and on the soul against the incursions of vain thoughts and imaginations, especially in those seasons in which they are apt to obtain advantage. If they are permitted to make an inroad into the mind, if we accustom ourselves to entertain them, if they habitually lodge within, then in vain we may hope or desire to be spiritually minded.

One erroneous principle, that which scare any has proved more mischievous to the present glorious work of God, is a notion that it is God's manner in these days, to guide his saints, at least some that are more eminent, by inspiration, or immediate revelation. They suppose he makes known to them what shall come to pass hereafter, or what it is his will that they should do, by impressions made upon their minds, either with or without texts of Scripture; whereby something is made know to them, that is not taught in the Scripture. By such a notion the devil has a great door opened for him.

The first thing is the mixture there oftentimes is in the experiences of true Christians; whereby when they have truly gracious experiences, and divine and spiritual discoveries and exercises, they have something else mixed with them, besides what is spiritual. There is a mixture of that which is natural, and that which is corrupt, with that which is divine. The great imperfection of grace, the feebleness and infancy of the new nature, and the great remains of corruption, together with our circumstances in this world, where we are encompassed with what tends to pollute us, expose to this.

Ministry Update and then a biographical account of my extended family out west and their reactions for over 40 years to a Christian Profession. Recorded on my wife's 60th birthday.

It will be of no small advantage to us to have our souls and consciences always affected with and in due subjection to the power of this truth — namely, that "to be spiritually minded is life and peace." From this it will follow that whatever we may think otherwise, if we are not so, we have neither of them — neither life nor peace. It will, I say, be of use to us if we are affected with the power of it; for many greatly deceive themselves in hearing the word. They admit sacred truths in their understanding, and assent to them, but don't imbibe their power on their consciences, nor do they strictly judge their state and condition by them, which proves to be their ruin.

What then ought to be our attitude toward the Supreme Sovereign? We reply, 1.  One of Godly Fear Why is it that, today, the masses are so utterly unconcerned about spiritual and eternal things, and that they are lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God? Why is it that, even on the battlefields, multitudes were so indifferent to their soul's welfare? Why is it that defiance of heaven is becoming more open, more blatant, more daring? The answer is, Because "There is no fear of God before their eyes"

O, Spirit of God dwell in us. Is not this also a covenant promise, "I will put My Spirit within you, and I will make you to walk in My ways." Dwell with us Holy Spirit; rule over us Holy Spirit; transform us to Your own likeness, O Holy Spirit! Then shall we be clean; then shall we keep the law. We...pray...for those who are unfamiliar with the work of the Spirit of God, who have never owned their God, who have lived as if there were no God.

Spiritual Minded Chapter 6 The true notion of heaven — that it is a state in which we will be eternally freed from sin and all concerns about it; but that is only through the exaltation of the glory of God's grace in Christ, by the pardon of sin. Someone who truly hates and abhors sin — whose principal desire and design of life is to be freed from it so far as possible; who walks in self-abasement through a sense of his many disappointments when he hoped it would act in him no more.

Part 4: Showing What Things Are To Be Corrected Or Avoided, In Promoting This Work, Or In Our Behaviour Under It. Having thus observed, in some instances, wherein the conduct of those that have appeared to be the subjects of this work, or have been zealous to promote it, has been objected against or complained of without or beyond just cause; I proceed now to show what things ought to be corrected or avoided.

We ask that our faith may clearly perceive the blood of the atonement and the covering of the perfect righteousness of Christ; and May we come afresh, depending alone on Jesus. "I, the chief of sinners am, but Jesus died for me." May this be our one hope, that Jesus died and rose again, and that for His sake we are accepted in the Beloved. May every child of Yours have his conscience purged from dead works to serve the true and living God.

Lord, we have a mercy to ask which shall be the burden of our prayer. It is that You would help us to live such lives as pardoned men should live. We have but a little time to tarry here, for our life is but a vapor; soon it vanishes away; but we are most anxious that we may spend the time of our sojourning here in holy fear, that grace may be upon us from the commencement of our Christian life even to the earthly close of it. Lord, You know there are some that have not yet begun to live for You, and the prayer is now offered that they may today be born again. Others have been long in Your ways, and are not weary of them.

We say that this real change passes on the whole man; we are changed in soul, body, and practice. All things are become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). This change appears in our souls, for by it, our understanding is strangely altered and it receives things in another way than it did before. It used to look at Christ and things eternal as uncertain and light matters; the things that were seen and present were the most impressive and appeared great and excellent. It admired riches and honor, while Christ and glory were overlooked and despised.

Pierced King, despised and nailed to a tree, sit You on the glorious high throne in our hearts, and may our lives prove that You are Lord over us; by our every thought and desire, and imagination, and word, and act, in every respect being under Your divine control. Your people breathe to You out of their very hearts the prayer that You may reign over us without a rival. O Savior, use for Yourself what You have bought with blood, and drive out the enemy, and let no power have any dominion over us except the power of Your good Spirit which works righteousness and peace.

Because men sin, not only in neglect of hearing and reading, but also in hearing and reading amiss, therefore the properties of reverent and faithful reading and hearing are to be set down, which are these that follow (they be eight in number): 1. Diligence 2. Wisdom 3. Preparation 4. Meditation 5. Conference 6. Faith 7. Practice 8. Prayer The first three go before reading and preaching. The next four come after them. The last must go before, and be with them, and come after them.

There being this twofold spiritual life, or ability of living unto God, that which we had in Adam and that which we have in Christ, we must inquire with reference unto which of these it is that unregenerate men are said to be spiritually dead, or dead in trespasses and sins. Now this, in the first place, hath respect unto the life we had in Adam; for the deprivation of that life was in the sanction of the law, "Thou shalt die the death."

Tarry a moment at the well-head. Behold the pure river of water of life as it proceeds out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. What an abyss is the grace of God! Who can fathom it? Like all the rest of the divine attributes, it is infinite. God is full of love, for "God is love"; God is full of goodness, and the very name "God" is but short for "good." Unbounded goodness and love enter into the very essence of the Godhead. It is because "His mercy endures forever" that men are not destroyed; because "His compassions fail not" that sinners are brought to Himself and forgiven. Right well remember this, for else you may fall into error by fixing your minds so much upon the faith which is the channel of salvation as to forget the grace which is the fountain and source even of faith itself.

Prayer is appointed by God for our spiritual blessing, as a means for our growth in grace. When seeking to learn the design of prayer, this should ever occupy us before we regard prayer as a means for obtaining the supply of our need. Prayer is designed by God for our humbling. Prayer, real prayer, is a coming into the presence of God, and a sense of His awful majesty produces a realization of our nothingness and unworthiness.

Although the work of regeneration by the Holy Spirit was wrought under the Old Testament, even from the foundation of the world, and the doctrine of it was recorded in the Scriptures, yet the revelation of it was but obscure in comparison of that light and evidence which it is brought forth into by the gospel. This is evident from the discourse which our blessed Saviour had with Nicodemus on this subject; for when he acquainted him clearly with the doctrine of it, he was surprised, and fell into that inquiry, which argued some amazement, "How can these things be?" But yet the reply of our Saviour manifests that he might have attained a better acquaintance with it out of the Scripture than he had done:

There are outward ways and duties by which our spiritual affections are expressed. Their rule also is the Scripture. The way marked out in it is the only channel in which the stream of spiritual affections takes its course to God. The graces required in it are acted by the affections; the duties it prescribes are those which they stir up and enliven; the religious worship it appoints is that in which they have their exercise. Where this rule has been neglected, men's religious affections have grown irregular, indeed, wild and ungovernable.

We beg You rather to send the serpents among us than to let sin come among us. Oh! that we might have our eye always on the brazen serpent that heals all the bites of evil, but may we not look to sin nor love it. Let not the devices of Balaam and of Balak prevail against us, to lead Your people away from their purity. Let us not be defiled with false doctrine or with unholy living, but may we walk as the separated people of God and keep ourselves unspotted from the world.

This depravation of our affections by the fall, is the only corruption of our nature that is evident to reason, or to the light of nature itself. The wise among the heathen both saw it, and complained of it. They found a weakness in the mind, but saw nothing of its darkness and depravation as to things spiritual. But they were sensible enough of this disorder and tumult of the affections in things moral, which renders the minds of men "like the troubled sea, whose waters cast up mire and dirt." Isa 57.20 This greatly aggravates the neglect of those who aren't sensible of it in themselves, because it is discernible in the light of nature.

Our first prayer is for others who as yet are in bondage. We thank You, Lord, that You have given them the spirit of bondage and made them to fear. We are glad that they should be brought to feel the evil of sin, to feel the perfection of Your law, to know something of the fiery nature of Your justice, and so to be shut up unto salvation by grace through faith. But, Lord, let them not tarry long under the pedagogue, but may the schoolmaster with his rod bring them to Christ.

Ordinarily there are certain previous and preparatory works, or workings in and upon the souls of men, that are antecedent and dispositive unto it. But yet regeneration doth not consist in them, nor can it be educed out of them. A material disposition is that which disposeth and some way maketh a subject fit for the reception of that which shall be communicated, added, or infused into it as its form. So wood by dryness and a due composure is made fit and ready to admit of firing, or continual fire.

That the corrupt principle of sin, the native habitual inclination that is in us unto evil, worketh early in our natures, and for the most part preventeth all the actings of grace in us. Though some may be sanctified in or from the womb, yet in order of nature this native corruption hath first place in them; for a clean thing cannot be brought out of an unclean, but "that which is born of the flesh is flesh:"

The saints prefer what of God may be obtained in this life before all things in the world. There is a great difference in the present spiritual attainments of the saints. Some attain to much greater acquaintance and communion with God, and conformity to him, than others. But the highest attainments are very small in comparison with what is future. The saints are capable of making progress in spiritual attainments, and they earnestly desire such further attainments. Not contented with those degrees to which they have already attained, they hunger and thirst after righteousness, and, as newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that they may grow thereby. It is their desire, to know more of God, to have more of his image, and to be enabled more to imitate God and Christ in their walk and conversation. Psa. 27:4, "One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.

Does it lie within the province of man's will to accept or reject the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour? Granted that the Gospel is preached to the sinner, that the Holy Spirit convicts him of his lost condition, does it, in the final analysis, lie within the power of his own will to resist or to yield himself up to God? The answer to this question defines our conception of human depravity. That man is a fallen creature all professing Christians will allow, but what many of them mean by "fallen" is often difficult to determine.

Ministry Update, books being narrated, some ministry news and prayer request

There are two ways whereby this may be done: — 1. By neglecting and refusing to observe and do what he hath appointed; 2. By adding appointments of our own thereunto, inconsistent with and destructive of that which he hath ordained: — I. In the first way we have some among ourselves who are fallen off from the worship of the gospel.

If little more than a century ago the streets of Paris ran with the blood of rioters, what assurance have we that before the present century closes every city throughout the world will not witness a similar sight? What is there to hinder earth-wide lawlessness and universal anarchy? Thus we have sought to show the need, the imperative need, for God to occupy the throne, take the government upon His shoulder, and control the activities and destinies of His creatures. But has the man of faith any difficulty in perceiving the government of God over this world?

Causes of Apostasy Chapter 4 Evangelical truths being by these or the like means entertained in the minds of men, which are also variously affected with them, they will move and act towards their proper end and design. And hereof there are three parts: — 1. To take off the soul of man from rest and satisfaction in itself, as unto present peace in the condition wherein it is, and hope of future blessedness by its own endeavors; for neither of these are we capable of in our depraved, apostate state.

What impression is made upon the minds of those men of the world who, occasionally, attend a Gospel service? What are the conceptions formed by those who hear even those preachers who are counted as "orthodox"? Is it not that a disappointed God is the One whom Christians believe in? From what is heard from the average evangelist today, is not any serious hearer obliged to conclude that he professes to represent a God who is filled with benevolent intentions, yet unable to carry them out; that He is earnestly desirous of blessing men, but that they will not let Him?

No man can know the greatness of sin till he has felt it, for there is no measuring-rod for sin, except its condemnation in our own conscience, when the law of God speaks to us with a terror that may be felt. Some men imagine that the Gospel was devised, in some way or other, to soften down the harshness of God towards sin. Ah! how mistaken the idea! There is no more harsh condemnation of sin anywhere than in the Gospel.

The Duty of Ministers As unto ministers, the faithful discharge of their duty, in preaching, prayer, and example, is required hereunto. Should I stay to show the necessity hereof at this season; as also what is required thereunto—what care, what diligence, what watchfulness, what compassion, what zeal, what exercise of all gospel grace, with the over-neglect of these things among many—it would take up a volume, rather than become a place in this present inquiry.