We want to read the word of God this evening from 1 Timothy chapter 4, and we'll read from the opening verse of this chapter. Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter time some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, speaking lies and hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from lease. which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine. whereunto thou hast attained. But refuse profane and old wives' fables, and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. For bodily exercise profiteth little, but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come. This is a faithful saying worthy of all acceptation. For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God. who is the Saviour of all men, especially of those that believe. These things command and teach. Let no man despise thy youth, but be thou an example of the believers in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity, till I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. Meditate upon these things, give thyself wholly to them, that thy profiting may appear to all. Take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine, continue in them, for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee." Amen, and the Lord will add his own blessing to the reading of his word tonight to all of our hearts. We did mention the subject we wanted to deal with, and we're just going to take a phrase out of verse 1 of this chapter, 1 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 1. It's the very last few words of this Doctrines of Devils. I did explain the reasoning why I wanted to deal with some of these subjects over the next number of weeks. It really came out of the time that we had David Kahut with us from the Czech Republic there a few weeks ago. A young man gave his testimony and he explained that he had come out of a neo-evangelical church. You'll remember him saying that. And he mentioned the fact that in that church there was, in his part, a need to combat modernism and liberalism, and some other false views and doctrines. think about that, because I know the older generation, some of you were in churches that preached that type of thing, but I'm particularly thinking tonight of the younger generation, the second and third generation Free Presbyterians, who don't know what it was to be in a church that preached modernism or liberals. And I thought it would be appropriate that if we just spent some time thinking about these terms and understanding what they're about, so that we can recognise that when we see these things and hear these things, that we're able to pinpoint them and say, well that's false teaching, that's not according to the scriptures, and therefore I need to beware, I need to be on my guard against these things. So that's really the background to why we want to take some time this day, and not be consecutive Lords' Day evenings, because we have Miss Russell coming on the Lords' Day evening as well to give a missionary report, and we'll be leaving the subject that night and coming back to it So we'll do some studies in this over the next few Lord's Day evenings as he leads. But let's take a moment now in prayer. We need the Lord's help as we come and think about these things. Our Father in heaven, it is our desire, Lord, to hold fast to the truth of God. We know, Lord, that it is only Thy truth that can be an anchor to our souls. And as we have read this chapter through, we have read something of the importance of these things. even the importance of being a good minister to remind people of these things. And we pray, O Lord, that as we dwell upon them, as we seek to sound an alarm and make ourselves aware of just what is going on and what is abroad, we pray that we might be aware of that which is contrary to thy word and to the truth. And we pray the Bible bless. We think particularly of our younger people that, or they might learn of these things and understand them, that they might be able to discern them in an evil day, Lord, when there is much departure from the Lord. We pray that they might be enabled, and we realise that we have a responsibility, Lord, to even teach them and instruct them and present them with these things and make them aware of them. And therefore tonight, Lord, we cry to Thee for help. We pray that Thou will bless us as we dwell upon these things and consider them in the light of Thy Word. We need help from heaven. We pray, therefore, grant to us the Holy Spirit that has promised us help, and we claim that promise even now, and thou wilt draw near to us. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen. From about the mid-1800s and onwards, the level of liberalism or modernism, we're going to join the two terms together, we'll define them in a little moment or two, but let's for the meantime take them together, but that leaven of modernism and liberalism began to seriously infect mainline Protestant churches. It is true that there has always been, down through the history of the people of God and the cause of Christ, there has always been departure from the faith. That's evident from reading the New Testament, that's evident from the days of the Saviour and the days of the apostles that followed on. There has always been a measure of departure from the Lord. Back in those times there was a significant leap forward taken in departure from the faith because of these things that came into what was then mainline Christianity, mainline Protestant denominations. Now by the term liberalism, We mean that open spirit of criticism and questioning of all theological doctrines and concepts and claims, even to the extent of throwing off the previous constraints that those doctrines and concepts and ways would have put upon individuals. And you can understand that, why they would take the term liberal in that. They wanted to be liberated from these constraints. They didn't want to have to hold to these old doctrines that had been held to down through history as being orthodox Christianity. By the term modernism we mean a preference for new ways of doing things and new beliefs over against the old historic ways of the past. argument presented that the new views that were coming, and the present day culture, needed new ways of dealing with that, and new ways of presenting the Lord to these people, and presenting religion to these people, and they didn't believe that you should be holding on to the old paths. No, we want modern ways. We want ways that we think are up to date, that will help us to deal with the culture that we live in and the climate that is abroad spiritually. So you have these two terms, liberalism and modernism, and as I say, they cross over very much and we're going to take them together tonight. Gresham Mason, who battled liberalism and modernism in his own denomination in America, and also within the very famous Princeton Seminary, This is what he had to say at the turn of the last century. He says the issue in the church of the present day, and we're talking here now way about 1900 and after that when he wrote these words, but he says the issue in the church of the present day is not between two varieties of the same religion, but a bottom between two essentially different types of thought and life. There is much interlocking of the branches, but the two tendencies, modernism and supernaturalism, or non-doctrinal religion in historic Christianity, spring from different roots. And that really does bring before us the seriousness of the issue to make men aware. We're not talking about variations on the same theme. We're not talking about things to make, well, it doesn't really matter about these things. What's wrong with somebody believing these liberal views or looking at these modern ways of doing things? And being a liberal or being a modernist, it's not just enough to say, well, it doesn't matter, just leave them to their ways. If you want to hold to the old ways, well, you hold to the old ways, but let these other individuals plot this new way and this new coach. We're talking about two essentially different things. That's why there can be no accommodating of them. Not that we're going to hold to the truth of God. There cannot be accommodating. There's no middle ground for them to meet, because they believe in essentially different things. They come from essentially different standpoints and viewpoints to consider the things of God, and therefore there can be no missing of them and meeting in the middle. movement stressed more and more the social role of Christianity, and preached what became known as the social gospel. It was characterised by a lack of emphasis upon, and often an outright denial, of the plenary, verbal inspiration and authority of the scriptures, and any commitment to doctrinal purity. Prominent biblical themes such as repentance from personal sin were rejected. Belief in hell was rejected. Lit the fire in hell. No, didn't want to believe that. The idea of Christ making atonement for sin and offering a sacrifice on the cross to put away sin was downplayed. That was despised and rejected. One observer summarised the whole basis of this liberal modernistic movement, and here's how he put it. That this movement presented a God without wrath, who brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgement, through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross. I'll say that again, just so that you get it. That they presented a God without wrath, who brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgement, through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross. And I think that very well sums up what really is involved here, because we get to the very heart of the Gospel. And when that young fellow was here the other week or so and testified how the Lord had worked in his heart and brought him out of a church that believed these things, and he separated and started to attend the work there at Minas Schosz in the Czech Republic, the Free Presbyterian Work. This is what he was leaving behind, this idea that goes to the very heart of the Gospel, and the type of truth in Christ that it presents. And that's why we have taken this term out of 1 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 1, doctrines of devils, because as this chapter highlights, these things do not lead to salvation. Anything but that. When you read down that chapter, it's not our intention tonight to go down the chapter expounding the chapter at all, but as we have read down the chapter, I trust the Lord has blessed even the reading to your heart. But there is the emphasis upon taking heed to these things, there is the emphasis upon avoiding them, avoiding these false doctrines and false views, because they are doctrines of devils, they take souls down to hell. They take souls down to hell. We want to make ourselves aware of them, and particularly, as I said, we want to do it for the young people, the younger generation. There's some here, as you know, you were in churches and you heard these things that we'll talk about tonight, and you still remember them, and that's why you're in the Free Presbyterian Church tonight. It's because you left churches that were preaching these things, but the younger generation don't know these things, at least not by experience, and hopefully for their benefit it will be a blessing to their soul. We want to notice some things about what liberalism-modernism believes. First of all, we'll say this, liberalism-modernism is an attack upon authoritative power. It's an attack upon authoritative power. Liberalistic, modernistic churchmen and scholars hate the idea of a verbally inspired, inherent, infallible, authoritative Bible. They despise that idea, that the Bible should be your rule of faith, that you can take the Bible literally, that you can actually believe what the Bible says, and believe it to be the very Word of God. They despise that idea, and they attack that idea. that the Bible can be your authority in that sense. And they did it particularly in two ways. They started out by questioning scriptural authority and accuracy. You see, there are those who come along, and they're still abroad today, and they will view the Bible as the witness of God rather than the Word of God. And they'll put emphasis upon that type of terminology. They'll talk about the Bible being the witness of God. And what they mean by that, they mean that it is a record of somebody's experience of God. It doesn't have to be true. It doesn't have to be replicated in anybody else's life. It's certainly not a rule for everybody else's life. Oh no, this is not an infallible rule to go by. This is just a record of people's experience with God, and one person's experience is different to another person's experience, and one person's experience is truth, and so is another person. That can be the truth as well. And they start to pull down the authority of the Bible, and the idea that it is the Word of God, inerrant. And they'll start to talk along these lines, that it's the witness of God, that it's the record of somebody's experience with God. And all the time they are lessening the idea that the Bible is an authority, that it is to be your rule for all that you believe and for all that you practice. And therefore, how they go about doing it is that they begin to question the supernatural aspects of the Scriptures. They started to deny the miracles. Oh no, those things never happen. The Lord feeding the 5,000 with a little lad's lunch? No, they don't believe such things. And some of you who are here, you may well have heard men trying to explain it away. But I've read explanations about people who've tried to explain away the feeding of the 5,000 just to take one example. And they said, well, you know, it didn't really, it wasn't really like that. It wasn't that the Lord just took that one lunch and so multiplied it in his head, 5,000. No, that little lad taking out his lunch and offering it to the Lord just provoked everybody else to take out their lunch and offer it to others as well. And they tried to point out my question. the supernatural aspect of the scriptures, and cast aspersions upon the supernatural things that are in the Bible, the miracles. Did Jonah follow, was Jonah followed by fish? They wouldn't believe that. They wouldn't believe that it's possible that that happened. I remember hearing a story of an old modernistic liberal minister who was visiting this old Christian lady, and they got into a discussion on these things. And he started to scoff at the Bible, and he said to the woman, do you really believe that Jonah was swallowed by a fish? She says, I do. And what's more, I'm going to ask Jonah when I get to heaven about it. And the old man's thinking, well, sure, I'll have a go at heaven. He says, what if Jonah's not in heaven? She says, well, you can ask him. Because that's just it. He wasn't going to heaven believing that, and denying the supernatural aspect of the scriptures. But that's what they did. They denied the prophecies. Oh, the prophets couldn't foretell things that were going to happen. Daniel foretelling about kingdoms that would rise and fall after his time, that was a no-no. Daniel didn't write that. Daniel didn't write the prophecies. And they started attacking the scriptures, and all the time seeking to pull down the Bible as an authority. And if they keep on at it, casting aspersions on the scriptures, you can't believe that, that can't be true, that couldn't really happen. You know what the outcome's going to be. The Bible is not going to be taken as an absolute authority. Tie that in with the rise of biblical criticism, the higher critics, as it became known, who claimed to investigate the date and the authorship of a book, the place and the circumstances of its composition. They wanted to search out the purpose and the nature of the book. And all they did was to try to pull it apart. They weren't serious in starting off and accepting it as the Bible, as the Word of God. No, they were wanting to pull it down. They were wanting to pull it down. Moses didn't write the first five books of the Bible. No, no, that could never be. Moses didn't write that. They believe there's a whole lot of different authors. There's a whole theory, man-made modernistic liberal theologians love passing comment on that theory that there's maybe upwards of three different writers that lie behind the first five books of the Bible. All brought together, that the system of worship that the Lord gave to Israel, that we believe the Lord gave to Israel, all that developed over a period of time. And you can go on through different parts of the scriptures. They believe there are two Isaiahs, two writers of the prophecy of Isaiah. As we've mentioned, they didn't believe that Daniel could write the prophecy that he spoke of. They believed that much around the life of Jesus Christ was a myth and a legend perpetuated by the apostles. They didn't believe that Paul taught a different gospel to Jesus Christ. These higher critics, they started to pull the Bible apart, and the whole idea that lay behind it was to get a Bible you couldn't believe in. And therefore, if you've got a Bible you can't believe in, and there's all these doubts and all these questions about it, how can that be authority for anything? And if you don't believe the Bible to be authority in anything, well then you can introduce change, you can introduce new ways. and say, well, those old things, that was just somebody's experience, and we've moved on, we've gone into modern times now, and we don't hold to those old things. And what do you end up as, mutilated by? You can't say then, thus saith the Lord. You can't lift up the scriptures then and say, here's what God says about any particular matter. Whether it's about the very most important matter of all, how are we right with God, how does an individual get to heaven? You can't come along and say the individual needs saved, they're a lost sinner needing God's salvation. You can't say, let's take moral issues. You can't say such and such a thing is immoral and can't be through the Bible. Because these higher critics, they believe they have proved the Bible to be untrue in all of these areas. And that's modernism. And young people, when you hear that type of thing being stated, you need to mark it out and say, that's modernistic liberal theology. And it ought to be avoided. As I say, we're not going down to 1 Timothy chapter 4 and expounding it. You'll see some of the verses there that certainly would encourage us to be aware of these things. For example, in verse 6 of that chapter it says, If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained. But we have to follow after good doctrine here. Again, we look at the very last verse, Take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine, continue in them, for in doing this thou shalt forsake thyself and them that hear thee. We must be aware of these things and be able to detect them. And when we hear that spirit that comes along, casting aspersions on the word of God, an area we missed out is creation. The first number of chapters of Genesis, not just the first three chapters, but certainly those chapters don't believe in creation, don't believe in the fall of mankind, Genesis 3. They scoff at the idea of a serpent coming and speaking to Eve. They don't even take Eve to be a historical person, or Adam to be a historical person. Well, if Adam's not a historical person, neither is Jesus Christ. Because Jesus Christ, in 1 Corinthians 15, is called the second man, the last Adam. And the idea is that the first Adam, the very first man, was a representative man. Jesus Christ was a representative man. Here's the two great representative men in the history of mankind. Adam, the first Adam, failed, and failed in his representation of mankind, brought sin into the world. Jesus Christ came forth to be the second man, the second representative man, and he didn't fail. He secured eternal life for his people. Well, if the first Adam didn't exist, neither does the second Adam. You can't have Christ. You can't have Jesus Christ as the second man, as the last Adam, if the first Adam didn't exist. But there's those that will come along and tell you that the first Adam wasn't a historical person. But them, they have no time for Christ and his atonement and his work of representing sinners at the cross, either. And wherever we detect that, we're to understand that's liberalism, modernism, and the doctrines of devils. The second thing I would say to you is that liberalism and modernism as a direct attack upon fundamental doctrines. Because once you begin to pull down the authority of the Bible, then every doctrine is open to question. And those old doctrines, long accepted as being historic Christianity, they were dismissed as just the personal, prejudiced views of people of their time. who didn't know any better, who were just influenced by the culture that they lived in, and that's why they believed these things. And we don't have to believe them. No, we can be modern, we can have new views, we can have new doctrines. We can change the old paths and the old ways. And I just want to go down through a couple, three of these particular things. Very significant areas. Let's think about the doctrine of God for a moment. Because in liberalism, modernism, there's there's a denial of the transcendence of God. And by that we simply mean that God is distinct from his creation, that God is far above and beyond his creation. Creation is just an example of God's power. It is not the limits of God's power when he spoke and brought the world into being. It's not as if God was working right at the very limits of his power and this world is as near as you can get to God. God is distinct from His creation and far superior to this creation. Furthermore, God is sovereign over all of creation, intervening supernaturally as and when He decrees. He is in sovereign control of all things, whereas liberalism and modernism have a different idea of God. They don't want to acknowledge a God who acts supernaturally. They deny the supernatural, they deny miracles, they deny God intervening in the affairs of man, they deny God prophesying things that are going to come to pass through his prophets. No, they try to merge the world in God, bring God much closer to the world. They want to have God inside the world. He's not outside having to interject into the world, he's not there having to break in, in a sense, working miraculously among the fairs of men, no. They have a different view of God than that. And really they see God as whatever a person's experience makes him to be. And according to them, your experience can be different from another person, even though it's contrary. That's your experience, and it's genuine. It's real. Nobody can take away your experience from you. How many times do we hear that today? Nobody can take away your experience. If your experience doesn't match the Bible, your experience is false. It doesn't matter who it is. If my experience doesn't match up to the Bible, my experience is false. It doesn't matter how real I think it to be, it doesn't matter what claims I make for it, if it doesn't tie up to the scriptures, it doesn't matter whose experience it is, it doesn't matter who comes along and says, I believe this happened, or I had this experience, I went through this, or whatever. If it doesn't match up to the scriptures, your experience and my experience is false. So there's this idea of pulling God down. He's not the transcendent being who is absolute and sovereign and does as he pleases in the world. No, they pull the Lord down. And then on the other hand they try to lift man up. A new view of human nature. No longer is mankind sinful, wholly depraved and separated from God. And by depraved we don't mean that he's as sinful as he possibly can be, because that doesn't happen in the world. When we use the term depraved we're talking about the very fact that every part of his being is infected by sin. his affections and his heart and soul and mind and understanding. Every part of his being is affected by sin. That's what we mean by total depravity. But they don't believe in that. They believe in human perfectibility. That man can improve if you only would give him new opportunities, if you would just give him a better environment to live in. You would soon discover man getting better and man improving himself. And it ties in with the rejection of creation and the fall and accommodating the idea that man has evolved and that man is getting better in the world. Man is not getting better, the world is not getting better. The world is not getting better. The world is getting worse. Man is getting more sinful. And as we heard this past week, he will continue on to get more sinful. An ultimate rebellion against God with the man of sin, the Antichrist appearing. being the epitome of rebellion against God, man is not improving, not according to the scriptures, not according to the world around about us, but modernism, liberalism, they won't tolerate the idea that man is depraved, separated from God, far off, can't do anything to save himself, just a lost sinner bound for hell. They won't accept that. Yet, as we know, that's what the Bible teaches. That every one of us by nature, no matter who we are, we're lost in sin, we need a saviour. We cannot do anything to save ourselves. We're parachute souls going down the broad road, and we cannot lift a finger to save ourselves. Our good works. People certainly do good deeds, but in God's eyes, they're not good. They're marred by sin and by corruption. Our righteousnesses, the Lord says, are as filthy rags in the sight. The very best efforts that man can come up with are stinking before God. Because they're always marked by sin. And nothing that we can do takes away our sins. Nothing that we do atones for those sins. The only thing that atones for sin is the sacrifice of a perfect life. Only Jesus Christ can do that. And only Christ, therefore, is the Saviour, and that's why we need to be saved tonight. And if you're not here tonight, if you're here tonight and you're not saved, that's what you need to hear. You need to be saved. Every one of us, by nature, need the saving power of God at work in our lives. And we say that on the authority of the Bible. But another area where you will read and maybe have heard about liberalism and modernism in their views, and that's their quest for the historical Jesus. That's how they put it. I remember picking up a book a long, long time ago as a young Christian, and that was the title of it. I didn't realise at the time what it was, but when I started to read it, it was evident. But that was the title of it, The Quest for the Historical Jesus. And you see, it's the idea that the Bible view of God, that old orthodox view of Jesus Christ as the eternal Son of God, the sinless Lamb of God, the one whose God manifests in this life, that's myth and legend, that's something that was preached by the apostles and others, that's not true. That's just how people set him forth back then, Jesus Christ as a man of his times. Oh, a good man, they'll acknowledge that. Maybe even the supreme man will acknowledge that, but never a God man. Never the eternal Son of God made flesh, manifested before us. And they have this idea of rediscovering the human Jesus. And in doing that, they will proceed to deny his deity. They will deny he's God himself. And they'll talk about him attaining divine status. I read a quote this week in studying on this. I think the man's name was Robertson. I tried to go back and find it and I couldn't. It annoyed me a great deal. But I can remember the quote. I think his name was Robertson. Maybe Alistair will help me. He knows Scottish churches pretty good. But he was charged with heresy with regard to denying the deity of Christ. And when he was put on trial in the church, the presbyter, the senator, whatever, he said, me deny the deity of Jesus Christ? I never denied the deity of any man, least of all Jesus Christ. That was his answer. He says, how did they charge me with denying the deity of Jesus Christ? I never denied the deity of any man, least of all Jesus Christ. And that's how they viewed Jesus Christ, as a man who had a greater God-consciousness than anybody else. That's what made him the individual that he was. They look upon him as a good man. He was a supreme man. but never a God-man. And in their eyes, it's just a matter of a sliding scale. Jesus knew more of God. He had more God-consciousness. His life was more God-centred than any other man. That's what made him the man that he was. That's what made him the founder of Christianity. That's why he had disciples following after him, because he had such a God-consciousness. And we're all on a sliding scale. The rest of us are somewhat lower than him. This is the historical Jesus. And they deny the person of Jesus Christ. They deny his deity. They deny his eternal sonship. They will deny him as the only sacrifice for sin. And where we find that, we need to say, that's liberalism, that's modernism, that's an attack upon the old historic views and doctrines of Christianity that are built upon an authoritative label. We need to mark them out and understand them. I want you to consider here. Liberalism and modernism is attacked upon the Gospel of Saving Greece. With the rise of liberalism and modernism, there came into existence, really a redefinition of the Gospel, and really it was a denial of the Gospel of Saving Greece. Now when we talk about the Gospel of Saving Greece, we're talking about a work that Jesus Christ does by his Spirit in the hardened life of the sinner, that every one of us need if we are ever to be in heaven. And if we do not have that work of saving grace, where the Lord brings us unto himself, convicts us of our sin, shows us our need of Christ, brings us to himself as a saviour, and we trust in him alone, by faith alone in him, we cannot be saved and we cannot get to heaven. Well, out went that old view. Oh, that's for the past. No, we want something new, we want something modern. And there went out this view that conversion was necessary for every human individual. Well, what else would you believe if you didn't believe man was a fallen creature? If you deny the fall in Genesis chapter 3, that all of humanity fell into sin by the actions of Adam and Eve, our first parents. If you don't believe that, well then, it naturally follows all, man doesn't need to be saved there. Man's not a lost soul bound for hell, and he needs Jesus Christ and his saving work of grace if he's ever to be in heaven. If you don't believe in the fall, Then it's not too difficult to go on to say, no man doesn't need to be saved. And hence there was a setting, a sag of that old gospel of saving grace. It brings a soul to Christ and makes them a child of God. Redemption. Well, the liberal or the modernist might use the term, but when he uses the term, he's talking more about as someone being found in the mystical communion of Christ in the community of the church and establishing the kingdom of God in their very, very terminology that means nothing. But that's the terminology that they will use. They'll talk about somebody being in the community of the church and so on. And to them that's redemption, if they ever use the actual word. And the gospel that they preach is a gospel that's problems of society rather than seeking to win souls for Jesus Christ. And that new gospel, as I say, didn't focus on preaching Christ and conversion, it focused on social justice, alleviating social deprivation. Now, there's nothing wrong with, in fact, it's a command of the Lord in his word to help those that are in need. The Christian has got a responsibility and a duty to do that. The Christian is not to pass by on the other side when there is somebody in need and we have got the means of helping them. We are to help them. That's the command of the Lord. We're to help them. In fact, John in his epistle says, how can the love of God dwell in a person that doesn't do that? that has the means and sees a brother in need and doesn't help that individual. John says, who dwelleth the love of God in him? So the Christian has a responsibility to help those that are in need. But there is a world of difference from that to jumping to say, that's what the gospel is. That's what the gospel is. And that's what happened, this idea of a social gospel. Characterised by social justice, alleviating social deprivation. Do you know that the term social justice, and it's one that's used very often today, do you know who coined that phrase? A Jesuit. You go and look it up in a dictionary and you will find the name of the Jesuit who coined the phrase social justice. Rome is a gospel of works. Is it any wonder that a term like that would come from a Jesuit? And liberalism, modernism, who'd done that idea and used it and had the same concept and they propagated this idea that the Kingdom of God was about changing social conditions in the earth. And as I say, there is nothing wrong, in fact the scripture commands a Christian to help people in need, but that's not the gospel. That's not what the gospel is about. Man doesn't have a nature that can be improved. He has a nature that needs change. He needs an alteration in his heart and soul that gives him a new nature. His nature can't be improved, his nature can't be bettered. He's a lost soul depraved before God, infected by sin in every part of his being. It's not improvement he needs, it's regeneration he needs. That's the gospel of grace. That Christ will regenerate a sinner and make them alive spiritually before God and change their nature. Then he will change their circumstances. then he will change their circumstances. And we know today that there are those, and they have been trying for decades to improve society, and it's getting worse. And the solutions they propose today are more of the same. The failed solutions. Because those things do not lead to the outcomes they expect. Because man has a heart problem. It's not his circumstances. The circumstances are just the symptom of his heart problem. He's got a spiritual problem in his heart. He's a rebel against God. He's a leprous sinner. He's inclined to sin. He's inclined to do everything that God tells him not to do. He's inclined to do nothing that God tells him to do. The problem is the heart. And it's the heart that needs to be changed. Then a person's circumstances will improve. And we have heard testimonies like that. We have heard about the drunkard who's been changed. Not because somebody changed their outward circumstances, but because the Lord changed their heart, because the Lord saved them by his grace. Gave them a new nature. And the man who was the drunkard or the gambler or the glass steamer, his circumstances were changed because the Lord changed his nature by saving him and transforming him and making him a new creature in Jesus Christ. That's what changed him. And then he improved. I always remember hearing the testimony of Billy Alexander, who went across Gaar church. He was a drunkard and he said his house, his home, he was marrying and I think he had a family at the time. But he said that his home was a hovel, broken windows everywhere, because he'd drunk every penny he had. But the day he was saved, he went home. The next day he started tidying up his house. Nobody had to tell him to do it. Nobody had to go and say, this is what you should be doing. Grace taught him. Grace taught him. The work of God's grace in his heart and soul in a few hours taught that man, I have to do something about the hobble of this house that I expect a wife and family to live in. You see, it's grace that changes an individual's heart. Then an individual's circumstances will be improved. But today we have a gospel that forgets about the need to change a person's heart and only is concentrating on alleviating the symptoms. Well, you know very well if you only deal with the symptoms and never deal with the root cause, you just cure one symptom and it just breaks out somewhere else. The same problem just manifests itself some other way. And that's what's happening in social policy and government today. One problem comes up and they throw money at it and spend a fortune to try to do something. pops up somewhere else. Same old sinful nature of man, just manifest itself in some other way, and then they put money in that, spend a fortune trying to sort out that problem, only for somewhere else the same problem to arise. Sin manifesting itself once more. And they just go round in circles, never improving anything. Because it's the heart of man that needs improved, by the change that God's grace brings to that In closing, let's take an example from the scriptures. Acts of the Apostles, chapter 19. We believe what the Bible has to say about the need of conversion. We believe the reality of the change that comes in the life of our soul that is saved. We believe that's how we change men and women. And that doesn't mean that we now stand and say things and say, well, we'll do nothing, we'll just preach the gospel. I think we understand that enough to say that that's not what we believe or practice. But really, to change society. How do we bring the Kingdom of God to the earth? When the Lord says, thy kingdom come, and we're to pray that in the Lord's Prayer, what does that mean? That means seeing, preaching the gospel, seeing lives change, then their circumstances change. Look at Acts of the Apostles, chapter 19, verse 18. Here's Paul the Apostle, and he's in Ephesus. Verse 17 tells us that he's in Ephesus, but verse 18, we'll read from there, it says, So here's what has happened. Paul has preached the Gospel. Many have believed. Souls have come to Christ. Souls have been saved. What happens? They immediately begin to change their lives. It says many that believed came and confessed and showed their deeds. They come to the Apostle Paul and they say, Paul, here's what our life had been before. Here's the filthy, dirty practices that we had engaged in as sinners. Verse 19, many of them also which use curious arts. brought their books together and burned them before all men, and they counted the price of them and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed." It prevailed. That's the word I want you to notice. The gospel prevailed in the hearts and lives of men and women. And that changed their circumstances when Paul preached the gospel and their hearts were regenerated and they believed the gospel. Paul didn't tell them, now you have to get rid of these old practices that you've been engaged in. It tells us there, they came to Paul and said, Paul, this is what we have been doing. This is our life before this. Before we ever believed in Jesus Christ and heard the gospel, this is what we lived, how we lived. And they burned them. Piled them all up on the street and burned them. That's the change we want to see in society. We want to see men and women giving up their sins. We want them to give up the things that are blighting their lives and bringing misery to homes. Even tonight in Newton Abbey, we want to see people giving those things up. How will it come about? The gospel of grace. The gospel of grace changing lives, regenerating a sinner's heart, bringing them to Christ, turning them around, making them a new person. Old things passed away, as Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5 and 17, all things becoming new. That's not the gospel of the it's not a gospel at all. It's not a gospel at all. And young people, wherever you hear it, run for your life. Run for your life. That's a doctrine of devils. That's social gospel. It thinks that that's how we'll bring the kingdom of God to earth. Our emphasis has to be the preaching of the gospel. Whether that's in our children's work, or our Sabbath school, or the day school, or the services here, or the outreach that we engage in, the emphasis has to be the preaching and the presentation of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's the message that will change hearts, fit them for heaven, and change their lives down here for the better. We could go on, there's many illustrations, not only on an individual basis, on a national, you go back into the history of how it improved nations, never mind improve an individual's life. It improved nations, brought life and liberty and freedom and progress. The gospel, the Bible, in truth, does not hinder nations. It advances nations. It advances nations. And whether it's an individual or a nation, it's the gospel that people need, the gospel of saving Greece. If you're not saved here tonight, that's what you need. And those who are saved, let's rejoice. The Lord has saved us and brought us to himself. But if you're here and you're not saved, may the Lord bring you to himself. Show you your need of Christ. That's what you need to change your life. And there's power in Jesus Christ to do that. Let's bow together in prayer.