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Again, like I told you just a
second ago, this is our sixth and final week. And if you want
to turn to Hebrew 7, you can. That'll be our first passage
to look at. But we're just going to kind of wrap up. And what
I'm going to do is, I'm just going to kind of barely touch
on a couple of things. So here's the deal about Roman
Catholicism. Like we could spend, you guys understand, we could
spend an entire year of Wednesday nights, but to me it would just
be dark and it would just be like exhaustive and I'm not really
wanting to do that. So let me just touch on a couple
things tonight and then kind of get to the main thing. The
first is the priesthood. So I don't think in our series
that we've really touched the priesthood. So you understand
that Roman Catholicism has priests, right? Do we have priests? We have a priest, right? The
great high priest, which is Christ. And then we have a lot of priests,
which we would call the priesthood of all believers, right? If you're
in Christ, you're a priest in the sense that you have access
to God. And so Rome says, though, there's
a common priesthood. So you've got to think of it
two classes. There's a common priesthood,
and there's a ministerial priesthood. So let me summarize. I'm not
going to read the whole thing. It was just too long. Let me
just summarize. This is from the Catechism of the Catholic
Church, 1547 to 1549. If you haven't been here, those
are the paragraphs, not dates. So the Roman Catholic Church
teaches that ordained priests act in persona Christi Capitis,
that is, in the person of Christ, the head. So by the word, they
have another made up. They have seven sacraments, one
of their made up sacraments. They have five made up sacraments
and then two they mess up. So but but one of their made
up sacraments is the sacrament of holy orders, and that is the
priesthood. So through the priesthood of
the ministerial class, the Christ is said to be actively present
in the priesthood. leading his church, the priest
is the visible representative of Christ. And the priest shares
in Christ's authority and function as a living image of God among
the people. There was a part in the debate,
and I'm not going to say names or go through it all, but there
was a part in the debate, you guys remember, where somebody said something
and the priest on stage, he was like, really like, you know,
firm is like sit down, you know, and I was like, whoa, you know,
like, I don't, I don't really feel like I could say it like
he did, but they have a little bit of authority. Um, so we could
spend all, we could spend all night on that. I'm not, let me
just give a couple of responses. First Hebrews. Did I tell you
chapter seven? So Hebrews seven, 23 and 24. says, the former priests were
many in number because they were prevented by death from continuing
in office, but he holds his priesthood permanently because he continues
forever. So let me just push back here.
The whole idea is an unbiblical idea to bring back the Old Testament
priesthood. And that's what Roman Catholicism
does. It tries to bring back what Christ has abrogated in
His ministry. and His work. And then Revelation
1, 5, and 6, you can turn there, but I'll just read it. John says,
To Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood
and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father. To Him
be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. So it's very
clear in the New Testament that the church is considered priests. We are priests. and we have access
to Christ, and we don't need another class of priest in between
us and the great high priest. Does that make sense? Let me
read to you, just to contrast a little bit, let me read to
you what we believe. This is from the 2nd London Baptist Confession,
chapter 26. I'm going to read a few paragraphs. So let me just show you how this
contrasts. So just listen, to every church gathered in this
way, this is paragraph seven, conforming to Christ's mind as
declared in his word, he has given all power and authority
that is in any way necessary to conduct the form of worship
and discipline that he has instituted for them to observe. He has also
given them commands and rules to use and carry out that power
rightly and properly. A local church gathered and fully
organized according to the mind of Christ consists of officers
and members. The officers appointed by Christ
are overseers or elders and deacons. They are to be chosen and set
apart by the church, called and gathered in this way for the
distinctive purpose of administrating ordinances and for carrying out
any other power or duty Christ entrusts them with or calls them
to. This pattern is to be continued
to the end of the age. Christ has appointed the way
to call someone prepared and gifted by the Holy Spirit to
the office of overseer or elder in a church. He must be chosen
by the collective vote of the church itself. He must then be
solemnly set apart by fasting and prayer. The body of elders
of the church must lay hands on him if there are any already
in place. A deacon must be chosen by the
same kind of vote and set apart by prayer and laying on of hands
as well. The work of pastors is to give constant attention
to the service of Christ in his churches in the ministry of the
word and prayer. They're to watch over the souls of church members
as those who must give an account to Christ. The churches to whom
they minister must not only give them all due respect, but also
must share with them from all their good things according to
their ability. They must do this so their pastors have a comfortable
living without having to be entangled in secular matters. And so they
can show hospitality to others. This is required by the law of
nature and by the explicit command of our Lord Jesus, who's ordained
that those who preach the gospel should earn their living by the
gospel. Final paragraph. Although overseers or pastors
of churches must be engaged in preaching the Word as a function
of their office, yet the work of preaching the Word is not
totally restricted them. Others who are also gifted and
prepared by the Holy Spirit for it and approved and called by
the church may and should preach." Okay, I'm just going to add all
that so you understand the contrast of our position. Do we believe
that elders here have a special status of mediation between you and
Christ? No, right? No. And by the way,
who has Christ given the authority to? Is it elders or is it the
church? Who holds the keys to the kingdom?
Is it the elders or is it the church? Do we believe in elder
membership or church membership? Church membership. Do we believe
in elder discipline or church discipline? You understand? There's differences and it's
quite important. So the biblical position is that
there's no separate sacrificial or mediating priesthood in the
church. Christ is our only high priest. All believers are priests
in him. The office of elder is not a
continuation of Levitical priesthood. By the way, bishop, elder, overseer,
pastor. How many offices is that? It's
just one. It's all the same. And the New
Testament church, they had plurality. So, okay, questions, comments
on that, and we'll move on. Okay, that was quick, I know.
We could have spent a lesson on it. All right, number two,
let me mention the Eucharist. Again, we could spend a long
time on this. I'm going to keep it brief. I will read now from
the Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 1376. And they quote the Council of
Trent and it says, Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was
truly His body that He was offering under the species of bread, it
has always been the conviction of the Church of God and this
Holy Council now declares again that by the consecration of the
bread and wine there take place a change of the whole substance
of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord
and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of
His blood. This change the Holy Catholic
Church has fittingly and properly called Transubstantiation. All right. So what are they saying?
All right. Can you spit that out back really
quick? What they're saying is that the elements of bread and
fruit of the vine become the body and blood of Christ. transubstantiation. It's a, and
then it becomes a, it's not a, their language be fair, a re-presentation
of Christ's sacrifice. They call it an unbloodied sacrifice. And I know I kind of caught some
flack for this, but you need to understand they do bow to
the wafer. Okay. The priest holds it up
and if they walk by or whatever, they bow to the wafer. Why do
they bow to the wafer? because they say it's Christ,
right? So a couple things, we could
spend a whole time on that. One, the theological refutation.
Let me just give a theological refutation. Let me ask the children
for a second, okay? Children, somebody can answer
this. I want you to stick your hand up if you know the answer
to this question, okay? Where is, okay, Joe, you know. OK, but you're just getting ready.
You're getting ready. All right. Get the elbow ready.
Stretch it out. OK, here we go. Where is the
body of Christ presently? All right, Ridge. Oh, the body
of Christ. That's a trick question. I know,
a little bit. Up there. In the attic? No, no, no, no,
no. I know what you mean. You mean
in heaven. You mean at the right hand of
God, the Father Almighty. That's what you meant, right? Yes. Very
good, Joe. That's excellent. The body of
Christ. Now it's confusing because Ridge
is right. The divinity of Christ is where?
Everywhere. So it's right. But the body of
Christ is in a location. It's in heaven at the right hand
of God, the Father Almighty. Okay, so theologically you say
we don't believe in transubstantiation because the body of Christ is
not in two places at once. That actually makes mincemeat
of the doctrine of incarnation, of the incarnation. Secondarily
though, I'll just read one verse. Again, we could spend a long
time on this. Hebrews 10, 14. For by a single offering he has
perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. How many offerings? How many
offerings does it take for us to be sanctified? How many offerings?
One. And Jesus has given that offering. And it's really just nonsense
to continue to say, well, he's being represented, represented,
represented. Let me say this too, by the way.
You can be part of the mass your whole life Okay? You can be part
of the Mass your whole life and at the end commit a mortal sin
and the Roman Catholic Church says you go where? You go to
hell, right? If that's not rectified. So the
idea of Hebrews 10.14, by a single offering, He has perfected all
the time those who are being sanctified, it just absolutely
butchers it. And I'll say one more thing.
It's important, but It has to do with Aristotelian metaphysics. It's just the idea that Aristotle,
so you have Aquinas in the 13th century who takes the logic of
Aristotle with the idea of elements and accidents and all these things.
And so that's when, so when Rome says, oh yeah, we've always believed
this. No, you haven't. It's in, Let's see, it's in the
13th century, I believe, when they actually solidify and dogmatize
their doctrine of transubstantiation. So anyway, questions, comments
on that? We could spend the whole time, and then we're gonna spend
the rest of the time on this last one. Questions, comments?
All right, then the last one, and we're gonna be done. And
I'll spend a little more time on this, because I wanna hammer
this home, and that is the doctrine of justification. So I think
I've hinted at this, we've talked about this in the series, but
I want to, we could spend a whole ten lessons on this, but I want
to make this clear. All these things we've talked
about are important. They're all important. But this is really
the dividing line, if you will. This is why we would say Rome
preaches a different gospel. Just a reminder, I think we've
covered this, but Rome teaches justification is received in
baptism, and then it involves an infused righteousness. So the language here, technical
jargon for some of you. Infused versus imputed. So we're arguing for a legal
declaration, and Rome is teaching, no, no, no, no, no, no. The righteousness
of God, of Christ, is infused into you, And so now you have
to cooperate in order to keep that up, to maintain it, to increase
it. All right? It's the Council of
Trent, Session 6, Paragraph 16. Why do I quote the councils?
These are authoritative, right? These are authoritative in Rome. So it says, life eternal is to
be proposed to those working well to the end. Or the Catechism
of the Catholic Church, 2068. All men may attain salvation
through faith, baptism, and the observance of the commandments.
What does the Bible say? Let's go to Romans 4. I mean,
it's all over the place. Romans is just as good as others. Romans 4. Well, just read 1 through 8.
What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according
to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified
by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.
For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it
was counted to him as righteousness. Now to the one who works, his
wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due. And to the one
who does not work, but believes in him, who justifies, the ungodly,
His faith is counted as righteousness. Just as David also speaks of
the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart
from works. Blessed are those whose lawless
deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is
the man against whom the Lord will not count his sins. This is the biblical position.
That justification is a legal declaration whereby God does
not count your sin against you. There are sins that you have
committed, but they are not counted against you because they've been
atoned for in Christ. And instead, what is counted
to your account is the righteousness of Christ, which is received
by faith alone. Rome collapses justification
and sanctification. So your right standing before
God, sure, Jesus is important, but it's not just based on that.
OK, it's also based on you maintaining and keeping that up. So your
final justification depends on you working with God in obedience
to Rome. And you have to work well to
the end. OK. But I want you to think about
that phrase, work well to the end. What is the problem with
that? I'm going to argue for a second that Rome does not understand
God's law. So all of you need to hear this. The law of God is a perfect standard. God cannot take his law and bend
it to us. It's an old illustration, but
I think it's helpful. You're in college. You take the
test, and you're always mad at the one smart person in the class,
because you made a D, and you want the professor to grade on
a curve, but you have this one person made like a 98, so that
affects the curve, right? So we think, well, maybe God's
like that. Okay, no one can measure up, so God just lowers the standard
to kind of grade on a curve for us. Of course, what's the reality
of that? No, God cannot do that. because
God is holy. So how do you work well to the
end? The question is whose standard
of well are we talking about here? Is it God's standard in
the law? Well, if it's that standard,
you're not meeting it. So then you say, well, maybe
it's not that standard. I need to meet Rome's standard. I can
just do what Rome says and I'll be okay that way. But you need
to ask yourself tonight, what gives Rome the right to replace
the perfect standard of God's law with their own standard? And their own made up and imposed
standard of human works? Galatians 2.16, yet we know that
a person is not justified by works of the law, but through
faith in Jesus Christ. So we have also believed in Christ
Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by
works of the law. Because by works of the law,
no one will be justified. So Rome, don't they read that
verse? They do, and here's what they
say. Oh, we can't be justified by works of the law. We agree
with that verse. And then they will say things
like this, Trent, no one ought to flatter himself up with faith
alone, fancying that by faith alone he has made an error. So
what is it? Is it faith alone or is it faith in works? So you're
justified by works of the law. No, Rome will say, no, no, no,
we're justified by good works. Well, this is where it gets confusing.
Okay, well, Rome, what are good works? Well, Rome doesn't give
an exhaustive list, but they talk about things like charity,
giving, making sure you attend Mass, right? And through this
religious process, according to the Catholic Catechism, 2010,
Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit
for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification,
for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment
of eternal life. I hope you're getting this. But
what they're saying is justification is a process. that you have to
keep, yes, yes, yes, we need grace, but you better keep up
your end of the deal. And if anywhere along the way
you commit mortal sin, you're out. And all the venial sins
that you commit along the way, like we already talked about,
that's going to come back to you in purgatory. Now, again, the grace that Rome
talks about, this is a very, very important word that you
need to hear tonight. The grace that Rome talks about is not
sufficient. What does the word sufficient
mean? What did you say? Good enough. It is enough. Did somebody say something else?
Enough. It is enough. So is the grace
in Rome enough to get you to the end? No. No, it is not. You have to Activate
it. You have to cooperate with it. So what Rome does is put you
back in the Garden of Eden. That's my analogy. And Rome puts
you back in the Garden of Eden and says, oh, you're back here
by God's grace. Now, do not eat of the tree of knowledge of good
and evil. They put you back there. That's not the gospel. Rome teaches
that the righteousness of Christ is infused into the believer's,
or sorry, righteousness is infused into the believer's soul through
sacraments and it requires continued cooperation and merit. But the
biblical truth is, justification is a legal declaration based
on the imputed righteousness of Christ alone received by faith
alone. The righteousness of Christ is
not infused within us, it's legally accredited to our account. Can
that really be true? Yes. Philippians 3, 8 and 9.
Indeed, Paul says, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing
worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have
suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in
order that I may gain Christ. Now listen to this, verse 9.
And be found in Him not having a righteousness of my own that
comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in
Christ. The righteousness from God That
depends on faith. 2 Corinthians 5, 21, for our
sake. He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we
might become the righteousness of God. Okay, remember God's
law? It requires perfection. You cannot
meet that. You cannot meet God halfway on
that. But the gospel is Christ has met this. And He was made
sin, 1 Peter 2.24, carrying our sins in His body on the tree.
Our sin was imputed to Christ. Was Jesus a sinner? No, but our
sins were credited to His account, imputed to His account, and He
was held legally responsible for our sins. And He died under
that judgment. That's the judgment and wrath
of God. And then He rose again on the third day. And of course,
we know, Ephesians 2, 8-10, I think it's helpful. For by grace you
have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing. It
is the gift of God, not a result of work, so that no one may boast.
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
Can we not just understand that? We are credited with the righteousness
of Christ legally upon our account, by grace alone, through faith
alone, in Christ alone, by the way, this is all God's doing.
Why? So that no one may boast. Right? Roman Catholicism gives you the
opportunity to boast. Why are you in heaven, or why
am I in heaven and you're not? Because I cooperated, and you
didn't. I kept going. I kept taking the
sacrament. I kept taking the Eucharist. I kept going to confession. I
kept it up. That's why I'm in heaven. Does
that sound like boasting in God alone? No. No. And even this, even our faith,
the Scriptures teach, is a gift of God. Even our faith is effectually
worked by the Holy Spirit in us. This week we have a catechism
question. Question 33. How does the Spirit
apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ? Answer, the Spirit
applies to us the redemption purchased by Christ by working
faith in us and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual
calling. This is all the work of God. This is all grace. Is the grace
of the Bible sufficient? Yes or no? Yes. The grace that God truly gives
His people, it actually brings us all the way home. I know it's
a song, it's not Bible, but it is a biblical song. Amazing grace,
right? Grace has brought me safe thus far, and what? Grace will
lead me home. Amen. And then, justified believers,
we do walk in good works. Not because we don't walk in
good works, because we are meriting anything. It's because God's
grace is at work within us. We won't read it tonight, but
another place you go, Romans 3, 21 through 26. But let me
give one final note about justification in Rome, and that is Rome, says, essentially, they don't
say this, I'm not quoting their documents, but by their practice
and what they teach, they say we'll break God's golden chain
of redemption. Now what is that? What is God's,
who can tell me without going to it, or before we go to it,
who can tell me what is God's golden chain of redemption? What? Who said something? You
said it? Yeah, okay, can we do it? So
where's that found? Yeah, Romans 8, 29 and 30. So
let's go there. Romans 8, 29 and 30. I'm just
going to read verse 30. So this is what theologians call
the golden chain of redemption. You can't break any of these
chains. OK, so Romans 8, 30 says it this
way. Those whom he predestined, he
also called And those whom he called, he also justified. And those whom he justified,
he also glorified. So I'm just going to take verse
30 and I'm going to take those one, two, three, four chains. So you just tell me, what are
those? Not four chains, four links. What are the four links?
According to verse 30, what are these four links in the chain?
You can give them to me. Well, foreknown is in verse 29,
but we could take that too, but those he foreknown or foreloved.
The second link in the chain is predestined. Okay, and then
called, and then justified, and then what? Glorified. All this
goes together. It's an unbreakable chain, but
think about it this way. So God says, how many of those
that God, just look at the text, how many of those that God justifies
does He glorify? Give it, I'm kind of simple,
give it to me in a percent. Okay, a hundo, got it. One hundred percent. So all those
God justifies, He what? He glorifies. Now, Rome says
there are many who are justified and then what happens? They lose the grace of justification. Right? They're never glorified
because they commit mortal sin, they never return, and they're
gone. Okay? So they break that chain. Let
me be clear. If a single justified person
fails to be glorified, then what does that say about Romans 8.30?
God is a liar. If it's 99.9 percent. Yeah, everybody
made it. 99.9 percent. But, well, yeah,
there's this one guy. You know, he was really bad.
No, no, no. No. God is true. And every man a
liar. God is true. Scripture says He
cannot fail. He cannot lie. Romans 8.33. You
can look down a few verses. Who shall bring any charge against
God's elect? It is God who justifies. So the Catholic gospel, by allowing
for the loss of justification through mortal sin, works to
break this unbreakable chain of redemption. So this creates
a gospel where justified believers, you're not guaranteed. If at
any point in your life you're justified, you will be what? Glorified. But not under Rome's
system. Rome's system, false. Biblical
gospel assures that all justified by faith will be glorified through
God's Sovereign grace. So in Rome's system, justification
is uncertain and contingent. In the biblical gospel, justification
is final, secure, and it's rooted in God's unchanging decree, Christ's
perfect and sufficient work, and the Holy Spirit's sufficient
and sovereign application. All right. Land in the plane,
because I want to say this. And then when we get through,
we'll have time for discussion. But I want to remind Providence
Baptist Church tonight that this series is not about pridefulness
and you need and I need to because we've made jokes and stuff. I
need to be careful. This is not about hostility to Rome. So first and foremost, like it's
not like I don't know, something silly. Let's go nail 95 theses
on all of Roman Catholics' doors. Okay, first and foremost, this
is about the Gospel. Galatians 1 says, how many Gospels
are there? We sing this, by the way. There's
how many Gospels? One Gospel. And Galatians 1 teaches
that if you twist this Gospel, if you change this Gospel, if
you add to this Gospel, then you are anathema. Which means
accursed. And so Roman Catholicism in their
slavery to man-made tradition teaches a different gospel. One that depends on something
more than the finished work of Christ and the sufficient grace
of God. So by pomp and ceremony, they
appeal to the human senses, which I'm studying Hebrews right now
to prepare for Mexico. But it's very similar to what
the author of Hebrews, he's arguing against these things to the Hebrews. He's saying, essentially, quit
putting all your awe and trust and hope in these physical things.
Well, Rome, it's like they don't read Hebrews and they go back
and they do all this pomp and this ceremony and this tradition.
And if you talk to some Roman Catholics, That's really what
pulls them in. They love to see all these things.
They love to see all the beauty, and the ceremony, and the ritual,
and the recitation. And you can go online, and you
can listen to a mass, and it's like, boom. The priest starts
off one thing, and everybody's repeating, it's memorized, and
all these things. It's like, whoa. That's attracted them. But this
is why I argue, and I don't say this lightly, that Roman Catholicism
is demonic. Because it's designed to attract
and then trap its adherents. Rome, I'm saying, has departed
from the apostolic faith once delivered to the saints. And
our aim in this series has been to expose these errors with clarity,
but also compassion. One, we want to enable us to
engage those caught in this dark system. You probably have friends,
neighbors, family, co-workers. You probably know somebody who's
a Roman Catholic. Well, I want you to be equipped
where you can have a real and meaningful conversation. And
I don't want you to just assume, oh yeah, they're a believer.
Well, not if they adhere to Rome. Now, can there be believers within
Roman Catholicism? Yes, but it's in spite of what
Rome teaches, not because of it. And if they are believers
within Rome, they need to come out of her. She is lost. So one,
I want to engage those caught in the system. Two, I want to
help Providence Baptist Church to hold fast to the glorious
gospel of grace, because it's only one. And it's always been
true. Sinners are justified by grace
alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, to the glory of
God alone. May we never compromise on this
truth. May we be faithful stewards of
it in our churches, homes, and witnesses in the world. And we
can be done with the recording.
Justification and Conclusion
Series The Failure of Rome
| Sermon ID | 91825165795732 |
| Duration | 32:36 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Romans 4:1-8 |
| Language | English |
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