God’s Demand for Discernment

today on grace to you we have a society that assaults any kind of dogmatism any kind of clarity any kind of strong conviction any kind of absolute truth but biblical truth is not relative it is absolute it is sharp it is black and white so when you begin to preach absolute truth to this post-truth culture they are highly offended and if pragmatism is your driving philosophy you're going to get rid of the things that offend them and so that's going to water down doctrine what in the world makes us so embarrassed about the gospel i determined to know nothing among you except jesus christ and him crucified [Music] [Music] now i was asked to talk about discernment it's a big subject and have a lot to say so i'm very interested to hear exactly what i'm going to say um that's part of the adventure of preaching but i would ask you to open your bible to first thessalonians chapter 5. first thessalonians chapter 5 and let's just approach it in a rather simple straightforward way at the end of uh this wonderful letter to the thessalonian church a church basically that was doing really well no particular issue or sin is raised in this epistle but there were some very basic instructions to give to them um verse 12 and 13 appreciate your leaders esteem them highly in love live in peace with one another admonish the unruly encourage the faint hearted help the weak be patient with everyone don't repay evil for evil seek what is good for one another for all people this is wonderful basic practical instruction for the church very pithy rejoice always pray without ceasing in everything give thanks for this is the will of god in christ jesus then it gets a little more serious do not quench the spirit do not despise prophetic utterances but examine everything carefully hold fast to that which is good abstain from every form of evil and on that basis he can pronounce a kind of benediction now may the god of peace himself sanctify you entirely i just want us to glance at verses 20 to 22 do not despise prophetic utterances but examine everything carefully hold fast to that which is good abstain from every form of evil this is the the last and sort of the climax of simple directives simple commands that we read this is basically commands to a healthy church do not despise prophetic utterances despise means make light of belittle treat as insignificant downgrade prophetic utterances is the greek word prophetess that just means preaching propheteos means to stand before someone and speak the gift of interpreting and proclaiming the divine will proclamation of the word of god don't downgrade preaching that that would be a sermon in itself to this generation don't downgrade preaching but examine everything carefully dakimazo means to test to validate to prove [Music] it is essentially what god does in first corinthians chapter four god ultimately is going to validate or invalidate the record of anyone's life as to its motives the process to borrow paul's words to the ephesians is an effort to learn what is pleasing to the lord and what is pleasing to the lord is an accurate interpretation of his word right cut it straight get it right we must be able to distinguish to judge examine everything hold fast to what is good hold fast to whatever conforms to a true interpretation of scripture hold fast to what is good this is not just talking about behavior this is talking about truth this is talking about teaching instruction preaching hold fast to what is good sounds a lot like romans 12 9 hate what is evil cling to what is good there is the foundational assumption about truth some things are true and some things are not and you have to be able to distinguish the difference so that you can hold to what is true and you can abstain from what is not hold fast means take possession of it embrace it wholeheartedly whatever is colossal inherently good not not good on the surface not good looking but inherently good as cacaos is inherently evil colossal is inherently good what is genuinely true and noble and righteous now you're at the end of first thessalonians look over at second thessalonians chapter 2 verse 15 and hear these words so then brethren stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught whether by word of mouth or by letter from us the apostle paul is saying hold on to apostolic teaching because the apostles doctrine was revealed from heaven there's no room for reckless faith there's no room for gullibility believing anything that comes down the pike you have to have the discerning power to sort out what is inherently good and true from what is evil the backside of that verse 22 abstained from every form of evil and not evil necessarily as a behavior but evil as an idea to abstain means to hold yourself away from to shun in fact it's used back in the fourth chapter of first thessalonians verse 3 this is the will of god your sanctification that you abstain from sexual immorality abstain means completely shun that and that's the very same verb here when you find any scheme any form of doctrine any teaching that is evil because it isn't true you turn away from it complete separation of the believer from any teaching any instruction that is not true listen if we are anything as christians we are essentially the people of the truth the church is the pillar and ground of what the truth the truth it was the lutheran commentator linsky who i think died about three years before i was born but through the years i've read his material who said this the worst form of wickedness consists of perversions of the truth the worst form of wickedness consists of perversions of the truth although he said many look upon these perversions with indifference and regard them as harmless this passage doesn't let you do that any perversion of the truth is evil anything evil is poisonous destructive damaging so abstain from every form idos i dust like the word idol ida says any shape any appearance any sort any species any category so as believers this is foundational to our christian life we must discern what is evil and what is good what is false and what is true this is a direct call for exercising spiritual critical powers the lack of discernment in the church today shows up in so many many many ways so how did we get to this point let me digress a little bit from our text just maybe to give you a little [Music] insight into that just looking at it i think there are some identifiable causes that started out as trends and have now become norms i'll give you a handful number one this is the product of the weakening of doctrinal clarity and conviction that ought to be obvious to everybody discernment can't exist whether it's really indifference toward doctrinal clarity and conviction and and why did doctrinal clarity and conviction begin to die out as an interest in evangelicalism because pragmatism took over and doctrinal clarity and strong conviction gets in the way of pragmatism gets in the way of marketing strategy political correctness and so i suppose the unintended consequences are that you literally validate the unbeliever's resentment of the gospel by removing the part that he resents and then if you try to reintroduce precision in doctrine clarity in doctrine [Music] he feels that this is a bait and switch living in a post-truth world the i think single [Music] greatest assault has to be on religion or philosophy people believe in truth in the physical world right because they can see it they live it every day it's a lot easier to believe there's no absolute truth in the spiritual world the religious world so in a post-truth world about the only place these people can go to to really accomplish their purposes is into the world of people's ideas and beliefs so you have a society that assaults any kind of dogmatism any kind of clarity any kind of strong conviction any kind of absolute truth so it receives the brunt of the world's attacks i don't see any attack on architecture or engineering i don't see any attack on obvious evident physical realities religion being the most subjective relative of all things is simply identified as some kind of an anti-intellectual irrational emotional experiential world that is not supposed to be rational it's not supposed to be propositional truth so it's fair game so in a post-truth world most of the assaults are going to come on what we think on ideas and religion of course is in the realm of ideas so when you begin to preach absolute truth to this post-truth culture they are highly offended and if pragmatism is your driving philosophy you're going to get rid of the things that offend them and so that's going to water down doctrine so the first thing i see leading to this lack of discernment is the weakening of doctrinal clarity and conviction secondly and i think this is how we have to think this culture is is unwilling to think antithetically this culture is unwilling to think antithetically about religion that is they don't think in black and white they they think on a sort of spectrum of relativity this means that everything continues along a line of relative shades of gray there's no right there's no wrong there's no truth there's no false everything is subjective but biblical truth is not relative it is absolute it is sharp it is black and white it is antithetical to all that is lies deception and error some years ago jay adams wrote a book called call for discernment in that book he wrote this antithesis is dulled more and more as people attempt to integrate run from that word when the bible separates key task says adams is to distinguish god's ways from all other ways whereas in this world people are looking for agreement how can we merge the kingdom of darkness with the kingdom of god from [Music] the perspective that will draw in a sinner discernment thrives when there's a thesis antithesis black and white antithetical mentality third reason that i think we have the problems we have with discernment and they're all overlapping is a preoccupation with image and influence as a key to evangelism i mean we've all seen the user-friendly approach come and go [Music] we've we've got to create an image if we're going to reach the non-believers we've got to be popular we've got to be acceptable carl henry is quoted in martin lloyd jones biography by my friend ian murray he said if you look at the early years of the billy graham organization you'll find that its overall policy was to attain prestigious influence for evangelicals to do this there had to be a successful image and that would not be possible they believed unless every effort was made to avoid any division with those who didn't believe the bible that's carl henry the graham organization goes on wrote henry was not ready to forfeit this is a quote forfeit dialogue with the ecumenical leaders in churches because it feared a loss of influence apologetics professor at the time e.j carnell at fuller said we need prestige desperately it's been around a long time we're going back into the 1950s if you're trying to find prestige in the culture you're going to lose the will to discern and discriminate the church has lost her will to disturb the world to disturb the sinner to upset the sinner to terrify the sinner so the cause lack of conviction failure to be antithetical preoccupation with worldly image a fourth just shortening is a little bit the reason why we have a lack of discernment is a failure to properly interpret scripture interpreting scripture is not easy it's possible but it takes some work [Music] the trend more recently is the mega church pastors are self-appointed untrained unskilled handlers of scripture they're sort of like a churchy quiz show host this is no place for fools this is no place for theater this is a place for gifted men who rightly handle the word of truth to stand and proclaim thus says the lord [Applause] and there are rules there's a science of hermeneutics there's a science of interpreting the bible it's not willy-nilly it's not a free-for-all if you look for a minute at second timothy the familiar words of this passage chapter 2 verse 15 be diligent to present yourself approved to god as a workman who doesn't need to be ashamed accurately handling the word of truth there's a right way to handle scripture in any other way is a wrong way god didn't mean anything you want him to mean he meant exactly what he intended to say when somebody raises this issue what does this verse mean to you it's like running fingernails down a blackboard to me my response is what does this verse mean if you never existed this has nothing to do with you or what you think what does this verse mean to you who cares that is not the question the question is what does god intend to say and i believe that is available and i can promise you it can be done and you know when you hear it don't you you know when you hear it this is so critical why 2 timothy 2 because there's so much whirly empty chatter verse 16 it leads to further ungodliness and talk that spreads like gangrene from people like hymanas and fellitus men who have gone astray from the truth that's all over the place people straying from the truth and misleading others so be diligent to be approved by god i i there's really only one audience who concerns me and it's the lord it's the lord there's a fifth reason why [Music] there's a lack of discernment and there's so much false teaching in the church and that is the failure to discipline error the first instruction the lord ever gave to the church matthew 18 first instruction this is the church if someone's in sin go to them if they don't repent go back with two or three witnesses if they don't repent tell the whole church if they don't repent put them out that's church discipline now look the the worst perversion in the church is false teaching but there's there's very little if any will to discipline anyone in churches today that's not the way to grow a church i get it you know people in jerusalem said don't join that place people die at the offering that isn't the issue the issue is the lord says he wants a pure bride once a pure church the realization the reality and even the threat of confrontation of sin and false doctrine in church is essential to keep it out of the church but there's no real interest in discipline [Music] even though the lord is explicit about that i would suggest also [Music] that another reason for lack of discernment is spiritual immaturity there's just a lack of robust biblical doctrine being taught in churches so you have a lot of baby christians who are children tossed to and fro and cared about by every wind of doctrine they don't have the powers to zern they don't have what hebrews 5 talks about having their senses exercised to grow up so those are some of the things that you would recognize that have contributed to this but i remind you that proverbs 14 33 says wisdom resides in the heart of the discerning proverbs 16 21 the wise in heart are called discerning proverbs 17 24 discerning man keeps wisdom in view but a fool's eyes wander to the ends of the earth that is why going back to our text this command in chapter 5 is so simple do not downgrade preaching but examine everything carefully embrace what is good shun every kind of evil spiritual discernment is the ability to distinguish god from satan sound doctrine from perversion [Music] so how do i become a discerning person well you know the answer right i think it starts with the desire proverbs chapter 2 my son if you will receive my words and treasure my commandments within you make your ear attentive to wisdom incline your heart to understanding i love this verse three cry for discernment is that part of your prayer life cry for discernment lift your voice for understanding if you seek her as silver and search for her as for hidden treasures then you will discern the fear of the lord you want discernment cry for that discernment treasure the commandments within you incline your heart to understanding search for the hidden treasures discover the knowledge of god for the lord gives wisdom from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding he stores up sound wisdom for the upright perhaps a pan for gold but verse 12 where can wisdom be found they could do all of that but they wouldn't find wisdom isn't that what james said if any man lack wisdom what's the next line let him ask of god i want to be a discerning person pray to be a discerning person pray for discernment and then submit the scripture because that's the wisdom from above follow discerning teachers follow discerning teachers they will teach you discernment paul says to timothy in second timothy 3 the things that i have taught you follow those things depend on the holy spirit the holy spirit is the anointing you have from god that teaches you all things you are the hope of the world because you can discern the truth be bold to proclaim it father thank you for our time together today tonight throughout the week thank you for giving us a little taste of heaven the fellowship of the saints which we will enjoy forever in your presence bless every precious soul here and with grateful hearts we express our deep gratitude for loving us for redeeming us for keeping us unto eternal glory we pray in christ's name amen discernment is critical in every area of life we are constantly lied to misled or simply misinformed nowhere is discernment more important than in our relationship with christ and his word thankfully for the believer christ gives us the holy spirit to help us in understanding truth and discerning fact from fiction in pastor john's book standing strong he examines what scripture says about spiritual warfare and how to resist the enemy of your soul to order a copy give us a call at 888 57 grace or visit our website gty.org this resource is great for personal study or with friends in a small bible study as it comes with a study guide located in the back of the book as always thank you for joining us today we are so thankful for those of you who share our commitment to stand strong for the truth one verse at a time [Music]

Channel: Grace to You

Views: 106,627

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Keywords: John MacArthur, Bible, Preaching, Christianity, Expository, Exposition, Sermon, Jesus, Christ, Grace to You, sufficiency of scripture

Id: 0115aDRo6pA

Length: 28min 30sec (1710 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021