Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible

Guest (Male): The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals presents the timeless teaching of Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: He lived among men, despised and rejected. He was the average man. He was put on the cross and died an ignominious death. And then, God raised him from the dead. The facts of this life and death and resurrection had been made known to individuals.

Did the individual hearer now accept these facts? Was this meek and lowly Jesus none other than the Lord Jehovah of hosts? Was this God's Messiah, come to do his eternal work? These were the questions that the individual had to face.

Guest (Male): Over a half a century ago, the late Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, then pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, saw the need to spread God's word beyond the hearing of his local congregation. He started the radio ministry which has become known as Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible.

The application of God's word as taught by Dr. Barnhouse is as relevant today as when he first taught over the radio airwaves decades ago. The message we'll be featuring on today's edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is entitled Man's Answer.

The Philippian jailer fell down before Silas and the Apostle Paul and asked, "What must I do to be saved?" They replied, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved." Many people today ask the same question, and God's reply is the same as well. Have you responded to God's call like the Philippian jailer did and come to the Lord Jesus Christ in repentance and faith?

The scripture text for this edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible, Romans chapter 10, we're looking at verses 9 and 10. Here again is Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse with a message entitled Man's Answer.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: Through the Lord Jesus Christ we come unto thee our Father and our God, and in the Holy Spirit, we pray thee that as thy word goes forth in this hour that thou shalt use it to thy glory in the hearts of those that listen. May we be so cleansed from every stain of sin and so yielded to thee that thou shalt be able to glorify thyself through thy word. We ask these things in the name and for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen.

We're studying now in the 10th chapter of Romans and come to the great verses, the 9th and 10th verse of this chapter, that "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." In the early portions of this epistle, we have seen God's part in salvation, set forth in much detail. And now, we are presented with man's answer to God.

The doctrine of justification by faith apart from the works of the law has been spelled out letter by letter through the earlier chapters. No one should be in confusion about the matter. Man's total inability to do anything for himself has been set forth with every possible facet revealing man's sin and death. God has declared man to be his enemy in order that he might die for him and bring him to the throne of heaven through grace.

God has declared that man could do absolutely nothing to fulfill the divine demands, but that he has made it possible to give man the divine righteousness which man could never reach by himself. All of this has been said over and over again in many different ways. And now, in chapter 10 and verse 8, God tells man that he has put the word of the gospel very near to the lost creature, even in his mouth and in his heart.

He then continues to expand the idea, showing what the word of faith is, that if an individual shall confess with his mouth that Jesus is Lord and shall believe in his heart that God raised him from the dead, he shall be saved. The reason for this is then given, because with the heart man believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. There are some problems and some great teaching involved here.

First of all, we must agree with practically all commentators that this passage is primarily addressed to Paul's brethren according to the flesh, God's ancient people, Israel. We can certainly come to a deep understanding of the passage if we consider it first as a word that is addressed to Israel. We can then expand it to its universal proportions and look upon it as a word that describes the transforming work of God in any individual, Jew or Gentile.

The first thing that was necessary for a member of the ancient covenant nation was to confess that Jesus Christ was Lord. The Greek here is literally, "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus Lord." This is a grammatical construction which must be translated fully, "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as thy Lord." It is taken for granted that the hearer has heard the full gospel.

He has been told that there were certain historic events which have happened and that these events are the basis of faith and of salvation. Jesus was a man walking among men. In physical appearance, he looked no different from other men, except that the scripture plainly says that he was not an outstanding personality. We read in Isaiah 53, "He hath no form nor comeliness, nor any beauty that we should desire him."

Christ did not look like these saccharine pictures which we see of him, the sallow bearded man. And there was something more. Not only must these facts be accepted as historically true, the individual had to make a personal commitment of his own being to this Messiah. He had to confess that this Jesus was his Lord. It was not possible that there could be secret belief among this people.

When Jesus was here upon the earth, we read in John's gospel, "Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue, for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." There have been those who have wondered why Paul here puts confession before the faith of the heart, since in all of the epistle up to this point, the emphasis has been so strongly upon faith.

If the whole passage is looked at, however, it will be seen that there are four phrases beginning with confession with the mouth, then going on to belief in the heart, then repeating the matter of belief in the heart and ending once more with confession by the mouth. And thus Paul goes from the outward act and manifestation to that which is the real cause of the confession, explains the deep principle of inward faith and ends with the fact that it must manifest itself in outward life.

Paul is showing that there is a work which must proceed from faith and that this faith surely produces the work. One of the most famous characters in the New Testament heard the Lord Jesus Christ preach but left no outward confession of his faith, and therefore we do not know whether he was truly saved or not. I refer to Nicodemus, the ruler who came to Jesus by night. We find Nicodemus mentioned three times in the gospel according to John and nowhere else.

But there is no mention that he had true faith in Christ. I hope that when I get to heaven I shall find Nicodemus there, but I do not know. If he is there, of course, he will be there by the grace of God. He does not deserve to be there, but no more do I. And the fact that I am there will always be the greatest wonder that shall ever possess my soul. Nicodemus heard great preaching, but many a man who has heard great preaching has turned his back on truth and has gone on his own way, not submitting himself to that truth.

Nicodemus came to Jesus saying, "Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him." Christ's answer was in reality a rebuke, for the last thing in the world that Jesus was, was a teacher come from God. There had been hundreds of teachers come from God throughout the era of God's dealings with Israel, but Jesus was not one of them. And there have been thousands of teachers come from God since the time of Jesus, but Jesus has not been among them.

Jesus Christ was not a teacher come from God. He was God come to teach and to die. It happened but once in the history of the world, and it will never happen again. Nicodemus came to Jesus with the unitarian approach, and he was sternly rebuked by Christ. He was told that he could not see spiritual truths because he had not been born again. And Jesus went on to speak of the new birth and said, "If I have told you earthly things and you believe not, how shall you believe if I tell you of heavenly things?"

And Christ then stated that he himself was both here on earth and in heaven at the same time, thus revealing the mystery of himself to Nicodemus. And he climaxed his teaching with words that have become universal in Christendom, "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life." Now, did any of this light penetrate into the proud heart of Nicodemus?

We have no way of knowing. Men listen to truth with their ears, but they do not hear it with their hearts. So many times, they're like people that work in radio studios and have a flood of so many million words go by that they can never pay attention to what is being said, just as long as noise is coming out of the loudspeakers. This is the way most people in the world are with God. Nicodemus did not leave any record of a confession of Jesus Christ as his Messiah and Savior.

He heard great preaching, but so have millions of other unbelievers. The second time we meet Nicodemus is in the 7th of John. The hatred of Christ by the rulers of the people had come to a climax that would shortly result in the murder of the Savior. Officers were sent to arrest Jesus, and they returned with the testimony, "Never man spake like this man." The Pharisees lashed out against them, stooping to the argument that their own importance had to be the supreme court that would decide the question.

"Are ye also deceived?" they said. "Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him?" It was the same argument that we sometimes hear today when there are those who would point out that many of the highly educated have not submitted themselves to Christ. So what? It was at this point that Nicodemus opened his mouth to say, "Does our law judge any man before it hears him and knows what he does?"

Now, this was a nice gesture, but it was the gesture of a man who speaks out for civil liberties and is ready to defend many a cause without necessarily believing in it. Oh, we may hope that Nicodemus' defense sprang from true belief, but there is no evidence to that effect. There may have been nothing more here than the forerunner of Voltaire, who said, "I do not agree with what you say, but I will die to defend your right to say it."

Oh, Nicodemus, if you truly believed on him, why did you not cry out and say, "This is God's Messiah, and I for one have put all my trust in him?" There was no such confession. The last time we meet Nicodemus is after the death of the Savior. The body of Jesus had been secured by Joseph of Arimathea, who is described as a disciple of Jesus but secretly for fear of the Jews. Nicodemus came to Joseph bringing a mixture of about 100 pounds of costly spices to embalm the body of Jesus Christ.

What was there in this gesture? We are not told. Was this an evidence of belief? Was this a gratuity to stifle the gnawings of conscience? We do not know. Conscience has brought many a gift to so-called holy places. The conscience of evil men has placed many a stained glass window in memory of a loved one who was outraged by the evil life of the giver and has erected whole churches with a percentage of stolen goods.

Oh, Nicodemus, you took care of the dead body of Jesus, but did you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead in spite of all your embalming spices? We do not know. Now, in the light of all that we read about Nicodemus, how different is the account of the woman who was found by Jesus and brought to salvation. And the contrast between these two characters is all the more striking because they are introduced to us in close proximity.

The story of the fourth chapter of John follows swiftly after that of the third chapter. The one is a story of a man, the other of a woman. The one is seemingly a seeker, the other is found by Christ, almost by accident but definitely by design. The first was a Jew, the second a Samaritan. The one was an aristocratic Pharisee, the other a village harlot. The one wanted Jesus to talk to him.

The woman tried to avoid the probing truth and attempted to change the subject. The one came at midnight, the other at noon. Both Nicodemus and the woman heard great truths, but the effect on them was utterly different. As we have seen, there was no sign whatsoever of faith in Christ and commitment to him on the part of the aristocrat. In the woman, there were many signs of faith and transformation.

She heard Christ say, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, "Give me to drink," thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." And a moment later, "Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life."

Now, it's not necessary to go through all of the conversation that our Lord had with this poor woman. It's enough to say that at the end, the woman declared that the Messiah would clear up all difficulties. Then Christ revealed to her that he was the Messiah. She immediately left her water pot and going back up the steep hill that led to the village, cried out to the men, "Come, see a man which told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Messiah?"

This was no idle confession but something that was so real that it brought life to others. For the men, some of them touched in their consciences as they realized that they were a part of her sin, rushed down the hill to the well where Jesus was and besought him that he would tarry with them. And he stayed there two days. And then we read, "And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman which testified, "He told me all that ever I did.""

And while there were those who later told the woman that they now believed in Jesus because of his own word, there can be no doubt of the fact that the impetus to their faith was the confession of the woman. The importance of a public acknowledgment of our faith cannot be overestimated. I think of two outstanding incidents in my own ministry which illustrate this. During the First World War, I had the opportunity of witnessing to a young man whose name was well known as the scion of a family that was prominent nationally for social standing and wealth.

The young man professed to accept Christ as Savior and he made public testimony to that fact among the soldiers of his company. When the war was over and he was about to go to his home in one of the wealthy suburbs of a great city, he told me that he was afraid that he would slip back into his old habits with his old friends. I told him that he would not have to give these people up, that they would give him up if he made a public confession of his faith in Christ.

He agreed to tell the first 10 people of his old set that he met upon returning home that he had become a living Christian. He arrived at the suburban station near his home, he told me afterwards, and almost immediately saw a girl whom he had known socially. She greeted him effusively and asked how things were going. He replied that the greatest thing that could ever happen to a man has happened to me. "Oh," she said, "you're engaged to be married."

He said, "Better than that. I've taken Jesus Christ as my Savior." Her face froze and she mumbled some words of politeness and quickly went her way. A few minutes later, a young man of his acquaintance passed by, greeted him loudly with the cry that now that he was back there would be some good parties. And this young man was told about the new life in Christ. He too stumbled over some polite remarks and went his way.

And the same circumstances were repeated with a young couple and with two more individuals. But by that time, the word had gotten around. A car passed with very close friends. They waved at him distantly. "Hi," and that was all. They'd heard the news. He'd become religious, who knows? They may have called him crazy. But his public confession had aligned him with Jesus Christ, had alienated those who did not want Jesus Christ, and had established and strengthened him in his stand for Christ as his Lord.

Another story of the nature and power of public confession is often brought to my mind as I look at a beautiful antique Chinese ivory in my home. It was given to me by an old Chinese woman in Java, in the city that was then called Batavia but which is now Jakarta. In the islands of the South Seas, the Chinese have long been the principal traders and some of them are immensely wealthy even by Western standards.

I was preaching there for a few days and was entertained in the home of an elderly Chinese matriarch whose husband had left her a great business and a home that was like a museum. I had been told that this woman was a fine Christian, but that her life was saddened by the fact that her son in his early 30s lived a life of debauchery. As I sat down to dinner in this home, the young man came in and was seated beside me.

We began to talk and before the meal was over, he promised to come to the meeting at which I was speaking that afternoon. He came. And between that afternoon meeting and the evening meeting, he talked with me most seriously about his soul. He attended the evening meeting at which I presented Christ as Savior and he left afterwards without speaking to me. The next day, however, he had cards printed and sent them out to hundreds of his friends and business acquaintances.

I substitute another name for his as I tell you the message of the card. "Ah Wong, having become a Christian, wishes to announce to his friends and acquaintances that he will no longer be seen in his old haunts or living his old way of life." Ah, the Chinese are not an effusive people and certainly they're not given to showing their emotions, but I shall not long forget the old mother as she stretched out her hands toward me, bowing so low, almost looking away lest I see the tears that she could not keep back.

And when we left, there was a gift for me of batik sarongs that a princess might wear and an antique ivory that could grace the wall of the finest art museum. She was very grateful because her son had been saved and because he had so publicly confessed his faith in Christ. You see, the world understands a confession of Christ. When anyone has publicly confessed Christ, the world is astonished if the life is not changed and rather cynical toward the person if they confess with the mouth without there being the change of life.

This is one reason why the unregenerate world publicizes the sins of those who have acknowledged Christ. You would never see a newspaper headline shouting "Bartender Defrauds Widow." But let a man who has been set apart for the ministry of Christ be caught in some sin and it's good for banner headlines, "Preacher Robs Couple." Ah, that from the point of view of the newspaper is a newsworthy item.

When a dog bites a man, it's not news, but if a man bites a dog, it's news. When an ordinary worldling steals, it is not news, but if a minister of Christ steals, it's national news. Incidentally, such a news item appears so rarely that when it does appear, it's a testimony to the honest lives of the hundreds of thousands of men who have not transgressed. Their confession of Christ has effectively worked in their lives in a practical way.

And when a man has thus confessed Christ and transgressed into open sin, the world is so quick to see it that it blazes it in headlines. Now, it should go without saying as we close that confession by itself is worthless. This is brought out to the full by the Apostle James. In fact, this is the inner meaning of the famous passage that tells us that faith without works is dead. For faith that is without works is the faith that has been spoken with the mouth, but which has never reached the heart.

The faith that is without works is faith that has confessed but not possessed Christ. James looks upon the outward appearance and Paul looks upon the heart. The truth of God is that the two must be in combination. "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation."

The Lord willing, we'll go on into this same text in our next study and see further great truths from it. And our God and Father, we pray thee that the Holy Spirit shall take this message to our hearts, and may there be many who will know what it is to believe in the heart and who will follow through to confess with the mouth Jesus as Lord. And we ask all this in the name and for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen.

Guest (Male): God offers eternal life to all who believe in Jesus Christ and confess him as Lord and Savior. What is your response to God's good news of salvation? You have been listening to Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible. We hope you've benefited from today's message entitled Man's Answer. To listen to more Bible teaching by Dr. Barnhouse, you can tune in anytime, anywhere around the globe via the internet by visiting us online at alliancenet.org.

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Again, that's 1-800-488-1888. You can also write us at Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Box 2000, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103, or visit us online at alliancenet.org. Be sure to ask for a free resource catalog featuring books, audio teachings, commentaries, booklets, videos, and a wealth of other materials from outstanding reformed teachers and theologians, including Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, Dr. James Montgomery Boice, Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, and Dr. Philip Graham Ryken. Thank you for listening. Please join us again next time for more classic teaching on Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible.