Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible

Guest (Male): The alliance of confessing evangelicals presents the timeless teaching of Dr. Donald Gray Barnhouse.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: Shortly you do not think that you could go to heaven just as you are. Your body waxes old, grows arthritic, cancerous, and dies. Your mind is filled with ignorance and subject to error. Your spirit is contaminated with the seepage from your fleshly nature. How then shall this trinity of darkness and sin suddenly be transported into the land of light and holiness? The answer is that it cannot enter into heaven without being created anew in regeneration that is based on the blood atonement provided by the Lord Jesus Christ.

Guest (Male): Over a half a century ago, the late Dr. Donald Gray 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 outreach 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 will be featuring on today's edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is entitled not hearers but doers. A mother tells her child to stay away from the cookie jar before dinner.

He may listen carefully and say yes mommy, but what does it matter if he grabs a cookie 10 minutes later? Many believers listen intently to sermons every Sunday. They know their Bibles, and yet their spiritual lives are marked by sin, weakness, and failure. Do you obey what you hear and read from the Bible or do you keep finding your hand in the spiritual cookie jar? The scripture text for this edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is Romans chapter two and verses 12 and 13. Here again is Dr. Donald Gray Barnhouse with a message not hearers but doers.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: Through the Lord Jesus Christ we come unto the our Father and our God and in the Holy Spirit. We thank thee that we can come boldly through the Lord Jesus Christ alone into the holiest of all and know that we shall be received because Christ has died and has risen again and is seated upon thy throne. We pray thee that thou shalt bless each listening heart in this hour and use the study to thine honor and thy glory in Jesus name. Amen. We're studying together in the second chapter of the epistle to the Romans and come today to the 12th and 13th verses.

As many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law. For not the hearers of the law are just before God but the doers of the law shall be justified. Here is the doom of any man who believes that he can be saved by his character or by anything that he can do for himself. And here is the stern judgment against the easy idea that the possession of a faith that is without works will cancel out a life of constant wallowing in sin. Here is a terrible warning for the moralist who does not believe in the revelation of God and a terrible warning for the man who says he believes but who does not cleave to a life of holiness.

First of all, we must establish the fact that the word judged means in reality condemned. There is no idea that a man can come up before God and receive a fair consideration of the deeds of his life. Such an idea is totally foreign to the Bible. There is in legal language what is known as being taken in flagrant delict, being caught in the very act of committing the offense. The Oxford English Dictionary under the word delict quotes Sir Francis Palgrave as follows. Cases of flagrant delict required no other trial than the publicity of the fact.

Now if you have an awareness of a moral code of righteousness, you are caught in the act of transgressing it for there is not one person who lives up to his own standards of right and wrong. And if you have ever come under the hearing of the word of God, you are required before God to give heed to it and to submit yourself to it. The very fact that you are listening to these Bible studies adds to your condemnation at the judgment bar of God. When your case comes up for trial, it shall be seen that you have sinned in the face of God's law.

And by that law you shall be condemned. Do not be deceived even by the error of well-meaning preachers who say to you that if you do not believe in Christ, you shall be lost as though the choice were now in your hands and that you could become one thing or the other. The correct way of stating the proposition is that if you do not believe in Christ, you will remain lost. For we read in John 3:18, he that believeth not is condemned already. The great Charles Hodge of Princeton in a book that has long been out of print sums up the case in an admirable way.

He says with respect to the character of men, the Bible very clearly teaches that all men are sinners. The apostle Paul not only asserts this truth but proves it at length in reference to both those who live under the light of nature and those who enjoy the light of revelation. He sums up the truths which we have set forth in so much detail in our studies of the first chapter of Romans concerning those who live their lives without knowledge of the word of God. He then continues, with regard to those who enjoy a supernatural revelation of the character and requirements of God, the case is still more plain.

Instead of rendering to this God the inward and the outward homage which are his due, they neglect his service and really prefer his creatures to himself. Instead of regulating their conduct by the perfect rule of duty contained in the scriptures, they constantly dishonor God by breaking that law. It is thus the apostle shows that all classes of men, when judged by the light that they have severally enjoyed, are found guilty before God. This universality of guilt, moreover, is confirmed by the clear testimony of the scriptures which declare there is none righteous, no, not one. There is none that understandeth.

There is none that seeketh after God. They have all gone out of the way. They have altogether become unprofitable. There is none that doeth good, no, not one. To speak, to act, to walk after the manner of men is in the language of the Bible to speak or act or walk wickedly. The world is composed of the wicked. This present evil world is the description of mankind from whose character and deserved punishment it is said to be the design of Christ's death to redeem his people. The world cannot hate you, said our Savior to those who refuse to be his disciples, but me it hateth because I testify of it that the works thereof are evil.

And again in 1 John 4:5, they are of the world, therefore they speak of the world and the world heareth them. While in the 19th verse of the next chapter of 1 John we read, we are of God and the whole world lieth in wickedness. Now this however is not a doctrine taught in isolated passages. It's one of those fundamental truths which are taken for granted in almost every page of the Bible. The whole scheme of redemption presupposes that man is a fallen being. Christ came to seek and to save the lost. He was announced as the Savior of sinners.

His advent and work have no meaning or value but on the assumption that we are guilty. For he came to save his people from their sins, to die the just for the unjust, to bear our sins in his own body on the tree. Those who have no sin need no Savior. Those who do not deserve death need no redeemer. As the doctrine of redemption pervades the scripture, so does the doctrine of the universal sinfulness of men. Now any man of good sense should be able to see immediately that if heaven is a perfect place and if God is to be there himself, there must be some change take place in man.

How is that change to be effected? Eternal light, eternal light, how pure the soul must be when placed within thy searching sight it shrinks not but with undisturbed delight can live and look on thee. The spirits that surround thy throne may bear the burning bliss, but that is surely theirs alone since they have never never seen or known a fallen world like this. Oh, how shall I, whose native sphere is dark, whose mind is dim, before the ineffable appear and on my unprotected spirit bear that uncreated beam? There is a way for man to rise to that sublime abode, an offering and a sacrifice, a holy spirit's tender energies, an advocate with God.

These these prepare us for the sight of holiness above. The sons of ignorance and night may ever dwell in the eternal light through the eternal love. Now in this famous hymn Thomas Binney seized the heart of the whole truth. No man can approach the light of God except his darkness has been poured into that darkness which surrounded the Lord Jesus when he died on the cross. And except the light of the Lord Jesus Christ has been poured into him in the new creation, our personality will survive the throne, but our fallen nature will not. Having been made partakers of the divine nature, we will live in a perfect heaven in the perfection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Oh, how great is the doom into which you must fall if you continue in your blindness while the light of God shines upon you. For you who have sinned within the framework of the law of God will be condemned by that law. Now there is one final word to the acknowledged unbeliever before we turn from him to the imitation believer. If you for one moment think that you are a doer of the law and that therefore you can be justified by God, you have failed to comprehend the nature of doing and of justification. Never forget that the devil quotes scripture and this is one of his favorite passages.

How many have been lulled to a sense of false security by some fancied approximation to the standards of God or by some thought that they are the doers the doers of the law. Listen to the Holy Spirit in the epistle of James, James 2:10, for whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. And again the same thought is found in one of Paul's epistles where we read in Galatians 3:10, for as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse, not a curse mind you but the curse.

For it is written, cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things. Note that it says all things. Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them. Only the doer of the law shall be justified and there is no man who has ever kept the law. So it follows that no one can be justified by his own works. Therefore salvation must be by grace. But now we turn to apply this text to another group of people. There are those within the fringes of Christianity who may have been baptized, may be members of churches, may entertain the thought that they are certainly going to heaven because they are what they call saved.

But a close examination of their life demonstrates the fact that they live in continual sin. Are such people saved? Can a man do as he pleases after he believes? The answer will come out more fully when we come to the opening verse of the sixth chapter where the apostle is horrified at the thought that anyone might for even a moment think it possible to be a believer and a wallower at the same time. Now I must tread with exceeding care for I do not wish to remove assurance from any true believer, but I do not wish to give false comfort to anyone who is deceived in the nature of Christ.

There are three ways whereby any believer may know that he is truly saved. The first is of course the authority of the word of God. This is the objective proof. The second is the witness of the spirit in his heart. This is the subjective proof. The third is the demonstration of power in the life of Christ within my life or the life of the man, any man, bringing that man to an experimental holiness which, though not sinless perfection while in this body of flesh, is moving in that direction constantly. Let us look at these three proofs of salvation.

We shall treat the first two briefly for their more detailed study will come in connection with the exposition of verses in later chapters. And the third is set forth to advantage at this point in our study. First, I may know that I am saved because of the declaration of the word of God. Salvation in essence is a business transaction between the soul and God. The sinner is in a lost condition and position. God contracts on the basis of his love in accordance with his sovereign grace to remove the guilt of your sin from you, to place it upon the Lord Jesus as Savior, there punish it to the full, and in consequence of that perfect substitutionary atonement, he promises to look upon you as being in Christ, justified forever.

It is not a question of feeling, emotion, or experience. It is a question of the word of the only being in the universe who cannot lie and who cannot be mistaken. Suppose that you were leaving the country on a prolonged trip. You know the fire insurance policy on your home will come due during your absence. The day of your departure arrives and you have not taken care of the premium payment and yet you must leave. You're concerned about the matter until a friend who is an officer in the insurance company tells you to forget about it and go on your way in peace.

He promises to take care of the matter. He is reliable. You believe him. Your feeling of peace in the matter is dependent upon your opinion of the man who spoke his word to you. The Lord God Almighty has bound himself by an oath. And since he could swear by no greater, he swore by himself. So that by two immutable, unchangeable things in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope that is set before us. Every true Christian begins his assurance at this point.

I bought an automobile and was about to drive out and I phoned my insurance agent and he said I'll put a binder on it right now and you're insured from this minute, so go ahead. I had nothing but his word over the telephone, yet I took that automobile out on the street. And I had perfect peace in driving for I knew that I was covered and I had it on the word of a man and that was all. But I knew him and I knew his word and that was enough. Now that's the way we rest in the assurance of God.

We rest our hope and our confidence on the word of God about the work that was finished on Calvary. And when we're saved, God looks down to us. It doesn't make any difference if you're ungodly. At the moment you believe in Christ, God says I've put a binder on it for you and you get the full policy ultimately in heaven, but right now you are protected. Secondly, I know I am saved because the Holy Spirit witnesses with that my spirit that I'm a child of God. When I come to the Bible and find the exceeding great and precious promises, my eyes see them written or my ears hear someone declaring them.

But beyond my eyes and ears there is a voice stronger than the voice of many waters at times or more tender than any human voice of human love. That thunders to my doubting heart or whispers to my wavering heart that the promises of God are true and that they are true for me. This is the witness of the Holy Spirit to my spirit. If as you hear my voice in this moment, there is no second voice within your heart applying these truths to you, giving you the comfort and consolation of your steadfast hope in Christ, then you may seriously question whether your sins have been placed upon the Lord Jesus Christ and whether you are free forever.

But if that voice is there speaking at times in tones of yearning love, at times in tones of grief when we wander, but always in tones of encouragement and assurance, then you do not need the confirmation of my voice to tell you that you have been made a partaker of the divine nature. Your heart sings with John's heart in the last lines of his first epistle. And we know that the son of God is come and hath given us an understanding that we may know him that is true. And we are in him that is true even in his son Jesus Christ.

That's 1 John 5:20. And did you catch the emphasis? For we read therein if we leave out half the verse and telescope it, and we know that he has given us an understanding that we may know. Yes, not only do we know but we know that we know. That's what the passage teaches. But in the third place, and this is the most practical of the three, we can know that we are saved because we see the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives bringing us to the place where we become doers of the law.

Let this word scorch the hearts of those who pride themselves on being fundamental in their doctrines but who are unregenerate in their living. If your heart does not overflow with the love of Christ, not only for the lost in China but for those who are forced to live with you in your house and in your daily activities, then you should question your salvation and give diligence to make your calling and election sure. If in the battle between the flesh and the spirit, the lusting of the flesh always wins over the lusting of the spirit and you live a constantly defeated life, then you should bring the whole question of your salvation to careful study to find whether the root of the matter is really within you.

You are a hearer of the law. We will grant that. You may even have gone to a Bible institute and have all the doctrines on the tip of your tongue. Nevertheless, our text comes as a challenge to your indifferent living. Not the hearers of the law are just before God but the doers of the law shall be justified. And you are not allowed to bring a verse or two on justification to contradict the great demand for holiness that runs like a golden thread through the whole of the Bible. It should go without saying that I believe and teach that the red strand of the blood runs through all of the scripture providing the only basis for our acceptance in the beloved Savior and our being accounted righteous in him.

We know too and have always taught that the only way whereby that righteousness may be imputed to our account is faith apart from human works. But we will not because we cannot in faithfulness to the scriptures allow the red strand, precious and essential as it is, to cause us to lose sight of the golden strand concerning practical experimental holiness. There are many men in the Bible who, though sons of Adam and partakers of his fallen nature, were yet looked upon as being masters of practical holiness. Enoch walked with God. David became a man after God's own heart.

Job was looked upon as a man who was perfect and upright and one that feared God and eschewed evil. Zacharias and Elizabeth, the parents of John the Baptist, were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. Paul was able within the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to say that touching the righteousness which is in the law, he was blameless. None of these people were justified by what they were or by what they did. The ground of their acceptance was Christ and Christ alone. But our text teaches that only such as they are accepted before God.

When we come to the eighth chapter, we shall see that the demands of the law could never be fulfilled in the life of an unsaved man. To suggest such a thing is to talk of putting all of the ocean into a quart cup. But what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit.

The ocean cannot be put into the quart cup of our adamite nature, but God gives us a new nature capable of taking in the ocean of his holiness. That is the truth which is everywhere taught in the Bible. When the baby Jesus was born into this world, they gave him the name of Jesus which means Savior because he was to perform a work of salvation. It does not say thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people in their sins, but it does say thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.

This is the truth of salvation and it is a glorious truth. You need not wallow after you are saved. There is power in the blood of Jesus Christ after he has saved you to make you pure in your whole being. It was this truth that set Wesley to singing, oh, for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer's praise, the glories of my God and King, the triumphs of his grace. And then he went on in another one of the verses of that hymn to say, he breaks the power of reigning sin. He sets the prisoner free.

His blood can make the foulest clean. His blood avails for me. May God help us to yield to the Holy Spirit's inventory of our hearts. May we be willing to see ourselves as he sees us. If you have trusted in your works for salvation, realize the futility of this and flee to the lamb for the cleansing of his blood. If you've come to Christ as Savior, do not trust in any work that leaves you in the thralldom of your sin. Live in the word so that the Holy Spirit may develop the life of holiness within you, being confident of this very thing that he which hath begun a good work in you will keep on perfecting it until the day of Jesus Christ.

And our God and Father, we pray thee that thou shalt take the truth to each heart in this hour. We ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Guest (Male): Hearing and reading the word of God are only beneficial if they lead to obeying the word of God. We must diligently read and study the Bible, believe it, and act on it. We hope you've benefited from today's message by Dr. Barnhouse entitled not hearers but doers. You can listen to additional Bible teaching by the late Dr. Donald Gray Barnhouse anytime, anywhere around the globe via the internet by visiting the alliance of confessing evangelicals website at alliancenet.org. An audio copy of today's teaching is available by calling us toll free at 1-800-488-1888. Today's message again is entitled not hearers but doers.

Or simply request message number R2-8. We would also like to make available to you a free copy of Dr. Barnhouse's booklet entitled Promises to Live By. We have all been disappointed by people who have let us down or have not kept their word to us, but God is always faithful to his word and to his promises. In this free booklet, Dr. Barnhouse shares glorious and unshakable promises from the word of God that will give you strength in any situation in life. Living by the shaky principles of the world will lead to confusion and despair. If you want to build your life on the strong, sure foundation of the promises of God, ask for your free copy of Promises to Live By when you call or write.

Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is a radio ministry of the alliance of confessing evangelicals headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The alliance of confessing evangelicals exists to promote a biblical understanding and worldview. Drawing upon the insight and wisdom of reformation theologians from decades and even centuries gone by, we seek to provide contemporary Christian teaching materials which will equip believers to understand and meet the challenges and opportunities of our time and place. Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible comes to you through the generous gifts of our listeners. If you have benefited from this broadcast and would like it to continue, please prayerfully consider a donation to help us keep this ministry on the air.

For more information or to make a contribution to support and further our work, contact us by writing alliance of confessing evangelicals, box 2000, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103. Call toll free 1-800-488-1888 or visit us online at www.alliancenet.org. Be sure and ask for a free updated resource catalog featuring books, audio teachings, commentaries, booklets, daily devotionals, videos, and a wealth of other materials from outstanding reformed teachers and theologians including Donald Gray Barnhouse, James Montgomery Boice, Michael Horton, and Martin Lloyd Jones. Then be sure and join us again next time for more classic teaching on Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible.