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: If for any reason a man thinks that something is unclean, he must then abstain from it. For if he thinks it to be unclean and eats it, he has defiled himself before God. But if he knows it to be clean, as Paul knew and was persuaded in the divine wonder of supernatural knowledge from God by the Holy Spirit and through divine revelation, then he is clear before God.

Now, take this out of history and theology and apply it to your own existence. Have you entered into redemption that God has provided in Christ? If you have entered into that redemption, have you thrown away the chains which he sundered? Or are you still carrying the severed links so that they cut your flesh and weigh you down and hold you back?

God calls you into the freedom of Christ. The chains are broken. Do not be subservient to ritual, form, ceremony, diet, ordinances, codes, regulations, and such like. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Know this and be persuaded of it in the persuasion that is in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Guest (Male): Over a half 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 will be featuring on today’s edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is entitled “Persuaded by Christ.” King Agrippa uttered some of the most tragic words in scripture when he said to the apostle Paul, “You almost persuade me to become a Christian.” To almost be a Christian is to be no Christian at all.

The love of Jesus Christ and the knowledge of his redemptive work on our behalf persuades us to commit every area of our lives to him. In every decision and action, no matter how great or small, we must be fully persuaded that we are yielding ourselves to Jesus Christ in faithful obedience and submission. The scripture text for this edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible: Romans chapter 14 and verse 14. Here again is Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse with a message entitled “Persuaded by Christ.”

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: Through the Lord Jesus Christ we come unto thee, our Father and our God, and in the Holy Spirit. We ask thee to bless the word as it goes forth, that thou wilt bring it in power, in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance to the hearts of the listeners, that each may be blessed of thee. Keep us close to thyself that men may see in us thy life and so glorify thee, our Father which art in heaven. We ask it in the name and for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Our text today is in Romans 14:14: “I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. But it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.” In our study, we find Paul now returning to the question that had drawn forth the teaching in the earlier verses of this chapter: the question of diet. There were those in the early church who wished to follow the Mosaic law concerning clean and unclean foods.

Just as the whole thrust of the epistle to the Galatians was against the carryover of religious circumcision into the New Testament church, so the whole thrust of the present passage is against the error of legalism in matters of diet, among other things. The Christian is not bound by any law whatsoever in connection with eating.

This was completely decided by the first church council when the apostles met to fulfill Christ’s great promise: “Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” We must be very careful to see that this famous phrase, as many Greek scholars have pointed out, can refer only to things and in no wise to persons.

It cannot refer to loosing a man from an oath or binding him to one. It cannot refer to loosing a man from his sins or binding them onto him. It refers only to things and practices. The first church council, recorded in the 15th of Acts, decided that all the ceremonies and practices that had been required of the children of Israel were loosed, and that they were free from henceforth to yoke an ox and an ass together, to wear clothing made of mingled wool and linen, and eat any food—excepting animals that had been strangled and blood.

The reason for this last is set forth in Leviticus: “The life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement by reason of the life.” In passing, let me point out that the Revised Standard Version is justified, if for no other reason than its rendering of this verse. This is a greatly improved translation.

Because of all that the church council had decided, Paul could say positively, “I know that nothing is unclean in itself.” And because he had the revelation of God, he could be persuaded of the Lord Jesus and be sure on both intellectual and spiritual and divine grounds that the truth he was teaching was veritably the truth from God. Oh, it’s wonderful to be able to say, “I know and am persuaded.”

Many people have a great deal of information without having much knowledge because they think it possible to learn the great truths of God in the same manner that they learn the facts of the arts and sciences. This is not true. If a man wishes to become a physicist, he must lay a deep foundation in mathematics and then proceed to the basic principles of physics. After much reading and much learning, he becomes educated in the science of physics.

But when a man seeks to know God and the things of God, this method does not work. Such a man may study languages and philosophy; he may know church history and the principles of ethics. But to know God and his ways, he must be as submissive as a child. He must surrender to the Lord, who said, “Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart.” There is no other path to spiritual knowledge.

At this point, I want to present a magnificent quotation from Martin Luther. If he has emerged frequently in my recent messages, it’s because I have rediscovered much of his writings and have spent hundreds of hours with him in parts of his works that I had never read before. He no doubt reveled in this phrase of our text: “I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus.”

In his introduction to the first section of his German works, he wrote in 1539: “I want to show you how to study theology in the right way. I have practiced this method myself. If you observe it, you will become so learned that if it were necessary, you yourself would be able to write books that would be just as good as those of the fathers and the councils. I too may presume to say in God, and to glory without boasting and lying, that I should not rank much lower than some of the fathers when it comes to writing books. I am far from being able to glory in a life that is equal to theirs.”

Guest (Male): The method of which I am speaking is one which the holy King David teaches in Psalm 119. No doubt all patriarchs and prophets adhered to it also. Here you will find three rules. They are frequently proposed throughout the psalm and run thus: *Oratio*, *Meditatio*, and *Tentatio*—prayer, meditation, and testing.

First, you should know that Holy Scripture is a book which turns the wisdom of all other books into folly because no book teaches of eternal life except this one alone. Therefore, you should completely despair of your own sense and reason. For by these, you will not attain the goal. Rather, by the presumption of their use, you will hurl yourself and others with you from heaven into the abyss of hell, as happened to Lucifer.

Rather, kneel down in your private little room and, with sincere humility and earnestness, pray God through his dear Son graciously to grant you his Holy Spirit to enlighten and guide you and give you understanding. As you see, David constantly prays in the psalm mentioned above: “Teach me, Lord. Instruct me. Lead me. Show me.”

He uses many more words of this nature, although he knew the text of Moses well and that of the other books besides, and he heard and read them daily. Yet he desires to have the real master of scripture, the Holy Spirit, in order by all means to make sure that he does not plunge into it with his reason and become his own master. For this method—that is, the method of self-exaltation—produces separatist spirits who imagine the scripture is subject to them and easily attainable by their reason, as though it were Aesop’s fables, for the understanding of which they require no Holy Spirit and no prayer.

Secondly, you should meditate. This means that not only in your heart but also externally, you should constantly handle and compare, read and re-read the word as preached and the very words as written in scripture, diligently noting and meditating on what the Holy Spirit means. Moreover, be careful that you do not become surfeited and get the notion that, having read, heard, and repeated it once or twice, you’ve done enough and understand everything completely. For this will never produce any extraordinary theologian, but men who are as untimely fruit that drops to the ground before it becomes half ripe.

Therefore, you observe how in this psalm David always says that he will speak, think, talk, hear, read day and night constantly, but about nothing else than God’s word. For God wants to give you his Spirit only through his external word. Be guided by this, for he has not issued the command in vain to write, preach, read, hear, sing, and say, et cetera.

Thirdly, there is the testing. This is the touchstone. It teaches you not only to know and to understand, but also to experience how right, how true, how sweet, how lovely, how mighty, how comforting God’s word is. It is wisdom over all wisdom. This is why you observe that in the psalm, David so often complains of all sorts of enemies, insolent princes or tyrants, about false spirits and sectarians whom he must endure because he is meditating—that is, because he is using God’s word in all manner of ways.

For as soon as God’s word becomes known through you, the devil will afflict you. He will make a real doctor of you and will teach you by his temptations to seek and to love God’s word. And thus you have David’s rule. If you study according to this example, you will also sing and glory with him in the words of this psalm: “The law of thy mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver.”

And again, “Through thy commandments thou hast made me wiser than mine enemies, for they are ever with me. I have more understanding than my teachers, for thy testimonies are my meditations. I understand more than the ancients because I keep thy precepts.”

Moreover, you will find out how flat and idle the books of the fathers and other writers will seem to you. And you will not only look down upon the books of the adversaries, but will also increasingly please yourself less by your own writing and teaching. After you’ve come to this point, confidently hope that you will have begun to become a real theologian who may teach not only the young, imperfect Christians, but also the progressing and mature ones. For the church of Christ embraces all kinds of Christians—young, old, weak, sick, sound, strong, alert, idle, stupid, wise, and so on.

But if you feel proud and imagine that you have certainly mastered your field and tickled at your own little book, your teaching and writing, as though you had done very splendidly and preached excellently; if, moreover, you are greatly pleased that people praise you before others, and you perhaps also want to be praised—otherwise you would grieve and quit, my friend—if you are of this sort, then take hold of your own ears. And if you grab right, you’ll find a beautiful pair of great, long, hairy donkey’s ears.

In that case, do undertake the expense of decorating them with golden bells so that people may hear you wherever you go, may point to you with their fingers and say, “Behold, there goes that fine animal which can write such excellent books and preach so splendidly.” Then you are blessed and super-blessed in the kingdom of that heaven. Yes, in that heaven where hellfire has been prepared for the devil and his angels.

Men may find honor and be arrogant elsewhere, but in this book—the Bible—all honor belongs to God alone. And this is the rule: God resisteth the proud but giveth grace unto the humble. To him be glory throughout the ages.

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: That’s the end of the Luther quotation. Oh, that each believer might come to the place where his knowledge and his full conviction rest on the divine simplicity of new life given to him through the new birth, and divine illumination imparted to him through the Holy Spirit’s opening the word of God.

“I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus,” says our text. “I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus.” It is the centrality of truth in Jesus Christ that makes a believer steadfast in true knowledge. We remember that the demons believe and shudder. It’s evident, therefore, that it’s not mere intellectual awareness that counts in the spiritual realm. There must be the enlightening of the mental faculties by the work of the Holy Spirit. God gives this enlightening in varying degrees.

Look, for example, at the difference in knowledge possessed by the man born blind and that possessed by Paul the apostle. The blind man in the 9th of John, when questioned by his neighbors after his cure and later by the Pharisees, was only aware that he had been the object of a miracle. He knew this and was persuaded of it. He knew nothing more. It was not necessary for him to know more.

He replied to his neighbors’ question: “The man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed and received my sight.” Now, that was about all that he knew. When they asked him where Jesus was, he could only reply, “I do not know.” When they asked him who Jesus was, he could dredge up nothing more than the general idea expressed by his partial answer: “He’s a prophet.”

When they repeated their questions, they added theological formulas. He hadn’t the remotest idea what the Pharisees were talking about. They indicated that Christ was no more than a man and that therefore he was a sinner, and that therefore he could not perform a miracle. The man simply replied, “Whether he’s a sinner I do not know. One thing I know, that though I was blind, now I see.”

Now, there will undoubtedly be many people in heaven with little more theological knowledge than this man possessed. I have preached to thousands of people who have come fresh out of paganism. I have met a minister who had been a cannibal and who had eaten human flesh as late as his 23rd year. Then the Lord saved him. This man grew in the faith and knew much more than the members of his congregation. They were a tribe that did not yet have the Old Testament in their language.

It is more than probable that hundreds of these believers lived and died without ever hearing of the Ten Commandments. They knew nothing of Moses. They may have heard a psalm or two. They knew little theology, but they did know the Lord Jesus Christ. A person’s faith may be better than his understanding of his faith.

Do not think that I’m decrying theology or denying the place of reason in its yieldedness to the working of the Lord. We are at present noting the difference in the degree of knowledge held by someone like this former blind man and that held by someone like the apostle Paul. The blind man was called by God for a certain purpose. He was not to be a channel of divine revelation or the author of a New Testament epistle. He was to be touched by the power of God and brought out of blindness into full sight. He’s never mentioned again after this incident in the Gospel of John.

We shall meet him in heaven, as we shall meet millions of other nameless believers who have lived and died on their small edge of the stage of history. He was healed. And there’s no reason to believe that he ever became literate or that he did anything more than live the life of a poor working man in ancient Jerusalem. This was all that God had called him to do and be. But he knew and was persuaded by the Lord Jesus to the full extent of the life to which God had called him.

Now, the spotlight that flooded Paul on his sector of the stage was intensely brighter than that which falls on most mortals. He was called for a similar purpose, but on a far greater scale. He too had been blind, for he was born a member of the narrowest sect of the children of Israel. He tells us that he lived according to the rules of that narrowest of sects—that strictest party of his religion.

This means that he adhered to a religion of rules and ceremonies. His clothing was dictated for him by the law of God. The way he took his food and drink became more important than the food and drink itself. The ceremonial washings, even though sometimes no more than gestures, were more important than deeds of kindness and love. Everything that could possibly go into the mouth was classified as clean or unclean.

Paul knew and was persuaded in the law that many things were unclean. And now, there is an about-face. Yes, more than an about-face. He is even more firmly persuaded that he had been wrong than he formerly had been that he had been right. He now holds that there is absolutely nothing unclean in itself. He does not hold this as an opinion based on sanitary laws. He’s not thinking in terms of allergies or of calories. There was no thought of proteins and carbohydrates.

His knowledge and certainty are now the fruit of faith in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now that he knows Christ, he knows that regulations about food and drink, and observances of days and times and similar matters, are not of fundamental importance. What was the motive that affected this transformation of Paul? There can be no doubt that his new attitude was the outgrowth of the great liberty which he had found in Jesus Christ.

He writes to the Galatians, who were going through a similar battle between legalism and liberty, to avoid the practice that was the very sign and seal of the relationship that had existed between their fathers and the living God: the ceremony of religious circumcision. To them he writes, “Stand fast therefore in the liberty in which Christ has made you free, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”

Likewise, Paul here is telling the Romans that they are not to follow a religion of rules. Nothing is unclean in itself. A man can eat whatever he pleases and whenever he pleases. There is complete liberty. The only factor that need be considered is what a man really thinks about these things that he eats. If for any reason a man thinks that something is unclean, he must then abstain from it. For if he thinks it to be unclean and eats it, he has defiled himself before God.

But if he knows it to be clean, as Paul knew and was persuaded in the divine wonder of supernatural knowledge from God by the Holy Spirit and through divine revelation, then he is clear before God. Now, take this out of history and theology and apply it to your own existence. Have you entered into redemption that God has provided in Christ? If you have entered into that redemption, have you thrown away the chains which he sundered?

Or are you still carrying the severed links so that they cut your flesh and weigh you down and hold you back? God calls you into the freedom of Christ. The chains are broken. Throw them away. Do not be subservient to ritual, form, ceremony, diet, ordinances, codes, regulations, and such like. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Know this and be persuaded of it in the persuasion that is in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And our God, we pray thee that each individual believer may know that Christ has cut the bonds that bound us into the slavery of rules and laws, and has made it possible for us to live in such a manner that the Holy Spirit fills all our life and moves us in the direction of honoring thee because thou art love and thou dost come to possess our being. We ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Guest (Male): In every decision and in every area of life, no matter how great or small, we must be fully persuaded that we are thinking and acting in complete submission to the Lord Jesus Christ. We hope you have benefited from today’s message entitled “Persuaded by Christ.” To listen to additional Bible teaching by Dr. Barnhouse, visit us online at alliancenet.org.

An audio copy of today’s teaching is also available by calling us toll-free: 1-800-488-1888. Today’s message again is entitled “Persuaded by Christ,” or simply request message number R14-27. We would also like to place in your hands our free booklet entitled *How the Holy Spirit Relates to You*. For many Christians, the Holy Spirit remains the most mysterious and misunderstood member of the Trinity.

Controversial and contradictory teachings about his person and work further cloud the issue. This free booklet cuts through the confusion with clear biblical truth. You will take a significant leap toward spiritual maturity when you understand who the Holy Spirit is and how he works in the life of a believer. Ask for your free copy of *How the Holy Spirit Relates to You* when you call or write.

Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is a radio ministry of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. We exist 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 which will equip believers to understand and meet the challenges and opportunities of our time and place.

We also produce the radio broadcast *The Bible Study Hour*, featuring the teachings of the late Dr. James Montgomery Boice, and *Every Last Word*, featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Philip Graham Ryken. For a full list of radio stations carrying our programs, visit our website at alliancenet.org. Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is able to remain on the air through generous gifts of listeners like you.

If you have benefited from the program 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 help further our work, contact us by calling toll-free: 1-800-488-1888. Write to us at Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Box 2000, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103. Visit us online at alliancenet.org. Remember to request a free resource catalog featuring books, audio teachings, commentaries, booklets, videos, and a wealth of other materials from outstanding Reformed teachers and theologians, including Drs. Donald Grey Barnhouse, James Montgomery Boice, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, and Philip Graham Ryken. Thanks for listening. Join us again for more classic teaching on Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible.