Gospel sword thrusts

Contents

I. God.7

II. The Everlasting Trinity ... 16

III. The Threefold Program of the

II

“ There is but one God .”— i Corinthians 8:6.

“ Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.”— Matthew 28:19.

B ELIEF in the existence of God is universal. You may say the Scriptures presuppose and assume the existence of God. It would be much more logical and truthful to say they recog¬ nize the innate, constitutional, universal knowledge of the existence of God. The Scriptures do not try to prove the existence of God. That marvelous fact is self-convincing. It is impossible for any one who thinks and reasons to deny the existence of God. It is stated in Holy Writ, “ The fool hath said in his heart there is no God.” There is not a human being in the world, regardless of his status being high or low, who hasn’t the inner conscious¬ ness of the existence of God.

Admitting the existence of God, you are con¬ fronted with the fact that belief in God involves more than merely accepting the fact of His exist¬ ence. Belief in God involves belief in Jesus Christ. Belief in God and in Christ compels belief in the Holy Ghost. Therefore, you are face to face with God, Christ and the Holy Ghost. In addition, you 16 cannot believe in the members of the Trinity with¬ out believing in divine revelation. Revelation is absolutely necessary. It may be said without fear of contradiction that revelation is infallible. Reve¬ lation is in the nature of God. When you think of. God you are compelled to admit revelation. Reve¬ lation is in the decree of God, because in the nature of God, not only revelation through creation, but through divine, specific, plenary revelation. In the necessity of the case the Bible had to come, because God’s relationship to the members of the Trinity, and the Trinity’s relationship to Him could not be revealed in any other way.

It is beyond possibility for one to separate these four great facts: God, Christ, the Holy Ghost, Divine Revelation—God’s infallible Book. If you discard the Father you cannot have the Son. If you discard the Son, you cannot have the Holy Ghost. If you discard the Holy Ghost and the Son, you cannot have the Scriptures. Therefore, the Scriptures do not assume the existence of God, but the Scriptures are in the very nature of the case, infallible proofs of the existence of God, and are incapable of separation from God.

In the study of God, you first consider the per¬ sonality of God. When you begin to study the personality of God you will be compelled to refute the false teachings of all ages. Pantheism im¬ mediately rears its head. It states that God is all, and all is God. Such a doctrine, of course, strikes at the personality of God, denies His creative power, eliminates Christ, and repudiates the Holy Ghost. Such a doctrine is blasphemous, and out of it have emerged all of the cults—Hindu philosophy, pagan evaporations, and every mod¬ ern form of so-called ethical yet faith-destroying organizations.

Careful reasoning forces one in viewing creation to admit a designing personality. Divine revela¬ tion teaches, not only the personality of God, but also the personalities of the Trinity. It is impos¬ sible to think of God without admitting and think¬ ing of the personality of God. It is impossible to logically think of God without personality. If God could exist without personality, then He would be an object for hatred rather than love. Cursed be the pantheistic idea of God. Any one, it seems to me, with common sense and with a soul retain¬ ing a spark of life, would hate a pantheistic God. In studying both creation and revelation you are forced to the conclusion that God is the Creator. In the face of this inevitable conclusion the false teachers speak of the great things, the dynamic force, and the first cause. In so doing they are eliminating the personality of God. If you de¬ stroy belief in God’s personality and creative power you must destroy the human soul. It could not have come into existence in any way except through the creative act of God. The human soul could not exist if God’s personality be not a fact, and if His creative act did not bring it into existence.

In the book of beginnings it is said “ Let us” That is not a mistranslation; it is not a mistaken use of words; the writer did not ignorantly use the plural for the singular. He wrote exactly what God dictated. God said, “ Let us make man in our image.” Who constitutes the “ us ” ? What is the “ image ”?

Again, God uses the same words when He speaks of destroying man’s efforts to build the Tower of Babel. The Word says, “ Let us go down and there confound their language that they may not understand one another’s speech.”

The Scriptures state that “ in the beginning was the Word ”—co-equal, coeval, eternal. Yet God says that He is the Father, and Christ the Son. Christ in His Incarnate form stood before the world exhibiting the personality of God. Behind Christ was the personality of the Father. The Scriptures also speak of the personality of the Holy Ghost. To deny the personality of the Holy Ghost is to utter blasphemy. Christ speaks of Him as a person. We are told not to grieve the Holy Spirit not to quench the Holy Spirit, not to lie to the Holy Spirit. You cannot grieve, nor quench, nor lie to an impersonal thing. Ananias was stricken be¬ cause he lied to the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost could not have done anything else than strike Ananias dead for the lie he had told, because his effort to lie to the Holy Ghost when brought face to face with the Third Person of the Trinity was in the nature of a blasphemous denial of His personality and of His right to know all about the transaction under consideration. There was nothing else for the Holy Ghost to do but to strike, and in that way, and through the death of Ananias, the personality, and power, and sovereignty of the Holy Ghost were established beyond question. It was an indispensable act of the Holy Ghost. It was perfectly logical.

These facts present to us the great doctrine of the Trinity. In thinking of the Trinity do not fall into the error of some who state there are three persons—three in one and one in three. The Scriptures do not teach that doctrine. The Bible teaches that there is one Being in three Persons— the eternal, everlasting, self-existent, self-created God, equal in power, substance, personality, and character. When God said, “ Let us make man,” He also continued in presenting the co-operating Trinity, and later in the Scriptures stated, “ Let us save man.”

In the sixteenth and seventeenth verses of the fourteenth chapter of John you find an epitome of all the verses that might be quoted on the subject. Christ says: “ And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever.” In the council of the Trinity God said: “I will send my Son that He may die that man may be saved.” “ Let us make,” “ Let us save,” “ Let us comfort,” “ Let us gather unto ourselves.” Christ said, “ Father, thou gavest them,” “ I have kept them,” “ I will bring them,” “ I will come for them that where I am there they may be for ever.” “ Let us make, let us save, let us comfort, let us gather, let us dwell together for ever.”

The doctrine of the Trinity is the most practical doctrine in the Bible. It is essential; k is impera¬ tive ; because we find that sin means that the law of God has been violated. Only the fool denies the existence of God, and only the fool denies the ex¬ istence of sin. Sin is the violation of God’s law, the non-conformity to God’s will, rebellion against God’s authority, the denial of God’s personality, the refusal to accept God as the sovereign to whom every knee shall bow. Sin is a stubborn fact. How are you going to get rid of it? If it is a violation of God’s law, who is to satisfy the law? Who is to save the sinner? Who is to pardon the criminal? How is pardon to be brought about?

You cannot answer these questions. If the Trinity does not exist, if God’s personality is not a fact, if Christ is not the eternal Son of God, if the Holy Ghost is not the Third Person of the Trinity, then these questions cannot be answered. You cannot solve the problem of man’s responsibility and accountability to God except through pardon. The sinner cannot pay his debt to law, to society, to God. The very nature of the case demands an intermediary. A bankrupt cannot pay; a dead man cannot pay a debt. Therefore you must put super¬ natural power into the man if you are going to solve the problem of sin; or, you must admit the existence of the supernatural, Triune God if you are going to establish pardon for the sinner. If the Trinity does not exist, then salvation is im¬ possible. Pardon must be preceded by propitiation. Pardon is not conditioned upon the merit of the criminal, but upon the merit of an intermediary who has satisfied the law for the criminal. God cannot pardon the sinner unless His pardoning act is preceded by the propitiating act satisfying the law of God. Law cannot be merciful, law cannot be lenient, law cannot be forgiving. Law has but one end—justice. Therefore, in the work of sal¬ vation the Holy Trinity is involved. Propitiation must precede pardon. The propitiating act must be a supernatural act by a supernatural member of the Trinity. Therefore propitiation must be of God, through Christ. Pardon must be by Al¬ mighty God, propitiation must be by Christ, re¬ generation must be by the Holy Ghost.

The Scriptures plainly teach that the sovereign God exists in three Persons; that the eternal Trin¬ ity is in the very nature of God essential in order that salvation may be effective. God the Father, God the Son, co-equal with the Father, standing as the Mediator between God and man, making propitiation for the sins of man, furnishing the ground on which God offers pardon to a lost soul; God the Holy Ghost must perform the regener¬ ating act.

The doctrine of the Trinity is not an abstract doctrine—a mere theological discussion—it is a necessity. It is the most precious doctrine. There¬ fore if one denies the Trinity he blasphemes God. If he denies the Holy Ghost, His existence, His power and His personality and His work, he com¬ mits the unpardonable sin. He who rejects the deity of the second paraclete, the Holy Ghost, is beyond the power of God to save.

The vicarious sacrifice of Christ makes it pos¬ sible for God to pardon. The Holy Ghost applies the blood of Jesus Christ and regenerates, creates the soul a new creature in Christ Jesus, and bap¬ tizes it into the body of Christ. Therefore the doctrine of the Trinity, the fact of the Trinity, the glorious experience of the Trinity are to the sinner more precious than all other facts.

Because of these facts the forces of evil are making their attacks upon the members of the Trinity. They attack the deity of Christ because in doing so they are repudiating God. If belief in the deity of Christ can be destroyed, then they have successfully attacked the Trinity. If Christ is not God, there is no Trinity. If the Trinity does not exist there are no infallible Scriptures. They know these facts as thoroughly as you understand them. If they can break down belief in Christ and His vicarious atonement, then they can set up the doctrine of evolution, of environment, of re¬ demption through character or any other subter¬ fuge for salvation. You can see the importance of Christ to the whole doctrine of the Trinity. You cannot separate the members of the Trinity. You cannot accept God and reject the other members of the Trinity because they are inseparable. Christ said, “ I and my Father are one.” He further¬ more stated that mere belief in God and His exist¬ ence was not sufficient. “ Let not your heart be troubled, ye believe in God, believe also in me.” You cannot accept Christ and reject the Holy Ghost, because Christ and the Holy Ghost are equal. You cannot have regeneration if the Holy Ghost does not exist. Christ furnishes the blood, the Holy Ghost applies and regenerates.

When at last, in that heavenly home, you stand before Christ clothed in the corporate body in which He arose from the dead and ascended into heaven, you will then and there see God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost in the person of Jesus Christ.

You cannot reject Christ and be saved. You cannot repudiate the Holy Ghost and be regener¬ ated. You cannot disbelieve in Christ and in the Holy Ghost and be pardoned. There is no salva¬ tion outside of the Trinity. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou art saved, because in that act of belief God pardons, Jesus Christ redeems, and the Holy Ghost regenerates. All three mem¬ bers of the one sovereign God, performing their respective parts brings the new soul into existence as a new creature in Christ Jesus.

Will you accept Christ ? There is no other way by which the Triune God can save you if you refuse. Salvation is instantaneous, perfect and efficient if you do accept Him. Let me urge you to take Him as your Savior, make your public con¬ fession of Jesus Christ.

Ill

THE THREEFOLD PROGRAM OF THE TRINITY

“But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, what¬ soever I have said unto you .”— John 14:26.

I ASK you to carefully read, and study the four¬ teenth chapter of John. It is the most super¬ ficially read chapter in the Bible. As the key-verse I ask you to study the twenty-sixth. First of all, the chapter testifies to the existence of the Trinity. Secondly, it testifies to the unity of the Godhead. Thirdly, it testifies to the person¬ ality of the members of the Trinity. Fourthly, to the work, not only of the Trinity, working in uni¬ son, but also to the work performed by each mem¬ ber of the Trinity. Fifthly, its declaration that belief in the Trinity is essential. We hear so much about what is essential and what is not, it is well for us to listen to the standard authority—God's Word. Sixthly, the chapter testifies to the infalli¬ bility of the Scriptures. Seventhly, it testifies to the supreme work of the Trinity at the present time. These divisions will, perhaps, give you a superficial estimate of the scope of the chapter, and the key, the twenty-sixth verse, will enable you to unfold the chapter.

There are three divisions in the three-fold pro¬ gram of the Trinity—the program for today, the program for tomorrow, and the program for the future. In other words, what the Trinity is doing now, and will continue to do until the Rapture; what the Trinity will do after the Rapture, be¬ tween the period of the Rapture and the end of the Millennium; and, what after the end of the Mil¬ lennium and throughout eternity.

I come, first, to the program of today. But first permit me to tell you of some of the things God is not doing, so that you may distinguish between the false teaching so rampant today, and the true Gospel.

I. God is not creating anything. The period of creation ended some time ago. God is not in the business of making worlds, of creating species, of bringing new life into existence. God finished the work of creation and rested from His labors. Not that God ceased to work; but He ceased to do that kind of work is the statement of Holy Writ.

II. God is not writing new revelations. The Book of Revelation is closed. There has not been a line added to the Scripture, nor a new sentence revealed by the Holy Ghost since the inspired record was finished. Nor will God ever make an¬ other revelation, either in this or the two succeeding periods. God has thrown away His pen; He has ceased to write; there are no more manu¬ scripts to be prepared by Him.

III. God is doing but one thing today, namely, saving souls. That is all He is doing, all He is going to do. That is now His supreme business.

There are three supernatural Persons—the three Persons of the Trinity—engaged in this work. They are the supreme architects of the soul in its origination. They are the redeemers of the soul, the life and the body. They have prepared a home, and a state of labor, progress and development in that everlasting home.

This chapter (fourteenth chapter of John) teaches that belief in the Trinity is essential, and it also reveals that the whole truth of that state¬ ment revolves around Jesus Christ. In the opening sentence of it Jesus said, “Ye believe in God.” That is inevitable; you cannot avoid it; you cannot escape it. There is only one way for man to escape believing in the existence of God, and that is to be born a fool. When any man of normal intellect, and normal in every other way, says he does not believe in the existence of God, then he perjures himself; and, the very denial is proof of the ex¬ istence of God, for you cannot deny that which does not exist. But, Christ says, “ You believe in God for two other reasons, not because of His existence only, but because of His benevolence, and because of His love, and because of His provision for you.” Those are things coming out of the general providence of God, that everyone inherits because he is a human being.

But Christ states a more significant fact: “You believe in God, then you must believe in me, if you are going to have the benefits, the everlasting, saving benefits of the existence, mercy and love of God.” In other words, this wonderful chapter teaches that the love of God is suspended at a certain height above the individual, and the indi¬ vidual will never come into the benefits of that love other than those that general Providence bestows on both the wicked and the saved, such as life, air, light, sleep, opportunity, food. They have nothing to do with the salvation of man, have no relation¬ ship to the soul and should never be taken into con¬ sideration when talking about God’s work for the individual. The soul-saving power of God is sus¬ pended above the individual, and there is no way by which the connection can be made between God and the individual except through the Medi¬ ator, Christ. Christ says, “You will never be connected with God unless that connection is made through Me. You believe in God; there¬ fore, if the existence, the love, the power, the mercy, the goodness and the saving qualities of God are to be yours, they are to come from God, through Me, administered by Me, and distributed by Me.”

He states another fact: “ I am going away. I am going back to the Father; but, I am not going to leave you without a representative—a Com¬ forter.” There are three definitions for the word “ Comforter.” First, as one great branch of the Church says, “ The second Paraclete,” simply. Comforter. The second is “ Teacher.” The third, “ Advocate.” Fourth, or rather the first repeated, plain “ Comforter.”

I am talking, now, about what God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost are doing now. They are operating, not individually nor directly in their separate entity, but jointly through the Holy Ghost. In other words, the Father is not ignoring the other members of the Trinity in be¬ stowing benevolences. Jesus Christ is not ignoring the other members of the Trinity in saving souls. The Holy Ghost is the directly appointed executive of the Trinity in the world, doing the work of the Trinity in the salvation of souls. God does not speak to any one except through the Holy Ghost.

Let us take another step: The whole question of the deity of the Trinity, is centered in the deity of Christ. Jesus, the eternal Son of God, who is one with the Father, is God. And when you have admitted that, you have admitted the existence of the Trinity, the deity of the Trinity, and the work of the Trinity. That is the reason, the sole reason, why those who do not believe in Christ are attack¬ ing the Trinity. They have no reason to make an attack on the Trinity, except to break down Christ.

They have no reason to attack Christ except to destroy His deity. There is not a man on earth making an attack on Christ because He is a man; nor is there a man on earth denying the existence of the human Christ. There is not an infidel on earth, there is not a man sufficiently inane to deny the stubborn, irrefutable facts of history. There¬ fore, every one who makes an attack on Christ is making it in order to destroy belief in His deity. If He be God, the Trinity is God, and His vica¬ rious atonement is the established route back to God. There is no other way back to Him.

Now, what does Jesus say? He says, that the supreme business of the Trinity is to save the immortal soul. Think about that statement for a minute. What does it mean? If you can think in comprehensive terms of God, and if you can begin to think of Christ as God, and the Holy Ghost as God, and of the marvelous work God has done in creation—the marvelous and incom¬ prehensible things He has done—then you can see what it means for the members of the Trinity to make the saving of the soul their supreme business.

But, as you are a superficial listener, you say to me: “ Why doesn’t God pick man up and save him ? ” Because, God created him a free moral agent; he did not develop into it.

Had man developed into a free moral agent, God might have used some force on him. Had he evolved into a free moral agent God, perhaps.

would have used some other power. But God created him a free agent, and that is as much a part of the creative work of God as the world itself. Therefore, if God makes the agent free, God is not going to break the reed, though it may be bent with sin and covered with the slime and muck of the pit. That is the reason God does not pick him up—snatch him up—and ; save him.

God, the sovereign of the universe, expressed His love for a lost soul, not because the soul was lovely, nor because of its righteousness and obedi¬ ence, but, in spite of its unrighteousness and un¬ loveliness, and in spite of the fact that the soul was damned, God loved it.

What next? This love logically must find ex¬ pression. Why? Because God is holiness. The holiness of God stands first, His love second, and the expression thereof, third. That love of God had its expression in Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, who was with God, who was God, became flesh so that God’s love might have tangible, reach¬ able, approachable, corporate form. Some of you say: “Look on a beautiful world, that tells me that God loves me.” It does not tell any such thing, except in the general sense of the exercise of God’s general providence that made everything lovely for those He loved. But when you say: “Jesus Christ, who is God in the flesh, loves me; I can feel Him, touch Him, hear Him, talk to Him, and know how to approach Him,” you are saying something very definite, very much more definite. God the Father begat the Son because He loved the sinner, and He sent the Son into the world for the sake of the sinner. The Son, the second Person of the Trinity, acquiescing, came and died because the sinner's death put out the candle. But Christ’s death lit the stars and made the path eternally bright and followable so that the benighted soul might come back to God.

Christ said, “ God and I are one, but God can pardon.” Remember, Jesus has never had the pardoning power. God has retained the pardoning power. Christ said, “ God cannot pardon unless there is propitiation. It is God’s province to pardon; it is mine to propitiate.” Working to¬ gether beautifully, aren’t they?

Here is God, in vicarious love, suspended above the lost, doomed and damned soul. God cannot, and will not directly make the connection. If the connection is made it must be made by the second Person of the Trinity, and when Jesus fills the gap between the suspended vicarious love of God, God cannot refuse nor withhold pardon from the soul with whom Christ has made the connection.

God is not acting directly in making the connec¬ tion. That is why Job spake of the talisman and the Psalmist of the propitiator. Christ spoke of the fact: “ No man cometh to the Father except by Me ”—that is, “ except I make the connecting link.”

Well, now, what has the Holy Ghost to do with all this ? Christ said, “ I have finished this work; I am going back to the Father, but I am not going to leave you comfortless.” Oh, how desolate and disconsolate the world would have been if Jesus had gone back and left it without some member of the Trinity! “ I will not leave you comfortless,” He said, but He did not say He was going to send the Comforter. What He did say was: “ I will ask the Father.” Why? Because the Father is the Provider; Christ is the Propitiator; the Holy Ghost the Comforter. God the Father, the Creator, the Lover; Christ the Executor; the Holy Ghost, the Regenerator.

Now, let us see what the Holy Ghost is doing. First of all, the Holy Ghost is doing the work of teaching. He is not the revealer, in the sense in which you speak of revelation. Frequently I hear people say: “ The Holy Ghost has revealed so and so to me.” The Holy Ghost has done no such thing. But Christ said, “The Holy Ghost will bring all things to your remembrance.” The Holy Ghost, since He took up His abode on earth as the executive of the Trinity, has not uttered one single new thought, nor revealed one single new thing to a soul on earth. Get that clearly. What does He say? He says that He will teach all things that Christ hath said and done. Do you notice where the dividing line comes in? In other words—here is the Bible. You know people everywhere are talking today about its proper interpretation.

There is no man on earth who possesses the right to interpret the Bible, in any other way except that which coincides with the Bible’s interpretation of itself. When any one undertakes an interpretation that is not clearly within the interpretation the Bible itself gives, he is outside the confines of his province and outside the range of his power. The Bible, itself, is God’s infallible Word, His everlast¬ ing standard that cannot be changed. You cannot amend it, subtract from it, nor add to it. It is the standard fixed by Almighty God. God made the standard, and sent the Third Person of the Trinity to be the Teacher thereof. The Bible is the stand¬ ard; the Holy Ghost is the Teacher; the Holy Ghost is the Advocate.

Advocate of what, of whom? Well, the Holy Ghost is in the world to advocate but one Person, namely, Jesus Christ. There is God the Father, with God the Son at His right hand conveying to the Father the things the Holy Ghost is doing and has done for you and for me—Christ presenting Himself and presenting His own blood and His own vicarious death to the Father as the ground on which the Father can rest pardon. Advocate! Propitiation—as the ground for redemption. What is the Holy Ghost doing? He is represent¬ ing Christ and advocating Him as the Son of God, to whom I should give my soul in trust, in order that I may be saved.

"The Holy Ghost is here as the Advocate of

Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, who vicariously died, and whose vicarious death is the means by which we can be saved. That is the work of the Ploly Ghost. Every man who has offered to him anything other than Jesus Christ, has that per¬ son, policy, program or cult submitted to him by an agent of Antichrist. Never lose sight of the fact that there are two advocates in the world. One is God, represented by the Third Person of the Trinity. The other is the agent of Antichrist, who is denying Christ and advocating everything else but Christ. Therefore, the Holy Ghost is here saying to you: “ Christ died for you. Let Him save you.” Satan, in the person of some one else, is saying, “ Oh, you don’t have to be saved through the blood of Jesus.” One is Antichrist, and the other is the Third Person of the Trinity. To whom are you going to listen ?