In liberalism, you lose the distinction between God and man. This is why liberalism tends to make the Christian life all about man and what he wants and less about God. You end up with a humanized God and a deified man. Man becomes the object of worship rather than God.
As we are introduced to a new character, Elihu, we first notice that he is full of zeal for God and his truth. So, what we can ask of this text and of ourselves is, where does this zeal come from?
Did Paul teach that doctrine was unimportant? Like Machen, we must compare the letter to the Philippians with the letter to the Galatians. Both letters were dealing with bad teachers. But Paul came down on one harder than the other. Did Jesus teach that doctrine was unimportant? He spent his entire ministry revealing who he was and the way of salvation. Every argument from Scripture that we could think of that would suggest that doctrine is unimportant to the Christian life, such as 1 Corinthian...
Job uses covenant language throughout chapter 31 in his final appeal. He declared that he had kept the terms of the covenant but he doesn't understand why he is suffering as if he sinned. Now, this foreshadows One who will indeed keep the terms of the covenant, perfectly, who will die in our stead. Let us hear the good news from Job.
Who is Jesus? This was and still is the most relevant question when trying to identify Christianity. Is Christianity just a lifestyle? Or is it a lifestyle founded on doctrine? Our Guest Preacher Rev. Danny Olinger brings the word of truth and what the Scriptures principally teach about who Jesus is and what that means for our Christian lives.
In Job's final speech (ch. 29-31), we have come to his lament, where he laments his present condition. He is like a man who is under the judgment of God, even though he is innocent. And what he has been through foreshadows one who was completely innocent. Sometimes the Christian will go through various trials, but through those trials God always has a good plan for his children.
The old saying, 'Doctrine divides but love unites,' is not true. Because once you ask the question, 'what is love?' The answer to that question is doctrine. Many have gone to the love verses of 1 Corinthians 13.1-13 to argue that doctrine is unimportant, which would be to miss the point entirely and how doctrine undergirded the whole passage. Doctrine is the foundation of Christian love and practice as it is laid out in all of the Bible, especially 1 Corinthians.
In this sermon, we will cover the last three of the six principles of Presbyterianism, as found in the famous work of Thomas Witherow, 'The Apostolic Church,' as drawn from Acts 13, 15, 16 and others. IV. Ordination is the acts of the Presbytery or a plurality of elders in the local church. V. The privilege of appeal to the assembly of elders and their right to govern in their corporate character. VI. Christ alone is the head of the church.
Before we get into chapter 2, I wanted to summarize what we have gone through so far in situating Machen historically, politically, and theologically. Where does the tradition of the OPC come from? Did we come from Revivalism? Or traditional and confessional Presbyterianism? In the Bible, is being born again just an experience? Or is it grounded in doctrine?
