What must I do to be saved?

According to the Pew Research Forum in 2017, 70% of Americans believe homosexuality should be accepted. That number jumped 19 percentage points in 11 years. In light of its growing acceptance in society, how should Christians respond to homosexuality?

We must not be afraid to call sin what it is. In Romans 1, Paul describes what happens when people reject God and instead pursue all manner of idols, including the idol of indulging the flesh. Ultimately, all sin is a rejection of God as God. We cannot condone, accept, or encourage anything God calls sin. This includes the practice of homosexuality, but it also includes gossip, pride, and rebellion against our parents. Let’s call all sin what it is – not just the sins that we see in others. Though we must identify sin, if we stop there, we stop short of the Gospel message.

We must believe in the powerful, transformative grace of God. Just as all sin is sin, so also God’s grace is big enough to free all people from whatever sins may ensnare them. The devil (and by proxy, the world) would have us believe some sins are inevitable because of our DNA or our circumstances. While both may play a role in what temptations appeal to us, God’s Word makes it clear that He can free us from the slavery of sin.

In 1 Corinthians 6:9–11, we see that people of all kinds of sinful backgrounds populated the Corinthian congregation. However, Paul says these Christians no longer embraced their past sinful identities because they were “washed…sanctified…[and] justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” We must believe God’s grace can change sinners of all stripes!

We must recognize that the answer to all sexual sin is a fulfilling relationship with God. It may be easy to think that the answer to sexual sin is sexual activity within the confines of a healthy, God approved marriage. Unfortunately, this is not true. Sexual sin is not a physical fulfillment problem; it is a heart problem. The only solution to this problem is a relationship with God that reorders the heart and will according to His will.

Paul offers this very instruction in 1 Corinthians 6:12–20. He teaches that the Christian is a member of Christ’s body, is joined to the Lord, is a temple of the Lord, and has been bought by Christ. These are all in contrast to sexual sin. The answer to the problem of sexual sin is joining oneself to Christ. When a person is joined to Christ, his or her life must become focused on using the body for God’s glory.

Only God can define sin. Only God can transform sinners into saints. Only God can satisfy our deepest needs. May we be people who stand for God’s truth and carry His grace to all people, for His glory.

Clay Leonard

Each of us has gone his own way.
                   —Isaiah 53:6

The apocryphal book Wisdom of Solomon alleges that God adapted manna to suit the taste of each Israelite (16:20–21)—an unlikely claim since they quickly became disgusted with manna (Nm 11:6).

However, it is true that God has an affinity for variety and individuality. No two blades of grass or two snowflakes are identical.

My twin cousins were labeled “identical twins”—like two peas in a pod. Looking at them, you couldn’t tell them apart. But no two peas in a pod are identical—nor were my cousins.

No two of us are alike. There is something distinctive in each person’s stride, voice, handwriting—and temptation.

The sin that entices me may be no temptation to you—and vice versa. God knows our individual weaknesses—and stands ready to meet our distinctive needs.

You are no clone. You are no duplicate.
You are a one and only.

pathwayco.com

We have given six studies on the use of “grace” (charis in Greek) in the NT (found 155 times). Let us now summarize what we have studied:

• God’s throne is characterized by grace (Heb. 4:16).
• The grace of God was on Jesus (Luke 2:40, 52), which shows His presence and blessings. God’s grace can be on others as well: Acts 2:46; 4:33; 6:8; 7:10, 46.
• Jesus spoke with words characterized by grace (Luke 4:22). We also ought to speak graciously (Gal. 4:29; Col. 4:6)
• Jesus embodied the grace of God (John 1:14, 17). He died for us by God’s grace (Heb. 2:9).
• God’s grace is offered to all men (Titus 2:11).
• Salvation is by the grace of God, which means we cannot and will never deserve it (Acts 15:11; Eph. 1:7; 2:5, 7-8; Titus 3:7).
• It is by God’s grace that He even offers the gospel message to us (Acts 18:27; Gal. 1:6; 2 Tim. 1:9).
• Spiritual blessings (including grace as it relates to salvation) are available to mankind only through Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 1:4).
• God’s grace teaches us to deny ungodliness (Titus 2:12).
• We are to continue in God’s grace (Acts 13:43), which means we must stick closely to what God commands in His gospel message (Acts 14:3; 20:24, 32; 1 Pet. 5:12; 2 Pet. 3:18). To understand the Gospel is to understand the grace of God (Col. 1:5-6).
• It is possible to receive God’s grace in vain if we don’t continue in it (2 Cor. 6:1; Gal. 5:4; Heb. 12:15). We cannot continue in sin so grace can “abound” (Rom. 6:2). It is not possible to turn God’s grace into a license to sin (Jude 4).
• It is a gift of grace to teach the gospel (1 Cor. 3:10; Gal. 3:7; Col. 1:7).
• Our giving is an act of grace (1 Cor. 16:3 and the ten times “grace” refers to our giving in 2 Corinthians 8 & 9).
• Various gifts have been given to us by God’s grace (Gal. 4:7; 1 Pet. 4:10).
• We are to sing graciously (Col. 3:16).
• By God’s grace, we can glorify the name of Christ (2 Thess. 1:12).
• “Hope” is by grace (2 Thess. 2:16; 1 Pet. 1:13).
• Grace can strengthen our hearts (Heb. 13:9).
• God’s grace blesses the humble (James 4:6; 1 Pet. 5:5).

I hope this study has been encouraging and enlightening. May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with you all (Rev. 22:21).

Paul Holland

The inspired Scriptures warn us about holding too high an opinion of one’s self.  Note: “For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think . . .”  (Romans 12:3)

With this warning in mind, a few observations seem appropriate:

1. There has been much emphasis in recent years on the need to elevate self-esteem.  It is claimed that a variety of personal issues ranging from abusive relationships to weight problems are all linked to low self-esteem.  Fix this, and many of the problems will go away, or so we’re told.  Yet God’s Word indicates just the opposite – that man’s problems are most often associated with thinking too highly of himself.  While admitting that there are some cases of unnatural and destructively low self-esteem, it seems clear that the real danger for most of us is in an already too high opinion of self.  In fact, all the warnings of God’s Word are about the danger of high self-esteem, not low self-esteem.  Address this problem and many of our other issues will melt away.
2. Too high self-esteem is manifested in a compulsive attention to ‘ME’.  When we think too highly of self we are constantly worried that MY needs are not being met, MY interests, MY concerns, MY opinions aren’t being attended to like I think they should be, etc.  Selfishness is the root of many troubles, and the modern self-esteem movement has amplified this significantly.
3. High self-esteem prevents us from developing the humble heart of a servant that God so much desires in us.  Our Lord said: “Whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant” (Matt. 20:26-27).

– by Greg Gwin

This question relates to the “P” of calvinism. Calvinism is a system of doctrine named after the teachings of John Calvin. The “P” in Calvinism is a part of the acronym: TULIP, which is popularly used to remember these five tenets of calvinism. The “P” stands for Perseverance of the Saints.

In brief, the perseverance of the saints is the idea that after a person is saved he cannot be lost. Several denominations adhere to Calvinism and the “P” of Calvinism in particular. Our question is: Does the Bible teach this doctrine?

First, understand that it is right for us to ask such a question. Christians are to, “Test the spirits to see whether they are of God” (1 Jn. 4:1), as the noble Bereans did (Acts 17:11), and “hold fast what is good” (1 Thess. 5:21).

In John 10:27-29 Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”

This passage (as well as others) are often used to support the notion that Christians cannot cease to be saved. Important to note here is the tense of two verbs Jesus uses. In verse 27 He says, “My sheep hear my voice.” This denotes a continued or sustained hearing. The same is true with the word follow. It is not, “follow Jesus for a moment,” but follow Jesus from now on. Jesus wants sustained commitment and faithfulness.

Also noteworthy here is that the Lord is emphasizing that no power is great enough to snatch away His sheep from the Father. Jesus is teaching that His followers cannot be forcibly removed from fellowship with God. Paul likewise says that there is no power of any sort that can separate us from the love of God (see also Rom. 8:31-39). He doesn’t say that we can’t walk away from Him.

Other passages could be noted but let’s take a moment to see what the Scripture directly reveals about this subject matter.

1. In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul is instructing the church to withdraw fellowship from a brother who is living immorally. Notice why… Verses 4-5 says: “When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus, you are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.” Paul says that objective of withdrawing fellowship from this brother is that he might be saved! We can safely conclude that this brother was lost otherwise there would be no reason for him to be saved.
2. Peter says in 2 Peter 2:20-21 – “For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them.”

Two things are obvious here: First, the people spoken of were saved. Second, what they became was worse than what they originally were. What were they? They were lost in their sin before they obeyed the Gospel (see 2 Thess. 1:8-9). Peter actually teaches it will be worse for such people than for those who never knew Christ.

1. Notice just a few verses from the book of the Bible that speaks more than any other about the possibility of apostasy. Hebrews 2:3 says, “how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation…” Hebrews 3:12 – “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.” Hebrews 4:1 – “Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.”

How many times does the Lord need to indicate that Christians can indeed fall away from the Lord? One, right? Just one statement would do. Let’s end with this one penned by the apostle Paul. He writes to the Christians in Galatia, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace” (Gal. 5:4).

Can one fall away from the Lord and His amazing grace? Paul says he can. This is why the Hebrew writer admonished Christians then and now to, “Hold fast” (see 3:6; 4:14; 10:23). My brothers, faithfulness to the Lord is so important that our Lord urged the Christians at Smyrna to be faithful even if it would cost them their lives (see Rev. 2:10). If we will remain faithful, we also will receive the crown of life!

Daren Schroeder

Perhaps no one was more acquainted with frequent threats to his life than King David. King Saul tried to kill him several times to prevent him from becoming king. In 2 Samuel 15, his own son, Absalom, attempted to stage a coup against him. 2 Samuel 15:30 describes David in a pitiable state. It’s in this setting that David wrote Psalm 3. In his prayer in Psalm 3, David provides an example of the believer’s response to a life-threatening, highly emotional situation. When you are dealing with threats, whether physical, spiritual, financial, or emotional, you can do like David: tell God about your situation (vv. 1–2), turn your attention to God (vv. 3–4), and trust God to save (vv. 5–8).

The prayer begins with a summary of David’s situation. Through a ruse, Absalom had turned the “men of Israel” against David (2 Samuel 15:6). So David prays, “Many are rising against me.” This betrayal at the hands of his own son was personal and devastating. Even worse, David goes on to say that his enemies doubted God would save him. In effect, the people believed God no longer wanted David as king! David told God about his situation.

Rather than seeking revenge or attempting to physically enforce his will on the people, David prays, “But you, O LORD, are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head.” David turns his attention from his enemies to God. He expresses confidence in his relationship with God and God’s desire to save him. While it often helps to recognize the source of our problems, we must not dwell there. Like David, we must turn our attention to God.

Finally, David announces his confidence in God’s salvation. David was a battle-tested warrior, a successful military leader, and a shrewd thinker. Yet, in the face of a threatening situation in which his own son sought David’s position and his life, David did not trust in himself. David trusted in God’s salvation, just as he had done when he met the Philistine giant Goliath with nothing but a sling and a handful of stones (1 Samuel 17).

All fears come from the awareness of threats (real or imagined). How can the believer rely on God and overcome fear? Like David, you can tell God about your situation, turn your attention from the threat(s) to God, and trust in God’s salvation. Like the psalmist we can say, “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you” (Psalm 56:3).

Clay Leonard

Text: Hebrews 11:8-10, 13-16
Aim: to emphasize our hope of heaven.
Thesis: we have been created with a longing for more than this life – a “homesickness” that points us to our true home, heaven.
Introduction:

TURN TO HEBREWS 11 – READ Verses 8-10, then 13-16.

By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9 By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with
foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

It is one of the most enduring mysteries of nature: how do geese, seals, whales, salmon, all sorts of creatures make long, difficult journeys, sometimes a 1000 miles or more, in order to go HOME? Without a compass or a map, somehow they unerringly make their way year after year to the same precise spot on the globe – driven and guided by some instinctive motivation to go home.

Take the monarch butterfly: you’ll see them fluttering along on the breeze, light as a whisper, yet each winter those insubstantial little creatures manage to fly as much as 1800 miles from Canada down to the mountains of central Mexico, and always they find their way back to the same spot. How do they do it?

Or homing pigeons: where do they get their uncanny sense of direction? Some have suggested they navigate by the stars; but when scientists transport the birds many miles away, cover their eyes, and turn them loose – even blindfolded, the pigeons still unfailingly find their way home.

Do animals make their migratory journeys by memory? Then how do we explain creatures such as eels, who make an arduous journey to a home they’ve never seen? For example, North American eels and European eels are of the same species, and both are born in the Sargasso Sea in the mid-Atlantic.

Yet newborn eels always return to the same exact streams and rivers where their parents grew up. Once there the little eels mature, eventually return to the Sargasso Sea, give birth to their own young, and the process begins all over again.

And not only that, the American eels and the European eels mix and mingle freely in the Sargasso Sea, but when it comes time to return to their ancestral waters to breed – you cannot fool them. No European eel ever makes its way to America, no American eel ever travels to Europe – each species always knows the way to its own home, even though its a place they’ve never seen!

[Illustration taken from Lowell Worthington – 45 & Satisfied]

That homing instinct is one of the most powerful in all of nature: God has instilled in a multitude of creatures…….the way to their own true home.

But did you know: the Creator has placed that same instinct in US? And when we are true to our God-given nature, there is an internal compass in human beings – a longing in our soul, deep in our being, for a home we have never seen.

You see, we are created for a perfect fellowship with our Father – we were never intended to exist in a sinful, fallen world such as this. Back in Eden, before things got so confused, Adam and Eve enjoyed a personal communion with the Lord – but after they sinned, our ancestors were thrown out of the garden, and God placed an angel at the gate to ensure that they couldn’t go back……….ever since, human beings have had a longing to return, to regain what we have lost, to restore that fellowship with the father, we have had a deep, deep, desire to go home.

Solomon hinted at it in Ecclesiastes 3:11 where he says God has “set eternity in the hearts of men.”

In his Confessions, Augustine described it vividly when he said of God, “You have created us for thyself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee.”

Listen to HEBREWS 11:16! After describing the faith of such great heroes as Abel, Enoch, and Noah – it explains WHY they lived the way they did.

Verse 16 “They were longing for a better country – a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.”

Did you catch that? There it is – that “longing” of the soul. Just as the salmon are driven to swim upstream, just as the swallows return to Capistrano, so there is, within the human heart, an innate drive to reach our one true home: those great men and women of old lived as they did, achieved their victories of faith, because they were “homesick for heaven.” And I can no more explain it than I can explain the flight of the geese in winter. But I can DESCRIBE it for you – in the life of ABRAHAM – in three phrases from this text.

THE FIRST PHRASE is in VERSE 8 – “called out”

What causes the geese to decide it’s time to fly south? The changing of seasons, a chill in the air, the shortening of the day, the position of the sun. What awakens our own spiritual homing instinct? It begins when we thrill to hear the voice of God – when we respond with joy at receiving His word – when we allow His Spirit to begin His work in us. We are “called out” of this world so that we can be prepared for the next.

The SECOND PHRASE is in VERSE 9 – “a stranger in a foreign country…..lived in tents”

You may remember the story of a disagreement between Abraham and his nephew Lot; how Abraham had his choice of locations, and could have chosen the best grazing lands – could have settled down in Sodom. ABRAHAM REFUSED TO “SETTLE DOWN” / “SETTLE” FOR WHAT THIS LIFE OFFERS / COMPROMISE.

Genesis 13:10a “Lot saw….” (from a temporal standpoint, his decision made sense)
:11-12 “Lot chose”
:13 “wicked”
:10b “before the Lord destroyed”

(Sodom’s judgment hanging over it / doom just around the corner) Lot chose the path of ease, comfort, prosperity – and the result was awful!

Abraham, on the other hand, was a “traveler,” a “pilgrim.” Abraham chose to live “in tents.” Have you ever gone camping? Spent some time in the great outdoors? It’s great – for a while. But living in a tent grows old quickly. Just ask the folks in south Florida. After Hurricane Andrew came roaring through back in 1992, more than 80,000 homes were totally demolished, rendered unlivable. 160,000 people were suddenly homeless. The Army came and set up tent cities. Folks were glad to have the shelter for a while. But they soon discovered that living in a tent gets old. It doesn’t take long before folks want to settle down – crave the permanence of four walls, a floor, and a roof over your head.

Listen! Why does the Bible emphasize Abraham “lived in tents”? It isn’t talking about REAL ESTATE – it is referring to REALITY, to spiritual reality. Abraham remained intentionally apart – not quite belonging – a “stranger in a strange land” – he refused to compromise his faith, because he knew this world isn’t permanent – it doesn’t last. Oh, this world is real, but it is not as real as the one to come.

1 John 2:15,17 “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him…..the world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever”

VERSE 10 – “a city with foundations”

IMPLIED: ABRAHAM WAS DISSATISFIED WITH THIS WORLD!

“This world is not my home, I’m just a’passing through,
My treasures are laid up, somewhere beyond the blue,
The angels beckon me, from heaven’s open door,
And I can’t feel at home in this world anymore”

Someone has said that an OPTIMIST is a person who’d like to believe this is the best of all possible worlds – and a PESSIMIST is a person who’s afraid he’s right! Well, Christians are REALISTS: we know this world is fallen, sinful, and imperfect – but we are HOPEFUL REALISTS, because we believe God has planned something better later on.

Was Abraham disillusioned by the raggedness of this life? Was he put off by the uncertainty of this world? Or is it more likely that when he was called by the voice of the Almighty, once he had encountered the power of the living God, nothing else was ever quite the same again? One thing is for sure: when Abraham heard that voice, he answered it, and he never looked back.

CONCLUSION:

WHAT DOES ALL THIS MEAN TO US? THREE KEY WORDS:

1. Verse 13 “aliens” – We live in a nation that is concerned about illegal aliens, foreigners slipping into our country, and we seem to be unable to maintain control of our own borders! But put the shoe on the other foot: what if you were one of those aliens? What if you knew that you didn’t belong, weren’t wanted? What if people looked at YOU with suspicion, made it clear you weren’t accepted, didn’t belong?

Have you ever felt uncomfortable, “out of step” with others, because of your faith? It will forever be the lot of the Christian to be an outsider! The earliest followers of Jesus felt this keenly. An unknown disciple from the 3rd century gave this description of Christians:

They live in their own homelands, but as foreigners. They share in everything as citizens, but endure everything as aliens. Every foreign country is their homeland, but every homeland is a strange country to them. They spend their time on the earth, but their citizenship is really in heaven. (Epistle to Diognetus)

2. Verse 13 “saw”

Hebrews 11:1 “Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we DO NOT SEE. This is what the ancients were commended for.”

FAITH is the confident expectation, the joyful anticipation, of the promises of God.

v. 3 “not seen”
v. 7 “not yet seen”
v. 23 “he saw him who was invisible”

“Seeing is believing”? NO – believing is seeing!

3. “by faith”

HOW CAN WE BE HOMESICK FOR HEAVEN WHEN WE’VE NEVER BEEN THERE? verse 13 “By faith”!

This passage reorients our thinking entirely: somehow we have gotten the idea that what we can SEE here on this earth is real, while all this talk about “heaven” is just wishful thinking.

When I was young, I thought sermons about heaven were morbid, and all that talk about the life to come was unhealthy – after all, I was eager to live in the here and now, and didn’t want to hear about the “by and by.”

But the longer I am privileged to live, the more I realize the limitations of this life and the imperfections of this world. And when faced with the impermanence, the unpredictability of this life – then you grow to appreciate what the Bible means about being “homesick for heaven.”

This life is precious – enjoy it as best you can, use it for God’s glory as long as you can – but don’t ever trust it, not completely – because you weren’t meant for a world like this, and sooner or later, it will always let you down.

God has put a homing instinct in you – don’t let the world drown it out!

“There’s a land that is fairer than day, and BY FAITH we can see it afar,
For the Father waits over the way, to prepare us a dwelling place there.”

Dan Williams

Let’s conclude our study of the use of “grace” in the NT; the Greek word is charis. The word is used 10 times in 1 Peter; twice in 2 Peter; once in 1 John and Jude; twice in Revelation.

As we seen in Paul’s letters, “grace” is used as a greeting in the other letters too, like Peter (1 Peter 1:2; 2 Peter 1:2) and John (2 John 3). In first text, Peter wishes his audience “grace to the fullest measure.” Peter writes that the OT prophets preached about the grace that would come (1:10) and Christians should set their hope firmly on the grace that came with the revelation of Jesus Christ from heaven (1:13).

In chapter 2, Peter writes to Christians who are slaves and encourages them to be submissive to their unreasonable masters because this submission will find “favor” (or “grace”) with God (2:19-20). In the next chapter, Peter writes to husbands to understand their wife and her needs, showing her honor because they are “fellow heirs of the grace [which brings] life” (3:7). In 4:10, Peter tells Christians that we are to use our gifts in serving one another as stewards of the multi-faceted grace of God.

When he teaches humility in the fifth chapter, Peter quotes Proverbs 3:34, that God “opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (5:5). In the same context, he refers to God as “the God of all grace” who will perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish us (5:10). Finally, Peter concludes his letter, stating that through his letter, he was exhorting and testifying to the true grace of God and Christians need to stand in it (5:12). At the end of the his second letter, Peter commands Christians to “grow in the grace… of our Lord and Savior” (3:18).

Jude writes (verse 4) that some people have infiltrated the church of Christ, who had been marked out for condemnation, but who were turning the grace of God into a license to sin and, thereby, were denying the Lord and Master.

Finally, we come to the final book of the New Testament, Revelation, wherein “grace” is only used twice. In 1:4, John wishes grace in his salutation on his audience, as Paul, Peter, and John did. The last words of God’s communication to mankind are found in Revelation 22:21: “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.”

Now that we have examined all the verses in the NT which use the word “grace,” we’ll draw some conclusions in our next study.

Paul Holland

Joy is a decision based on knowledge. It is a choice we can make. 

You can have joy in every moment of life if you choose to do so. We won’t always feel happy, but joy is a trait that goes deeper than emotions. It is a feeling of hope because of salvation. As a saved child of God, you can have joy in the knowledge of Christ, the church, and an eternity with God. 

We all know people that are joyful 24/7. No matter what happens they seem to always look on the bright side. On the other hand, I’m sure you can think of someone that’s always down. They can always find something to complain about. They could have a perfect life and still be looking for something negative to dwell on. Two people can go through the same situation and have two completely different reactions. 

As Christians we should be people of joy. Why? Because we have every reason to be joyful! But what about having joy in tribulation? How can we be joyful when our world comes crashing down around us? We need to remember that joy isn’t the same as happiness. Joy comes from an understanding of the bigger picture. Happiness is short term and based on current events. 

The faithful Christian can go through heartache and feel sadness, but still have joy in the bigger picture. We can face trials, no matter what they are, and still have joy because we know this world is not our home. James 1:2 says “count it all joy when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.”

We can have joy in knowing that if we face trials with endurance, we will ultimately receive the greatest reward we could ever get. This kind of joy isn’t something that comes naturally. It takes time to develop, and trials to perfect it. 

Not every day will be a happy day, but in Christ every day can be joyful. 

Carl Pollard

Today we complete our brief study of instrumental music in worship…

BRIEF HISTORICAL NOTES CONCERNING INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC

1. Differing dates are sighted for the introduction of instrumental music in worship, but all of them are centuries after the apostolic period. A historian by the name of Bowles said that instruments “appeared with some frequency during the period from 1000-1300 while in the later middle ages its use continued to spread…” (See The Spiritual Sword. Woodson, William. January 1993). In fact, since the time of Christ, much more worship has been offered to God without the instrument than with the instrument! While we may be in the minority today, in the historical context, we certainly are not. (Not that minority/majority really matters.)
2. The first documented case of instrumental music within the restoration movement in the U.S. involved a man named L.L. Pinkerton who introduced the instrument in worship at the church in Midway, KY in 1859. There were likely a few cases previous to this in the 1850’s. (See Sounding Brass and Clanging Symbols, Woodson, William, p. 19).
3. Perhaps it should be noted that there are in fact many other groups who continue to oppose this manmade addition to worship, such as most Orthodox churches, Primitive Baptist (and some other Baptist Churches), The Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America, Mennonites, Quakers, Amish, some Anglican churches as well as others.

COMMON ARGUMENTS FOR INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC

ARGUMENT #1: Instrumental music is used in the OT.

RESPONSE: Yes it is, but our standard for faith and practice is the NT of Jesus Christ (see Jn. 12:48; Mt. 17:1-8).

ARGUMENT #2: The book of Revelation talks about instrumental music.

RESPONSE: The mention of instruments of music in Revelation is in regards to a vision of heaven. Two things should be said about this: (1) What takes place in heaven is not a model for our worship on earth. (2) Also, in reality, there will be no instruments in heaven because it is a spiritual realm. Flesh and blood can’t enter into heaven (see 1 Cor. 15:50), and neither can a piano or symbol! What can enter heaven is our spirit from which our songs and worship proceed!

ARGUMENT #3: The word “psallo” in passages like Ephesians 5:19 and Colossians 3:16 means “to pluck as of the harp.”

RESPONSE: Two things should be mentioned here. First, the best Greek lexigons suggest that while the word “psallo” originally meant to “pluck the strings” (or something similar), by NT times the word came to mean simply singing. (See Gingrich & Danker, Strong’s, Thayer’s Greek Lexicon.) Secondly, even if the definition of “pluck the strings” could be proven, the Bible text indicates that it is the cords of the heart that are to be plucked! (See again Eph. 5:19 and Col. 3:16.)

ARGUMENT #4: The use of instrumental music is a matter of opinion.

RESPONSE: It is the opinion of some men that it should be used. The way we worship God is a matter of faith for which God has supplied all we need to know (see 2 Pt. 1:3; 2 Tim. 3:16-17; Rom. 10:17). When God commands something, He does not need to tell us everything we are not to do. For instance, with the Lord’s Supper He doesn’t need to tell us everything we should not use (peanuts, tea, etc.). To consider the authority of the silence of the Scripture, see Hebrews 7:14 (and also Col. 3:17 again).

ARGUMENT #5: Instrumental music is a matter of expediency. In other words, it simply helps our singing.

RESPONSE: Perhaps we need to be reminded that singing to God has two main functions or purposes: (1) To praise the name of God; and (2) To teach and admonish one another. Concerning the first point, does a dead instrument really give praise unto God? Should we decide how the God of heaven should be praised, or should we let Him decide what gives Him glory? Secondly, simply singing (vocally) accomplishes the task of speaking to one another in song. If anything, the use of instruments hinders the ability to communicate a vocal message.

ARGUMENT #6: There is no difference between using instruments of music and using PowerPoint, a pitch-pipe or a song book.

RESPONSE: There actually is a big difference. Instruments of music are an actual part of the worship being offered to God. I’ve never known a single person who felt that way about PowerPoint, a pitch-pipe or a song book. These, and many other things, are simply expedients which help facilitate the actual worship.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

1. It is ironic that churches of Christ have historically been ridiculed for not using instruments in worship. Instead of doing so, wouldn’t it be wonderful if such people would give up their man-made innovations and take a step toward religious unity in the truth?
2. Let us make certain that our focus is always upon giving God the glory that His holy name deserves!

Daren Schroeder