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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Corinthians 8:1–13

May 11, 2025

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I greet you all this morning in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is a glorious day and I just want you to pause with me for a moment and take a look round at what is taking place here. Look at these graduates and representing so many nations, so many states, so many places, so many families, so many hopes; the realization of so many of those hopes on this day and the launching of even greater and further hopes on this day; the faculty and administration and trustees of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and behind us, so many Christians in the Southern Baptist Convention and in the larger Christian world. They know what is taking place here and celebrate what is taking place here. I welcome family and friends and all those gathered on this occasion.

This is the day, as we said, that the Lord is made and we are going to rejoice and be glad in it and I want you to note something: you don’t get to hear this in an indoor commencement. I want you to hear the birds and the creatures around us and recognize that they too, in their own way, are rejoicing in the day that the Lord has made. They have no understanding of what is going on here and are probably perplexed. I don’t think we’re interrupting them all that much, but we do know what is taking place here. We do know the significance of this. We can’t look at these graduates without seeing promise. We also can’t commemorate this day without thinking God for accomplishment.

We need our thoughts to be guided by Scripture. I would direct our thoughts this morning to the end of Romans chapter 11 and the beginnings of chapter 12. Just a few verses. Beginning in Romans chapter 11, verse 33: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?’ ‘Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?’ For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen. I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

My mind is drawn to this passage when I think of this day, when I look at these graduates, when I consider this assembly. My thoughts are drawn to this passage, this hinge passage in Paul’s letter to the Romans. It begins with a testimony to why we are here in the first place. How is it that such a school as Boyce College would exist? What is the warrant? What is the charter? What’s the constitution? What’s the charge? What’s the stewardship? Well, it all begins in the conveyance of truth from one generation to another. This is the perpetual mission of the Christian Church until Jesus comes, we are to pass on the faith once for all delivered, but it’s not just a matter of some kind of neutralized, autotomized transmission of the truth. It is through the consecrated process of Christian teaching and we find this already in Scripture.

Paul here is teaching the Romans. In his apostolic ministry to the Romans, he is defining the Christian faith and thus not only for the church at Rome but for the church until Jesus comes. And these truths are eternal and unshaken. Paul comes to this transition in the book of Romans. He’s going to turn to more practical affairs. The background of the first 10 chapters going into the 11th chapter have to do with the weightiest matters of the gospel of Jesus Christ and in chapter one, Paul declares, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.” He’s not ashamed of this gospel. He’s been defining this gospel. He’s been offering expositions of this gospel, detailed teachings of this gospel. But at the end of all of this, as he’s transitioning to more practical matters of concern to the church, he offers what is here a doxology, a statement of praise to God.

It is so apt for our consideration this morning, “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” There’s absolutely no purpose for this college, but for the fact that truth is real, that truth is objective, that truth is substantial, that truth is eternal. That truth can be transmitted from one heart to another, from one mind to another, but the source of all truth is not this faculty. The source of all truth is no human authority at all. Riches and wisdom, the knowledge of God are his alone. It is by his grace and mercy that he shares his riches of wisdom with us. He loves us. His grace towards us is shown not only in the fact that when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, but that from the very beginning God loves us to reveal himself to us. He speaks to us in His word and in His word are revealed true wisdom, true riches, the true knowledge of God. His judgments are unsearchable. And an acknowledgement from the apostle Paul. His ways are inscrutable.

It’s not a word we use every day. When you see a word like inscrutable, it implies scrutable. Let me just put it this way. It is not our business to figure God’s ways out. We have no independent standpoint from which we judge the ways of God. He is not obligated to reveal all things to us. He rather gives us, which by his grace he would have us to know. His ways are inscrutable. And then questions, rhetorical questions from the Old Testament that Paul recites here for “Who has known the mind of the Lord?” Obvious answer to that question. “Or who has been his counselor or who has first given a gift to him that it might be repaid?” Our position is made very clear. We are the recipient by God’s grace of all that he gives to us and of all that he reveals to us, including the wisdom that he has imparted to us. We have nothing to give to him. He owes us nothing. He does this out of his grace and mercy.

“Who has been his advisor?” Around every earthly court, around every White House, around every premier’s or prime minister’s office, there is a retinue of advisors and their job is to advise. There is no such body of advisors around the throne of God. No one has ever given something to him in order that he is indebted to them and then in the hinge verse here, we have one of the most classic, one of the most crystallized and clear statements of the comprehensiveness of the Christian worldview. What is it that we teach on? What authority have we taught? What kind of education has been conveyed at Boyce College? What is the authority for any of these things? Look at verse 36: “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”

We’ve been about the business of teaching Christian truth. We’ve been about the business of considering all things on the basis of the authority of Scripture. We’ve been seeking to weigh all and, in the classroom, and in the totality of the student experience at Boyce College, we have sought to bring all things captive to Christ. But behind all of this is the reality that all that should be known, all that is true, all that is revealed to us comes from him and it is through him. We didn’t search him out. He revealed himself to us. It is not our initiative that leads to learning. It is his initiative that leads to learning and at the end of all things, the conclusion, the promise of all things, the fulfillment of all things is of Him, from him and through him and to him are all things. Not most things. Not some things. The world wants to at least at its greatest moment of concession, perhaps admit, “Well, there are secular things and there are holy things.” But what does the Scripture say? We are told that there is no distinction. “From him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”

Four years of study and a baccalaureate degree. We didn’t invent that. It’s been around since the emergence of the medieval university and that university emerged out of the church and that university was based upon the unity of the universals—the good, the beautiful, the true, the real. And the university in its beginning was established upon the fact that there is one from whom all these things come. The Giver of all that is true. The Giver of all that is beautiful. The Giver of all that is good. The modern university has lost the “uni” part of the university. What is left is a glory of secular learning devoid from any kind of unifying vision. Our task in this college has been to present a unified vision, a comprehensive vision based upon not only the reality of the one true and living God, not only in the worship of the one true God—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost—but also in the promise of the gospel and in the unity of all things in the comprehensive revelation of God.

The audacity of this educational mission is that the graduates of this institution would know the will of God, would know the truth of God. Now, of course, we as human beings can know only in part. But we can know in part. Four years is a big part. The whole point of Boyce College is that there will be a faithful transmission of this part. It’s an urgent part. It’s a very timely part, the period of life generally in which you have young people in college. It is in itself a turning point—childhood behind, adulthood ahead. I think it’s fair to say that in the experience of almost every graduate, and there are parents and loved ones here to witness to this, there are faculty to witness to this, there are peers to witness to this. There’s been an enormous amount of growth just over the course of the last four years. The graduates of this college are the same as when they came and not it’s an awful lot of work. If they’re absolutely in every way the same as when they came, it’s been a waste of time. They’re not the same as when they came. By God’s grace we pray, they have been well armed for the calling ahead, the battles ahead, the challenges ahead, the joys ahead. Even the sorrows ahead.

This transition in the passage “From him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever.” It leads to the first two verses of chapter 12. Paul writes to the Romans saying, “I appeal to you therefore brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” Alright? We watch our language carefully. Here we are here this day to celebrate lives sacrificed to the glory of God. That’s not my language. I don’t think, if it were just left to me, I would even think of that language.

Brothers and sisters, and I speak particularly to the graduates, is that not shocking language? Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul appeals to us by the mercies of God to present our bodies as a living sacrifice wholly and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship. The great promise of this class, the great promise of every one of these graduates, and we look out at you and we’re not ready to say goodbye. That is nonetheless in one sense what is happening here. We want you to think of this campus always as a home for you. We hope that when you remember your years on this campus, you not only remember them with thankfulness but commend the same to others. We look forward to seeing you come back. We look forward to seeing what the Lord does in your life. We look forward to hearing how the Lord is using you in mission and work and ministry and to the glory of God and the church. We look forward to seeing future classes of Boyce College brought in your arms and pushed in your strollers. We look forward to hearing how the glory of God is being manifested in your lives and in your work, in your marriages, in your homes, and your calling in your careers.

This morning I’m not urging you to sacrifice all that and yet I guess I am. And this text is addressed to every one of us at every point in our life, to every Christian. We are to live lives as a living sacrifice. Our discipleship is as a living sacrifice unto God and thus everything that we have, everything that we are given, everything entrusted to us is a temporary stewardship to be exercised by a living sacrifice, dead to self and alive to God. That’s all. If we weren’t a Christian assembly, this text would seem absolutely bizarre. But we are a Christian assembly and that is how we are gathered here.

Finally in this passage, even as we are told that these living sacrifices must be holy and acceptable to God, we have the exhortation Paul gives to the church: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” My charge to you is the graduates of Boyce College of 2025 is that you be not conformed to this world, but show the world what it means to be transformed by the wisdom of Christ.

Paul straightforwardly speaks here of being transformed by the renewing of your mind. We certainly hope and pray that your years spent in study at Boyce College has prepared you for an even greater transformation of your mind to the glory of God as a living sacrifice. We hope and pray that all that has been invested in you and all the toil you have put into this degree—this is a moment of real accomplishment. You should feel the glory of this. You should feel the stewardship of this. You should understand this as also a day not only of accomplishment, but of commitment and also stewardship. You have received much. Now, it is your task to transmit much to others and furthermore to have a mind that is not conformed to this world, but transformed by the power of God, transformed by the gospel, transformed by the Scripture, transformed by truth.

Quite honestly, I think some people look at higher education and they say, “Well, okay, they’re just different kinds of higher education and that’s not entirely wrong. I mean, you have public universities, you have private colleges, you have universities that have different traditions and they come from different commitments.” There are some people that say, “Well over here is secular education and over here is Christian education.” They do see that Christian education must be different. I mean, after all, we’re pretty serious about this. We are here as the inheritors of a very serious commitment to this calling over. Well more than a century, but the thing is they really have no idea how different this is. They really have no idea how subversive we intend to be. They really have no idea how ambitious you are for the gospel of Jesus Christ. They really have no idea how your education is so different than their education and we’re not here today to confirm ourselves in institutional pride.

We are here today to remind ourselves of the stewardship entrusted to this school—it’s a stewardship we take very seriously. This faculty has taught faithfully this faculty has taught passionately. This faculty has taught personally, as you know in the classroom and elsewhere. You have also learned a great deal, but you have also taught each other and that’s a part of the college experience as well. You’re not just graduating as individual units of accomplishment. You’re graduating as a class together and there’s something very sweet about that. But even as my charge is that you be not conformed to this world but transformed by the renewing of your mind throughout the entirety of your lives, I want to tell you that this is no small moment for Boyce College, for this faculty and administration and for all those who are gathered here, including parents and families and friends.

For us, this is a day yes of the recognition of accomplishment and for that we are thankful. It is the day, yes, for an exercise in gratitude for there are many who would wish for this opportunity who will never have it. But it is also a moment in which we recognize that some of the most wonderful faithful Christian young people on planet Earth are about to be dispersed into the world, to the glory of God and to the glory of God. We just need to look at this day and look at these graduates and have a picture in our mind, not only of what has been done, but what God is about to do. To God be the glory, great things he has done.

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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Corinthians 7:17–40

May 4, 2025

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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Corinthians 7:1–16

April 27, 2025

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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18

April 20, 2025

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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Corinthians 6:1–20

April 13, 2025

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Our text this morning is found in Proverbs seven. Let us hear the word of the Lord together. 

Proverbs chapter seven, 

“My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you. Keep my commandments and live; Keep my teaching as the apple of your eye; bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart. Say to wisdom, ‘You are my sister,’ and call insight your intimate friend, to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.

For at the window of my house I have looked through my lattice, and I have seen among the simple, I perceived among the youths, a young man lacking sense, passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night in darkness. 

And behold, the woman meets him, dressed as a prostitute, wily of heart. She is loud and wayward; her feet do not stay at home; now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait. She seizes him and kisses him, and with bold face she says to him, ‘I had to offer sacrifices and today I have paid my vows; so now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly, and I have found you. I have spread my couch with coverings, covered linens from Egypt. I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. Come, let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love. For my husband is not at home; he has gone on a long journey; he took a bag of money with him; at full moon he will come home.’

With much seductive speech she persuades him; with her smooth talk, she compels him. All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver; as a bird rushes into a snare; he does not know that it will cost him his life.

And now, O sons, listen to me, and be attentive to the words of my mouth. Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths, for many a victim has she laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng. Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death.” 

Well good morning. 

We had our board of trustees meeting this week. An enormous encouragement about the health of the institution and the support that comes to us. Very encouraging. We had a faculty meeting yesterday. Very encouraging. This is a faculty I compare to no other. This is the faculty with whom I would want to study. It’s a golden time. I’m very thankful for that.

It was in chapel Tuesday when Dr. York preached so faithfully. And by the way, urgently. The preacher who was scheduled for the day could not get here because of the weather. And I know my dear brother is one who can step in a moment’s notice, which is about what he had. 

I read this text to you this day, and I do so because I think we have a unique moment. We have a unique faculty. We have just the right student body. You are who we have been praying for. And this is not just any institution, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Boyce College. We’re not just a school, a college, graduate programs. Without apology, we are those things, but that’s not all we are.

We are servants together of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are Christians. We are gathered together as Christians committed to a common cause to prepare ourselves, all of us, for even greater service and greater deployment to the glory of God in the future. 

But there are snares. I think we should be incredibly thankful that the scripture is so clear about such snares. The snare of sexual passion outside of the integrity of marriage is not a new temptation. Timing a message like this is not easy to think about. I had scheduled myself to preach this message just a few short weeks ago and then we realized we were going to have many guests on the campus and I decided it may not be exactly the right time to have this kind of message. 

And it is because every time you turn to a passage like this, there’s a tendency to ask, “What happened?” Is it like a break glass in emergency kind of–go to scripture when something happened, when there’s a tragedy, when there’s a headline, when there’s heartbreak? Well, it is that, but it’s a lot more than that. This message isn’t timed because of anything recent. Although sadly in the history of the Christian church, there’s always something all too recent to break our hearts. When you read this passage and hear its words, knowing that it is thousands of years old, the message from Solomon to son, this is hardly new.

Proverbs seven is a remarkable passage, and it doesn’t come out of a vacuum here in the Proverbs. It goes as a theme all the way back to chapter two and certainly chapters five and six, the warnings concerning adultery. Chapter five, a great deal to say about adultery and warnings to this son about adultery. And then in chapter six, some practical warnings and then he’s back to adultery in chapter six, verse 20. It is a preoccupation of this father concerning his son, and I think we can understand why. Then of course comes chapter seven. We can understand why this father is so concerned for his son and it is because this is a dangerous world and one of the powers corrupted by sin turned into a worldly pattern. It is human sexuality.

Parents wonder when to have the talk and, especially with first children, they often wait too late. The old adage about the boy and his dad. He finally decides to have the talk and he says, “Son, we need to talk about sex.” The boy says, “Okay, Dad, what do you need to know?” Just an ironic warning that that conversation almost surely needs to come earlier than later. 

In an institution like this, in a school like this, there’d be a temptation not to come anywhere close to a passage like this. But it’s out of concern and a sense of stewardship, I didn’t want to let this term pass without a confrontation with this text. And in the background of course are heartbreaking headlines, a sadly repeated conversation. Reputations ruined, ministries crashed, God’s people traumatized, sheep scared, sometimes even sheep scattered.

So here we are, we are confronted with Proverbs chapter seven. The context of this is also the theme and structure of the book of Proverbs as not merely the wisdom of the world, but the wisdom of God coming from this father. And we’re not just reading here some kind of etiquette book or ethical manual from ancient history. We’re reading what is the inerrant, infallible Word of God.

The candor of these chapters is shocking to us. I don’t remember anyone covering this with me in Sunday School. I don’t know of any denomination or church that’s decided, “We’re going to take Proverbs five, six and seven for our Vacation Bible School theme this year. But we come to this text because it is one of the most honest, direct, compelling admonitions to us concerning something that is so much a part of humanity, so deadly a snare, as well as so beautiful a blessing in its right context.

The context here in Proverbs is what is sometimes referred to as the tale of two women. The structure of Proverbs–you have Lady Wisdom and you have Lady Folly, and they are both visible. they are both accessible, they both use language, they are well identified. Lady Wisdom comes with the word of wisdom. The wise listen to Lady Wisdom. Lady Folly is the opposite. She comes with smooth words as we shall see. Her way, the scripture makes very clear, as we saw at the end of chapter seven, is the way to Sheol, the way to death. 

Except before us in the Proverbs, wisdom and folly, life and death, blessing and curse. The classical place to see the distinction between these two women is Proverbs chapter nine, just two chapters over. First wisdom. 

“Wisdom has built her house. She has hewn her seven pillars. She has slaughtered her beasts; she has mixed her wine; she has also set her table. 

She has sent out her young women to call from the highest places in the town, ‘Whoever is simple, let him turn here!’ To him who lacks sense she says, ‘Come eat of my bread and drink the wine I have mixed. Leave your simple ways and live, and walk in the way of insight.’”

Then we have wisdom defined. Look at verse nine. 

“Give instruction to a wise man and he will be wiser still. Teach a righteous man and he will increase in learning, for the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.”

But then beginning in verse 13 is the Woman Folly. 

“Lady Folly is loud; she’s seductive and knows nothing. She sits at the door of her house; she takes a seat on the highest places in the town, calling to those who pass by, who are going straight on their way, ‘Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!’ And to him who lacks sense she says, ‘Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant.’ But he does not know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol.

Two women. Two trajectories. Two forms of language. One instructive. One seductive. There’s a way that leads to wisdom. There’s a way that leads to folly. There’s a way that leads to life. There’s a way that leads to death. There’s a way that leads to blessing and there is a way that leads to curse.

In chapter seven, we find a father’s instruction, and he speaks of this candidly to his son in the introduction to this chapter, “My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you. Keep my commandments and live.” Biblical principle. Obey and live. 

“Keep my commandments and live. Keep my teaching as the apple of your eye.” That is a constant wisdom. It’s always on the mind. It is that which the son learns to prize wisdom rather than folly. This is the law of God, the commandments following the very covenant that God made with his people. Choose life and live. Obey and live and be blessed. Disobey, it is the way of Sheol. 

He speaks of wisdom and consistently with what he has said in the rest. He is to keep the Scripture before him. He is to have the Scriptures on his fingers, written on the tablet of his heart, and then he is to incline himself to wisdom. He has to choose the voice he will hear. 

And this is the basic principle for all of us, the entirety of our lives. We have to choose which voice we will hear. There are competing voices in our ears. There are competing voices to our hearts and, here’s the thing, this text makes clear there is responsibility in our ears. We’re going to decide to whom we will listen.

“Say to wisdom, ‘you are my sister.’” It’s a very sweet thing. You have the personification of wisdom and the personification of folly, foolishness. Call wisdom your sister. The sweetness of the relationship with the sister. She will be a companion for life and for blessing. “Call insight your intimate friend.”

Then all of a sudden the shift in verse five, “to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.”

This father is very aware of the power of sexual temptation. This father is very aware partly because he was once a son–young, needing the same instruction from his father. This is something that is contextualized in a message from father to son. It is for the entire church, men and women, young and old, but the context here is of the father speaking to his son. He warns him about the forbidden woman, the adulteress with her smooth words.

The father’s warning is very direct. This is not a beat around the bush conversation. This is not one of those conversations you have when you’re not sure what the conversation was about. A friend of mine told me not when he was young, but when he was older, we were talking about some things. 

He said, “My father decided to have the talk with me.” 

He said “I was 13, and I knew it was unusual because my dad set aside special time for a conversation.” 

He said, “I didn’t have any idea what it was about.” 

I said, “how did it go?” 

He said, “Well, my dad was clearly embarrassed. I was embarrassed because he was embarrassed.” 

And I said, “Well, how did it go?” 

He said, “I didn’t understand it before he said it. I didn’t understand it after he said it. Looking back, I’m not particularly sure what he was talking about.” 

He was afraid to get to the core issue and be very specific and for a 13-year-old that meant I have no idea what you’re talking about. 

You’ll notice this Father knows what he’s talking about. This father is not evasive. He’s speaking directly. Listen to wisdom, not to folly.

He will tell the tale of this young man that follows as a tale of warning. Bruce Waltke excellent insights on the Proverbs. He says, “This young man should be theologically defined as a gullible dimwit.” He is in one sense, kind of a literary figure of, well, gullible dimwittedness. The father is presenting this picture to his son clearly to demonstrate just how dimwitted and gullible the young man he sees is. 

Now, why did the father speak this way to the son? It is because every young man at the wrong moment given the opportunity will be this gullible dimwit. Every young man.

But it’s not just young. It just becomes more dimwitted when a man of any age gives himself to such folly, such sin. Among the young, the sin often burns with passion. Among the older, it’s a mix of that plus vanity, ego. An attempt to regain youth, conquest, entitlement. It’s just all deadly sin. It’s a path to Sheol. 

What about this young man? The father sees him out the window of his house. He looked through the lattice and he saw this. “I have seen among the simple, I have perceived among the use, a young man lacking sense.” And what we have in chapter seven to the proverbs is a descent into sin. It is a progression. I think it’s incredibly helpful that scripture is so clear about this progression. Because this progression helps us to understand not just the pattern of this sin but the pattern of sin.

But this sin is so illustrative because its dangers are so clear, and the context is so understandable. If we’re honest, we can see this happening even as it is described in this chapter. His descent is predictable, the temptation is progressive, the desire is flammable, the trap is set, and then the rest of the story. 

We read the text together. I just wanted, I want us to look at the central verses here together. I want to suggest a very simple outline for understanding this descent, understanding this proverb, understanding this message from a father to a son, from God to his church. 

The first thing I want to see, I want us all to see about this young man, is that he went where he was not to go. It starts somewhere. It starts with the fact that he went where he was not to go. This is in verses six and eight all the way through eight 

“For at the window of my house I have looked out through my lattice, and I have seen among the simple, I have perceived among the youths, a young man lacking sense, passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house in the twilight in the evening at the time of night and darkness.”

So this young man has not just accidentally come across this temptation, he’s taken himself into this temptation. He’s walked right into this trap. He knows exactly what he’s doing. Look at the timing. It’s in the twilight, in the evening, in the time of night and darkness. One of the themes of Scripture is that nothing good takes place at night. When you walk intentionally into the darkness, the deeds of darkness are made very clear in Scripture as compared to the deeds of light and the theme of sin is made very clear and God’s judgment is made very clear in the fact that when the light comes, the things are revealed. The things done in darkness will be revealed in the light. 

And this is just not all that different than the context of similar sin, even today. There are parts of towns, cities where you ought not to go. A young man ought not to be found. When I was elected president here a long time ago, I had a strange period in which I was the President-Elect. Several extremely awkward months. I wasn’t president yet. I had an office on campus but I had no power or authority whatsoever. It was like the rest of the campus saw Darth Vader sitting in a small office. That’s the way I felt. One of the things I did, by the way, some of the most profitable things I did during that time was I decided I’m going to go and travel to other theological seminaries, especially where presidents have been at this for a long time and see what I can learn from them. Just some phenomenal conversations with some wonderful men. Now along with the Lord. The other thing I did was I took the faculty minutes for this institution and read–I know this is going to sound insane, but it was helpful–I read every word of the faculty minutes from the first meeting of the faculty in 1859 to the present, all that we’ve got. Took a little bit of time.

There’s a lot of stuff in there you don’t need to read. A lot of motions have absolutely no contemporary relevance. The original faculty were four and you know how that worked? It was a small group and then it grew slightly larger. The move to Louisville meant that by the late 1870s the seminary was fully relocated and the faculty is again, the student body is growing and growing and the context was a shift from Greenville, South Carolina to Louisville, Kentucky. What made Louisville different is that this is a river city. Alright, the musical, the music man, you got trouble in river city.

I found a very strange motion adopted by the faculty. It was the faculty of this institution instructing the students that evangelism was not an adequate excuse for being found on the riverfront at night. Right…you’re here for evangelism. Well, no you’re not. 

And I thought it’s very interesting. You go that far back and you see all the things they did about doctrine and confession and curriculum and then no excuse to be found at the riverfront at night. This young man went where he wasn’t supposed to go. 

And so you see the progression in sin and you notice it is his volition. It is his will. He knows what he’s doing. He knows where he is going. He may not know everything that will come, but he takes himself to the proximity of temptation. He is responsible for going where he was not to go. 

In verses 10 through 12, we also see that he saw what he wasn’t supposed to see. He was not to see. He saw what he was not to see. 

“And behold a woman meets him dressed as a prostitute, wily of heart. She is loud and wayward; her feet do not stay at home; now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait.”

He sees her. And she takes initiative here. She meets him. She’s dressed as a prostitute. Okay, one of the difficulties in looking at a text like this is how much we allow our imaginations to imagine the text. Let me just say, evidently you could tell a prostitute by how she dressed. Evidently it was visible. And evidently she is not dressed so as to decrease sexual interest. She’s evidently dressed so as to increase sexual interest, and that is because she wants to sell sex. It’s the essence of being a prostitute. 

So just notice again the progression. This young man went where he wasn’t to go and then he saw what he wasn’t to see and the progression goes from just the going to now, the seeing. We know full well the pattern of sin that comes from seeing things we are not to see. It also reminds us of a biblical truth, a central inference in terms of Christian moral understanding based upon both the Old Testament and the New. No man has the right to see the nakedness of a woman not his wife.

That is not a right. This is the scourge of course of pornography that is now so much more pervasive and nearly universal and, frankly, so much more horrifying in its content, its accessibility. So now to the young, younger and younger. The pathology of pornography is this way. But this isn’t pornography on a website. This is pornography in the darkness, the woman on the corner. So he went where he wasn’t to go and then he saw what he wasn’t to see.

In verses 13 through 21, he heard what he wasn’t to hear. 

“She seizes him and kisses him, and with bold face she says to him, ‘I had to offer sacrifices and today I have paid my vows; so now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly…”

Let me just point out something. She didn’t seek him first. He went where he wasn’t to go. This is the sought who was seeking to be sought.

“…So now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly, and I have found you. I have spread my couch with coverings, colored linens from Egyptian linen; I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. Come, let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love…”

Before we go any further. It’s not love he’s after. It is not romance he’s after. It is not covenant marriage he’s after. He’s not after love, he’s after lust. But you’ll notice how the words are smooth. That’s exactly what we’re told here is smooth words. You redefine things. You create euphemisms in a seductive pattern. 

“…Come let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love…”

And then this is not incidental, “…For my husband is not at home; he has gone on a long journey; he took a bag of money with him; at full moon he will come home.’ With much seductive speech she persuades him; with her smooth talk she compels him.”

Now let’s notice something. He’s responsible. He’s fully responsible. He’s a moral agent. It was the abuse of his moral agency that led him to be where he wasn’t supposed to be and to see what he wasn’t supposed to see. Now to hear what he wasn’t supposed to hear, he is not an innocent victim. He’s an idiot. He’s fully morally responsible, but a trap has been set.

He went where he was not supposed to go. He saw what he was not supposed to see. He heard what he was not supposed to hear. 

Fourth, he felt what he was not to feel. It’s here in the text. It’s here in the text verses 22 and 23. 

“All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver; as a bird rushes into a snare; he does not know that it will cost him his life.”

It’s a candid statement of the process of sexual sin. It begins with something on this young man’s heart. Just an interest, sinful interest just biblically to find his lust. And he allows lust to take him where he wasn’t supposed to go, to see things he wasn’t supposed to see, to hear things he wasn’t supposed to hear, and to feel things he wasn’t supposed to feel.

The snap of arousal is made very, very clear here. The intentionality of being where this will happen and it does happen, going towards the trap and eventually the trap is set, and he walks right into the trap. Now there is a progression here. We need to know, we need to be thankful for the biblical candor. Brothers and sisters, we need to be thankful that the Lord God Almighty wants us to know this and to know it as he would frame it and to warn us as he would warn us and to speak candidly about exactly how this happens.

He felt what he wasn’t supposed to feel. Now there is a progression here, but a progression is not the same thing as an inevitability. You’d want to think that at some point, at some point this young man would come to his senses, and perhaps even after going where he wasn’t to go and seeing what he wasn’t to see, and hearing what he wasn’t to hear and even feeling what he wasn’t to feel, we could hope that all of that coming together and he knows exactly what is happening, we could hope that some kind of conviction would come into his heart. Some kind of self-preservation instinct would come into his heart, some kind of awareness that he’s like an animal about to walk in a trap. We would like to think that that might happen, and it can happen. It can happen. One of the things I want to say is this progression is not inevitable. And so one of the words of a father to a son here is, “You may go where you’re not supposed to go and see what you’re not supposed to see, and hear what you’re not supposed to hear. But you’re not a victim. It’s you who is responsible then to walk into the trap. And when you do, the trap is set.”

And at that point, it’s not just that he went where he wasn’t supposed to go and he saw what he wasn’t supposed to see and he heard what he wasn’t supposed to hear and he felt what he wasn’t supposed to feel. He does what he wasn’t to do. He did what he was not to do. He is not innocent, but he is stupid. That’s the verdict of the father. Look at this, 

“All at once he follows her, like an ox goes to the slaughter, as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver, and a bird rushes into a snare; he does not know that it will cost him his life. And now, O sons, listen to me, and be attentive to the words of my mouth. Let not your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths for many a victim she has laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng. Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death.”

There’s more to the story. There’s also the word of the New Testament. I want to direct us to First Corinthians chapter six beginning in verse 13, in the context of the New Covenant, 

“The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I take then the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For as it is written, ‘The two will become one flesh.’ But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body. But the sexually immoral person…”

You notice that’s larger than just prostitution. 

“…The sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you are bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”

Praise be to God. Do you see the sense of an even deeper imperative? Moving from Proverbs to Galatians, First Corinthians in this passage, from the Old Testament to the New Testament, it’s not just avoid the seductress, it’s glorify God in your body. It’s now the New Covenant context. With whom will you join your body? Flee from sexual immorality. I have to believe that Proverbs seven is in the background. The young man should have fled. The Father instructs his son to flee. So also the Apostle Paul to us.

Alright, the message here is clear–the damages of sexual sin. Practical considerations about those damages. It’s an insult to the goodness of marriage. We need to see the biblical imperative of faithfulness and obedience. It’s a thou shalt not. Let’s be honest, we don’t have time to think about all of this in detail because we don’t need to. The Bible is clear and restricting sexual expression to that between a man and a woman in the holy covenant of marriage. Until death do they part. And the Bible presents that as glorious and as a picture of the covenant, even between Christ and the church, the covenant of marriage. 

It’s one of the horrible things about the sexual sin here. It destroys the soul. But in every form, I don’t know if you’ve thought about this before, but in every conceivable form, sexual sin undermines the sanctity of marriage. Marriage is a creation order institution. The first thing we are told after we are told we are made in the image of God.

What we have here is the imperative of faithfulness. And what is at stake is the glory of God and also the destruction of life. Sexual sin is not the unforgivable sin. But saying that, we must make very clear that sexual sin is horribly destructive to the body and to the soul. Life and death hang in the balance. 

But in reaching this point, there’s something more I have to say. This text gives us no permission to see women as inherently the seductress and men as morally victimized. It happens, but the scripture makes very clear there is more to this story. This is in particular a warning from a father to a son. And this is for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. We all need to know this. And I would say to women as well as to men, you need to know the progression here and what is going on. We are informed and instructed by this. And for the glory of God, we must all hear this and understand exactly what is taught here. But remember in Proverbs you have the two women presented as paradigmatic opposing voices. You have the Woman Wisdom and the wisdom and the Woman Folly. And the voice of the Woman Foolishness comes with such seduction and smooth words.

But you know this young man is fully absolutely responsible. He is a responsible moral agent. He has exercised that in the most sinful way in that progression from going where he wasn’t to go, seeing what he wasn’t to see, hearing what he wasn’t to hear, feeling what he wasn’t to feel and doing what he wasn’t to do. He is not presented here without moral agency. The animal caught in a snare. We don’t blame that animal in moral terms. The stag caught in a hunt. We do not blame in moral terms. The young man caught in this situation we blame for knowing the trap was a trap and intentionally going into the trap, step by step. 

Not only do we have here a picture of sexual sin and temptation and the progression of sin, we do have a dimwit who destroys himself with sexual sin. There’s more to it than that. When it comes to sex, there are dangerous women and dangerous men. There are male and female patterns of sexual sin. This one’s very candid about the male pattern of sexual sin, even right down to the seeing and the hearing and the feeling. But in both cases there is a progression in both cases, sin is a distortion of a longing. In both cases it leads to predation.

And I think I’m responsible to say at this point, this parable, this picture from the Proverbs is of a seductive woman. But let’s be honest, the world is filled with manipulative men. They manipulate the very situation that is described here. And it is they who take advantage of the uniqueness of the longings of a girl or of a woman. They know exactly what they are doing to lead her to go where she is not to go, to see what she is not to see, hear what she’s not to hear, feel what she is not to feel, and then do what she is not to do. In a world of sin, both men and women can be exploiters and the exploited.

Sin is sin and devastatingly so. So what now?

We got nowhere to go. We have nowhere to go but to the gospel of Jesus Christ. We have nowhere to go but repentance and faith. We have nowhere to go but what the Puritans called “godly detestation of sin.” We’re meant to look at this and not just say “What an idiot.” We’re to look at this and say, “Oh my goodness, my God. How horrifying is this picture? Lest we follow in that same pattern and path.” 

We have nowhere to go but the gospel of Jesus Christ, the mercy of God and the promise of forgiveness. We’ve got nowhere to go with sin but to the cross. And we have nowhere to go as Christians but to repentance and then to faithfulness.

And so, every single one of us will hear this passage with a different set of ears. But we need to receive it with a common heart for Christ. And, let’s be honest, a common concern for each other lest we sin. 

Our call to worship this morning was Micah chapter six, verse eight. “He has told you, O man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice and love kindness and to walk humbly with your God.”

By the grace and mercy of God, to walk in wholeness and in purity, committed to receive every gift God gives us to His glory as he has given it to us. And to walk no other way, to see no other thing, to hear no other voice, to feel no sinful passion, lest we do what we are not to do. Let us do what we are to do, to do justice and love kindness and walk humbly in purity with our God.

Let’s pray. 

Father, we’re just so thankful for all you’ve given us in this text. Father, we pray that your word will do what you have promised. It will do that it will reside in our hearts. And so Father, I pray that this word will reside in every one of our hearts, every person in this chapel, every person as a believer hearing this message, I pray that your word will reside in our heart so that we will not go, we will not see, we will not hear, we will not feel, we will not do that which would dishonor you and rob you of your glory. May you show your glory in a faithful church. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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Third Avenue Baptist Church

Louisville, KY

1 Corinthians 5:1–13

April 6, 2025

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Well, good morning.

I greet you all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. What a wonderful thing to be in this service together this morning. I want to welcome our guests as well as all students and faculty and friends who are here this morning. It is a privilege for Christians to get to sing songs such as we have just sung. It is a privilege for Christians to be deployed in Christ’s service, as you’ve been invited to do and this project upcoming. It is a blessing to Christ’s people just to be together in one place. That’s in so many ways the great blessing of this campus. It’s not an accidental assemblage of people. It’s the strategic gathering together of teachers and students, all of us learners together of God’s word and God’s ways, so we greet you all. It’s a privilege to look out this morning and see you. It is an even greater privilege for us to turn to God’s word together. I want to invite you to turn to Deuteronomy chapter 30. Deuteronomy chapter 30.

I am teaching a class on leaders and leadership this term and just last week before the break I was teaching on Moses. Now, I kind of call the class Moses to Margaret Thatcher because we’re looking at ten different leaders and the first three are David and Moses and Paul. Moses being the first, and I believe Moses being the paradigm of leadership for the entire biblical tradition. So much so that Jesus is the new Moses leading his people not out of captivity to Pharaoh in Egypt, but rather out of captivity, to sin and to death and to darkness. A greater than Moses. But until Christ, at least what we hear at the end of the book of Deuteronomy is since the death of Moses, no prophet like him has arisen in Israel.

Now, a part of the fun of the new book I just had come out on the three offices of Christ is that Christ infinitely fulfills all three offices in the Old Testament: prophet and priest and king. But when many people think about prophets in the Old Testament, they think about predictive prophecy or the confrontational prophets. We think about Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, but Moses is in the Old Testament, the paradigmatic prophet. The text that we’re going to consider this morning in Deuteronomy 30 is at the end of the very long leadership of Moses. I found teaching about Moses to be a daunting challenge, a wonderful challenge, and one for which I’m incredibly thankful. But Moses is a remote figure to us in so many ways, and I think that’s the way it is supposed to be.

I just lectured on Paul. Paul is so much more accessible to us and not just in chronology and in time, although I’m sure that has something to do with it. But we have far more introspection in Paul. We have much more of an understanding of the interior life of Paul. This particular passage comes at the end of the long ministry of Moses, a remarkably faithful ministry. But remember how chapter 31 begins: “So Moses continued to speak these words to all Israel. And he said to them, ‘I am 120 years old today. I am no longer able to go out and come in. The Lord has said to me, ‘You shall not go over this Jordan.’ The Lord your God himself will go over before you. He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them, and Joshua will go over at your head, as the Lord has spoken.’”

Moses is 120. His life in so many ways broken into three periods of 40 years. 40 years the Prince of Egypt, 40 years in the wilderness, 40 years after his call leading Israel. He’s old. I don’t know anyone 120 years old. I know old, old… but I can only imagine what 120 years old looks like. He describes himself by saying, “I’m 120 years old today. I am no longer able to go out and come in.” I don’t know exactly what that means, but it evidently has a good deal to do with leadership. It is not just about physical strength. When he dies, we are told that he died with his strength unabated, his strength intact, his vigor unabated. The Lord preserved him, but in this circumstance, he recognizes the transition is inevitable. Israel is now at the brink of the land of promise, but they’re on the wrong side of the river Jordan. They need to cross the river in the covenant promises of God and take conquest of the land that the Lord their God has promised them.

It is so clear that Moses aches to be the one to lead Israel into the promised land, but it is God’s judgment that he should lead Israel to the brink of the promised land and then go up on the mountain and die.

Last words mean a lot. They mean a lot of you’re talking about great figures of history, sometimes we have their last words, sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we have their last words and we think someone made them up. Sometimes they’re indisputable. But what weight we would assign to such last words. We have the last words of Moses and of course some of these words will continue through the successive chapters, but in this section of this great sermon of Moses, the Lord speaking through him, we come to chapter 30 and Moses is setting up what is at stake. It’s part of the task of Christian teaching, part of the task of Christian parenting, part of the task of Christian leadership and of the Christian life. It’s understanding what’s at stake.

For the sake of time, we will not read all of chapter 30, but we will begin at verse 11. God speaks through Moses:

“For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.

See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today, by loving the Lord your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”

A valediction of sorts here. Last words, a good many of them. All of them important, all of them precious. We can only imagine how Israel heard these words. They’re standing at the brink of a transition. Today, it’s Moses. It has been Moses for many, many years. Soon Moses will be dead and it will be Joshua.

The Lord has provided a successor, but no one said the transition is going to be easy. Moses the prophet, speaks this word from the Lord. In some ways it is a repetition of what Israel has heard before and as a matter of fact, that’s the whole purpose of the book of Deuteronomy. In one sense, deutero nomos, the second giving of the law. There’s a particular reason or necessity for this, and that is that the generation of the exodus became unfaithful, so unfaithful that they even worshiped a golden calf. They were unfaithful such that the Lord said to them, you will not enter the land a promise, but your children will.

Well, alright, but that presents a challenge. It requires the second giving of the law, so that the generation which will enter the land of promise has heard the law. Even as Moses received the law, they will hear it and it is their responsibility to heed it. Israel is on the brink of the conquest. Moses is speaking some of his last words, so what is he going to say? Well, the first thing, he says this as the Lord is speaking through him, this is the Lord’s voice, “For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’” In verse 14, “But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.”

This is an astounding statement. It feels natural to us because it seems natural to us that the word is near us. It is just a fact of life. We take for granted that the word of God is near us, that we don’t have to try to go to heaven to get it. We don’t have to go across the seas to get it. The word of God has been, by God’s grace, brought to us. In the case of Israel, it was brought to them by the prophet or through the prophet Moses. For us, the great good news is that the word of God is near to us because we have the holy scriptures, and so we have Moses, yes, five books of Moses, but we have far beyond that. We have David, we have the kings, we have Solomon, we have prophets, we have gospels, we have apostles, we have epistles. So much more. We don’t have to go far to get it. It has been brought near to us. It is accessible to us.

It’s one of the reasons why in the history of the Christian Church, one of the main concerns has been to make sure the word of God is accessible. One of the stories of the Christian Church, especially you go to the turning point like the reformation, is that it was predicated upon so s scriptura the Scripture alone, and that’s why I love taking people in churches in London, Saint James Piccadilly, not what I’d name a church, but Piccadilly is the neighborhood. St James was the name, so it’s St. James Piccadilly. Why do I love taking people there? It is because the original building burned in the Great Fire of London, but you’re not looking at a ruin. You’re looking at a very typical Christopher Ren building, astoundingly beautiful, stately, and elegant. But if you compare that church building, that place of worship with ones before the fire, you’re going to notice one stunning difference.

St. James Piccadilly has these soaring windows that let in the sunlight why Christopher Wren’s brilliance as an architect? No. The why is the reformation and the reformation puts the bible in the hands of God’s people and whereas before the reformation, you sat in the dark room and priest did everything behind the screen. After the reformation, you sit in the pew with a Bible in your hand. It’s the same Bible the preacher has in the pulpit and you read the text even as he preaches the text, and that takes light and that takes windows. One of the reasons why we’re so committed to Bible translation, getting the word of God into as many languages as possible, as fast as possible, and as accurately as possible. A part of the Christian missionary movement has been very clear in its logic where we go with the gospel, we go, this ruptures yours.

It’s very easy for us to take this for granted. It’s very easy for us just to assume you can go into a store and buy a Bible that you can have a Bible sitting on your desk, on your table, you can have a Bible in your hands, but that is not to be taken for granted. It is a miracle. It is a sign of God’s grace. It is a sign of God’s mercy that we have the Scriptures.

Moses says in the very next sentence as the Lord speaks through him, see, “I have set before you today life and good, death and evil.” Okay, alright. Yeah. That’s got to be right. So when you hold the Bible, when you open your Bible and you read it and your private devotions, when you study it, when in a small group you discuss it when you’re at Christian worship and the scriptures preached, what’s happening?

Well, none of it would be happening if the word had not been brought near to us, the only way this happens is because the word is brought near to us, but here’s where I think most Christians underestimate what in the world is going on every time this word is opened, set before us is life and death, blessing and curse.

We ought never to preach a message without understanding that we are preaching life and death, blessing and curse. We ought never to open the word of God and read a single word without understanding that we are reading life and death, blessing and curse. In our private devotions, we just open the Scripture… what do we get out of this? Well, life or death, blessing or curse. There’s not a tame word in Scripture. There’s not a portion of God’s word of which this is not true.

God intends it this way. It isn’t that the Lord says to his people, “Oh by the way, the way this is kind of set up is that set before you is life or death, blessing or curse.” No, he doesn’t say that. He says, “I have sat before you today, life and death, blessing and curse.” So, God in his sovereignty intends it this way,  that every time we open the word it’s blessing or curse every time. It’s life or death every time.

The Lord is reminding the children of Israel of this fact as they are about to enter the land of promise. It’s a good thing that we are reminded of this fact every time we come to worship. Every time I come to the preaching of God’s word, well, what’s at stake here? Oh, I don’t know… Relevance, application, brilliance and exposition, religious information, data for edification? No! Life or death, blessing or curse.

That certainly has to weigh on the preacher, right? It better weigh on the preacher. What’s at stake here? If the preacher doesn’t see anything particular at stake in the text, it’s going to be an unfaithful sermon. But it’s just as true of the hearer as the preacher. It’s just as true of the Pentateuch, as of the gospels. It is just as true of the epistles, as of the prophets. It’s just as true of the Psalms as of the book of Revelation. The Bible is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword. It’s not safe anywhere you touch it. And as it cuts, it cuts blessing on one side, curse on the other. It cuts life on one side, death on the other.

I want us to pay particular attention to verse 16. “If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today, by loving the Lord your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if,” verse 17, “But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess.”

Alright. Much of institutional Christianity is disappearing. You probably noticed this. Any major cities city like Louisville, you drive around town, you see a lot of whited sepulchers curse. You see a lot of churches where evidently at one time the word of God was preached. No more. You can sometimes tell everything you need to know by the presence or the absence of a rainbow flag flying out front, which by the way is exactly correlated with whether or not the word is rightly preached inside. Now, thankfully, there’s so many wonderful gospel Bible churches in this city. Now, this is God’s gift, and I don’t take it for granted.

This is an amazing demonstration of God’s love, so many congregations in which so many of our students and faculty here are deeply engaged. There are signs of God’s promise in these congregations of faithfulness and they often meet in far less elegant buildings, less prestigious addresses, but in them is Bible and gospel, ecclesia, mission, joy, living faith. That has everything to do with the power of the word, with the presence of the word or the absence of the word. Which, put another way. means obedience to the word or disobedience to the word, the fulfillment of the responsibility of preaching and teaching or the failure in the responsibility of preaching and teaching. Or a failure in the responsibility of hearing and heeding seen in not hearing and in disobeying.

What I want to draw attention to in a way that I think gets inadequate attention by Christ’s people is what we see here first when we see verse 16 and then to verse 17. The first word in our English translation, the first word of verse 16 is “If.” I think a lot of preachers are scared to death of “if.” Little word, just two letters. “If” in the structure of the English language and its parallel in the structure of the Hebrew language, as it is in the Greek language, the presence of an if is a syntactical sign that there is a “then.” It’s a conditional.

If you do this, this will happen. And if we obey the word, if we obey the word… “If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today, by loving the Lord your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it.”

Too often where we are tempted to preach or to rest in the promises of God without the “if.” “If” will get you into trouble, people want to be told that they’re going to be blessed by God, period. They don’t want a conditional. They don’t want an “If you obey, if you walk in my ways, if you keep my commandments and my statutes, then you shall live and multiply and long live into the land of promise.” There’s an “if” the other side of that is a then, but just because we are slow of hearing and dull of heart and, in spiritual terms, stupid. The Lord through Moses makes it clear by offering the other conditional, he comes in the next verse, “But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish.”

So, the big issue here is what’s at stake? Life and death, blessing and curse. The “if” underlines the fact that God’s promises are sure and certain, but they are presented to us, they’re presented to us with an “if.”

That means we have to think about this because God’s purposes are absolute, his sovereignty is absolute, his will is absolute. So how the “if” fall within the sovereignty of God? Well, there are mysteries there we’ll never fully understand, but we understand by the entirety of Scripture that we are to preach the sovereignty of God, the security, the essential unbreakable unchangeable of his decrees. We rest in the fact that we as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are chosen before the foundation of the earth, but God has sovereignly willed that his people be presented with “if.”

Israel isn’t told, “You’re my elect people so you don’t have to worry about a thing from now on, obey disobey no matter, walk in my ways don’t walk in my ways no matter.” No… He actually tells them, “If you do not obey my word, your enemies are going to trample on your heads…. You’re entering the land of promise, but you’re going to have nothing but trouble and by the way, you’re going to die fast. You’re not going to live long in the land that I have promised you.”

The “if” the unavoidable, inevitable, conditional. It’s got to be very central to our understanding of Christianity. It’s got to be very central to our understanding of biblical faith. It’s got to be very central to our understanding of preaching and teaching. It’s got to be very central to our understanding of hearing. Every time we hear a sermon preach, whether we recognize it or not, it is coming to us as the word of God and there’s an “if.” If you obey it, you shall surely be blessed. If you disobey it, you shall surely be cursed.

Part of me says that if you understand what’s at stake here, you just don’t come to church… But then of course you are dead because you’re cut off from the word of God and you’re cut off from the people of God. This was something that greatly affected Martin Luther, the reformer. With his greater and deeper understanding of the gospel came to a greater and deeper understanding of preaching and of what is at stake in preaching what is at stake in both preaching the word of God and hearing the word of God, and there was a sense in which that realization, given Luther’s fears led him to think maybe it’s just too dangerous a thing to preach. And then he came to the understanding that nonetheless, this is what God has commanded and his people need to be fed and the preacher has just got to get up and preach.

The preacher is never worthy of preaching. The preacher is just a frail and fragile human being, but God has so chosen and decreed that his word is to be preached through fallible human preachers. This is why Luther says “sin boldly.” People take that out of context: order a second piece of pie or something stupid. That’s not what Luther meant. He simply meant in the context that if you sin even as you’re preaching because maybe you think about that  you’re hungry while you’re preaching. In other words, we are earthen vessels. The word of God is perfect. We’re not. But if God’s called you to preach then even in preaching, you’re going to sin, you’re going to have a wayward thought. So, sin boldly because the one thing you can’t do if you’re called is not get up in the pulpit and preach the word of God in season and out of season. The word of God has to be preached.

You want to see what it looks like to take away the inevitable conditional? If you take away the conditional, you end up with something like liberal Protestantism in which preachers are actually at pains to tell you there’s nothing major at stake. “There’s no heaven and hell to worry about. There are no flames of hell to avoid. There’s no judgment of God to fear. There is no gospel imperative to drive us to take the gospel to the ends of the earth. No, just about any religion will do, just about any amount of religion will do, just about any variant of religion will do and evidently just about anything will do in the pulpit.”

There are some clever ways out of this. You can try to get out of this. Try to get away from that inevitable, conditional. Let’s try. Let’s try to defang it a little bit. I’ll tell you one thing that’ll defang it: Purgatory. It’s unbiblical. It’s actually contradictory to the entire structure of the gospel. Not only is it not found in God’s word, it actually contradicts God’s word, but it’s a very convenient doctrine. The Roman Catholic Church has purgatory and purgatory is kind of a middle ground and virtually everyone’s going to go there at least for some length of time, and so in so far as there is sin in the Roman theology not covered by sacramental grace and there is sin still, there is a need for purgation still. Well, there’s purgatory over there and for a length of time you’re in purgatory until such time that you are qualified to enter into heaven itself, but you notice that purgatory is not hell. Purgatory is just a place where you’re being purged of unrighteousness until you’re ready. It’s a brilliant invention if you don’t care about biblical authority, the gospel, because you tell people you don’t have to worry about hell, you’re not really going to hell. You’ve been baptized in the Catholic Church, so you’re not going to hell maybe in purgatory a long time. But you know eternity’s longer.

You’re not going to hear the conditional, you’re not going to hear the “if” in gospel terms where the if then is prosperity rather than eternal life. Prosperity theology has an “if then,” but it is a false “if then” there are promises on the other side to the conditional, there are promises to God’s people. You will prosper in the land of promise. You’ll live long in the land of promise, but it is not a glib promise that in the context of your age you are going to be unusually prosperous.

I remember as a student seeing the death announcement in the headlines of a health and wealth preacher famous at the time who died at age 82. My first thought was, “That’s about the right time.” Evidently, whatever this preacher preached, did it make the difference between 81 and a half and 82? I don’t know. That evidently is not the conditional.

I mean there is a, even in the wisdom literature in the Bible, there’s an obvious thing if you jump off a cliff you’re going to get hurt. That’s an if, but the main point of this conditional, and it’s made so quintessentially, so clearly in this text, is this a difference between life and death, blessing and curse, obedience and disobedience, faithfulness and unfaithfulness. We ask what’s at stake? I think it’s really important that we understand how much we have to lean into the consequences, lean into the inevitability of the conditional. If this has at least something to do with, for instance, the argument that comes out of originally in terms of its quintessential argument. It is based in even the New Testament of course and foreseen in the Old Testament, but it shows up at crucial times in church history. It shows up in the reformation: thesis and counter thesis.

You have the Protestant confessions answered by the Council of Trent, but in the modern age you had rival worldviews in collision, two different intellectual worlds in collision, and this is where you had originating, at least in some sense in Dutch Calvinism, you had the recognition that faithfulness means we have to clearly identify the antithesis. The thesis of truth and the antithesis that is already present in our culture. You have to preach the thesis and the antithesis. You’re not doing your job as a theologian, as an apologist, as an ethicist, as a Christian believer, as a preacher, as a student, as a professor, you’re not doing your job until you’ve not only identified the thesis, but you have clearly identified and refuted the antithesis. It’s one of the reasons why in our teaching here we have to deal with a lot of stupid heretical bad stuff. It’s because we really can’t teach the thesis in our context without teaching what is the antithesis.

We have to defend the thesis. We have to tear down the antithesis. You have a church over here, it preaches universalism. How did it get there? You’ve got to break that down. You have to understand that here’s a Christian over here arguing for the legitimacy of same-sex marriage. Okay, well, you’re going to have to have to understand the antithesis and you only do so because you first understand the thesis of marriage as revealed in Scripture. But you have to understand how the antithesis is now formed and how, by the way, you are going to have two opposing conflicting worldviews inevitably. Two completely irreconcilable sets of truth claims because when you look at one issue like that, it’s never just one issue like that. It is an entire chasm that separates life from death, blessing from curse, thesis from antithesis. It’s not just a mind game. It’s about life and death.

The final passage here, the final paragraph section begins in verse 19, “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”

Alright, time is fleeting. Turn to Romans 10. Romans 10 beginning in verse five. “For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. But the righteousness based on faith says, ‘Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’ (that is, to bring Christ down) ‘or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, ‘Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”

Deuteronomy 30, Romans 10. Paul brings the words of Moses, the word of God through Moses, right from Deuteronomy 30 to Romans chapter 10. The context has changed. It’s not Old Covenant, it’s New Covenant. It is Christ who has been brought near to us. We didn’t go up to heaven to get him. For God’s so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. We didn’t go to heaven to get him any more than Israel went to heaven to get the word. The word was brought near to us. We didn’t cross the seas to bring him. We didn’t bring him up to us. No. God brought him up out of the grave.

Some people hear the “if” in Deuteronomy 30 and say, that’s so Old Testament. It’s so New Testament. What does the Lord say through Paul? Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. The context here is the faithfulness of God’s people, the reality of God saving act, the issues, the faithfulness of God’s people as they were getting ready to enter the land of promise. The issue now is the faithfulness of Christ’s Church in this generation. We’re in the same situation. No, no, we’re in the same predicament, but it’s not the same situation. The predicament is the “if,” the conditional. The situation is infinitely different. We’re not just talking about living long in the land of promise. We’re talking about eternal life, the gift of God to all who believe and have faith in his Son.

The Old Testament law had content, so does the gospel. If you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord… Don’t run from the conditional. You can’t. There’s no escape. Don’t minimize what’s at stake. Hear it, be warned by it, be encouraged by it. Live in it, preach it, teach it, share it. On the other side of that “if” is life or death, blessing or curse.

It’s true in Deuteronomy 30, it’s true in Romans 10. It’s true then, it’s true now. Praise be to God. Let’s pray: Father, we’re so thankful for the candor of your word. Thank you. Thank you for the directness of your word. Thank you for the warnings in your word. Thank you for the blessings in your word. Father, may we, this morning, live by your grace and for your glory in the “if” of faith and obedience to all you’ve revealed to us. It will be to the praise of your name. In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord we pray. Amen.

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