Building a Resilient Church Culture: Part 4 – Accurate Histories

Take your copy of God's Word and join me in Psalm 111.

We are now halfway through a series of sermons, which is a phrase I don't even like saying, series of sermons.

But all the same, halfway through a series of sermons expressing our need to build a resilient church culture.

We live in days of growing soft totalitarianism, particularly concerning anthropology, how we came to be, why we exist.

And we believe that we're going to find ourselves increasingly uncomfortable holding to biblical standards of sexuality, gender, gender roles, etc.

Now to hear me, soft totalitarianism should be held up and compared to hard totalitarianism, which would be things like communist Russia, the USSR.

We are not suggesting this morning that we are going to find ourselves in the gulags of Canada.

Although I wouldn't want to be sent there right now.

But rather that socially it will get more and more difficult to hold to biblical standards.

If you're new to this study, I believe you'll be well served by going to our website, finding the recordings of the three previous sermons, and taking some time to consider that.

We did an overview sermon to begin with where I try to flesh this out a bit more.

But each week I've begun with three prerequisite statements, and I think that they bear repeating each week that we do this.

So, once again, before we proceed any further, as a general practice, we preach expositional sermons.

And even beyond that, our favorite type of preaching is verse-by-verse exposition.

I look forward in the fall to beginning the book of Romans with you once again.

So, that means that we typically, right, we open up to a text, and the point or points of the text is the point or points of the sermon.

We exegete it. We let it speak to us out of the text.

The opposite of that is eisegesis, reading into a text what you think that it means, and we run a risk of doing that as we preach topically.

The labor is to not do that, but we run a risk of doing it.

And so, I just want to say, great concern for this, even as I'm the one preaching, be discerning as people preach topically to you.

Secondly, we're not trying to be alarmists.

But we believe, your elders believe, that it's proper for us to be thinking about and to preparing ourselves for greater challenges that we think are coming for the church.

We care about this because we love you very much, and because we care about the glory of our God.

And thirdly, six total weeks is not nearly enough time to be talking about this.

And I know that I swim in different waters than you, where my brain is all week long.

It's different than where your brain is.

You'll leave here and begin thinking about tomorrow having to teach or sell insurance or build houses or whatever that may be.

But I think it's going to be important for us to continue to talk about these types of things together.

So, I want to encourage you to ask questions.

Push at me.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about anything that I say.

That we might be better together as a church for the glory of our God.

So, how do we build a resilient church culture?

One that's going to stand against the rising tide of self-totitarianism.

It's going to have to be built.

It's not just going to happen.

We're going to have to put practices in place and be deliberate about it.

It's going to have to be a strong thing that we do together, right?

This tide is going to be a destructive tide.

We're going to have to stand.

We're going to have to link arms together.

I think of the SEAL training where they all lay down in the ocean with their arms linked together and just get washed over by waves.

But we're going to stand and we're going to take those waves on together.

It's going to have to be cultural, right?

It's going to have to seep into everything we are as a church.

And this morning, we're going to consider the third of the five things that we believe that we need to be working on.

We've already talked of our need to define and hold to the clear mission.

of the church.

That was number one, clear mission.

And we've also talked about our need to do robust theology, right?

Knowing what God has commanded and what he has promised and carefully doing the work of theological triage in order to maintain unity in the church

for the sake of standing firm on matters of first importance.

Today, we are going to consider the church's need to work on knowing accurate histories.

This is the one, honestly, that I've most trembled at and with my level of preparation still tremble at.

That's the one I think most difficult to make a direct argument from the scripture on.

So as I talk about being discerning, I'm just repeating it again.

Please be discerning as we consider the need we believe to work on accurate histories.

So, Psalm 111, verses 2 through 4.

Psalms 111:2–4

Before I read it, beloved, let me remind you that this is God's word to us written for his glory and our good.

And so we would all do well to listen to it in order to believe its promises and obey its commands.

Verse 2.

Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them.

Full of splendor and majesty is his work, and his righteousness endures forever.

He has caused his wondrous works to be remembered.

The Lord, the Lord, is gracious and merciful.

So you see in just these few verses, Psalm 111, right?

An exhortation, right?

That if we are those who delight in God, we will delight in his works.

And therefore, we're being told here that we ought to study them and remember them.

Because it's in them that our God displays himself as gracious and as merciful.

There are many in our age who want us to just forget the past.

They say that everything valuable is found in everything new.

Newness equals rightness.

We are to always be progressing, always casting off the old ways for the sake of better ways.

Others would have us fixate on the particularly positive or particularly negative aspects of history.

They either always want us acting in response to some evil committed as if we committed the evil ourselves,

or working to preserve some good as if it was never mixed up with any error.

Others still would have us altogether ignore the past because who has time to do the careful work of really knowing our history and learning anything from it?

I suggest to you that none of these are the way forward.

None of them will help us to build a resilient church culture,

but rather, we should actively pursue knowing, interpreting, understanding, and teaching accurate histories.

The word that we use for history comes from a Greek word which means to know.

The Greek word for a historian means wise man or knowledgeable man.

So if we are to navigate a troubled age,

perhaps there is something to be learned from those who have navigated troubled times before us.

The preacher of the book of Ecclesiastes states in chapter 1 and verse 9,

What has been is what will be,

and what has been done is what will be done,

and there is nothing new under the sun.

Just because we might experience something to be new doesn't mean that it's new.

Patterns repeat themselves over and over and over again.

And so history will serve us.

It will help us to see how we have arrived where we are.

Help us to value what we should value and discard that which needs discarding.

Proverbs 19 and verse 2 says,

Desire without knowledge is not good,

And whoever makes haste with his feet misses his way.

So we need to know who has gone before and how we got here.

It's going to help us to see more clearly the way to go forward.

A quotation accredited to a number of men,

including the Irish statesman Edmund Burke,

Spanish philosopher George Santayana,

and my favorite in this lineup,

Winston Churchill,

goes something like this,

quote,

Those that fail to learn from history are,

you all know it, right?

Doomed to repeat it, end quote.

That's right.

I believe that a careful study of history will all at once embolden us to stand for the truth,

as many before us have,

and humble us,

as our troubled days are minor compared to the troubles of those preceding us.

We feel a bit uncomfortable.

Those who have gone before us experienced much more.

Now, I say we will need to be actively pursuing,

knowing, interpreting, understanding,

and teaching accurate histories,

because I want to emphasize that I'm not merely contending

for the careful reading of a good world history textbook.

Histories, multiple avenues of history.

I am contending for the careful reading of a good world history textbook.

So to be clear, that is good.

But not just that.

We will need to know, interpret, understand,

and teach world history,

and national histories,

and state histories,

and local histories,

and, most importantly,

church histories.

We're going to really know who we are

and the context in which we live

and know how to stand in it.

We're going to have to do all of these things.

We will need to have knowledge of how we arrived here,

right?

And especially at how God orchestrated the arrival.

How is it that God is at work in the midst

of all the affairs of mankind?

I believe that the most important way that we can do this

is through the study of church history

placed in the context of broader history,

right?

To know the narrow in light of the broader history of the world.

Now, the Bible is not silent on this topic

as it pertains to knowing God

and His interactions with and for His people.

I already read to you Psalm 111, right?

Great are the works of the Lord.

Steady by all who delight in Him.

Full of splendor and majesty is His work,

and His righteousness endures forever.

He has caused wondrous works to be remembered.

The Lord is gracious and merciful.

That is the Jewish history,

and it is ours if we're in Christ,

grafted in to Israel.

Let's look together at a couple of other Old Testament examples.

So we're going to Bible drill for just a moment here.

A couple of texts, just three if I remember correctly.

Firstly, Deuteronomy chapter 4.

Deuteronomy 4 · chapter mention

So if you can turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter 4.

Deuteronomy 4 · chapter mention

We find in Deuteronomy a restatement of the law

just before the people go into the promised land.

Chapter 4, beginning in verse 9 and following.

God instructs,

Only take care and keep your soul diligently,

lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen,

and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life.

Make them known to your children and your children's children,

how on the day that you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb,

the Lord said to me,

Gather the people to me,

that I may let them hear my words,

so that they may learn to fear me

all the days that they live on the earth,

and that they may teach their children so.

And you came near and stood at the foot of the mountain,

while the mountain burned with fire to the heart of heaven,

wrapped in darkness, cloud, and gloom.

They're called to remember the thing that had happened,

the thing they had witnessed when the Lord came down

and met with Moses on the mountain,

gave to him his law.

They're to remember it for the sake of their souls,

for the sake of the souls of their children,

and for their children's children,

their grandbabies as well.

Another text, so turn with me to Psalm 78.

Beginning in verse 1.

The psalmist writes,

Give ear, O my people, to my teaching.

Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

I will open my mouth in a parable.

I will utter dark sayings from old,

things that we have heard and known

that our fathers have told us.

Right? There's the history.

Things that we have been told.

We will not hide them from their children,

but tell to the coming generation

the glorious deeds of the Lord and his might,

and the wonders that he has done.

He established a testimony in Jacob

and appointed a law in Israel,

which he commanded to our fathers to teach,

to their children,

that the next generation might know them,

the children yet unborn,

and arise and tell them to their children,

so that they should set their hope in God

and not forget the works of God,

but keep his commandments.

And they should not be like their fathers,

a stubborn and rebellious generation,

a generation whose heart was not steadfast,

whose spirit was not faithful to God.

Right?

So we see again an instruction being given here.

Right?

I'm going to tell you things that you need to turn

and tell to others.

Right?

That there would be a generational faithfulness to God,

that they would know how it is that God has acted on their behalf.

And at the end of that text,

so that they would learn how not to act.

Right?

They would learn to keep the law,

and they would also learn that they should not be like their fathers,

stubborn and rebellious,

a generation whose heart was not steadfast,

and they were not faithful to God.

Right?

So we see these Old Testament texts,

this commendation to learning and knowing the history of the people of God,

particularly how God had acted on their behalf.

Let me give you a New Testament example of the same.

1 Corinthians chapter 10.

1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

Let me ask you to join me there.

You're not used to this.

You're used to just camping in a text, aren't you?

Beginning in verse 1,

Paul writes,

For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers,

that our fathers were all under the cloud,

and all passed through the sea.

Right?

Here he is talking about the Exodus.

And all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea,

and all ate the same spiritual food,

and all drank the same spiritual drink.

For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them,

and the rock was Christ.

Nevertheless,

with most of them,

God was not pleased.

For they were overthrown in the wilderness.

Now these things took place as examples for us,

that we might not desire evil as they did.

Do not be idolaters as some of them were,

as it is written,

and the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.

We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did,

and 23,000 fell in a single day.

We must not put Christ to the test as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents,

nor grumble as some of them did and were destroyed by the destroyer.

Now these things happened to them as an example.

But they were written down for our instruction on whom the end of the ages has come.

So again,

you see here,

an encouragement to remember the past,

that we might learn something from it.

And so,

we ought to know our Bibles.

And this is no surprise to you,

especially if you're accustomed to the teaching in this church.

But I just want to carefully emphasize that we are to pay attention to the histories of the Bible

to learn how our God has dealt righteous judgment to those who do not walk in His ways

and mercy and grace to those who do.

This book is full of history,

which is helpful and instructive to us.

Now,

I think at that point the case is simple.

It's easy.

I could say to you,

we ought to know Bible history.

And y'all would go,

absolutely.

We're on board with you.

I just read to you four texts that make that very point.

But then I want to say,

we ought to also go further out and beyond the canon.

And we have to be careful as we do such a thing.

But we ought to see how it is that God has worked since the canon was closed.

How it is He's working amongst His people beyond the record of the Bible.

This is an important thing.

It's an important work for us to do.

And how do we know as we look at history where God has moved and where God hasn't been moving,

particularly as it concerns the history of the church?

And we do so as it accords with the Bible.

Right?

We see movements of people who go out and do things biblically.

We can praise God for the way that God has worked amongst those people.

It's a thing we ought to be about doing together.

If you don't take up this endeavor yourself with your very limited amount of time,

at very least notice how important we believe it is as our church gathers.

So I'm not giving to you a new thing.

So we're going to begin doing some history together.

We already do this quite a bit.

You were handed a bulletin this morning.

I hope.

Maybe you weren't.

But there's a bulletin.

And there's a quotation on that bulletin.

And it is very rare that there's a contemporary quotation on the bulletin.

It's not typical.

But that's the case.

Usually, I'm seeking to draw you back to history.

Right?

To commend to you somebody that's worth reading and worth paying attention to.

Right?

Not perfect people, but people who walked faithfully with our God.

We are not alone in this faith.

Praise God.

It's not just us in this room.

But we stand on the shoulders of giants.

I mourned the loss of R.C. Sproul.

It was a very sad day when the world lost Dr. Sproul.

But it opened up a ton of quotes for me for the bulletin,

which is also a very nice thing to be able to do.

It's also why we use quotations in sermons.

I want you to know that I'm never quoting somebody old

because I want to prove to you that I read old things.

That's not what I'm doing.

I'm not trying to flex and say that I'm somehow smarter than you at all.

I'm trying to connect you to a greater faith

than just the faith that we can observe.

It is a faith that goes out and beyond us.

So even if you never read a church history book,

you can at least participate in that

and learn some things and know some things

and chase a couple rabbit trails from time to time.

But I would commend to you the study of church history.

And there's some really wonderful resources out there

as you look at this and you hold it up to the Scripture.

You think about how God has worked through the history of the church.

This could be a very important thing for you to do.

We must not think that every aspect of church history is commendable,

but much of it is.

Much of it is.

God's people walking faithfully with their Lord.

If we find ourselves holding a position

not held by those who have walked before us,

then there's a very good chance

that we need to rethink our position.

How have faithful brothers and sisters

walked through similar times before us?

I'll commend to you a few things.

First, a book called Pages from Church History

by Stephen Nichols.

It's a short one.

It's 300-something pages.

It gives you a quick introduction to church history.

In addition to that,

he does a podcast called Five Minutes in Church History.

So if you have any inclination in yourself

to learn anything about church history,

I can guarantee you have five minutes somewhere in your day

where you're doing nothing.

You might be moving from one place to another

or brushing your teeth for some portion of that five minutes.

Let him be your timer.

Brush your teeth for five minutes.

You can listen to five minutes in church history

and have your soul encouraged

by those who have gone before you.

Another good book to commend to you,

The Unquenchable Flame by Michael Reeves.

Which is about the Reformation.

Why are we Protestants?

That's an important question you ought to be able to answer.

We are Protestants.

We are still protesting against the Roman Catholic Church.

Why?

What's the issue at hand in this case?

It's the gospel itself.

Salvation by grace alone,

through faith alone,

in Christ alone.

To understand that we don't add anything

to the equation of our salvation,

but that God saves us by his power

and keeps us by his power.

It's expressed in faith,

but we are saved by God.

God.

I was shocked just a number of years ago

at the 500th anniversary of the Reformation,

of the day that Luther nailed the 95 Theses

to the door of the Wittenberg Church.

How much ecumenicalism started going on in those days.

Like we needed to restore the relationship

between the Protestant Church

and the Roman Catholic Church.

And I say no.

It's a day to double down, right?

To say no, no, no.

Justification by faith alone.

Do you know why you're a Protestant?

Is it just because you were born into a house of a Protestant?

Or because you believe what the Scripture teaches

about our salvation?

If you want to read something more thick,

more dense,

2,000 Years of Christ's Power by Nick Needham.

It's a four-volume set.

It's a wonderful, wonderful, helpful read.

We need to be studying church history.

We need to tap into the past.

We need to know that we are not new at this.

We need to be encouraged to not be innovators, right?

But to see how faithful people have walked in obedience

to the text throughout the centuries.

We also need to know the errors of the past.

It is helpful if you study the old confessions

to know why those were issues at all to begin with.

It'll help you recognize error in our day.

Let me just give you a couple of quick examples.

If you were familiar with Arianism

and the great error and heresy that that was,

perhaps you wouldn't be so drawn in

to read or watch a book or movie like The Shack.

You would have heard about it

and heard what was being said about it

and we'd go,

hmm, this sounds a lot like Arianism.

I maybe need to be careful about this type of media.

Or,

Marcionism

may prevent us from suggesting

that we need to unhitch our faith

from the Old Testament.

Or,

Pelagianism

might help us

give a more careful articulation

concerning the nature

of free will.

These matters have been debated

biblically in history

and can be helpful

to us.

I'll say just as a side note,

I think that all of us

are arrogant beyond belief

if we think that we're more intelligent

than the people who have gone before us.

Just about everybody

I pick up and read

who has gone before me

is much, much smarter than me

and I have much to learn

from them.

Maybe we'd all be a little bit smarter

if we'd get off Twitter.

Also, read biography.

The Lord has shaped me,

I think,

through the reading of biography

than any other book I've read

apart from the Scripture.

So,

hold that up,

hold that primary,

but if beyond the Bible

you're going to read something,

I would really commend to you

the reading of biography.

A wonderful biography

to commend to you.

It's actually an autobiography.

It's put out by

the Banner of Truth Trust,

John G. Payton,

the frontier missionary

to the New Hebrides.

I read this biography

in preparation for a men's retreat

that we started doing.

This is,

we're entering into our

14th year, I think,

of doing it,

and we always do

a biographical sketch.

So, I led the charge in that,

and I knew nothing

about John G. Payton.

I thought he sounded

kind of cool.

He went to some islands,

an island chain of cannibals

as a frontier missionary.

And so,

I picked it up,

and I thought,

this will embolden

the men of our church

to contend for the faith.

And God did that

very thing in me.

He worked in my heart

a greater firmness

to stand for the truth.

We'll read to you

a brief quote out of that.

This is Payton himself

writing about how

resistant the church was

to send him to such a place.

So, he wrote,

quote,

John Payton replied

to this man,

quote,

Mr. Dixon,

you are advanced

in years now,

and your own prospect

is soon to be laid

in the grave.

I just love that fullness.

There to be eaten

by worms.

I confess to you

that I can live and die

serving and honoring

the Lord Jesus.

It will make no difference

to me

whether I am eaten

by cannibals

or by worms.

And in the great day,

my resurrection body

will rise

as fair as yours

in the likeness

of our risen Redeemer.

Right?

How good.

Right?

He encouraged the man

who was telling him

not to go do missions.

Right?

If we could just be faithful

to our Lord,

our bodies will be raised

fair in the likeness

of our risen Redeemer,

whether eaten by worms

or by cannibals.

Another wonderful biography

I commend to you

is the biography

of George Mueller

called George Mueller

of Bristol

by A.T. Pearson.

It's put out

by Kregel Publications.

It's the best one.

It's the definitive one,

I will say.

And God used this biography

in a lot of ways.

My father handed it to me.

I don't remember

what we were talking about

at the time,

but something in the Bible.

And my dad said,

I think you're ready

to read Mueller.

And I went,

what?

And he handed it to me.

And praise God,

at least in some measure,

I was ready to read Mueller.

And I said,

Mueller,

many of you have heard me

talk about my belief

in the sufficiency

of the Bible

and saying how that doctrine

has got concreted

in my heart.

It's not going anywhere.

I believe that the Bible

is sufficient

for life and godliness,

that we don't need

to look outside of it

for direction.

And I will say it

after that,

I don't really know

how that happened,

like what was going on exactly.

In thinking this week,

I can remember

at least this biography

was part of that working

in two ways.

I'm going to read you

one quote

and then tell you

something else

that happened

in George Mueller's life.

He says this.

So he goes to a place

named Tainmouth,

I hope I'm pronouncing

that correctly,

in England,

because he's sick.

And he says this,

a quote,

Before this period,

I had been much opposed

to the doctrines of election,

particular redemption,

and final persevering grace

so much so that,

a few days after my arrival

to Tainmouth,

I called election

a devilish doctrine.

I knew nothing

about the choice

of God's people

and did not believe

that the child of God,

when once made so,

was safe forever.

But now I was brought

to examine

these precious truths

by the word of God.

End quote.

He made a practice

of going through

the entirety of the Bible

when there was

an issue that vexed him.

When he wasn't sure

what to think

about a particular issue,

he would read

the entirety

of the scripture

with that issue

in mind.

Another example

of this,

again,

if you're a guest,

we are Credo Baptists

here.

He spoke boldly

in a Bible study

about his belief

in paedo-baptism,

the baptism of infants,

and afterwards

an old woman said,

Mr. Mueller,

have you ever searched

the scripture

on this matter?

And he responded

to her honestly,

no, I've not.

And she said,

well, then I don't think

you should speak again

on it until you have.

And so he did.

And he read

the entirety

of the Bible

with a particular doctrine

of baptism

in mind.

And I'm grateful

to say that he became

a Credo Baptist.

Let me also commend

to you a broader book.

I think that you'll be

served by

21 Servants

of Sovereign Joy

by John Piper.

It's put out

by Crossway.

Short,

condensed,

very Piperian

biographies.

21 of them

will serve

your soul.

So it's good

for us,

right?

It's good for us

to think about

the past,

to be informed

by the past,

both to learn

from its mistakes,

right?

And then to stand

on the shoulders

of its successes,

to see the ways

in which God

has been at work.

I have wrongly said

in the past

that the church

always thrives

in persecution.

But if we're

better students

of history,

we'll know

that that's not true.

The church

has not always

thrived

in the middle

of persecution.

It often does.

The church,

capital C,

global,

will always

go forward,

right?

Nothing will

prevail

against it.

But locally,

it has not

always.

You read the history

of the Christian church

in Japan,

altogether stamped out.

We need to learn,

what were those people

not doing

or doing

well

to preserve

their ability

to stand

in the face

of such

opposition.

So we're going

to have to have

a clear mission,

we're going to have

to do robust theology,

and we're going

to have to pick up

accurate

histories

to run this over,

to do it again

and again,

to think about it

carefully,

and apply it

with wisdom

in our day.

So let me read

in closing

once again,

Psalm 111,

just verse 2.

Great are the works

of the Lord,

studied by all

who delight

in them.

Let's pray together.