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Grace Baptist Church of Danville

December 10, 2017

Believing the gospel is believing that the man Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, that the man Jesus of Nazareth actually accomplished all that the Old Testament prophets said the Christ would accomplish.

Daily Readings for the Week of December 10-17, 2017

Sunday 1 Thessalonians 1-5 Thursday Titus 1- Philemon

Monday 2 Thess. 1-1 Timothy 1 Friday Hebrews 1-5

Tuesday 1 Timothy 2-6 Saturday Hebrews 6-8

Wednesday 2 Timothy 1-4 Sunday Hebrews 9-10

· Shelby and I want you all to join us after our worship service for our annual Open House at the Parsonage. There will be no service here tonight.

Happy Birthday! David Coleman-13^th James Jordan-16^th

Nursery Duty This Week

Shante’ Birchum (AM) — Debbie Bartley (PM) Tuesday: Ruth Wall

The Word Assumed Our Flesh and Blood — Don Fortner

(Tune: #98 – I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day — LMD)

1. From everlasting was the Word,

The Son of God and God the Son.

The Word was with God, and was God,

The Father and the Son are One.

All things in heaven and on earth,

By Christ our God, the Word, were made.

From Him all creatures have their birth.

He is the whole creation’s Head.

2. Behold, with awe, this mystery,

The Word assumed our flesh and blood,

That He might put our sins away

And reconcile us to our God!

Yes, God the Son, who knew no sin,

Stooped to become a mortal man,

That He, for us, might be made sin,

And make atonement for our sins!

3. We now behold, with joy, His face.

The God-man, God the Father’s Son!

How full of truth! How full of grace!

In Him God makes His glory known!

Behold, my soul, the love of God!

Come, sing His praise! His goodness tell!

Let sinners ransomed by His blood

Give praise to Christ – Immanuel!

“He that Sitteth upon the Circle of the Earth”

Isaiah 40:22

Sadly, we who embrace Holy Scripture as the inspired, inerrant Word of God are misrepresented as ignorant and unlearned people who are members of “The Flat Earth Society” (a group of people who are so out of touch with reality that they deny obvious facts, and believe the earth is flat, embracing ancient pagan notions, instead of that which anyone can see from an airplane window). Sadder still, some who profess to believe the Scriptures embrace and teach this ancient pagan notion, pointing to Isaiah 40:22, and blasphemously assert, “If you believe the earth is a globe, you believe a false gospel and worship a false god. You are an idolater.”

The Circle

Every schoolchild knows the word “circle” commonly refers to more than a circle drawn on a flat surface with a compass. A circle may refer to a group of people or things, a realm of activity, or as it does here, the globe. The earth is a sphere, a globe, not a flat plain. It is a ball hung upon nothing (Job 26:7). The Lord God, our Savior, the Triune Jehovah, sits in the ease of absolute sovereignty, as Lord and King over the entire globe he calls Earth. The government of all the earth is upon his broad shoulders of infinite omnipotence. It is our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, who orders the entire globe and all its inhabitants. Perhaps the word “circle” here refers not to the globe itself, but to “the heavens” that circle the earth, from which our God beholds the children of men, “the inhabitants” of the earth, as “grasshoppers,” puny and insignificant.

The Curtain

The Lord our God “stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain.” The heavens refer to the firmament (the vast expanse) he made at the creation. This great firmament, the heavens, our God continues to stretch out. It is he who providentially upholds all the heavens. He who dwells in the highest heaven stretches them out as a curtain, and draws them around himself. The language is obviously symbolic. God who is infinite, incomprehensible Spirit cannot be encompassed by the finite heavens he has made! The language here used symbolically asserts that the Lord God draws the curtains of the heaves around himself, thereby hiding from fallen man the ineffable light of his glorious being. He is God “who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see!” He covers himself with light as a garment, stretching out the heavens as a curtain around him (1 Timothy 6:16; Psalm 104:2). And he stretches out the heavens as “a tent” surrounding the earth and its inhabitants

The Message

Isaiah’s message is exactly that which God commands all his messengers to declare, a message of blessed comfort (Isaiah 40:1-2). — God our Savior is the absolute monarch of the universe. You may, therefore, confidently trust him. All is well. The salvation of his people is a matter of unquestionable certainty.

“Heap Coals of Fire on His Head” —Romans 12:14-21

How do you deal with your enemies? I mean those people who oppose you, injure you, seek to harm you, and speak and do evil against you. Your enemies — Those people who hate you, hate your God, hate your gospel, and hate you because of the gospel you believe. How do you deal with them? How do you think of them? How do you treat them? More importantly, how should we deal with our enemies? Romans 12:14-21 tells us what God has to say about this.

In the first 13 verses of this chapter, the Apostle Paul tells us how we are to deal with our brethren, God’s people, his church. Giving our bodies as a living sacrifice to God means that we are to devote our lives to the service of God’s church, serving in every way we can the temporal and everlasting good of our brethren.

In verses 14-21, the Apostle tells us that giving our bodies as a living sacrifice to Christ means devoting our lives to the temporal and everlasting good of our enemies, too. In this part of the chapter, the Spirit of God teaches us, as much as possible, to treat our enemies as our brethren. — After all, some of them are!

“Bless them which persecute you: bless, and curse not.” — Our Savior fed the multitudes, healed their sick, and attended their weddings and, when invited, even went to their dinner parties, though he had nothing in common with them except humanity. He came to many who received him not, that he might come to some he would cause to receive him. He fed multitudes who wanted nothing but what he gave them to eat, that he might feed some with the bread of heaven. He healed many lepers who never believed him, that he might cause one to return to him with deep gratitude and worship him. He wept over multitudes who would not weep for themselves, that he might cause some to weep for him whom they had pierced. He prayed for those who crucified him. He died for many who were his tormenters and murderers.

Shall I do less? He died for me when I despised him. He prayed for me when I cursed him. He provided for me when I blasphemed him. He protected me when I had no regard for him. He redeemed me when I would not have him. He sought me when I refused to seek him. He called me when I was determined not to call upon him. Shall I do less for those who set themselves against me?

“If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.” — Paul is not undoing all that he has taught us here and all that he teaches about kindness, love, tenderness, and generosity throughout his epistles. He is not telling us to be nice to people because that will make hell hotter for them, as if such a cruel desire is commendable.

What, then, is Paul telling us? He takes his words in verse 20 directly from Proverbs 25, where the wise man Solomon, who was an eminent type of our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, teaches us how to live as wise men and women in godliness. This doctrine is not from below, but from above! This is the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of God’s free grace, grace teaching us to live in true godliness. These coals of fire are not coals of judgment, but coals of grace, by which the hearts of our enemies are melted. Our Savior preached this doctrine in his Sermon on the Mount.

Nothing is more grueling to our flesh than the exercise of kindness and love toward those who hate us. But if we would honor our Savior and serve the souls of men, we must conquer the hearts of our enemies the same way that Christ conquered our hearts, by heaping the coals of mercy, grace, and love on their heads.

The Grace Bulletin

December 10, 2017

Grace Baptist Church of Danville

2734 Old Stanford Road-Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438

Telephone (859) 576-3400 — E-Mail don@donfortner.com

Donald S. Fortner, Pastor

Schedule of Regular Services

Sunday

10:00 A.M. Bible Classes

10:30 A.M. Morning Worship Service

6:30 P.M. Evening Worship Service

Tuesday