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July, 2021 (Vol.55-No.7) |
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Preached by Dr. Gene Scott on October 4, 1987 (2nd in the series on The Called and Chosen) For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. Romans 11:29 WE READ IN ROMANS 11:29, “For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” The King James Version translators made a poor decision when they used the one English word “repentance” to translate several different Greek words. The word “repentance” is a cognate of a Latin word that means “to do penance,” which has nothing to do with sorrow and chastisement. A better translation of this verse reads, “For the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable” or “without recall.” Jesus said in Mark 1:15, “Repent ye, and believe the gospel.” Here, the translators used the word “repent” to translate a Greek word that essentially means “to turn with one’s mind.” Again, it does not mean sorrow or chastisement. It describes an act of the will: it means to turn from something, to something else. The New Testament consistently teaches that we are saved by God’s grace and not by our own willpower. In Colossians, Paul condemned what he called “will-worship.” I am not saying that the will has no place in Christian action. The will is involved, but the will is not deified. Faith is an action, based upon belief, and sustained by confidence. The will must be involved in the action, the mind is involved in the belief, and the emotions are involved in the confidence. That is why Romans 10:17 says, “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” If you expose yourself to God’s performance long enough, it causes your confidence to flower. But your will must still be involved; you must hang your body on your belief by an action, which is sustained by your confidence in God’s faithfulness. Repentance does not necessarily involve your emotions, though your emotions can help propel your repentance. You don’t have to come to an altar and cry your eyes out to repent. You can repent sitting where you are as you initiate the decision to turn from your way to God’s way. It is possible to repent in the right direction or in the wrong direction. When you are backsliding, you are repenting in the wrong direction: you are turning away from commitments that you made to God. With that background, let’s read Romans 11:29 again: “For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” Now that we have defined the word “repentance,” we know that this verse does not say that the gifts and calling of God are without sorrow. There is too much sorrow and crying going on in most churches today. We even try to influence God with our tears hoping that He will allow us to turn away from our commitments. I have cried to God about His calling more times than I care to admit. As children, we learn to cry to get things from our parents. Or if we have been given a difficult assignment, we hope that by our tears we will be given something easier to do. The laws of God in the spiritual world are as operational as the natural laws in the natural world. In the previous message, I quoted from Paul’s teaching in 1st Corinthians 9:17 about God’s calling: “For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation of the gospel is committed to me,” or literally, “a stewardship of the gospel is delivered unto me.” The calling of God makes us trustees. To be a trustee means that you have been entrusted with certain responsibilities. In the natural world, people can go to jail for violating a trusteeship. When God gives you responsibilities, you can perform them willingly or unwillingly; but nevertheless, a stewardship of the gospel has been delivered unto you. There is no such thing as total freedom. You might be free from certain things, but in reality, you are a slave to something else. There is no such thing as a “free” person anywhere in this world. That was Paul’s lament in Romans 7: What I would do, I find myself not doing; and what I would not do, I find myself doing. Therefore, I recognize there is a law in my mind that agrees with the good, but there is another law in my members that takes me into captivity. Paul described the law of sin as a force as real as gravity. Gravity holds us all captive. No matter how hard I try, I cannot fly by flapping my arms. We all know this, so how could something so obvious in the realm of Christian behavior be forgotten when it is repeated again and again in God’s word? There is a law of sin and death! Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death.” The law of sin captures our behavior; it is a law of death that claims our ultimate destiny. There is no escape from the law of sin and death without the implant of a life force with sufficient power to set us free. Without that implant of a force capable of delivering us from the law of sin and death, we remain in its grip as literally as a spacecraft is gripped by the force of gravity until the power from a rocket engine overcomes that force. If you have ever watched a rocket launch, you have seen how it starts off slowly as it strains to break free of gravity; then it ultimately gains speed and breaks free. Why do people entertain the idea that they are free? We are only free to choose a master. Some people don’t like this idea. They resent anything that they feel interferes with their independence. They say, “Well, if I can’t be free, I’ll just leave the church!” You are free to leave, but wait until God decides to teach you that there are consequences for turning from His calling. The gifts and calling of God are irrevocable. There are many things that I am still learning about God. I sometimes describe my faith using the imagery of a circle with some solid dots in its center. The dots in the center of the circle represent the anchor points of my faith, the things that I am sure of. The fact of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is the most solid thing at the center of my faith. As I move away from the center of the circle, the dots get smaller and fainter. These dots represent the things I am not sure of. I am constantly studying to expand my knowledge and gradually expand the region of solid dots. While I am still learning and expanding my understanding of things that reside in the periphery of the circle, I never underestimate the reality of the core of my faith and its claim on my life. I never wanted to be a preacher. I sometimes find the association with this “profession” the most painful cross that I have to bear, not because of the profession itself but because of the many self-anointed fools who have invaded the field. It is difficult for people to find the genuine preachers when there are so many artificial ones dominating the airwaves. I believe that a true preacher of God’s word is someone who accepts his or her calling and is totally committed to it. It is the highest calling that God can give to a man or woman. I know that God claimed me, and though I have fought it for many years, I have learned the lesson and have submitted to His calling. Like Paul, I say, “For if I do this thing willingly, I have my reward. But if I do this unwillingly, nevertheless a stewardship of the gospel is delivered unto me.” I am God’s trustee and cannot run from the responsibility. I have accepted His calling, although too often I have accepted it unwillingly. Paul said in Ephesians 4 that God gave some apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastoring teachers for the perfecting of the saints to the work of the ministry. One of the responsibilities of a true God-called pastor is to occasionally “clean house.” While it is true that the calling of God is irrevocable, it is also true that people must be sorted out. Even Jesus had to sort people out. He knew from the beginning that one of His twelve disciples would betray Him. One-twelfth of His anointed band went bad. When Judas was about to betray Him, Jesus said, “Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?” Judas did not suddenly change at that moment; he fulfilled his potential as a son of the devil from the beginning. Yet the disciples all started out looking the same. It is not how you start; it is how you finish, which is why Peter said, “Give diligence to make your calling and election sure.” I have been preaching with a tone of severity to help shake you into an understanding that you were not set free to do whatever you want to do. You are one of the lucky ones if you have been set free from bondage to sin and from bondage to traditions, but you have been freed to become a bondslave to God’s call on your life. The risk of preaching the message of grace, peace, and freedom is that some people will think it means they can live their lives any way they please. They think they do not need to be committed to God’s work. They think they can stop fighting the fight of faith. When I came to pastor this church twelve years ago, I said that God was looking for a group of uncommon people. Some people go to church only until they find a husband or wife, and after they have accomplished their personal mission, they no longer have an interest in God’s work, if they ever had one. If you have any respect at all for God’s word, you will understand that He lays the same responsibility on you for your calling as He lays on me as a pastor. Some people might ask, “Well, what is my calling?” The very fact that you have to ask that question defines your calling. There are only two kinds of people in the church, which is the society of God’s called ones: pastors who follow Christ and saints who follow their pastor as their pastor follows Christ. Paul said to the Corinthians, “Follow me, as I follow Christ.” To the Thessalonians, he said, “Ye became followers of us, and of the Lord.” You can complicate it all you want. You can mess it up with the vain traditions of this world and remain in bondage to your foolishness, or you can be set free into the truth that is Christ and His word, and therein is life eternal. If God has called you to be a minister, then go start a church tomorrow. The church certainly needs more leaders to preach the gospel and to counter the voices of the fundamentalists. Buy your first newspaper ad and choose a street corner to start preaching from, and then demonstrate that you are called and that God is leading you. If you are not ready to do that, friend, then you are not one of God’s “gift” ministers to the church defined in Ephesians 4: “And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints. . .” I am sure there are many pastors who at times are brought to the point of saying, “I’m tired of this business of perfecting saints! I would rather have any other job. I would rather train horses or elephants, tame lions, or charm snakes!” There is nothing harder in this whole world than perfecting saints! Some people want to be a pastor because they desire a position of prominence. Everyone wants what they perceive to be the perks of the position, but no one wants the responsibility. It is not easy being a pastor because occasionally we have to do things that make the saints hate us. It is like parenting in this respect. There are some parents who don’t know the difference between loving their child and loving to be loved by their child. Likewise, you can tell the difference between a real shepherd and a false shepherd because false shepherds and hirelings love to be loved by their flock and will do anything to manipulate them. Real shepherds will die for their flock, and they will risk being hated by their flock if they must be hated for doing what the Chief Shepherd leads them to do. That is the call of God on the pastor. People want to pass judgment on pastors and decide if they are living a lifestyle that “qualifies” them to be pastors. I maintain that the pastor’s personal life is not relevant to their calling because the office is God-ordained. Paul said in 2nd Corinthians 4:7, “We have this treasure in earthen vessels.” God chooses earthen vessels as His gift ministers. Some of them might be “cracked pots,” but God does the choosing. They get their direction from God and have the responsibility of leading their congregations. They do not have to justify their ministry to the world. If you are a God-called minister, your ministry might have to wait until the Resurrection to prove itself, and death might be your portion. Those who are not called to be one of God’s gift ministers have only one choice: who will they follow? The Catholic Church teaches the doctrine of apostolic succession: they believe that someone can be a minister only if they are able to trace their calling through the laying on of hands all the way back to Peter. They believe that the keys of the kingdom of heaven were given to Peter, and that authority was passed on to a continuous line of successors up to the current Pope. Salvation, in the Catholic view, is exclusively delegated to the successors of Christ’s authority. Their position allows no independent calling of a saint to salvation, and it allows no independent calling of a minister to service. But the Catholic Church is wrong in its initial interpretation of the passage about the keys of the kingdom. They have retroactively applied their interpretation, and it is possible to find the point in history when this was done. Moreover, the so-called line of succession has been broken periodically, and history will not support the claim of succession made by those who say that they have been delegated the keys. Furthermore, God called Paul from outside the line of successors. Thanks be to God, His word shows that He has not neglected His church. Otherwise, the church would have no God-called ministers as a result of the breakdown of this false system. The Protestant position is based upon the fact that God does the calling. The Protestant position is that we are called to sainthood and we become the beneficiaries of God’s grace and peace. And by our faith, we instantly make contact with God without some chain of command in between. God is still in the business of calling people: He gave some apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastoring teachers, and He uses them in His calling of saints throughout every age of the church. Proverbs 18:16 says, “A man’s gift maketh room for him.” If you are not sure of your calling, then you are not one of those gift ministers: you are one of the saints. What is a saint? The Greek word for “saint” is hagios. A saint is someone or something given over to the full possession of the deity. A saint, captured by the law of sin and death, can strike a connection with God’s Spirit by the act of faith. When the light in you is illuminated and life of God’s Spirit comes into you, you are set free from the law of sin and death. Romans 8:11 says that the same Spirit that raised up Christ from the dead shall so dwell in you. God’s gift of His Spirit makes you a called saint. You turn your life over to the direction of a new force, which is His life in you, and it is not a random force. God’s plan puts the saint under the direction of His gift ministers. And just as the gift minister cannot run from his calling, you, the called, cannot run from yours. The gifts and calling of God are without recall. With respect to the ministry, it doesn’t matter what your position is in the world. You might be a banker and have gotten used to people coming into your office and soliciting you. You might think that you can bring your position in the world into the church. It doesn’t matter what your position is in the world; God is the one who calls leaders in His church. There is only one legitimate proof of God’s calling. Protestants have the freedom and right to test a ministry by its expression of the word of God. This has been twisted by Satan into meaning “judge the preacher.” A Protestant preacher’s authority is not traced through the laying on of hands; it is confirmed by his gift of teaching, which is a self-evident gift. Does the preacher take God’s word and make it come alive? Does he open the eyes of your understanding of God’s word? If he does, then he is God’s gift to the church. It is not a skill that can be learned; it is not something that can be taught in a Bible school or university. Otherwise, there would be more gifted Bible teachers in this world. In reality, there are more Bible school-trained fools running around in this nation than anywhere in the world. They stand behind pulpits preaching pseudo-knowledge that they have plagiarized without understanding. I don’t have to listen to someone preach for more than five minutes before I can tell whether he is a self-anointed preacher or a God-called gift to the church. Some people will listen to a preacher preach the word of God, but after a while they start to focus on the human vessel. They begin to criticize the preacher’s personality, or they find fault based on some rumor they heard about his private life. Many people lack the self-awareness to understand that criticism can go both ways: pastors are sometimes tempted to complain to God, “Why did You send me such intractable people?” People can be very judgmental and they will make any excuse to justify abandoning their calling. I have been preaching a simple message: I am called, and the proof of my calling is the results in my congregation; you are called, and the proof of your calling is your first and continuing response when exposed to the gift. Why do some people quit? Why do some slack off? They forget those principles. In Mark 4, Jesus told the parable of the sower to His disciples and said that if they did not understand this parable, they could not understand any parable. In this parable, the sower goes forth to sow the seed, which is God’s word. The seed falls on four kinds of soil. Three of the soils produce a loss, but the fourth soil bears good fruit because it is good soil. The disciples said, “Explain this parable to us.” And Jesus answered, “Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables: that seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them.” Jesus deliberately cloaked the truth in parables, which means there are some whom He does not want converted. There are wayside people who receive the word quickly and get giddy about it, but Jesus does not want them. There are stony-ground and thorny-ground people whom He does not want either. He does not want them to understand because He does not want them converted. Only a few in this world will be saved out of this world. The sobering conclusion to this concept is in Matthew 7:14, where Jesus said, “Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” The church was not placed in the world to save the world. The church is comprised of those whom God is saving out of the world who will fill the vacuum left by Satan and his followers when they were cast out of heaven. Those who are saved will become joint heirs of everything Christ purchased with His life’s blood and will rule and reign with Him throughout eternity. Some fool might say, “I don’t believe that!” I would say, “That is your choice; go ahead and be one of those whom God does not want converted.” Christians need to get a fresh understanding of the purpose and message of Christianity. The purpose is not to set you free to party down here on earth. Ironically and paradoxically, God does not really care about your partying if you don’t lose your first love. God is not against your having a good time. You simply cannot be saved by becoming a fundamentalist who does nothing. Paul said in 2nd Corinthians 5:15, “He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again” to claim you. God is like a great horse trainer: He leads you like a horse being trained with a lead line attached to its halter. And when He tugs that lead line, you will stop kicking up your heels and prancing around in the pasture. You will get your self-centered mind with its deceiving, corrupt desires under control and understand that there are very few in this world whom God wants. To use a different analogy, God has built transmitters and receivers. God’s transmitters are His gift ministers, and He has planted receivers in the saints to receive His word. He has called some as His gifts to the church for the perfecting of the saints. It if happens to you, you will know it. Quit kicking against the pricks and accept your calling. If a pastor has turned on lights for you, God has called you to follow that pastor as he follows Christ. There comes a point when you stop arguing about it. I still argue with God, but much less frequently than I used to. I am not more called of God than you are. You are no less called of God than I am. I must make my calling and election sure. If I do it willingly, I have a much greater reward, but I am still boxed in. God will harness me and take me down the path He wants me to go even if He has to break everything in me to get it done. And God has equally called you, and you knew it when the call first came. Once again, I can make a practical application to your giving. The Bible says that the tithe is the Lord’s. God said in Numbers 18:21, “I have given the children of Levi all the tenth in Israel for an inheritance.” And in 2nd Corinthians, Paul says that the preacher of the gospel is in the same position as the Levites. When you pay tithes to a preacher of the gospel, you are not giving that preacher anything but what the Lord has already given to him. It is your duty to give God’s way, and preachers should never engage in any antics to coerce people to give. Some Christians treat preachers like beggars. Or worse, they put the preacher in a position of having to beg from a robber! Imagine the ludicrous picture of a man who was just robbed, who finds the robber and then pleads, “Sir, would you mind giving me some charity? Would you give me back some of those things you just stole from me?” That is absurd! The Bible says that the tithe is the Lord’s and if you have not paid it, you are a thief and a robber! The gifts and calling of God are without recall: there is no escaping them. There may come a day when your health is broken. When you are lying on your deathbed suffering much pain, you might finally understand what I call the “rough side” of God. He is the Boss, friends. But as painful as His claim on you may be in this life, on the other side of death, you will be ruling and reigning with Him as a joint heir throughout eternity, while those who were not called will be in hell. Then you will thank God that you were one of the called. So let’s be diligent in making our calling and election sure. Stop fighting your calling, stop going AWOL, and let’s get on with the job that God has called us to do. Reprinted with permission from Pastor Melissa Scott | December, 2021 Wingspread | November, 2021 Wingspread | October, 2021 Wingspread | September, 2021 Wingspread | August, 2021 Wingspread | July, 2021 Wingspread | June, 2021 Wingspread | May, 2021 Wingspread | April, 2021 Wingspread | March, 2021 Wingspread | February, 2021 Wingspread | January, 2021 Wingspread | | Year 2019 Wingspreads | August, 2016 Wingspread | 2016 Wingspreads | 2014 Wingspreads | 2013 Wingspreads | 2012 Wingspreads | 2011 Wingspreads | 2010 Wingspreads | 2009 Wingspreads | 2008 Wingspreads | 2007 Wingspreads | 2006 Wingspreads | 2005 Wingspreads | 2004 Wingspreads | 2003 Wingspreads | 2002 Wingspreads | 2001 Wingspreads | August, 2001 Wingspread | November, 2001 Wingspread | December, 2001 Wingspread | 2000 Wingspreads | 1999 Wingspreads | 2015 Wingspreads | Year 2017 Wingspreads | 2018 Wingspreads | Year 2020 Wingspreads | Year 2021 Wingspreads | Year 2022 Wingspreads | Year 2023 Wingspreads | | Return Home | Current Wingspread | Wingspread Archives | Contact Us | |
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