MacArthur on the Dangers of a Subjective Authority in the Church

Like any form of false religion, theological liberalism began as an abandonment of the authority of God’s Word. Centuries earlier, the medieval Roman Catholic Church had experienced a similar, though more gradual, departure—exchanging the authority of Scripture for the authority of ecclesiastical tradition and papal decree. That is why the Reformation was necessary. By departing from the sole authority of Scripture, both Roman Catholicism and theological liberalism became enemies of true Christianity, fraudulent versions of the very thing they claimed to represent.
The modern charismatic counterfeit is following down that same perilous path—basing its belief system on something other than the sole authority of Scripture and poisoning the church with a twisted notion of faith. Like the medieval Catholic Church, it muddles the clear teaching of Scripture and obscures the true gospel; and like Schleiermacher, it elevates subjective feelings and personal experiences to the place of highest importance. The extent to which both of those corrupt systems destroyed the lives of millions is matched by the doctrinal devastation spreading from charismatic error and confusion.
Though many charismatics give lip service to the primacy of Scripture, in practice they deny both its authority and sufficiency. Preoccupied with mystical encounters and emotional ecstasies, charismatics seek ongoing revelation from heaven—meaning that, for them, the Bible alone is simply not enough. Within a charismatic paradigm, biblical revelation must be supplemented with personal “words from God,” supposed impressions from the Holy Spirit, and other subjective religious experiences. That kind of thinking is an outright rejection of the authority and sufficiency of Scripture (2 Tim. 3:16–17). It is a recipe for far-reaching theological disaster.

MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (2013). Strange fire: the danger of offending the holy spirit with counterfeit worship. Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

Book Recomendations from 2013 Continued

Strange Fire- John MacArthur

Some people have accused Dr. MacArthur for being divisive in the body of Christ; however this book is both an excellent read, and a great tool to help us think through the various issues that relate to the contemporary debate swirling around the Charismatic movement. I highly recommend this book, and purchased it the day it came out.  His section of fallible prophets and the tests proposed by Jonathan Edwards and applied in this book were especially helpful.  I also highly recommending going to the Grace to You, Youtube channel to watch the video messages from the Strange Fire Conference hosted this past fall.  It was very good.

The Transforming Power of the Gospel- Jerry Bridges

Jerry Bridges writes in a very conversational style, which I enjoy.  This book was like sitting in the living room having a conversation with a dear seasoned saint about the gospel and its implication on both my righteous standing before God, and the nature of growth into Christ-likeness over the course of my Christian life.  I have given out several copies here in Ghana, and highly recommend it.  If you want to sharpen your understanding of the gospel, then this is a great read for you.

Ashamed of the Gospel: When the Church Becomes Like the World- John MacArthur

How is pragmatism and worldliness shaping the American church?  Dr. MacArthur addresses this issue in a very helpful manner.  At what point in the American church did these many pragmatic practices infiltrate the church, and which 19^th century figure’s theology so shaped many of these serious deviations in the church?  I highly recommend this book.

John MacArthur Answers His Critics

Excellent interview on the Prosperity Gospel Movement that is essentially the face of the Charismatic movement here in Ghana. Check out this interview as well as the sermons on Grace to You. It is important to be informed and discerning about these kinds of issues. This is no small mater.

A Condensed Case for Expositional Preaching:

I am deeply burdened by the tremendous need in our day for a solid practice of sound exegetical preaching that covers the whole counsel of God. As I think about the current condition of “Christianity” in the field to which my family is going to serve, I am reminded that sound exposition of Scripture is the only remedy of their spiritual confusion and blindness. I came across the following statements from John Macarthur’s book Fools Gold, and they struck a cord with my heart, and I hope that they will with you as well. Whether you are a Christian layman, or a teacher in the church, these thoughts present a case of the need for each of us to be committed to the sound expositional teaching of God’s word, and the need for us to be joined to a local assembly where the focal point of corporate worship is the sound exposition of the word of God. On page 36, Macarthur writes: “It is my unshakable conviction that the proclamation of God’s Word should be the heart and focus of the church’s ministry (2 Tim 4:2). And proper biblical preaching should be systematic, expositional, theological, and God-centered. Such preaching is in short supply these days. There are plenty of gifted communicators in the evangelical movement, but today’s sermons tend to be short, shallow, topical homilies that massage people’s egos and focus on fairly insipid subjects like human relationships, “successful” living, emotional issues, and other practical but worldly-and not definitively biblical-themes.”[1]

On pages 36-41, he goes on to list the following 15 reasons why this shallow preaching is damaging the contemporary church.
• It usurps the authority of God over the soul.
• It removes the lordship of Christ over His church.
• It hinders the work of the Holy Spirit.
• It demonstrates appalling pride and a lack of submission.
• It severs the preacher personally from the regular sanctifying grace of Scripture.
• It clouds the true depth and transcendence of our message and therefore cripples both corporate and personal worship.
• It prevents the preacher from fully developing the mind of Christ.
• It depreciates by example the spiritual duty and priority of personal Bible study.
• It prevents the preacher from being the voice of God on every issue of his time.
• It breeds a congregation that is as weak and indifferent to the glory of God as their pastor is.
• It robs people of their only true source of help.
• It encourages people to become indifferent to the word of God and divine authority.
• It lies to people about what they really need.
• It strips the pulpit of power.
• It puts the responsibility on the preacher to change people with his cleverness.

I plan to post the content of these points and further develop then in the future.

---

[1] John Macarthur, Fools Gold: Discerning Truth in an Age of Error, (36-41).

Pulling the Expository Message Together from Rediscovering Expository Preaching

Here is another great little section worth your time and consideration from the same book, Rediscovering Expository Preaching.

Pulling the Expository Message Together

At the third stage the expositor has finished his deep study and asks himself, “How can I blend my findings in such a way that my flock will understand the Bible and its requirements for their lives today?” In a sense, the art of exposition commences here.
Nolan Howington uses a graphic description to relate exegesis and exposition: “Thus an exegete is like a diver bringing up pearls from the ocean bed; an expositor is like the jeweler who arrays them in orderly fashion and in proper relation to each other.”
Titles, outlines, introductions, illustrations, and conclusions enter the process at this stage. The message moves from the raw materials mined by exegesis to the finished product of exposition, which the hearers, it is hoped, will find interesting, convicting, and compelling. The key to this step is remembering what distinguishes exposition: explaining the text, especially parts that are hard to understand or apply. It is equally important to remember not only the text, but the audience as well.
F. B. Meyer offers this advice when thinking of the listeners and what sermonic form the message will take:

There are five considerations that must be met in every successful sermon. There should be an appeal to the Reason, to the Conscience, to the Imagination, to the Emotions, and to the Will; and for each of these there is no method so serviceable as systematic exposition.

MacArthur, J. (1997). Rediscovering expository preaching (17). Dallas: Word Pub.

Processing and Principlizing the Biblical Text from Rediscovering Expository Preaching

The following section of Rediscovering Expository Preaching was an excellent section.  I think that it balances welll the various factors that should properly interact in the event of Biblical expository preaching.

Processing and Principlizing the Biblical Text

A man in tune with God’s Spirit and Word is ready to begin a process to discover not only what God originally meant by what He said, but also appropriate principles and applications for today.
1. Processing the biblical text—A man cannot hope to preach effectively without first having worked diligently and thoroughly through the biblical text. This is the only way the expositor can acquire God’s message. Two preachers from different eras comment on this essential feature:

A man cannot hope to preach the Word of God accurately until he has first engaged in a careful, exhaustive exegesis of his text. Herein lies the problem, for competent exegesis requires time, brain power, “blood, sweat, and tears,” all saturated with enormous doses of prayer. (John A. Sproule)

You will soon reveal your ignorance as an expositor if you do not study; therefore diligent reading will be forced upon you. Anything which compels the preacher to search the grand old Book is of immense service to him. If any are jealous lest the labor should injure their constitutions, let them remember that mental work up to a certain point is most refreshing, and where the Bible is the theme toil is delight. It is only when mental labor passes beyond the bounds of common sense that the mind becomes enfeebled by it, and this is not usually reached except by injudicious persons, or men engaged on topics which are unrefreshing and disagreeable; but our subject is a recreative one, and to young men like ourselves the vigorous use of our faculties is a most healthy exercise. (C. H. Spurgeon)

2. Principlizing the biblical text—Preaching does not stop with understanding ancient languages, history, culture, and customs. Unless the centuries can be bridged with contemporary relevance in the message, then the preaching experience differs little from a classroom encounter. One must first process the text for original meaning and then principlize the text for current applicability. One’s study falls short of the goal if this step is omitted or slighted.

MacArthur, J. (1997). Rediscovering expository preaching (15–16). Dallas: Word Pub.

Excerpt from Rediscovering Expository Preaching, by John MacArthur

Excerpt from Rediscovering Expository Preaching, by John MacArthur

While certainly not a wholehearted endorsement of MacArthur’s theological system, I want to highlight some of his great statements regarding the practice of Biblical expositional preaching:

In summary, the following minimal elements identify expository preaching:

1.   The message finds its sole source in Scripture.

2.   The message is extracted from Scripture through careful exegesis.

3.   The message preparation correctly interprets Scripture in its normal sense and its
context.

4.   The message clearly explains the original God-intended meaning of Scripture.

5.   The message applies the Scriptural meaning for today.^[1]

Greer Boyce has aptly summarized this definition of expository preaching:

In short, expository preaching demands that, by careful analysis of each text within its immediate context and the setting of the book to which it belongs, the full power of modern exegetical and theological scholarship be  brought to bear upon our treatment of the Bible. The objective is not that the preacher may parade all this scholarship in the pulpit. Rather, it is that the preacher may speak faithfully out of solid knowledge of his text, and mount the pulpit steps as, at least, “a workman who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”

The preacher’s final step is the most crucial and most perilous of all. It is to relate the biblical message both faithfully and relevantly to modern life. At this point all his skill as a craftsman must come into play. We must be warned that faithful exposition of a text does not of itself produce an effective sermon. We need also to be  warned, however, that faithfulness to the text is not to be sacrificed for the sake of what we
presume to be relevancy. This sacrifice too many modern preachers seem willing to make, producing, as a result, sermons that are a compound of moralistic advice, their own unauthoritative and sometimes unwise opinions, and the latest psychology. Expository preaching, by insisting that the message of the sermon
coincide with the theme of the text, calls the preacher back to his true task: the proclamation of the Word of God in and through the Bible.^[2]

---

^[1] MacArthur, J. (1997). Rediscovering expository
preaching (12–13). Dallas: Word Pub.

^[2] Ibid, 13–14