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Westminster Shorter Catechism Question #2
Pastor Christopher Chelpka
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[00:00:00] Our heavenly Father, as we come now to hear your word read and preached, we ask that you would give us ears to hear without your revelation. There is no knowledge of you, without your spirit working in our hearts to change us so that we might respond. There is no responding to you, no coming to you, no dwelling with you.
[00:00:27] But your spirit is at work and has been at work in our hearts. We are here today because we love you and we desire to worship you, to serve you, to know you, to call upon your name.
[00:00:44] We ask, Lord, that you would continue to strengthen your love for us in us, and our love for others in you.
[00:00:55] Lord, we ask that you would bless us as we consider and meditate on these things. May we come to enjoy you more and your word that you have spoken. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:01:11] Well, tonight I'd like to consider this truth that you have printed in your bulletins from our shorter catechism regarding the word of God.
[00:01:22] The word of God last week we considered our chief end. The scripture tells us everything good comes from God. There's no good apart from him.
[00:01:35] Scripture tells us that from him and through him and to him are all things. There's nothing higher than him. There's nothing more important than him. He is our first priority and our last priority. He is our alpha. He is our omega.
[00:01:53] And because of him, and because of the things that he's done for us in Christ, not only are we called and commanded and designed to glorify him and enjoy him forever, but we are enabled to glorify him and enjoy him forever through the work of Jesus Christ, through the gospel of God. The power of God unto salvation, we come into our own in a way. We become people that are able to do the things that God designed us for.
[00:02:31] That leads naturally to this second question.
[00:02:34] What rule has God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him? We are people that need instructions for all kinds of things. If you want to buy a house or get good grades or figure out how to work your new phone, you need instructions. Some more, some less, but something because of a lot of different things.
[00:03:01] Ignorance is one. We just don't know what we don't know.
[00:03:05] Weaknesses and inabilities are another. Sometimes we know things, but we forget them or we have difficulty following them.
[00:03:13] And then, of course, when it comes to some things in life, perhaps we could say all things. There's a measure of sin that's involved as well.
[00:03:23] There's a moral problem right when we come to do this or that thing, and when it comes to glorifying God. We know, as we thought about last week, that applies to everything.
[00:03:35] So how do we glorify God and enjoy him in all of our lives, in our eating, in our drinking, in whatever we do? It's a really good question, and it's a really important question, and it's one that we don't want to just guess at. This is a question that we don't want to suspect we have the right answer for or hope we have the right answer for. We need to know that we have the right answer on how we can glorify and enjoy God.
[00:04:05] Well, the answer to this question, as we find it in scripture, is summarized here. The word of God, which is contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify him and enjoy him.
[00:04:22] It's the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him. Now, God reveals himself, we know, in other places outside of scripture. He reveals himself in nature. He reveals himself and various laws and human customs and all kinds of things.
[00:04:40] But these things will never teach us and direct us and enable us to glorify God and enjoy him.
[00:04:49] Just the opposite. They may teach us of the glory of God, but they do not enable us, empower us, or show us how we might do that.
[00:05:00] In fact, they tend to only condemn us by showing us the greatness of God in all of his glory, as we consider the sweep of his design, the power of his work in the world. When we consider these things, and then our disobedience to him, our inability to keep his law, our inability to do anything that's good, these laws only end up pushing us away, in a sense, because they bring us under a curse, not in and of themselves, but because of our sin, reacting to them because of ignorance, because of weaknesses of all kinds, because of our sin, we need a direction.
[00:05:47] That's true, especially of relationships, isn't it?
[00:05:51] Relationships are complicated. They're more complicated than plugging in your new fridge or programming, I guess. Your new fridge.
[00:06:02] Relationships can be challenging because people are complicated.
[00:06:10] They have wills and desires, things they like, things they don't like. And in a way, this is true with God as well.
[00:06:19] When we consider God and all that he wants and all that he's doing, there's a lot to know. There's a lot to think about. And in some ways, the scriptures tell us that it's impossible to know everything that we can know about God. In fact, it's impossible to know God at all, except for his revealing, his speaking, his telling us if it's hard enough to know how to be a good friend or a good employee, or even how to be a good subject to a king, how much more difficult is it to know how to glorify and enjoy God, God, who is so infinite, so separate from us in all of his perfections, in all of his bigness, in his greatness?
[00:07:10] How can we know him? How can we serve him? How can we enjoy him?
[00:07:18] These are big questions, and it's important to recognize that we have an answer. And we have an answer because the hymn our God has spoken it to us.
[00:07:33] That's why we know. We're not guessing or speculating or wondering or hoping or wishing about our relationship with the Lord. He tells us.
[00:07:44] He tells us what he wants.
[00:07:47] He tells us how we can be holy. He tells us what it means to enjoy him. He tells us what it means to put him first. And all of these things are revealed in his word.
[00:08:01] In psalm 85 eight, we hear this prayer.
[00:08:05] Let me hear what the good Lord, or I'm sorry, let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak to his people, to his saints.
[00:08:19] Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his saints. How do we know peace? How do we find peace? The scriptures tell us, we know it, and we find it through the speaking of God.
[00:08:37] Let's turn to a few other verses. Would you turn with me to first corinthians, chapter one.
[00:08:43] First Corinthians, chapter one.
[00:08:47] Verses 20 and 21 remind us of the importance of the revelation of God and the limits of human capacity to know him apart from his revelation.
[00:09:05] In one corinthians 120 21, we read this.
[00:09:11] Where is the one who is wise?
[00:09:13] Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
[00:09:22] For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.
[00:09:35] Let's think about this for a moment.
[00:09:39] First in verse 20, what do we have?
[00:09:42] We have a challenge, don't we?
[00:09:45] A kind of throw down words, a contest. Where's the one who's wise? Where's the scribe? Where's the debater of this age? Where's the challenger?
[00:09:57] Why is everyone so quiet?
[00:09:59] That's the impression that Paul gives here. And the way that he asked this question, and we know the answer. He puts it in the form of a question, in the next verse or in the next sentence, has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
[00:10:15] That's why nobody's talking. That's why no one's willing to say anything.
[00:10:20] As Paul brings these ideas to our minds, it's because God has made foolish the wisdom of the world. He explains it in verse 21.
[00:10:29] For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe the world did not know God through wisdom.
[00:10:50] Well, the Bible speaks very highly of wisdom, doesn't it? Sometimes we talk about certain books of the Bible and the Old Testament as being called wisdom literature, a collection of sayings and psalms and whole books devoted to knowing the fear of the Lord, to knowing truth from error to discerning how the world works, how things work. This is wisdom, and there's wisdom of the world. If you can't know God through wisdom, what could you possibly know God through?
[00:11:24] Well, Paul gives the answer.
[00:11:26] We don't know God through studying the things of the world and the things that have been made, not in a saving way.
[00:11:35] We are saved through what he calls the folly of what we preach, which ultimately is the wisdom of God, the folly of what we preach. What he means by that is, of course, the gospel.
[00:11:52] This foolishness of God becoming man, this humility, this meekness that is found in Christ coming into this world, becoming man, and then dying in the place men. This is weakness. This is humility. This is suffering, not strength. We don't see in Christ's ascension to the throne, political maneuvering. He doesn't have a campaign manager and a social media manager and all these people around him working all the angles to make sure that he gets into the place that he needs to be so that he can overthrow the Romans, ascend to the throne. None of this.
[00:12:38] Instead, he ministers to a few people for a short period of time and then is crucified.
[00:12:44] The world would call this foolishness, and indeed it called him foolish. They mocked the Lord. They crucified the Lord.
[00:12:52] They did not treat him with honor and respect. They did not crown him as king. They put a crown of thorns on his head and wrote above the cross, king of the Jews, in a kind of sarcastic, sneering way.
[00:13:08] The world saw what God was doing, and it laughed at it, but God was doing it. Still, wisdom is not accounted or we do not count something. Wisdom based on whether people think God is doing something right or not. Wisdom is counted based on what God is doing, period.
[00:13:28] And so when and Paul speaks about the revelation of Christ or the folly of what we preach ultimately, the wisdom of God. Or as we see in verse 28, God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing, things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
[00:13:50] And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us the wisdom was wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption.
[00:14:00] When these things are preached to us, when these things are known, we can know that God is overcoming something great, and he's doing it on purpose, and he's doing it with an intention for us to hear and to believe.
[00:14:17] Let's turn to John, chapter one, verse 18.
[00:14:32] In thinking about the difficulty of knowing God at all, much less glorifying him and enjoying for him forever, listen to what the word says in first.
[00:14:44] I think I said one John tonight. John is what I meant to say. Sorry if I didn't say that. John 118 no one has ever seen God, the only God who is at the father's side. He has made him known.
[00:15:04] You can begin to see where the word of God is taking us, where the scriptures are taking us, and where the word with a capital w, the second person of the Trinity, takes us. He takes us into the knowledge of the father, into the knowledge of God. He makes theology possible, knowledge of God, knowing God, believing, trusting, seeing God, he makes that possible because of who he is.
[00:15:36] Without him, without God's self revelation through the Son, we don't know him. We cannot know him. No one has ever seen God, the only God who is at the father's side. He has made him known. And who is he? John tells us in the wonderful beginning of his gospel.
[00:15:55] In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
[00:16:03] He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made. That was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
[00:16:21] In verse 14, John writes, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth.
[00:16:38] How is it that we come to know God when God reveals his glory to us through his son?
[00:16:48] You can see why the catechism summarizes this truth so faithfully and so well when it says the only rule to direct us is the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. There's no knowing God apart from the revelation of the word. But we have to connect two things, don't we? We have to connect the word as the scriptures with the word as Jesus Christ, right? How do these things do these, how do these two things connect? If Jesus is the one who reveals the father to us, if he's the one who reveals the father to us in a saving way, that we might know him and worship him and glorify him, what does that have to do with the Bible?
[00:17:36] To answer that question, let's turn to Luke, chapter 24, which is just a page back from where we just were.
[00:17:50] In Luke, chapter 24, Jesus appears to disciples that are walking on the road to Emmaus, and they don't recognize him.
[00:18:02] They don't recognize him, but he slowly reveals himself to them.
[00:18:09] He slowly reveals himself to them. In verse 26, he says, was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? It's a question he asks them. And then we read. And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures, the things concerning themselves.
[00:18:34] I'm sorry, concerning himself.
[00:18:37] Then they draw near to the village where they are going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly, saying, stay with us, for it is toward the evening, and the day is now far spent. So he went in to stay with them. When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight. And they said to one another or said to each other, did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?
[00:19:15] And how did he open up the scriptures? What did he tell them? He showed them how all of it was concerning him.
[00:19:24] Now, that, I think is proof enough to connect the scriptures to Jesus. Jesus says it. Jesus shows it. And these men not only come to understand it, but experience it. And their hearts were burning within them as he was speaking this and revealing these truths to them.
[00:19:42] But we can also see the proof of Jesus words all throughout the scriptures in prophecies that are fulfilled in ways that, in types and shadows and things that the Lord instituted and then fulfilled in Christ all kinds of many, many ways in the covenants that he's made and many other things.
[00:20:03] The scriptures themselves testify to what Jesus says, that they are concerning him.
[00:20:13] And so when we come to the word of God in the scriptures, we are coming to hear the word of the Son, the revelation of the Father, and the word also of the spirit.
[00:20:28] We come to know God as he has revealed himself to us. And that should give us confidence, give us confidence in the word. That the word of God contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify him and enjoy him.
[00:20:51] So we can conclude with this our problem of distance from God, our problem of lacking communication with God, of knowing him and worse, sinning against him, of committing idolatry and giving our worship to false gods. All of these problems the Lord overcomes in revealing himself in Christ in this saving way, in a way like he did with these disciples on the road where he opens their eyes and he helps them to see the truth about himself.
[00:21:29] No longer are we separated and alienated from God when he, by his word and spirit, speaks to us so that we might worship him in spirit and in truth.
[00:21:41] The redemptive act that God does in giving to us, the word is also the redemptive work that he does. It is both the benefit that we receive and the work at the same time.
[00:21:56] What I mean is, the work that he does is the revealing of himself, and the benefit that we get is the revealing of himself.
[00:22:03] We come to know him so that we may worship him, glorify him, and enjoy him forever.
[00:22:13] Having the word of God then, in such a way, should give us confidence of its benefits.
[00:22:20] One last verse I'd like to read tonight from two Timothy 316. Perhaps you know it or even have it memorized.
[00:22:30] All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
[00:22:50] A commentator, James Fisher wrote, thinking about these truths and the word of God. He said that the spirit that dictated the word is the same spirit that gives us the word, the same spirit that interprets the word.
[00:23:06] We have the word because God gives himself to us. He shows himself to us. He works in our hearts to change us so that we might see these things. And his work is effectual.
[00:23:20] It is breathed out by God, just like God breathed that life into Adam. He breathes life into us through his word, and he trains us, and he corrects us, and he makes us complete for every good work.
[00:23:37] So, as we consider the redemptive work of God and the redemptive benefits of God in coming to know him through his word, what do you think might be a redeemed response or the response on the part of us who have been redeemed?
[00:23:54] I think there's lots of things we could think about.
[00:23:58] One is we ought to hold the word as precious and true as the word of God. It is authoritative. If it's authoritative, that means we should know it. We should listen to it. We should be eager to hear it and apply it to our lives.
[00:24:16] We should be eager to understand it, to defend it, to teach it as we are able, but most of all, to humble ourselves before the Lord, that we might worship him, glorifying him and enjoying forever.
[00:24:34] It also means that as we hear the word, we ought to and apply it to our lives. We ought to be honest about ourselves and hope, humble ourselves before God in his word.
[00:24:44] When we hear the word of God, we don't get to say, well, that might be nice advice. I think I'll take it. Or that seems helpful, or maybe later.
[00:24:53] No, the God who made you speak to you, the God who redeemed you and brought you out of death, any life out into life, he speaks to you and we ought to listen.
[00:25:06] Of course, this is difficult amidst our sin, our distractions of various things and weaknesses. But God promises that those who search for him will find him, those who ask, he will answer.
[00:25:25] Brothers and sisters, as we continue to explore the truths found in God's word, let us remember the source from which we derive them, the one who speaks them, and the salvation that we have, not through the wisdom of this world, but through the gospel and the grace of God in Jesus Christ. Let's pray.
[00:25:49] Our heavenly Father, we ask that you would bless us through your word. In the Bible.
[00:25:55] It speaks to us of the Son who reveals, who reveals you and your grace and your glory.
[00:26:04] Lord, we ask that your spirit would be with our spirit, that we might learn to see and hear, to act and to believe.
[00:26:16] We ask that when we are downcast and struggling, that you would open up your word to us, that we might find encouragement, that it might be to us weapons in an armory, that it might be the fruit of a garden that feeds us. Lord, we ask that your word would strengthen us, equip us, and allow us to be the tools by which we might strengthen, encourage, and equip others.
[00:26:45] Lord, we ask that you would help us to know your word, to not be illiterate when it comes to the Bible, but to know it not just in its big parts, but its little parts, in its grand, sweeping themes, in the tiniest details. Help us to learn the names and the places. Help us to remember the things that we read, help us to distinguish and hear the law and the gospel. Help us to have better and better categories for how we read and think through your word as we consider you ourselves, the world that you've made and the work of redemption that you are enacting in our lives and in the world.
[00:27:31] In all these things, Lord, we confess our great need of you, and we thank you for revealing yourself to us in your word. We pray all this in Jesus name. Amen.
