Paul’s letter to the Romans concludes with a doxology. A doxology is an expression of praise to God – often sung, but not necessarily so. Whether sung or not, there is generally a poetical quality to it. “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.” “Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.” “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” There are many such doxologies in the Word of God, and they come in a great many forms.
As I pointed out last Sunday, this doxology comes at the end of a rather lengthy and complicated sentence. The first part of the sentence is more like a prayer, or like the blessing of a priest, such as Numbers 6:24 – “The LORD bless thee, and keep thee: The LORD make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee: The LORD lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.” Paul’s concluding remarks aren’t exactly like Numbers 6, but there are some similarities. And then comes the doxology proper – “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.”
It’s not this praise that I’d like us to consider this morning, but rather to the prayer-like blessing. “Now to him that is of power to stablish you….To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever.” We touched on this last Sunday night, but I’d like to expand it this morning. It was obviously important to Paul, and so it should be important to us as well.
Even though we sometimes read of Paul’s desire to help restore some fallen brother like this, far more often he prays and preaches for God’s people to hear the truth, learn the truth and stick to the truth throughout their lives. There isn’t any special relationship to God just because the prodigal has returned home. In Ephesians Paul said of Christ, “He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.” In Hebrews he said, “Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering,” and “be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines.” James tells us, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him” … “a double minded man is unstable in all his ways.”
Okay, it’s not a good thing to be bouncing around theologically or in our day-to-day Christian living either, but from where does stability come? It comes from the Lord Himself, through the teaching and preaching of the Word of God.
Once again, I need to point out that these three verses are not talking about the eternal security of the soul. I will come back to this subject tonight, but we aren’t dealing with it now. Paul is talking primarily about stability of doctrine, of holiness, and of godly living.
Why do we need stability in these areas? First, because truth is always truth, and the truth of God never changes. For example, if the doctrine of creation was true before the arrival of Darwin and Dawkins, then it is still true. There isn’t room for a professing Christian to say that he believes in Theistic Evolution. God didn’t create life through the process of evolution over billions of years. He took less than a week to miraculously create every species of living creatures. Can we ever really trust the preacher or theologian who bounces around between differing statements about the origin of life?
Second, “the double minded man is unstable in all his ways.” And being unstable he is vulnerable. One of our men last Sunday was talking to me about preachers who espouse strange interpretations on obscure or sometimes even common Bible passages. We agreed that some theologians, seminar speakers, radio preachers and pastors, seem to need really strange and weird ideas in order to maintain their notoriety. I would guess that some of these people are deliberate frauds and greedy heretics who have no other desire than the wealth that their notoriety can amass. But some of them are victims of their own foolishness – their self-inflicted vulnerability. I urge you all to avoid such people and such conditions. There is nothing new under the sun, especially when it comes to theology.
Third, we need stability, because the Lord doesn’t take kindly to fools.
Paul prays for our establishment because we need it.
What is the means of this establishment? It is the “preaching of Jesus Christ.” Some good people interpret this to refer to the preaching which Jesus did while here on earth. Other better people believe that it means the preaching which is ABOUT the Lord Jesus Christ. Without a doubt there is a great deal which we do not know, and probably which we will never know, about our Saviour. With the information that we have right now, it’s silly to be dogmatic about whether or not Melchizedek, the King of Salem, was the pre-incarnate Christ, or just a servant of God, who was a type of Christ. In process of a study about David or Abraham or the Book of Hebrews we might refer to that mysterious man without documented father or mother, but to build our doctrine of Christ around him would not add to the stability of the saints. But that Jesus is the God-man, the theanthropic person, the incarnation of the second person of the God-head is not speculation, nor is it unimportant. To know and to be convinced that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, as well as my Saviour, there is a foundation stone with weight and substance, and which shall never be removed. When the Bible tells us over and over again that Christ is returning and shall some day sit upon the throne of David to rule over all of creation, there is some preaching of Christ which has substance. And that He died on the cross, taking upon himself the sins of countless children of Adam, there is joy and peace, hope and reason to worship and serve. In the clear and unmistakable truths of the gospel there is stability.
What is the source of our establishment? “Now to him that is of power to stablish you … according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God…” This word “mystery” is a mystery to a great many causal Bible-readers. There are verses which indicate that it refers to the inclusion of the Gentiles in the Lord’s plan of grace. But it’s actually a bit bigger than that. The Lord has graciously forgiven sinners since before the days of Abraham and Noah. And since Israel wasn’t the Lord’s chosen nation until after Abraham, it is obvious that He has been gracious towards Gentiles from the very beginning. The mystery was not saving grace or ethnicity, but how He could be “both just and the justifier of them which believe.” For centuries it was a mystery that the Son of God would take upon him human flesh. And it was a mystery how Christ could become a man without becoming a sinner at the same time. It was a mystery how or why he would deliberately bear the sins and the penalty of God’s elect. It made no sense, and even those prophets which were given a glimpse had to admit that it was beyond their ken.
The glorious first chapter of I Peter touches on this mystery. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time…. … at the appearing of Jesus Christ: Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls. Of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into.”
The gospel, which was a mystery to so many, for so long, has become the foundation which gives the saint of God stability to live and serve the Lord. It was given to us for the obedience of FAITH. It doesn’t matter what the world might throw at us; because we know the truth, we are, and shall be, free. Let the wicked jealously rant and rave against us for following “superstition” and having faith in the unseen. That is exactly what faith is all about. “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” But just because there is much that we haven’t seen with our eyes, we have seen many such these things described in God’s Word. That is good enough for the believer.
But remember that this stability is not only for the blessing of the saint.
Notice once again the last verse: “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.” It is very important to realize the elevation to which Paul lifts Christ Jesus. He certainly doesn’t consider Jesus to be on a level with himself. He doesn’t think of Jesus as “one of the boys,” or as one of many ways to bring glory to the Father. He is the only way. Not only is salvation only through Christ – praise to God can only be through him. So he says in Hebrews – “BY (CHRIST) therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name. Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, Make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, THROUGH JESUS CHRIST; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.”
And Paul is not alone in this kind of thinking. Peter says, “To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” and “the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you. To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.” And there are the words of John – “John to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne; And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.”
There is no glory brought to God through our ignorance, fence-straddling or vacillation between various doctrinal positions. We are obligated to learn the truth and to cling to it. Through the Lord there is the ability to come to that position. And in doing so we magnify the Lord of that truth.
And part of that truth is: we all come into this world as sinners condemned to eternity in the Lake of Fire. But the eternal Son of God has come with healing in His wings. The innocent and perfect Saviour died on Calvary in order to pay the penalty of sin of those for whom He intended to save. The truth is you must not think of yourself as one of those saved until you have repented of your sin in broken humility, and if your entire hope for salvation and eternity is not firmly resting on Christ Jesus. He only is “the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto the Father but through him.” Without Christ you have nothing at all. You must believe this and you must cling to this without wavering. And the Ord has “power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ.”