SPEAKER_01: This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.
SPEAKER_00: Well, welcome.
SPEAKER_00: For those of you who are here for the first time, you know, if I'm a little scary, you'll know that I'm not the normal guy.
SPEAKER_00: I want to welcome you also from Anchor Bible Church in Louisville, Kentucky, if you're ever in the area.
SPEAKER_00: We'd love to have you to come visit, you know, if you're gonna go see the Creation Museum or the Ark Encounter, you know, we're about an hour away.
SPEAKER_00: So we would love to see you and you know, be nice to you there.
SPEAKER_00: So uh welcome just from our church to your church.
SPEAKER_00: It has been a privilege to be here.
SPEAKER_00: Um I I like cold weather, and uh but when I first got here on Friday, it was like real cold weather.
SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think it's the wind, you know, that kind of enhances the coldness.
SPEAKER_00: I I grew I did grow up in the mountains of Idaho, but it was uh the snow fell straight down.
SPEAKER_00: Here it kind of seems to go sideways, though.
SPEAKER_00: It's a little bit different.
SPEAKER_00: And uh we've had a super great time with men.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know who attends here on Sunday or what up, you know, but I just went around and talked with guys and guys from all over little towns who came.
SPEAKER_00: So you're doing a really good job at blessing not only your congregation, but um a lot of little churches that need encouragement and pastors who need encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: So praise God for that.
SPEAKER_00: Uh a few years ago, um, it was uh October was coming, and I thought I would do uh a little series of sermons on what are called the solas of the Reformation.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I wanted my congregation to kind of understand some of the history behind, you know, who they were, what it means to be Protestant.
SPEAKER_00: Like a lot of young people go, what's that?
SPEAKER_00: You know, they don't even know what that means.
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, you know, I need to like talk about this.
SPEAKER_00: I need to talk about some of the key doctrines that that brought the church, you know, out of kind of uh works-based salvation uh in Roman Catholicism and you know, just kind of the history of where we got our Bibles and things like that.
SPEAKER_00: And so I did a little series called The Solas of the Reformation, and uh I kind of front-loaded them with quite a bit of history uh so that people kind of got some history, and then we kind of looked at a key text related to each of the solas, and solas means only, and uh, there is like by grace alone, by faith alone, in Christ alone, by the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're gonna look at this morning because the theme for the men's conference was word-centered leadership, and I thought, you know, this would be encouraging, I think, to all of you just to be reminded of something I know you probably all know already, but uh just to be reminded and encouraged about it is is helpful and to have some history about it.
SPEAKER_00: But we're going to be talking about the doctrine of sola scriptura by the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: When the Reformation was happening with Martin Luther in Germany and John Calvin in Switzerland, and in Great Britain among uh the Puritans and various groups, nonconformists they were called, Henry VIII, the King of England, wanted to divorce his wife, Catherine of Argonne, so he could produce a male heir.
SPEAKER_00: She was, she got pregnant multiple times.
SPEAKER_00: It's just, you know, he's not getting a male child like he wanted.
SPEAKER_00: So he wanted to divorce her, but the Pope would not permit it.
SPEAKER_00: So Henry's solution was okay, then um I'm gonna make my own church.
SPEAKER_00: I'll make myself head of the church and will seize all the Roman Catholic holdings in Great Britain.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was a it was a win-win for him.
SPEAKER_00: But Henry needed help, so he appointed a Roman Catholic priest named Thomas Cramner and appointed him to be Archbishop of Canterbury and kind of help him get his, you know, new church up and running.
SPEAKER_00: Cramner, however, at that time was just your average priest, but he started reading the writings of Luther and Calvin and came to saving faith.
SPEAKER_00: Came to believe that salvation was not by works, it was not by keeping certain sacraments, it was by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, from the Word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: And so he became a strong advocate of Protestantism.
SPEAKER_00: And for those of you who aren't familiar with the term, it just means to protest against the unbiblical doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church.
SPEAKER_00: And Cramner then, as he began to study, wrote what is called the Common Book of Prayer.
SPEAKER_00: And that is kind of a liturgy, the Roman Catholic liturgy was very popular, so he wrote one that was more biblical and didn't have extra biblical junk in it.
SPEAKER_00: He wrote it kind of the articles that kind of became distilled down in what are called the 39 articles of the Anglican Church of the Church of England.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've never read them, I'm sure if you read them, you'd go, wow, these are good.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're good.
SPEAKER_00: They were encouraging.
SPEAKER_00: He started saying, pastors, you need to be trained in biblical preaching.
SPEAKER_00: You need to be trained in theology.
SPEAKER_00: You need to be trained in doctrine, you need to be trained in the original languages.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna put an English Bible in every church, and we're going to set it there so anybody who wants to read the Bible in the common vernacular English can come in and read the Bible for themselves.
SPEAKER_00: And at that time, that was like super radical.
SPEAKER_00: Because the Roman Catholic Church had been burning people at the stake for a long time for reading their Bibles.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
SPEAKER_00: The Roman Catholic Church invented many doctrines not found in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: They couldn't have people reading the Bible for themselves because then their ability to control and manipulate and plunder people would be exposed, and so they killed people who read the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: After Henry VIII died, his son Edward VI became king, and Edward was mentored by Cramner, and he made sweeping religious reforms that were very good.
SPEAKER_00: And Edward died young, however, and though Edward announced Lady Jane Gray to succeed him, his half-sister Mary I, the daughter of Henry VIII's first rejected wife, Catherine of Argonne, usurped the throne.
SPEAKER_00: Lady Jane Gray was taken out.
SPEAKER_00: And Mary hated Protestants.
SPEAKER_00: She hated the Church of England because she knew her father had divorced her mother in order to marry another woman and exiled her mother and expelled her from the court and pronounced Mary illegitimate and took away her princess status and made her live with this really grumpy lady named Lady Shelton.
SPEAKER_00: And so she just had this hatred for Protestants.
SPEAKER_00: And when Mary became queen, she wanted to wipe out Protestantism.
SPEAKER_00: And so she burnt at the stake in the kind of cattle yard on the outskirts of England in Smithfield some 300 faithful Bible-preaching pastors.
SPEAKER_00: And that earned her the infamous title of Bloody Mary.
SPEAKER_00: And because Cramner was at the forefront of Protestantism, he was kind of the architect of Protestantism in England, he became the primary target of Mary's wrath.
SPEAKER_00: Cramner was removed from office, he was tried, he was imprisoned for heresy, he was defrocked, his head was shaved, he was given present clothes to wear, and they kind of tortured him and treated him very cruelly.
SPEAKER_00: Yet the more they abused Cramner, the more he dug in his heels and he held to the doctrine of sola scriptura that the word of God alone is sufficient for all matters of faith and practice, and that the word of God is above what the church says is true.
SPEAKER_00: The Roman Catholics realized torture wasn't working on Cramner, so they tried this completely different approach.
SPEAKER_00: They removed uh Cramner from prison, they got him cleaned up, they gave him really nice clothes, they put him in the house of the dean of Christ Church, they gave him every luxury, and he was in his 60s, so this was kind of nice, you know, not being tortured anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And what didn't work, when torture didn't work, pampering of the flesh did work.
SPEAKER_00: And they just told him that you'll be restored, you'll get the queen's pardon, you'll be able to live in luxury if you just deny the faith.
SPEAKER_00: At first, he was asked to sign a very ambiguous document that you couldn't even tell what it was saying, it was so obscure.
SPEAKER_00: And then another document which said a little more, and another document which said a little more, and another document which said a little more until a full recantation of his Protestant beliefs were placed before him, and fearing going back into prison, fearing suffering, wanting the Queen's pardon, he signed it as well.
SPEAKER_00: And where persecution had failed, pampering the flesh triumphed a good lesson for all of us to learn.
SPEAKER_00: When signing that last document, Cramner denounced the faith and affirmed Roman Catholicism, undoing everything he had worked for years to do.
SPEAKER_00: Because the Protestantism was growing rapidly.
SPEAKER_00: Bloody Mary, when she heard that Cram Render at her candidate, she rejoiced.
SPEAKER_00: She said, We're gonna kill him anyways, but don't kill him.
SPEAKER_00: And it was a sad day because Thomas Cramner was kind of the general of Protestantism who denied the faith to save his skin.
SPEAKER_00: And you may be thinking to yourself, Well, how could Cramner do that?
SPEAKER_00: How can he deny the faith?
SPEAKER_00: Well, pretty simple, he was a sinner.
SPEAKER_00: That's all.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm gonna tell you the rest of Cramner's stories later.
SPEAKER_00: But this whole story here that I just told you is all focused around this huge issue called the doctrine of sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Do you ever wonder why the word of God is faithfully preached and taught in this church and consulted for everything that is done in this church?
SPEAKER_00: The reason is the doctrine of sola scriptura, which says Christians must live by the Word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: The doctrine of sola scriptura also gives rise to what is called the regulative principle, which basically says everything that happens in a Christian's life in the church is to be regulated by what the word of God says.
SPEAKER_00: As Martin Luther famously declared, while on trial at worms, my conscience is bound and held captive by the word of God, sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: So turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy chapter 8.
SPEAKER_00: Deuteronomy chapter 8 is going to be our key text here.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to be looking at verse 3 in a minute.
SPEAKER_00: And as you find Deuteronomy chapter 8, let me just give you a little background and context.
SPEAKER_00: It's written by Moses right before the people entered the promised land.
SPEAKER_00: The word Deuteronomy means second law, but it's really not a second law, it's the same law applied in more practical ways to what they're going to encounter when they enter into the promised land.
SPEAKER_00: In Deuteronomy chapter 1 through 4, Moses gives a quick historical survey of Israel's 40-year wanderings.
SPEAKER_00: In chapter 5, he restates the Ten Commandments, which were also given previously in Exodus 20.
SPEAKER_00: And then in chapter 6, he gives what is called the great Shema.
SPEAKER_00: Shema is the Hebrew word for hear.
SPEAKER_00: Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
SPEAKER_00: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your might, with all your soul, with all your strength.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, that is the great Shema.
SPEAKER_00: So he gives that.
SPEAKER_00: And then in the rest of chapter 6 through chapter 9, Moses gives the people of Israel this kind of spiritual pep talk because they're getting ready to go into the land.
SPEAKER_00: He knows he can't go on the land.
SPEAKER_00: So he's giving them this pep pep talk to get them psyched up right before they go on this military campaign.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where we find our text for this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Moses gives multiple reminders to remember to not forget to keep the commandments of the Lord, to love the Lord, to listen to the voice of God, etc.
SPEAKER_00: And Moses wants the people of Israel to love God and to demonstrate that they love God by keeping the commandments.
SPEAKER_00: So all the rest of the book, all the laws in the book of Deuteronomy, are not for getting saved, they're for expressing love to God, which is exactly what Jesus taught, like in John 14 and 15.
SPEAKER_00: If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews got this wrong.
SPEAKER_00: They got it, if you keep my commandments, God will love you.
SPEAKER_00: And so when Jesus came, he tried to switch it back to the way it should have been from the beginning.
SPEAKER_00: Now look in your Bibles at Deuteronomy 8.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to read verses 1 through 6, and then we'll jump in.
SPEAKER_00: The Word of God says, Deuteronomy 8, verse 1, all the commandments that I'm commanding you today, you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to give to your fathers.
SPEAKER_00: You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.
SPEAKER_00: He humbled you and let you become hungry, and fed you manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years.
SPEAKER_00: Thus you are to know in your heart that the Lord your God was disciplining you, just as a man disciplines his son, therefore you shall keep the commandment of the Lord your God to walk in his ways and to fear him.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray and then we'll jump in.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we are so grateful to be here this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we are thankful to have a warm building and cushy seats and friendly faces and good fellowship.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we are thankful to come in freedom to worship you, to give you glory, to consider your word, to sing songs of praise to your name.
SPEAKER_00: Father, I pray that you would help us as we look at your word, that we would understand it, that we would grasp its meaning, that your spirit would work in us to make us more like Jesus, that we might live better for your glory because we love you.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, from Deuteronomy 8.3, I'm going to give you three important truths about solo scripture and encourage you to live by the word of God alone so you can be blessed.
SPEAKER_00: First, an example for you to remember.
SPEAKER_00: Look at Deuteronomy 8.3, where Moses says he humbled you and let you become hungry.
SPEAKER_00: Well, what's Moses talking about here?
SPEAKER_00: Uh he's talking about how God led the Israelites out of Egypt, you know, the ten plagues, and uh they crossed the Red Sea, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then they camped at Mount Sinai, and they were there for, I think, one year and two months, and he let them camp there until they ran out of food.
SPEAKER_00: Now you may be thinking to yourself, well, why would God do that?
SPEAKER_00: You know, why why would he deliver the people only to take them out, you know, some two million people out in the middle of the desert and let them run out of food?
SPEAKER_00: It's an odd thing for God to do.
SPEAKER_00: But if you look at the near context of verse 2, he tells us in the middle of the verse, why?
SPEAKER_00: That he might humble you, there's one reason, testing you, there's another reason, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.
SPEAKER_00: And there's the big reason.
SPEAKER_00: Why did God wait until Israel ran out of food?
SPEAKER_00: Because he had told them he was going to take care of them.
SPEAKER_00: And he wanted to humble them so they would learn to trust the Lord, especially in trials, especially in what appeared to be impossible situations.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said in Matthew 18, 4, whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: You want to be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?
SPEAKER_00: Be humble.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to the religious leaders in Matthew 23, verse 12, Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled.
SPEAKER_00: And whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.
SPEAKER_00: James chapter 4, verse 10, humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and he will exalt you in due time.
SPEAKER_00: Peter says in 1 Peter chapter 5, verses 5 through 7, and all of you clothe yourself with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but he gives grace to the humble.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you in the proper time.
SPEAKER_00: So it's very clear that what God wants to do is sanctify, teach the nation of Israel to humbly trust in him that they might be blessed.
SPEAKER_00: Christians have two options.
SPEAKER_00: You can choose to humble yourself, or God will do it for you.
SPEAKER_00: And just so you know, the latter is way more painful.
SPEAKER_00: When God brings down the heavenly spanky spoon, and he's got a lot of spanky spoons.
SPEAKER_00: It can be the transmission in your car, financial issues, sickness, relationship difficulties, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: God knows how to humble the proud.
SPEAKER_00: And God promised to take care of the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And the entire nation needed to learn what we all need to learn to trust in the sufficiency, the reliability, the authority of the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he wanted to teach them.
SPEAKER_00: And to not trust in themselves and to not trust in others and to not trust in anything else.
SPEAKER_00: This is exactly what God wants from every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: The last plague, the death of the firstborn, taught Israel to trust the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: Do exactly as I say, and the angel of death will pass over.
SPEAKER_00: God led them to the shore of the Red Sea into a dead end with no possible way of escape if attacked.
SPEAKER_00: Back in Egypt, Pharaoh's thinking to myself, man, I lost my.
SPEAKER_00: My head.
SPEAKER_00: What did I do?
SPEAKER_00: I just got rid of my workforce.
SPEAKER_00: You know, we can't do our own work.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go back and uh with the army and we'll fetch all our slaves back.
SPEAKER_00: And so Pharaoh musters his army.
SPEAKER_00: He traps the people of Israel in this little dead end canyon next to the Red Sea.
SPEAKER_00: And why would God lead his people to a dead end so they could not escape?
SPEAKER_00: The same reason.
SPEAKER_00: So they could learn the doctrine of sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Did all who observe the Passover escape the death of the firstborn?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Did all who believe the Word of God pass through the Red Sea?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: But we are so slow to learn, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: That's just how it is.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've ever read Exodus and thought, man, what's wrong with these people?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't they just consult the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't they just do what God says?
SPEAKER_00: And then you start realizing they're kind of like me.
SPEAKER_00: They do just what I do.
SPEAKER_00: Our first response in a trial is often to trust ourselves, trust our money, rather than the word of God.
SPEAKER_00: And God knows this.
SPEAKER_00: And so he put the Israelites into this other impossible situation by leading them out into the middle of a desert and just waiting until they ran out of food and they got hungry.
SPEAKER_00: So he could teach them to trust in his word alone.
SPEAKER_00: And it begins to dawn on the people as their stomachs begin to growl, as their children start saying, Mom, Dan, I'm hungry.
SPEAKER_00: And as they see their parents and grandparents wilting, that there's two million of them in the middle of the desert, and there's no grocery stores, there's no Costco, there's no nothing.
SPEAKER_00: There's just some dirt, scrubs, and some scorpions.
SPEAKER_00: How in the world?
SPEAKER_00: How in the world are you gonna feed two million people in the desert?
SPEAKER_00: It is, it's impossible.
SPEAKER_00: And the people begin to realize this, and they begin to get fearful.
SPEAKER_00: And some who are assertive grab for power.
SPEAKER_00: Almost always happens when people get afraid.
SPEAKER_00: The people who are the most aggressive are the people who are most afraid.
SPEAKER_00: They grab for power.
SPEAKER_00: We need to make a plan here, we need to get a committee together here to go back to Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: We can volunteer to be slaves again.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how we're gonna cross the Red Sea, but man, we need to get back because we're all gonna die.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what they're doing.
SPEAKER_00: They're freaking out.
SPEAKER_00: And it seems it's kind of rational, you know?
SPEAKER_00: There's some reason behind that.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, we are out here in the desert.
SPEAKER_00: What are we doing out here?
SPEAKER_00: Why do we follow this nutcase?
SPEAKER_00: Why are we here?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't we go back to Egypt?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't we just get safe?
SPEAKER_00: Now imagine there you are in the desert with your wife and your little children and your grandparents with nothing to eat and no food in sight, and you're on the wrong side of the Red Sea from Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: Are you going to believe God's word, sola scriptura, or not?
SPEAKER_00: That is the question.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever been reading, you know, the through the Exodus, and you see all these impossible situations, and the people just keep freaking out when God gives them another one and another one.
SPEAKER_00: He's trying to teach them the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: But like the old hymn says, we're prone to wander.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we feel it.
SPEAKER_00: And we often don't trust God's word when trials come.
SPEAKER_00: We turn to our Visa card, our savings account, our friends, our ideas, the internet, the government, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: But what many profess to believe as Christians, they don't apply when trials come upon them.
SPEAKER_00: They don't search the scriptures and pray and trust in God's precious and magnificent promises.
SPEAKER_00: Like the Israelites, you know, we try to deliver ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And when we try to deliver ourselves, we turn away from the word of God, from the doctrine of sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, God sends us trials to teach us to trust in his word.
SPEAKER_00: Not after we have tried everything possible to rescue ourselves, but to trust his word from the get-go.
SPEAKER_00: Even if the situation seems impossible and we can't figure out any way of escape, if God's word says we can trust him.
SPEAKER_00: I know how hard this is.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I I get into my office, you know, I wake up my computer, and you know, I have good intentions.
SPEAKER_00: I I'm gonna pray and ask God to help me, and you know, I'm I'm gonna prepare a sermon to preach to people, and I want, you know, God to be glorified.
SPEAKER_00: But I see that I've got a few emails, and I, oh, look at that.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, so-and-so did this.
SPEAKER_00: Now I get a text message, and pretty soon I start getting busy and I start crafting a sermon.
SPEAKER_00: I realize I haven't even talked to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Here I am, I'm writing a sermon, and I haven't even talked to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I've been distracted by these things, and I'm not even asking him for help as I'm doing this spiritual thing in the flesh.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not because I don't know what's right to do, it's just I'm a sinner.
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of times I live like a practical atheist, and I'm not relying on the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God wants all of us to trust him, to believe in his word completely, relentlessly, without hesitation, without compromise, so we can be blessed, so we can be blessed, so he can be glorified.
SPEAKER_00: The trials you and I have to go through and will go through or have gone through are ultimately all sent by God, who is working all things after the counsel of his will, so that we can learn to trust him.
SPEAKER_00: Will we trust his word or not?
SPEAKER_00: Are you tempted to trust in yourself, your resources, your wisdom, strength, money, other people?
SPEAKER_00: Listen to what Jeremiah says about that.
SPEAKER_00: Jeremiah 17, verses 5 and 6.
SPEAKER_00: Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength.
SPEAKER_00: For he will be like a bush in the desert and will not see when prosperity comes, but will live in a stony waste, in a wilderness, in a land of salt without inhabitant.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you don't want to trust the Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, then go ahead and be a little dying, scraggly bush in salt and dirt.
SPEAKER_00: You want that's what you want?
SPEAKER_00: Then do it your way with Frank Sinatra.
SPEAKER_00: But if you want to give God glory, if you want to be blessed, then you trust the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You know, blessed is the man who trusts the Lord and whose trust is the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna be like this tree, you know, planted by the streams of water, and and and its roots go into the stream and it never ceases to yield fruit.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we need to do.
SPEAKER_00: We don't trust the Lord in his word.
SPEAKER_00: We place ourselves into a spiritual wilderness, a stony wasteland of salt without inhabitant.
SPEAKER_00: But look again at Deuteronomy 8:3.
SPEAKER_00: It says he humbled you and let you become hungry.
SPEAKER_00: And here is something interesting.
SPEAKER_00: He fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know.
SPEAKER_00: This is so good.
SPEAKER_00: God leads these two million people out there, he lets them get hungry.
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing to eat but rocks and dirt that are out in the middle of nowhere, they don't have any crops, they've eaten all their little snacks they've taken with them.
SPEAKER_00: Will they trust in God's word alone or not?
SPEAKER_00: And then in Exodus chapter 16, verses 2 through 4, we read this.
SPEAKER_00: The whole congregation of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: The sons of Israel said to them, Would that we have died by the Lord's hand in the land of Egypt when we sat by the pots of meat and we ate the bread to the full, for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.
SPEAKER_00: It's like the people who talk about the good old days, which really weren't that good.
SPEAKER_00: They kind of strain out all the negative and they remember the few good things, package them together as if they just sat around and weren't slaves and weren't being beaten and worked seven days a week.
SPEAKER_00: We just sat around eating meat and pot and stuffed our face with bread.
SPEAKER_00: Then the Lord said to Moses, Exodus 16, 4, Behold, this is this is interesting.
SPEAKER_00: This is the solution to their starving in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: I will rain bread from heaven for you.
SPEAKER_00: And the people shall go out and gather a day's portion every day, that I may test them whether or not they will walk in my instructions, sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Would they believe the Lord that bread would rain down from heaven or not?
SPEAKER_00: Amazingly, our text says he humbled you and let you become hungry and fed you manna.
SPEAKER_00: Notice, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know.
SPEAKER_00: Bread had never rained down from heaven before.
SPEAKER_00: This is a whole new thing, an unexpected thing.
SPEAKER_00: It was never conceived or imagined.
SPEAKER_00: I bet the day before God said this, if you would have surveyed all two million people and say, God's gonna feed you tomorrow, how do you think it's gonna happen?
SPEAKER_00: No one would have said bread's gonna rain from heaven.
SPEAKER_00: It was inconceivable.
SPEAKER_00: It was impossible for man, but not for God.
SPEAKER_00: The all-powerful, all-wise God will always deliver his people according to his word, and he will never fail.
SPEAKER_00: If necessary, he will do so by unexpected, miraculous means.
SPEAKER_00: God promised to be their God to take care of them.
SPEAKER_00: God cannot break his word.
SPEAKER_00: All of his promises come true.
SPEAKER_00: His word never returns void.
SPEAKER_00: He is the God who cannot lie.
SPEAKER_00: So consider that to keep his word, God reigned bread out of heaven for two million people for 40 years.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
SPEAKER_00: Will you trust in God's word, sola scriptura, or not?
SPEAKER_00: Listen to me.
SPEAKER_00: I don't care how many impossible situations you get in, what kind of trials or circumstances look like in your life, what you think is happening in the future, you need to trust the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: Trusting in the word of God alone is the only way to show love to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: It is the only way to give him glory that he deserves and to receive the blessing he wants for you.
SPEAKER_00: Think with me.
SPEAKER_00: Is God all powerful?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Is God all knowing?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Does God know all things before they happen?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Has God declared the end from the beginning?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Does he accomplish all his good pleasure?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Is he working all things after the counsel of his will?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Now consider the implications of that, of those statements right there.
SPEAKER_00: Consider the implications of that, of every trial you face.
SPEAKER_00: All your trials are ultimately from the hand of an all-sovereign God.
SPEAKER_00: God knows about your trials beforehand.
SPEAKER_00: God has the power to stop your trials if he wanted to, and if he doesn't, he wants you to go through them and trust him and his word alone.
SPEAKER_00: Now, secondly, what you should not live by.
SPEAKER_00: Look at Deuteronomy 8.3.
SPEAKER_00: He humbled you and let you become hungry and fed you manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you understand.
SPEAKER_00: Here it is, that man does not live by bread alone.
SPEAKER_00: This is a very difficult lesson for us to learn because we just naturally tend to want to learn but live by sight, by what we see.
SPEAKER_00: In the world, cash is king, food is king, clothing is king, cars are king.
SPEAKER_00: In the Bible, God is king.
SPEAKER_00: Yet the Bible tells us not to worry about food and clothing.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us God is the one who gives us everything we need for life and godliness.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us God gives us the power to make wealth.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us Jesus will never leave us or forsake us.
SPEAKER_00: God uses difficult circumstances and trials to get us to the place where we keep learning better and better, hopefully, that we can trust Him.
SPEAKER_00: And you're never gonna hear this from TV, from a secular book, from Fox News.
SPEAKER_00: The world never encourages you to trust in the Word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: This is why we must be people of the Word and read the Word and study the Word and talk about the Word and meditate in the Word and go to Sunday school and go to conferences and read good Bible-saturated books and sing good Bible saturated music because we need to be constantly reminded of this truth.
SPEAKER_00: And pretty much all that the world throws at us is a denial of the sufficiency of the Word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Christians don't live by bread alone, by mere physical sustenance, money, food, clothing, things.
SPEAKER_00: Be involved in discipleship relationships, be involved in reading your Bibles, have regular quiet times, listen to good sermons when you're going down the road.
SPEAKER_00: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_00: If you do not, the world will brainwash you, brainwash your children, brainwash your relatives, anyone, and teach you to trust in yourself and trust in the government and trust in science and trust in doctors.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, believer, you do not live by bread alone.
SPEAKER_00: The constant siren voices of Satan in the world system is do not trust the word of God alone.
SPEAKER_00: It's antithetical to what the Bible teaches.
SPEAKER_00: Most Christians allow the word to speak into their lives.
SPEAKER_00: Very little compared to how much they let the world speak into their lives.
SPEAKER_00: Strive to change that.
SPEAKER_00: In Matthew and Luke 4, when the Holy Spirit led Jesus out into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, just like he led Israel out into the wilderness to be tested.
SPEAKER_00: And God allowed Jesus to become hungry just like he let Israel become hungry.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, in the face of every temptation, did what?
SPEAKER_00: Quoted the word of God and was victorious.
SPEAKER_00: Unlike Israel, who did not and were not.
SPEAKER_00: Will you act like Israel or Jesus when your next temptation or trial comes?
SPEAKER_00: Will you trust in yourself, your resources, food, money, clothing, world, doctors, internet, whatever, or trust in the Word of God alone?
SPEAKER_00: God reminds us all that man does not live by bread alone.
SPEAKER_00: Third, what you must live by.
SPEAKER_00: Look at the end of Deuteronomy chapter 8, verse 3.
SPEAKER_00: But man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the first word, bod, which tells us a contrast is being made between living by sight and trusting in self in things like bread and trusting in the word of God alone by faith.
SPEAKER_00: What proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord is his word, his inspired, living, active, sharper, piercing, able to judge word that will not return void, that is like a hammer that shatters rock and a fire that consumes, that will never pass away.
SPEAKER_00: As 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17 tells us, all scripture is inspired by God or God breathed, and it's profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and training in righteousness, so that the man or woman of God may be adequate, thoroughly furnished, or equipped for every good work, every good work.
SPEAKER_00: Peter tells us in 2 Peter chapter 1, verses 3 and 4, seeing that his divine promises have granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence.
SPEAKER_00: For by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is the world by lust.
SPEAKER_00: Notice this.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the through the true knowledge of him, his precious and magnificent promises.
SPEAKER_00: What is that talking about?
SPEAKER_00: The word of God.
SPEAKER_00: Everything pertaining to life and godliness in this book.
SPEAKER_00: Peter goes on to describe the greatest experience that he ever had on the Mount of Transfiguration.
SPEAKER_00: And then he says in 2 Peter chapter 1, verses 19 to 20, and we have the more sure prophetic word to which you do well to pay attention as a light shining in the dark place.
SPEAKER_00: Pay attention to the more sure word.
SPEAKER_00: The Reformation happened because faithful men preached and died for the doctrine of sola scriptura, so you and I could have a Bible.
SPEAKER_00: They died so we could have a Bible.
SPEAKER_00: And we see it all the way through the scriptures, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: In Matthew 4 and Luke 4, when Jesus was tempted, what did he turn to?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In Matthew 5, 17 and 18, what did Jesus say would never pass away?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In Matthew chapter 26, verse 54 to 56, and Luke 24, 44, what did Jesus say would have every detail accomplished?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus debated with the religious leaders, what did he argue by?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In Luke 24, 27 to 46, what did Jesus refer to when speaking with the disciples on the road to Emmaus?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In John 5, verses 45 to 47, what did Jesus say would judge all men on the final day?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In John 10, 35, what did Jesus say could not be broken?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: What did Paul remind the Ephesian elders in Acts 20, verses 20 through 32 that he taught them day and night for a period of three years?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: There's a subtle theme here.
SPEAKER_00: In Acts 17, 11, what did Paul say made the Bereans more noble than those in Thessalonica?
SPEAKER_00: They searched the scriptures in 1 Corinthians 15, 1 through 4.
SPEAKER_00: When Paul reminds the Corinthians how they were saved, he says they believed what?
SPEAKER_00: The gospel in the scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In Ephesians 6, 10 through 18, where Paul lifts the believer armor, what is the only offensive weapon?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In 1 Timothy chapter 4, verses 6 and 13.
SPEAKER_00: What does Paul tell Timothy to teach, give attention to, and be absorbed in and take pains with?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: In Colossians 3.16.
SPEAKER_00: What are we to have dwell within us richly?
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: And what are the elders to constantly teach, preach, and counsel with and protect, according to Titus chapter 1, verse 9 and 2, verse 1, the scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: And that's just a small sampling because we don't have infinite time.
SPEAKER_00: And this is why every healthy local church and every healthy believer in every local church must believe and live by the doctrine of sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Let's get back to Archbishop Cramner.
SPEAKER_00: So Cramner has denied the faith, the very faith he has spent years and years promoting.
SPEAKER_00: Mary plans to secretly burn him at the stake, but Cramner doesn't know it.
SPEAKER_00: The Queen writes to Roman Catholic Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Paul, asking him to secretly prepare a funeral sermon for Cramner, who is to be burned at the stake outside St.
SPEAKER_00: Mary's Church in Oxford.
SPEAKER_00: I've stood there on that thing and seen the martyrs memorial right there.
SPEAKER_00: High-ranking officials and noblemen were instructed by the Queen to attend, and news spread all over the country.
SPEAKER_00: The Queen wanted Cramner's denial of faith to do as much damage as possible to the Protestant movement.
SPEAKER_00: And right before Cramner was executed, he was visited by Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Polo, asked him if his faith in Roman Catholic doctrine still held.
SPEAKER_00: Cramner affirmed that he did.
SPEAKER_00: But his conscience was bothering him.
SPEAKER_00: About 9 a.m., the next morning, Bishop Bonner, who participated in Cramner's degradation, led Cramner through the streets with great pomp and circumstances, kind of like a conquered foe who had been captured in war.
SPEAKER_00: And many Protestants stood along the road weeping, wondering how Cramner, who had written so many things, taught so many things, done so much for the faith, the true faith, the faith of the Reformation, could deny the doctrine of sola scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: And when Cramner arrived at St.
SPEAKER_00: Mary's, the church was packed with grief-stricken Protestants and jeering Roman Catholics.
SPEAKER_00: The Cramner was placed in front of the church on a crude makeshift platform where he knelt and prayed, and Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Paul began to preach Cramner's funeral sermon before all this giant crowd.
SPEAKER_00: It was at that moment that Cramner realized that Mary had lied to him.
SPEAKER_00: He wasn't going to be pardoned, that he had denied the faith to save his skin and wasn't going to save his skin.
SPEAKER_00: He realized what a fool he had been in denying the faith in order to have safety, the promise of safety and pleasure from people who didn't know the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And at that moment, his faith, his resolve to trust in the word of God alone returned to him with a vengeance.
SPEAKER_00: Like Samson's strength which came upon him before the Philistine lords.
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Paul then said, Quote, brethren, lest any should be in doubt of this man's earnest conversion, you shall hear him speak before you.
SPEAKER_00: Then he turned to Cramner and said, Master Cramner, openly express the true profession of your faith that all may understand that you are Roman Catholic indeed.
SPEAKER_00: Cramner agreed and confessed that during his life he committed many grievous sins.
SPEAKER_00: But one sin weighed on his soul far more than any other.
SPEAKER_00: Then a fierce countenance came upon Cramner's face, and he boldly said, And now I come to the great thing of which troubles my conscience more than any other thing I have ever did or said my whole life, and that it's the distribution in writing that in contrary to the truth of which I now hear renounce these things, these things which were written by my hand, contrary to the truth, that I believe in my heart, and written for fear of death, to save my own life, if it might be.
SPEAKER_00: That includes all such bills and papers I have written and signed with my hands since my degradation in which I have done, offended and contrary to my heart, since I have done this, my hand shall be first punished.
SPEAKER_00: For when I come into the fire, I will let it be the first thing that is burnt off.
SPEAKER_00: And then crying out at the top of his voice, and all these people are looking, and the Roman Catholic jaws are falling down and their mouths are gaping open, and the Protestants are smiling.
SPEAKER_00: He says, As for the Pope, I refuse him as Christ's enemy and antichrist with all his false doctrines.
SPEAKER_00: And the papists gasped, and the people, the Protestants begin to cheer, and so they seized him because they realized their plan had backfired.
SPEAKER_00: Immediately they grab Cramner, they drag him outside of the church, they chain him to the stake.
SPEAKER_00: They've already got bundles of wood all around him.
SPEAKER_00: And when the flame rose up, Cramner stretched out his hand, he put it into the flame, he raised up his other hand and he said, This unworthy right hand, this unworthy right hand, until it was burnt completely off.
SPEAKER_00: And then the flames engulfed him and he died.
SPEAKER_00: J.C.
SPEAKER_00: Rile in Light from Old Time says this.
SPEAKER_00: But then came the time of Cramner's triumph.
SPEAKER_00: With a light heart and a clear voice, he cheerfully allowed himself to be burned at the stake amidst the frenzied outcries of the disappointed enemies.
SPEAKER_00: Boldly and undauntedly he stood up at the stake while the flames curled around him, with reference to his having signed his recantation.
SPEAKER_00: He thrust his hand into the fire, saying, This unworthy right hand, steadily holding up his left hand towards heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Of the martyrs that, strange to say, none at the last moment showed more physical courage than Cramner did, and nothing, in short, in all his life became him so well as the manner of his leaving it.
SPEAKER_00: Greatly he had sinned, but greatly he had repented.
SPEAKER_00: Like Peter he fell, but like Peter he rose again, and so passed away, the first Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury, end quote.
SPEAKER_00: Historian Harold Chadwick said this.
SPEAKER_00: The Pope's followers were completely frustrated in their attempt to use Archbishop Cramner to destroy the faith and steadfastness of the true Christians.
SPEAKER_00: And like Samson, Cramner destroyed more of his enemy with his death than he did with his life.
SPEAKER_00: And so Archbishop Cramner died proclaiming the doctrine of the solo scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Believer, time has run out.
SPEAKER_00: When you leave here, when you go home and you encounter trials, and they'll come and they'll keep coming.
SPEAKER_00: Are you gonna trust God's word or not?
SPEAKER_00: Are you gonna rely on God's word alone or not?
SPEAKER_00: Remember that those trials, when they come upon you, are tests from God to teach you to trust in his word alone.
SPEAKER_00: They're reminders not to live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: They are given to help train you to instinctively turn to the Lord's word instead of anything else.
SPEAKER_00: They teach you to cry out with Cramner, Sola Scriptura.
SPEAKER_00: Pray with me.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we are thankful for your word.
SPEAKER_00: I just thank you for Cramner and his example.
SPEAKER_00: I thank you, Lord, that we can come here in a church like this, that upholds your word, that preaches your truth, that proclaims your gospel, Jesus Christ crucified and resurrected from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: I pray for anybody here, Lord, who has not yet repented of their sin and place their faith in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: May they do that now.
SPEAKER_00: May they quit pretending if they are pretending.
SPEAKER_00: May they quit hiding if they are hiding.
SPEAKER_00: May they believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be born again by grace.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, help all of us leave here with a greater commitment to trust your word, to stay in your word, to encourage each other with your word, to sit under biblical preaching that you might be glorified and we might be blessed.
SPEAKER_00: We pray all this in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.
SPEAKER_01: Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: You can learn more by visiting our website at faithfree.com.