Sovereign Grace

Pastor Martin addresses the origin of the fear of God, demonstrating that it is a distinct blessing of the new covenant, not something that grows on natural Adamic soil. He expounds Jeremiah 32:38-40 to show that God pledges to put His fear into the hearts of His people, then traces how the three ingredients of the fear of God correspond to the three blessings promised in Jeremiah 31:31-34. He culminates with Psalm 130:4 — 'There is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared' — showing that the discovery of forgiveness through the blood of Christ is the very thing that produces true, covenant-rooted fear of God.

The second message on unconditional election answers the four most common objections to the doctrine and traces its practical influence. The objections — it is not just, it is not fair, it kills personal concern and effort for salvation, and it makes evangelistic passion unnecessary — are answered primarily from Romans 9, with appeals to the life and labors of Christ, Paul, Whitefield, and Spurgeon. Pastor Martin concludes by showing that rightly received, the doctrine impels gratitude, engenders stability, constrains confidence, motivates faithfulness, humbles in the face of usefulness, and drives us to self-examination.

Pastor Martin moves into the period of proclamation, the book of Acts, to demonstrate that the kingship of Christ was a dominant note in apostolic preaching. He shows that the very words 'Christ' and 'Lord' carry the freight of messianic kingship and supreme rule, and that Acts opens and closes with the kingdom motif framing the whole book. He then expounds the first Christian sermon at Pentecost in Acts 2, where Peter's climactic argument from Psalms 16 and 110 declares that God has made the crucified and risen Jesus 'both Lord and Christ' and that all forgiveness flows from a presently enthroned Savior who must be obeyed.

Moving from the exceptional universal call to the normal New Testament usage, Pastor Martin examines the effectual call of God under two heads: its author and its results. From 1 Corinthians 1:9, 2 Timothy 1:8-10, and Romans 8:28-30 he shows that calling is God's activity exclusively and the Father's activity particularly — not God plus the sinner, not loving sovereignty plus moral suasion, but the same raw material of grace and the same hand of loving sovereignty that forged election and predestination. He then lays out the three results of this call: it effects vital fellowship and union with Christ, it always issues in holiness (the called are constituted saints and brought from darkness to light), and it always culminates in glorification. He closes by answering the common objection: calling is God's work, but believing and repenting remain the sinner's responsibility.

Pastor Martin introduces the doctrine of regeneration as the second threshold blessing alongside calling. He answers the question raised by effectual calling — how can a sinner dead in trespasses respond? — by turning to the grace of regeneration, 'an inner recreating of fallen human nature by the gracious, sovereign action of the Holy Spirit.' He surveys the word's usage (Matthew 19:28 and Titus 3:5) and the history of the term from baptismal perversion through the older Reformed use. Then he turns to the major Old Testament analogies Nicodemus should have known — Deuteronomy 30:6's circumcision of the heart, Ezekiel 11 and 36's giving of a new heart and spirit with cleansing, and the new covenant promises of Jeremiah 31-32 — drawing from each the fourfold emphasis of a sovereign, inward, gracious act that results in love to God, obedience, and mutual covenantal fellowship. He closes with a stinging warning against the cheapened 'born again' language of modern pop evangelicalism.

In the concluding sermon on Psalm 1, Pastor Martin expounds verse 6: 'For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish.' He defines the two 'ways' as trodden paths or habitual patterns of life, explains the righteous as those with both imputed and imparted practical righteousness, and demonstrates that 'knoweth' means God regards with special favor, purpose, and delight. By contrast, the way of the ungodly is described without any reference to God -- it simply shall perish. He concludes that a man's destiny and his way are inseparably joined, and the only escape is repentance and faith in Christ.