I invite you to turn with me in the Word of God to Acts chapter fourteen. Acts fourteen will also be turning to the canons of Dort. The third and fourth heads of doctrine. Find this on page one hundred four in the back of your Psalter hymnal. This afternoon, we continue our study in the canons. We're dealing with the chapter on total depravity and irresistible grace or efficacious grace, efficient grace. For a scripture reading, we'll read together Acts 14. Seeing the work of God, not merely in Paul, but also in Lydia, when the Lord has given faith. So here, God's Word, Acts chapter 14, verse 1. Now, it happened in Iconium that they went together to the synagogue of the Jews and so spoke that a great multitude, both of the Jews and of the Greeks, believed. But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brethren Therefore, they stayed and therefore stayed there a long time, speaking boldly in the Lord, was bearing witness to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands. But the multitude of the city was divided, part sided with the Jews and part with the apostles. And when a violent attempt was made by both the Gentiles and Jews with their rulers to abuse and stone them, they became aware of it and fled to Lystra and Derby. cities of like like on like onia and to the surrounding region when they were preaching the gospel there. And in Lystra, a certain man without strength in his feet was sitting a cripple from his mother's womb who had never walked. This man heard Paul speaking. Paul observing him intently and seeing that he had faith to be healed, said with a loud voice, Stand up straight on your feet. And he leaped and walked and the people saw it. Paul had done. They raised their voices, saying in the Lyconian language, The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men. And Barnabas, they called Zeus and Paul Hermes because he was the chief speaker. And the priest of Zeus, whose temple was in front of their city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates, intending to sacrifice with the multitudes. But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard this, they tore their clothes and ran in among the city, crying out and saying, Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men with the same nature as you and preach to you that you should turn from these useless things to the living God who made the heaven, the sea, the earth, the sea and all things that are in them, who in bygone generations allowed all nations to walk in their own ways. He did not leave himself without witness and in that he did good, gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness. And with these sayings, they could scarcely restrain the multitudes from sacrificing to them. Then Jews from Antioch and Iconium came there and having persuaded the multitudes, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead. However, when the disciples gathered around him, he rose up and went into the city. And the next day he departed with Barnabas to Derby. And when they had preached the gospel to that city and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith and saying, we must, through many tribulations, enter the kingdom of God. So when they had appointed elders in every city, every church and pray the fasting. They commended them to the fear to the Lord in whom they had believed, and after they had passed through Pisidia, they came to Pamphylia. Now, when they preach the word in Perga, they sent down to Italia. From there they sell to Antioch, where they had been commanded to the grace of God for the work which they had completed. Now, when they had come and gathered the church together, they reported all that God had done with them and that he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles. So they stayed there a long time, but the disciples. There is a reading from God's Word. Let us turn now to canons of doors to find this on page one hundred four in the back pages of the Psalter hymnal. This afternoon, we hope to look at articles eleven to fourteen. So article eleven page one hundred four. But when God accomplishes is good pleasure in the elect or works in them through conversion He not only causes the gospel to be externally preached to them and powerfully illuminates their minds by his Holy Spirit, that they may rightly understand and discern the things of the Spirit of God. But by the efficacy of the same regenerating spirit, he pervades the inmost recesses of man. He opens the closed and softens the hardened heart and circumcises that which was uncircumcised, infuses new qualities into the will Which, though heretofore dead, he quickens from being evil, disobedient and refractory. He renders it good, obedient and pliable. Actuates and strengthens it like a good tree. It may bring forth the fruits of good actions. Article 12. And this is that regeneration so highly extolled in Scripture. the renewal, new creation, resurrection from the dead, making alive which God works in us without our aid. But this is no wise effected merely by the external preaching of the gospel by moral suasion or such a mode of operation that after God has performed his part, it still remains in the power of man to be regenerated or not to be converted or to continue unconverted. But it is evidently a supernatural work, most powerful and at the same time most delightful, astonishing, mysterious and ineffable, not inferior in efficacy to creation or the resurrection of the dead. As the scripture inspired by the author of this work declares so that it all whose heart God works in this marvelous manner are certainly infallibly and effectually regenerated and do actually believe. Whereupon, the will thus renewed is not only actuated and influenced by God, but a consequence of this influence becomes itself active. Wherefore, also man himself is rightly said to believe and repent by virtue of that grace received. Article 13, the manner of this operation cannot be fully comprehended by believers in this life. Nevertheless, they are satisfied to know and experience that by this grace of God, they are enabled to believe with their heart and to love their Savior. An article fourteen. Faith is, therefore, to be considered as the gift of God, not on account of its being offered by God to man to be accepted or rejected at his pleasure, but because it is in reality conferred upon him. and infused into him, nor even because God bestows the power or ability to believe and expects that man should, by the exercise of his own free will, consent to the terms of salvation and actually believe in Christ. But because he who works in man both the will and to work and need all things in all produces both the will to believe and the act of believing also. There is a reading of our confession and God had a blessing to it. Beloved congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, we began this year in the House of the Lord studying Lamentations three and that sermon we began with the question, What is God's view of us and why? Remember, we've decided that that was a more important question than what is our view of God? What is God's view of us and why? We saw that as God views us as believers through Christ, that through Christ we are united to Christ. And when God looks down upon his children, he sees Jesus Christ. He sees his only begotten son. That's why we can worship God today. That's why he receives us as his own. God sent the son of God to become a son of man so that the sons of men may become sons of God. What a gracious and what a merciful God we serve. This afternoon, as we continue our study of the cannons of doors dealing with total depravity in the working of God's grace, we will see again. That in light of our sin and rebellion to God, just how much we need his grace Paul David Tripp, the Christian counselor, wrote, quote, No one gives grace better than the person who is deeply persuaded that he needs it himself. Self-righteous people tend to be critical, dismissive and impatient with others. No one gives grace better than the person who is deeply persuaded that he needs it himself. It should not take us very long to recognize how much we need the grace of God. Because every day we come before the throne of grace to repent of our sins. Every week we hear God's law read in worship and we are reminded of our need of a Savior. Every week when we think, how can I earn the favor of God? We are reminded of the Philippian jailer. Sirs, what must I do to be saved? Paul and Timothy told him, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. The truth is simple and yet profound. We hope to see this afternoon what we hope to see this afternoon is how someone is able to believe. If they are bound in depravity. If we are born with natures that are totally depraved, restrained, How are we able to believe? Paul and Timothy said to the Philippians jailer, believe. They did not say pray and ask God for the Holy Spirit, and then you may believe. So we must ask also where we find the balance here. The balance between the divine sovereignty of God. And human responsibility, on the other hand. What are we called to? With these questions in mind that we come to the Kansas afternoon under the theme are our Trinitarian God raises us from death to life by his power. Our Trinitarian God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit raises us from death to life by his power. First, we'll see the work of the spirit and preaching. Second, the mystery of regeneration and the third faith given from above. So first, the work of the spirit and preaching. Article 11 begins where Article 10 left off. It's balancing for the belief of the fact that behind all of God's dealings with man is this truth of election. There's a reason why you have to begin with election, it's before time, this election is sovereign, it's immutable, it's unchangeable. God doesn't change his mind about it. It's from before the foundations of the world and the cause or ground of this election was not in the fact that man would meet some conditions down the road. But it was merely according to God's good pleasure and will it please God of it, of his infinite wisdom to choose some everlasting life. So in Article 11 begins with, but when God accomplishes his good pleasure in the elect or works in them through conversion. It brings us back into the realm of the election of God, playing itself out in real time. In history. What's happened before history takes place in history. That which occurred before time plays out in real time and space for the elect God and his own timing works in the elect true conversion. And the first thing God does through the Spirit here as he causes the gospel to be externally preached to them. As we saw earlier. There's no substitute for preaching. There's nothing else like the preaching of the word. Not Bible reading, not prayer, not reading a book, not even reading a book of sermons. Cetera, there's something mysterious that takes place in the preaching of the gospel. And there's a thirty one of our catechism. It explains how the preaching of the Word of God opens and closes the door to the kingdom of heaven. A sermon is not merely a speech, a lecture, a Bible study, even though may have aspects of all of those. It's different, it's unique. And as we know from our catechism, God does not want his people taught by dumb images, but by the lively, by the living, Preaching. Of the word. This is what God has ordained. He could have ordained angels to preach. But he didn't. He didn't, and this is part of the foolishness of the preaching and the foolishness of the cross, the way that God works for his own glory. Two things we need to be reminded of concerning applying this idea of the indispensability of preaching. The first thing is that realize that it's God who accomplishes his purposes in preaching. The Word of God goes forth. The minister is merely a mouthpiece, a vehicle for the Word of God. And it's God who works. And we can be thankful for that. As the minister of the Word, I'm extremely thankful of that. A sermon that a minister thinks does not go very well could be used by God to produce faith in the hearts of the sheep of God. God uses preaching in spite of the man in the pulpit. It's the work of God. And secondly, the preaching of the word and the work of seminaries, seminary students, missionaries, ministers, the encouragement of young men to enter the ministry. This ought to be high priority on our prayer concerns or on our prayer list is the people of God. Prayerfully support the preaching of the word. When God accomplishes his good pleasure in the elect, he accomplishes this through the preaching of the gospel. When the election under the preaching of the word, the Holy Spirit of God illuminates the minds of the believers. Article 11 says that this happens so that they may rightly understand and discern the things of the Spirit of God. No longer thinking carnally, no longer having worldly eyes, carnalized, but spiritual vision from the Word of God because of the Holy Spirit of God living in us, abiding in us, enlightening us, illuminating us. What was dark becomes light. The human mind is naturally darkened by sin. What the Holy Spirit does in illumination is he flips on the light switch of the spirit room in the mind. This is how God works by the spirit. What was dark is now light. We need the illumination of the Holy Spirit in order to understand the word of God and to receive the preaching of the word. You cannot do it rightly without the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit. Think about that on the opposite flip side, without the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit, what happens in the reading of the Word of God, what happens in the explanation of the Word of God, what happens in the preaching of God, it will not be spiritually and rightly understood. Doesn't matter if it's a Ph.D. professor sitting under the preaching. Realize, brothers and sisters, that without the illumination of the Holy Spirit, natural man will remain in the dark. In a sense, we cannot teach someone the Bible in order to get them to believe. Rather, they must believe so that they have the ability to understand the Word of God. The Holy Spirit only illuminates the minds of the elect. Article 11 also says that the Spirit of God pervades the inmost recesses of man. Look at Article 11 if you have your confession open. He pervades the inmost recesses of man. He opens the closed and softens the hardened heart. Circumcises that which was uncircumcised. Infuses new qualities into the will, which though before this were dead, he quickens, which means makes alive. From being evil, disobedient and refractory, he renders it good, obedient and pliable. This refractory pliable idea. Think of a metal which is able to be shaped refractory means you can't shape it pliable like putty. You can shape it. You can move it. This is what God does to the will. He softens it so that it can be moved. It can be shaped by the Holy Spirit of God being renewed in the image of God. He renders it good, obedient, and pliable, actuates and strengthens it like a good tree. It may bring forth the fruits of good actions. This working of God is a supernatural working of God. It's not contrary to nature. It's above nature. It's super nature. It's super natural. This working of God. The tree, which is us, which has fallen, humanity is is naturally rotten. And it only produces what is rotten. And yet God, by his grace, softens that which is hard. Makes pleasing unto him that which was rotten, that it may bring forth good fruit. And yet so often the rotten tree remains in the unbeliever. And God permits that rotten tree to continue to grow and to produce fruits of sin and wickedness Why? Why does God allow the weeds to grow among the wheat? Why not get rid of those tears? God allows it to grow so that later it might be chopped down. It's for his purposes, for his church. And for his glory. Good actions do not normally or naturally flow from that tree. Our God rather uses the Holy Spirit in the hearts of the elect and God ordains to accomplish his good pleasure in them. It's God's good pleasure and God accomplishes it, which brings us secondly to the mystery of regeneration. As good students of the Bible, And of the catechism. You'll notice that the word regeneration here is used in a unique way. If I would explain to you what regeneration is, theologically, I would not explain the way the canons of Dort explains it. Regeneration simply is to be made alive or to be born again, generated again. Normally, we would say that this takes place before conversion. It. And if this idea of regeneration is without any mediation works by the Spirit of God, when the Spirit of God brings one from death to life initially. However, we're speaking about regeneration here in a broad way. In a sense, regeneration. And we're talking here about calling regeneration and conversion. So it's kind of broader than a narrow understanding of regeneration. So Article 12 begins by saying this is highly extolled in Scripture, this regeneration of God, this whole process of bringing one from death to life, from a rotten tree to a tree that will bring forth good fruits. And so it uses all this language from the Scripture. This biblical language of renewal, of new creation. For instance, it quotes 2 Corinthians 5. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17. We read, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new. So what does this mean? He's a new creation. Well, the old creation was a simple, a depraved, a rotten creation. The new one is renewed in the Spirit of God by the working in the heart. And it is a new creation. It is renewal. It is a resurrection from the dead being made alive. The quote here from John 5.25 or Romans 4.17 or Ephesians 2 verse 1. Romans four seventeen, we read. As it is written, I have made you a father of many nations in the presence of him whom he believed, God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did. God, who brings life from the dead resurrection from the dead, the salvation of God is wonderful and is glorious. This is the work of God. And because of that, as we've seen all throughout the canons, this moves the recipient of the regenerating grace of God to worship. We don't really even have the words to respond to God. We just worship God, we stand before his presence in awe and thanksgiving and gratitude, we sing God's word back to him. We rejoice this regenerating work of God impacts the whole entire being of man. This regeneration, which takes place in the hearts of the elect, is affected totally and completely by God. Article 12 mentions three things that do not effect this regeneration of God. The first thing is the external preaching of the gospel. We would say that conversion is mediated through the preaching of the word. Right, you believe through the preaching, but the preaching itself is not the cause of faith. The cause of faith is the working of the Holy Spirit. OK, the preaching itself is not the cause of faith, it is the Holy Spirit. It's this idea of guns don't kill people, people kill people. The gun is the vehicle used to commit a crime. The gun itself does not go to jail. The person. The preaching is a vehicle that God uses not to bring death, to bring life. To bring life. It's the vehicle, it's not the efficient cause. In the preaching. In the preaching, it does no good If the hearer does not hear the voice of the Good Shepherd, the Son of God speaking to the heart. Because in the preaching congregation, you do not merely listen with your ears, but your hearts. You need to be impacted by the preaching of the Word of God. It might sound like that, since this is a work of the Spirit, you have nothing to say about it. Wrong. Wrong. God calls you to prepare your hearts so that even in the preaching, even in the preaching, you are loving God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. This involves preparation before you come to worship. But it's not merely by the external preaching of the gospel. It's by the work of the Holy Spirit. The second thing that does not affect faith, cause faith in this sense, is what the confession calls moral suasion. What is moral suasion? Sounds like persuasion. Well, this is explained. This is the Arminian conception. This is explained in paragraph 7 of the rejection of errors. So a couple pages later, page 108. This moral suasion is explained. This is what it is. We reject those who teach that the grace whereby we are converted to God is only a gentle advising. That's the moral suasion or, as others explain it, that it's the noblest manner of working in the conversion of man. And this manner of working, which consists in advising is most in harmony with man's nature, that there is no reason why this advising grace alone should not be sufficient to make the natural man spiritual. Indeed, that God does not produce to produce the consent of the will, except through this manner of advising. And the power of the divine working, whereby it surpasses the working of Satan, consists in this, that God promises eternal, while Satan promises only temporal goods. It's this gentle advising. It's for me to lay before you a couple of things. Lay before you first what God promises and then what Satan promises. You want enjoyment in this life? You want a lot of friends in this life? You want a lot of wealth in this life? All of these worldly things. Or do you want eternal life, a peace of conscience and soul? Then choose God, they would say. If you want these other things, choose Satan. Choose the way of the world. It's this coaxing of the conscience into faith. It's also a form of sensationalism. Or moralism. There's a danger of sensationalism and moralism and preaching or not moralism. Sensationalism or emotionalism. Where a minister can. Pull on the heartstrings of the people of God. Maybe you could tell a story. Maybe a very personal story and he gets the people of God to do anything they're ready. Tell us what to do. And this is moral suasion. A lot of people who are good at getting money out of people do this, right? They coax their wallet open. Get all their money, right? It's a form of sensationalism. This can take place also in the preaching of the word, which has produced the modern phenomenon in North America, the altar call, right? Altar calls weren't taking place when the candles in the door were written. I'm sure that it would have included this idea if they were written today. It's the idea of the altar call. to get people so emotionally involved, the more tears, the better ready to make the decision to follow Christ. Come forward, sign your name, say the prayer and you'll have everlasting life. And they do this time and time again. This is what moral suasion is. It's a misrepresenting of God and his word, the goal may be fine, The goal is to get people to believe the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's good, right? But in the way that God has determined in the final thing, which is to cover all our minions, is that God does not work in us first so that by our own power we make the decision. Do you want to be regenerated or not be converted to God or not? To say so is an attack on the sovereignty of God. Why does the Arminian want to reserve for himself the glory of the choice of salvation? After all, to us, even it doesn't actually sound that bad. I mean, you know, we live in a democracy. We like our choices. We like our freedom. This is because Satan is so blinded our eyes by the fall that we do not want others to do anything for us. We want to do it alone. We want our freedom. We want our ability. We want our responsibility. We want our free will and a choice of whether or not we want to resist the grace of God. He gives it. We can receive it or reject it. Sorry, this is not how God works. God is not like the man at the mall handing out candy canes at Christmas time. You just say, no, thank you. No, take it. OK, I'll take it and throw it in the garbage a couple steps later. God, through the preaching of the gospel, performs the work of regeneration and conversion. It's mysterious. There's absolutely no possibility that God will not accomplish what he sets out to do. This is called irresistible grace. That term is not used in our confession, irresistible grace. Over the ideas there, The term that our confession is used is called efficacious. Grace has an effect in efficacy. And we can see this in the positive statements of Article 12. You see, this all has to fit together that if God has some chosen. And that the way that he is going to produce faith in them so they send to the preaching of the word and the preaching of the word, they will believe he will give his grace. Will the elect of God reject the grace of God? Of course not. Does it make sense? Impossible. And hence, the irresistible grace of God. It's working of God is a supernatural work. Confession calls it most powerful, most delightful, astonishing, mysterious and ineffable. This is the work of God. It's supernature, supernatural. It's powerful because As Paul says, it is the dunamis. It is the power. Think here, dynamite. It's the dynamite of God. That's the Holy Spirit of God. It's the dynamite of God. It's the power of God unto salvation. It's astonishing. It's awesome. It's mysterious, they can't fully comprehend it, and it's ineffable, meaning it's almost too holy to speak of. It's almost too holy to speak of. Think about it. Why did God save you? Why did God save you? You continue to sin against him. You continue to fall into the same bad habits. Most of the New Year's resolutions you made this week, statistics say that they will be broken within two weeks. Have you ever heard someone ask But a wicked person is going to hell when they think about hell and heaven, they say, that's just that's just not fair. It's not fair that God would send so-and-so to hell. It's not fair. Really? Do we really want to talk about the fairness of God? God is not fair. If God were fair, everyone would be going to hell. The reason why everyone is not is because God is also gracious. It's the grace of God that anyone would believe. It's the glory to the grace of God that he performs in us. This is why we who are born with depravity become trophies of the grace of God. Everyone who believes is a trophy of the grace of God. Praise God for faith. He performs this in us. And yet, in light of the sovereignty of God and salvation, this does not remove, this does not abrogate the responsibility of the Christian. After all, God does not repent and believe for you. You do. You repent and believe for yourself. Is this just merely a mystery we cannot figure out? No. Hooks says it's true because God never violates the work of his own creation. He never violates the nature of man. That is, God in the execution of his good pleasure never interferes between the heart and will and the mind of a man on the one hand and the actions of that man on the other. On the contrary, the act of faith and repentance proceeds from the will of the man. That man believes that man repents. But he believes repents only by virtue of the grace received. God renews him. Hence, man is rightly said to believe and to repent. The one who has begun a good work and you will bring it to completion. There is a mystery here. Between God's sovereignty, between man's responsibility And yet, both are true and both have been revealed by God Almighty himself. Therefore, we stick to the Scriptures, which teach us to repent, to believe, to love God, to love our neighbor. Which brings us finally to faith given from above. Article 14 says faith is therefore to be considered as a gift of God, not on account of his being offered by God to man to be accepted or rejected at his pleasure. but because it is in reality conferred upon him, breathed and infused into him. And here we come back to the man at the mall handing out candy canes. Do you want one or not? Faith does not work this way. Faith is rather conferred upon the believer. God, in this sense, breathe it into him. The closest thing we get to see of someone coming from death to life physically is when someone receives CPR. Someone's unconscious, not breathing, they receive CPR. Does the person administering the CPR ask the unconscious person, first, before I give you CPR, do you want it or not? No. Well, yeah, they're nearly dead. They give the CPR. Does the person administering the CPR tell the person to breathe? No. They breathe their own breath into their lungs. They push down on their chest to get the lungs breathing air going in and out through the mouth. The will of the individual is out of the equation. After all, they are unconscious. CPR is not an agreement, a contract, a covenant or treaty. CPR is sovereignly and unilaterally administered. Once the patient breathes. They have the choice, so to speak, whether they keep breathing or not. Look at the end of Article 14. And that expects that man should, by the exercise of his own free will, consent to the terms of salvation, actually believe in Christ, but because he who works in man, both the will and to work and indeed all things at all, produces both the will to believe and the act of believing also. God brings us from death to life. He gives His grace and He gives His grace sovereignly. Sovereignly. Brothers and sisters, God has revealed Himself in the great Redeemer, Jesus Christ. He has ordained the preaching of the gospel for the producing and the strengthening of the faith of the people of God. He does this in a mysterious way, in a way that exalts and glorifies His name. He's ordained the preaching of the foolishness of the cross. That God would become man to die for men. This is the work of God. It's that Jesus Christ, the one who has gone to the cross, who is the object of our faith. It is Jesus Christ. It is Jesus Christ who's placed before us in the preaching of the gospel. And the call comes to believe, to trust, to walk in light of his salvation. He seriously he earnestly calls us to come unto him to find eternal rest for our souls. Believe in him. Preaching is the power of God unto salvation to all who would believe. This is God's power. But he exercises that power by the Spirit of God in his church and the elect. Let us make number 392 our prayer. Listen to these words. Spirit divine, attend our prayer and make our hearts thy home. Descend with all thy gracious power. Come, Holy Spirit, come. Come as the light to waiting minds that long the truth to know. Reveal the narrow path of right the way of duty show. Come as the fire in Kindle, now the sacrificial flame that all our souls and offering be to our Redeemer's name. Come, come as the dew on hearts that pine descend and still this hour till every barren place shall own with joy that quickening, making alive by quickening power. Amen.