The Puritans…were great souls serving a great God. In them clear-headed passion and warm-hearted compassion combined. Visionary and practical, idealistic and realistic too, goal-oriented and methodical, they were great believers, great hopers, great doers, and great sufferers. But their sufferings, both sides of the ocean (in Old England from the authorities and in New England from the elements), seasoned and ripened them till they gained a stature that was nothing short of heroic. Ease and luxury, such as our affluence brings us today, do not make for maturity; hardship and struggle however do, and the Puritans' battles against the spiritual and climatic wildernesses in which God set them produced a virility Of character, undaunted and unsinkable, rising above discouragement and fears, for which the true precedents and models are men like Moses, and Nehemiah, and Peter after Pentecost, and the apostle Paul.
J.I. Packer

The Purpose Of Parables

The Purpose Of Parables THE PURPOSE OF PARABLES B2-16-6A Lu. 8:9-10 & Is. 6:9-12

INTRODUCTION: Teaches religious truth by the analogy of common experience.

I. DIRECTION TO THE SINCERE

  1. God will always honor a sincere heart
  2. The plan of salvation is not meant to be hard
    1. “Fools, should not ere therein” (Is. 35:8)
    2. “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” (Ro. 10:9)
  3. God loves the sinner & wants to reconcile him
    1. “Having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself” (Col. 1:20)
    2. “Ministry of reconciliation” (2 Co. 5:18)
  4. It is our ministry to share with others

II. CONFUSION TO THE HYPOCRITES

  1. “Cast pearls before swine” (Mt. 7:6)
    1. “Trample them under their feet”
    2. “Turn again and rend you”
  2. We should not put the Gospel in a position of

    possible harm lest:

    1. It should suffer reproach
    2. Our testamony to others be reproached

III. POINT OF DECISION TO ALL

  1. Numerous places state: “so there was a division among the people because of him” (Jn. 7:43)
  2. Son of man came to “give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division.”(Lu. 12:51)
  3. “Stone that the builders rejected” (Mt. 21:42) YOU HAD BETTER CHOOSE CORRECTLY!!

SUMMARY:

  1. We must, “Go, & tell this people, Hear ye indeed”
  2. Some will not hear, understand, or perceive
  3. “How long? And he answered, Until… the land be utterly desolate….and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.”

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