Christian Traditions

One doesn’t have to look far to find a dead tradition. They lie around churches like the old tombstones of a church burial ground: rotting, crumbling, and yet too memory-filled to just dump over the hill somewhere.

But what about live traditions? Like faithful apple trees in the graveyard fencerow that bear fruit with the regularity of a ... tradition, they bless souls time and time again.

How do you turn a crumbling tombstone into a live apple tree? At this point my analogy sort of breaks down ...Yet for some people, those old, dead, dry traditions can never be revived: they HAVE to go! They have experienced traditions for years—dead, dry, hollow, and starting to stink—and they KNOW that church life never prospers if it is clogged with the tombstones of centuries gone by.

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Assurance of Salvation

After John Wesley had been preaching for some time, some one said to him, “Are you sure, Mr. Wesley, of your salvation?” “Well,” he answered, “Jesus Christ died for the whole world.” “Yes, we all believe that; but are you sure that you are saved?” Wesley replied that he was sure that provision had been made for his salvation. “But are you sure, Wesley, that you are saved?” It went like an arrow to his heart, and he had no rest or power until that question was settled. Many men and many women go on month after month, and year after year, without power, because they do not know their standing in Christ; they are not sure of their own footing for eternity. Latimer wrote Ridley once that when he was settled and steadfast about his own salvation he was as bold as a lion, but if that hope became eclipsed he was fearful and afraid and was disqualified for service. Many are disqualified for service because they are continually doubting their own salvation.

The Church Must First Repent

The occurrence of the word “Repent” in the messages to the Seven Churches is truly remarkable. The word repentance—in the mind of the average Christian—is connected with sinners and not with professing Christians. And yet the word used throughout the New Testament in the presentation of the Gospel message to sinners is exactly the same word repeated by our Lord in His messages to the Seven Churches.

The word “Repent” occurs over seven times in these seven messages. It is omitted from two of them—Smyrna, the poor, persecuted Church—for a church in persecution is generally a purified one, and Philadelphia, the loyal Church, the Church that had kept the faith. The noun “metanoia” (repentance) is defined variously as a change of mind, a change of heart, a change of attitude, or a change of direction.

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