Springs of Refreshing

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: The Greek word for refreshed in our text is used nowhere else in the New Testament. It is a bold word for in classical Greek and in the papyri, the word is used for lying down together to sleep, and is almost invariably used of the companionship of married couples. And Paul is using this word, a word that challenges thought, for it indicates the depth of spiritual refreshment which God has for us in Christian fellowship.
Guest (Male): Over a half a century ago, the late Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, then pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, saw the need to spread God's word beyond the hearing of his local congregation. He started the radio ministry which has become known as Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible. The application of God's word as taught by Dr. Barnhouse is as relevant today as when he first taught over the radio airwaves decades ago. The message we'll be featuring on today's edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is entitled, "Springs of Refreshing." If you feel thirsty, you can always go and get something to drink. But where can you go if you are spiritually thirsty? On one occasion Jesus cried out, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink." Have you found springs of spiritual refreshment in your relationship with the Lord? The scripture text for this edition of Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible, Romans chapter 15, we're looking at verses 32 and 33. Here once again is Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse with a message entitled, "Springs of Refreshing."
Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse: Through the Lord Jesus Christ, we come unto thee our Father and our God and in the Holy Spirit. We thank thee for thyself and that when our souls are dry, we can come to thee to be refreshed. Whatever the need of any of thy people, wilt thou be to them the supply for that need. Be water for our thirst. Be food for our hunger. Be love for our loneliness. Be fullness to our emptiness. Be thyself as the full answer to all that our souls crave. We ask it in the name and for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. In Romans 15:32 and 33, Paul prays and asks the Romans to remember that by God's good will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company. The God of peace be with you all. Springs of refreshing. A French art critic and historian tells a wonderful story about Corot, the famous landscape painter. In his book which has never been translated from the French, Jean-Francois Raffaelli tells of an incident in his own boyhood. While walking near the village of Barbizon, where so many French artists lived and painted, he saw the renowned Corot sitting in a field, painting a meadow with woods in the background. Stealing up behind the artist to look at the canvas, to his astonishment he saw that Corot had put in a lake, although actually there was no lake in the field before him. "But Monsieur Corot," he exclaimed, "is it permissible to paint a pond where there is no pond?" Corot looked up and said, "Young man, it's 11 o'clock. I've been here in the field since six this morning. I became very thirsty, and so I put water in the picture to refresh myself." We smile, but we recognize therein our own thirsts and hungers, our need for refreshment. In our text, Paul expresses his need of refreshment and gives a clue to how we are to be refreshed. One of the joys of Bible study is to come across verses where the will of God is so clearly stated that we can go into God and claim answers to prayer without adding "if it be thy will." Whenever we find the will of God expressly stated, then we may come boldly to God and draw on his resources, knowing that he must honor his promises. And thus we find Paul asking the Romans to pray that by God's good will he would come to them with joy and be refreshed in their company. Now, this part of the prayer was answered. We draw the conclusions from this text that it is God's will for us to be in joy and that it is God's will that our souls be refreshed. Other verses corroborate these promises. The Lord Jesus in the upper room, the night that he was betrayed, three times told his disciples that it was his will that his people might know joy. "These things have I spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you and that your joy might be full." In his first letter, John also declared, "These things we write unto you that your joy may be full." The Lord Jesus also desires that our souls be spiritually refreshed. He began his ministry with a list of the blessings including, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled, they shall be satisfied." There are types of spiritual refreshment which lead us into closer contact with Christ. It is not sufficient to have one of these without the others. Just as the body needs human protein, carbohydrates, fats, and other food elements to make a completely rounded diet, so we need food from the Bible, which we get from the Holy Spirit alone speaking to us in the word. And we need nourishment from the company of other believers. If either of these elements is lacking, the Christian life is lopsided. Now, first let us consider the refreshment that we get from the Bible alone. We approach it knowing that the Lord has given it for guidance and instruction. "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a guide unto my path." Here we find the revelation of the will of God. It is impossible to know the will of God apart from the word of God. The only thing that any human being can know about God apart from the divine revelation in the Bible is the revelation in nature of his eternal power and Godhead, as we read in Romans 1:20. But in the Bible, we meet the Creator as Father, the author of the eternal plan which reveals his wisdom and grace. Here we meet the Lord Jesus Christ and apart from the Bible, there is no knowledge of him whatsoever. In this book, the Holy Spirit is introduced to us. And when we trust in Christ, the Holy Spirit comes in to teach and sanctify us. Christ said as he prayed to the Father, "Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is truth." The Spirit through Peter told believers to desire the pure spiritual milk that they might grow thereby. God has revealed himself to thousands of individuals through his word, millions. We think of Martin Luther, who cast his anchor in the first chapter of Romans and rested in the fact that the just shall live by faith. We remember John Bunyan in all his sore trials, his heart torn by the sense of his sin, until he comes to a place in the word where he learns that Christ now stands between him and his sins. And then his soul is bathed with wonder and his heart is filled with peace. John Wesley felt his heart strangely warmed while listening to a message on the book of Romans. And this has been the testimony of uncounted millions. Some time ago I ran across a Bible that I used in my teens. It was torn and worn and marked almost beyond reading. I turned to the 53rd of Isaiah and saw that as a boy when I was only 15 years of age, I wrote in the margin, "Here I met God." As the years passed, I was able to look back at that remembered experience and to know more of what it really meant. For a while, I thought that this was the time and place of my salvation. But later, as I learned more about the word of God, I realized that it marked the time when I became aware that I was alive in Christ. How long I was alive before then I do not know. The story of the gospel goes back to my earliest recollections, but it was through the book that I came to awareness of life in Christ, and I was exceedingly refreshed. At this point, someone might interject that it's not the Bible that refreshed me but Christ. In one sense this is true, but in another sense it is not. We must be extremely careful about this because there is a group of men calling themselves teachers who attempt to use Christ to destroy the final authority of the Bible. Recently I received a letter from a woman who was greatly disturbed by my preaching. In the letter she said, "The Bible is your standard, Christ is mine. The Bible is a human book as well as a divine book. It's only the written word; Christ is the living word. Perhaps Protestants have substituted the Bible as the only authority. If this is so, I must follow God all along, for where Christ speaks louder than the book, I will follow Christ." Well, what she did not see is that the Lord Jesus Christ cannot lie. What he has given in the written revelation he will never countermand by any other revelation. Christ cannot speak louder than the Bible, though he takes its truths and gives them trumpet accompaniments. Now having issued this warning, let it be said that we are not refreshed by mere ink and paper. Our refreshment is from the Lord Jesus Christ himself, but it comes to us through the words that he has given us in his book. Let me liken the Bible to a love letter. Throughout history, when lovers have been separated, they have written to each other. The letters have been pressed to the heart, the paper has been kissed, and the words read and reread. The letters have been taken to bed and tucked beneath the pillow. And every sentence is absorbed as an expression of the personality and the love of the writer. Now, a human lover may prove fickle or faithless. His feelings may change and what passed for love may turn to hate. But there is no change in God. When we hold his letter, we hold much more a part of him than the lover holds when he reads a letter from his beloved. He may close his eyes and seek to visualize her face, her form, and even may reach out to touch her even though she's not there. But when we hold the Bible, we can reach out and touch the Lord Jesus Christ himself. There is a divine sense in which mortal man in a body that is perishing can stretch his soul through the Bible and touch the living God. And there is a wonderful sense in which the Lord reaches down and touches us. This is far beyond the sense in which absent lovers yearn for each other. He is a very present love, and we stretch our soul to him and find him there. And in this finding, there is great refreshment. There have been those who throughout history who have sought to live in the attitude of the tent's outstretched soul. These have been called mystics. Though we can find no justification in the scripture for such mysticism, we do not condemn them. It may well be that the Lord allowed a few such souls, Thomas a Kempis, St. John of the Cross, Bernard of Clairvaux, to spend their lives thus so that they could write down some of their experiences to help refresh thirsty travelers on the hard pilgrimage of life. And it's all right for souls who are toiling at the tasks of common life to breathe some blessing that these ancient mystics have recounted, if it helps the heart to rise above the waves of life and, like a swimmer drawing a deep breath before plunging once more beneath the surface, breathe deeply of Christ before going back into the necessary struggle of life. John Wesley was disgusted with his brother Charles who wrote, "Jesus lover of my soul, let me to thy bosom fly." John thought it was sentimentality and said so in no uncertain terms. But there is a great sense in which we desire to pillow our head in Christ's bosom and to know his loving care. John Wesley himself slipped into this same sentimentality, if you wish, when he translated Rothe's great hymn including the following: "O love, thou bottomless abyss, my sins are swallowed up in thee. Covered is my unrighteousness, nor spot of guilt remains on me. While Jesus' blood through earth and skies mercy, free boundless mercy cries. With faith I plunge me in this sea, here is my hope, my joy, my rest. Hither when hell assails I flee, I look into my savior's breast. Away, sad doubt and anxious fear, mercy is all that's written there." "Christ's bosom," wrote Charles Wesley. "Christ's breast," wrote his brother John. Both found what we all need to know at times, that only the supernatural resting place that God has provided for us in Jesus Christ can refresh our souls when we are in dire need of refreshment. Second, there is the refreshment that comes only from the company of other believers. This is why each believer should have a church home. I am so sorry for those Christians, especially in large cities, who go from church to church, tasting sermons here and there, never knowing the fellowship of believers. And I am so sorry for those churches which might be called society churches, where people meet and politely smile at their own close friends and calmly ignore those who are not of their social class. Oh, if we read carefully all of Paul's epistles, we shall find that believers are called upon to do many things for each other. They are to interact upon each other in the working of their faith. Listen to his word in the letter to the Ephesians: "His gifts unto men were varied; some he made his messengers, some prophets, some preachers of the gospel. To some he gave the power to guide and teach his people." "His gifts were made so that Christians might be properly equipped for their service, that the whole body might be built up until the time comes when, in the unity of common faith and common knowledge of the Son of God, we arrive at real maturity, the measure of development which is meant by the fullness of Christ. We are not meant to remain as children at the mercy of every chance wind of teaching and the jockeying of men who are expert in the crafty presentation of lies. But we are meant to hold firmly to the truth in love and to grow up in every way into Christ, the head." "For it is from the head that the whole body, as a harmonious structure knit together by the joints with which it is provided, grows by the proper functioning of individual parts to its full maturity in love." Now, this functioning of the individual parts constitutes one of the most important reasons for the visible church. We believers need each other. And if we do not know that we need each other, we have missed a great deal. It is necessary to consider this truth all the more closely because of false doctrine about the church. In the early part of the 1800s, an Irish church leader traveled widely and wrote prolifically, the main theme of his work being that the church is in ruins. The church is in ruins. This phrase, "the church is in ruins," occurs actually scores of times in the writings of this otherwise evangelical and spiritual leader. But the church is not in ruins. The church stands in our day as it has always stood. Admittedly, there are groups which call themselves churches but do not hold any of the essential doctrines of historic Christianity. Admittedly, there are many false brethren within organizations that hold the creeds of historic Christianity, but the church is not in ruins. For better or for worse, 90 percent of all the true believers in Christ who will be in heaven are within various denominations. To attempt to purify them now by starting a new group is to accomplish nothing more than starting a new denomination. And because of this centrifugal force of separation, believers need to give earnest heed to the truth of the oneness of the body of Christ. Each believer belongs in a special sense to every other believer who has ever lived throughout the history of the church, and to every believer who lives today, no matter what his association. I feel my oneness with every man who loves the Lord Jesus Christ as his savior and who calls him Lord. Now, like every other member of the human race, Paul had needs outside himself that could not be satisfied except by God, who plans to satisfy some of our needs only through other believers. No man lives unto himself. Paul had begun this letter to the Romans by telling them that he longed to see them for two reasons. He had something to give them and they had something that he needed. He wrote, "For I long to see you that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, that is, that we may be mutually encouraged by each other's faith, both yours and mine." And now at the end of the epistle, he repeats the thought. He wanted to come to them that he might be refreshed by their company. Believers can do for each other something that cannot be done in any other way. This is why it's necessary to go to church. Fellowship with other believers fills a need that cannot be supplied in any other way. I return to a thought expressed earlier in order to amplify it here. Just as food chemists have discovered that the body needs various vitamins, some of which can be provided in some types of food and some from other types of food, so the Lord tells us of one thing which can be received only by contact with other believers. Without this essential refreshment, we suffer spiritual vitamin deficiency, and no pills or capsules can make up the lack. We may sit in a room by ourselves and study the Bible, learn many things, and experience great joy in the truth that we find, but that is not enough. We can go through the Bible to the Lord Jesus Christ and come in contact with him through the work of the Holy Spirit in the word, and we can find exceeding joy in this, but still this is not enough. For there is something of Christ himself that he does not reveal to us except through our contact with others whom he has redeemed and in whom he is revealing himself. I am sure we shall never understand all of Christ until we have met every believer of every age who has been redeemed by him and who has found in him his highest joy. I have something of Christ to give that cannot be obtained from any other source, direct or indirect. And I have something of Christ to receive from every Christian who has found strength, salvation, and joy in him. Paul went to Rome and was refreshed in their company. We go to our churches and are refreshed in the company of other believers. We read the history of God's work in lives of believers and are refreshed. We shall not know full refreshment until we are joined, head and body together, Christ and his church. In the meantime, let us seek to love one another and seek for that which draws us together in Christ. And our God and Father, we pray thee that the Holy Spirit shall bless this truth to us, that the church may be drawn ever closer to Jesus Christ. And that knowing him better, we shall love each other better and that the world shall see how truly we are one, and may thus know that thou didst send Jesus Christ. Here we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.
Guest (Male): The Bible declares, "Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely." Only Jesus Christ can satisfy your spiritual thirst and refresh your soul. We hope you have benefited from today's message, "Springs of Refreshing." To listen to additional Bible teaching by Dr. Barnhouse, visit us online at alliancenet.org. An audio copy of today's teaching is available by calling us toll-free, 1-800-488-1888. Today's message again is entitled "Springs of Refreshing," or simply request message number R15-32. We would also like to make available to you a free copy of our booklet entitled, "Walking by God's Word." If you try to walk in the dark, you may hurt yourself or become lost. The same will happen if we try to make it through life without the light of God's word. The Bible declares, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." And this free booklet will help you apply the wisdom and light of the scriptures to every area of daily living. Ask for your free copy of "Walking by God's Word" when you call or write. Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible is a radio ministry of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. We exist to promote a biblical understanding and worldview. Drawing upon the insight and wisdom of Reformation theologians from decades and even centuries gone by, we seek to provide contemporary Christian teaching which will equip believers to understand and meet the challenges and opportunities of our time and place. We also produce the radio broadcast, "The Bible Study Hour," featuring the teachings of the late Dr. James Montgomery Boice, and "Every Last Word," featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Philip Graham Ryken. Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible comes to you through the generous gifts of listeners. If you have benefited from the broadcast and would like it to continue, please prayerfully consider a donation to help us keep this ministry on the air. For more information or to make a contribution to help further our work, contact us by calling toll-free 1-800-488-1888. That's 1-800-488-1888. Visit us online at alliancenet.org or write, Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Box 2000, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103. Be sure to ask for a free resource catalog featuring books, audio teachings, commentaries, booklets, videos, and a wealth of other materials from outstanding reformed teachers and theologians, including Doctors Donald Grey Barnhouse, James Montgomery Boice, Martin Lloyd-Jones, and Philip Graham Ryken. Thank you for listening. Join us again next time for more classic teaching on Dr. Barnhouse and the Bible.