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Three Angels Fellowship SDA Church

The Five Solas

Garhett Morgan

Why Protestant?

The Protestant in Me

Sola Scriptura

Sola Gratia

Sola Fide

Sola Christus

Father in heaven, again, we want to thank you for your goodness and your grace.

Lord, here today, we're talking about a very simple subject.

But Lord, simplicity doesn't mean that it lacks importance.

So Lord, as we discover this important biblical teaching of your word that I'm sure many of us, if not all of us, know already.

I ask that it would continue to make an impact on our lives.

We've been going through a series, the last month or 2, on the 5 solas of the Reformation.

And this is like part 4 or 5 or 6 or something on that, I don't know.

If you're a first time visitor, you haven't been here in a while, and you're like, great, I'm gonna be lost because he's building.

Yeah, we're building, but this definitely stands alone as well.

So don't worry about anything, everything's gonna be just fine, you should be able to catch on fairly quickly.

There are 5 different battle cries of the Reformation that brought the Christian Church out of the Dark Ages when people were probably at their most biblically illiterate.

Not just most the society was illiterate, but even if they could read they didn't have the opportunity to read the Word of God.

And there was a group of people, men and women might I add, that came together and formed the Protestant Reformation and started to get people's noses back in the Word of God.

And so anyway, there's a few different teachings that those people came through together and started to cry out, And that's what we've been going over the last few weeks.

The first 1 is in Latin, sola scriptura, which means the Bible and the Bible alone, amen?

The Bible is the ultimate authority in our lives.

We recognize that there is other authority out there.

We recognize that there's authority of government somewhat.

We recognize that there's authority at work.

But the ultimate authority is God's Word.

And if anything else contradicts the Word of God, we side with the Word of God.

Because God's Word is breathed by Him, it was created by Him, that's where we gain ultimate authority, is this living Word.

By the way, I was taking a look earlier this week at a study about the physical Word of God, and I know that many of you might look at your phone on your screen or on your phone or anything, that's just fine, I'm glad that you use your phone.

But I was reading a study this week on this and it surveyed a bunch of people that go to church and it mentioned that the people that bring a physical copy of Bible to church, they report that they have a richer experience in church than those that use the screen.

And so the author of this article was trying to go into why that is, and I kind of like what he was saying.

He was saying that this, there's so much that we can do on it, Right?

You ever gotten a bad phone call on this?

This connects you to all the bad news that's going on out there.

This connects you to a lot of things, and it represents a lot of things.

Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but this is just 1 thing, and it's just the word of God.

And you can do many things on this screen, some of them good, some of them bad.

There's nothing innately bad about it, right?

But this can only do 1 thing, and that is grow.

And so I would encourage, if you're reading on your screen, that's fine, no judgment here, but I would just encourage you, and maybe it's just because I'm old-fashioned and I like just the ink on paper, but bring it.

If you don't have 1, get a good 1 and start looking at it because it's easier to remember when you're reading it.

And there's something about holding the object and having it in your hand that just, I don't know, it makes it feel so much more real, doesn't it?

You know, there's so much that's fake on here.

So anyway, shameless plug on bringing your Bibles to church.

The second sola of the Reformation in Latin is sola gratia, which is by grace alone, right?

So simply, and in review of that, we understand that we are saved through the gift and free gift and expensive gift of Jesus dying on the cross for our sins.

We identified grace as simply God killing the things that are killing his people.

It's unmerited favor, it's forgiveness, but it's also God's power to get the things that are killing us out of our lives.

It's only by the grace of God that we can be saved.

You can be a perfect Christian the rest of your life and you're still not going to make it.

It's only by the gift of God, grace alone.

Finally, last week we took a look at faith alone.

Faith is more this believing that God exists, even the devils believe that God exists and they fear and tremble, right?

It's the New Testament that tells us that.

But faith is not only believing that God exists but that God is an active part in your life and trusting him to be in your life.

And today is probably the easiest of the solas, and in Latin, sola Christus is what they call it.

Very simple message, but what does that mean?

If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Matthew chapter 21.

We're gonna look here at something that Jesus said in his earthly ministry as he was there in front of the temple, that I've always, well I used to, and maybe I still do a little bit, I've always struggled with just a bit.

Matthew chapter 21, and we'll start in verse 42.

But it's interesting because when we think of Jesus, we think of the guy that little children run to, we think of the guy that is full of love, we have a very specific picture of who Jesus is.

But every once in a while, Jesus does something or says something that seems very uncharacteristic for him.

For instance, we looked a few weeks ago when Jesus said, I did not come to give peace, I came to bring war.

And it's like, wait a minute, I thought Jesus was the Prince of Peace.

Usually there's a reason why Jesus says these things.

And this is 1 of the ones that often confuses me.

Matthew chapter 21, we'll start here in verse 42.

Jesus said to them, have you never read in the scriptures the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone?

This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.

And the 1 who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him." So Jesus identifies this cornerstone, and this cornerstone was rejected just like someone else was rejected, and we'll get to that in just a minute.

And Then it mentions that if someone falls on this corner stone that he's going to be broken.

Now I don't know if you've ever fallen down and broke yourself, but that usually involves some pain, doesn't it?

You don't want to fall down and get broken.

And then he says, or you have another option with this stone, it can fall on top of you and it can crush you to the point that you don't exist anymore.

1 of them seems lesser than the other, but What does Jesus mean when he talks about this cornerstone and you either falling on it or it falling on you?

Now, this specific scripture that Jesus is saying here is 1 that the Jewish people would have known very, very well.

If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Psalms, chapter 118, and we see the passage that Jesus quotes, and then we're gonna talk a little bit historically about what this passage means.

Psalms, chapter 118, and we'll take a look here at verse 22.

By the way, Psalms 118 is interesting because the Jewish people, they have for a very long time, they still do, and they did during the time of Jesus, whenever there's a new month or a new moon, the Jewish people celebrate the new month coming in, that God has given them a new month.

And in the celebration of the new month or the new moon, they repeat Scripture.

They quote 1 chapter of Scripture specifically, and you'll never guess what chapter it is.

So every month the Jewish people, and Jesus would have grown up doing this, and the people that he's talking to would have done this, they quote the entirety of Psalms 118.

So it's something that every Jew would have had memorized, and they would have remembered it.

Series

The Five Solas

Sola Christus

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

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