Randy McCarthy
In this sermon, Randy asks us to think about this question: what is the purpose of the preaching of the gospel? He refers to 1 Timothy 1:5 which states that the end (or purpose) of the commandment of God is to promote love out of a pure heart, and a good operative conscience, and genuine faith. Randy focuses on the conscience of man, which is a faculty which God has given every man to enable him to know and judge his own behavior; when we disobey our conscience, we feel inward condemnation. Randy shows that while our conscience is operable, it is not infallible due to the fall of man. If we ignore our conscience, it can easily be damaged; if we are not careful, we can do amazingly sinful things and our conscience will not condemn us. Randy looked to three examples in the Old Testament of men whose consciences were “seared over with a hot iron” (1 Tim 4:2): Cain (Genesis 4), Joseph’s brothers (Gen 37, 42) and David (1 Sam 11). God nevertheless promises to cleanse our consciences by repentance and faith in Jesus Christ (1 John 1:9).
Bill McCarthy closed out the services by stating that a good summary of what was preached by Randy was “to beware your conscience” since it can be so easily damaged. Bill spoke of the heart of man and how easy it is for us to sin – no man needs to teach us how to do that. He referenced 1 Cor 9:24-27 and Ps 119:9 to show that we are called by God to be temperate in all things and to run the race before us by applying the things we hear in the gospel.
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