Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
or contact us at my libertybaptist.org or just look
us up on Facebook. And now we hope that this
message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
Glad to be back with you here today.
And if you would turn your Bibles, please, to Matthew
chapter #16 We're at an interesting spot in our series
right now because we're looking at world religions and cults.
We have now for really almost a year, but we're getting
ourselves to the place where we're kind of tailing to the end
of our series. And we have to ask ourselves a
question this. So as we study world religions
and cults, what exactly is the Catholic Church?
But many have who are here have had experience with the Catholic
Church. Maybe growing up in the Catholic
Church or having extended family of which are part of it,
certainly is very much part of the culture here in New England
where we are. Every town has a parish, or you
could be like Easton, which has two different parishes in
Northeastern and Southeastern. And so there is much in our
culture that is steeped in Catholicism here in New England.
And so we do have to ask ourselves, when it comes to
world religions and cults, where exactly does the Roman Catholic
Church fall? Now I understand, and this may
be a sensitive issue for some, I do want to talk about it in a
way that is, I hope, as we have done with all of the world
religions and cults, that is compassionate.
But yet at the very same time, we must proclaim the truth of
God's word for what it is. We must speak the word for what
it is. And as the Bible says, we speak
the truth and love, Amen. And so it's important for us to
be able to do so to not hold back on the truth, but yet also
to present in such a way that I hope that you could share this
video and maybe the next few videos that we do, the next few
lessons with friend, the neighbor, a family member, and
to be able to show them what the Bible says about Catholicism.
And so really the issue comes down to this.
And this is what we'll look at today when it comes to the issue
of faith in Christ. Is it all about the Scripture or
is it Scripture plus tradition? Because as we as Bible believing
Baptist, we would say today that it's all about the Scripture,
isn't it? If the Scripture says it, we
believe it. If the Scripture doesn't say it,
well, then we don't believe it. But for the Catholic Church and
for our Catholic friends, it is Scripture plus tradition that
all come together to make up what is the faith for the
Catholic Church. And so we want to approach this
with discernment and charity, not contempt.
It's not my desire to make fun of those that are part of the
Catholic Church. That's not my desire in any way,
shape or form. But at the same time, we do need
to address what is the Catholic Church and where does it fall
within our studies. Now by the Catholic Churches own
tally, we don't know exactly how many Catholics there are, but
some estimate that it's somewhere around 1 billion
adherence to the Catholic faith out of the 8 billion or so who
live here on this earth. And there are some things that
we have in common with Catholicism.
Quite honestly. We think about the Trinity, we
think about the bodily resurrection of Christ.
We we say the inspiration of Scripture that even the
Catholics would say that scripture is inspired.
It's what they say after that that is problematic.
But there are many similarities to where we could sit down and
talk with a Catholic and be able to find some common ground.
We understand that, that even in the most grossest of errors,
we've looked at things like Hinduism and we've looked at
things like the Muslim faith that we find that, well, yeah,
there is some kernels of truth that are able to be found and
there. And certainly when it comes to
the Catholic Church, there are certain doctrines that we could
talk about and find that we have so much in common.
But yet the issue is that Rome over the years has added to
Scripture a body of tradition of Sacramento, theology of the
doctrine of worship and prayer to Mary, papal authority, the
Saints and prayers to Saints, all of these different things
that have been added on top of the word of God.
And that's just a very short list that we could present to
you this morning. So the central issue really
comes down to authority. What is the final authority for
Christian faith and practice? So this morning we are going to
look at the issue of is Catholicism A cult or a false
religion? This is the question of which we
will ask ourselves this morning. The Catholic answer again is
Scripture plus sacred tradition, that which has been passed down
from the Church fathers, that which is dogma coming from the
Pope who speaks ex cathedra, meaning that he speaks on the
behalf of Jesus Christ when he speaks in such a way.
But maybe we ask ourselves where do we find the foundation of the
Catholic Church? And the answer is it's actually
found in Scripture, but it's actually Scripture that is
interpreted in error. And so I want us to look at that
this morning to get a better understanding of exactly where
this tradition comes from. So Matthew chapter 16 is where
we'll start here this morning in verse #13 I've double checked
all my references today, so hopefully we're in good shape.
I'll write Matthew chapter 16 and beginning in verse #13 Now
this is a text we looked at just recently in our Sunday morning
services. And we're looking at a little
bit of a different light today, again with the thought process
of the foundation of the Catholic Church being assigned
to this text. But yet that has been assigned
incorrectly. So look at verse #13.
It says when Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he
asked his disciples, saying, whom do men say that I, the Son
of Man, AM? And they said, some say that
thou art John the Baptist, some Elias and others Jeremias or one
of the prophets. He saith unto them, but whom say
ye that I am? And I'll remind you here again
this morning that really the issue of who Jesus is is not who
your parents thought he was, or what family you got born into or
what family grow up into. It really comes down to this.
What think ye of Christ that all of us are personally accountable
for the faith. And so here is Peter in one of
those moments where you just say, Peter, you said it good
this time he says this, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the
living God. Now I want you to focus here on
Peter for just a moment because there is is a thought process
that Peter was the first Pope. This is a question or rather
this is a doctrine of which the Catholic Church believes that
what is taking place here in just a moment in Matthew chapter
16 is Peter becoming the first Pope because Jesus answered
verse 17 and said unto him, Blessed art thou sign in
Barjona, for flesh and blood had not revealed it unto thee, but
my Father, which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, thou
art Peter. And a on this rock I will build
my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
And I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of heaven.
And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in
heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be
loosed in heaven. So here is Jesus according to
the Catholic Church, being ordained as the first Pope of
what will be the Catholic. And by the way, the word
Catholic simply means universal, meaning that they just look at
the Catholic Church as the only true church.
That the Catholic Church will be headed up very first by Peter,
who will be considered the first Pope, that he will be the rock,
the foundation of the church. But then also he will have the
keys to the Kingdom as well, as you can see represented there in
a picture by that large key of which he's holding.
Now there's several problems with the Catholic Church
founding being assigned to Matthew chapter 16.
The 1st is this, that Jesus Christ was not saying that Peter
would be the rock of which the church was built upon.
That is not what is being said here.
He says, I will say also unto thee, that thou art Peter.
Now the Greek word for Peter is Petrus, which means a very small
stone or a Pebble. So Peter, thou art Peter.
Remember this is the name has been assigned to him by Christ.
Thou art Peter, you are a Pebble, and upon this rock I
will build my church. Now the Greek word for rock in
verse #18 is Petra, meaning a bedrock or a massive foundation.
So Jesus is not saying that Peter is the rock that the
church can be built upon, because if that's the case,
you're building upon a Pebble and you can't build a whole lot
on a Pebble. Amen.
But what he is saying is this, thou art Peter, you are a small
rock and upon this rock I will build my church.
And I believe when Jesus saying upon this rock, he is saying the
bedrock principle of what Jesus just or whether what Peter just
confessed, what was the confession that thou art the
Christ, the Son of the living God.
Is the church built upon Peter? No.
Is the church built upon the fact that Jesus Christ is the
Son of the living God? Yes, that is what our church is
built upon. That's what all true churches
are built upon. Thou art Peter, you are small,
but your confession is great. And this confession is what the
church will be built upon. Now Peter himself that that's
the first problem, is that Jesus is not saying that Peter will be
the Pope. He is saying that Peter is the
Pebble, and that his declaration, his confession, was
great and large, that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living
God. The second problem that we have
here is this. Peter himself did not consider
himself to be the foundation. We find in first Peter chapter 2
verses #4 and 4 through 6 that Peter makes very clear that
Christ is the chief cornerstone. Peter does not take this upon
himself. You can go back to to even in
Galatians chapter 2. We talked about this a few weeks
ago when Peter was with stood in the face by Paul and Paul told
him you're doing wrong and that what you are doing an infallible
Pope does not get corrected by a fellow apostle.
But yet here's Peter or who is corrected by Paul.
We see that Paul was in error and he was not infallible in any
way. In fact, in first Peter chapter
5, verse 1, he calls himself a fellow elder.
This is the way he looked himself.
I'm just a pastor like other pastors.
I'm not holding myself to a higher standard than other
pastors and I'm over other pastors in a papal way.
No, I'm simply just Peter, a man who is a servant of Christ.
So, so there's several problems here.
There's the problem of the, the issue of, of what the church was
built upon and it was built upon the confession of Peter.
There's the issue of Peter himself saying, I'm not the
foundation of the church. There's also the issue of the
keys, the Kingdom verse #19 it says, and I shall give unto thee
the keys of the Kingdom of heaven.
And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in
heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt loose
on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
And the Pope's of the day. And there have been hundreds of
popes that have taken place and the numbers of popes that can't
really be reckoned properly because there were sometimes
splinter popes and there was at some time three different popes
at the same time, each one claiming different authorities.
And so it was very hard to be able to pin down exactly how
many there were. And all of them claim to have
these keys, the Kingdom, that whatever they say that they are
saying on behalf of Jesus Christ, in fact, they would
consider themselves to be the very vicar of Christ.
You say, what does that word the vicar of Christ mean?
That on earth they are Christ. Christ is not here right now,
but in Christ's place is the Pope.
Now you don't have to know a lot about the Bible to know that
that should bother you, that that is blasphemous, that a man
could claim to be the very representation of Jesus Christ
on earth, that Jesus Christ is basically embodied in this man.
Now there's Catholics who will say that's not what we believe.
They may not believe that, but that's what their church
teaches. And that's the issue, that there
are many good Catholics in the sense that they don't believe
those kind of things. But yet at the same time, that's
what their church teaches, whether they realize it or not,
that He is the very representation of Christ, that
He can forgive sins just as Christ forgave sins.
This blasphemy in the highest order, but he's the vicar of
Christ. This is what's taught.
But he has these keys to the Kingdom, it said, but really the
keys, the Kingdom can be assigned to the fact that when
you look in the book of Acts that there were three different
times the Holy Spirit came down in a very major way.
You look at the day of Pentecost, that the day of
Pentecost when all those folks were saved, the Holy Spirit came
down. You find in Acts chapter 8 that
when Peter was there that the Samaritans received Christ in
the first time in a very major way and the Holy Spirit, it came
down in a unique way. And then later on while Peter
was talking to Cornelius, the man who had the Italian band,
remember that was not a band like playing instruments, but
that was the the soldiers that were together and and the Holy
Spirit came down again. Every time you see the Holy
Spirit come down to the Jews, to the Samaritans, to the Gentiles.
Those are the three people groups because remember you have
Jews and Gentiles and Samaritans are a mix of Jew and Gentile.
Every single time that that was the case.
Who was there? Peter.
I would say that he was exercising those keys to the
Kingdom at that point, showing that the gospel being given to
the Jews, the gospel being given to the Samaritans, the gospel
being given to the Gentiles. I'm not saying that no one was
saved before that, but I'm saying that the Holy Spirit came
down and filled those believers at that time, and Peter was
there for each of those things. It would seem to me that that
makes more sense of what is taking place with the keys to
the Kingdom than saying that he becomes an infallible vicar of
Christ when we show that, well, he was very fallible and still
made mistakes. Because if you're a person, you
are fallible and you make mistakes.
And so, no, we would disagree with the fact that Peter was the
first Pope there. There is no historical evidence
that Peter was ever in Rome. There was no historical evidence
that he ever claimed to be the first Pope.
These are things that have been assigned to him hundreds and
hundreds of of years later. So we ask ourselves going into
where does these things come from?
You say, pastor, you mentioned some of these things already
that we would disagree with our Catholic friends about.
Where does this teaching come from?
You say tradition, but is that encoded anywhere?
Is that can that be found anywhere?
And the answer is yes, that you find that the Catechism, the
Catholic Church Catechism, the CCC, the Catechism of the
Catholic Church holds the doctrines of which the Catholic
Church believes. And in many ways the Catechism
of the Church holds the same authority as the Bible.
Now again, there will be some of our Catholic friends that would
hold their their heads and maybe scream and say that's not what
we believe. But the proof is in the pudding
whether they actually believe that or not that the Church, the
Catholic Church teaches that what you find in the catechism
is equivalent to the Word of God.
Why? Because tradition holds the
same, and I would even argue holds higher standard to
Catholics than the Word of God. Now, the Catechism of the
Catholic Church states that Scripture and tradition must be
accepted with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.
I'm going to say that again, because again, that's a
blasphemous statement. Scripture and tradition must be
accepted with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.
But what do we find that the Bible says?
Well, the Bible makes clear in second Timothy verse chapter 3,
verse 60 and seven. All Scripture is given by
inspiration of God is probable for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, for instruction and righteousness, that the man of
God may be perfect or complete, fully thoroughly furnished unto
all good works. Meaning that everything that you
need can be found in this book right here.
No pastor, there's things that go on in this world today that
can't be found in the Bible. Everything that we need for our
life can be found in precept or in principle in the word of God.
Sure, the Internet, I mentioned this a few so sure the Internet
is not found in the word of God. Gambling.
Oh, I guess gambling is found in the word of God.
Online gambling is not found in the word of God.
There's some gambling in the Word of God that gambled for
Jesus, garments, nicotine, marijuana.
Where do you find these things in the Bible?
Well, you don't find them necessarily in precept, but you
find them in principle. And so we always go to the Word
of God, that it's not the word of the pastor and the Word of
God. It's the word of God.
It's not the word of the Pope. It's not the latest tweets from
the Pope and the Word of God. It is the word of God and the
word of God alone. Now again, according to the
Catholic Church Catechism, the Roman Pontiff, the Pope when
speaking ex cathedra enjoys infallibility, meaning that when
the Pope speaks ex cathedra, he speaks without error and speaks
on behalf of God. Now, I want to be clear about
this. The Pope, as he speaks, you say,
pastor, I hear the Pope saying all kinds of things, not just
this Pope, but the other Pope's. So every time he speaks, he's
perfect. To be clear, that's not what
Catholic doctrine teaches because I know the Pope's been
in the news for comments he's made the last few weeks.
That doesn't mean that every time that he speaks, he speaks
with the words of Christ in their own doctrine.
The last time that Pope has spoken ex cathedral was actually
back in 1950, and it was in part about Mary Ology, including the
Assumption of Mary, meaning that Mary didn't die in the
traditional sense, but that she was just assumed up.
And that because she is, we'll see in just a little while,
worshipped as Christ in many ways that the last spoken ex
cathedra, the last time the ex cathedral was spoken by the Pope
was in reference to Mary Ology. Now you say, well, 1950 pastor,
that's 76 years ago. So it can't be that big of a
deal. The fact that that's even on the
table, the fact that there could even be the thought that the
Pope speaks and if he says so that it's equivalent to the
Bible ought to be enough to make a Catholic head for the hills.
Could you imagine if I got up here today and said, I know what
your Bible says, but listen to me as your pastor because what I
say is as true as the Bible and I say it and it comes from Jesus
Christ himself, from him to me, to you, that you need to leave
and I need to sell shoes for a living or insurance instead of
being a pastor because I speak with authority when I preach,
but it's not my own authority. It's the Lord through his word
to me, to you. And when I bypass that and teach
something that's on my own without it being in the word of
God, I lose my authority because my authority is found in that
which God has called me to do. But truly, where does that call
even come from? The word of God?
First, Peter chapter 5 makes that very clear what the job of
the pastors do. That's when Peter called himself
a fellow elder that that we're to be elders and and shepherds
of the flock and examples of the flock.
This is what God calls us to do. But Galatians one verse 8 says,
though we are an Angel from heaven, preach any other gospel
unto you than that which we have preached unto you.
Let him be accursed. Mark 713 making the word of God
of none effect through your tradition which you have
delivered, and many such like things, do ye?
What did the Pharisees do? Well, they had added on top of
the word of God. They had the written law, but
they'd also had the oral law. So where did that oral law came
from? The Pharisees.
They said that it was passed down from Moses through them all
the way to the people. Now here's the problem.
How were you able to find out the moral law or the oral law?
Rather well, because it wasn't written down.
The only way you could find out was to have a Pharisee teach
you. Well, how do we know if the
Pharisees teach you right? You just have to trust them.
Don't compare it to the Word of God, just listen to the
Pharisees. They'll tell you what you need
to know. Does that not sound a lot like
the Catholic Church of today? Well, where do we find the
Bible? Don't worry about it.
There's some other things that you need to know too.
Where can I find out these other things?
You can't find them anywhere else.
You can only find them through US.
Well, should I read it for myself?
Don't worry about reading it for yourself.
We'll tell you that what you need to know.
And the Catholic Church for years has discouraged people
from reading their own Bible. Why?
Because you don't need to know. The priest will tell you what
you need to know, and you follow along.
Can you see how damaging that type of doctrine is when you can
listen to a message here at Liberty Baptist Church by the
grace of God and what's my job? To do well, to preach the word
of God. And then you can go home like
the Bereans in Acts chapter 17. And you know what you can do?
You can search the scriptures for yourself to see if that
which I said is so there have been times that people have come
up to me over the years. I try to be careful in that
which I preach. I try to be very careful to to
divide rightly the word of truth.
But there have been a few times over the years that someone
said, pastor, when you said this, did you really mean this
or pastor when you said this? I think the Bible says this.
And I can tell you at least a couple times where I've had to
go through and some study on my own and say, you know what?
I'm wrong about that. And when people bring those
accusations to me, and I don't mean an accusatory manner, but
they bring that to me, it's something I take very seriously.
I don't say, well, I'm the pastor, just listen to me.
Well, who does that sound like? We got to be very careful that
we let the word of God speak. And those are things that take
seriously. And sometimes I have to study
some of those issues for a while to be able to make sure I
understand exactly what's being spoken of.
But it has to be the word of God that stands not what we believe
in and of ourselves. But it's all this tradition and
it makes things so confusing. You don't even understand how to
be able to move ahead, to move forward.
What is it to be in the faith? You know, we had this
conversation and some of you have asked and even just
recently, you know, pastor, how do I join the church?
How do I join the church? I'm so glad that the answer,
it's in your bulletin this morning.
I covered it this morning in my article for this week.
But the answer is pretty simple. We go to Acts chapter 2.
They were saved, they were baptized, they were added unto
them, which is the church. Now, is there more nuance to
that that we can explain through the word of God?
Of course. But it really just comes down to
this. You got to get saved the Bible
way, you got to get baptized the Bible way, and then you were
able to join the church. And we saw what a wonderful
picture of that last week. And to see four that were
baptized and that was awesome. I'm still thankful to the Lord
for that. But when you have tradition and
dogma and church fathers and the catechism that are all speaking
on top of the Bible, something that's exceedingly simple
becomes something very complicated.
And that's pretty much the summary of the Catholic Church
in a nutshell. Something is very simple becomes
something very complicated. So I would ask maybe this
morning to the Catholic Church, how does someone become a member
of the Catholic Church? Now, believe it or not, we're
going to need about a 6 minute video to be able to show you the
answer to that. And you say, Pastor, is it going
to be simple? You just need to watch, All
right, So why don't we go ahead and show that now and then we'll
get back to our study here in a moment.
So. How does someone become
Catholic? In this video, I'm going to give
you the full breakdown from the first practical step to your
final moment of initiation into the church.
Let's get into it. Hey guys And Father David
Michael Moses, I'm a Catholic priest and if you join these
types of videos or if you're joining the Catholic Church, you
might want to subscribe so you don't miss out on future
informative videos. So First off, I would have
thought this was obvious, but I just realized some people don't
know this. We do allow converts in the
Catholic faith. I've seen people saying, oh, I
wish I could join the Catholic Church and it's like, you
totally can. And actually not only do we
allow converts, we want converts.
Jesus said go to all the nations and baptize them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
So the church exists to bring people to communion with Jesus
Christ, who is the way, the truth and the life.
So I have no problem saying I want you to be Catholic.
I want you to have confession and the Eucharist and the
fullness of the truth. One thing I will say is that for
someone joining the Church, we want them to actually want to be
Catholic, not just to do it because other people are doing
it or because it's convenient in some way.
I hope you love the liturgy. I hope you love the Catholic
devotions. I hope you like the Church and
the people, but we really want to be united in what we believe.
So this video is more geared toward an adult who wants to
convert to Catholicism. A baby who is baptized Catholic
is a different story. So if you want to become
Catholic, the first step would be to call your local parish.
It doesn't have to be the parish closest to where you live, but
it would make sense that it is because it would probably be
where you want to go to in the future when you call the Church.
You can ask them about the OCIA program.
OCIA stands for Order of Christian Initiation for Adults.
It was just recently changed from RCIA, so you might hear
that term as well. Now you might wonder why the C
stands for Christian and not Catholic, and that's because we
believe Catholics are the original Christians.
We trace our history right back to Jesus himself.
So what is OCIA? Well, it's a gradual process
within the community of becoming Catholic and it can depend on
the specific situation, the person, the church, and what God
is doing in their life. But here's the basic outline up
front. There's basically 2 tracks.
There are catechumens who have never been baptized, and there
are candidates who have been baptized in another church.
So if you're a catechumen who hasn't been baptized, then the
ultimate end of OCIA will be Baptism, Confirmation, and 1st
Communion. One kind of cool note is that
because baptism forgives all of the sins of your life,
catechumens don't actually need to go to confession prior to
their entrance in the church, but after baptism.
Of course they would want to make a regular confession.
Because candidates have been baptized into the church, they
would go to confession ahead of time.
Then as they received into the church, they would be confirmed
and received their first communion.
The reason this works is that the Catholic Church recognizes
the baptism of other faiths as long as they did it according to
the biblical formula saying I baptize you in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
If you aren't sure, they will help you figure out in the OCA
program. Funny story, my dad was actually
a convert to the faith from the Lutheran Church and he said when
he made his first confession, he was convinced the priest was
going to tell him at the end. Rex, I appreciate that you want
to join the Catholic Church, but with all your sins, we just
can't have you here. To his surprise, instead the
priest just forgave him. So don't be afraid of your first
confession. So the first phase of OCIA is
the inquiry phase or the pre catechumenate phase where you're
getting acquainted with the church teachings and the
community. This is a really great time to
be asking questions, getting more information, exploring,
learning. There isn't a set time for how
long this takes, so people can really move at their own pace
while having the support of the community.
I promise we're not offended by questions at this stage.
We want to get you the right answers.
We could say this is a time to meet Christ, to get to know Him,
to learn who He is. If I could take it back to the
time of Christ, this phase would be kind of like being someone in
the town who's hearing about what Jesus is doing and wants to
get to know Him better. At the end of this phase, you
have the right of acceptance when you're formally accepted
into the process. The next phase is called the
catechumenate phase, which is a period of formation where
candidates and catechumens break open the word being proclaimed.
At this stage, you're usually meeting for weekly classes to
learn more about why the Church teaches, what it does, to go
deeper into what prayer is, to learn more about the sacraments,
the Catholic devotions. These meetings will have talks,
discussions, small group time, and fellowship as you learn more
about the faith. This is also a time to better
understand Scripture, so people in this stage will often go to
Mass and stay while the Scriptures are being proclaimed,
which we call the Liturgy of the Word.
Then, before the Liturgy of the Eucharist and Communion time,
they will often be dismissed to go off by themselves to go
deeper into the Word of God. At my parish, we do both of
these back-to-back. Participants go to Mass for the
Liturgy of the Word, then they are dismissed for a time of
discussion. Then they go for their weekly
meeting where they go deeper into elements of the faith.
This is a time to follow Christ. It's like the moment when the
apostle were called by Jesus to be his disciples.
They didn't have it all figured out.
There was a lot for them to learn, but they were locked in
on following Christ. Around this time you will
probably get settled on who your sponsor is.
This is basically a Catholic whose faith you admire, who can
be a companion and an example and an encouragement to you in
the faith. They can be there during the
initiation process, but they're especially helpful afterwards.
You really want someone who isn't afraid to challenge you to
stay on track. This phase concludes with the
Right of sending, which is performed by the local Bishop.
Next, you have the Purification and Enlightenment stage.
This often happens during the season of Lent.
It's a time of continued reflection and deep prayer.
Part of this stage is public ceremonies called the
scrutinies. Now I know that word scrutiny
sounds kind of intense, but we don't need it in the sense that
anyone is judging you. Instead, we're scrutinizing
ourselves for places where we've been wounded and asking for
God's healing. Part of the scrutinies is a
minor exorcism, which is a casting out of any evil
influence over you. This should actually be a
consolation for all of us that no matter what your history is
like or what baggage you have, the church has a system for
setting you free. At this stage you're referred to
as the elect because you're responding to God's call in a
concrete way. This phase concludes with the
rites of initiation, which is probably what you've been
looking forward to. Usually these happen at the
Easter Vigil, which is a long mass that happens the night of
Easter. The whole church gathers
together, we hear the readings, basically the whole story of
salvation and that we celebrate together the resurrection, Jesus
coming back to life, which is fitting because each person in
the church is being brought back to life spiritually through the
sacraments. This is when those entering the
church are baptized, confirmed, and received their first
Eucharist. It's a really, really exciting
night. Just super, super joyful as the
community welcomes in our new members.
At this point, you're a Catholic.
You are part of the family. This puts you in the final phase
called Mr. Goji, which is a Greek word meaning to lead
through the mysteries. It's basically a kind of
continuing formation. It's like after you get married,
you don't just stop learning about your spouse.
In fact, you're maybe more excited than ever to discover
more and more about who they are.
At this point, you're referred to as a neophyte, which is
basically just means someone who's new.
This is also a time when you're now being sent on mission
yourself. You've become a follower of
Christ, now you need to help others become followers as well.
You might be wondering, how long does all of this take?
So there isn't a set time, but on average it usually goes about
a year. It could take two years or more
if needed, or less time if there are extenuating circumstances.
So there's the basic structure. If you are feeling drawn to the
Catholic faith, please, please act on it.
Call a church, get involved and make it happen.
The Catholic faith is such a beautiful gift and I absolutely
believe it is the best way to encounter Christ and to become
the person He has called you to be.
Let me know what other topics you guys think might be helpful
and we will see you in the next one.
God bless. Saved, baptized, added unto them
or that. Now the production value of that
video was excellent, except for that one video for that one
little clip where the guy had that huge bouquet of flowers
behind it. That was like that was a huge
bouquet of flowers. That was a that that got me
every time I watched it. But you, you see that and you
go, that's so confusing. None of that was found in
scripture. On top of the fact that how does
someone come to be saved nowhere.
Do you see any information on that?
There's a reason for that. And we'll get to that probably
next week. But there was one phrase that I
want you to really focus in on. And I, I, I, it's the third time
I've watched that, but I just, I, I want to write it down
because I, it just really stuck out to me this last viewing.
The church has a system that will set you free.
That one phrase that he said, the church has a system.
That's after he talked about the mini exorcism.
The church has a system that will set you free.
What's so important for you to understand about the Catholic
Church is they believe that they are the very gatekeepers of the
faith. That there is no coming to the
faith without going through the Catholic Church to get to
Christ. The difference between that and
the Bible is this, that Christ is the one who will set you
free. Not that the church has a
program that will set you free. Christ will set you free.
He who is free is free. Indeed, the Word of God says the
Baptist Church is not the gatekeeper of salvation through
Jesus Christ. We are simply what I believe is
The Proclaimers of what the Word of God says about Christ.
But being a Baptist will not get you to heaven.
Now the Catholic Church will say being a Catholic won't get you
to heaven. But yet again, if it talks over
the walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, as I say, if
it talks like a duck, that'd be a talking duck.
But it is a duck. And there's so many things of
which the Catholic friends that we have would say we don't
believe that. Or maybe the Catholic priest
says, well, that's not what we believe.
But yet, if you follow the logical progression of the
teachings, you will find that that's absolutely what they
believe in practice, even if it's not what they think that
they believe in their day-to-day life.
So really, we ask ourselves this question, and this is probably
where we will focus and, and end here today.
And what doctrines do the Catholics hold beliefs that
differ from the Bible? We'll cover just one this
morning and we'll get into more of them, including the
Sacramento system next week. But the first is this salvation?
Is it by faith alone or faith plus works?
Is salvation by faith alone or is it faith plus works?
This is the most critical doctrinal divide between Rome
and the Bible. This is what the Catholic Church
teaches. The Catechism of the Catholic
Church #1129 says the Church affirms that for believers, the
sacraments of the New Covenant are necessary for salvation to
be saved. They affirm that the sacraments
of the covenant are necessary for salvation.
The Catholic Church believes there are 7 sacraments.
You ever wondered why, if someone is close to passing away
in the Catholic Church, why they call for the priest?
Maybe you've heard that before. We got a call for the priest.
Why? One of the sacraments is the
last rites, and that is a giving of grace to the one who is
passing away. If the priest is not called and
they're going to miss the grace that they need because they have
no real hope of eternal life. They have a hope so salvation,
but they don't have the hope of salvation.
Any Catholic you talk to and you ask them, are you going to
heaven? If they're being honest about
what they believed, and they usually are, they'll say this.
I sure hope so. I, I hope I'm going and you go
to a Catholic funeral, a funeral mass.
What do you see? That there are prayers being
offered, that they hope that this one will be able to go to
eternal salvation and eternal life.
To them, justification is an ongoing process initiated by
baptism, maintained by the sacraments, acts of penance, and
their own cooperation with grace.
Now this is important. The Council of Trent, which was
spoken in 1547, says this. If anyone saith that by faith
alone the impious is justified, let him be anathema.
They say, what is this in reference to?
It would be the Protestant Reformation.
The fact that there were those who were saying that it was the
Scriptures alone, Sola scriptura was the call the Protestant
Reformation. And certainly there would be
disagreements I would have with the Protestant Reformation being
a Bible believing Baptist. We're not Protestants.
We never came from Rome. And I think it's important you
understand this morning people say, well, if you're a Baptist,
you're a Protestant. My answer is no, I'm just a
Baptist. Protestants were protesting Rome
and separated from Rome as Baptist.
We've never identified with Rome anytime in history.
In fact, often times very much persecuted by Rome, whether
Baptist or our Baptist forefathers in different groups
that came before, you know, identified with Rome.
We never protested being part of Rome and so we are simply Bible
believing Baptist. But in reference to the calls of
Sola Scriptura in reference to salvation by grace through
faith, they said in the Council of Trent, if anyone saith that
by faith alone the impious is justified, let him be anathema
meaning this let him be cursed. Now understand the implications
of this this morning. The Catholic Church has taught
that anyone who is outside of the Catholic Church that teaches
salvation by grace through faith that they are not saved and they
will spend an eternity in hell. Now again, there will be
Catholics that will have their hair on fire and say we don't
believe that the Council of Trent is still in force today.
The Catholic Church has had multiple opportunities to
overturn the Council of Trent. They've talked around the
Council of Trent. They've made dialogue about the
Council Trent. I would encourage you to look
this up on your own, from reliable sources, both from the
Catholic Church itself and from others.
And it's quite clear that the Council of Trent is still in
force today, meaning that the clear teaching of the Catholic
churches, unless you are anything but a Catholic, you
will not go to heaven. You said, why is it important
that we know that? You need to know where the lines
are drawn. You need to know where they are.
Now, again, many of your Catholic friends don't know
this, don't understand this, and certainly it's very likely not
being taught in their local parish.
But just because they don't know it, and just because it's not
being taught doesn't mean that that's what the hierarchy of the
Catholic Church stands for. And that is their clear belief
that if you believe that you're saved by faith, that you're
accursed and you're outside of the faith.
Now Needless to say, that's not what the Bible teaches.
The Bible teaches it's not by our works of righteousness.
It's not by that of which we do. Let me just give you a sampling.
Romans 328 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith
without the deeds of the law. That ought to solve it right
there. Romans 4, verses four and five.
Now to him that worketh is the reward, not reckoned of grace,
but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but
believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, His faith is
counted for righteousness. If you have to work for it, then
you are the one that has paid the debt.
There's no grace involved. Ephesians 289.
Probably the most quotable of all these verses.
For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of
yourself. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast.
I don't know how a Catholic gets around those two verses.
And I think the answer is when it's not just scripture but also
tradition, that it really doesn't matter what the
Scriptures say. It really matters what the
interpretation of man of the scriptures say.
What do we say? Let the Scriptures speak.
The purpose of Bible preaching is this, to find the true
context of the Word of God, to make sure we're preaching it
straight and true as it is. So you know what the Word of God
is. The purpose of the Catholic
Church is. Let's explain what we want the
Bible to mean. And you need to believe our
explanations even more than you believe the Bible.
It's a damnable heresy. And so where do we consider
Catholics? Is it a world religion?
Is it a cult? And we'll look at this more next
week. But the answer is I don't know.
I don't know. But I don't know that I need to
categorize it as one or the other.
Here's what I know. It's error.
And those who believe it truly follow it are not saved.
Now, there are some people that have attended Catholic churches
that don't believe what the Catholics say about salvation
and believe what the Bible says. And again, it's not about where
you go to church, it's about the fact that you believe the
gospel. Do I understand all of that?
Why would you attend the Catholic Church and not believe
with the Catholic Church? I don't know.
But I do know this, that again, we don't get our cards checked
of what denomination we were when we get to heaven.
And that's just the Baptist to get in.
It's really about this. It's about do you believe the
gospel message? And so I'm not here to tell you
that every single one of your friends who have ever attended a
Catholic Church are going straight to hell.
That's that's not my call to make.
I thank the Lord is not my call to make that Christ is the
righteous judge. But I will say this, if they are
to believe everything that the Catholic Church teaches, it is
not a doctrine that will send anyone to heaven.
And this ought to burden us about our Catholic friends, our
Catholic neighbors, maybe even your Catholic family.
Now, the good news is you probably have some that you're
close to that are Catholics, but it's just because their family
was before them, they don't really have a lot of regard for
the Catholic Church. They may even have some disdain
for the Catholic Church because of the abuses that have taken
place and have been uncovered in the last several years, which,
by the way, go back generations and generations.
My goal today is not to try to mock those who believe in
Catholicism. My goal today and in the next
couple weeks is not to try to to talk down to them, but rather to
plead with them. What does the Bible say?
Believe the Bible. Do not trust the word of man,
Trust the word of God. Thank you for listening to the
sermon from the pulpit of Liberty Baptist Church.
If this message was a blessing to you, or if there's any way we
can serve you, please let us know by contacting us at
info@mylibertybaptist.org. Or you can visit us this Sunday
at 800 Washington St. in Easton, MA.
May the Lord bless you as you grow in His Word.