Prayer Meeting 1/4/25

The Great Stumbling Block To Devotion - Part 3

(Thomas Brooks)

Watch the Full Sermon HERE.

Well tonight I want to conclude with this three part teaching drawing from volume five of the works of the wonderful 17th century Cambridge puritan Thomas Brooks.

We have called these teachings ‘The Great Stumbling Block To Devotion’. However, at first glance, as we enter into the final part, it seems that title isn’t fitting, but as I studied for this final part, the more it became totally fitting. Although the title doesn’t really give us insight into the subject from the outset.

Brooks has a different title for this 216 page work. The main title is: ‘The Golden Key To Open Hidden Treasures’. And the more I have studied it, the more wonderfully fitting that title is. The subheading he calls ‘Serious And Weighty Questions Clearly And Satisfactorily Answered’.

We have broken this 216 page work into three sessions. Brooks does too, but at much more length, were he asks three different questions.

The first being:

What are the special remedies, means and helps against cherishing or keeping up any special or peculiar sin, either in heart or in life, against the Lord or against the light of conviction of a man’s own conscience?

An absolute vital question to ask ourselves. Basically the question is this: What are you actually doing to stop justifying sin in your life?

The second question which we covered last time was:

What is that faith that gives a man an interest in Christ, and in all those blessed benefits and favours that come by Christ?

So in a nutshell; what makes a man live for Christ? Where does that faith come from?

Tonight I come to the final serious question and the Brooks’ answer. And it’s a whopper of a question. Maybe one you have asked, and wanted to know the answer to. However, remember Brooks’ main title, which is: ‘The Golden Key To Open Up Hidden Treasures.’ And my much lesser quality one of: ‘The Great Stumbling Block To Devotion.’ (On second thoughts I think they complement each other quite well.)

Here is the third question:

Whether on the great day of the Lord, the day, of general judgement, or in particular judgement that will pass upon every soul immediately after death, which is the stating of the soul in an eternal estate or condition, either happiness or misery, whether the sins of the saints, the follies and vanities of believers, the infirmities and enormities of sincere Christians shall be brought into the judgement of discussion and discovery or not? Whether the Lord will either in the great day of account in man’s particular day of account or judgement, publicly manifest, proclaim and make mention of the sins of his people or not?

That is the question. Do you want me to put it in layman’s terms?

When Christ returns, what account will we give? What sins will the Almighty reveal? What will He tell the world? What will He share about us and our sins, and lack, and actions? How much detail will He go to, what will He reveal to all about us?

Will He reveal even what we can’t remember? Will it all come flooding back? Will all hear the judgement and know our deepest darkest actions?

Will all our fakeness, all our lies, all our thoughts and emotions, be paraded in front of us? Will all be there to hear of our folly, and our weaknesses, and sins of the past?

How many will be mentioned? Will they all be brought to light, even the ones we were not even aware were sins? Will broken promises be brought up? What detail will that day of judgement bring?

What if you can’t remember them all? What if your confession is weak? Will it be a confession? Who will hear it? How loud will it cry out?

Have you ever thought about that day?

Do you think and hope it will be a case of ‘well done good and faithful servant’. Or do you think ‘oh no, I’ve got way too much baggage, I have a lot of skeletons’.

Brooks in this work spends 61 pages answering the first two questions. He spends the next 200 answering this one.

Let me read the prayer for tonight, which is from the ‘Valley Of Vision’ page 48-49, or page 27 in the paperback, and is entitled ‘The Second Coming’:

O SON OF GOD AND SON OF MAN, Thou wast incarnate, didst suffer, rise, ascend for my sake; Thy departure was not a token of separation but a pledge of return; Thy Word, promises, sacraments, show thy death until thou come again. That day is no horror to me, for thy death has redeemed me, thy Spirit fills me, thy love animates me, thy Word governs me. I have trusted thee and thou hast not betrayed my trust; waited for thee, and not waited in vain. Thou wilt come to raise my body from the dust, and re-unite it to my soul, by a wonderful work of infinite power and love, greater than that which bounds the oceans’ waters, ebbs and flows the tides, keeps the stars in their courses, and gives life to all creatures. This corruptible shall put on incorruption, this mortal, immortality, this natural body, a spiritual body, this dishonoured body, a glorious body, this weak body, a body of power. I triumph now in thy promises as I shall do in their performance, for the head cannot live if the members are dead; Beyond the grave is resurrection, judgment, acquittal, dominion. Every event and circumstance of my life will be dealt with— the sins of my youth, my secret sins, the sins of abusing thee, of disobeying thy Word, the sins of neglecting ministers’ admonitions, the sins of violating my conscience— all will be judged; And after judgment, peace and rest, life and service, employment and enjoyment, for thine elect. O God, keep me in this faith, and ever looking for Christ’s return. 

Okay you know I can’t go deep into two hundred pages in the time we have left. So I hope to get at least for us to grasp the answer, and to grasp the answers. And I will say this, at times I’m answering from two answers given, and in the meantime trying to boil it down to the crux of the matter.

It’s not that Brooks doesn’t say it amazingly, he does, it’s just that each answer is quite wordy. However, I don’t want to shrink the impact of this great man’s gift, at the same time.

Answer One:

First our Lord Jesus Christ, in his judicial proceedings in the last day, which is set down clearly and largely in Matthew 25:34-42 doth only enumerate the good works they have done, but take not the least notice of the spots and blemishes, of the infirmities or enormities of the weakness or wickedness of his people.

In a nutshell all of God’s people who are saved, will be judged on the good they have done - not their failings.

Let me read Matthew 25:34-42

“Then the king will say to those on his right hand, ‘come, you blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave me food; I was thirsty and you gave me drink; I was a stranger and you took me in; I was naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you visited me; I was in prison and you came to me.’ “then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and take you in, or naked and clothe you? Or when did we see you sick, or in prison, and come to you?’ and the king will answer and say to them, ‘assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.’ “then he will also say to those on the left hand, ‘depart from me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels: for I was hungry and you gave me no food; I was thirsty and you gave me no drink;”

Think of this brothers and sisters, we have been imputed His righteousness. We have been washed white as snow.

Brooks writes:

You know that scarlet and crimson are double dyed and it will be as if that wool was never dyed at all, but as white as snow.

Issiah 1:18

“Come now, and let us reason together,” says the Lord, “though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”

Do you think Jesus stands as a wounded man on that day, and starts to pull out the nails, and the blood goes from His body onto ours, and we then go through the sin process and the shame process?

Do you think it’s now our turn to get the punishment He took for us?

No dear brothers, not us, but rather those that didn’t know Him, that are not washed - they will get the judgement without the grace.

Answer Two:

Surely Jesus Christ, the saint’s paymaster, who hath discharged their whole debt at once, who has paid down upon the nail, the ten thousand talents which we owed and nailed it to the cross.

To paraphrase — Christ is not coming back for some back pay.

Brooks adds:

He will never mention the sins of his people he will never charge the sins of his people upon them.

Answer Three:

On that great day the works of the saints will follow them into heaven.

That’s what we will be judged on, not our sins, but our works for the Lord. Hence why Pauls says:

2 Timothy 4:6-8

For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved his appearing.

Did Paul (aka Saul), do a lot of wicked things we have never heard about, that are not recorded? Yes. What did Paul say:

Romans 7:19-25

For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

Would Paul be saying he looks forward to the crown if he knew he was going to get all his sins from the past and all his actions exposed? No he would not.

Which brings me to the last point…

Lastly - This is what the Lord will reveal on that great day, to the world about all His believers - Brooks writes:

In that great day, all the works of the saints shall follow them into heaven, and on that great day the evil works of the wicked shall hunt and pursue them into hell.

You are not as a saint, as a chosen vessel, as an elect and son and daughter, going to be shamed in front of the world who hate God.

All your good deeds will be exposed, not for your glory, but for Him that lives in your glory. The judgement you will receive, is according to your good works.

Brooks writes:

And on that great day, the Lord will make mention to the ears of the whole world. Of every prayer you ever prayed, every sermon you preached and heard, of every tear you shed, of every fast you endured, of every sigh and groan that you ever had, of all the good works, that you ever did or spoke, and all the great things you suffered.

Do you think God will allow His elect to stand trial in front of the wicked? No, no, they will not. They will receive a crown for their deeds.

Listen to Psalm 1 -

Psalm 1 :1-6 (NASB)

How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but they are like chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.

I will close with this from a true father of the faith today Sinclair Ferguson. I heard him say this, and it’s jaw dropping.

He says:

I would say, especially to a Christian who is nervous and fearful about the final assessment, that we should always remember that just as our justification is by grace, that assessment will also be by grace. And if there’s any moment of embarrassment I envisage, I think I might be inclined to say “Lord if I had really understood this, I would have wanted to serve you better.

Isn’t the title fitting?  - ‘The Great Stumbling Block To Devotion’.

Or Brooks title ‘The Golden Key To Open Hidden Treasures’.

Amen.