What Will Remain?
The sermon emphasizes the importance of having a faith that stands the fiery trial of life, and the merciful nature of God's judgment to purify and refine his people.
J.C. Philpot preaches about the refining fire that tests every man's work, not just as God's wrath in the last day, but also as the fiery trials experienced in this life. These trials, sent by God through afflictions and temptations, burn up the superficial and reveal the genuineness of one's faith. The fiery trial exposes the inadequacy of worldly refuges and highlights the enduring nature of God's work in the soul, like gold refined in a furnace.
Text
"The fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is."- 1Co 3:13
The fire which is to prove every man's work of what sort it is, is not merely God's wrath as manifested at the last day; but his fire as significative of the fiery trial which takes place in this life, and which God mercifully brings upon his people to burn up their wood, hay and stubble. Now it is an inestimable mercy to have all this combustible material burnt up before we come to a death-bed. Fiery trials, such as God sends through afflictions, temptations, distressing feelings, and painful soul exercises, will burn up the wood, hay and stubble which any of his saints may have gathered up as a superstructure. Guilt pressing upon a man's conscience, the terrors of the Almighty in a fiery law, his arrows deeply fixed in the breast and drying up the spirit, fears of death, hell, and judgment, and the terrible consequences of dying under the wrath of God, all these are a part of the fiery trial which burns up the wood, hay, and stubble heaped by Babel builders on the foundation. All sink into black ashes before this fire, which proves what they are, and what a vain refuge they afford in the day of trouble.
What then stands the fiery trial? God's work upon the soul, the faith that he implants by his own Spirit. It may be weak; it may be tried; it may seem at times scarcely to exist; and yet being of God, it stands every storm, and lives at last. A good hope through grace, a hope of God's own communicating and maintaining, -like a well-tried anchor, this will stand the storm; like gold and silver, this will bear the hottest furnace; lose its dross, but not lose the pure material, but be refined, purified, and manifested all the more as genuine metal. So, too, these "precious stones" 1Co 3:12, these heavenly visits, sweet manifestations, blessed promises, comforting discoveries, and gracious revelations of the Son of God, with the whispers of his dying, bleeding love, -these heavenly jewels can never be lost and never be burnt up. They may be tried, and that keenly and sharply, but being of God's gift and operation, they are essentially indestructible.
Sermon Outline
- I. The Fire of God's Judgment
- A. A trial to prove every man's work
- B. Not just wrath, but a merciful trial to purify
- II. The Nature of the Fire
- A. A burning of wood, hay, and stubble
- B. Guilt, fear, and distressing feelings
- III. What Stands the Fire
- A. God's work upon the soul
- B. Faith implanted by the Holy Spirit
- C. A good hope through grace
Key Quotes
“The fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.” — J.C. Philpot
“A good hope through grace, a hope of God's own communicating and maintaining, -like a well-tried anchor, this will stand the storm; like gold and silver, this will bear the hottest furnace;” — J.C. Philpot
Application Points
- We should be grateful for the merciful trials that God sends upon us to purify and refine us.
- Our faith should be rooted in the hope of God's communicating and maintaining grace.
- We should hold onto the precious stones of heavenly visits, sweet manifestations, and gracious revelations of the Son of God.