Let Them Alone

Let Them Alone

Matthew 15:14

Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.

The words of the title were the words of Christ referring to the religious leaders of His day, the scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 15:1). The disciples of Christ were concerned that our Lord Jesus had offended these elders because He said to them: “Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias (Isaiah) prophesy of you, saying, This people draw nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” (Matthew 15:7-9). Our Lord Jesus explained to His disciples: “Every plant, that my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” (Matthew 15:13). In these words our Lord informed His disciples that these scribes and Pharisees were not: “trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD,” (Isaiah 61:3) but, that they were tares, and therefore would, in their time, be rooted up. (Matthew 13:36-43). The Lord Jesus by this counsel taught His disciples and every one of His people of all ages the will of God: in that He said, “Let them alone”: for it is the work of God to search out His sheep; as it is written: “For thus saith the LORD God; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.” (Ezekiel 34:11-12).

These men, the scribes and Pharisees, were not “children of the covenant” (Act 3:25), they were not “children of the promise” (Galatians 4:28) for God’s promise, is to the children of the promise, that is, His elected people, those whom He chose in Christ before the foundation of the world, (Ephesians 1:4); and predestinated unto the adoption of children (Ephesians 1:5). Those scribes and Pharisees demonstrated that they were children of the devil: as it is written: “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar and the father of it. And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. (John 8:44-45). The disciples therefore were instructed to “Let them alone” these religious men were dead in trespasses and in sins (Ephesians 2:1) as all men are by nature; and they will remain in that condition to all eternity unless the Spirit of life from God will come unto them and make them alive (Ezekiel 37:5; John 5:21): for, the Son quickeneth, that is, makes to live, or makes alive, whom He will.

All and every one of the children of the covenant of grace will infallibly be found of God the Holy Ghost, and will be given life; of the life that is in Christ Jesus. For Christ Jesus said “I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.” (John 10:28-29). Those who hear the gospel and are made able to believe by the gift of life that is in Christ Jesus entering into them make manifest their election of God (John 5:24; I John 5:11; Colossians 3:4; Ephesians 1:3). Those who are never concerned about the gospel, the glory of God, or the life beyond this perceptible world, show themselves to be the seed of the serpent (Genesis 3:15). Those who are continually hostile to the things of God and are given up to our natural aversion of the gospel, have no part in the covenant of grace, they will not be sought out of the Holy Ghost and be convinced of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, (John 16:8-11) for it is His work, it belongs to His office in the covenant, to arrest and apprehend the children of the covenant (Philippians 3:12), He will “bring them into the bond of the covenant” experientially (Ezekiel 20:37) by giving them new life, a new heart of faith, and a new spirit of delight in the things of God: for, their new life is in Christ Jesus.

There are a great many today who are of the spirit of the Pharisees, which is the spirit of antichrist: for they deny the essentials of the doctrine of Christ (II John 1:9-11). Our Lord Jesus commanded His disciples: “Go ye therefore, and teach all  nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. A-men.” (Matthew 28:19-20). Baptism is to be administered in the name of the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity because of the united love and participation of each Person in the salvation of the elect. Each of the three persons of the Godhead is active in the salvation of the children of God, the Father chose the objects of His everlasting love and named them in the covenant of grace before the foundation of the world in Christ ( Ephesians 1:4; Hebrews 12:23), God the Son redeemed those the Father had chosen with His own precious blood (I Peter 1:18-19), and God the Holy Ghost calls the chosen and  redeemed children of the everlasting covenant by His infinite power “which effectually worketh also in you that believe.” (I Thessalonians 2:4-5; 13).

Our modern Pharisees deny the work of the Father for they deny the thing the Father did, they deny His election of grace. They deny that The Father chose some to everlasting life, and did not choose others. The Preachers of our day, know the word of election is in the Bible, they cannot deny that truth, and so they pervert the truth to say that God knew who would believe and because of that, He chose those persons to eternal life. But; again this is a perversion of the word of God: “A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.” (Galatians 5:9) That is, one false precept must be supported by another until nothing is left of the truth. Those who the Father chose to eternal life “MUST be saved” (Acts 4:12; Matthew 1:21; John 6:37) for the covenant is sealed by the precious blood of Christ (Hebrews13:20) therefore the terms of the covenant must be met (Genesis 6:18; 9:11; 17:7, 19,21; Ezekiel 16:60, 62) and certain it is that it shall be; for “and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:”(Hebrews 8:10).

Redemption by the blood of Christ is also denied by this generation of preachers and parishioners, according to most modern preachers Christ actually redeemed no one until the sinner makes his blood effectual to the redemption of his soul by the sinner’s choice. The truth is that Christ redeemed all the church of all ages by one offering, (Hebrews 10:10, 14; Zechariah 3:9). If Christ died for all men and every man, then all men must be saved, for Christ died to put away the sin of His people, so that if He died for all men, then no one has sin that was not put away by the death of Christ; consequently all men must be saved, which things are contrary to scripture and to the experience of the rich man who refused Lazarus help (Luke 16:24), and is now in hell. And if Christ died for all men and put away the sin of all men, then the sin of unbelief can make no one guilty; for by himself he purged our sins, not us from our sins, but our sins (Hebrews 1:3; Isaiah 1:18), if in this verse the word our refers to human kind collectively, and not to the election of grace distinctively, then all men must be saved: which is again, contrary to the scriptures. Christ Jesus bought the church of God with His own blood, as said the Apostle Paul: “For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.” (I Corinthians 6:20). Christ Jesus bought His church: that is, the whole and entire “remnant according to the election of grace” (Romans 11:5), and none else, He gave himself a ransom for the many, as many as the Father has given Him (John 17:2); and as many as are ordained to eternal life (Acts 13:48). Christ Jesus is the good shepherd that gave His life for His sheep (John 10:11) and there are many who are not His sheep (John10:26).

The effectual call of the Holy Ghost is denied by this generation, for today preachers say that the call may be overcome, resisted, and not obeyed, preachers of our day deny the effectual nature of the call to salvation. But the psalmist has said: “As soon as they hear of me, they shall obey me: the strangers shall submit themselves unto me.” (Psalm 18:44). And again it is written: “Strangers shall submit themselves unto me: as soon as they hear, they shall be obedient unto me.” (II Samuel 22:45). And our Lord Jesus Christ has said: “It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” (John 6:63). To whom the Lord Jesus will, He speaks the word of life: (Philippians 2:16, see I John 1:1) and so speaking by His Spirit He gives eternal life (John 10:28). To this may be added the words of the Apostle Paul to Timothy “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me His prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God; who hath saved us, and have called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,” (II Timothy 1:8-9). Notice reader: It is God who has saved us, and when? Before the foundation of the world by choosing us in Christ Jesus, the Father gave us to the Son before the worlds were made, and accepted us in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1:4, 6). In the purpose of God, and according to His determinate counsel, Christ Jesus was slain before the foundation of the world and then actually at Calvary (Acts 2:23; Isaiah 53:10: Revelation 13:8), but why? To justify His people from all things (Acts 13:39) So that God “might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.” (Romans 3:26). The work of salvation is a finished work, and finished by Jesus Christ alone. (John 17:4). Repentance and faith are characters of the living, those to whom the Lord Jesus has given eternal life: the spiritually dead cannot exhibit characteristics of life. Therefore “Let them alone” until such time as the Lord of life and glory may, according to His will, grant them life, who are heirs according to the everlasting covenant of grace. 

AJ Ison

See the writers blog at www.hebrews915.blogspot.com hear the true gospel of the free and sovereign grace of God in Christ Jesus preached at www.13thstbaptist.org webcasting live at listed service times.