Cited in sermons
Cornelius Van Til
12 sermons · All people cited
The Persistent Problem of Idolatry
Romans 1:18–32 sets the universal guilt of mankind before any presentation of the gospel, and this exposition argues that the root of all social and moral disorder is not first a behavioral problem but a theological one: the suppression of God's self-revelation and the exchange of His glory for creature-worship. Paul's descent from ungodliness to unrighteousness maps directly onto contemporary culture, and the three divine abandonments of verse 24, 26, and 28 are read not as future threat but as present judicial reality. Believers are called to recognize idolatry as a persistent personal danger — of theology, innovation, utilitarianism, Mammon, and self — and to find the only antidote in the cross of Christ.
The Warning Concerning Perilous Times
Paul's warning in 2 Timothy 3:1–9 locates 'perilous times' not in some distant future crisis but in the present age — the entire span between Christ's first and second advents — and identifies the danger as false teachers operating within the visible church. The sermon works through four considerations: the need to recognise the danger, a detailed description of apostate character (seventeen vices rooted in self-love), the command to avoid such men, and an encouragement that their folly will ultimately be exposed. Pastors and church members alike are called to combine sound doctrinal knowledge with the discernment and resolve to identify and turn away from heresy, trusting that Christ is building his church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
The Conduct of God's Servant
Second Timothy 2:20–26 confronts the reality that the visible church always contains both honorable and dishonorable vessels, and calls God's servant to respond not with contentious disputation but with flight from youthful lusts, pursuit of righteousness, and gentle correction of those in error. Paul's metaphor of vessels in a great house is applied to Timothy's pastoral conduct: cleansing oneself from the influence of false teachers issues in sanctification and fitness for the Master's use. The closing verses ground the servant's patient, humble engagement in the doctrine of repentance as a sovereign gift of God — not merely a failure of argument or evidence, but a work of divine grace that alone restores men from the devil's snare to rational, truth-knowing life.
The Objection to the Divine Plan
Peter's rebuke of Christ in Matthew 16:22 is not merely a disciple's well-intentioned blunder — it is an alignment with the adversarial agenda that Jesus had already confronted in the wilderness temptation of Matthew 4. This sermon expounds the divine necessity of Christ's suffering and death as grounded in the eternal Covenant of Redemption, and presses the point that to object to a suffering Messiah is to object to the only ground of sinners' salvation. The response to Peter — 'Get behind me, Satan' — exposes the disease-at-the-heart nature of any theology that removes the cross from Christianity's center, and the sermon closes by pressing listeners either to embrace the crucified Christ or to reckon with the inescapable judgment of that same Christ.
The Lord's Prayer, Part 4
Matthew 6:10 — 'Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven' — is not a passive resignation but a twofold petition: that God's people would actively obey His revealed, preceptive will as disclosed in Scripture, and that they would submit patiently to His secret, decretive will even when it brings hardship and trial. The study distinguishes the decretive will (God's eternal, all-encompassing decree, which cannot be altered) from the preceptive will (the commandments and precepts God requires of His creatures), drawing on the Westminster Larger Catechism, John Owen, Thomas Watson, and Thomas Manton. Four practical applications follow for the individual — recognizing God's right to command, knowing His revealed will, obeying it, and submitting patiently to His providential ordering — together with applications for the church and for society.
The Fact of the Resurrection
John 20:1–23 presents three convergent lines of evidence for the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ: the empty tomb witnessed by Peter and John, the personal appearance to Mary Magdalene, and the appearance to the assembled disciples. The sermon examines each episode as a first-hand historical account, noting the specific details — the folded grave clothes, the testimony of a woman, the skepticism of the disciples — that authenticate rather than undermine the record. Running throughout is an apologetic case against the mass-hallucination and grave-robber theories, grounded in the nature, variety, and consequences of the post-resurrection appearances. The resurrection is shown to be the Father's public vindication of the Son's substitutionary work, and hearers are called to trust the living Christ whose empty tomb guarantees both judgment for unbelievers and justification for all who believe.
The Descent into Idolatry
Romans 1:18–32 presents the universal condemnation of mankind, tracing the descent from the suppression of general revelation into full-blown idolatry and its attendant vices. The wrath of God is not an incidental doctrine but the necessary backdrop to the gospel: ungodliness precedes unrighteousness, and when God is rejected, judicial abandonment follows — God gives men over to the very sin they have chosen. Idolatry is not merely an ancient phenomenon but the root of every vice list Paul enumerates, and contemporary idols of false religion, mammon, and self demand the same vigilance the Apostle John commands: 'Little children, keep yourselves from idols.' The only antidote to idolatry is the gospel, in which the righteousness God demands is also the righteousness He supplies through faith in Jesus Christ alone.
The Fallen King and the Grace of God
David's catastrophic fall into adultery and premeditated murder in 2 Samuel 11–12 is the lens through which this sermon examines the nature of sin, its inevitable exposure before a holy God, and the sovereign grace that pursues and pardons even the most heinous transgressor. Working through four observations — the sin itself, the attempted cover-up, the divine verdict, and the Lord's response through Nathan — the exposition magnifies not David but Christ, the only King without blemish, whose finished work is the sole ground of forgiveness. The confession 'I have sinned against the Lord' and Nathan's immediate declaration 'the Lord has put away your sin' together demonstrate that intensity of repentance contributes nothing to atonement; pardon rests wholly on grace. Listeners are called to see themselves in David's cover-up, to abandon every attempt to hide transgression, and to come to Christ whose death is the only reason any sin can be put away.
The Law of Love
Matthew 5:43–48 contains the sixth and final antithesis of the Sermon on the Mount, in which Christ corrects the Pharisaic addition 'hate your enemy' — a phrase found nowhere in Scripture — and restores the full demand of the moral law: love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute you. Christ is not introducing new legislation but faithfully expounding the eternal righteousness of the Father, whose law always required love even toward enemies, as texts from Exodus, Leviticus, Proverbs, and Job demonstrate. The sermon traces the contrast between true law and scribal distortion, the three positive duties of love, the theological ground of sonship in reflecting the Father's common grace, and the summary call to perfection — which ultimately drives the believer to the cross and to the imputed righteousness of Christ who alone satisfied these demands perfectly. Kingdom citizens are not bare-minimum disciples but are called, by the Spirit's enabling, to embody an ethic that distinguishes them entirely from tax collectors and pagans.
The Apostle's Fear for the Galatians
Paul's alarm over the Galatian churches' drift toward the Judaizers' doctrine serves as the occasion for examining three realities: the degradation of man's former state apart from God, the divine initiative that constitutes saving knowledge, and the spiritual equivalence of all false religion — whether pagan ritualism or Mosaic ceremony — as a return to bondage. The sermon works through Galatians 4:8–11, pressing the claim that any addition to Christ as the ground of justification — whether circumcision, holy days, or any human merit — renders the cross of no effect. The hearer is called to rest in Christ alone, to worship God for the sovereign grace by which he is known before he knows, and to pray for faithful ministers who will not soften the apostolic warning against gospel corruption.
The Words of Truth and Reason
Acts 26:18, which B. B. Warfield calls 'the summation of the gospel,' records Christ's commission to Paul: to open blind eyes, to turn sinners from the power of Satan to God, to grant forgiveness of sins, and to bring them to an eternal inheritance — all by faith alone. The sermon expounds these five gospel blessings in their natural order, showing that each presupposes the severity of the human condition: spiritual blindness, satanic bondage, guilt before a holy God, and the inability to merit anything. The application presses believers toward constant gospel-mindedness rather than a merely occasional sacramental recollection, and calls every unregenerate hearer to see their need for Christ as the only Savior.
A House for the Lord
Haggai 1 confronts the people of God with misplaced priorities: sixteen years after returning from Babylonian exile, the foundation of the Lord's house lay exposed while the people paneled their own homes and filled their own comforts. The sermon situates the book within the history of the restoration period — from Cyrus's edict through the eventual completion of the second temple — and argues that the people's neglect of the temple was not merely architectural indifference but a rejection of God's presence among them. God's covenantal judgment fell in material scarcity and providential drought, precisely as Moses had warned in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. The chapter closes with genuine repentance, divine reassurance, and the Spirit-wrought enablement that always accompanies God's call to a great work — pressing the congregation to examine their priorities, investments, and worldview in light of Matthew 6:33.