History of the Alliance

• AB Simpson’s Fourfold Gospel: https://www.amazon.com/Fourfold-Gospel-B-Simpson-ebook/dp/B00J7X9PBQ/ref=sr_1_7?crid=3SN0V64Q4MS4F&keywords=fourfold+gospel&qid=1644007366&sprefix=fourfold+gospel+%2Caps%2C67&sr=8-7
• The short video on the CMA we will watch in service: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLKWsi6Crko&t=2s

A generation of Gods work

Introduction to Series: Where We’ve Been

Looking back to see Christ in our history will clear the way to see Christ in our future

The History of the C&MA

• We spend a lot of time working at predicting the future.
• in fact, anxiety is the work of predicting a future that may or may not happen.
• So any time spend in anxiety is the work of prediction of future events.
• Talk about a time when anxiety got the best of you and you tried to predict a future that ended up not happening as badly as you thought?

All of Jesus to All the World

The most important thing we can understand about our history is how our history has viewed Jesus Christ.

• Our movement began in 1897 with a few people and some newly saved immigrants who had come into America looking for a new life.
• We are now in 88 countries, have 22,000 churches worldwide and have over 6,200,000 members of which we are a part.

I am going to take the rest of the time to talk through how we view Christ.  We have a statement about Jesus called the Fourfold Gospel.  It is one of the distinguishing marks of the CMA.  Not that we are the only ones to believe it but that we highlight it as a primary understanding of how we do ministry

Christ as Savior

Christ as Sanctifier

Christ as Healer

Christ as Coming King

Christ as Savior is how we find Him

• Each one of these areas is intended to enlarge our understanding of the greatness of Christ and His mission for the world.

English Standard Version Chapter 14

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

• The fourfold Gospel communicates that salvation is found in no one else. It is in Christ alone.
• “And they cried with a loud voice, saying, salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.” Rev. vii. 10. This is the cry of the ransomed around the throne when the universe is dissolving in wreck, and terror is filling the hearts of men. It is the first cry of the ransomed after they reach their home and have seen all that it means to be lost and to be saved, while the earth is reeling, and the elements are melting, and all things are quaking and trembling in the first approaches of the great catastrophe.” -AB Simpson
• We need saving. And we often look to many different places to find salvation.  But we need to be reminded that only Christ can offer true salvation.
• Modernity is defined by our options and our desire for those options. We not only have options but we desire options.  We don’t want to be stuck with just one thing.
• How have you experienced Christ as Savior?

Christ as Sanctifier is how we follow Him

English Standard Version Chapter 14

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

• Christ is the way and He is the truth.
• That is the process of sanctification.
• Sanctification is a fancy way of saying that being changed and transformed into Christlikeness.
• Following Christ is a relationship, it is ongoing and daily.
• “It comes through the personal indwelling of Jesus. He does not put righteousness into the heart simply, but He comes there personally Himself to live. Words are weak; they, indeed, are utterly inadequate to express this thought. When we arrive at complete despair of all other ways we learn this truth. And Jesus Christ Himself comes into the heart and lives His own life there, and so becomes the sanctification of the soul. -AB Simpson
• Sanctification is not about doing better, it is not about making better choices. It is the reality of Christ living in us and changing us as we give Him more and more access to our lives. 
• Christianity cannot be done and never has been done without Christ.
• How have you experienced Christ as Sanctifier?

Christ as Healer is how we see Him

English Standard Version Chapter 14

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

• The CMA believes in healing for the mind, body, and soul. There is no part of our lives that Christ cannot access or does not have supernatural sovereignty over. 
• Christ is the One who heals our primary wound in being separated from God. Salvation is the ultimate healing
• But God is attentive to our other wounds
• “Addressing an audience in London many years ago, Dr. Simpson related the following experiences which marked three great epochs in his life: “Some twenty-seven years ago, I foundered for ten months. in the waters of despondency, and I got out of them just by believing in Jesus as my Saviour. About twelve years ago I got into another deep experience of conviction, and I got out of that by believing in Jesus as my Sanctifier. After years of teaching and waiting on Him, the Lord Jesus Christ showed me four years ago that it was His blessed will to be my complete Saviour for body as well as soul.””
• How have you experienced Christ as Healer?

English Standard Version Chapter 53

      4       Surely he has borne our griefs
      and carried our sorrows;
                  yet we esteemed him stricken,
      smitten by God, and afflicted.
            5       But he was pierced for our transgressions;
      he was crushed for our iniquities;
                  upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
      and with his wounds we are healed.

Christ as Coming King is how we worship Him.

English Standard Version Chapter 14

14 “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. 4 And you know the way to where I am going.”

• We are saved by His sacrifice and are awaiting His return as King.

“This cannot be the publication of the Gospel, but must be HIS PERSONAL, VISIBLE, AND GLORIOUS APPEARING. The Gospel is to be widely diffused; His truth is to prevail; His cause is to triumph, but He is coming personally, and He is infinitely more than even His truth and cause.” – AB Simpson

English Standard Version Chapter 4

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

• All that we hope for we find in Christ. Every longing, every bit of impatience is satisfied in Christ. 
• The Call of the Alliance is to know Christ in such a way that we take all of who Christ is to all the world.
• Don’t stop until Christ is your Savior, Sanctifier, healer and coming King
• And don’t stop until He is your neighbors as well.
• How can your longing remind you of Christ our Coming King?