A Radio Address by Doctor Walter A. Maier (1893-1950)

Preached Sunday, September 25, 1949.

"For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ."

--I Corinthians 3:11

As most of you know, the foundation truth of this broadcast, Fundamental Faith in Jesus Christ as God's Son and the world's Savior, has been publicly attacked. Indeed, the opposition to the glorious gospel truth is constantly being assailed more widely and more severely. Now please don't worry about the fact that this assault, as many others, has been made against us personally. During the past sixteen seasons of broadcasting Christ's eternal gospel, almost every name you can imagine has been heaped on us by atheists, war-mongers and rabble-rousers, because God has helped us call sin ''sin," denounce evil in high, as in low places, and then point men to Jesus, the only Redeemer from ruin. Despite all this, our broadcast has, by God's grace--and again we ask you to believe that we mean only by God's grace, not by human efforts, least of all mine--steadily grown, until today, as we open our seventeenth season in the Name of the triune God and for the spread of the gospel of our Lord Jesus, "Bringing Christ to the Nations" is larger and more widespread than ever before. The more violently the message of the cross has been assailed, the greater has been the Almighty's blessing.

We are, however, disturbed over the increasing degree, some people use the word "Fundamentalist" to express their contempt for anyone who trusts each word of Scripture. Has loyalty to the Bible and the Lord Jesus in the United States dropped to the low point that those who follow the whole Christian Creed are to be criticized publicly?

I thank God that I am a Fundamentalist and praise the Holy Spirit for helping me make the Bible the foundation of my faith. Morever--and this is the appeal as our radio mission begins its seventeenth season--I have the privilege of speaking to you from historic, century-old Trinity Lutheran Church, mother church of our faith in Milwaukee, the first of one hundred and seventy-six churches in this Wisconsin metropolis.

Don't you make the mistake of rejecting Holy Writ before you read it! Study the divine records without prejudice, and the Lord can help you add your name to the many who have been converted to Christ by this searching of Scriptures and learning the ground truths of the glorious gospel!

Don't be afraid to be a Fundamentalist and believe the whole Bible! With your loyalty to the Lord you are in good company, the best you can ever have. You stand with Jesus who, praying to His Father, said, "Thy Word is truth." You stand with Paul as he declared, "All Scripture is given by inspiration." You stand with Martin Luther, who told the great assembly of princes and prelates when he was asked to retract his teachings that unless he were convinced from clear passages of Scripture, he could not and would not retract, adding in triumph ''Here I stand I cannot do otherwise. God help me! Amen!"

You stand with the mightiest minds of the ages. One of the greatest European scholars of all times was Christian Gellert, professor of the University of Leipzig. His classrooms were always overcrowded. Princes and leaders visited him. Even Frederick the Great, scoffer though he was, invited him to his palace. Gellert's death was considered a national calamity, and a biographer records, "Perhaps no grave has been watered by so many and such sincere tears" as Gellert's. Was he ashamed of the Scriptures? Never. He wrote that strengthening hymn: 

Jesus lives, no longer now

Can thy terrors, death, appall me.
 

When he died, his Bible, worn from use, was found opened at Job's second chapter, containing the words, "Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?"

Within the Bible, the foundation book of our faith, the foundation truth is Christ Himself. Our text emphasizes this when it speaks of the "foundation that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." Now what are the fundamental doctrines which the Scriptures teach concerning our Lord? May the Holy Spirit help you hear and believe these [truths]. (missing part of text)

 
Fundamental Truth No. 1

Jesus Christ is your God. Who says this? Your heavenly Father, when repeatedly He calls Christ "His Son!" The writers of the Old Testament, when they foresee Jesus, the Messiah, as "the mighty God!" The writers of the New Testament when they call Jesus, "God blessed for ever," or kneel before Him to worship Him as "My Lord and my God!" Christ Himself proved that He was the Almighty, for the miracles which He Himself performed are plainly the work of God.

Besides, you need God almighty, with whom nothing shall be impossible. God, who with all the resources of Heaven, can protect you in danger, provide for you in need, comfort you in sorrow and, finally, after death, take you to heaven. Here He is in the Lord Jesus Christ, "very God of very God."

His triumphant "all power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth" is a personal guarantee of strength and victory to those who entrust themselves to His care. Be a strict Fundamentalist and insist that Christ is your God!  Don't be satisfied with any compromise or with any denial of Scripture which makes Jesus good and godly, high and exalted, but still a human being, even as you and I!  A human christ can never help you, but a divine Christ can always deliver you.

Fundamental Truth No. 2

To save you, the Son of God was born of the virgin Mary and became man to take your place in suffering the guilt of your sins. Of course, you cannot understand Christ's being born a child. Even the Bible calls it a great ''mystery", but if you cannot explain a hundred other marvels of nature which surround you in everyday life, why should you refuse to accept God's own revelation concerning the birth and incarnation of Jesus?

An American church leader can rise up to contradict God's Word and to declare flatly, "I do not believe in the Virgin Birth." But are you going to trust men or God? Build your faith on the faultless foundation of the prophets and the apostles, "Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone."

Fundamental Truth No. 3

Moved by a limitless, heightless, depthless love for you, the Son of God, made the Son of Man, gave Himself on Calvary's cross as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world.  This, indeed, is the fundamental of all fundamentals, the unsearchable mercy of Jesus' love which led Him, sinless and stainless as He was, to become sin for us, first by removing the guilt, the curse, (missing text)

God, then, by loading all their sentence, punishment and pain upon His [Son](missing text)

suffering in our stead the full punishment of our rising up against God and for each of us dying the death we deserved.

In this blood-bought atonement of Jesus Christ, full and complete because it wipes out every sin, even the scarlet vices and the black crimes which distress many of you, in this cross-gained redemption, free because in Heaven's highest mercy it is granted you by grace and through faith; in this atoning mercy, final, because it has left nothing required for your redemption undone, you have the heart and center of the Christian creed. Believe it, and you are saved; reject it, and Jesus will reject you. Don't let anyone keep you from this foundation fact of faith! The modernist churchman whom I cited declares boldly and we think blasphemously: "I do not believe in the old-fashioned theory of atonement (the Bible truth of Jesus, that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin), nor do I know any intelligent minister who does," but don't let that disturb you! The Bible puts a curse on all who contradict Christ's redemption. Paul declared ''But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed!" You cannot destroy Gibraltar by shooting pebbles at it with a sling shot, neither can the eternal Rock of Ages, faith in Christ crucified for our sins, be moved by the pygmy attacks of puny unbelievers.

Fundamental Truth No. 4

To prove that His sacrifice for the sins of the whole world has been accepted, and to give every believer the victory over the grave, Christ on the third day after His crucifixion publicly triumphed over the tomb. If you want the assurance that the gruesome grave is not life's end, that through Jesus you shall live in a resurrected, radiant body, far too marvelous for human understanding, that the Son of God has opened the door of Heaven for you, be a Fundamentalist; trust the foundation promise of Christ, "I am the resurrection, and the life, he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?" (John 11:25, 26).

Fundamental Truth No 5

The Savior, risen, ascended, exalted at the right hand of His Father, will come again in glory to judge all unbelievers, but to bring His believers safely home to Heaven. The day of that judgment is rapidly approaching. Scripture records for us the signs which are to foretell the beginning of the end and the approach of Christ's return. Never previously have these warnings been fulfilled so frequently and exactly as in the present moment. The time is drawing close, the Bible teaches us, when the earth will be destroyed by fire, and "the elements shall melt in fervent heat."

Don't listen to those who say that the globe will not be consumed by fire, that matter is indestructible, that the world will go on forever. Even scientists who have no interest in the Bible as God's Word are writing and speaking about the end of the world as never before, and if some claim that man himself will be able to blow up the earth, why should anyone doubt that the Almighty will keep His Word and make an end of this unbelieving, sin-saturated sphere?

(missing text)

fundamental truths concerning Christ which you should believe. Do you think it is in the interest of saving souls and of promoting the welfare of our country, for leaders derisively to call a person who accepts and teaches these foundation truths 'a Fundamentalist," as though he were a "funnymentalist," the term which modernist preachers often derisively substitute? God help America if those in high position think it smart not to believe in the fundamental truths of the faith!

When today we invite you to proclaim the Lord Jesus Christ your Savior, we do not hesitate to warn you that as soon as you stand up for Jesus, you will have to stand up against assaults on your faith. Yet the battle is worth the fighting. Make the "foundation . . that is laid" for you, "Jesus Christ!"

You, too, should be a fundamental, faithful follower of the Lord Jesus Christ because the apostle tells us plainly, "For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid." How foolish and how tragic to put one's trust in anyone other than Jesus.

My countrymen, to be known by God, know Jesus as your Redeemer! Be a fearless, faith-filled Fundamentalist, no matter who opposes you! Believe and trust every word of Scripture, every gospel promise concerning your Savior! Then you will have the foundation that can never be weakened or shaken, because you have the divine, life-giving, Heaven-bestowing Christ. Amen.

(From "The Lutheran Hour,"  International Lutheran Laymen's League, St Louis, MO)

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Last Updated October 31, 1999 by Douglas McKay