morning we're going to be looking at one particular verse in John chapter 8 if you'd like to open your Bibles there with me John chapter 8 we just sang of being free and our Lord speaks to the Pharisees in John chapter 8 about a making men free.

And in John chapter 8, verse 33, the Pharisees respond with, we be Abraham's seed, and we're never in bondage to any man. How sayest thou you shall make us free? We've always been free.

The great lie, the great lie, The universal lie is that man is free to choose the destiny of his own soul. Free will, free will.

Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for the deliverance from sin and the the faith that you give to your Children, enabling them to believe on thee. Lord, we pray that thy will would be done and that you would not leave us to our own free will. Lord, that we might by your spirit and by your grace, delight ourselves in thee. And then, and only then, can we have the desires of our heart. Lord, our desires and our interests are so sinful and fleshly. Oh, how we need to be set free from ourselves. We cannot say with these Pharisees, never have we been in bondage to any man. Lord, we've known something of the bondage of sin and the darkness of our own lost, dead spiritual condition. Lord, we pray that for those who have not yet come to believe on Christ, that you would show them their inability to be free apart from being made free. Lord, you said that where the spirit of God is, there's liberty. And if the sun make you free, you're free indeed. Lord, we pray this hour that your Holy Spirit would give us liberty to worship and that we would be brought to the foot of the cross and be able to rejoice in the deliverance of our sin. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen.

You all know that we have a new baby in our family. And though she's not yet six months old, she has already proven many times what the scriptures declare about our sinful fallen condition. The Bible says that we come from the womb speaking lies. I've observed how capable she is of acting as if she was dying or that the world was coming to an end only to really want to be changed in the position that she's in. I will not be surprised when she's able to speak, and her first words are no. We smile at this, and yet we know that a child doesn't have to be taught to lie. They lie by nature. They have to be taught not to lie. And though the consequences of their childlike lying might be somewhat minimal and might even bring a smile to our face. The consequences will only become worse as the lying becomes greater.

God alone, Romans chapter three says that all men are liars and God alone tells the truth. I've noticed also that it seems like dogs have more of a conscience when it comes to lying than humans do. When you challenge a dog about what it's done, at least it will hang its head in shame, whereas a man will look you right in the eye and lie to you.

What is a lie? It is a false statement made with a deliberate attempt to deceive. A false statement made with the deliberate attempt to deceive. Men lie, we lie, in order to protect and to promote ourselves. Lying is part of life in this world. We have to spend much of our time and effort trying to figure out what's true and what's not true. And depending on the lie, The consequences vary. But there is one great lie. There is one universal lie. There is one lie that all men believe, and the consequences of it are eternal damnation, eternal separation from God. It is the lie that says that I've never been in bondage to any man. God has given me the ability to decide the eternal destiny of my own soul. I can, by my own free will, decide whether to accept or whether to reject Jesus Christ. I'm not in bondage to any man.

These Jews in making this declaration had no idea that the man that they were in bondage to was themselves. This is the lie that we pray our children will be delivered from.

Turn with me to Isaiah chapter 63. Isaiah chapter 63. Verse 8, for he said, surely they are my people, children that will not lie. So he was their savior. When we consider the the purity of our Lord and stand in his presence, we come to realize that even when we speak the truth, there is an element of self-promotion and self-protection in every word that proceedeth out of our mouth. He is the only one that spoke in such a way as his words are. pure and perfect and no dial and no lie, no imperfection. So when the Lord says, These are my Children and they will not lie and therefore I will be their savior. He's speaking about a work of grace that God does in the heart. It causes us to confess what we would not have otherwise been able to confess. We, for the first time, are able to take sides with God against ourselves and agree with God that we are sinful and that we have no righteousness or no ability, no ability whatsoever, to come before God lest he makes us able and willing. We dare not set ourselves up on the throne of God. You see, this universal lie that God has given me the ability to choose to accept or reject him puts me on the throne of God. It makes God dependent upon me in order for him to be able to save me. It is the lie that Paul speaks about in 2 Thessalonians 2. It's what these Pharisees are saying.

We be Abraham's children, we've never been in bondage to any man. We are free to do what we want, when we want, however we want. And if we decide to believe on you, it'll be our choice. It'll be our choice.

Turn with me to Romans chapter 9. Romans chapter 9. Verse 15, for he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will, he hardeneth.

Verse 19. Thou wilt say then unto me, why doth he yet find fault for who hath resisted his will? If this is true, then how can he blame me if it's his choice? But nay, O man, who art thou that disputeth? That's what that word repliest means. It means to dispute or argue. Who art thou that argues against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, why hath thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay of the same lump to make one vessel of honor and another of dishonor?

God is sovereign in this matter of salvation. And man, because of his spiritually dead condition, will not come. He will not come. Jeremiah chapter 13 verse 23 says, can the Ethiopian change his spot or the leopard, Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? Then may you also do good who are accustomed to doing evil. This is our nature. Our nature is to lie and to believe the lie. And until God gives us a new nature, we will be in bondage to our will. We'll be in bondage to ourselves.

Now, we don't say we've never been in bondage to any man. God reveals to us our sinful condition. We know that we're always in bondage, except he make us free. The Lord Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, Lord, not my will, but thy will be done. Lord, don't leave me to myself. Don't leave me to my own will.

Augustus Toplady, the man who wrote the hymn Rock of Ages, said this, a man's free will cannot cure him even of a toothache or of a sore finger, and yet he madly thinks that it's in his power to cure his own soul. The greatest judgment which God himself can in any present life inflict upon a man is to leave him in the hand of his own boasted will. If God leaves us to ourselves, then we will do what we will. And what we will will not be to believe upon him.

We must be born again. We must be made willing. We must be delivered from the power of darkness. We must be translated, as the scripture tells us in Colossians chapter one, verse 13, into the kingdom of the light of his son.

Yes, the will of man is free to choose anything it wants. I would take that a step farther and say that the will of man can only choose what it wants. You cannot choose against your will. You can never make any choice against your will. Every choice that you make in life is that which you will to do. That's what the will is. The will is the power of choice. And therein lies the problem.

you will not come unto me that you might have life, John chapter five. And then in John chapter six, the Lord Jesus said, no man can come to me. No man can come to me except the father which sent me draw him, make him willing. Now you put those two verses together and God's not saying, You will not come to me because you can't come to me. He's saying to us, you can't come to me because you will not come to me. That's why you can't come. You cannot come to God because you don't will to come to God and you can't choose anything against your own will.

See the will, the will by nature, as I illustrated with the baby, is in bondage to its own nature. It's in bondage to its own lies and it believes the lie. And so therefore, because it will not, it cannot. And sandwiched between John chapter five and John chapter six is This verse, all that the Father giveth me shall come unto me. And he that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.

What the Pharisees are saying to our Lord in John chapter 8, verse 33, We've never been in bondage to any man is the universal lie that's believed by all men. I'm free. I can do what I want. Yes, you are free. And yes, you can do what you want. But here's the problem. You will never want to come to Christ. Not the Christ of Scripture. A man manufacture in the idol factory of their own minds a God that they're attracted to because that God is fashioned like unto themselves. The scripture says, you thought that I was altogether as thyself. And they make a God who has hands, who has eyes but he cannot see, has ears but he cannot hear. and they that worship him are like him. But the God who is the sovereign God, the omnipotent God, the immutable God, the self-existent, independent God who is not dependent upon anything from us and we're dependent upon everything from him, man will never come to him. unless they're born of the Spirit.

Nicodemus, you cannot see the kingdom of God except you be born from above. God must make us willing in the day of His power. In the new birth, He must give us His Spirit. He must shine the light of the gospel. Faith is not our decision to be saved. Faith is not even the cause of salvation in any way, it is the result of it. It's not the cause of life, it's the proof of life, it's the evidence of life. Faith is what man does willingly because he was made willing.

But here's what all men say. I've never been in bondage to anyone. What are you talking about? The lie denies man's sinful condition. The Bible says that we come into this world evidenced by even a baby who comes from the womb speaking lies We come into this world dead in our trespasses and sins. A spiritually dead person cannot choose to come to God. He must be made alive.

The Lord tells us in Isaiah chapter 1 verse 16, from the sole of our feet to the top of our head, there is no soundness, nothing but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores." He describes a leper, and that's what we are by nature. We walk by the, we walk, the scripture says, according to the prince of the power of the air. We follow the father of lies.

Where did this line begin? Well, Satan, who's called the father of lies, told the first great lie, didn't he? When he came to Eve and he He didn't just come out with a bold-faced lie right up front. We sometimes chuckle at the lies of our young children, or we may say, well, it's a white lie. But the Bible says that no lie is of the truth. In other words, the gospel of God's free grace in Christ has no element of error to it, and a little bit of leaven leavens the whole lump. So if we introduce just a little bit, then we destroy everything. And so Satan knew that. And in the garden, he didn't just come right out and say that God did not say, he asked Eve, did God say that thou shalt not eat of the trees of the garden? See, now he's cracking the door. A little bit of leaven. He's introducing just a little bit of error into what God said.

And Eve corrected him and said, oh no, God didn't say that. He said we can eat of all the trees of the garden, but the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the midst of the garden, that tree we're not to eat of. And then she added a little extra when she said we're not to even touch it. No evidence that God said you should not touch it, just said don't eat from it. Probably a good idea not to touch it. Because that tree, like Mount Sinai, represents the law. It represents the law.

How is it that we know the difference between good and evil? The tree of the knowledge of good and evil. What is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? The Bible says that yet though we come into this world out of our mother's womb speaking lies and we drink iniquity like water and that all men are liars and that God alone tells the truth, at the same time God has put into our hearts his law. All men know in their conscience the difference between right and wrong. And so every time we lie against our conscience, our conscience becomes a little less reliable until the scripture says that we are capable of searing our conscience beyond feeling. If we lie against our conscience enough, then our conscience will never, will not even be able to tell us the difference between right and wrong anymore. This is what this tree is.

God did tell the children of Israel when they were at Mount Sinai, don't touch the mountain. Don't even approach the mountain. Stay clear of the mountain. You cannot stand in the presence of God's holy law, the law of the knowledge of good and evil. and without it condemning you, without it judging you guilty. That's the purpose of the law. So when the Lord told Adam and Eve not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he's telling them, don't go to the law for the hope of your salvation. Don't think that you're going to be able to present to God some righteousness that you've established on your own by your own good works and by your own law keeping because the truth is you've never been able to keep any of God's law not one time. The law will do nothing but kill you. The law will do nothing but slay you. It'll do nothing but condemn you. All right?

Eve and consequently Adam believed the lie. They believed that they could eat of that fruit of the law and that their eyes would be open and that they would become like God. In other words, they would be able to stand in the presence of God's holy law and they would be able to keep it. They would be able to establish a righteousness by their law-keeping. God's the only one that's ever kept God's law. He's the only one that's ever kept it. This is the lie. These Pharisees were going about establishing their own righteousness, ignorant of the righteousness of God. thinking that their law-keeping and that their lineage as the seed of Abraham and that their good works were somehow going to earn them favor with God. They were in bondage to a works gospel. They believed the lie.

When God gave the children of Israel the law at Mount Sinai, Moses came down and read the law and the people responded by saying, we will do it. We will do it. And Moses said, you can't keep God's law. And he made a blood sacrifice. He made a blood sacrifice.

Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Yeah, we can do that. We can do that. No, you can't. No, you can't. What God demands, God must provide. He calls on us to believe. and those that have been shown the truth of their own condition. And the only way that you can see that is to see something of the holiness of God.

The law is not given to us in order to give us a path to follow that we might earn favor with God by our law keeping. The law is given to us in order to show us the glory of Christ, the glory of Christ. And when we see him as the only one who was able to keep God's law in heart and in mind and in word and in deed, we come to this conclusion, there's nothing in me like him. Oh, Lord, I need an advocate with the Father. I need one who's able to keep the law.

No, we can't say, I've never been in bondage to any man. All we like sheep have gone astray. each unto his own way. The man that they were in bondage to and the man that all men are by nature and in bondage to is themselves. They ate of that fruit and their eyes were open. What were their eyes open to? Not to their ability to keep the law. Their eyes were open to their nakedness. Who told you you were naked? Did you eat of the fruit? Did you eat of the tree? Yeah, you ate of the tree. And now what do we do? We try to cover up our own nakedness by sewing together fig leaves. What an apt picture of what man does by nature in trying to cover up his nakedness before God. I can't think of a garment that would be less able to cover a man than fig leaves. And yet, that's what we do. Try to cover up our nakedness with the works of our own hands.

A lamb had to be slain. I wonder if that lamb that God slew and shed blood right there before Adam in the garden was his pet lamb. The blood was shed and the skin of that lamb became his covering before God.

We've never been in bondage to anyone. We're free to do what we want. When we want, if we decide that we want to go to heaven, if we decide that we want to believe on Jesus, we'll make that decision when we're good and ready. We have free will. And the child of God says, my will's not free now and it's never been free. I've got to always be made willing. Lord, you're gonna have to give me your spirit. Where the spirit of God is, there's liberty. If the son shall make you free, you should be free indeed.

This being made free to believe on Christ, yes, it's an experience in the new birth. But it's a daily walk of faith as well. It's not just something we look back on as something that happened in the past. We have to keep coming, don't we? Why? Because we still have that old sinful nature and that old will of man that's in bondage to his...

A top lady had it right. The worst thing that God can do for any man in this world is to leave him to himself leave him in the hand of his own boasted free will. This is the universal lie.

Turn with me, if you will, to 2 Thessalonians 2 Thessalonians 2. Verse 10, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish, speaking of the power of Satan, this is the influence that the devil has on the hearts of man. just like he had on the heart of Eve and Adam in the garden. The father of lies is still promoting this lie with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved. They received not the love of the truth that they might be saved. They wouldn't come to the Christ who is.

In verse 11, and for this cause, God shall send them a strong delusion that they should believe. Now, in the original language, it would be more accurate to translate that little word A, which is an indefinite article, it could apply to lots of things, to the word the, the definite article the, the. That they should believe the lie. The lie. that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

Now we read that and our thoughts initially are, he's talking about people who are indulging themselves in the pleasures of the flesh and the shameful sins of this world and so they won't come to Christ because they're doing that. And yes, that applies. This is the condemnation. Light has come into the world, but men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil.

But just like with that verse in John chapter three, this applies not only to the works of the flesh in the immoral man who won't come to Christ because he can't give up the pleasures of sin, but this also applies to the outwardly moral religious man who's doing his best to live a good life and yet he's taking pleasure in his unrighteousness.

In other words, he's taking comfort in something that he's done or decision that he's made or prayer that he's prayed or work that he's performed in order to be saved, taking pleasure in unrighteousness.

This is the man that the Lord speaks of who stands before God in the day of judgment and says to him, but God, we have done many. Lord, we've done many wonderful works in thy name. Don't you remember when I prayed that prayer? Don't you remember when I made that decision? Don't you remember all these good things? We've done everything.

And the Lord Jesus speaks to them the most horrid words that a man will ever hear. Depart from me. you workers of iniquity, for I never knew you. In other words, what you're promoting as your righteousness, I'm revealing as your iniquity.

And because you have no love for the truth, because you have no love for Christ being all your righteousness, for you being nothing but sin, for your inability to ever keep any part of God's law, For you believing that what these Pharisees believed, we've never been in bondage to any man. We can do what we want when we want. We'll be saved when we're ready to be saved.

Because you had no love for the truth. The salvation is of the Lord. He must make me willing. He must exercise His grace and mercy toward me by the power of His Spirit through the preaching of His gospel. I cannot be saved. Why can I not be saved? Because I will not be saved.

And I'll keep going back to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thinking that if I just do enough good, God said, you touch that tree, you touch that mountain, you'll die. You'll die.

Brethren, what a joy it is for us to not be able to boast before God and say, I've never been in bondage to any man. Lord, I was born in bondage. And if you leave me to myself, I will go right back to what I am by nature. Not my will, but thy will be done.