Let's open our Bibles again to
Colossians. Colossians chapter two. We rejoice in knowing that our
God delights in showing mercy. We ask him to show mercy and
he delights in it. That's what he said. This past week, planted some
trees in our yard. Planted a grapefruit tree, thanks
to Scott. Planted a guava tree, and planted
a cypress tree. And if those trees survive, they
will always remain a grapefruit tree, a guava tree, and a cypress
tree. The nature of those trees is
not gonna change. The roots will go down, the trunks will grow
taller, but the trees will remain exactly as they are. Isaiah chapter 37, verse 31 says,
and as the remnant that has escaped from the house of Judah, the
Lord's speaking of his people as escapees, that's what we are. We've escaped by God's grace. And he says this about them.
They shall take root downward and bear fruit upward. So he
likens his people to a fruit tree. We see that time and time again
in the scriptures. The Lord likens the church to
a fig tree for its sweetness and for a olive tree for its
fatness. He calls the church the trees
of righteousness which are the plantings of the Lord and he
refers to the church as a palm tree which shall flourish. The
point that I want to make in introducing this message is that
the life and nature of a tree is in its seed and Once that
is established, the nature of that tree never changes. It remains
exactly the same. And the promise was made to Abraham
and to his seed, singular, not seeds, but seed, referring to
Christ. So Christ in you is not only
the hope of glory, but he is the seed of life. He's the seed
that died and was put into the ground and brought forth life. And so these trees, they don't
change their nature. Notice with me in Colossians
chapter two at verse six. As you have therefore received
Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him." I've titled this message, Nothing
Has Changed. Nothing has changed. From the
day of the new birth to the day of our glorification, we walk
in the same manner in which we were called. as you receive Christ
Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him. There was a time, Amos speaks
of it in Amos chapter eight, he talks about the religious
man who runs to and fro seeking God's word and never finds it.
And some of us can relate to that. In religion, we were always
changing the nature of our tree. We would go from this kind of
tree to another kind of tree, never satisfied with the fruit
that we had, and so thinking that we just had a different
nature of tree. But once the Lord plants his
trees of righteousness in Christ, once he puts his seed in you,
then your tree will grow deeper in its root
system and it will grow taller and it will become more fruitful,
but it will never change its nature. As you received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walk ye in him. Stay the course, stand fast,
abide in Christ. I just found that verse in Amos
chapter 8, they shall wander from sea to sea and from land
to land and to and fro they will seek the word of God. Wandering
around aimlessly like drunken men trying to find out what the
truth was. Once the Lord Jesus reveals himself
as the truth, then that song that you led us in, Adam, becomes
our prayer. Lord, we just want to know you
better. We want to become nearer to you. But we're not looking
for something different. We're not looking for some change. satisfied with Christ and we
shall be satisfied when we awake in his likeness. And so that's
our hope. I read an article, I think I
put it in the bulletin, maybe for this Sunday, that Maurice
Montgomery wrote. He said, those who have been
saved are those who are being saved. Those who have learned
of Christ are those who are learning of Christ. Those who know the
Lord are those same ones who desire to know Him. Those who
have seen the glory of God are the same ones who cry with Moses,
Lord show me thy glory. Peter put it like this, to whom
coming. To whom coming. So we're, as
you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him. Nothing has changed. Nothing
has changed. Pray that we grow in His grace
and the knowledge of Christ, but we're not running to and
fro. We're not wandering from sea
to sea. We're not looking for something different than what
the Lord has provided. Scott, could you see if you can
help this gentleman, please? Ramon is not here. He's not here
tonight. Thank you. So I have eight points very quickly
with that as our introduction. How did you receive Christ Jesus
the Lord? Because that's the same way you
walk in him. The same way you walk in him. And my first point
is that we receive Him as a sinner. We receive Him as a sinner. And
that never changes. The roots grow deeper and we
see more and more of our sin. And we don't believe in a progressive
sanctification whereby we become less sinful. Pray the Lord will
restrain the outward manifestations of our sin, but here's the difference. We thought that if we could limit
the outward manifestations of sin, that that was the evidence
of our salvation. We thought that sin was just
something that we did. And when the Lord plants the
seed of the gospel in our hearts, we come to believe that sin is
what we are. That we do what we do because
we are who we are. We are what we are. We're sinners. He strips us of our righteousness.
He causes us to cry with with Job, behold, I am vile. We find our voice with the prophet
Isaiah, woe is me, I'm undone, or with Paul, the apostle, in
me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. To will is present
with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. Everything
I do is infected with my sin. I need a Savior. I need a Savior. As you receive Christ Jesus the
Lord, so walk ye in Him. We never graduate from being
a sinner in coming to Christ. We had to be made nothing. We
had to be brought to naught. We had to lose all confidence. in the flesh, the Lord causes
his people. And here's something that only
a sinner can understand. Because what I'm about to say
would not sound right with most folks. But the scripture says
that we loathe ourselves. And we do. We loathe our sin. We hate that about ourselves.
And so we're It never goes away. We find ourselves
seeing more and more of our sin, and more and more of our need
for Christ. And so, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk
ye in Him. Secondly, we received Him in
love, and we walk in love. wasn't the threat of the law
or the fear of judgment. It was the love of Christ that
constrained us. It was the goodness of God that
led us to repentance. It was His love for us that broke
our hearts, and it's still His love. We love him because he
first loved us and it's his love. We come to him by love. And so
as you receive Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk ye in him.
By this shall all men know that you are my disciples because
of your love, your love for one another. And God calls us to
walk the same way we received Christ Jesus. that our hearts
would be broken over his love. Ezekiel chapter 16 is that passage
where the Lord says, I passed by thee and I saw thee polluted
in thine own blood. And I said, your time of love,
your time of love has come. And I spread my skirt over thee
and I covered thy nakedness and thou becamest mine. Oh, This
is how we received Him. We don't go around trying to
scare men into the kingdom of God by preaching the law and
hellfire and damnation. We preach the love of Christ. And that's the means by which
the Lord brings us. And that's the means by which
He keeps bringing us. And so as you receive Christ
Jesus the Lord as a sinner and in love, walk in him. Ephesians chapter 3 verse 17
says that Christ may dwell in your hearts rooted, and here's
the tree illustration again, rooted and grounded in love,
in love. And then in Ephesians chapter
5 verse 2 the Lord tells us walk in love as Christ also has loved
thee. So, it's the love of God that
brings us to Christ. And it's the love of God that
keeps us coming to Christ. As you receive Christ Jesus the
Lord, so walk ye in Him. And how often times the Lord
chastens us with those words that He spoke to that same church
that He spoke to about love, that I just quoted. In Revelation,
when he speaks of the church at Ephesus, he said, I have someone
against thee. Thou hast left thy first love. What a grace, what an experience
the Lord gives us when he calls us to himself in love. And if
we're not careful, we will be like that church in Ephesus. and leave our first love. As
you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him. You see,
the tree doesn't change, does it? It doesn't change. We remain
a sinner, he remains a lovely, and he continues to woo us and
draw us with his love and put his love in our hearts. Thirdly,
we receive him by grace. by grace for by grace are you
saved through faith and that not of yourselves it's a gift
of God we walk by grace we were saved by grace unmerited undeserving
free grace grace demerited faith grace the gift of God undeserved
gift of God. The more we grow in grace and
in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, the more we see
our need for grace. Why? Because the deeper those
roots go in the tree and the more we see of our sinfulness
and the more the Lord moves our hearts with his love for his
forgiveness and so we see more and more of our need for grace
and the most mature believer is the believer that believes
themselves to be in need of grace more than anyone else. With our God's grace, we will
not be saved. It's all of grace. We were elected
by God's grace. We were redeemed by God's grace.
We are regenerated by God's grace. We are kept by God's grace. We
will be glorified by God's grace. It is all of grace. And so as
you received Him by grace, so walk ye in Him. Revelation 22 verse 21, the very
last verse of the Bible. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
be with you always. Amen. Amen. So be it. Oh, that's what we
need, isn't it? As you receive Christ Jesus,
the Lord, we're not, we're not presenting anything on our part,
on our, on our behalf to obligate God in any way. We are completely
dependent from the beginning to the end on his grace. As you receive Christ Jesus,
the Lord, so walk ye in him. Grace is not giving me a chance
to be saved. Grace is God saving me without
asking for my permission, or anything else from me for that
matter. That's grace. Grace is the sovereign act of
God, whereby He calls us out of darkness into His marvelous
light, and takes out the heart of stone and puts in a heart
of flesh, and opens the eyes of our understanding and gives
us the gift of faith. So thankful that the gifts and
callings of God are without repentance. They're without repentance. He
doesn't take them back. And that's another way in which
you came to the Lord Jesus Christ. You came to Him as a sinner.
You came to Him in love. You came to Him on grace, by
grace. And you came to Him through faith.
Through faith. We walk by faith, not by sight.
You see, as you receive Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk ye in
him. That doesn't change. Nothing has changed. We abide
in the same gospel and the same truth. Now we see it more clearly. We become more dependent upon
him. We grow in these things. God, by God's grace, we become
more fruitful. But we don't, nothing, it doesn't
change the nature of the tree. The guava tree I planted yesterday
will always be a guava tree, long as it lives. I don't expect
to go out there one day and find oranges on it. It's just not
gonna change. Faith, the evidence of the new
birth, not the cause of the new birth. God doesn't save us because
we believe. We believe because he saved us. And the same thing's true now. We continue to believe. And faith
always cries, Lord, I do believe, help thine on my unbelief. Lord,
I've got so much unbelief in my flesh. Donnie and I were talking
about this and I confess to him, we say we trust the Lord and
we do. And yet we find ourselves awake
at three o'clock in the morning worrying about things and praying
and asking the Lord to take them off our mind and heart. And Lord,
help my unbelief, help my unbelief. Some of you younger folks, you
get older, you come to understand that a little better, but that's, faith grows in both directions.
It grows down and it grows up, doesn't it? Faith, it's the anchor
line that connects the boat to the anchor. The Lord Jesus Christ
is referred to as the anchor set by God, sure and steadfast,
the anchor of our soul. And we are that little boat,
but there's a connection between the anchor and it's called faith.
God gives us that faith. Faith is the empty hand. that
receives the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't come to God with anything
in our hands, but nevertheless, the Lord opens our hand and gives
us faith to believe on Christ. And so our hands are always empty. We never come to the Lord with
anything that would obligate Him in any way. We come to Him
with an empty hand. He gives us ears to hear and
eyes to see and hearts to believe. Faith is that childlike dependence. Except you become as a little
child, you should not have any kingdom of heaven. And we continue
to come to Him as a little child, completely dependent. Faith is
the touch of Him, of His garment, of a sinner who loves Him and
crawls into His presence. says, oh, if I could just touch
the hem of his garment, I'd be made whole. And those drops of
oil that dripped from Aaron's robe drip from the Lord Jesus
Christ, who's anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows,
and he shares that oil with his children. And we continue to
come to him for that same faith and for that same spirit. Nothing
has changed. Faith is that confident assurance
that knows, as Abraham knew, the father of the faithful, that
what he had promised he was also able to perform. That's faith. We know that he performed what
he came to accomplish. He satisfied the demands of God's
law and God's justice. He actually saved His people. Lord, save me. Save me. As you receive Christ
Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him. As you receive Christ, that's
another. How much do we understand about
the Anointed One, the Messiah, the One Son of God, and the power
of the Spirit of God to accomplish His salvation when we received
Him? We received Him as the Christ, but as the tree grows, we become
more and more understanding as to who He is as the Christ, the
seed of the woman that would crush the head of the serpent. The prophet, the three men were
anointed in the Old Testament. Prophets were anointed, priests
were anointed, kings were anointed. And no man could serve in all
three capacities, the Lord Jesus Christ. We have to have a prophet. We have to have a prophet as
one who communicates the things of God to us. We have to have
a priest. A priest is one who communicates
us back to God. And we have to have a king to
reign over us and to restrain us and to give us his law and
to keep us. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
is seen in all three of those offices. It's seen in the Ark
of the Covenant. where Moses was instructed to
put inside the ark. You remember the ofar of manna? That's the bread of life that
came down from heaven. That's the Lord Jesus Christ
as our prophet. Aaron's rod that budded. You
remember when Moses put down Aaron's rod at Pharaoh's magicians
and it grew and Well, that was when he put down the rod with
the with the elders of Israel who were rebelling against Moses
But that rod was put into the into the ark and then the tablets
of stone the Ten Commandments Were put into the ark How we
need a prophet We need a priest to intercede for us. I present
himself on our behalf. And we need a king to conquer
us. That's what we need a king for. A king to conquer us. We will raise our fists in rebellion
against God. We will say, according to our
own nature, we'll not have that man reign over us. But when the
Lord puts the seed of life in us, we see our need for a king.
Lord, conquer me. Make me willing. Submit me to
your authority. The Sanhedrin, on that night
that they took our Lord to crucify Him, said, Art thou the Christ? Tell us. Art thou the Christ? He had already made it clear.
He said to them, If I told you, you wouldn't believe me. And
if I asked you a question, you wouldn't answer me. My hour has
come. This is what I came into the
world to do. To die for my people. To deliver them. That's the ministry
of the Christ. And that's how we received Him.
And that's how we continue to walk in Him. As you receive Christ Jesus,
we not only receive him as the Christ, we receive him as our
Savior. That's what Jesus means. Our
Joshua. Moses could not bring the children
of Israel across the Jordan into the promised land. Only Joshua
could do that. Moses, a picture of the law,
had to die on the other side of the Jordan. And the Lord Jesus
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believes. And he satisfied all the demands
of God's holy law. And in the type of Joshua, our
Jesus brought his people across the river of death, Jordan River,
into the promised land. That's how we receive him. Sinners
receive the Lord Jesus as the savior. His name shall be called
Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins. He was
successful in accomplishing the salvation of His people. He didn't come to offer salvation.
He didn't come to make it possible. He did not come to do His part
so that we could do our part. He came as the sovereign, successful
surety and Savior. of His people. And that's how
we receive Him. And that's how we walk in Him.
As you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him. How did you receive Him? One
day, one day, the Lord, He caused you to bow to Him. He
caused you to to crown him Lord. He's Lord. He's Lord over the
living and the dead. He's called the Lord of hosts.
He's he's called Lord of heaven and earth. But one day you received
Christ Jesus as Lord, as Lord. And you were you were willing
subject. You were willing servant. You
were brought to bow gladly before him. And And we continue in the
same way in which we came. We continue to come to him as
Lord. What happened to Saul of Tarsus?
And Saul calls himself a pattern for all salvation. And when the
Lord arrested him on the road to Damascus, who art thou, Lord? I am Jesus of Nazareth. whom thou persecuted. Oh Lord,
what would you have me to do? What would you have me to do?
What a glorious thing it is when God brings us to bow to him as
Lord. And it's what men won't have. They're not going to have someone
else reign over them. But by God's grace, we delight. We delight in having the Lord
Jesus Christ reign. We need him to reign over us.
We need him to subdue us and to make us willing. The word
Lord in the Bible is the word kyrgios. I looked it up again
today and The first definition that is
given of Kyrios is the one to whom something belongs. The one to whom something belongs. The master, the owner, the one
who reigns over another. And the Lord said to his disciples,
he said, you call me master and Lord, and so you say, right,
for such I am. But if I am your Lord and your
master, and I wash your feet, then you ought to wash one another's
feet. Here's the manifestation and
evidence of having the Lord as your Lord, as your willing servant. He's called the Lord God. We
crown Him. He's Lord. We see that often. The Lord Jesus Christ is Lord
over the living and the dead, whether they want Him to be or
not. But what a wonderful thing it is when we receive Him as
Lord and then walk in Him. as the Lord. See, this is the
nature of the tree, isn't it? As you receive Christ Jesus,
the Lord, so walk in Him. These things haven't changed
from day one. They've matured, they've grown.
Lord willing, they've become more fruitful. And let me say
this about fruit bearing. And some of us came out of a
religious tradition where we went around inspecting one another's
fruits self-righteously. You know, the truth is that the
one who thinks he doesn't have fruit is the only one that's
actually bearing fruit. Well, child of God, you believe
yourself to be a bearing tree with very little fruit. That's
a good thing. That's a good thing. The Lord
Jesus Christ is the, you know, he gets all the glory, doesn't
he? God's people do bear fruit. and bear fruit to His glory.
You're bearing fruit right now of faith, rejoicing in the message
of the gospel, encouraging one another. 1 Thessalonians 1 verse
5. It begins in verse three, when
he says, for our gospel came unto you not in word only, but
in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance. So here's how we received him.
We didn't just receive him as some intellectual argument, received
him in the power of the Holy Ghost, where the Holy Ghost shut
us up to Christ. We didn't have a choice in this
thing. And so the Holy Spirit continues
to shut us up to Christ and continues to give us much assurance so
that we have no confidence in the flesh. And then in verse
5 of that same passage, he goes on to say, and with much affliction. How did you receive Christ Jesus
the Lord? You received him with much affliction. You remember when you first believed
the gospel and the resistance of friends and family members
that you tried to talk to about what you believed? And Lord taught
us some things in those experiences on how to talk to people, but
it's still, we still find ourselves strangers and pilgrims in this
world. We still are at odds with the
world. the philosophies and the religions
and the direction of the world, with much affliction. Listen
what Paul said in Hebrews chapter 10. He said, call to remembrance
the former days in which after you were illuminated, you endured
a great fight of affliction and you took joyfully the spoiling
of your goods. Now the Hebrew, the letter to
the Hebrews, I believe it doesn't identify
its author as the other epistles do, but I think it was probably
the Apostle Paul, but whoever it was, it's God's word, isn't
it? But it's being written to Jews, to Hebrews. who, when the
gospel came, they lost their jobs. They lost their families.
They lost their possessions. They were kicked out of Israel.
They had to flee for their lives. And so the Lord said, and you
remember the former days? Don't forget. You took joyfully
the spoiling of your goods and you've not yet suffered under
blood. It hasn't cost you your life yet. But the same affliction
that you experienced when you became believers is the affliction
you're going to experience the rest of your life. And the greatest
affliction for the believer is the affliction of their own sin
and their own unbelief and Satan and the world in which they live
and the contradiction that they are to themselves conflict that
they have between their spirit and their flesh. That's the affliction. It doesn't go away, brethren. It doesn't go away. As you receive
Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk ye in him. Isaiah 37 verse 31 again, and
the remnant that has escaped from the house of Judah, We are
the remnant that has escaped. Shall again take root downward
and bear fruit upward. You know, we're gonna stand in
just a moment and sing a hymn. And the scripture speaks of that
being the fruit of our lips, giving thanks unto God. Matter
of fact, our speech, as we offer up prayers and praise and thanksgiving
and songs, is called the calves, a calf. It's called the calves
of our lips. So we don't take a blood animal
and put it on an altar, but the Lord receives the prayers and
he bottles them up, the scripture says, and they are praise and
honor to him. So there's the fruit. There's
the fruit. How did you receive Christ Jesus
the Lord? You received him as a sinner,
received him in love, you received him by grace, you received him
through faith, you received him as the Christ, you received him
as the Savior, you received him as Lord, and you received him
in much affliction. As you received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walkie in him. We were little tender trees when
the first, when the Lord first planted us. And, uh, the nature
of that tree is determined by the seed from which that tree
grows. And it never changes, never changes. Amen. All right, let's stand
together. Adam, 474, number 474. Let's stand. Not have I gotten, but what I
received. Grace hath bestowed it since
I have believed. Boasting excluded, pride I abase. I'm only a sinner saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the
glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Once I was foolish and sin ruled
my heart, causing my footsteps from God to depart. Jesus hath found me, happy my
case. I now am a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. Only a sinner, saved by grace. This is my story, to God be the
glory. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace. Unavailing, no merit had I. Mercy had saved me, or else I
must die. Sin had alarmed me, fearing God's
face. But now I'm a sinner, saved by
grace. Only a sinner saved by grace. Only a sinner saved by grace. This is my story to God be the
glory. I'm only a sinner saved by grace. ? Suffer a sinner whose heart
overflows ? ? Loving his Savior to tell what he knows ? ? Once
more to tell it would I embrace ? ? I'm only a sinner saved by
grace ? Only a sinner saved by grace. Only a sinner saved by
grace. This is my story, to God be the
glory. I'm only a sinner saved by grace.