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John Reeves

As His Manner was

John Reeves November, 27 2022 Video & Audio
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John Reeves
John Reeves November, 27 2022

In this sermon titled "As His Manner Was," John Reeves addresses the centrality of Jesus Christ in preaching and the significance of the gospel message. He argues that God's communication with humanity, especially through the Scriptures, culminates in the person and work of Christ, as outlined in Hebrews 1 and John 1. Reeves emphasizes that true gospel preaching must focus on Christ as the fulfillment of all Scripture, presenting Him as the only way to salvation and the one for whom all men are called to trust. Specific references to Luke 24 illustrate how Jesus interpreted the entire Old Testament through His redemptive work. The practical significance of this message is rooted in the assurance that salvation is entirely through Christ's atonement, not through human works, which affirms the Reformed doctrine of salvation by grace alone through faith alone.

Key Quotes

“A gospel preacher cannot waste time talking about God's love, heaven and hell, and not bring out who Christ is, what he has done, and where he is right now.”

“The simple answer is a man sent of God will preach Christ Jesus the Lord and him crucified. That's the gospel in a nutshell.”

“The gospel is what God uses to express what his son has done. He went to the cross, he shed his blood, the perfect blood of Christ, to save his people.”

“With all the power in heaven and earth, can God lose anything that he's died for? If he died for you, he will not lose you.”

Sermon Transcript

Auto-generated transcript • May contain errors

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Before we look at our text in
Acts chapter 7, I'd like you to turn to Hebrews chapter 1.
You need to set a table. You need to lay out a couple
of things before we get to our point. In the book of Hebrews chapter
1, we see some very important words
to keep in mind. Hebrews chapter 1, we read in
verse 1, God, who at sundry times, different times, throughout time,
and in diverse manners through different ways, whether it be
visions or speaking to one's heart or just speaking to the
soul or the spirit of one, in diverse manners, spake in times
past unto the fathers by the prophets. Hath in these last
days, God, who at several times used to speak to them through
the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us. Now these last days were the
days from the moment Christ Jesus began his ministry on this earth
till now. Hath in these last days spoken
unto us by his son, by his son, whom he hath appointed heir of
all things, by whom he also made the world. That one, that one
that this is talking about, his son is the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, are you saying, John, that
God is talking to us right now through audible words? Are we
supposed to hear his voice? Folks, if you're hearing somebody
speak to you that you can't see, you need to talk to somebody
about that, okay? God does not come to us and talk
to us in a audible voice, like you hear me talking right now. He talks to us through his word. This is his word. He tells us
that. Turn over now, if you would, to the first chapter of John.
John chapter one, we're gonna see very, very clearly that this
is the word of God, and he speaks to us through this word. In the book of John chapter one, our Lord inspired the apostle
to write these words. In the beginning was the word. You don't need to turn back there,
but in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. That's
the Word. That's the Word of God being
preached right there. God created the heaven and the
earth. This is what it's talking about.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God. See
that? This Word has always been in
the heart of God. Everything that we read in these
scriptures about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has been
before the Word was ever even written. and before the world
was ever created. It says that he has loved us
with an eternal love. That means it goes back to before
anything was ever made, to as far as anything can ever be.
It continues on, it never stops. God's love has always been for
his people. His word has always been in him
and about him, for us, for whom he has loved. It was with God
and the word was God The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him, and without him was not anything
made that was made. And then over verse 14, we see
that very same word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus Christ, God Almighty in
the flesh, right there, the creator of everything that is. Well,
you say, well, now, wait a minute. God says he created everything.
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are one.
Three distinct persons, absolutely, but one. Christ says in his scriptures,
he says, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father. He
says I and my Father are one. We just saw where it declares
he created everything. The Word was made flesh, that's
Christ. Now one more if you would, just a couple of pages back to
the left, actually only one page. Just flip over one page to the
left there. You'll see yourself in Luke chapter 24. In Luke chapter 24, the Lord
had been walking with a couple of disciples. He had been buried. Christ had been hung on the cross,
killed, he was dead. He gave up the ghost. His body
had died. They took him and they put him
in the grave, rolled the rock across the grave, the stone across
the tomb. On the next morning, some folks
came by and the rock was moved aside. Guards were still there. They'd been there all night.
What? The rock is moved. And they looked in and there
was nothing there but the clothing that Christ had been wrapped
in, his burial clothing. It was nicely folded, nicely
folded there. And they're like, what happened
to him? Where'd he go? He had arisen. God cannot die. Christ in the flesh as 100% man
can die, but God cannot die. The one God in the spirit cannot
die, therefore he arose again from the dead. When he went into
that grave and he took all of our sins with him, all the ones
that we've committed, all the ones that we will commit to the
day he takes us out of this world. Isn't that good news? Isn't that
good news? I bring that, I make that a point
to say that because this message, is about the good news. Just like it was last week. Just
like it was Friday night. It's about the good news. He rose from the grave. He was
revealing himself to certain ones. Not everybody. When Christ
came back from the death, he did not reveal himself to the
world. When he was in the world preaching
and teaching about the merits of his righteousness, the righteousness
of his people in him, everybody saw him. He walked down the street,
everybody could see him. After he arose again, only certain
ones could see who he was. He only revealed himself to those
for whom he loved. And these two men were walking
along, they were all bummed out. They were completely bummed out,
because they thought this was gonna be the Christ, this was gonna
be our Savior. But he's dead. So how can he be our Savior?
And he's walking along with them, and they're talking, and he tells
them, he says, well, let's just see this in verse 25, it says,
O fools and slow of heart to believe, all the prophets have
spoken. Did you catch that? What are
the prophets? Moses and everything else, all
the way up until the book of Matthew. That's the prophets. Oh, fools and slow of heart to
believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ
to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory? Everybody who talked about God
talked about Christ coming to this world, dying for the sins
of his people. Folks, people in the Old Testament
were saved exactly how you and I were. Christ, Christ alone,
Abraham, he was saved by Christ. He believed God's promises, just
as you and I look back and see the promises of God now, we believe
him, Abraham believed the same thing. Did he do it perfectly? Absolutely not, neither do you
or I, neither do you or I. And then he says in verse 27,
this is what I wanted to turn over here for, and beginning
at Moses, and all the prophets. Now here Christ is, he's walking
along, he's talking to these two men, they're complaining
about it, and he says, oh, you fools, slow to heart to believe. And beginning at Moses, and all
the prophets, he, our Savior, expounded. That word means explain.
Think about that. The Old Testament. There's a
whole lot of the Old Testament. They had the Old Testament, it
was all done, it was completed. It had been done for, I think,
about 400 years, something like that. It was all written, it
was all complete. He expounded from the moment
of Moses in the beginning God created all the way to the end
of Malachi. Walking down the road with these
men, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things
concerning himself. Now this is important. I want
you to understand what it is that Christ talked about when
he walked this earth. Look over at verses 44 and 47. This is what Christ sent out
his disciples to talk about. Verse 44, he writes these words. He says, and he said unto them,
these are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with
you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written
of the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning
me. Then he opened their understanding
that they might understand the scriptures. And he said unto
them, thus it is written, And thus it is behooved Christ to
suffer and to rise from the dead the third day. You see the subject
that he's talking about here? You see, what was that subject?
That Christ should suffer and rise from the dead the third
day. And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached
in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. The subject
we've just seen in these three sections of scripture that we
looked at is all about Christ. It's all about Christ, everything. Our Lord said in John chapter
five, he says these words in verse 39, he says, search the
scriptures. Search the scriptures. Look through all of them, all
you want. For in them you think ye have eternal life. Yes, you
do. You do. Eternal life is right
here in the scriptures. And those words are they that
which testify, confess of me, he says. John, you're making
a whole lot of something in here. What's going on? I was asked
this week to do something. Now before I say that, let me
just ask you this. Have you ever listened to a message of a preacher? or read something that somebody
maybe asked you to read. You picked up a book and said,
oh, look at there, that's a good, interesting title. Let me read
this. I'm interested, I wanna read
this. Let me look at it. And then after you're done reading,
you're sitting there wondering, is this guy preaching the gospel?
Is this guy supposed to be some kind of religious guru? Did I
hear, is he preaching the gospel, this guy that I'm listening to
with my ears? It sounds right. It sounds like it might be right.
He's talking about words from this book. He's talking about
nice things. God loves his people. He said
that several times in his message. He talks about everybody being
sinners and deserving damnation. Is he talking about the gospel? He brings out words of the Bible
He brings out godly instructions like prayer, but something's
missing. I don't know what, I can't quite
put my finger on it. What is this guy talking about
up there that I can't quite put my finger on? I got it. I know what it is. The guy didn't talk about anything
that gives me any hope. Everything he talked about was
something I should be doing. How can I better myself by doing
this? How can I put away that old feelings
of sinfulness that I had? How can I do this? How can I
do something? Oh, they mentioned the word of
the love of God several times. They may even mention Christ,
as in, I do this in the name of. But they never mention Christ. I was asked to listen to a message
earlier this week from a man who calls himself a gospel preacher. And I listened to two messages
just to make sure that I wasn't being judgmental. God tells us,
he tells you and I, here's some instructional godliness, here's
some practical godliness for it, he tells us To discern the
spirits. Test them. To be the brilliance,
first off, go and check and make sure whoever's standing in the
pulpit, he's talking about this God of the scriptures, all of
the scriptures. Not someone who's taking something here, like John
3.16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
son. Not someone who just takes that and makes it whatever they
want of it. I gotta be honest with you folks,
I just about couldn't get through the second message. He mentioned
the name of Christ twice in the whole message. And both times
it was, I did this in the name of Jesus. I did this. You tell me what
hope is in that. Do you have that kind of hope?
Is there hope in you, in something that you do? What a false hope
you have. I was given some literature.
I'm kind of, I was really kind of hoping the person would be
here today. They sent me some, several pages. How to pray, how the prayer of
life of Jesus was. And that's two pages there. Challenge
of wavering faith. That's two pages there. These
are each service. The power of godly meditation.
Godly meditation on courage. Five different, six different
messages. They're guidance through godly meditation. This is by a man that if I mentioned
his name, everybody here would go, I've heard of him. Some of
his stuff's pretty good. I've heard of him. I've listened
to several of his messages that were pretty good. This isn't worth the paper it's
on. Not once in any of this is Christ mentioned. Where was the hope? Where was Christ? In your handout, in your bulletin,
I wrote an article. I had to send this article to
a brother in Christ to say, hey, did I go overboard here? Did
I go out too far in this? Read with me if you would. How
can one determine, first off the title is just what is gospel
preaching? How can one determine a gospel
preacher from someone who just talks? The simple answer, the
simplest answer is a man sent of God will preach Christ Jesus
the Lord and him crucified. That's the gospel in a nutshell.
A gospel preacher cannot waste time talking about God's love,
heaven and hell, and not bring out who Christ is, what he has
done, and where he is right now. If you speak of God's love and
leave out what he did in sending his son to die for those he loves,
you have missed the good news. You have missed the gospel and
you are not a gospel preacher. Every word that came from the
greatest gospel preacher that walked this earth, You know who
that is? Jesus Christ. What did we just
look at? Did we not just look at several
verses? What was the message? Jesus Christ. Every word that came from the
greatest gospel preacher to ever walk this earth was the gospel
message. Christ expounded in all the scriptures
and things concerning himself, as we read in Luke 24. You might
ask, well, John, wait a minute. Wait a minute, there's so much
more in the Bible. I've been asked this question. I've been
approached this very statement. John, there's so much more. There's
so much more in the Bible. There's so much good stuff for
us to learn, for us to be taught in instructions of Christ. What
about all that? Did you know? that there's Christ
and him crucified in every instruction God gives us in the Bible? What? What? What did I write next? Not one
thing that my God has told me to do can I do in an acceptable
way. You might think you can do something
acceptable of God in your own way, Not one thing, not one instruction
God has given me can I do that he would accept. Because there's
sin in everything that I do. I'm full of sin throughout this
body. I need something perfect to be
before God. I need a savior. That's the gospel
in God's instructions to us. There are those who are gonna
say, John, You're encouraging people to sin, just live their
lives sinfully. No, I'm not. I am not. Not at all. God's law is great. It's good. Everything about God's
instructions is good. Go out and be holy for your God
is holy. But don't think you can do it
good enough for God to accept it. Because then your pride starts
buffing up. See how good I am? See what I've
done right? We're shaking our head yes and
right, because we've done that, haven't we, Pauly? We know. We
know. You might ask, what about all
the instructions? Oh, I read that part. Back on the rest of
it here. The gospel in the instructions is, my Lord fulfilled it all. Jesus paid it all, all to him
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
he washed it white as snow. What is a true gospel preacher?
He is one whom God has been gracious to, one who knows the experience
of divine grace, one who can talk nothing save Jesus Christ
and his Savior. I know a man and you know a man
by the name of Gene Harmon who preaches in his prayers. Every
prayer that man does. We were sitting there, we were
having pizza at his daughter's house in Tennessee one time.
And we're sitting there, and I'm just saying, okay, thank
the Lord for the food, here we go. He preached the gospel in about
two seconds. It was wonderful. God help me
to use that man as my example. Gospel preachers don't preach
something one day and then preach the gospel the next day. Practical godliness is important. It's important for you to walk
according to God's word as best you can. But that's not what
saves you. Christ Jesus is who saves us. That may be foolishness to you,
but to us who know the Lord of glory, we echo the words of Paul,
for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power
of God unto salvation. to everyone that believe it.
That's Romans 1, verse 16. Where was the gospel in those
messages? It wasn't there. It was all about what you should
be doing to make your walk with God better. Folks, you know what
to do. What? You do. You do. This young man sitting
right here knows right from wrong. I guarantee you he does. He knows when he's doing something
wrong, and he knows when he's doing something right. That's practical godliness. When I came here, when the Lord
put me in the position of being the pastor, you folks who were
here, you'll remember what was my words to you. I said, I'm
not coming here to teach you how to walk with God. You already
know. If you want help looking into God's
word to see something to answer a question, I'll be happy to
do that, but that's not what my job is. My job is to teach and
preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's what
saves God's people. That's what brings God's people
out of darkness. That's what feeds God's people
every time we hear it. We feast on our Savior. We feast
on what he's done for us. We feast on where he is right
now. It's all about him or it's not, it's nothing. It's vanity. That's what King Solomon said.
Everything in the flesh is vanity. Look over at John chapter three.
We just, back over to the right this time. John chapter three.
In verse 14, we read this. After speaking with a man by
the name of Nicodemus, a ruler, a leader, after speaking to him
and telling him that we must be born again, the natural man
cannot accept God. We must be born of water and
of the spirit. And Nicodemus talks with the Lord. He goes
on, he says, art thou a master of Israel? In verse 10, verily
I say unto thee, we speak that we do not know. We speak that
we do know and testify that we have seen. If I have told you
earthly things and you believe not, how shall you believe if
I tell you the things of heaven? And then he says this, and no
man hath ascended up into heaven, but he that cometh down from
heaven, even the son of man, which is in heaven, and as Moses
lifted up. Here we are, we're back to that
subject again. What is a gospel preacher? Was
Moses a gospel preacher? Did he preach practical godliness?
Absolutely he did. What did you remember for here?
For raising up Christ. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
Is that not the gospel? Is that not what a poor sinner
needs to hear? My goodness, if you want to call
it that. I don't need to tell you what
I do for goodness for people. My Lord knows what I do. And if I was to tell you, all
it would be doing was bragging about this flesh. But if I trust in what I do,
then there's no room for me to trust in the only one I can trust
in. Whatever I do in this physical body, Whether it be go down and
feed the homeless down at the Kossuth kitchens,
no matter what it be. Whether I go down here where
the homeless camp is and give them some money. Or whether somebody
comes to the door and says, yeah, I'll help you out as much as
I can. Or go over and volunteer to help out an elderly person
that may need help. Whatever the goodness is, may
it be from God and not from me. may be a glory to him and not
to me. Folks, I am bitten. I am bitten by those
serpents that God sent out into the camp. This flesh of mine
is gonna die. The poison of it is in my blood. It reaches out to every point
of my body. Every drop of my soul is plagued
by my sin. I have no help or no hope in
this flesh. Is there anything, anyone that
I can look to? I need a savior. Do you? I don't seek to hear about how
good I am or how good I can be. That's all the religious world
is all about today. They teach and preach that If you'll stop smoking, you'll
be much better. Well, that's true. But that doesn't
save you. You're still going to die. You're
still going to go through that doormark death at some point.
Some of us live to our inner 90s or 100s, some less. But you're
still going to die. The poison goes from the top
of our heads all the way to our feet. That's sin. We do the things that we do wrong
because we are sinners. I don't want to hear from somebody
who all they does is tell me I can be better. I listened to
that. I almost said the bad word. I
listened to that stuff when I was in Amway. I thought I could sell
anything. I was able to buy a Cadillac
on credit in 1962. This is 1990. So it was pretty
old. My whole point to that was I
never could understand what those people were talking about in
making myself better. I couldn't sell anything. It
never helped me at all. Some people are helped quite
a bit by it, you know. There's a guy who gets up on
stage in front of thousands. He's got like five jets. And
he walks back and forth with his little thing sticking out
of his ear coming out of his mouth. He said, you can do it. Come on,
everybody. Get pumped up. Saturday Night
Live did a poof on that. They had Arnold Schwarzenegger
and Martin Short standing there. They were all muscled up. And
they were, we can pump you up. That's what religion has become.
You can be better. Just come down to the front of
the aisle. You can be better. Get in the
tub back here and get some, get wet. I don't need to hear that. I need to hear about somebody
who's done it perfectly for me. Somebody who's already accomplished
a righteousness that I can't have in my flesh. Somebody who
has loved me so much that he would give himself, he would
die for me. Do you know there is one who
died for his people? Are you one of his people? Do
you belong to him? There ought to be a smile on
everybody's face who belong to him right now. Yes, I do! And he died for me too, John!
Paul wrote this. A man that God inspired to write
all these books in the New Testament. More books than any other writer.
He said to the Romans in chapter 7, verse 18, he says, for I know
that in me, in him, right then and there, when you pen those
words down on paper, he says, I know that in me there is, that
is, in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present
with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. In
this flesh, I carry the mark of the beast. You know what that
is? Six, six, six. Is it tattooed on you somewhere,
John? No. You know what the mark of the
beast is? Six, six, six. God the Father. Perfect. Number seven. Number seven is
a symbol for perfection. God created the earth in seven
days. There were seven days in a week. The number seven's perfection. God the Father, seven. God the Son, seven. God the Spirit,
seven. John Reeves, six, six, six, short
of glory. No matter how good I can act in
the flesh, I'm always gonna come up short. Because I'm not perfect
like my God is. 666 is the number short of perfection.
Anything I do in the flesh will be short of his perfection. And
folks, God requires perfection. A gospel preacher speaks of the
only perfection that ever walked this earth. And who is that?
Jesus Christ, the Lord, the son of the living God. You
see, folks, the gospel is Jesus Christ. Christ sent his son to
be our propitiation, our payment. If he gave his only begotten
son for our cause, how shall he not give us everything else? Our God requires perfection,
and a gospel preacher speaks of the only perfection that ever
walked this earth, his Son, the living God. Consider with me,
if you would, this example. Turn over to Luke chapter 4 for
just a moment. Back again to Luke, and this
time chapter 4. Consider with me the example
here. It'll only be another moment. Over in Luke chapter 4, look
at verses 16 through 21, if you would, with me. In verse 16 of
Luke chapter four we read, and he came to Nazareth where he
had been brought up and as his custom was. Did you catch that? As his custom
was. That means he did it on a regular
basis. There was a certain time, a certain time every time that
Christ would do this one thing whenever it was appropriate.
Whenever they were gathering in the synagogue, it was time
Christ would come, according to his custom wise. He went into
the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up for a reading.
And there was delivered unto him a book of the prophet Isaiah,
and when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was
written, and listen to the words that we read in Isaiah 53. The
spirit of the Lord is upon me, on Christ. The Spirit of God
is upon him because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the
poor. He hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach
the acceptable year. the Lord. He then closed the
book and he gave it again unto the minister and he sat down
and all the eyes, the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue
were fastened on him and he began to say unto them, this day, that
very day, that very day that our Lord read those words, he
says, right now, this day, this scripture, Christ right there. Now if you
would turn back to Acts chapter 17. Allow me to make my title and
a couple of closing comments. Christ preached himself in fulfilling
the words of Moses. Fulfilling the words of Moses
and all the prophets. Everything in God's word points
to him. And God's messengers, gospel
preachers, do the same. Not once, but every single time. You're not gonna hear, I pray,
Lord willing, anything from me. 23 years I sat in, or 20 years
I sat in the ministry of Gene Harmon, not once did I hear anything
else. It was always Christ and Him
crucified. That's what fed the soul of this
sinner. That's what kept, by the power of God, the soul of
this dead sinner. Look here with me at Acts chapter
17. Paul writes, now when they had
passed through Amphibolus, and I know I don't pronounce these
names right, Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was
the synagogue of the Jews, and Paul, as his manner was, that's
the same word, It means exactly the same thing. It's actually,
I'm sorry, I said that incorrectly. It's not the same word. It's
a different word, but it has the exact same meaning. As his manner was. What was his
manner? To come into the synagogue. But look, it goes on to tell
us, was, as his manner was, he went in unto them, and the three,
and three Sabbath days, three Sabbath days, reasoned, conversed,
discussed, with them out of the scriptures, opening and alleging
that Christ must, needs, have, suffered, and risen again from
the dead, and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is the
Messiah, the Christ, the Savior. Paul went in in what was his
manner? To preach Christ. I wish to know
nothing of you save Christ and Him crucified. The gospel message
is the power of God unto salvation. It's the message that keeps us. Actually, it's the message that
calls us. It's a message that keeps us.
Look back at chapter 16 on the page right beside you there.
Look at verses 25 through 32. And at midnight, Paul and Silas
prayed. and they sang praises unto God,
and the prisoners heard them. And suddenly, there was a great
multitude, or suddenly, there was a great earthquake, so that
the foundations of the prison were shaken, and immediately,
all the doors were opened, and everyone's bands were loose.
And the keeper of the prison, now, you gotta remember something.
Back in those days, you know, over here in Folsom, these guys
ain't gotta worry about it. But back in those days, if somebody
got out, if you lost one of your prisoners, you died. You usually
lost your head. They didn't lose prisoners back
in those days. That's all there was to it. Maybe
one guy did, but it only took one's head to roll down the plank
before everybody else did. No, I'm not going to lose anybody.
No. And the keeper of the prison,
awaking out of his sleep and seeing the prison doors open,
he drew out his sword and would have killed himself. supposing
that the prisoners have been fled. But Paul cried out, he
cried with a loud voice saying, do thyself no harm for we are
all here. Then verse 29, then he called
for a light and he sprang in, he came trembling and fell down
before Paul and Silas and he brought them out and said, sirs,
what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe on the
Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved in thy house. And they
said, believe, or he said, believe, and I have. And then here, look
at verse 32. And they spake unto him the word
of the Lord, and to all that were in his house. They spake
the word of the Lord. As his manner was, is the title for
this message. As his manner was. The gospel
is what God uses to save his chosen people. The gospel is
what the spirit uses to reveal who Christ Jesus is. In the gospel,
you must bring out that Christ is God in the flesh. 100% flesh,
100% Savior, 100% God, divine God. It's the gospel that God
uses to express what his son has done. He went to the cross,
he shed his blood, the perfect blood of Christ, to save his
people. Not that they might be saved,
but that they will be saved. The gospel is what God uses to
tell us where he is right now. Death could not hold him. He's
God Almighty in the flesh. He arose himself from the dead,
and God has him sitting at the right hand right now, the right
hand of all power. All power in heaven, in earth,
and under the earth belong to our Savior. With all the power
in heaven and earth, can God lose anything that he's died
for? If he died for you, he will not lose you. That gives this
poor sinner a whole lot of peace. Because it doesn't take me long
to get outside that door and mess it up again. That's why
I got no confidence in the flesh. That's why I don't need to hear
about somebody who can tell me what to do. I need to hear about
the one who has done it. Is practical godliness important?
Absolutely. Don't get me wrong. Don't be
like those who say, John, you're teaching, there is no law. You
can go out and do whatever you want. That is not true. If you
believe that, if you think that, then you don't have any idea
what the grace of God is. The grace of God is that he first
loved me, and because of that, I love him and want to do his
will. We come together to search God's
word for instruction every Friday night. We come again at 10 o'clock
on Sunday mornings. Yet practical godliness alone
is one thing. If all this guy does is talk
about what you can do, if you just do this, he's only talking
about your works. That's not gospel preaching. Without the gospel, then all
it is is man's works. There is no satisfaction in my
walk with God. Satisfaction with God is only
in my substitute, Christ Jesus the Lord. Listen to the words
of Matthew chapter 17, verse 5. While he yet spake, behold, A
bright cloud overshadowed them. Christ and his couple of disciples
were on the Mount of Transfiguration. They saw the glory of God in
the transformation of Christ. He shined. The light of his glory
shined forth. They wanted to make Moses and
Elijah were there, and they wanted to make three tributes, three,
they wanted to build three altars to commemorate the three of them.
And then all of a sudden, Moses and Elijah were gone, and all
there was was Christ and a cloud over his head. Listen to the
words of God that came from the sky. Behold, a voice out of the
cloud which said, this, speaking to the one who stood right before
them, the only one left, this, is my beloved son, in whom I
am well pleased. Hear ye him. Amen. I pray the Lord bless you all
with that.

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Joshua

Joshua

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