I've noticed that I don't move
as fast as I used to. I don't know if any of y'all
have that problem. But I don't guess it's a problem,
because it's better to move slowly than not move at all. We've been looking in 1 John,
Chapter 2, of course, John begins this chapter with this declaration, my little children,
these things write I unto you that ye sin not. That's a very simple thing to
say, isn't it? Tell somebody don't sin. Very good advice. But thankfully, that's not all
that he says, because if that was all that he said, we would
be most miserable people. Because there's not a man on
the earth that sinneth not. In fact, he said in the last verse
of the chapter before, if we say that we have not sinned,
We make him a liar and his word is not in us. Sin not. But if any man sin,
we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And that's our hope today. That's
our only hope. You know, if we should, a lot
of people think that they are going to come into the presence
of the Lord because they have avoided this sin or that sin. In fact, most people, I would
dare to say, they look at the Ten Commandments and they think
to themselves, well, I've done pretty good. You know, I've not continually done all these
things. I might have done all of them
but you know I've quit and I'm doing better now and I'm sure
that everything's all right between me and the Lord. It's the way
a lot of people think. But the Ten Commandments are
not given. The law of God, of course, the law of God encompasses
more than the Ten Commandments, but the Ten Commandments are
generally what people think of when they think of the law. And sadly, most people think
of the law as a checklist that they go down and they see how
they're doing. But The Lord takes that word, that
law, and when he is pleased to use it to show a man what the
law is in contrast to what he is by nature, then that man is slain before him. Have you ever
been slain by the law? To be slain by the law is to
look at the law and realize what a miserable failure you are.
How far from God you are. How without any help or hope
you are. And until a man's brought to
that place, he'll never be brought to a place of calling out to
the Lord to help him. Because as long as a man thinks
he has some ability to help himself, he will. He'll keep going down
that road. But in the mercy of God, he's
pleased to teach his people that they are sinners. And that's the most, that's the
most blessed state that a man can bring the Lord, that the
Lord can bring a man into. is to know himself to be a sinner.
A lot of people think that that's the worst place he could be.
You know, we're supposed to try to lift folks up, make everybody
feel good. But the most blessed place the
Lord has ever brought a man is to bring him to the place where
he knows himself to be a sinner. Greatest blessing that David
ever received in his life. was when Nathan came to him in
the power of the Spirit of God and he said, Thou art the man. And David was slain that day
because he knew it was true. He knew he didn't have a leg
to stand on. And the Lord showed David what he was. was a man who was greatly blessed,
a strong man, a man who was resolute in his desire to be an obedient
follower of Christ. I mean, when Peter declared that
he would follow the Lord unto death, he meant that. With every
fiber of his being, He believed that he would stand with the
Lord because he wanted to stand with the Lord. And yet the greatest blessing
that ever came into Peter's life was when the Lord said, Peter,
Satan hath desired to have thee to sift thee as wheat, but I
have prayed for thee. that thy faith fail not. And Peter didn't really, he didn't
believe that was gonna, he didn't believe what the Lord said. The
Lord said, you're gonna deny me three times, Peter. He's thinking, it's my, no, all
these other guys might, but not me. But you see, Peter was blessed
by Almighty God to be shown what he was by nature. And when he
was, The Lord said to him, he said, and when thou art converted. See, most people would, you know,
when you talk about conversion, they would have said, well, all
the disciples were converted when they started following Christ.
But none of them were. Because none of them had any
idea who Christ was. Do you realize that? I mean,
they walked with him every day. And they said things such as
Peter said, thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. They
didn't know what he was. They didn't understand that.
They had one thing in their mind as to what that meant. But you see, the Lord was faithful
to his children. He didn't cast them off. He should
have many times, shouldn't he? When he said, oh, faithless generation. You don't believe what I'm telling
you. I mean, you've seen me feed the 5,000. You've seen me feed
the 3,000. You've seen me raise the dead.
You've seen me do all these things. And yet, Philip says, Lord, show us the Father and it will
suffice us. He said, Philip, have I been
so long time with you? Have I walked with you every
day? Have you seen me reason with the Pharisees and show them
how far from God they are? Have you seen me raise Lazarus
from the dead? Have you seen me, as I said,
which is easier to say to a man, thy sins are forgiven, or rise
up and walk? Philip, is it really possible that I
have walked with you all this time and you have seen these
things? and you have not known me. He
said, Philip, he that has seen me has seen the Father. Oh, what a glorious thing. Now,
Philip didn't at that point in time know, still know this. The time would come when he would.
Peter, for all that he knew, and all he had thought, I mean
how, I think often, How ashamed Peter must have been when the
Lord was arisen from the dead. And of course, in the Grace Gazette,
I wrote something about that this week. But as he went from being a boastful
man to denying the Lord, and then coming face to face with
the Lord. Because evidently, according
to what the scripture says, of course Mary was the first one
that he appeared to, but Peter was the first of the disciples
to whom the Lord was pleased to reveal himself after his resurrection. Now I don't know when that is.
The scripture doesn't specifically tell us, but it does say he was
seen of Cephas. That's the name the Lord gave
to Peter. He said, thou art cephas, thou
art of stone. And so Peter, I'm sure that each
time the Lord came to him, now he was delighted, I'm sure, to
see the Lord, but yet how ashamed he was because He had to see his sin
was ever in his mind. And whenever the Lord came to
him on the seashore when he appeared to the disciples who were fishing
and he called, he said to them, come and dine. And this is one
of the most beautiful scenes in the scripture to me as I think
of it in my mind of how they had toiled all the night, hadn't
caught any fish. And the Lord was on that seashore
watching. I don't know how long he was
there. Probably from the beginning. And all the while they toiled,
he had prepared for them a fire and a meal. with fish. And he told them come and dine. And while he was there, during
that period of time, he said to Peter, Peter, love this thou
me. Peter was ashamed. He knew he couldn't boastfully
say, yes, Lord, I love you. Because he knew what he was.
He knew what he'd done. The Lord didn't leave him there.
He said, Peter, love this thou me. And Peter reluctantly said,
Lord, you know that I love you. Peter, love this thou me. Yea, Lord. feed my sheep. And the Lord took a man who had
denied that he even knew the Lord, cursed, was angry that
someone was accusing him of following the Lord because he was fearful. And yet on the day of Pentecost. He stood
before a crowd of thousands. Three thousand were converted
that day, saved, called upon the name of the Lord. So I don't
know how many were there. Ten, twenty thousand, I don't
know. But Peter boldly stood up in front of all of these people
and he declared who Jesus Christ is. How could something like
that happen? Except that the Lord in his mercy
changes a man's heart. Cleanses him of his sin. Because
you see, Peter was not ashamed. He boldly declared who Christ
is. Because now you see, Now that
Peter that the Lord brought down, he brought up. And he doubtlessly
and with a vigor in his heart declared his love for Jesus Christ. And so it is that the Lord does
that. And he gives to every man the measure of faith that pleases
him. Not all men are Peter. Some are Thomas. I won't believe
unless I can put my hand in his hand and in his side. Yet the Lord is faithful. John writing here says, I write
unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for
his name's sake. That's who he started off writing
to, wasn't it? My little children. Because you
see, all of God's people are his little children. But then
here, he makes a distinction between three groups of people. He says, I write unto you, little
children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake.
Because see, that's the place that we must begin, as little children. I mean, if
by the grace of God, that's the first place he brings us, is
it not? To believe that Jesus Christ is the Savior of sinners. man can't enter the kingdom of
God if he does not believe that. He is the savior of sinners.
I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven
you. That's the basic, the basic truth. Now let a man not be lifted
up with pride and think that he's ever gonna get past that,
because that's the place we always come back to. That's that place
we can't move away from. We're never going to get too
big for our britches because the whole basis of why we are
called to walk with Christ is because he has forgiven our sin. We can't ever forget that. You
know some people say, well you know we need to move on from
that. No. If you ever move on from
that, you've gone too far. You need to come back, my little
children. I write unto you because your
sins are forgiven for his name's sake, not for your sake. See,
a lot of people think the Lord saves them for their sake. He
saves his people for his sake. because he loves them. He loved
them before the foundation of the world. He was given his people chosen
in Christ before the foundation of the world and he has loved
them with an everlasting love and he will lose none. They belong
to him. And for his name's sake, for
his glory, He came into the world to save his people from their
sins, and he has done that. He says, I write unto you, fathers,
because ye have known him that is from the beginning. Fathers,
fathers are those who have gained some understanding. Hopefully, I don't know, I'm
a father and I don't know how much understanding I have, but
I have a little bit, I think. But he says here, I write unto
you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. See, there is an understanding.
When a man comes to Christ, he doesn't know a whole lot about
him, does he? And it's not necessary. I mean, when Bartimaeus was sitting
by the highway side, he didn't know a lot about the Lord. When
the woman that was with the issue of blood came up and touched
the hem of his garment, she didn't know a whole lot about him. But it wasn't necessary. But
there he is, you see, as the Lord is pleased to teach his
people. and lead them and give us understanding, we come to
the place that we know Him, the scripture says, that is from
the beginning. Now what does that tell us? If we know Him that is from the
beginning, what does the scripture say? In the beginning, God created
the heavens and the earth. Now there's only one beginning,
And if we know Him that is from the beginning, we know Him to
be the absolute true God who made the world. Scripture says
He made the world by His own hands. We have known Him that
is from the beginning. We didn't know that to start
with. Wasn't necessary for us to know that to start with. But
as the Lord teaches us who He is, we learn that, do we not?
and we rejoice. Just like the disciples, they
didn't know who he was. The Lord said, Philip, don't
you know me? If you've seen me, you've seen
the Father. Dear brethren, we rejoice because
we have known him that is from the beginning. He is the true
and the living God beside whom there is none else. He says,
I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the
wicked one. And there's a work of God in
the sons of God, regardless of their age, that he works in them
both the will and the do of his good pleasure to give them a
desire to stand with him, to walk with him. to be what he
has called us to be. We've overcome the wicked one.
Now, we overcome the wicked one because of Christ. We don't think
that we do it by ourself, but whenever we're enabled to walk
in those things that he has taught us to walk in, what a privilege
that is. We don't look at it and say,
oh, look what we've done, but we rejoice in the word of God. He said, if a man keeps the law
of God, he's a child of God. What does that mean? He delights
in it. It's that thing that he desires to walk in. Now, surely
not perfectly, but absolutely. You have overcome the wicked
one. I write unto you, little children, because ye have known
the father. Because you see, even the little
children know who their father is. Even the little children
run to him for help in time of trouble. I write, I have written
unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that's from the
beginning. You've known even more than simply
that he is your father. Once again, you've known him
that's from the beginning. He is the true and living God.
I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and
the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked
one. How do we overcome the wicked
one? by the Word of God abiding in
us. How does the Word of God abide in us? Is there something
you can do to cause that to happen? I mean, have you ever made the
Word of God abide in you? None, but the Spirit of God does. He works in us, both willing
to do of his good pleasure. He applies that, as David said,
thy word if I hid in my heart that I might not sin against
thee. Now David wasn't speaking about something he did in his
own power, but he's talking about what the Word of God, the power
of the Word of God in the people of God is. And that's what the
Lord is doing. And then he says this, love not
the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any
man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that's in the world,
the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life,
is not of the Father, but is of the world. See, these things
are not the work of God in us. These things are what we are
by nature. See, you don't ever have to tell
a man to love the world because he's born into the world loving
the world. We don't love anything else but
the world until such time as the Lord is pleased to change
us. Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of
God. But he says, love not the world, neither the things that
are in the world because This is not what we've been called
to do. This world's not our home. We're passing through it. We're
strangers and sojourners in this world. This world's not our home.
We don't embrace it. For all that's in the world,
the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of
life, that's pretty much what we are by nature. The world passeth
away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God
abideth forever. How does a man do the will of
God? except, you know, on the one hand, a man can't escape
the will of God. That's what Paul's argument was
in the ninth chapter of Romans, when he said, you know, men say,
well, if God's absolutely sovereign, then what can we do about it?
Everybody's doing the will of God. Well, Paul said, nay, but
O man, who art thou that replies against God? Why would you use
an excuse? You know, why would you say,
to the Lord that I'm not guilty. Oh, that we might know of a certainty
that we are guilty before God. But yet, by the grace of God,
we do the will of God because he works in us to will and do
of his good pleasure. Not because we by nature decide
to. A lot of folks think they decide
to do the will of God. Well, you know, I was a drunkard,
I was all these different things, and I just decided one day I
was gonna straighten up. And I did. No, that's not it. Because if a man straightens
himself up, he can crooked himself up the same way. But you see,
when God straightens a man up, he'll be straight. because that's
the work of the Spirit of God, amen. And so it is that we're
exhorted to love not the world because don't love the things
that you love by nature. Don't sin. But if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the Father. See, the Lord knows what we are.
He knows that we're dust. When he came to his disciples,
after he had asked them to pray with him. And he came back and
they were asleep. He could have just cast them
off and said, well, y'all ain't got no time with you or whatever. But he knew what they were. He
said, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Dear brethren,
that's what we are by nature, is weak and sinful flesh. and
we'll fall a thousand times, we'll turn away and walk no more
with the Lord, if left to ourself. But by the grace of God, he will
keep his people from falling. And that's a glorious promise.
Because if it weren't so, we would have no hope whatsoever.
So may the Lord give us a mind and heart to trust him, call
upon him daily. because that's what he does in
his people.