In the book of First Timothy,
chapter one, as we continue through this, the Apostle Paul wrote,
and as you know, Timothy was in Ephesus, the church at Ephesus,
and Paul had gone away, and he wrote this epistle and the second
epistle to Timothy, instructing him and encouraging him in the
ministry to this church, this group body of believers in Ephesus. And as you know, the Apostle
Paul, he had pointed out that false teachers had subtly crept
into the church. Now that's common. Don't ever think you're immune
to that. Because you have to be on your toes. You have to
be discerners. And I often tell people that
when you hear a preacher, me or whoever, Listen critically. And by critically, I don't mean
listen to find fault. That's not a way to listen. If
you're just listening to find fault, you'll find it, because
we're human. But listen to make sure that
what they're saying is according to the scripture. And that's
a command from God. 1 John 4, test the spirits. That's talking about preachers.
who come claiming to preach the word of God. So that if I say
something that's contrary to the word of God, then you need
to come and talk to me, first privately, and if that doesn't
work, then we do what the scripture says to do. Now I'm not talking
about non-essential things that even believers disagree on. Because
I may have a particular verse that I think says one thing,
you may think it says another, but you know what the old adage
there is, we're either both, one's right and one's wrong or
we're both wrong. You know, you can look at it that way. Now,
if I hold a view of any scripture that denies, now listen to this,
that denies or challenges or confuses the gospel, now that's
different. And that's what's happening here
in 1 Timothy. And it had to do with false preachers
who were Jews who claimed to believe Christ, claimed to be
Christian, but they were perverting the law. They were using the
law unlawfully. Look at verse eight. But we know
that the law is good if a man use it lawfully, rightly. Now, what law is he talking about?
Well, I've often told you that anything God says is law. God
doesn't make suggestions. Christ, when he addressed his
disciples, and when he addresses the New Testament church in these
epistles, when he says love one another, that's not a suggestion.
That has the force of law, not legalism now. Don't always equate
law with legalism. Most of the time, when it comes
to unbelievers, you can do that. And I'll show you why. But just
because a man says law, you know, you all with your children, raising
your children, did you ever have to lay down the law? You weren't doing that legally,
you were doing it out of love. Did you ever tell them what I
say goes? They say, why dad, why mom? Because
I said so. That's the law, all right? And
there is a law of love, but we don't ever look at any law from
God as being a way of salvation. Do you understand that? We don't
look at anything that God says by way of commandment as a means
of our sanctification. I was reading in a friend of
ours, Brother Scott Price, he wrote a little thing, he says,
if grace is not good enough for you, the law won't help you. And that's so true. The name of this, of our media
ministry, Reign of Grace, came from Romans 5.21. And that says, as sin hath reigned
unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto
eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. And then you can think
of, I've got it cited, just the reference, Romans 10, 4, twice
in this lesson. And what does that say? For Christ
is the end of the law, that word end means perfection, fulfillment,
finishing, completion. You can put all those words there.
Christ is the finishing, the perfection, the completion of
the law, precept and penalty under righteousness for righteousness
to everyone that believeth. Now your believing doesn't make
you righteous. Do you know you can turn faith,
a wrong view of faith into legalism? Because if salvation, now listen
to him, if salvation is conditioned on you in any way, to any degree,
at any stage, under that kind of system, you're
either gonna be under the woe of despair because you're gonna
think, I haven't done enough. Think about it. Or you're gonna
be self-righteously proud. I've done enough. Like the old
Pharisee, we talked about that last night. Thank God I'm not
like other men. I've done this, I've done that. And somebody says, well, have
you done enough? And I always ask them this. I
say, well, what is enough? The only enough, in God's eyes,
is the perfection of righteousness that can only be found in Christ. And that's it. Now does that
mean we should give up and just throw caution to the wind and
live like idiots? No. No, we should do our best
to be the best we can be in every area of life to the praise of
the glory of His grace, not trying to earn our way into His favor,
but because He's freely and fully given us everything that He has
in Christ. And we didn't deserve one thing,
or we didn't earn one thing. Think about that. Isn't that
enough to cause you to thank the Lord? Is that article I wrote,
Thank You, Lord, is that in today's bulletin? Or is that last week? I get confused. Today. And I got to thinking about this
last week. Isn't it awful that I have to
remind myself to do this? But it's true. And that's the
flesh. Thank you, Lord, for saving my soul. Thank you, Lord, for
making me whole. Thank you, Lord, for giving to
me thy great salvation, so rich and so free. Well, okay, now,
if we cannot be saved by the law, which we can't, if we cannot
be made holy by the law, see, God makes us holy. He sets us
apart. Law keeping does it. Because
you look at an individual out here who's like a false preacher,
for example, or a false Christian, and they're trying to keep the
law, trying to do the best they can. Well, you should too. But
that's not what sets you apart. What sets you apart is the motive
of the mind and the heart, which is grace and love and gratitude.
So he says the law is good, Whenever people pervert the law, and you
know Israel did that. You can read this, I've got a
citation for Romans 9.31 through 10.4. You remember in Romans
9.31, that's where Paul said that Israel sought after righteousness,
but they did not attain it. Why? Because they sought it by
the works of the law and not by faith. Well, what is it to
seek righteousness by faith? It's to seek it in Christ. It's
not to seek it by your do-gooding or your law-keeping. Now, should
we try to be the best that we can be? Should we fight the flesh?
Struggle, remember the struggle. That's the warfare of the flesh
and the spirit. Are we engaged in the warfare? We should be.
I ought to be struggling to love you like I love me. I ought to
be warring to love God perfectly. I ought to be in a battle within
to be a good pastor, a good father, a good husband, good grandfather,
all of that. And I fail in so many ways. And
I'll say, just watch me. Don't watch me. But anyway, I
hope by God's grace that I can be a good steward and an able
witness. That's what I want to be. But
not to be saved. Not to be made righteous. Now,
I want to be righteous. And righteousness is my goal.
But I don't have it in me. I have the Spirit of God. He's
righteous. But read what Paul wrote in Romans
7. Who shall deliver me from this
body of death? And if you ever get to thinking
that you're righteous in yourself, as I said last week, just go
look in a mirror. And compare yourself now to what you were
30 years ago. The body is dead because of sin,
Romans 8, 10. But the spirit is life because
of righteousness. And where do we get that righteousness?
In Christ, by his obedience unto death. It's his righteousness
imputed to us. That's the heart of the gospel. Paul described the blessing,
or David described the blessedness of the man to whom the Lord imputed
righteousness without works. Well, when preachers who claim
to be Christian, and that's what's happening here, when they take
that law, now right here, I think what we're talking about is the
law of Moses. The old covenant, which was given
to Israel by God through Moses on Mount Sinai. and lasted for
about 1,500 years up until the time of Christ. But there were
unbelieving Jews who wanted to keep that law going. All right? And I'm going to talk a little
bit about that in the next message about Abraham. Of course, he
was before the law, before the Mosaic law, the law of Moses,
Sinai. the Ten Commandments, the ceremonies,
the dietary laws, all of them, the Sabbath laws, all that. Somebody said they counted one
time it was like over 650 some laws that Israel was under in
that economy. But now that law was never given
to that nation as a way of salvation. That's not what it was for, okay?
So Paul says the law's good if you use it lawfully, Well, they
were using it unlawfully because they sought righteousness by
their works and not by faith in Christ. They stumbled at the
stumbling stone. Remember when Christ came and
preached the gospel to them? And they hate the light, you
know, because it exposed what they were so proud of as being
evil, evil deeds. So what are we talking about
here? Well, we're talking about these false teachers teaching
the law in wrong ways. And mainly when you go out to,
when you look at the New Testament and you see these churches that
God had established through men like Paul, in the Gentile world,
one of the first things that the unbelieving Jews insisted
on is that the Gentile men who entered into their spiritual
fellowship as they saw it, that they be circumcised. Now that
law was, that circumcision was first given to Abraham, but it
was established as a law under Moses. And here's something,
here's how they would say it, for example. They'd say, now,
we're saved by grace, but you gotta be circumcised in order
to really be saved, or to be assured of your salvation. Have
y'all ever heard the term lordship salvation? You know what that
really is? It's works-based assurance. That's what it is. I gain my
assurance of salvation because I'm doing good or I'm doing better. That's an unlawful use of the
law. Where should my assurance come
from? I quote it all the time, Hebrews 12 too. Looking unto
Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. I'm sure of my
salvation because I have a surety and his name is Jesus Christ.
And he's the righteous one. I stand before God washed in
his blood, clothed in his righteousness. But these unbelieving Jews who
claim to believe the gospel, they were insisting that the
Gentiles be circumcised. Well, you remember what Paul
says at the end of Galatians, in Galatians 6, 14, when he says,
God forbid that I should glory, boast, or have confidence save
in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is
crucified unto me and I unto the world. For in Christ Jesus,
circumcision or uncircumcision availeth nothing but a new creation."
And what is that new creation? It's a regenerated, born-again
sinner who looks to Christ for salvation, for assurance, for
motivation. The glory of God is their goal.
You see, I hear a lot of people talk about their works as being
their witness. You ever heard that? Well, that's
my witness. Well, certainly, now listen to
me on this. This is important. I don't want
bad behavior to get in the way of my witness. You understand
that? I mean, if you all saw me walking
drunk in downtown Albany, oh, that's my preacher. That kind
of thing. I don't want that. But that's
not my witness. My witness is the gospel. How
God saves sinners. And just like that Matthew 5,
16 passage, when it talks about, somebody start that for me. Senior
moment. Let your light shine before me.
Thank you, Randy. Let your light so shine before
men that they may see your good works and do what? Draw attention
to you? No, glorify your Father which
is in heaven. Now understand this, when you
say let your light so shine before men that they may see your good
works, do you know an unbeliever doesn't know what a good work
is? They don't know what a good work is. Bible says if you don't know
Christ, your life is calling good evil and evil good. So you
look at that Pharisee who's sincere and dedicated, who fasts twice
a week and gives more than the time, and you say, boy, that's
a good work. Know what? Because he didn't
have Christ. It's an evil deed. It's self-righteous. It's a denial of Christ. That's
why Christ told those false preachers in Matthew 7, depart from me,
you that work iniquity, I never knew you. And I've heard preachers
preach on that passage and say, well, they just weren't sincere. Read the context. Now, I wanna
be sincere, don't you? But if you're gonna be saved
based upon your sincerity, how much is enough? You don't have
any standard to go by. That's why Paul, when he talked
about his brethren according to the flesh, the unbelieving
Jews, he said, I bear them record. They have a zeal of God, but
not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's
righteousness are going about to establish their own. They
don't know God. That's the problem. Well, that's
the problem with these. Another thing in the Law of Moses
that these false preachers were, and we know this from reading
the epistles. is they were trying to get them
to keep a Sabbath day, keep holy days and all that. See, we don't
keep a Sabbath day. Sunday's not the Sabbath. Christ
is our Sabbath. Now, the first day of the week
is a day that I believe that we should set aside to gather
together as we are to worship the Lord. That's the New Testament
command. Forsake not the assembling of
yourselves together. And we ought to be here if we
can. unless we're providentially hindered. And of course, you know, saying
you're providentially hindered, you're saying God's the one who
put me in this position. So understand that. But that's
what, this is the Lord's day. Every day's the Lord's day, I
know that. But this is a special day. It's not any holier than
any other day or anything, but we're met together to worship,
and that's a good thing. And our worship is accepted before
God, not because we're here, not because we're sincere, not
because I'm preaching, it's because of Christ. He's the mediator. He presents our petitions, our
prayers, our praise to the Father. And they're washed in the blood
of Christ just like our persons are. That's what I believe. The law's good if a man use it
lawfully. And how is it used lawfully?
Well, the Bible tells us. The law was given to Israel to
show them their sinfulness and the impossibility of salvation
by their works. It was given to show them their
need of grace. Over in Romans 5, And I've cited these in your
lesson. Listen to this. Verse 20 of Romans
5. And it says, moreover the law
entered that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded,
grace did much more abound. And then he goes, As sin hath
reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness.
Look at Galatians chapter 3. I'm going to preach on this passage
at 11. Paul makes it clear that no person,
no man, is justified before God based upon their works of the
law. God justifies the ungodly. What is it to be justified? It's
to be forgiven of all my sins on a just ground. And it's to
be declared righteous before God on a just ground. And what's
the only just ground? The obedience unto death of Christ
as our surety, our substitute, our redeemer. And so he says
in verse 19 of Galatians 3, and what Paul's telling them now,
And there were false preachers in Galatia, too. Now, Jewish
men who claimed to believe grace, but they said, but you've got
to keep the law, you've got to do this in order to really be
saved. And that's a denial of the gospel. And Paul tells them
the law wasn't given for that purpose. Well, verse 19 of Galatians
3, wherefore then serveth the law? Why was the law given? That's
what that means. Why did God give it if I can't
be saved by it? It was added because of transgressions
till the seed should come to whom the promise was made and
it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. Now I'll
explain some of that later on in the message. But the seed,
there's Christ. It was given to that nation,
all right, to hold them together as a nation, a system, an ethical
system, to hold them together up until the time of Christ.
And the whole system, the Ten Commandments, the ceremonial
law, exposed their sinfulness and their inadequacy to keep
the law for salvation. And if you read Israel's history
now, during that 1500 year period where the Mosaic law was in effect,
there's one thing that stands out, failure. They failed. What would you have done if you'd
have been living under that as a Jew? Would you have failed?
Now if you say no, I've got one big term for you that you need
to go study. Self-righteousness. And you'd
be amazed how many people call themselves Christian today who
in their Speaking of salvation and what saves us, when they
compare themselves to Israel under the Old Covenant, they're
actually saying without using these words, I'm better than
them. Think about it. No, the law was
given to shut us up to God's grace in Christ. And we're not
under the Old Covenant, that's been abolished by way of fulfillment
in Christ. But still God has commandments.
Love God perfectly. Love your neighbor as yourself.
Love the brethren. Our neighbor includes our enemies.
And then our brethren is our brothers and sisters in Christ.
And we can't even do that perfectly because of self-love that remains
in us. So a right use of the law. Now, look at verse nine. He says, knowing this, that the
law is not made for a righteous man. Well now, we know that we
all fell on Adam, and the Bible says there's none righteous,
no, not one. And he's talking about men and
women by nature there, those who born in Adam fell into a
state of sin and depravity and death. But righteous here, I
believe refers mainly to the justified sinner who's made so
by the grace of God. And what's happened here is they've
been convinced of sin by the Spirit, and they are righteous
in Christ based upon His righteousness imputed. And he says the law's
not made for them, but for the lawless and the disobedient,
the ungodly, for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers
of fathers and murderers of mother, for manslayers. Verse 10, for
whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for
men stealers, for liars, for perjured persons. Now he got
this list of sins. Now before we consider those,
understand this, we are all sinners. I've said it, there's only two
types of people on this earth. Sinners lost in their sins and
sinners saved by grace. So we're all sinners. But we
have to understand this, that what he's talking about here
are those who don't have Christ. They don't look to Christ. And
they're engaged in the practice of sinful behavior. And it includes
not only the immorality that exists in the world, that's part
of it. But it also includes false religion. Look at it. He says the lawless and the disobedient. That describes both the self-righteous
religionist who's seeking salvation by his works as well as the rebellious
person who against his own conscience or her own conscience determines
to break the law. Like anyone who is openly immoral
in the eyes of men. But it does include a sinner
who's seeking righteousness by works of the law is lawless and
disobedient. And certainly those who go out
to break the law openly, they're lawless and disobedient. He says
for the ungodly and for sinners. The ungodly describes those who
have no reverence for God, no fear of God before their eyes.
And that describes a religious person who doesn't believe in
Christ. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. Sinners, describes those who continually fall short. A religious person who's trying
to be righteous by their works, they fall short. And certainly
those who are openly immoral, they fall short. Why do they
fall short of? They fall short of the glory
of God, Romans 3, 23. What is the glory of God? It's
Christ and the glory of his person and the power of his finished
work. And he says, for unholy and profane. Unholy describes
those who consider nothing sacred. They don't care. They don't consider
any devotion or fear of God. Profane describes those who have
contempt for the things of God, in whatever way they express
that. He says, for murderers of fathers, murderers of mothers,
for manslayers, that's murder. We know murder's wrong. I read somewhere, and I don't
remember where I read this, so I didn't really quote it. Why
would he mention mothers and fathers specifically? Some said
that it became a common practice that when your mother and father
got old, they'd kill them to get the inheritance. So I don't
know if that has a reference. That's certainly murder to do
that. Although I don't think anybody killed me to get the
inheritance. But anyway, murder is, you know,
the first murder. Cain murdered Abel over the gospel. Then he says whoremongers and
those that defile themselves with mankind, those are sexual
sins involving fornication, adultery, and homosexuality. It's sin. There's no way to paint it in
any other way if we believe the Bible, folks. Now again, we're
all sinners. And when God saves us, He saves
us from sin. So understand that. Men-stealers. You know what that is? That's
kidnapping. I know that ungodly men had used
the Bible to condone slavery. The Bible never condoned slavery.
In the book of Deuteronomy, it's called kidnapping, men-stealers.
Now later on it recognized that there were servants who grew
up in a household and that was their life. And that's like having
a job. But to kidnap somebody, no, that's
men stealers. Liar and perjured persons includes
all who make a habit to lie for their own gain and false witnesses
in courts of law. So that's who the law was made
for, is to convict them of sin if God, is pleased to do so. And you know as well as I do
that that's up to his sovereign will. He said, I'll have mercy
upon whom I will, and then I'll be gracious to whom I will. Let
me close out. Verse 10, the last part of verse
10, he said, and if there be any other thing that is contrary
to sound doctrine, remember that's Timothy's, Paul's theme to Timothy,
Do those things which are consistent with sound doctrine, meaning
mainly the gospel, verse 11, according to the glorious gospel
of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust. Now I'm
gonna start with those two thoughts there next week in the next lesson,
because I've run out of time.