It's going to be beginning at
verse 6. The title of the message is, Ask, Seek, and Knock. And of course that comes from
verse 7 where he says, Ask and it shall be given you. Seek and
you shall find. Knock and it shall be opened
unto you. Before we saw the import of the
scriptures, the whole scripture, from Genesis to Revelation, that
it is all about Christ and salvation and the life that we live as
sinners saved by grace. And there are life principles
given in the scriptures throughout. How Christians ought to behave,
our attitudes, all of that's there. But it's all focused upon
and centered around the Lord Jesus Christ and how God saves
a sinner. And we should never get away
from that, no matter what we're studying. And the reason I'm
saying that is so many people look at the Sermon on the Mount,
here in Matthew 5 up to chapter 7, that we're studying, they
look at it as no more than a moral handbook. And of course, there
are principles of Christian morality. That kind of obedience that comes
from the Lord and motivated by grace, gratitude, and love. And
when you come to a section like what we're coming to, it says
in verse six, this is the first verse we're gonna deal with today.
He says, give not that which is holy unto dogs, neither cast
you your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under
their feet and turn again and rend you, tear you to pieces. That's what that means. And that
seems like a very harsh verse, you think about it. And you'll
read several commentators who will tell you, you know, the
Lord had just given us the commandment, judge not that you be not judged.
And of course, we know that he's not talking about all judgment.
and like most people kind of imply, ignorantly imply, he's
only speaking of self-righteous judgment by which we self-righteously,
on a wrong standard, declare ourselves to be right and just
before God and despise others, as we read in Luke chapter 12
last week, meaning that we count others to be lost and unjust
on a wrong ground. And he just said that, but incidentally,
I've got in your lesson today, I missed, I have a wrong reference
in last week's lesson. The Lord commands us to judge
righteously. And the verse that I quoted there
is what I've got in your lesson today. Judge not according to
the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. And that's John 724.
In last week's lesson, I quoted it as John 7-7, and I was wrong. So you might want to mark that
down, OK, that I was wrong. It's John 7-7 is what I said,
but it should have been John 7-24. So if you're keeping these
lessons, go back and just correct that. But anyway, he's talking
about judgment. Well, the verses that we're going
to study today and next week, Lord willing, show the kind of
judgment that we ought to do. For example, if he says, judge
not that you be not judged, and then all of a sudden, verse 6,
he says, give not that which is holy unto dogs. Well, who
are these dogs? He says, neither cast your pearls
before swine. Well, what are these pearls?
And who are the swine? We have to make a judgment there.
But how are we gonna make such a judgment? There's only one
way, judge righteous judgment, which means this, righteous judgment,
I've got this in your lesson, righteous judgment is based on
God's word. And that literally is God's judgment. Not ours, but God's, but we agree
with God. in this because it's in his word.
So here he says, give not that which is holy unto dogs. Well, what is he talking about?
What is holy? Well, he's talking here about
the gospel. And the way we know that is because
the gospel is such a unique and separate message that it is the
holy word of God. And it's only by the gospel that
we can judge righteously. You know, back over in, I think
it's Isaiah 42, when it's a prophecy of the Messiah, he says he will
bring judgment to the Gentiles. Whenever God brings the gospel
to a people and reveals that gospel to them, he brings judgment
to them by which we can judge rightly according to his word. For example, before we know the
gospel, wherein Christ is revealed as the only way of righteousness,
we really don't know what sin is. We know that immorality is
sin, when somebody kills somebody, we know that's sinful. We know
that robbing is a sin, stealing. We know that taking God's name
in vain, we know that's a sin. But you know what I'm talking
about. What is it we don't know? We don't know that the very best
works of the best of sinners in the eyes of men is sin when
aimed at making a person righteous before God. Salvation. Because
salvation is not by works. We know that whenever people
set their minds religiously, sincerely, not playing church
now, but sincerely, decide that they're going to get right with
God. And they go about that based upon their works of morality,
sincerity, religion, charity. We know that that dishonors God.
That denies Christ. That exalts the sinner. and gives
that sinner room to glory. We don't make such a judgment
apart from the Holy Spirit revealing the gospel to us. And so what
is he talking about? He's talking about the word of
God, give not that which is holy. Now obviously in the context
here, he's also talking about evangelism. Going out, preaching
the gospel, getting the gospel out to the world. What is the
rule of evangelism in the scripture? What is the gospel mandate? Well,
it's go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every
creature. And you tell him, he that believeth,
and Marcus says, believeth and is baptized shall be saved, he
that believeth not shall be damned. So we're commanded, basically
here's what it is. We're commanded to preach, to
witness the gospel to everyone and anyone who will listen to
us. If we have that opportunity,
if God gives us that opportunity to witness Christ and him crucified
and risen from the dead, we're to take that opportunity. But
what about people who do not want to hear what we have to
say. They reject it out of hand. They won't give it a minute's
thought or notice. Basically, they say in a heartened
attitude, get away from me, I don't want to hear what you have to
say. Now that's the dogs and the swine that he's talking about.
Remember when Christ sent them out two by two? And he told them
to go and tell them the kingdom of God is here. And he said,
now, if they shut the door, what do you say? Wipe the dust off
your feet and go on. You see, we cannot force people
to hear what we say. This idea that you can force
people into the kingdom of God was fostered by false religion.
You remember Catholicism and the Spanish Inquisition. And
they'd say, repent. or we'll kill you or they'll
torture you. That's satanic, that's what it is. We're not
to do that. But every now and then, the Lord
will open a door and somebody will say, I'd like to hear more
about what you say, about what you believe. What do you believe
the scriptures teach? And we're to embrace that opportunity
immediately. And so when he describes that
which is holy and the pearls, talking about something valuable,
valuable gems, he's talking about the gospel of God's free and
sovereign grace in and by the Lord Jesus Christ, salvation
based on his righteousness imputed. You remember when you first heard
that and the Lord made it effectual to your salvation, to the praise
of the glory of God's grace? This gospel reveals and honors
the holiness, the justice of God, the righteousness and the
grace and the love of God, mercy. It's truly a message that is
set apart, holy. And it's the most valuable thing
we have. Paul called it a treasure in 2 Corinthians 4. You remember
he said we have this treasure in earthen vessels. And it sets
our message apart from any other and all other ways that men and
women devise of salvation which is deadly. It's quoted twice
in the book of Proverbs, there is a way that seemeth right unto
men. It's the way of destruction, the way of death. This gospel,
think about it, it tells us how God can be just and justify the
ungodly. The answer to the most important
question that a sinner can ask in considering his or her relationship
with God. How can a man be clean? A sinner
that's born of woman, how can he be clean? How can a man be
just with God? And then how can God be just
and justify the ungodly? That is a valuable treasure. It's holy. It's valuable. So when we go out and we get
these opportunities to evangelize, to preach the gospel, to anyone
and everyone who will listen, will oftentimes come up against
someone who says, get away from me. I just don't want to hear
what you have to say. I had a man tell me one time
up in Kentucky, he said, you know, he said, you're my friend
and I like you. He said, yeah, believe that,
he liked me. He said, you're my friend. He said, and you're
welcome in my home anytime. But he said, but leave your theology
outside the door. That's what he told me. And I
told him, I said, well, I'll respect your wishes. But I said,
I'll pray for the day that the Lord will change your mind. And
that's what I did. Never did get another opportunity
to talk about it. Now, when we get these opportunities
to preach the gospel, And God gives us someone who will listen.
And just like me, I stand here preaching the gospel. We do realize
that not everyone, even who will listen to it, will believe it.
Paul said in, I've got it quoted in your lesson, 2 Corinthians
chapter two, he said, to some it's gonna be the savor of life
unto life. And isn't that a joy? When God
brings one of his children to faith in Christ and repentance
of dead works, more joy in heaven over one sinner that's brought
to repentance, over 99 that need no repentance. But to others,
it'll be the savor of death unto death. But you see, opportunities
to witness Christ And failures, whenever they say, get away from
me, and that's what he's talking about. Read it again. Give not
that which is holy unto dogs. False preachers are often called
dogs in the scripture. And he says, neither cast you
your pearls before swine. Swine, you remember, in the Jewish
economy of the Law of Moses, was an unclean animal. So he's
talking about people are unclean. Well, what makes a person unclean?
Sin. Well, what can cleanse us from
sin? Well, what can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood
of Jesus. So these swine and these dogs
are unbelievers. And essentially what he's referring
here is to the non-elect. They don't wanna hear the gospel
and they never will. Now that's not to say from our
viewpoint that somebody may one time say, get away from me, I
don't wanna hear it. That maybe between that time and their death,
maybe the Lord will change their minds. But here he says, lest
they trample them under their feet and turn again and rend
you. In other words, they trample
this glorious message under their feet and turn again to tear you
to pieces. Now somebody asked, was he talking
literally there, tear you to pieces? Well, it's happened in
the past. There are Christians, true believers
who have died over their testimony of the faith. Fortunately, or
that's a wrong word. Providentially. I try to train
myself to keep that in mind. Providentially, we live in a
time where that is illegal. If somebody hates what we preach,
under our Constitution, it's illegal for them to come in here
and shut us down or to torture us or kill us. But anyway, this
is what he's talking about. And all this requires judgment.
Judgment. the righteous judgment that God
gives us in his word. So the gospel is a valuable treasure,
and all false gospels are unholy and worthless things. Now understand,
so that's who he's talking about here. It's not out of place here.
Now maybe not every single word that the Lord said is recorded. I don't know, but I know what
he wanted us to see is recorded. So when he says, judge not lest
you be judged, he's talking about unrighteous judgment. But whenever
we're doing the business of the evangelistic mandate, we have
to make judgments. And we're told to receive those
into our fellowship who testify of the gospel of Christ according
to the scriptures. And we're told to reject those
from our fellowship who do not receive that message. Now when
we say reject them, we don't mean shut the door and not let
them in. But we mean we don't receive
them into the fellowship of our spiritual family. And you remember
like in 2 John chapter, or verse nine through 11 talks about that.
Receive them not into your household. That's talking about the church.
In other words, if you don't believe the gospel, you're not
a member of this church. That's just the plain fact of
it. Because God brings his people into the church. Well, those
who are dogs and swine, they don't want any part of it. And
so, we're not to go any further with them. We're to wipe the
dust off of our feet, metaphorically, and go on. And there may be somebody,
you know, Paul the apostle, he went all over the Gentile world
preaching. And oftentimes it was the Lord's
purpose to send him into a place to raise up a gospel church.
But sometimes he had to be run out of town under a cloak because they were
going to kill him. So that's the way it goes. I
believe these next verses prove what I'm telling you here is
true. He says in verse seven, look at verse seven and eight.
Ask and it shall be given you, seek and you shall find, knock
and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth. And he that seeketh findeth,
and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Now he's not talking
about prayer in the sense that you're gonna get anything you
ask for. As I put in your lessons, this
doesn't mean that no matter what you ask God for, he'll give it
to you. Ask and you shall receive. He's
talking about salvation. And this isn't a blank check
written in your name and all you have to do is fill in the
amount or something like that. This has to do with the blessings
and the benefits of salvation that only God can provide. And
it's the opposite of the dogs in the swine who want no part
of it. When we go out to evangelize, sometimes God's going to bring
a sinner to conviction. And hear what you have to say.
He's going to make that gospel effectual to you. And they'll
ask for salvation God's way. And they'll seek the Lord as
He's revealed in His Word as the God who justifies the ungodly. And they'll knock upon the door
of salvation which is Christ. And everyone who does will get
what they're asking for, what they're seeking, and what they're
knocking on that door for. And you want to know why? Because
it's God who causes them to ask, to seek, and to knock. Because
left to ourselves, we'd be no better off than the dogs in the
swine. Left to ourselves, what does
the Bible say? The natural man receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God. He won't ask for salvation. Here's
the key, God's way. Now he may ask for salvation,
but he'll want it his way, which is the way of works, the way
of conditional salvation, the way of some kind of a sliding
scale of righteousness. He'll seek righteousness, but
how will he seek it? By his works. And God won't give him salvation
because that's not God's way. He may look up into the sky and
say, Lord, save me. You know, when Christ rode into
Jerusalem on the donkey and they cried, Hosanna, that's what that
means. Lord, save us. It's a praise
word. Well, he'll save any sinner who
wants salvation his way. And it's Him, it is God who brings
that sinner to desire salvation His way. Look at it again, He says, ask
and it shall be given. Seek and you shall find. Remember
in Romans 3 verse 10, there's none that seeketh after God,
no not one. What is that saying? It's saying
by nature we won't seek the true and living God, we'll seek a
God. a God of our imagination, a God who is like us, an idol. So he says in verse eight, for
everyone that asketh receiveth. What did Christ say in John six?
All that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that
cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. Isn't that right? Well, what
is his name? Read the scriptures. Who is God? The God of this generation who
is popular among people who call themselves Christian is an idol. That's not the name of our God.
That God who loves everybody, who's trying to save everybody.
If men and women will just cooperate. That's not the name of our God. The name of our God, He has many
names that describe His glorious character, but I believe the
best summation of it is a just God and a Savior. And how is
that possible that God would be both a just God and a Savior? And it's only by the glorious
person, Jesus Christ, the God-man. and based upon the righteousness
that he accomplished on Calvary's cross as our surety, our substitute,
our redeemer, and preserves us under glory as our intercessor
and advocate, pleading the merits of his righteousness, which God
has imputed to us, rejecting all else, bringing us to faith
in Christ and repentance of dead works. Now look at verse nine,
these last few verses. He says, or what man is there
of you whom, if his son ask bread, will give him a stone? Or if
he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If you then, being
evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much
more shall your father, which is in heaven, give good things
to them that ask him? things that are set forth in
this metaphor that show us the nature of God's salvation. And
let me tell you something, God is a merciful God, and he's ready
to save, he delights to show mercy, and he knows how to do
it. And that's what he does. There's
two things I'll conclude with. First, he's saying this. If we as sinful people, even
evil by nature, if we know how to give good gifts to our children,
and we do, sometimes we do it overly, but we know how, well,
we can be sure that the God of all grace and mercy, the sovereign
God of this year, he certainly knows how to give good gifts
to his children. Don't ever think otherwise. You see, if our children ask
us for a fish to feed their hunger and keep them alive, we wouldn't
give them a snake and kill them. Well, would God give us a snake
if we were asking for bread? No. God is the God of all grace
and mercy. in abundance, and He's willing
and able and ready to give His chosen people, His children,
all that we need and must have for salvation unto glory. Think about Ephesians 1.3, Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in Christ. All spiritual blessings. Romans chapter eight, I believe
it's verse 31, I think, I'm not sure. Or maybe it's on down,
32. But he says, he that spared not
his own son, but freely gave him for us all, but gave him
for us all, how shall he not with him freely give us all things? All things that we need. Think
about it. Every aspect of salvation is a gift of God's grace based
upon Christ's righteousness imputed to it. Our justification, our
sanctification, our regeneration, our conversion, our preservation
unto glory. Every bit of it. And he knows how to do it. That
means he knows how to do it in a way that honors him. He knows
how to do it in a way that meets our need. Again, going back,
how can God be just and justify the ungodly? Man doesn't know
how to do that. Oftentimes, even in giving gifts
to our children, we don't know how to do it for their good.
You've heard of the proverbial rich man who gave his son everything
and never made him work for a day of it? But God knows how. And you think about the glory
and the wisdom and the power of imputing our sins to Christ
and imputing his righteousness to us so that he can freely and
justly, righteously, for our good, give us all things necessary. And we didn't have to work for
him. Blessed is the blessedness of
the man to whom the Lord imputed righteousness without work. So
he knows how. Then secondly, it's apparent from these verses
that all spiritual blessings and benefits are only given to
his children. And that's his elect. The election
of grace chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world.
And I've got a list of References there that you can look up, you
know these scriptures. Ephesians 1, 2 Timothy 1, salvation
given us in Christ, in Christ Jesus before the world began.
All of these. Now, that's not revealed to discourage
or dissuade anyone from asking and seeking and knocking. It's
revealed so that God gets all the glory and we get none. And I put in your lesson here,
you know, sinners might say, unbelievers might say, well,
if that's only for his children, then it doesn't matter what I
do. You know, I may not be one of his children. Well, you may
be one of his children. And what are we commanded to
do? We're commanded to seek the Lord. We're commanded to ask
for salvation His way. We're commanded to knock at the
door of salvation, which is Christ. And somebody may ask, Am I one
of God's children chosen in Christ before the world was created?
And the answer is this. Here's how I would answer it.
And I've got this quoted in your lesson. Are you interested in
seeking and finding righteousness and eternal life God's way as
revealed in his word in Christ? Can you be satisfied with anything
less than what God reveals in His Word? Because if you can
settle for anything less than free and sovereign grace and
the perfection of righteousness that can only be found in Christ,
and if you live and die in that state of unbelief, I can tell
you you're not one of God's children. But all who believe and cling
to Christ. Here's what Paul wrote. He says,
knowing brethren, beloved, your election of God for our gospel
came not unto you in word only, but also in power and in the
Holy Ghost and in much assurance as you know what manner of men
we were among you for your sake. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone that believe. Are you interested
in that? Do you want to know that or will
you settle for something less than what God says in his word?
Christ said the truth will set you free. Okay.