Until then, it's good to be back
today, I should say. We had a good time of fellowship
and worship last weekend down at Bethel Baptist Church in Choctaw,
Oklahoma, during the 25th Annual Bible Conference. Messages that
the other brothers brought were really edifying. I had a good time sitting around
the table visiting with everybody. It was a refreshing weekend and
it's good to be back. Turn, if you would, in your Bibles
to Luke chapter seven. Luke chapter seven, we are going
to pick up with where we left off two weeks ago. Luke chapter seven. I'll start reading in verse 41
and read down to verse 47. It says, there was a certain
creditor which had two debtors. The one owed 500 pence and the
other 50. And when they had nothing to
pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell me therefore, which
of them will love him most? Simon answered and said, I suppose
that he to whom he forgave most. And he said unto him that I was
rightly judged. And he turned to the woman and
said unto Simon, seeest thou this woman? I entered into thine
house, thou gavest me no water for my feet, but she hath washed
my feet with tears and wiped them with the hairs of her head.
Thou gavest me no kiss, but this woman, since the time I came
in, hath not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil thou didst
not anoint, but this woman hath anointed my feet with oil. Wherefore
I say unto thee, her sins which are many are forgiven, for she
loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little. Now, we began looking at this
the last time we were together, and I spoke to you on the first
portion of this message about the fact that we are debtors
before God. As we see here, Jesus gives an
illustration about a creditor, and he had two debtors, one that
owed him 500 pence and one that owed him 50 pence, and Jesus
was asking the question, who was forgiven the most. And of
course, Peter, Simon, he got it right. He said the one who
was forgiven the most, the one who had the most debt was obviously
forgiven the most. There was more to forgive there,
right? And so Jesus used that as an illustration to say then
we who have been forgiven much as far as our sins are concerned,
that we have a debt that is great, we have sin that is great, and
if we have been forgiven much, we will love much. Those who
have come to know their debt before God, those who have come
to know their sin before God, the depth of their sin, the amount
of their sin, the egregious nature of their sin towards our holy
God, whenever they come to know they have been forgiven of God,
They love God much. Now, a lot of people think that
outwardly this is a command to, well, you need to go love God
much because he forgave you much, but that's not what Jesus is
saying. Jesus is saying here that for
the one whom God by his spirit comes and quickens, brings to
spiritual life, there is given to them eyes and ears to see and to hear and a mind,
spiritual mind, to understand the depth of their sin. Until
we're born of God, we might know that we've done something wrong,
okay? We might even call it sin. But
until we're spiritually alive and know spiritual things, the
depth of these things that the Bible teaches us, we truly won't
know how outrageous our sin is towards God. We won't know how
deep the sin goes in our nature. It's only whenever we see these
things that we realize how much we need Christ and flee to Him
for our salvation, for our forgiveness. And what Christ is saying here
is that when someone has been given that spiritual understanding
and the gospel is preached to them. See, that's why we preach
the gospel, even though we believe in absolute predestination. We
believe that God has predestined everything that is ever gonna
happen, every action, everything, that not anything is gonna happen
outside of the will of God. That even though we believe that,
we still believe that there is the command for the child of grace
and for the church to preach the gospel. It is through the
gospel that Jesus is speaking or declaring to his sheep, who
have been given spiritual understanding, their freedom in Christ. They're
being led out of captivity and being free from their sin, from
the law. And so that gospel is a declaration. That's why we preach the gospel
to everyone. It's because it's a declaration
to. the elect of God of their salvation in Christ Jesus. And
so we continue to preach. A lot of people, again, like
I said, because we believe in predestination and election,
a lot of people say, well, why do you even mess with preaching
the gospel? If God's ordained that everybody's
gonna, you know, that only these people are gonna be saved and
these people aren't gonna be saved, then why do you preach
the gospel? Because God has commanded us
to, first and foremost. So whether we understand anything
else about predestination or election or salvation, God has
commanded us to go with the gospel and to preach to all peoples. And that's what we are called
to do, so we do that. But also we see that that is
the means by which God is declaring to his sheep the news of their
salvation by which they hear it and repent of dead works,
repent of false thinking about how they are saved, and they
turn to Christ Jesus and look to him alone for their salvation.
Now that in and of itself isn't what saves them. Christ is who
saved them. but the gospel saves in the fact
that it saves us from wrong thinking about how we're saved. See, believing the gospel, repentance,
faith, that isn't what saves us in the legal sense before
God. That's not what makes us right
before God. That's not what gives us eternal
life. That's not what gives us the
new birth, okay? What, what, brings that about
is the work and the righteousness of Jesus Christ alone. That's
what brings that. But salvation in the sense of
I've been saved from my dead work thinking. thinking that
I can accomplish the law, thinking that I can work my way good enough
to be accepted of God, thinking that my religious works are what
God wants and is what God is going to accept. No, that's what
the gospel saves us from that. Because for a child of grace,
it's the state of mind that the new birth brings to the child
of grace. The child of grace is brought
to a state of mind to truly know their sin. And then they truly
see that they cannot keep the law. The more they try to keep
the law, the more they see, I can't keep this. I might be able to
keep it for a little while, but I can't keep it. But also if
we dig a little deeper into the scriptures where the Bible says
that that which is flesh cannot please God, we're of the flesh,
inanimate. So anything we do apart from
the work of God in us doing it is nothing but dead works. It's
just flesh. It can't do nothing. And so everything
that we do is always going to be riddled with sin. And so our
only hope is Christ Jesus and what He has done for us. But
whenever the child of grace is born from above and given spiritual
life to understand, they come to know the debt that they owe.
They come to know how much that they were forgiven, and that
is the catalyst for them to love Christ Jesus much. Whenever they
realize how much they have been forgiven, they love much, and
it comes from within. This love is a love that has
been shed abroad in our hearts. It's not an outward command,
you need to go love the Lord. Does the Bible say, love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy strength, with all
thy might, and love thy neighbor as thyself? And it says, on these
two hang all the commands of God. All the commandments that
was ever given by God in the Old Testament, or in the Ten
Commandments, all those things hang on those three things, or
those two things, to love God and to love your neighbor. But
see, both of those things, loving God and loving your neighbor,
isn't something that we can do outwardly by outward compulsion,
by outward words. It's something that has to be
fueled from the inside by something that we can't produce. We can't
produce love for God. We can't produce love for our
brothers in Christ without the love of God being shed abroad
in our hearts. God has to shed that love abroad
in our heart and then and only then can we love God truly and
love our neighbor as ourselves. And it's a mysterious thing how
that we can truly go from being enemies of God, haters of God,
wanting a God made in our own image to seeing the God of the
Bible and saying, you know, that's who God is. And I love him for
who he is, even though that may not be the God that I would have
chosen you know, or the way I would have done it, but he's revealed
himself as he said, and I'm good with that. To love God for what
he has done for us is something that we could never do in and
of ourselves. So we talked last week about how we're all debtors.
Every one of us has missed the mark. Every one of us has sinned
before God. Every one of us has missed righteousness. We cannot have a righteousness
of our own. The Bible says that all of our righteousnesses are
as filthy rags. And so we have this debt that
we cannot repay. We absolutely cannot repay this
debt. It's greater than we can ever,
ever repay. And so the Bible also told us,
and we looked at it last week, the Bible said that the soul
that sinned in it shall surely die. The wages of sin is death. Your sin that you've committed
against God, God has determined as the judge, the creator and
judge of all things, that the wage for that sin is death. Not
just physical death, that is also true. The outcome of sin,
whenever Adam transgressed and disobeyed God, he brought sin
and death into the world. And because we are from Adam's
seed, every one of us is just like him. We will have sin, we
sin, We have a nature that cannot keep God's law, and we have a
sentence of death upon us. Every one of us, from the moment
that we are conceived in the womb, we begin to die. Even though we have not yet been
born, the moving and progression of growth in this human body
is always towards death. We're growing older to the point
where we'll eventually die. If we grow to be old, God may
have different plans and you may die in a different way. You
may die in an accident. You may die of poor health early
in life. You may die of some accident,
quote unquote accident. We call them accidents, but they're
truly not accidents according to God's side of things. All things are planned by hand.
But either way, we are gonna physically die, but that's not
what we're talking about here. We're talking about a death that
is beyond physical death. We're talking about a death which
is complete and total separation from God from all eternity and
experiencing that death, that separation in torment for all
time. That God will preserve you And here's the reason why. Your
debt can never be paid. You owe an infinite debt. And we talked about this the
last time we were here, right? What's infinite? Everybody know
what infinite is? We can illustrate this by the
symbol for infinity. Y'all know what the symbol for
infinity is, right? Put this over here. Okay, the
symbol for infinity Anywhere you start on this thing
and go around, it never stops. It never stops. It continues.
There's no stopping point. If I drew a line, I have a starting
point and an ending point. OK? But yet, in infinity, we
have, it just goes on and on, on and on, on and on. It don't
ever, ever stop. because our sin is infinite,
meaning that it is, we can't put a price on it because it
is so outrageous. That's how holy God is. He is
so holy that whenever his creation has sinned against him, it is
so magnificent, not in a good way, but so great that there
is no way for us to ever, ever, ever, ever be able to repay that
debt. So thus, for an eternity, we
will suffer that eternal damnation, that eternal death, where the
Bible says, as we've talked about, that there is utter darkness,
that there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, where the flames will
never go out or the worm dieth not. And so we see that this
debt must be paid and every one of us owe this debt. But today, as I mentioned last
week and we left off, we see the Bible teaches that there
are degrees of debt. We're all debtors to God, but
some of us have greater debts than others. As we see here in
this parable that the Lord give us, there was one who had a debt
of 500 and another that had a debt of 50. One had a greater debt
than the other. We have not all sinned to the
same degree. Therefore, we're not all debtors
to the same extent. Now, granted, Every sin that
we commit is of huge, huge implications. Just one sin is enough that you
are falling short of the glory of God. Whether you sin 10 sins
or 20 sins, your sin is, one sin is enough because the Bible
says that if you have sinned in one, you have sinned in all.
However, the judgment that will come down is gonna be commensurate
with the sin. For the judge to be just, the
sin will be dealt with commensurate with the amount, the judgment
will be commensurate with the amount of sin. Okay, we even
have that in our laws here today. If I don't pay, say I get a speeding
ticket and I don't pay my speeding ticket, okay? Then they put out
a warrant for my arrest until, then I gotta go before the judge
and then they'll arrest me. And then I gotta go before the
judge and he may say, well, you owe this fine, you gotta pay
this fine. If I can't pay this fine, I may
have to spend a couple days in jail. But if I go and shoot somebody
in the face and kill them, I come before the judge, that's
going to be a completely different sentence, right? Matter of fact,
depending on what state you live in, you might get the death penalty.
So even in our own law systems, we see that the judgment is commensurate,
is balanced between the amount of
the crime, OK? And so debtors who owe a mighty
debt will have a mighty judgment. Now, some people will say, well,
preacher, I don't agree with you on that. I don't think that's
right. You know, sin is sin in God's
eyes. Sin is sin in God's eyes. And
I think that God's going to, you know, hell is hell, sin is
sin. We're all going to experience, if we're not saved, we're going
to experience the same thing. God's not going to show favorites
in hell. God's not going to show favorites
in His judgment. Well, turn with me, if you would,
over to Matthew chapter 11. Now, I'll just say this. I'm preaching this as I understand
it from reading God's word. And as I always say around here,
I am not the ultimate authority on this. The Lord is. The word
of God is. And I'm always open for correction
long as it comes by God's word. If someone has the word of God
to instruct me rightly in, and it doesn't contradict other parts
of scripture, then hey, I'm great with that. and will gladly renounce
what I've said. But whenever I read things in
scripture and gain the understanding that I've gained from the Spirit's
teaching, I can only believe and teach the things that are
there that I can see, that I can understand. And to me, whenever
I read this, the word of God says, Matthew chapter 11, starting
in verse 20, Then began he, speaking of Jesus,
then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty
works were done because they repented not. And here's Jesus
speaking. Woe unto thee, Chorazin! Woe
unto thee, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which
were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would
have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you,
it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of
judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which art
exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell. For if
the mighty words which have been done in thee had been done in
Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto
you that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the
day of judgment than for thee. Now that's saying a lot. You remember Sodom. Sodom and
Gomorrah, they're two different cities that were side by side.
And God called down fire and destroyed everyone, everything
in those cities, except for Lot and his family. For immorality,
sexual immorality. And he called down fire and just
destroyed everything. And here Jesus, can you imagine
you being the one or the city that Jesus says on the day of
judgment it's gonna be more tolerable for Sodom than for you. Meaning
that your sins are even more egregious than two cities that
God completely wiped off the face of the earth because of
their sins. Now to me it seems that that
is a different degree of judgment. He's saying that it's gonna be
more tolerable for Sodom in the day of judgment than it was for
Capernaum in the day of judgment. That one is gonna receive a greater
judgment than the other. Same thing for Chorazin and Bethsaida. They're gonna receive a greater
judgment than Tyre and Sidon. Luke, if you would with me over
to John chapter 19. John chapter 19. This is where
Judas has come and betrayed our Lord. And the soldiers have come,
arrested Jesus, and brought Jesus before the Sanhedrin, before
the religious leaders. And they had their way with him,
then they took him to Herod, then they took him, or to Pilate,
then they took him to Herod, then back to Pilate. And Pilate
was given the, about to, you know, give the word to crucify
him. But before all that, you know,
Pilate was saying, you know, I haven't found anything wrong
with this guy. Why should I, you know, why should
I do, follow after all this stuff that they're wanting to do and
everything? Anyway, whenever Jesus would defend himself in
front of Pilate, because that was his purpose, was to go to
the cross, he wasn't there to get himself out of it. So whenever
Jesus would not retaliate, would not do anything, Pilate kind
of got a little frustrated because he'd seen, hey, there's nothing
wrong with you. I don't see any reason why I
should be killing an innocent man. But yet what happened? Pilate gave in to the crowd,
and he came to Jesus in one last desperate thing. Verse 10, Pilate
says, then saith Pilate unto him, speakest thou not unto me?
Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have
power to release thee? He's saying, come on, man, just
work with me here. I have the power to either crucify
you or let you go. And you're not saying anything,
you're not doing anything. And Jesus finally opened his
mouth and this is what he said. Thou couldst have no power at
all against me, except it were given thee from above. So the
power that Pilate had to do what he had to do there was given
to him by God. Pilate was put in that place
for that purpose. But look what Jesus says. Therefore, He that delivered
me unto thee hath the greater sin. He's talking about Judas. The one that delivered Jesus
unto them, he said had the greater sin. Now, so that tells me that
there are greater sins than others. Jesus, the Bible actually says,
that there are some things that God hates more than others. Now, while every sin is infinite
and immeasurable in our eyes, great enough to ruin us forever,
there are some sins that have special vileness and offense
to God. And so the Bible teaches that
there are degrees of punishment in hell because divine judgment,
as I said, it's always proportionate with the crime. He doesn't measure
our sin by our yardstick, but by His holiness. Here's one thing that we look
at. Turn with me in James chapter
3. It's one of the reasons why I have a lot of struggle as a
pastor, as a preacher. And sometimes I know if I want
to be truthful with myself and with you and with anybody else
that's watching and listening, there are many times whenever
I come to this pulpit, I have come just cavalier, not caring,
you know, not feeling like I want to be here. I've mentioned that
to you before. You know, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not shielded
against those types of feelings just like all you guys. I mean,
I stand up here and watch y'all's face. I can see sometimes you're
wishing you were back home in bed or somewhere else. And we're not immune to that
feeling either. Sometimes whenever I get up here
and preach, I'm getting up here out of duty because I know that's
what I should be doing, but not necessarily what I want to be
doing that morning. I'm not applauding that. That's not good to be like
that, but it's the truth. And so that's why every time
I take the pulpit stand and preach, that's why there's lots of fear
and trepidation. That's why I have to pray for
the Lord to give me utterance. That's why I have to ask the
Lord to show me something, give me something, teach me something.
Give me the truth that I might convey the truth because if you
don't, then I'm gonna give my opinion of things and that's
not gonna help anybody. It's not gonna be good for anybody.
But the Bible speaks of this, look at James chapter three,
verse one. It says, my brethren, be not many masters knowing that
we shall receive the greater condemnation. For in many things
we offend all. If any man offend not in word,
the same is a perfect man and able also to brighten the whole
body. But look there in verse three, it says, Be not many masters,
knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. What
is he saying there? He's talking about becoming teachers. He said,
be not many teachers, knowing that we shall receive the greater
condemnation or the greater judgment. Why? Because God has called us
to this place to teach. given us a gift to teach. And
if we do not do that, if we are not about that business that
God has given us to do, then we come under a greater condemnation. That's why I say, you know, a
lot of people just always talk about preachers or about pastors
and just say, man, you guys got it made. You only have to work
one day a week. Well, for one, that's not true.
especially if you pastor churches like this one. I work many hours
in the week at a secular job. I don't just work here. And again,
this isn't work. You guys did not hire me. I am
not your employee. I am the pastor of this church
by the call of God. By the recognition of this church,
they understand and realize that God has called me to do this
thing and they have laid hands upon me and have prayed and have
ordained me to be pastor. But that in no way means that
you're my employer and I'm your employee. I'm not a hireling. I do not preach for filthy lucre. I don't preach for money. I don't
preach to be Rewarded, I preach because I've been called to preach.
And as for the last, well, it's been, let's see, it's October,
let's see, November the 7th will have been seven to 20, 13 years. 13 years that I've been the pastor
here. And not once have I ever asked
for money. But yet there is a judgment that
comes, a greater judgment that comes for those who are pastors,
preachers, because God has called them to a very important task. And you guys are gifted and called
just like the pastors are called. And you're preaching the gospel
and testifying of what Christ has done is just as important. But we come under a greater scrutiny
because we are standing up saying this is what God says. We're
telling the sheep of God and feeding the sheep of God and
we're to feed them good food, not goat food. OK, but feed them
sheep food, sheep eat sheep food, goat eat goat food. OK. And the
preacher, a lot of times, and you see this in a lot of churches
around, they preach easy things. The Bible says that they gather
around themselves men that teach and preach what their itching
ears want to hear. They want good things. Speak
to us good things. Speak to us things that are easy,
not the things that are hard. You think it's easy for a preacher
to get up every Sunday and to tell you that you're a sinner?
To tell you that you're not worthy? to tell you that you are unable
to keep God's law and that everything that you do is a filthy rat?
You think it's easy for us to get up and say that God has chosen
before the foundation of the world everyone who will be saved
and that there'll be some who he has not chosen? that will
experience everlasting damnation. Those aren't easy things to teach,
but that's the truth. And that's why we have to get
up and preach these things. And so there is a greater condemnation
that comes upon the preacher if he doesn't faithfully discharge
those things. There's a greater judgment that
comes upon him in this life. Now, granted, when we come before
the Lord, Those who are of the elect of God, when we come before
the Lord in the judgment, brethren, listen, the only accounting that
we give is the accounting that Jesus has paid it all. He has
paid everything for us. Look at John chapter 15, if you
would. Look at verse 22. John 15, verse
22. Jesus says, if I had not come
and spoken unto them, they had not had sin, but now they have
no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me, hateth my
father also. Let's write this so. If you hate Jesus, you hate God
because Jesus is God. If you hate Jesus, see these
Jews, they understood the Father. They understood Jehovah. They
understood Yahweh. That's their one God, the one
God. The hero Israel, the Lord our God is one God. There's none
else, there's none beside Him. He is the only true and living
God. And Christ is that God 100%.
He is the everlasting Father. He is God, manifested in the
flesh. And to hate Christ Jesus is to
hate God. And so these Jews who knew this
Adonai, who knew this father, who knew this Jehovah, was not receiving Christ. And
Christ is saying, you cannot love God and hate me because
we are one in the same. I am the living God, manifested
in the flesh, the image of the invisible God. The fullness of
the Godhead that you know, Adonai, Jehovah, the Almighty God, is
in me, and I in Him. We are one, one God. The Father, the Word, and the
Holy Spirit, these are three witnesses that bear a record
of Christ that are in heaven, and these three are one in Christ
Jesus. They're one God, and they testify
of the one man who is God, and that's Jesus Christ. He is the
living God. And so Jesus says that he that
hateth me, hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them
the worst, which none other man did, they had not had sin. But
now have they both seen and hated both me and my father. But this
cometh to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that is written
in their law, they hated me without cause. See, they didn't have any reason
to hate Christ. He'd done nothing, right? He had not broken one
law. He had not done one thing amiss.
Listen, Jesus hadn't done anything to anyone. He had not transgressed
God's law in any way, shape or form. They had no reason to hate
Christ Jesus. But yet they hated him. In 1 John chapter 5 and verse
10, 1 John chapter 5 and verse 10. John writes, he that believeth
on the Son of God hath the witness in himself. He that believeth
not God, he that believeth not God hath made him a liar. Because he believeth not the
record that God gave of his Son. Now see, that came right after
where I was talking about a while ago. For there are three that
bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit.
Whenever the Bible teaches and talks about the Father, the Father
bears witness or bears record of the Son, Jesus. That's God
in the flesh, okay? The Son, Jesus, is not the invisible
God that is the three that bears record. It's not talking about
that. That's talking about the divine
essence of God, the divine nature of God. The Godhead is the invisible
God that no man has ever seen, who is spirit. Whenever it speaks of the Son,
it speaks of the one begotten of God, the one whose body was
prepared and that Godhead then inhabited. and that that body was manifesting
the God, that divine, trying God. He says, if we receive the witness
of men, the witness of God is greater, for this is the witness
of God, which He hath testified of His Son. So the testifying
is always of the Son, of God manifested in the flesh. It's
always pointing to God manifested in the flesh. And he said, he
that believeth on the Son of God hath that witness in himself. But see what was happening, the
Jews was not believing on Christ as we just read. They hated Christ. Christ was not of utmost importance
to them. He that believeth not, God hath
made him a liar. because he believeth not the
record that God gave of His Son. This is the record that God hath
given to us, eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that
hath the Son hath life. He that hath not the Son of God
hath not life. Brethren, unbelief on Christ
Jesus, the rejection of God's mercy and grace in Christ Jesus,
is probably the most glaring, hideous evil in all the world. He that believeth not shall be
condemned. He that believeth not is condemned
already. Those are things the Bible says.
Why is he condemned already? Because he's not believed in
the name of the only begotten Son of God. See, whenever we are in unbelief,
we make God a liar because He says it's all about Christ and
salvation is in Him. But whenever we don't, whenever
we don't believe, see, let me just take a little side note
here for you guys. You guys hear me, my kids hear
me often preach this and teach this and the church here has
heard me preach and teach this often. Why? Why we make such a distinction
on the doctrine of free will and the doctrine of sovereign
grace? Why we make such a distinction between Arminianism and the doctrines
of grace? Why we make such a distinction
on why this church does not receive into membership anyone who still
believes in free will doctrine, who still was baptized under
free will doctrine. We don't recognize their baptisms
as valid baptisms because they were baptized under a doctrine
that is not the doctrine of Christ. And here the Bible teaches that
the witness of God is that Christ is salvation. that it's up to
Him, it's all about Him. The testimony is the work of
Christ. And if we think that salvation
hinges on something or some condition that we do, then that is not
the testimony and the witness of God. The witness of God is
in His Son, not in your accepting, rejecting, repenting, believing,
coming forward, being baptized, those things is not what affects
your salvation. It is purely the work of Christ
alone. And so we make those hardline
distinctions. The reason that we don't call
someone a brother or sister who is still believing that salvation
is by their own free will, they're still in unbelief. They have
not submitted to the righteousness, which is in Christ. They've not
submitted to the righteousness, which is in imputed righteousness
alone has saved you, not your decision making. Not your coming
by your own volition. The coming of your own volition
was by the sovereign grace of God who drew you, give you a
new heart, quickened you, and drew you to Him by the gospel. You were already saved at that
point because Christ had saved you. But if you believe that
you had to do that to be saved, you're still in unbelief. And
so as long as you're in that unbelief, you make God to be
a liar because God has said differently. That's why I'm so confused with
the many among the sovereign grace people that still hold
that the Armenian believers who are preaching a false gospel
and in a false church with a false gospel recognizes their false
baptisms and recognizes them as brothers and sisters in Christ. I don't understand that. I'm
not saying that we have to have perfect knowledge, but we have
to know and believe that salvation came from Christ alone and not
by our works. I mean, that's the very fundamental
thing that we learn by faith. Whenever we're in unbelief, we
deny how sinful we truly are. If you're here today, you think,
you know, I'm really not that bad. God's gonna be okay with me.
And you're still in unbelief. If you think that God's gonna
pat you on the back and say, you know, you're all right, come
on in. You did your best. You're still
in unbelief. Brethren, the debt is great.
And the degrees of that debt will come up at the judgment.
But the greatest of all those is unbelief. Yes, we may steal,
we may kill, we may cheat, commit adultery, fornication, lust in
our heart. The Bible speaks of the lust
of the eyes, the lust of the mind, the pride of life. We might
run them up like that. But whenever we stand before
the judgment seat of God, The unbelief. Unbelief is going to be the greatest of
all those sins. We did not believe God who cannot lie. But yet we
believed he was a liar. No, I don't believe that's how
we're saved. That's why it's blasphemous whenever
someone says, I'm never going to serve a God that predestinates
everything. I'm never going to serve a God
who elects some and not others. That's blasphemy. That's hatred
of the truth and living God. Let's look at something else
here before we get through today. We know that we're great debtors
and we owe our Creator. We know that that debt is different
among all of us. Some have a greater debt than
others. But all of us, if we are in unbelief, it is that unbelief
that is the greatest debt of all. And the Bible teaches that God
is just and satisfaction will be demanded. As I just said,
God is not going to wink at your sin and say, OK, Matter of fact, think about this,
brethren. When we all stand before the Lord, the Bible says that
broad is the road that leadeth to destruction, and many be there
that walk on that. The Bible says narrow is the
way that leads to righteousness, and few there be that be on that. So whenever we stand before God,
there's gonna be the mass majority of creation that is gonna be
in the ones who did not find it, the
ones who did not have it. There are gonna be more in that
day of judgment that is gonna be in unbelief than there will
be of those who believe. And so God is standing there
judging the masses and he has his sheep on his right and his
goats on the left. And as he's judging those goats
who are far outnumbering those who are the sheep, it can be
easy for a judge to say, you know, this is the majority, you
know, I will at least give them a little slack, you know. There
was more that was teaching this direction than there was in this
direction. I mean, you look now, even in Joplin, how many preach
and teach the gospel of sovereign grace here in Joplin? There isn't
many. I know of only a couple of churches that even somewhat
come close to preaching this gospel. And you think of all the other
churches that's preaching this free will gospel out there, and
they're all standing before God and saying, you know, they really
didn't have enough people to tell them. Is that going to matter?
No. God is not going to lower His
bar of justice for the accused. Satisfaction
is gonna be demanded. That's why the Bible says that
the wages of sin is debt. Ezekiel 18, 20 says, the soul
that sinneth, it shall die. So there has to be a sin debt
paid. There has to be a sin debt paid. You might deny that you have
debt, but your debt's still there. You might ignore that you have
a debt before God, but it's still there. Every obligation must be met. God is going to deliver the debtor
to prison to suffer at the hands of the tormentors forever. But here's the other fact about
you. You have nothing to pay. You owe all that debt, but you
don't have anything to pay. Look, if you look back at our
passage there in Matthew chapter seven. Matthew chapter 7. I don't know what I'm talking
about. Luke. I believe in Luke. Luke said... Verse 42. It said, And when they
had nothing to pay, He frankly forgave them both. When they had nothing to pay,
He forgave them. The legality of forgiveness was
taken care of in the work of Christ, okay? So a baby born
today who might be converted and believe
the gospel 40 years from now, The forgiveness for that elect
child of grace was already there. Their sins have already been
forgiven. Their experience of their forgiveness doesn't come
until the Lord gives them that spiritual understanding we talked
about at the first. We experience or feel or understand
or know that we have been forgiven. The guilt of sin has been removed
from us. The weight of sin has been removed
from us. But we don't ever come to that
place until we come to realize that we don't have anything to
pay. See, that's why I was saying at the beginning of this in my
introduction that unless you're born from above, quickened from
above, you'll never understand that you have nothing to pay.
You will keep thinking that you can do something to gain favor
with God. That's why Jesus said that unless
your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisee, You're never
gonna be saved. See, they thought they had a
righteousness by keeping the law. If I just keep the law and
follow the laws, then I'm gonna be accepted to God. And they
rejected Christ who said, I am the way, the truth, and the life,
that no man cometh unto the Father except by me. They said, no,
no, no, no, no. We're of Abraham's seed. Moses
give us the law, we keep the law. We have our sacrifices. The law and these bulls and goats
is what's gonna get us to heaven. And to you, it may be, I don't
drink, I don't do drugs, I don't fornicate, I don't do all these
bad things. And God says, none of those things
are pleasing in my sight. They're all as filthy rags. It's
only whenever we come to the place of knowing that we have
nothing to pay. He says, and when they had nothing
to pay, they came and realized, oh, creditor, we don't have the
money to pay you. There's nothing that we can do.
We're without help. We're without hope. We don't have anything
that is going to meet your justice and you to be able to let us
go. It's at that point that he said,
you're forgiven. See, if Christ brings us to the
place of realizing our debt, realizing our inability to get
out of that debt, then he brings the good news. You're forgiven. Just like he did with that woman.
That adulterous woman who by the law should have been stoned.
who by the law should have been killed on the spot when she was
caught with her adulterer. By the way, the adulterer should
have been drug out too, but that's where, games with Jesus. They only drug out the woman
and not the man. Both of them should have been
drug out in the streets and stoned to death. But here Jesus went
to this woman and he said, your sins are forgiven. only whenever
she knew that she was rightfully there. She knew. By law, I'm
where I should be. She wasn't trying to plead her
case. She knew that she was guilty and that she deserved all of
that that was coming upon her. She knew that. It was at that
point that Jesus said, your sins are forgiven. See, brethren,
it's not until we come to the understanding or realization
of our sin and our inability to pay that debt and look only
to Christ for hope. Look only to Christ for release,
for salvation. That's whenever the gospel comes
in and says, guess what? You've been forgiven. That while
we were yet enemies, Christ died for us. While we were yet with
sin, Christ died for us. While we were dead in trespasses
and sins and enemies against God, Christ died for us. And he comes and he tells us
you're forgiven. See, our repentance will not
pay our debt. Our good works will not pay our
debt. Listen, even the everlasting
torments of hell will not pay our debt. Again, that's why it
will be eternal torment. because it will never be able
to be repaid. God demands righteousness and
we don't have any. God demands satisfaction and
atonement for sin and we cannot provide that because we are sinful
people. We're all bankrupt before God.
We all have nothing but sin and hell owed to us. And so we pray that God would
bring us to an understanding of our salvation so that we might
know these things. The only way that our sin debt
can be paid, brethren, is by a surety. You guys have heard
me talk about surety before. Matter of fact, we preached several
weeks on this very thing just not too long ago. There is no other way that our
sin debt can be gotten rid of. If the sin debt must be paid
and the sinner has nothing to pay, then somebody has to pay
for him. If the sinner who cannot pay
and the price that is so great that no one can pay it, if any
is to be saved from the penalty of that, someone has to pay it
for them. And that's exactly what a surety
is. Say this, a surety is someone who makes himself liable and
responsible for the deaths of someone else. For deaths that he didn't make
himself. Remember, I gave you the illustration in our understanding
of things here in this world. If somebody commits a crime and
they have to go to jail, there's what we call a bail bondsman. And that bail bondsman is their
surety. He goes before the judge. pays
their bail for them and says, you know, I will guarantee that
this man will show back up in court and here's the money. And
the judge says, okay, you know, you're responsible for that person.
You remember we talked about Benjamin in Genesis chapter 43. And he said, whenever they were
going back before Joseph, and he said, He said, from my hand
you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to
you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. See, Jesus is standing as our
surety before the holiness of God, before the justice bar of
God. And that perfect righteousness
that God requires, Jesus said, I will apply my righteousness
to them. and I will take their debt and
sin and I will pay the price. See, that's what assurity is
about. Someone else makes the debt, someone else pays for it. The only possible way consistent
with the justice of God for sinners to be saved is through assurity. So unless there is someone able
and willing to pay for our sin debt, Every one of us are absolutely
positively doomed, but praise the Lord. In Hebrews chapter
seven, the Bible says that Jesus is the guarantee of a better
covenant. It is paid in full. Christ has paid everything in
full for his people. In Galatians chapter three and
verse 13, Turn there with me and we were just about done.
Galatians chapter three. And look at verse 13. I want
you guys to read these words for yourself and don't just take
my word for it. Don't just listen to me and then
let the words go in one ear and out the other. I want you to
read what God's word says to us. And if you're his, what the
word is saying to you. Galatians 3 and verse 13. It says, matter of fact, I'm
gonna back up to verse 10. It says, for as many as are under
the works of the law are under the curse. For it is written,
cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do. Now let me just stop there, that's
why I say, For people who want to be under the law, I've had
people here before that say, you don't preach the law enough.
You need to be preaching the law. We need to hear the law.
Why don't you preach about people having to keep the law and everything
like this? Well, the reason why is there's no hope in the law.
There's no hope in the law. It says here, for as many as
are under the works of the law are under the curse. If you want
to be under the law for righteousness, then you're under a curse. Because
the Bible says, cursed is everyone that continue, if not in all
things which are written in the book of the law to do them. If
you wanna be under the law for your righteousness, if you wanna
say, you know, I'm not gonna go on the way of believing on
Jesus alone, it's gotta be a little bit of law with the grace. Then God is telling you, then
you're cursed. Because the only way that that works is if you
continue in all the works of the law, always. Verse 11, but
that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is
evident for the just shall live by faith. That's why I'm saying
it's unbelief that is the greatest sin before God is unbelief because
you're saying God's a liar. His way of salvation is not true.
The just live by faith. They live by the faith of Jesus
Christ. what He did, what He did and
accomplished, not by what you accomplished under the law. Verse
12, and the law is not of faith, but the man that doeth them shall
live in them. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law,
being made a curse for us, for it is written, cursed is everyone
that hangeth on a tree. So there is our surety. standing
there before the judgment seat of God, taking the full debt
that we owed and became a curse for us. Now listen, if you wanna
try to gain acceptance with God by the law, by your good works,
by doing what you think God's gonna accept, then you're gonna
be the cursed one and you deserve everything that Christ experienced
on that cross. And one of these days you will
experience that eternal separation from God and that torment that
comes by it. For as many of the works of the
law are under a curse, but praise the Lord for his people, Christ
hath redeemed us, bought us out of the curse, being made a curse
for us. See, he said, instead of you
paying, I'll pay. Just like the creditor did with
those two men. Whenever we come to the place
where we know we cannot pay, the gospel tells us, guess what? Someone's already paid your bill
for you. And to whom much is forgiven,
loves much. Look at 1 Peter chapter three.
1 Peter 3, look with me if you
would, in verse 18. It says, for Christ also has
suffered for sins, the just for the unjust. The just one died
and paid the debt. The unjust got off free. Now that don't seem fair, does
it? But it's just. It's not fair but it's just. See, a lot of people will say,
well, it's not fair that God chooses one over another, but
it's just. God doesn't say anywhere that
I am a fair God. Everything I do is fair. Listen,
if God worked in fairness, the only thing that's fair is that
we all be destroyed and that his son not die in our place.
So we don't ever wanna jump on that That's not fair, bandwagon. You deserve everything that you
get because you're a sinner. No, it's just. The just for the
unjust doesn't seem fair and it isn't fair, but it is just
because God is just. And God said that him dying in
your place is satisfaction, I will accept that as payment in full. For Christ also hath once suffered
for sin, but just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.
The only way he, remember he said, I am the way, the truth,
and the life, no man comes to the Father except by me. The only way that Christ can
bring you to the Father is for him to take your place. being put to death in the flesh,
but quickened by the spirit, by which also he went and preached
unto the spirits in prison. We sing the song, Jesus paid
it all, all to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
but he washed it white as snow. Brother, there's no forgiveness
under the law. There's no forgiveness by your
own deed, by your own worth, by your own merit. Forgiveness
only comes through the blood of Jesus Christ and his surety
ship cost him everything. The Bible says that Christ became
rich for your sake, or excuse me, Christ who was rich became
poor for your sake, that by his poverty, you might become rich. In Acts chapter 13, the Bible
says that they found in him no guilt, In Ephesians 1, it says, we have
redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins according
to the riches of his grace. Christ paid our debt when we
couldn't pay it. That's why we sang that hymn
the last time we were together. Remember it? Read it for you. Mercy speaks by Jesus' blood.
Hear and sing, ye sons of God. Justice satisfied indeed, Christ
is full atonement made. Jesus' blood speaks loud and
sweet, hear all deity can meet. And without a jarring voice,
welcome Zion to rejoice. Peace of conscience, peace with
God, we obtain through Jesus' blood. Jesus' blood speaks solid
rest, we believe and we are blessed. Should the law against her roar,
Jesus' blood still speaks with power. All her debts were cast
on me. She must and shall go free. Listen, brethren, for the children
of God, the case has been dismissed. And that's what the Holy Spirit
tells every child of grace whenever they are born from above. He
teaches them the gospel. The faith that is given to us
in the new birth is a faith that reaches out and receives that
gospel, not the gospel of what you do, not the gospel of law,
not the gospel of self-righteousness, but the gospel of imputed righteousness. The Bible says, there is therefore
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk
not after the flesh, but after the spirit. If we have been put
into Christ, we are not after the flesh, but after the spirit
now. And so there's no condemnation
to us. Sin cannot be imputed to those whose sins were not
imputed to Christ. If our sins were imputed to Christ,
they are never gonna be imputed to us. We have a great Savior. We have
a great God. He's done much for us. And in
our passage in Luke, the Bible says that to whom is forgiven
much loveth much. Has Christ forgiven you much? Do you love him much? The Bible
says we love him because he first loved us. If you're to have your sin debt
removed from your conscience, you must look to Christ alone.
That's where we find rest. We must look to the blood of
Christ to be that which God accepts on our behalf and not our own
self-righteousness. The Bible says that if we confess
our sins, that he is faithful and just to forgive our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Psalm says, blessed is the man
unto whom the Lord imputeth not sin. Blessed is the one whose
transgressions are forgiven, whose sin is covered. Brethren, the debt has been paid
in full. And I pray that the Holy Spirit
give us all ears to hear that, a heart to understand that, a
mind to understand that, and a heart to receive that and to
look to him alone. And may you find forgiveness
and rest in that good news. Does anybody have any comments
or anything that you'd like to say? Testimony or if you think that Christ has
saved you, if you want to make that known. All right, let's bow. Our gracious
Heavenly Father, we thank you again for the word of God that
we have today before us. We thank you. for the forgiveness
that is in Christ. We thank you that our sin debt
has been paid in full. We thank you, Father, that you,
by your Spirit, come and teach your people these things. We
know that in our own flesh that we are debtors to God and that
we cannot do anything to gain acceptance with him. That we,
without Christ, would be, as all men, most miserable because
we have no hope. But because of Christ Jesus,
we have hope. Our hope is in Him, not in our
own works, not our own deeds, our own will, our own works,
but our hope is in what Christ has already done for us. And
our hope is that we are in Him and that that has been applied
to us, to our life. And so Father Lord, we just thank
you for that. We thank you for being the surety,
being the just. The Bible says that because of
the work of Christ, the just for the unjust, that he is both
the just and the justifier. He can, through righteousness,
be the justifier of the wicked, but only because of the surety,
only because the just man died in our place. Father, I don't
think we truly can understand in this lifetime the depth of
that love for us. I don't think we can truly understand
the implications of God dying on our behalf. Forgive us, Father, for our sin.
Forgive us for our. Cavalier attitudes towards what
you've done for us. Forgive us for being so earthly
minded. I'm not thinking of you more
often, coming to you in prayer and study of your word and gathering
with your people, Father, that those things, while they don't
save us, they truly, if we have the love shed abroad in our hearts,
should be evidences of things that's happened within. And so,
Father, I pray that you would make your people faithful, keep
them faithful, make them willing in the day of your power, that
you might bring and convert those of your sheep that have yet to
confess and profess faith in you. Lord, we just ask that you
would do that. And so Father, Lord, we pray
that you might honor and glorify your son in all that we do and
say, may you keep us this week as we go in safety. Lord, we
pray for our country. We pray for this nation. Even
as we approach the time of election, Lord, we know that you are sovereign
over all things and that you set up kingdoms and you tear
down kingdoms. You set up leaders. You take
down leaders, and we know that it's all by your sovereign hand.
And Father, we pray that you would give us a good leader.
We pray, Father, that you would help us in this country to once
again return to a fear of God, to a respect of Christ and God
in this country. Lord, we pray that you might
remove the wickedness from among us, that you might remove those
things that are dishonoring to you. And Father, Lord, we know
that we deserve justice as a country. We know that your hand of blessing
has left us a long time ago, but Lord, we pray that you might
once again place that there and that you might grant us repentance. We pray for those who are not
here, for Brother Ed. Lord, we ask, Lord, that you
might be with him wherever he's at today. And for his son, we
pray for Sister Louetta, for Beth, for Mindy, and for all
those that have been here and as they've moved away, Lord,
we pray wherever they're at now, that you just might touch and
minister to them, that they might find places of worship that preach
the truth of God. And Lord, again, we thank you
for all that you've done. And may you bless this time together
around the table and the food that we're about to eat. For
it's in Jesus' name that we pray.