Well, what a joy it is for us
to be here with you, and I look forward to this entire confidence. The theme of our conference is
titled, Pilgrims in Progress. And of course, this theme, this
title is drawn from the number one best-selling book of all
time, apart from the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress. This Christian classic
was written by that great man of the 17th century, John Bunyan. It was published in the year
1678. John Bunyan was in prison for
12 years for his refusal to stop preaching the gospel of Jesus
Christ. In fact, they never even locked
the door. He was free to walk out at any time under one condition
that you will not preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. He had a family. He had young
children. He had a blind daughter. He paid
a great price to remain in that prison because he must obey God
and not men. And while in this prison, John
Bunyan wrote Pilgrim's Progress. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said
that the smell of the dungeon is in every page of Pilgrim's
Progress. Spurgeon went on to say that
John Bunyan was a walking Bible. Cut him anywhere and he bleeds
Bibline, whatever that is. The idea is that he just bleeds
the Word of God. And this iconic book is an allegory
of the Christian life. The main character, as you no
doubt know, is a believer named Christian. And in the course
of his journey to the celestial city, which is heaven, he comes
to the city of vanity, which is the world, with all of its
snares and lures and temptations and lies. And Christian is accompanied
by his companion traveler, Faithful. And in the town of Vanity are
all kinds of vanities to distract Christian and his Christian life. Inside the city of Vanity is
a fair. It is Vanity Fair. And the fair
is very old. It has been operating for many,
many years, for centuries. And it is always well attended. The head of Vanity Fair, John
Bunyan writes, was Beelzebub. And his aim is to entertain all
travelers who come to Vanity and to sell them all kinds of
merchandise. He sells the many goods of the
world and promises much happiness. but never delivers any. At Vanity Fair are all kinds
of places to lure believers and to lure Christian and faithful
into its web. There are seductive shows. There are nightclubs, casinos,
and most deceptive of all, fashionable churches. At Vanity Fair are
all kinds of activities. gambling, cheating, defrauding,
embezzling, lying, stealing, swindling, and conniving. And there are all kinds of people
who have set up their shop to sell their wares here at Vanity
Fair and who live within the city of vanity. There are fools
and thugs and lewd women and murderers and adulterers. And
also here at Vanity Fair are synthetic Christians. of those
who profess religion in the gospel but who do not know the God of
Christian. There are charlatan physicians
who offer false cures to the travelers who come through. There are crafty lawyers and
unscrupulous politicians and racketeers. And the broad road
that leads to destruction brings Vanity Fair much trade and traffic,
and it runs right through the very center of this town. And Bunyan says, the only way
to miss an encounter with Vanity Fair is to leave this world. For as long as you are in this
world, you are passing through Vanity Fair. He points out that
the Prince of Peace long ago came to Vanity Fair. And the
Lord of the Fair, Beelzebub, tried to sell the Prince of Peace
many of his vanities and many of his wares, but the Prince
did not care for any of Beelzebub's merchandise. In fact, Beelzebub
offered him all of the kingdoms of the world if he would but
just worship him. And the Prince of Peace refused
and left the city without spending one penny for any of Beelzebub's
goods. As Christian and faithful enter
Vanity Fair, they create an enormous sensation. Their dress was different
from the people who lived there. They stood out like a sore thumb. And so also was their speech
different because they did not speak with the crudeness of those
who lived there. They had no interest in the goods
of Vanity Fair. And so the men of the fair mocked
Christian and mocked faithful and said, what will you buy?
Do business with us. And Christian and faithful responded,
we will buy truth. When the people of Vanity Fair
heard this, they rose up in a storm against Christian and against
faithful, and they took them and whipped them and put them
in the iron cage and then put them on trial and prosecuted
them for their faith. False accusations were brought
against them, and both faithful and Christian were condemned. Faithful was executed. and became a martyr. And Christian
was imprisoned and then released, but paid a great price for his
commitment to buy truth. Nothing has changed in the last
almost 340 years since John Bunyan first published Pilgrim's Progress
in 1678. The world in which Bunyan lived
is the world in which you and I live, only worse. We who know the Lord are like
Christian, and we are pilgrims in this world, and we are headed
to a better land. We are headed to the celestial
city. But in route, as we live our
daily Christian lives, we find ourselves passing through vanity
fare, and we are all enticed daily by the emptiness of what
this world would offer to us. In this first session, I want
to talk about what Christian and faithful said they would
buy. They said no to the merchandise
of this world that Beelzebulb was offering to them, and instead
they responded, we buy truth. And so in this session I want
to talk about the truth. I want to talk about you and
me buying the truth and how imperative it is that we turn a deaf ear
to the call of this world and that we remain focused upon the
truth. I have four headings under which
I want to gather my thoughts for the remainder of our time
here today. They're very simple headings,
and if you're a note-taker, I would encourage you to jot these down. First of all, as we think about
the truth, as Christians said, we buy the truth. And I trust
that your testimony here today is, we buy the truth. Number
one is the priority of truth. The number one priority in your
life must be the acquisition of the truth, and nothing supersedes
the truth in your life. And why would I say this? Because
no one can be born again without the truth. And no one can be
saved. And no one can come to a saving
knowledge of God through His Son, Jesus Christ, independent
of the truth. If anyone anywhere on planet
Earth is to be saved, to be converted, and to know Christ, it will always
be in response to the truth. There's an old saying, you can't
get there from here. Well, without the truth, you
can't get to heaven and you can't get there. And without the truth,
you cannot grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus
Christ. You cannot know God's will without
the truth. You're lost in a fog for His
Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path. You
cannot know and do God's work because it is by the truth that
we are equipped to do the work of God. You cannot have the assurance
of your salvation apart from the truth. For 1 John 5.13 says,
these things we have written unto you, that you may have,
that you may know that you have eternal life. You cannot worship
God apart from the truth. Jesus said, God is spirit, and
those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. You cannot obey God apart from
a knowledge of the truth. And I want to say again, you
cannot go to heaven apart from a right response to the truth. Jesus said, I am the way and
the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but
through me. And that is why we are underscoring
at this point the priority of truth. You cannot worship without
the truth. You cannot be saved without the
truth. You cannot be sanctified without the truth. You cannot
serve God without the truth. The truth is non-negotiable. Jesus said, you shall know the
truth. And the truth shall set you free. Jesus said at the heart of his
coming into the world, apart from his death upon the cross,
he said, for this I have been born. And for this I have come
into the world to testify to the truth. As you live in this
vanity fair called San Francisco, Silicon Valley, San Jose, Napa
Valley, Monterey, Los Angeles, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and
every other place in this great state of California. You must
be reminded of this priority. We must buy the truth. Now second, not only the priority,
of truth. But second, the meaning of truth. What is truth? What does the
word mean? When Christians said in Vanity
Fair, no to the world, but yes to the truth, what does truth
mean? In one word, truth means reality. It is the way things really are. Truth is what corresponds to
reality. It is not how things may appear
to be. It is not how we want things
to be. It is not what most people say
something is. It is not what opinion polls
indicate what most people think something is. It is not what
the culture says something is. It is not what majority vote
says something is. It is not what society says something
is. Instead, truth is how things
really are. Truth is actuality. Truth is veracity. Truth is accuracy. Truth is that which conforms
to the way things really are. Truth is not a distortion. nor a fabrication, truth is reality. And apart from the truth, one
lives in a world of darkness, in a world of deception, and
in a world of lies. Do you see what the truth is?
And the truth is found in the written Word of God. Jesus prayed
in John 17, 17, "'Sanctify them by Your word, your word is truth. Truth is found in this book,
the written word of the living God. The Bible says, all Scripture
is God-breathed. Theonoustos, it is breathed out
of the mouth of God. Jesus, quoting Deuteronomy 8,
verse 3, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word
that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Romans says, let every
man be found a liar. Let God be found true. The meaning of truth is reality. As you live your Christian life,
you must have an accurate understanding of the way things really are.
You must accurately understand who God is. You must accurately
understand who you are. You must accurately understand
who Jesus Christ is and what the way of saving grace is. It is by the truth that you enter
the Christian life and it is by the truth that you advance
and progress. This leads us now to third, the
characteristics. truth? What are the distinguishing
marks of truth? Number one, truth is divine. Truth comes down from above. Truth does not originate in this
world. It does not come up from this
world. Truth must come from another
world. Truth must come from God Himself. Truth must come by divine revelation. God is the author of all truth. God is the source of all truth. God is the determiner of all
truth. He is the governor of all truth.
He is the arbitrator of all truth. He himself is the standard of
all truth. And he is the final judge of
all truth. Truth is whatever God says something
is. Man is what God says man is. Sin is what God says sin is. Heaven is what God says heaven
is. Hell is what God says hell is. The final judgment is what God
says the final judgment is. God Himself, in fact, is truth. In Psalm 31, verse 5, we read
that God is the God of truth. In John 14, verse 6, Jesus said,
and I've already quoted it, I am the way and the truth and the
life. Jesus is literally truth incarnate. In Ephesians 4, verse 21, we
read truth is in Jesus. There is not one drop of truth
outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. Outside of Christ are lies and
deceptions and falsehoods. All truth is found in the Lord
Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit, in John 14,
17, is the spirit of truth. And in John 15, 26, again, he
is called the spirit of truth. In this sense, truth is Trinitarian. Truth is the self-expression
of God himself. Truth is everything that is consistent
with the mind of God, the being of God, the will of God, and
the character of God. Number one, truth is divine. The first characteristic of truth
is it is divine. Second, truth is absolute. By this we mean truth is not
relative. There's not one truth for you
and a different truth for me. and a different truth in the
South, and a different truth on the West Coast, and a different
truth in the North or in the Northeast. No, truth is absolute. And because truth is absolute,
it transcends individuals, and it transcends regions, and it
transcends nations and continents because there is only one truth. Truth, therefore, is exclusive. It is not inclusive. Truth is
very discriminating. Something is either truth or
it is untruth. But all things are not truth.
Truth is not arbitrary. Truth is not conditional. Whatever contradicts biblical
truth is by definition false. And what is false is incompatible
with the truth. It is an error. Because truth
is absolute. It is sovereign. And it rules
and reigns. And we must be in submission
to the truth that God has spoken. Truth is divine. It is absolute. Third, truth is objective. And by objective we mean truth
is not a feeling. A truth is not subjective. And because our feelings fluctuate,
Truth, which is not a feeling, does not fluctuate. It is conveyed
in clearly defined words that have precise meaning. Truth is conveyed in words that
are understandable. Truth is concrete. Truth is black
and white. Truth is narrowly defined by
God's Word, and therefore truth is rational. It is factual. It is cerebral. It is cognitive. The Bible is, in 2 Timothy 2.15,
the word of truth. And in Psalm 119, verse 160,
we read, your word is truth. Truth is found in specific words
that have specific meaning in the revealed, written, inspired,
infallible Word of the living God. Something is true regardless
of how anyone feels about it. It is true whether it speaks
subjectively to your heart or whether it does not speak subjectively
to your heart. It nevertheless is truth. Truth
is specific. Truth is never vague. Truth is
never fuzzy. Truth is razor sharp, like a
surgeon's scalpel. Truth is a laser beam. It is
explicit. It is exact. It is clear cut
in its meaning. Truth never stutters. A truth
never speaks out of both sides of its mouth. A truth never mumbles. Truth tells it like it is. Fourth, truth is singular. Truth is always referred to as
the truth. It is never referred to in the
Bible in the plural, truth. It is always referred to in the
Bible in the singular, truth, with the definite article the
in front of it. It's not a truth as though it
is one of many truths. It is always the truth, singular,
and the emphasis of the singular is that all that is affirmed
by the truth, it all hangs together. It never contradicts itself.
It never violates what it says. Truth is one body of truth. Truth is one system of truth. It is one body of divinity. Francis Schaeffer wrote years
ago, Christianity is not a series of truths, plural. but rather
truth, singular, spelled out with a capital T." James Montgomery Boyce, the great
expositor of a few decades ago, wrote, truth is singular. A truth is never found in fragments. that would require us to speak
of truths in the sense of unrelated facts or items. Beuys says, no, truth holds together. Therefore, there is no phase
of truth that is not related to every other phase of truth. You tell me what you believe
about one truth in the Bible, I'll tell you what you believe
about forty other truths in the Bible. It is like a tapestry
that is woven together tightly, and the pulling of one thread
causes other threads to be moved. You can pull a thread in Genesis,
and a verse in Revelation crinkles on the other end of the Bible.
It is all one statement of truth. It presents one diagnosis of
the human dilemma. It presents one way of salvation. It presents one history of redemption. It presents one savior of sinners. It presents one plan for the
family. It presents one way to pursue
holiness. It presents one remedy unto eternal
life. All truth forms one coherent,
seamless network of truth. That is why, therefore, it's
all or nothing. You can't pick and choose what
you want in the Bible and just pass over the others like you're
going through a buffet line. I'll take some Romans today but
no thank you on the Deuteronomy. No, it's all singular. It's all
or nothing. It would be like if I came to
your house and I knocked on the door and you said, who's there? I said, Steve Lawson. And you
said, Steve, come in. Lawson, you stay out. You couldn't
cut me in half and only half of me come in and the other half
stay out. No. It's all or nothing. And that's exactly the way that
it is with the truth. We believe the full counsel of
God as it is revealed in the Scripture. Number five, truth
is immutable. Not only is it singular and objective
and absolute and divine, but fifth, truth is immutable. That is to say, truth never changes
its mind. Truth is fixed. Truth is anchored
and established. God does not change, neither
does God's truth change. God's truth is constant from
age to age. God's truth is unvarying. It
is timeless. It transcends generations. The
truth is always the same. Right is always right, and wrong
is always wrong. Society may try to redefine morality,
and culture may try to reclassify right and wrong, but new truth
is old heresy. The truth never changes. And
truth is eternal. Truth is transcendent. Truth
is everlasting. Psalm 119, verse 89, forever,
O Lord, your word is settled in heaven. I've translated that
out of the original Hebrew, and this is what it literally means.
Forever, O Lord, your word is settled in heaven. It means what it says and says
what it means. Isaiah 40, verse 8, the grass
withers, the flower fades away, but the word of our God abides
forever. Matthew 5, verse 18, for truly
I say to you, and whenever Jesus says truly, truly I say unto
you, He is underscoring the enormous importance of what is about to
follow. Everything that Jesus said was
true, but some things that Jesus said rise to a higher level of
importance. This is one of those. For truly,
I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest
letter or stroke shall pass from the law until all is accomplished."
I love that. When I was a younger man, after
I graduated from college, I went to law school. I thought I wanted
to be a lawyer. I enrolled, began to study case
law, constitutional law, civil law. And when I came to the final
exam, My entire grade for the semester was the final exam. I woke up early studying, stayed
up late at night studying. And when I would walk in to take
the final exam, what was so frustrating to me is so often they changed
the law by the time I got there. Now, we need Christian attorneys.
But for me, I wanted to pour my life into a law that never
changes and the truth that never changes. And what I study as
a young man, I will teach and I will preach in my 30s, in my
40s, in my 50s. And when I come to my dying day,
what I studied in my 20s has never been more true than it
will be on the last day of my life. Luke 16, verse 17, it is
easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke
of a letter of the law to fail. Because truth is unchanging. It is therefore always up to
date. It is always relevant. It is
always contemporary. It never needs being updated.
It always speaks to every generation in every city and in every country
around the world. Truth is never outdated. Truth
is never any longer truth. I want to give you one more.
Truth is authoritative. Truth makes assertive demands
upon us. Truth necessitates something
from us. Truth is never just interesting. Truth is never intended to salve
our curiosity. Truth is demanding. Truth is commanding. Truth possesses
the right to rule our lives. The life of every person is defined
by his or her relationship to the truth. You cannot be saved
apart from the truth. You cannot be sanctified apart
from the truth. We have already said that. When
the truth speaks, God speaks. And when the truth commands,
God commands. And truth is so determinative.
Truth determines where you will spend all eternity. Truth determines
whether you are in or out of the kingdom of God. Truth has
power to convict. Truth has power to save. The
truth has power to judge. The truth has power to damn and
to conform. John MacArthur writes, Authentic
Christianity is concerned first and foremost with truth. The Christian faith is not primarily
about feelings, although deep feelings will surely result from
the impact of truth in our hearts. The Christian life is not about
human relationships, even though relationships are the main focus
in many of today's evangelical pulpits. It is not primarily
about success and earthly blessings. Biblical Christianity, MacArthur
writes, is all about truth. God's objective revelation in
the Bible, interpreted rationally, yields divine truth in perfectly
sufficient measure. Everything we need to know for
life and godliness is written for us in the truth of Scripture. He writes, God wrote only one
book, the Bible. It contains all the redemptive
truth by which He intended us to have in order to establish
our lives. Do you see the characteristics
of truth? When you see the properties of
truth, the particulars of truth, we understand something of the
priority. of truth. Finally, the response
to truth. How should we respond to the
truth? Let me give you several things.
Number one, receive it. Buy it. Acquire it. Receive the truth into your life
and it will be well with your soul. Refuse the truth of the
Word of God and you will be in a perilous state, receive the
truth. Receive it by faith. Receive
it with all of your heart. Receive it into your mind from
pages of Scripture. Number one, receive the truth. Second, read the truth. If this book is what it claims
to be, the written word of the living God, How could we ever
just let it sit on the table? How could it ever just remain
on the desk or on a nightstand and remain unread? If we receive
it, we must read it. And as we read it, seek to understand
it and to seek to begin to incorporate it into our very lives. Third, reverence it. Every time
you open the Bible, stand in awe of it, for it never errs
and it never fails. There is no other book like the
Bible. Take what it says seriously,
for it contains the very voice of God. Stand in awe of the truth
as it is found in pages of Scripture. Calvin said, when the Bible speaks,
God speaks. Fourth, rejoice in it. Let the Bible thrill your soul
and cause you greatest joy. Find comfort in this book in
the darkest hours of the night. Let this book lift you up when
you are down. Let this book encourage you when
you are discouraged. There is no other commodity that
you could buy that will lift your soul up like the truth that
is found in the Word of God. Fifth, rely upon it. The truth is trustworthy. It
is a trustworthy guide. It is more sure of the path that
you should take than anything else in this world. The truth
has never once missteered your life. The truth has never once
misguided you or ever once misdirected you. When you cannot see your
way in this dark world, hold forth the truth that is found
in the lamp of the Word of God, and you will see the way, you
will see the dangers that will be encroaching around you, and
you will see the narrow path that you are to take. Six, reflect
upon it. Meditate upon the truth. Let its truths and doctrines
and teachings and examples and promises and warnings. fill your mind and flood your
soul. As a cow would chew the grass
and chew its cud and stand there in the field and just chew on
it and chew on it and take it in. So throughout the day, you
should be saturating your mind with the truth and chewing on
the truth and digesting it into your life. Seventh, run with
it. Live the truth. Put it into practice. Never just sit as a spectator
looking at the truth. Receive it into your own heart
and run the race that God has set before you. Live it out. Put it into practice. Incorporate
it into your very life. And finally, relay it. Pass it on to others. Do not
keep it simply for yourself. Bear witness to the truth. Testify
to the truth. Teach the truth. Preach the truth. Pass on the truth to others who
are all around you. No wonder Christian said when
he came to Vanity Fair, I will have none of your merchandise,
as he refused Beelzebulb, as he turned a deaf ear to the calls
at the fair, beckoning him to buy the merchandise of the things
of this world that cannot satisfy and cannot save. No wonder Christian
said, we buy the truth. And they were willing to pay
whatever price was necessary for the truth. And for faithful,
it cost him his life. And you and I are living in unprecedented
times in the history of this nation in which we find ourselves. We now find ourselves in a post-Christian
society. And as you live in this region
in which you find yourselves, where some of the finest Christians
live here on the West Coast, There is at the same time a vanity
fair that is calling out to you and wanting your children and
wanting your grandchildren and are wanting your allegiance and
your loyalty. You must say no to the world.
Do not love the world nor the things that are in the world.
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the
lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life, it is all passing
away. But he who does the will of my
Father in heaven shall abide forever." Turn your back to the
world. Say no to the world. Deny yourself. Take up a cross. follow after
the Lord Jesus Christ. It may cost us our lives. Sooner
than we think, Christian persecution is coming at an accelerated rate. May we be like Christian and
be willing to pay the ultimate price if called upon for the
truth And may we be like Christian and refuse the vanities of the
fair. May we say, we buy the truth. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven, we thank
you that you are the God of all truth. And we thank you that
you speak to us with perfect accuracy and fidelity. and your words are marked by
inerrancy. Lord, we treasure the truth and
we know that we have come to believe the truth of your word
and of your gospel because your spirit has worked in our hearts
and in our lives. He is the spirit of truth and
he has opened our understanding to the truth that he has written
in sacred scripture. I pray that through these sessions
that we will have together and in the upcoming days, that we
will deepen our roots and deepen our confidence in the truth of
your word. And may we say, as for me and
my house, we will stand on the truth. In Jesus' name we pray,
amen.