Turn with me if you would over
to John chapter 1. John chapter 1. We find here, now this isn't
actually from the words of Jesus, but we see here, this is the
work of Jesus. It says here, look with me at
verses, well, we'll just start from verse one and read our way
down. It says, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not
anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life
was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness,
and the darkness comprehended it not. There was a man sent
from God whose name was John. The same came for a witness to
bear witness of the light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that light, but was
sent to bear witness of that light. That was the true light,
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. He was
in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew
him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not.
Here it is, verse 12. But as many as received him,
to them gave he power to become the sons of God. even to them
that believe on his name, which were born, not of blood, nor
of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of the man, but of
God." Okay, and so we'll stop right there. We're seated in
view here. We're talking about the Lord
Jesus Christ, put in verse 14. It says, and the word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. We beheld his glory, the glory
of the only begotten. of the Father full of grace and
truth. Talking about the Lord Jesus
Christ, He was given power to make people sons of God. And nobody receives Him, but
as many as received Him, to them, who's them? The ones who received
Him, right? But as many as received Him,
to them gave he power to become sons of God. See, they believed
because they were sons of God. Remember, the scriptures say
that because ye are sons, he has sent his spirit into us whereby
we cry out to the Father. We don't cry out to God, we don't
cry out to to salvation. We don't cry out for help. We
don't cry out in repentance. We don't cry out to God over
our sin and over our need for him until the Holy Spirit comes
into our heart, comes into our life, comes into our soul and
spirit, until he comes into us. And whenever he comes into us,
he gives us that power by the new birth, through that new life,
that new birth, that spiritual life. All we have is dead spirit,
right? But in the new birth, we have
spiritual life given to us. And in that new spiritual life,
we have power to receive Christ, to believe on Christ. As many
as received him, to them gave me power to become the sons of
God, to them that believe on his name, which were born, again,
here we go, They were not born. Their spiritual birth did not
come as a result of their blood. These children of mine do not
become Christians, do not become born again because they are my
children, despite what a lot of covenant Presbyterianism might
teach. Nor of the will of the flesh I can't beat myself into submission
and make myself a Christian. I can't change myself. I can't
make myself better. I can't make a moral turn. I
can't make this bad tree a good tree. I can't make this bad ground
fertile ground. I can't make these spots, if
you will, of this leopard change. I am corrupt. I am evil. I am
dead in trespasses and sins. I have no spiritual life within
me. And the will of the flesh cannot change that. I cannot
change and make myself different. I cannot make myself better so
that I'll be acceptable to God. I am not born again. I am not
born of the Spirit by the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man. It is not by my choosing. It's not by my will. It's not
by anybody else's will. No matter how much my grandparents,
or parents, or aunts, or uncles, or cousins, or brothers, or sisters,
no matter how much they want me to be saved, the will of man
will not cause me to be born again. By what is anyone born of God? The will of God. which were born
not of blood, nor of the will of man, or excuse me, the will
of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of, and it's inferred
there because of the previous two phrases, but of the will
of God. We are born not only of the will
of God, but we are born by the exercise and power of God. Why? There is one who is given
power to make those sons of God. There is one who is given power
to make sons of God. There is one who is given power
to bring forth those who were given to him from all eternity
through the new birth. And so we see that one of the
doctrines of Jesus Christ is the fact that salvation as it
pertains to of quickening or being born again has nothing
to do with the will of the flesh or the will of man. It is the
will of God. Turn with me to John chapter
3. If you have a Bible that has
red letters in there from Christ, which by the way, your Bible
is not a bad Bible if it doesn't have red letters. Believe it
or not, I've had people tell me that, well, that's not a legitimate
Bible because it doesn't have the words of Christ in red. Matter of fact, you can get Bibles
in those where they have the words of Christ in red. They
differ from Bible to Bible sometimes. Also, there's places in scripture
where it has words in red that if you read it in paragraph form
or contextual form, you'll find that that wasn't Jesus that said
that. And there's places that is not
in red, when you read it in paragraph form and in context, you'll find
that it was something that Jesus did say, but they didn't say
it was Jesus that said it. So don't go off the words in
red just because of that. But if you do have those in words
in red, I am gonna be reading mostly just the words of Jesus. Because what are we doing here?
As we looked at in the last deal, the doctrine of Christ is one
thing that we outwardly look at, that profession of what doctrine
it is, what gospel it is that we are believing. When we say
we believe the gospel, then what doctrine is that? The doctrine of Christ. What
does he say? What did he teach? John chapter 3, verse 1. There
was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, the ruler of the Jews.
The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him, Rabbi, we
know that thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can
do these miracles that thou doest, he said. God be with him. Jesus
answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except
a man be born again, he cannot, cannot see the kingdom of God. So here we see that Jesus says,
that there has to be a new birth before anyone can see the Kingdom
of God. And we just read in John chapter
1 that no one is born of the will of the flesh or the will
of man. So any doctrine that comes preaching
that you can be born again by making a decision or choosing
for yourself by your will, by free will, then they are preaching
contrary to the doctrine of Christ. Because right here we have two
chapters, or two verses, that say it's not by the will of man,
it's not by the will of the flesh, and Jesus says that no one can
see the kingdom of God, comprehend the kingdom of God, know the
kingdom of God, see the kingdom of God, receive the kingdom of
God, be part of the kingdom of God, understand the kingdom of
God. They cannot see the kingdom of
God except they be born again. And being born again has nothing
to do with the work of man but of God. That takes it out of
condition. So any doctrine that comes that
has a condition for your salvation is a false doctrine. And what
did it say in the scriptures? We're not to receive that into
the house. We're not to wish them Godspeed. We're to mark
them out that are contrary to that doctrine. We are not to
accept them. We're to avoid them. Jesus goes on to say, Nicodemus
said to him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter
the second time into his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered,
verily, verily, I say unto thee, except, there's that word again,
except. What does that word mean? That's
a small word, but it has meaning, right? Words have meanings. And
what does that word mean, except? That means that there's no other
way but this, right? This is the exception, and there's
only one exception. There is no other way. Look at
in verse three. There is no other way a man can see the kingdom
of God except being born again. So if you're not born again,
you can't see the kingdom of God. But now Jesus says this,
except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot
enter into the kingdom of God. So unless one is born again,
he cannot enter. He cannot see the kingdom of
God. He cannot enter the kingdom of God. Paul reiterated that
whenever he wrote by the Holy Spirit in 1 Corinthians 2, 14,
I believe, or around to that area, that the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God. Neither can he. Neither can he. It's an ability
thing, right? Why? Because they are spiritually
discerned. One has to be born of the Spirit
to see the Kingdom of God. Why? Because the Kingdom of God
is a spiritual Kingdom. The doctrines of the Kingdom
are spiritual doctrines. The work of the Kingdom is a
spiritual work. The love of the Kingdom is a
spiritual love. So we can't love God, love the
Brethren, and we cannot love God's Word and we cannot hold
to the Gospel, understand the Gospel, unless one is born of
the Spirit and no one is born of the will of the flesh or the
will of man. But they're born of God. Jesus says, that which
is born of the flesh is flesh. Only can do flesh. Only can understand
the things of the flesh in a fleshly way. Paul also reiterated that
in that 1 Corinthians 2 chapter. Because he said that all the
wisdom of man can do is produce the wisdom of man. I'm kind of
summarizing that. That the wisdom of man is there,
and that we don't speak in words of wisdom in the wisdom of men.
We don't teach the things in the traditions of men and the
wisdom of men. We do it by the things of the
spirit. And no one can know the spirit except the one that has
the spirit in them. So he says, that which is born
of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is
spirit. And he goes on to say, marvel
not that I said unto thee, ye must be born again. He didn't
say you got to get born again. He didn't say you need to try
to get born again. He said, ye must be born again. That's a statement of fact. That's
a statement of being. Ye must be. born again already
before you can see the kingdom of God and to enter the kingdom of God.
You have to be born again. Ye must be. It's an imperative
thing too, right? There is no other way. You can't
be outside being born again to see and to enter the kingdom
of God. And that tells me that If it's
an imperative thing that it's a positive, I mean, this has
to happen before you can see an inner, then all those for
whom Christ died for, all those who are in the kingdom of God
was born again and they were born again, not of the will of
the flesh, nor the will of the man, but they were born again
of God, the will of God, the power of God. Why? Because they were made sons by
Christ. Jesus makes this comment, the
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whether it goeth.
So is everyone that is born of the Spirit. So the Spirit goes
wherever it wants to go, as directed by Christ, that is. Whenever
I say goes wherever it wants to go, I'm talking about in regards
to man, okay? He doesn't go where man tells
him to go. Again, he's not born of the will
of the flesh. Nicodemus answered and said unto
him, how can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto
him, art thou a master of Israel? Thou knowest not these things.
Verily, verily, I say unto thee, we speak that we do know, and
testify that we have seen, and ye receive not our witness. Now
Jesus here very early in this book of John, very early is setting
something that I'm fixing to show you as we go through the
rest of the doctrine of Christ. There is two groups of people. There are those that are gods
and there are those that are not. There are those who believe
and there are those who don't. There are those who are of the
seed and there are those who are not. There are those who are sheep
and there are those who are not. There are those who are of the
Father and those who are not. There are those who are of the
Kingdom and those who are not. You're going to see this pattern.
There's two groups of people. You remember way back when we
did the study on the two seeds? We've seen all through Scripture
that there's two generations of people. There's a generation
of Christ, then there's a generation of Satan or Adam, through Adam. It says, Verily, verily, I say
unto thee, we speak that we do know and testify it, that we
have seen and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you
earthly things and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if
I tell you of heavenly things?" So he's basically telling you,
if I've told you some earthly stuff, natural man stuff, and
you can't even comprehend that, how in the world do you think
you're going to comprehend something that takes the Spirit of God
in you to comprehend? See, that's the tragedy of most
of these churches that's around here today. They think that they
can, by the wisdom and oratory of men, convince and explain
into the kingdom people of God. They think that they can teach
somebody and they'd be converted. They think that they can preach
somebody into heaven. They think that they can teach
somebody into heaven. They think that they can preach somebody
into the kingdom of God, but it says here that If they can't understand earthly
things, then they're not going to be able to understand, certainly
not going to be able to understand heavenly or spiritual things.
And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down
from heaven, even the Son of Man, which is in heaven. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish. Now everyone
said, ah, now we're getting to it, preachers. There you go,
now you're getting to the gospel. Well, so far we've already been
preaching the gospel. Jesus has already been preaching
the gospel. The gospel is that man cannot do nothing spiritually.
And that it takes an act of God to do that. And that without
that act of God, no man could, can, would, will. So he's preaching good news,
right? What's the good news? Well, the good news is we're
dead in trespasses and sin. The good news is that we have
no ability to do spiritual things. It wouldn't even be on our mind.
We don't even see the Kingdom of God as anything important,
as anything of need. But what happens? The Spirit
of God comes in us, quickens us, gives us spiritual life.
And guess what? We begin to see the Kingdom of
God, we enter the Kingdom of God, and we begin to perceive
the things of the Spirit of God So that's the gospel. We're already
talking about gospel, even though we ain't got to John 3, 16 yet,
we're preaching the gospel. And the gospel and the doctrine
of Christ is that no man can accept God. And he says that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Now, what
do we see here? Well, number one, we see perseverance
of the saints. Okay, well, we just talked about
total depravity, okay? Y'all remember the acronym TULIP,
right? Anybody that's been under the
doctrines of grace, they've heard TULIP. T for total depravity,
U for unconditional election, L for limited atonement, I for
irresistible grace, P for perseverance or preservation of the saints,
right? That's the five points of what
they call five points of Calvinism. It didn't start with Calvin.
It even didn't start with, I mean, Even the five points itself and
what it was called Calvinism wasn't started in Calvin. Other
people started it. Anyway, but those five points
kind of summarize what we believe of the gospel. And some people
say, well, that's not the whole of the gospel. Well, I agree,
that's not the whole of the gospel. But that is the doctrine that
Christ preached. And so they at least have to
preach this doctrine if they're preaching the doctrine of Christ.
And we've already seen total depravity. No man can except
as total depravity. Man is dead, trespasses, and
can't do anything spiritual. That which is flesh is flesh.
Born of the flesh is flesh. It cannot please God. That's
total macravity. By the will of man, by the will
of the flesh, we cannot be born again. That's the total macravity,
an inability for spiritual things. And now we're seeing perseverance
here, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but
have eternal life. So here we see that there is
Perseverance that is given by Christ. And notice that what
is the cause of perseverance? Is it their obedience? Are those
people given eternal life and they're kept with eternal life
because of their obedience? No, it's because of the finished
work of Christ. Even so, the Son of Man must be lifted up.
Why? That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish. I have
to be crucified. Why? Because the crucifixion
of myself is the grounds upon which God was justifying. If
I don't be lifted up, then I've broken the covenant of God. I've
broken my covenant with the Father because I promised the Father
that I would bear their sins in my body on the tree and that
through that sin bearing, you promised you would justify all
my people who would in time sin in Adam. that the promise was the father
would justify if the son would die and bear their sins. And so the outcome of that is
if he dies, if he's lifted up, then he is able to give eternal
life to whomever he chooses. Why? Because they've been justified
before God. That even though they're dirty,
rotten, scoundrel sinners, even though they're dead in trespasses
and sins, even though they've done the violent and worst things
just like the rest of the wicked and the unrighteous and the reprobate,
even though they've done that, based upon justice and the grounds
of Christ, Jesus can go to whoever He wants that He has died for
and give them eternal life because they have been justified before
God and that justification in eternity was based upon Christ
coming and dying. That's why Jesus said, So must
the Son of Man be lifted up. Why? Because that was the hinge
pin of the eternal covenant. Jesus must complete all that
the Father gave Him to do to satisfy His justice in justifying
sinners. God cannot justify the guilty.
But the only way He has given to justify the guilty is through
someone taking their place, substitution. So Jesus here is preaching. Is
Jesus actually saying all that? No, but that is what Jesus is
meaning. And as we open up more of what
Jesus teaches, more of what Paul and the epistles teach, we find
out what Jesus is saying here. Why must the Son of Man be lifted
up? Because that is the hinge pin of justification and no man
can be saved unless they're justified. They have to be cleared of their
guilt. They have to be removed. They have to be spotless. God
cannot acquit the guilty. So someone has to actually do
the deed of taking on the wrath of God, the punishment of God,
and stand in their place. And Jesus did that. So He must
be lifted up. Why? That whosoever believeth
in Him. Who are those? Well, we're going
to find out that whosoever believeth in Him are His sheep, His elect,
the ones ordained from the foundation of the world, who is given eternal
life. That whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life. That's perseverance. That's limited atonement. Who
are the ones who are given eternal life? The ones who believe, right?
Who are the ones that He must be lifted up for? The ones who
are going to be having eternal life. The ones who are believers.
Okay, so he wasn't lifted up for those who were not given
that. For God so loved the world that
He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life. See, we think that's the
gospel in a nutshell. Oh, God loved the world so much,
they turned away from Him, went away and had Him. Now they're
all wicked, vile, and all messed up. But God still loves everybody
and He wants to save everybody. But He's not going to transgress
their free will, so He's going to give them a choice. And so
He sent Jesus to die for them, and if they accept Jesus in their
heart and believe that He died for them, then God will save
them. And so they think that that's what John 3.16 is saying. But it's not. Look at the context.
The Son of Man must be lifted up that, so that, whosoever believeth
in him should not perish. So that secludes everyone else
except the ones who have believed. For God, so now He's given the
grounds here, for, because God so loved the world that He gave
His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him again, that
is quantifying who the salvation is for, who the eternal life
is going to be for, who it was for whom Christ was being lifted
up. the ones who believe. And the Armenians are going to
say, right, I agree. That's why we keep telling everybody,
you have to believe before you get eternal life. And you say,
well, wait. There's more to the story than that. Yes, it's only
those who believe that are going to be given eternal life. Yes,
it's only those who believe. But here, it's only those who
believe that Christ died for. So at that juncture, The Armenian
has to part ways with the doctrine of Christ because they say, wait,
Jesus died for even those who didn't believe. Because they
believe that he died for those that are in hell, too. He died for the whole world.
And so the whole world has been died for. Well, Jesus must be
lifted up so that they would have eternal life. So if Jesus
was lifted up, which he was, then everyone for whom he was
lifted up was given eternal life. So that's what John 3.16 is saying.
It's not saying that there's this open invitation for just,
you know, God loved everybody and Jesus died for everybody
and that salvation is open for anybody who just wants to choose
it. No, no, no, no. Don't negate what's already been
said in John that being born of God does not come by the will
of man or the will of the flesh. And being born of God is something
that is a must before anybody can see the kingdom or enter
the kingdom. And so Jesus had to die so that
that could happen. For God sent not his Son into
the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him
might be saved. Okay, so that's a conditional
thing, right? The salvation of the world hinges
on Jesus coming into the world and being
saved by Him, right? For the world to be saved, it
was conditioned upon Jesus coming and being lifted up. Now, if
that's the case, if He'd be lifted up, then that means that salvation
is given. That's the trade-off. That was
the work in the covenant. If you do this, I will do this. That's what a covenant is, right?
When you go down to the bank and you sign a mortgage loan,
sign up for a mortgage loan, okay, what are you saying? You're
telling the bank, if you'll give me this money here so I can buy
this house, then I will repay you this money plus this much
extra interest that you're asking for. That's a covenant. That's
a contract. Between two people, right? Jesus was our covenant hand. He was the one that stood before
God and said that I will be crucified for
them. I will bear their iniquities.
I will take your wrath. And in doing so, they go free. Not just acquitted, free. They go free. No conditions. There is nothing to hold back
the fact that I can bring them to God right now. They are justified. They are sanctified. They are
glorified. Why? Because God has given them
to Christ. They are they are his by covenant
Tractual, which God cannot lie and go back on what he says.
He can't go back on his oath. And so Jesus here, if he'd be
lifted up, is going to save the world for whom he died for. So
you can't say that the world is everybody indiscriminately
because all of them are being saved. So the doctrine that Jesus
is teaching here is a particular redemption, a limited atonement,
but it's also an efficacious one. He that believeth on Him
is not condemned. That's a statement of being,
a statement of fact. Anybody that believes on Christ
is not condemned. Why? Because Christ was lifted
up for them. There is no condemnation to those
who are in Christ Jesus. Those who are in Christ Jesus
are the ones for whom Christ died, and the ones for whom Christ
died or was lifted up for, they shall never perish but have everlasting
life. They're not going to be condemned. He that believeth in him is not
condemned. But he that believeth not, that's the other category.
There are those who believe and there are those who don't believe.
And at some point in time, all the elect of God will be made
to believe. Why? Because that's the two categories.
God makes them to believe. God causes them to believe. God
bears them in the spirit a new birth so that they can understand
spiritual things and believe. We have the Spirit of God. Why?
That we might know the things freely given to us. He that believeth
and he that believeth not. Two categories of people. You
can write elect, non-elect. You can write sheep, goats. Wheat,
tares. God's, Satan's. You can write
those two things over all that. He that believeth on him is not
condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already, because
he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is condemnation, that
light is coming to the world, and men love darkness rather
than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone that
doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light,
lest his deeds be reproved. but he that doeth truth cometh
to the light. Okay? So he that doeth truth
cometh to the light, which is Christ, that his deeds, the one
who is coming, he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that
his deeds, the ones coming to the light, anyone who comes to
the light, comes, that his deeds may be manifest that they are
wrought in My will? Wrought in my flesh? Or wrought
in my good preaching? My receiving? My believing? My
law-keeping? In my tithing? My good works? Is it wrought in the fact that
I am born of Christian parents or grandparents? Is it wrought
in my church attendance? No, my deeds, that my deeds may
be manifest that they are wrought, my coming to God, my doing the
truth, manifest that all these things are wrought in God, meaning
that they are controlled and done, empowered by God. So here, Jesus is preaching not
only unconditional election in these verses, not only is He
preaching preservation, not only is He preaching total depravity
and limited atonement, but now we see He's preaching irresistible
grace. That the coming and believing
was given by Him, how? In the new birth. And nobody
asked for it. Nobody decided for it. Nobody
worked for it. It was irresistible. God gave
it to him when he decided to give it to him. Wow. All five
points so far in just three chapters of John. And people say Jesus
didn't preach the five points. But the five points aren't part
of the doctrine of Christ. What time do we have here? It's almost 12. We've got a whole
lot more to say, so we'll probably save that for another time. All right, anybody got any comments
or questions? Anybody got any questions? I
always want to encourage you, if you've got questions or statements
that you'd like to make, then feel free to do that. I always
want to give an opportunity to give questions. That was one
of the things we did at the 5th Saturday yesterday, and all those
guys down there, when they do their 5th Saturdays, they have
two preachers preach, and they break and have lunch. And then
after lunch, they have a question and answering time where all
the ordained preachers get up in front. If anyone in the church
has a question, whether it's about one of the messages that
was preached or anything in general, whatever they want to ask, they
ask. And the preachers up there, whoever
wants to field that question or comment on it, they give the
church time to ask questions. confront if there's something
in a message that they disagree with what that guy said or want
clarification on it, they have that opportunity. And I think
that's biblical also. That's why I always ask, just
so you'll know, that's why I always ask at the end if anybody has
any questions or any comments or anything there. That's the
time that if you want to question or, and I'm of course always
after the fact, if you don't want to do it publicly, you want
to do it privately, you're always welcome to do that. And I'm always
open for that. Anyway, does anybody have any
questions or comments? Let's bow and have a word of
prayer.