I invite your attention back
to 1 Timothy chapter 1. This book as well as the second
epistle of Timothy and the epistle of Titus are referred to as pastoral
epistles. The apostle Paul wrote them as
instruction and affirmation in the matter of what it is to preach
the gospel and how a pastor is to comport himself in the post
to which he's been appointed. It's important To understand that what these
words tell us in this passage has somewhat to do with the life
of Timothy and the life of Titus in their experience of grace.
Paul, when he took Timothy to preach with him, had Timothy circumcised. He was
a Greek. He had him circumcised. He did
it voluntarily, Timothy did, because he wanted to be able
to preach to the Jews without them having something to keep
the truth. It was a voluntary act for the purpose of the preaching
of the gospel. Becoming all things to all men
that he might win some. However, Titus also agreed. Paul
refused to have circumcised. And the reason was that it was
not a voluntary thing. The legalists, the Judaizers,
said, I ain't going to hear him unless he's circumcised. And
Paul says, then I ain't going to circumcise him. So we have
one element who voluntarily went under the knife for those who
are of the circumcision, and one who would not go in it for
those who are of the circumcision. Law and grace, legalism. and grace. That's what this is
about, this whole text. All three epistles carry the
sense that the preaching of the gospel is akin to being a soldier
or a warrior engaged in a battle for the defense of the gospel.
And the common battle that Paul fought was the question of his
true apostleship and where he went. Well, you weren't one of
the twelve that walked around with Jesus Christ. And he had
to often defend that position. So he identifies himself immediately
as an apostle that had that office by the command of God. Now another apostle had been
chosen by the church. In Acts chapter 1, they had a
vote. Churches like to have votes.
They had a vote, and they appointed a man named Matthias to be the
twelfth apostle, as in Acts chapter 1, verse 23 and 26. He was chosen or appointed to
that office by the church, by the vote of the church, to replace
Judas. The only problem was, Matthias
was not God's choice of the twelfth apostle. God had not chosen a
good church man like Matthias, but he had rather chosen a blasphemer,
a raving persecutor of the church, an inquisitor to be a man who
replaced Judas. that the glory for any who are
saved be not by the collective vote of man but by the grace
of God and for the glory of God alone. Paul says this in verses
12 through 17 of this very chapter. I thank Jesus Christ my Lord
who hath enabled me that he counted me faithful putting me in the
gospel ministry and I was before a blasphemer and a and a persecutor
and injurious, but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly
in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ was exceedingly abundant with faith and love, which is
in Christ Jesus. And this is a faithful saying
worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world
to save sinners, of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause
I obtain mercy that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth
all longsuffering for a pattern to them which should hereafter
believe on him to life everlasting. Paul was saved so it would ever
be said and without any question that God saves the worst of humanity
Not the best, but the worst of humanity. The Holy Spirit inspired
Paul to write these words concerning himself. I am the chief of sinners. He doesn't say I was. He says
I was a blasphemer. I was a persecutor. I was injurious. I am the chief of sinners. And that's the pattern you see.
God will save the chief. He won't have no problem with
sinners like you and me. That's the pattern. Now this
letter was to Timothy. Paul's beloved son in the Spirit,
which means that Timothy was converted under the gospel that
Paul preached and also that he was Paul's close and trusted
companion in the gospel. Timothy is told to stay at Ephesus.
to charge some there who were straying from the truth and inserting
their own personal views into the preaching of the gospel.
And he told Timothy to charge them to preach no other doctrine
than what Paul had preached there in Ephesus. And we know what
Paul preached in Ephesus. No doubt about that. In Ephesians
chapter 1, Paul said this to the Ephesian church, Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. who has blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in Christ, according as He has
chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestinated
us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto Himself,
to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He has made
us accepted in the Beloved." That gospel, Timothy. That one. The gospel that he said in Acts
chapter 20 when he was leaving Ephesus and going to Jerusalem
to be bound. He said, I declare to you all
the counsel of God. All the counsel of God. Therefore
I'm free of the blood of all men. That gospel, Timothy, you
make sure that that's the doctrine that they preach. And you charge
them not to preach anything else other than that. Now doctrine,
though held by most in this day as some theological treatise
or a paper delivered by some doctrine of divinity, was to
Paul and every true gospel preacher the plain, simple declaration
of what they had been taught by God. Doctrine is what God
has taught, which results in men coming to the Lord Jesus
Christ. If God teaches you, you'll end
up at the feet of the Savior. If you don't end up to the feet
of the saviors, it's because God hasn't taught you. I mean,
what's true of one is true of the other. In John chapter 6,
our Lord said this in verse 45, it is written in the prophets.
And the prophet that it was written in is Isaiah 54 and verse 13. It is written in the prophets,
they shall all be taught of God. Now who are the all here being
talked of? Well, if you look back at verse
37, he says, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me. That
all. And him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out, for
I came down from heaven not to do mine own will, but the will
of him that sent me. And this is my Father's will
which is sent me of all. that he has given me, I should
lose nothing but raise it up again in the last day. Therefore
all, he says, it is written in the prophets, they shall all
be taught of God. Every man therefore that hath
heard and hath learned of the Father, that is to say has been
taught by the Father, cometh to me. Christ said that. Everybody
that God teaches comes unto me. Now what does God teach? Doctrine. In fact, the word taught is the
same word as doctrine in other places in Scripture. Didactos.
We've got some didactators here in the congregation. Arlene's one of those. She's
a didactician. She's a teacher. That's what
it means. God teaches us doctrine. God indoctrinates His people.
And once they're brainwashed by God, they come to the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's exactly what that means. This matter of doctrinal preaching
was paramount in these pastoral epistles to Timothy twice and
to Titus. No less than 16 times in these
three books, Paul admonishes these two preachers to be sure
to preach sound doctrine. Sound doctrine. And these who
strayed were not denying the gospel outright. They were adding
to the gospel their take on personal righteousness. And people have
all kinds of takes on that. To seek to add to a thing that
is complete, however, is to diminish it. Indeed, it is to declare
unclean what God has made clean, and that's what the gist of this
whole teaching is here. He says that they teach no other
doctrine in the last phrase of verse 3, and the other doctrine
which Paul says is not sound doctrine, which he says at the
end of verse 3, teach no other doctrine into the end of verse
10, which is contrary to sound doctrine, is categorized in verse
4, this unsound doctrine. He says, neither give heed to
fables and endless genealogies which minister questions rather
than godly edifying which is in faith. Four things. First of all, he says unsound
doctrine is a fable. A fable. You're familiar with
fables, Aesop's fables. You probably read them as a child.
A fable is a story designed to teach a moral principle addressing
some moral behavior. The one that came to mind when
I was working on this message was the tortoise and the hare.
That's a morality tale. It's a morality tale. Also, Unsound
Doctrine is labeled as endless genealogies. endless genealogies,
which tend toward the false notion of pedigree among the people
of God. People like the idea of pedigree.
That's why we have hierarchy in so many churches. You have
the clergy and the laity. A fellow called me from Gideon's
the other day, wanted to know if some of my laity wanted to
come to a Gideon's thing. And I said, what? What's a laity? There's no clergy and laity in
the church of the living God. The pastor has an office. But
so does everybody else in the building. And he's the most visible, so
probably the least worthy. Because it's the uncomely parts
that keep the body running, not the pretty face. Isn't that right? In this genealogy, they talk
about pedigree. And for the child of God, there
is no pedigree. And that idea of genealogies
plays no part in spiritual life for the Lord says of those that
received Jesus Christ, which were born not of bloods, not
of bloods, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of
man, but of God. Those who God has saved are mutts. That's what we are. We're mangy curs and the like. And neither of these do what
the gospel does, this moral story which addresses behavior or these
genealogies. Neither of these do what the
gospel does. It brings people about an opposite consequence. The gospel, Paul says, edifies,
that builds, strengthens faith. And the other doctrine asserts
the necessity of works for righteousness that can be seen and therefore
is blasphemy. Blasphemy. It's not just a matter
of opinion. In fact, to opine in the presence
of God is the first meaning of the word heresy as it's interpreted
in Scripture. To opine when the truth is set
before you. You say, well, this is what I
think about that. Just shut up. This is what you bow to. This
is God's Word. This is what that is. Paul says
it's blasphemy. Look at verse 19 and 20 of chapter
1. "...holding faith and a good
conscience," he tells Timothy, "...which some, having put away
concerning faith, have made shipwrecked, of whom Hymenaeus and Alexander,
whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme."
So whatever they're doing, this unsound doctrine, it's not just
a different view. They're blaspheming against God
Almighty. Look what Paul said to the church
at Ephesus as he was leaving them in Acts 20. In Acts 20, verse 28, he says, Take
heed, and here's what he tells the preachers as he's leaving.
They don't want him to leave because the Holy Spirit has told
them when he goes to Jerusalem, he's going to be bound. And he
was bound. But they thought that since the
Lord had revealed it to them, that they were supposed to stop
him. No, the Lord was just telling them that's what was going to
happen to him. And Paul said, I don't care whether I'm bound
or not, I'm going there to preach the gospel. But he said to these elders at
Ephesus, Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the
flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed
the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood.
For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves
enter among you, not sparing the flock. And of your own selves
shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples
after them. That was a promise he said, and
he's telling Timothy the same thing. Stay at Ephesus. Well,
I've got them ravening wolves that showed up. Men are drawing
away men to themselves rather than pointing them to the Lord
Jesus Christ. Back in our text in verse 5 it
says, Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart. The word charity is the same
word as love. Charity out of a pure heart and
of a good conscience and of faith unfeigned. Now Paul introduces
where this other doctrine or where the other doctrine preachers
stray from the path. It is in the area of the commandment. It's in the area of the commandment.
The commandment refers to the Decalogue of the Ten Commandments.
Our Lord, in His earthly ministry, had made it clear that all the
Law and the Prophets hang on these two things. When the Pharisees
came to Him in Matthew 22, it says, Which is the greatest of
the Law? He said, Love the Lord God with
all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Love your neighbors
as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets,
that's from Genesis to Malachi, all the Law and the Prophets
hang on Those two things, love God, love your neighbor. They all hang right there. In
Romans 13, Paul reiterated the same. He said, O man, owe no
man anything but to love one another. And love worketh no
ill, and therefore it's the fulfillment of the law. Also, he lists three
evidences or results of the gospel. And when I say evidences, these
are strange evidences. These are odd evidences. They
are evidences that cannot be seen with the human eye. If you
can show me an evidence that you're a child of God, you're
in trouble. Because you can't prove anything you say. And neither
can I. But he gives some evidences,
invisible though they are. Now the end of the commandment
is charity out of a pure heart. That's one. And a good conscience. That's two. And faith unfeigned. Faith unfeigned. A pure heart. Can you see my pure heart? I
can't even see it. How can you see it? But every
child of God's got a purified heart, been purified by grace,
a new heart and a new mind, sayeth the scripture. A pure heart. A good conscience. What's a good
conscience? A quiet conscience. A conscience
that never accuses you. Any other kind of conscience
is a bad conscience. If your conscience accuses you,
then I can tell you what you're doing. You're trying to do something
to obtain a righteousness before God, and your conscience is continually
saying it's not enough. You may throw your fig leaves
together, but when God shows up, you'll hide. That's what
the conscience does. The conscience says you better
straighten up. And you try to straighten up, the conscience
says that's not enough. That's not enough. So the believer has
another evidence, a good conscience that is a quiet conscious because
a perfect sacrifice has been offered in his room instead.
And the other is unfeigned faith. And that simply means not faked. Not faked. And this is where
the other doctrine preachers have erred. And Paul counts the
clamor they make, the sermons they preach as nothing more than
irritating noise. Vain jangling. Empty words. He says that. In verse 6, from which some,
having swerved, have turned aside unto vain jangling. That's almost onomatopoeia, isn't
it? If you know anything about poetry,
it's almost sad. The words almost sound like what
it is. Like Poe when he said, the tin-tin tabulation of the
bells. You can almost hear the ring of the bells. Vain jangling. ring to it. But what does it
mean? It means empty words. Empty words. That's exactly what
it means. But it contains the word vain.
And that tells us something. This tells us something of their
design. Vanity is the empty groundless
glory of self. It's me getting glory, and I
don't deserve any glory. As Paul warned in the Acts, we
just read, these ravening wolves draw men to themselves. And it's
vain. It's empty. But it is a kind
of glory that men desire. Look over Galatians 6. Paul addressing here in 1 Timothy,
in these first 10 verses, the very same issue he was addressing
in Galatians. In Galatians 6, he says this,
As many desire to make a fair show in the flesh, they constrain
you to be circumcised, only lest they should suffer persecution
for the cross of Christ. What does he mean by that? If
you preach the cross of Christ, you tell men there's nothing
they can do. They can do nothing. They are to do nothing. They
can do nothing. Nothing of who they are or what
they do ever enters into their salvation. Nothing whatsoever.
That's to preach the cross. I'm not talking about the wooden
gibbet upon which Christ hung. I'm talking about the crucifixion
of the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ, on Calvary Street. For
neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law, but
desire to have you circumcised, that is, keep the law, that they
may glory in your flesh. That's what they want. They want
a glory in your flesh. But he says, but God forbid that
I should glory, save in the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ, by
whom the world is crucified unto me, and I am crucified unto the
world. Now the other doctrine preachers
desire, he says, in verse 7, desire, desiring to be teachers
of the law. That word desire means they intend
and they determine. to do so. But in reality, they
never reach that highest state. The only one who teaches the
law is the gospel preacher. We'll see that in a minute. That's
what he's talking about right here. But he's determined to
be teachers of the law, not as to its proper place in the economy
of the gospel, but for the purpose of drawing men away from the
faith to themselves. The issue is control. I went
to a funeral the other day, and they had a church covenant up
on the wall. And people like covenants, you
know, where they promise to do stuff. I remember I was in a
Baptist church for years where there was a church covenant on
the wall. And, you know, I tried to keep all that... Well, I didn't
do much of it, to be honest with you. I just never quite could
come up to what the covenant required. I didn't pray for my
brethren every day. You know, I didn't. I didn't
even abstain from alcoholic beverages. You know, I didn't do that. Gee
whiz, I was in real trouble. But that covenant, boy, it laid
it out on how I was supposed to live. And people like that.
They can say, why is the church covenant? But there ain't a soul
out there that keeps it. But if they can get you in misery
enough to where you won't do something, they'll glory in your
flesh. Though they don't keep the law themselves. You see,
it's all about control. It's all about control. The only
way to control people, the legalists believe, the other doctrine preachers
believe, is by legal regulation so they can teach the law in
a manner that would check men's behavior. You see, religion is
about behavior. Spiritual life is about God. That's a big difference between
those two. The gospel has to do with the
heart. the conscience and faith. The other doctrine has to do
with behavior. What they desire to teach is
unsound, unsound doctrine, and they are woefully ignorant of
what they are saying and the implication of what they require.
When a person stands up and tries to bring a believer back under
the law, he has no idea what he's saying. I've listened to
them. In fact, I was one of them for many, many years. I've told
you many times, I thought the only two people saved in Rosemont
Baptist Church was me and Jim Byrd. And I had some real doubts
about him. Real doubts about him. But I
was a strict legalist, buddy. You know, I taught Sunday school.
I've gone back and apologized to every one of those people
I can find about lying on God to them. Because that's what
I did. I was trying to control their lives. It's all about control. And I had no idea what I was
doing. I had no idea the implication of what I was doing. That's why
he says this, desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding
neither what they say nor what they affirm. They don't get it.
They don't know. And these empty words have to
do with their use of the law. And this was what really, as
I was reading this, this is what jumped all over me, this word.
Now the title of my message is, I don't know what the title of
my message is, I think it's The Measure. But I first entitled
it, Use. Use. Because that's what he said. Desiring to be teachers of the
law and understanding neither what they say nor whereof. But
we know that the law is good if a man use it lawfully. if he use it lawfully. And that's what Paul is dealing
with here about using the law. Using the law. Paul makes it
clear that it's not about the law itself, which is good and
just and holy, but it's about how the law is used. How it's
used. These are using the law unlawfully,
which suggests also that there is a lawful use of the law within
the parameters of the gospel. Doesn't that suggest that? If
these use it unlawfully, then doesn't that suggest that there's
a lawful way to do it? This first phrase of verse 9
is a monstrous iconoclast. An idol killer. Tried and true is this declaration.
Look at verse 9. Knowing this, that the law is not made for
a righteous man. He didn't put this up as a debatable
fact. He said, knowing this. Knowing this. Boy, that chops
down some big trees, don't it? There is no way to find in these
words some kind of implication or some kind of suggestion. This
is just a simple factual declaration, true declaration. And it's an
astonishing fact which cannot really be misunderstood. Does
anybody here misunderstand what that says? Is this hard to understand? The
law? The law is not made for a righteous
man. Everybody understand that? That's
pretty clear, isn't it? That's a real simple sentence.
A real simple sentence. So this can only be believed
or denied, as the gospel is set forth exactly the same way. You
can only believe it or deny it. There's no middle ground. There's
no sticking your foot in the door. Knowing this, he says,
and that asserts that this is not some theological, ethereal
thing reached in the higher planes of academia. This is plain old
elementary, kindergarten, standard teaching of the gospel. That's
what it is, just standard teaching. Knowing this, Knowing this, the
law is not made for the righteous man. Say what? You say that to
99% of religious people today and they'll think you are a devil
worshiper. In fact, I've been called that
for saying that. This statement is a revelation
of two things. The law is not made for the righteous
man. It's a revelation of two things. First, the other doctrine preachers
are using the law unlawfully as a goad or a whip to make men
righteous, thus declaring that the gospel has not made them
righteous. They really don't know what they're
affirming, do they? Their use of the law discounts
the work of Christ as declared by the gospel because they use
it to say that men are not righteous in Christ but must obtain a righteousness
by their own merit. Secondly, this glorious phrase
is an unqualified declaration that the proper use of the law
is that it be used to declare a man righteous in Jesus Christ. The unlawful use of the law is
to declare that a man is not righteous by the salvation of
Jesus Christ. That something is left to be
done. He got it started and you've got to finish it. The righteous
use or the lawful use of the law is to declare that a man
is righteous by the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The unlawful use of the law, removing from the constricts
of the gospel, is actually nullifying the imputed righteousness of
Christ. Does God say we're righteous? Does God say His children are
righteous? Does He ever say they're not? Does He ever say of His
children, is there some inspired canon that He says of His children
saved by the grace under New Testament gospel teaching? Anywhere
in this book does He say, My people are not righteous. We
know by nature they were horrible. Whether it be the Jews or the
election according to grace, we know they are horrible people. Naturally they are horrible people.
But God doesn't describe them that way. We know that Moses
killed that fellow, buried him in the dirt, looked this way
and that to make sure there wasn't nobody watching, and ran off
and hid and didn't tell a soul. How did God report that? In Hebrews
chapter 11 He said, didn't love Pharaoh, he loved me. And he
wasn't having no part of that mess, so he chose me. That's
how God put it. Now what happened? Notice how God sees it. And how
God sees it is how it is. And God declares His people to
be righteous. Jeremiah 23, verse 6, "...the
name by which He shall be called, Jesus Christ the Lord, our righteousness."
The name by which He shall be called, the Lord, our righteousness. In 33, verse 19, Jeremiah, it
says, "...the name by which she shall be called is the Lord,
our righteousness." The church is righteous before Almighty
God because of what Christ has done in their room instead. He
hath made Him to be sin for us, and you know sin that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him. God hath made Him
to be unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.
The result is that those who have been forgiven all their
sins, these other doctrine guys, these other doctrine preachers,
said they are yet guilty of their sins. That's what they're saying.
That's why this preached the law. If I bring you back under
the law, I'm saying you're guilty. And I'm making God a liar. Because
He says you're not. He says you're not. The unlawful
use of the law says that saints are actually those people described
in verses 9 and 10. This is what they don't understand
that they're affirming. They're saying to believers who
have trusted in the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ alone for
your salvation, that you are lawless, and ungodly, and a sinner,
and unholy, and profane. For murderers are fathers, and
murderers are mothers, and manslayers. You're whoremongers. And you're
those that defy yourself and mankind. You're men-pleasers.
You're liars. You're perjured persons. And
you're everything else that's contrary to sound doctrine. But if you're a believer this
morning, you're not. You're righteous. God is a liar. The unlawful use
of the law annihilates the work of Christ altogether, makes the
gospel a lie. What does the law say? Romans
3, 19 and 20 says, What the law saith, it saith to them that
are under the law, that every mouth might be stopped, and all
the world become guilty before God. You say, well, I'm a good
person. Shut up, you're lying. You're
not a good person. Not under the law. Not under
the law. Look over to Acts chapter 13.
What about that? The law says we're guilty by
nature. Paul, when he was preaching about
this very subject to the Jews in Acts chapter 13, said this,
Be it known unto you in verse 38, Therefore, men and brethren,
that through this man, that is, Jesus Christ, is preached unto
you the forgiveness of sins. And by him all that believe are
justified, which means just as if they never sinned, they are
not guilty before God, are justified from all things from which ye
could not be justified by the law of Moses. Is that clear enough? Look over Romans 8. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh
but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of
life in Christ Jesus hath made us free from the law of sin and
death. What the law could not do, in
that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son
in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin or
annihilated sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the
law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit. He goes on to say in the same
chapter in verses 33 and 34, Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is He that condemneth? It is Christ that died. Yea,
rather it is risen again, who is even at the right hand of
the Father, who also maketh intercession for us. There's no charge against
the believer. And to say that the believer
can be charged or can be guilty is the unlawful use of the law.
And it's blasphemy. The unlawful use of the law makes
God a liar because He's declared that by the work of Christ He
will not remember the sins of His people anymore. He declared
that. You say, well, I don't believe
that. I don't care. I don't care. God says it. That's
the way it is. In Hebrews 10, in reference to
the law and what it could not do. No amount of shed blood of bulls
and goats, a veritable ocean of coagulate, crimson uselessness,
except to point to something else. Never took away sin. But that
was different in the case of Christ. In the tabernacle, the
priest didn't have a chair to sit down or a bench to sit down.
He couldn't rest because 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, those lamps
must be trimmed, that surebread must be fresh, that incense must
be placed on the altar, those morning and evening sacrifices
must be made every day, 365 days a year. There was no pause. So they couldn't sit down. They
just worked and worked and worked and worked, and to no avail.
No sin was ever taken away. It says in verse 11, And every
priest standeth daily, ministering in Hebrews 10, and offering oftentimes
the same sacrifices, which can never take away sin. An opposing view, an opposition.
Something's happening here that did take away sin. But this man,
after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on
the right hand of the Father God. How come the priest couldn't
sit down? Their work was never done. How come he sat down? His
work was done. He finished salvation. From henceforth expecting or
waiting until he's in and he's made his footstool for by one
offering, Underline it. He hath perfected. That's the same word he used
on the cross. Tileo. He used tetelestai. Same word, Greek word, tileo.
What it means is perfect. When Christ said, It is finished. He was saying perfect. When He
perfected forever, He's saying perfect. Now, are there degrees
of perfection? I don't think so. I mean, it's
not really a compliment to say to somebody, you're just almost
perfect. Because that, you know, it just ain't that great. For
by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.
How are they sanctified? According to verse 10, they are
sanctified by the will of God. by one offering. Wherefore the
Holy Ghost is also a witness to us, for after that he said
before, that is in Jeremiah 31, this is the covenant that I will
make with them after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my
laws, and that is not the Ten Commandments, that's the book,
in the heart and the minds of his people where I write them.
I'll put the laws in their hearts." What's he going to do there?
Upon regeneration, God puts this book in the hearts of the people.
They don't know it. They know it's been put there, but they
don't know this book. But what they do is respond to this book
positively every time it's preached. That's what the law is in their
heart. You take a believer and they hear something they never
heard before, but they hear it from the Word of God and go, yeah, that's
it. I believe that. Why? Because it's already in
their heart. It's there to respond to the
preaching of the gospel. That's what it's there for. And
he says, and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." No
more. The other doctrine preachers
say he remembers. He said, I don't. And their doctrine
is simply this, it's unsound. That's what he says in the last
verse of our text in verse 10. He said, anything contrary to
sound doctrine. Well then, how is the law lawfully
used? It is used as good and holy and
just. That's how it's used. And that
its standards and its requirements have been fully met in Jesus
Christ. Every exacting demand has been
fulfilled by Christ and His complete salvation, even unto the rendering
of a perfect death to satisfy the law's justice and to propitiate God for all
the elect. Herein is love. Not that we love
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son, the propitiation
for our sins. The lawful use of the law within
the parameters of the gospel is the declaration that Christ
has so fulfilled and satisfied the law that the law itself has
nothing to do with the person to whom Christ has been made
to be their righteousness. The lawful use of the law is
the declaration that the law asserts that it can find no fault
in the saint and no ground upon which it can accuse the believer
That's why Paul said, it is not made for the righteous man. Not made for him. Why? It don't
have nothing to do with him. You see, the law condemns. That's what it's designed to
do. The law confronts us with the sentence of death. The law
condemns. Well, who does it condemn? It condemns sinners. So if it
has no accusation against you, what is the law saying about
you? You're righteous. Why? Because of what Christ did
on Calvary Street. That is sound doctrine. That
is sound doctrine because it is according to the glorious
gospel of God. Look at verse 11. According to
the glorious gospel of the blessed God. The glorious good news. And that word blessed means happy,
satisfied. According to the glorious good
news of the happy and satisfied gospel of Almighty God. And the grace of our Lord Jesus
was exceedingly abundant with faith and love which is in Christ
Jesus. And this is a faithful saying worthy of all acceptation.
Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am
chief. Howbeit, for this cause I obtain mercy, that in me first
Jesus Christ might show a pattern of all longsuffering, for a pattern
to them that should hereafter believe on him to everlasting
life. Now unto the King Eternal. immortal, invisible, the only
wise God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. Father, bless us to understand
and pray in Christ's name. Amen.