Good to see everybody. Let's
open tonight's service with hymn 224. Hymn 224, and let's all
stand together. I know not why God's wondrous
grace to me hath made known, nor why unworthy Christ in love
redeemed me for His own. But I know whom I am believin'
and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I've committed
unto Him against that day. not how his saving faith to me
he did impart, nor how believing in his word brought peace within
my heart. I know whom I have believed and
am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. I know not how the Spirit moves,
convincing man of sin. Revealing Jesus through the Word,
creating faith in God. But I know whom I have believed
and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I've permitted
unto Him against that day. I know not what of good or ill
may be reserved for me. Of weary ways or golden days
before his face I see. But I know whom I have believed
and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I committed
unto Him against that day. No, not when my Lord may come
at night or do dayfare, Nor if I'll walk the vale with Him or
meet Him in the air. But I know whom I am believing
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. Please be seated. Good evening. We're going to read tonight from
Psalm 40. Psalm 40. I do love that hymn. And we don't know if we will
walk the veil with him or meet him in the air, but either way,
we will not die. I've been very, I told Tricia
I can't hardly wait to try to bring a message on what Nathan
said to David when he said, thou shalt not die. Thou shalt not
die. We're not gonna do that tonight,
but soon, Lord enables will. You have your Bibles open to
Psalm 40. I waited patiently for the Lord
and he inclined unto me and heard my cry. Notice that this is a
Psalm of David and as with all the Psalms, we see the Lord in
this Psalm. He brought me up also out of
a horrible pit out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a
rock, and established my goings. He hath put a new song in my
mouth, even praise unto our God. Many shall see it, and fear,
and shall trust in the Lord. Blessed is that man that maketh
the Lord his trust, and respecteth not the proud, nor such as turn
aside to lies. Many, O Lord my God, are thy
wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which
are to usward. They cannot be reckoned up in
order unto thee. If I would declare and speak
of them, they are more than can be numbered. Sacrifice and offerings
thou did not desire, mine ear hast thou opened. In Exodus 21, when a servant,
after having finished his seven years, says, I love my master,
I love my children, I want to remain, they bored his ear through. That's the reference here. Mine ear hast thou opened, burnt offerings and sin offerings
hast thou not required. Then said I, lo, I come. In the volume of the book it
is written of me. I delight to do thy will, O God. Yea, thy law is within my heart. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, Thank you for sending your son
and for satisfying your justice, fulfilling your law, establishing
our righteousness. Thank you for the promise of
your presence when your children gather together for worship.
Lord, we pray that that we would have ears opened to your word. Lord, that if that's to be, we
know that you must open them. You must give us ears to hear.
Lord, we pray that you would. We thank you for the hope and
the confidence that we have in being able to worship you with
I know whom I have believed and I'm persuaded. Lord, we know
that persuasion comes from you and we thank you for it. We are
persuaded that the Lord Jesus is able to keep all that we've
entrusted to him against that day. Lord, comfort our hearts
and Give us hope and light and faith, forgiveness of our sin. We ask it in Christ's name, amen. Number 30 from the Spiral Hymnbook,
number 30. Let's all stand together again. Glory, glory, I'm forgiven. All my sins are washed away. Christ my Israel, blood atonement. All my sin has put away. Sin imputed to my Savior when
He died upon the tree. As the substitute for sinners,
God will not impute to me. Glory, glory, I'm accepted, robed
in Christ's own righteousness. I'm a child, an heir of heaven,
saved by God's almighty grace. Christ's obedience to the Father
is imputed now to me. In God's sight I'm poor and holy. He declares me so to thee. In Christ's hands I am secure. He who saved me sure will keep
me. By God's grace I shall endure. This is not a vain presumption. I just take him at his word. Christ has swore they shall not
perish who believe on me their Lord. Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles to John
chapter 9. John chapter 9. Been here in this chapter for
a couple of Wednesday nights and I remember last Wednesday
night considering how the Lord healed this blind man. as a parable
with the spittle and the clay and the going down to the pool
of Siloam and washing them and how each part of that parable
in action tells us something glorious about our Lord and how
he gives sight to the blind. Tonight I want us to think about
the simplicity of the gospel. And I'm so thankful that it is
simple. Paul, you remember writing to
the church at Corinth. And Corinth is, of course, in
Greece and very close to Athens, the center of learning during those years. You know, the Athenians were
very proud to hear something new. You remember when Paul went
to Mars Hill and the Corinthians were Athenian wannabes. And there
was some men in the church at Athens, at Corinth, that wanted
to impress other men about what they knew. And I love what Paul
said when he wrote to the church at Corinth when he said, I fear,
I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in the
garden, that your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity
that is in Christ. And I'm thankful that that the
gospel is for the simple. And I love the simplicity and
the honesty and the humility and the childlike innocence of
this man that the Lord heals when interrogated by his neighbors
and then by the Pharisees, just the simple, response that he
makes. And I've titled this message,
A Simple Confession, A Simple Confession. Let's read these
few verses together, John chapter nine and verse eight. The neighbors
therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind,
said, is not this he that sat and begged? And some said, this
is he, and others said, he is like him. But he said, I am he. Therefore said they unto him,
how were thine eyes opened? And he answered and said, a man
that is called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said
unto me, go to the pool of Siloam and wash. And I went and washed,
and I received sight. Then said they unto him, where
is he? And he said, I don't know. I don't know. Now they would
eventually take him to the Pharisees and his response to their theological
questions and interrogation was, I don't know. All I know is that
once I was blind and now I see. That's all I can tell you. You
see, the wonderful clarity and simplicity of this man's confession
tells us something about the simplicity of the gospel. Later,
he gets excommunicated. They put him out of the synagogue,
which was an eternal death sentence as far as the Jews were concerned.
His parents wouldn't debate with the Pharisees because they were
afraid they were going to be excommunicated. They ultimately
did kick him out. And to a Jew, that would have
been an eternal death sentence. What that was equal to was that
there's no way I can be saved now. That's a sentence of judgment. And so in that state, he comes
back before the Lord, and the Lord asked him, do you believe
on the Son of God? And he said, who is he, Lord,
that I might believe? And the Lord just very gently
and lovingly says to him, you have both seen him, and he that
speaketh unto thee is he. And he said, oh, Lord, I do believe. And he worshiped him. He worshiped
him. That's the essence of faith. Just bowing before the Lord and
worshiping him. Acknowledging that he's worthy
of worship and that his glory and his greatness is far beyond
our comprehension. The best that we can do is just
worship him. The honesty and the childlike
innocence of this young man is set in contrast to the intimidation
and the hypocrisy and the judgmental attitude and the attempt to instill
fear on the part of the neighbors and the Pharisees. And that's
always the case. When the Lord does a work of
grace in the heart, there's just a quiet, childlike simplicity
to faith. Whereas unbelief always plays
the part of the hypocrite. Unbelief always stands in judgment
of others. Unbelief always attempts to impress
other men and intimidate other men. What a beautiful picture. I hope that the Lord will do
a true work of grace in my heart and bring me to the place where
this young man was. He was found outside of the temple. To be outside of the temple is
to be separated from God. He's a clear picture of each
of our salvation. You know, the word worship in
the Bible and the word ungodly are the same word. And ungodly just means unable
to worship God, unable to worship. Why is it? Why are we unable?
Why are we outside the temple? Why are we unable to worship
God? Because there's nothing in us like him. I'm ungodly. There's no point of comparison
between me and God. And the only hope that I have
of being able to worship God is that if God comes and resides
in me, then now there's something in me that's like God. Now there's
a spirit of grace in me, Christ in me. The hope of my glory is
enabling me now to come into the presence of a holy God. But
before that, I'm separated from God. Like this young man, we
are blind, unable to see, unable to believe, unable to understand
anything concerning the things of salvation, the things of God,
and the truths about ourselves. And like this young man, we're
born that way. David said in Psalm 51 that he
was estranged from the womb, and he has gone astray as soon
as he was born. He said in Psalm 51, in sin did
my mother conceive me. In Adam all died. We come into this world spiritually
blind, just like this young man. Helpless, unable to help ourselves,
unable to find any help from anyone else, dependent upon God
to do a work of grace for us. He was a beggar. Poor in spirit. have nothing
to offer God for the redemption of my soul. I'm poor. As we saw Sunday, the first of
the Beatitudes in Matthew chapter five, blessed are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God. If we're poor in spirit,
we've been blessed by God. And all that are in the kingdom
of God are beggars. They have nothing to offer God
that would redeem them. They're dependent upon Him to
provide the price of redemption. Now, one word of caution that
I would give would be that being a mercy beggar can
very easily turn into a work. And we're so bent toward a works
gospel by nature that we'll even take something as precious as
this truth being a beggar before God and pervert it into a work
of penance. If we can beg enough and be low
enough and humble enough, then God will hear us. Let's just leave being a beggar
at the point of not having anything to offer God, not having anything
to give God, Because anything past that can
very easily become a false humility and a work. The other thing that I want you
to notice about this man is that he didn't cry for mercy. He didn't
ask for anything. You remember it was the disciples
that said has this man sinned or was it his parents that he's
born blind? And the Lord said neither but
that the works of God might be manifest in him. God gave him
this affliction for this moment of time because just like the
Lord went to the to the well in Sychar and said, I must needs
go through Samaria, he must needs meet this man. And the Lord initiates
this. You remember Bartimaeus was blind
and Bartimaeus cried and asked Lord, Jesus, thou son of David,
have mercy upon me. Bartimaeus, what would you have
me to do for you? Oh Lord, that I might see. Bartimaeus cried,
but that cry came as a result of Bartimaeus hearing that the
Lord was coming through. So faith comes by hearing and
Bartimaeus heard what the Lord had done and who he was. And
he laid everything on the line and cried out. And the more people
tried to shut him up, the louder he cried. But this man doesn't
cry at all. He doesn't ask. He can't see
the Lord. He doesn't know the Lord's there.
He doesn't know who he is. And the Lord takes notice of
him. I'm so thankful for that when
we're When we're blinded by our own sin, the Lord takes notice
of us and he comes to where we are even when we don't have any
way of getting to where he is. The last thing that I would,
in line of what I just said about the Lord having pity upon him
is that no one else pitied him. No one else pitied him. The disciples
didn't even pity him. The disciples thought he was
getting what he deserved. There was no one that had any
compassion for him. And when the Lord looks upon
his children, oh, what compassion, what tenderness. As a father
pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him."
Oh, we never have to be afraid of coming to him in fear of being
turned away or him being reluctant. Scripture says it's more blessed
to give than to receive and we know that from our own experience,
what a blessing, how much more of a blessing it is to be on
the giving end than to be on the receiving end. But if that's
true of us, how much more of it's true of him? We sometimes are reluctant to
come to him and ask. because we think that he might
be reluctant to meet our need, but that's never the case. He's
always more willing to show mercy and pity than we are to ask for
it, always. He's more blessed to give than
we are to receive. Notice how simple His response
was how faithful he was to just tell
what he experienced. People were confused. He said unto them in verse nine,
I am he. How were your eyes open? Well,
and he told him exactly, exactly what happened, except he left
one thing out. And I guess if there's anything,
this is sort of the, maybe the meat of this message,
for me it is. This man left one thing out when
he told how the Lord, when he answered their question. Notice
that they were not interested in who healed him, they were
interested in how it happened. And men who do not have any interest
in the things of God will show great interest in how things
come about. And they want to debate doctrine
and they'll want to debate scripture and they'll want to you know,
compare experiences and whatever, they want to know how it happened.
They're not interested in who did it. So they wanted, these
men wanted to know, how were thine eyes opened, verse 10.
And he answered and he said, a man that is called Jesus made
clay and anointed mine eyes. He doesn't tell them how he made
that clay. He didn't see the Lord make spit
onto the ground or pick up the dirt and spit into his hand.
However it was, he did it. He didn't see where the water
came from. All he knew, he felt the wet
mud being put on his eyes, but he didn't know how it came about. Now we saw last Wednesday night
that The water that came out of our Lord's mouth is his word.
It's his word. It came from the very mouth of
our Lord and how exceedingly, as David said, broad is thy word. It's past finding out. And here's the meat of this message. He didn't know how it happened. He couldn't explain the... Do we really know how we're saved? There's only so far we can go
in explaining scripture. We compare scripture to scripture,
it's the best explanation we can give. In the beginning, God. What do we understand about that?
Before time ever was, there is an eternal, immutable, self-existent,
omnipotent God. who never had a beginning and
he spoke and created out of himself everything that we see in this
universe of time and space in which we live. Can we understand
how that? So what do men do who can't understand
that? They create theories that they
think they do understand. And they come up with ridiculous
propositions of evolution and whatever else because they have
a need to be able to control the narrative and to understand
how these things could be. Faith just bows to what God says
and faith bows to who God is. What do we understand about that?
What do we understand about imputation? How can we understand that we
were in the loins of our father, Adam, and when Adam died, we
died, and that God imputed the sin of Adam to all of his prodigy? How can we understand that when
Christ went to Calvary's cross, that God made him to be sin for
us? How can we understand that in
the new birth that God, God comes and takes his residence in us
and imputes to us the perfect righteousness of the Lord Jesus
Christ? What do we understand? How can we? You see, this man
didn't know where the water came from any more than you and I
are able to understand the truth of what God has revealed in his
word. In fact, we don't really understand
anything we believe. And yet, here's the simplicity
of this man. He didn't know, he couldn't understand
it, he didn't know even where the mud came from. He knew who
did it and he knew he could see. And he just simply answered their
questions. And when he met the Lord at the
end of this chapter, he believed on him. He just believed on him. I know men who want to argue the time of
justification. Were we justified in eternity
past? Were we justified at the cross? Are we justified when we believe? When exactly does justification
before God takes place? Well, the Bible teaches all three
of those, but here's the problem with those men. If they would
be more concerned about who does the justifying, they wouldn't
have to worry about when. You see, they're trying to, They're
trying to organize some logical thought and reason so that they
can give an explanation as to when these things take place
and they miss the who. The Pharisees and the Sadducees,
what was their biggest contention between them? It was about the
resurrection. The resurrection of the body.
That was the doctrinal difference between these two groups. and
they were always in contention with one another. When the Lord
Jesus in his glorious person comes on the scene, they unite
forces against him. And both teams, both groups,
though they had a completely different view of the resurrection,
they missed the person of the resurrection. Oh, Martha, I am
the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me shall
never perish. Other men will want to argue
the details of how and when the second coming of Christ will
take place. And just like the Pharisees and
the Sadducees and just like the men who will argue the doctrine
of justification, they miss the who. Just be concerned about
who's coming, who's coming. We don't know when it's gonna
be and we don't know how it's all gonna work out. And there's
so many things in the scriptures that we don't understand concerning
the second coming of Christ, but we know who's coming. And he is to be our focus. What can we possibly understand
about the incarnation? How is it that God Almighty the
creator and sustainer of all of life could be conceived in
the womb of a woman that he made and be born into this world as
a baby dependent upon that woman to give him life, the one that
he had given life to. How can we comprehend that? How
can we comprehend that the fullness of the Godhead resided in him
bodily and that he was made in the likeness of sinful flesh?
How can we possibly understand that? Todd and I were talking recently
about some of these men who love to debate and they love to split
hairs over doctrine and theology and And I asked Todd about one of
them in particular and I said, have you ever heard him say that
we don't understand anything we believe? And Todd said, no,
I've never heard him say that. And I said, and you won't. You
won't hear him say that. He don't say it. What can we possibly understand
about substitution? that God charged the Lord Jesus
with all the sins of his people and that Christ stood in our
stead before a holy God and paid the full price for our redemption.
And that he ascended back into heaven and took with him the
names of those for whom he lived and died. And that we're seated
with him right now in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. How can
we comprehend that? But we believe it. Why do we
believe it? The same reason this young man
believed. He believed what had been revealed
to him, he confessed to. How these things came about,
he didn't know. Where Jesus was, he didn't know. He couldn't answer their theological
questions when they interrogated him. But he gave a clear, simple
answer to what he did know. And whenever we are enabled by
God's grace to do that, the Lord gives a little bit more
light. He shows us a little bit more of his glory. Turn with
me to Titus, Titus chapter three. You know, I don't guess there's anything more highly esteemed
among men. And the Lord said that which
is highly esteemed among men is abomination with God. But
there's probably nothing more highly esteemed among men than
knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up. You know,
we see it in religion. And that's when it takes its its worst form. Look what Titus
says in what Paul says to Titus in Titus
chapter 3 verse 9. But avoid foolish questions and
genealogy and contentions and striving about the law for they
are unprofitable and vain. I fear, lest by any means, as
the serpent beguiled Eve in the garden, that your minds might
be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. You see, the gospel is only simple
when God gives faith to just simply believe it. As soon as we try, as soon as
we start trying to figure out a way for us to fully
understand it. Well, there's some understanding,
of course there's understanding, but that comes from God. As soon
as we, you know, start, well, doing what Paul warned us against
here, you know, vain contentions over things, then it gets really
complicated. The gospel is only complicated
because we complicate it. Because we complicate it. Faith
is so simple. This young man didn't know much,
but he testified to what he knew. The Lord may, when the Lord does reveal himself,
a new believer is very excited and zealous about, you know,
wanting to, thinking that everybody's gonna love to hear this. Everybody's
gonna love this. And they go to their family members
and their neighbors and their friends, thinking, you know,
everybody's gonna rejoice in this. And the Lord may protect
his babes, because he's very gentle to do that. He may protect
his babes from a lot of difficult persecution at the beginning.
But in time, in time, people figure out what you believe,
they're going to hate you for it. They hated this man for it. Nothing has changed. His neighbors started talking
about him. Is that the guy we think it is? And then they reported
him to the religious leaders, the Pharisees, and then they
drug him into the Sanhedrin and ended up excommunicating him.
See, the progression of his persecution grew As he took a stand for the
gospel, it just grew. Is this not why, brethren, the
fellowship of the saints is so precious to us? We have a liberty and a joy and
a freedom in Christ that the world can't relate to. And what
a blessing it is to be able to share that. in liberty with one another. The outward appearances of faith
will be evident to our neighbors. They'll see a difference. And just like these men saw a
difference, our language, our love, patience, our habitation, you know, where
we want to be and where we don't want to be, even our countenance men will
notice. a difference in this man. Turn
with me to 1 Peter chapter 4. 1 Peter chapter 4. Verse 1. For as much then as
Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise
with the same mind, For he that hath suffered in the flesh hath
ceased from sin, that he no longer should live the rest of his time
in the flesh to the lust of men, but to the will of God. For the
time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of
the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lust, excess
of wine, revelings, banqueting, and abominable idolatries, wherein
they think it strange that you run not with them to the same
excess of riots, speaking evil of you." When the Lord gives us eyes to
see, we're different. You just, you
can't avoid it. And other people, this man was
changed and other people noticed it and they wanted to know what
happened. But then the more he began to talk to them about what
happened and more importantly who it was that did it, they
had already decided, the parents were afraid of of saying anything about the
Lord Jesus because they had already publicly announced if anybody
called Jesus the Christ, they were gonna be excommunicated. And this man suffered the excommunication
of the Jews because of his clear,
simple confession. One warning or word of caution,
I guess, is that it's not just a change
in behavior that people notice. I hope they do. But a person can have a a religious
experience and a moral reformation in their life and change their
behavior. And generally, when a person's
behavior improves, people don't persecute them for that. They
commend them for that. They're happy for them. Maybe even a little jealous,
you know, I wish I could change my life and be, you know, be
like that. I sent my AC guy over to Don
and Mary's house to work on the AC and he's worked for several
people in our church. And he said to Don, how do you
say it, Don? He said, how is it that you all
get such good clients or something like that? Because he, after
meeting several of us, he was very impressed with the behavior
of you. And wanted to know what it was. Why, you know, why are you all
so different? We weren't different, we were
just treating him, you know. So there's, you know, and his
name's Bobby and I've talked to him many times about things.
He was a professing atheist and now he's kind of coming around
on that but my point is that even unbelievers
will be happy for you if your life is showing evidence of,
you know, of honesty and sincerity and peace and hope But there's
one thing they won't tolerate. Turn with me to Matthew chapter
five. There's one thing that the unbeliever
will not tolerate, and they're not impressed with it. Matthew chapter five, look with
me at verse 10. Blessed are they which are persecuted
for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when men shall revile you and persecute you
and say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad
for great is your reward in heaven for so persecuted they the prophets
which were before you. What is it to be persecuted for
righteousness sake? Is it to be shunned socially
because you're not participating in the things that the world's
participating in and you're upright and You know, and they persecute
you for that? No, no. Being persecuted for righteousness
sake is standing for Christ as your only righteousness before
God. Making it absolutely clear that
our Righteousnesses are as filthy rags before God, that there is
nothing in us that would merit us favor with God. And that the
only hope of our acceptance before a holy God is to be found in
him, not having our own righteousness, which is of the law, but that
righteousness, which is by the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus
Christ, that he is the only righteousness that there is. And that anything
that we do to try to add to him only takes away our righteousness.
That Christ is everything in our salvation. And the religious
and the irreligious will hate you for that. This is what this young man did. In simplicity and clarity, he
confessed. that Jesus had given him that
sight. And they wouldn't have it. Men by nature hate Christ. They hate the one that we love. And they love that which we hate. Our Heavenly Father, thank you.
Thank you for the gift of faith to just believe what you have
revealed. And Lord, forgive us for our
unbelief, but cause us, Lord, just to bow and to rejoice in
the truth that we have about our Savior and about what he's
done and who he is. Lord, give us the faith to declare
him simply and clearly, plainly. We ask it in Christ's name, amen. 168, let's stand together. Lord, I hear of showers of blessing,
Thou art scattering, full and free. Showers the thirsty land
refreshing, Let some drops now fall on me. Even me, even me,
Let Thy blessing fall on me. ? Pass me not, O tender Savior
? ? Let me love and cling to Thee ? ? I am longing for Thy
favor ? ? Whilst Thou art calling, O call me ? ? Even me, even me
? ? Let Thy blessing fall on me ? ? Pass me not, O mighty
spirit ? ? Thou canst make the blind to see ? ? Witness, sir,
of Jesus' merit ? ? Speak the word of power to me ? ? Even
me, even me ? ? Let thy blessing fall on me ? Love of God so pure
and changeless, blood of Christ so rich and free. Grace of God so strong and boundless,
magnify them all in me, even me. ? Even me, let thy blessing fall
on me ? ? Pass me not thy lost one bringing ? ? Bind my heart,
O Lord, to thee ? ? While the streams of life are springing
? ? Blessing others, O bless me ? Even me, even me, let thy
blessing fall on me.