Alright, let's take our Bibles
once again. Turn with me to 1 John. 1 John. Chapter 1. 1 John 1. I'd like to look at a
couple of verses this morning. I'm going to look at verses 6
and 7. remind us all what was said in
verse 5. The scripture says in verse 5,
this then is the message which we've heard of Him. That is,
that we've heard of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's God's prophet. God has a prophet. And we, as
ministers of God, we just say what the prophet has said. Whatever
the Lord Jesus Christ has said, that's the only thing that's
worth saying anyway. What have I got to say? What do I know?
I don't know anything, apart from that which the Lord has
been pleased to reveal to me. This is the message which we've
heard of Him and declare unto you, that God is light, and in
him is no darkness at all." John, under the inspiration of God's
Spirit, said this is the psalm and substance of the gospel.
This is the message disclosed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and
this is what he said, God is light. Meaning this, God is the
revealer, of himself. God is light. Light reveals. If we didn't have the light of
the sun shining, we wouldn't see. It'd be just pitch black. You gotta have light to be able
to see. And this is what the Lord Jesus
has said. God is the revealer of himself. This is what he's revealed. He's
holy. He's just. He's good. And through the person of His
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, He's the Savior of sinners. That's what He's revealed. That's
what this book right here sets forth. God speaks. He's light. He speaks. Well, the Scripture says He speaks
through nature. Nature. declares the handiwork
of God. And that nature right there,
you see the seasons come, the seasons go, the summer solstice,
winter solstice, they know exactly when it's going to be. Why? Because
of order. The nature declares the power
of God. Who could make that but God?
You think that came from two little old pieces of slime or
something that somehow, you know, you think that man was just nothing
more than a lump of scum on a pond of water and somehow, you know,
through You know, evolution or something, it developed a brain
and all of these parts and it works. No, in the beginning,
God. That's what scripture says. God
created. He made it, made man. There's
order here. So Almighty God is light. He's declared Himself in the
light of nature. And nature, because there's a
tree out there and there's grass and there's birds, because of
nature. Because the sun comes up at certain
times in the seasons because of the order of nature. I'm going
to tell you something. Man is without excuse. You say,
well what if man never hears the gospel of God's grace? And
he leaves this world without Christ. God's going to justly
send him to hell. Because he had nature. I'll tell
you this. Nature will never reveal to man
God's sovereignty in electing grace and salvation. God is lied
in the conscience of a man. You know all men know the difference
in right and wrong. They've got a mind that is able
to comprehend anything. They know right and wrong. They
know it's not right to steal. They know there's something wrong
with killing somebody. They know that. God is light. But I tell you this, Almighty
God is light in the glorious declaration of His gospel to
His people. It's going to take a new heart,
it's going to take a new man, it's going to take a new revelation
from God. And whenever God Almighty discloses
Himself, the Scripture says, God is light and in Him is no
darkness, there's no obscurity to it. The Lord's going to have
to give a man and a woman new eyes to see, going to give them
a new heart to understand. He's Almighty God. He's heavenly. He rules in the army of heaven
and among the inhabitants of the earth. Nobody has a right to question
Him. Nobody has a right to doubt His word, His sovereignty. Men
do. But He's God. He's light. Now,
verse 6 says, If we say that we have fellowship with Him,
and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. If we say that we are partakers
of the divine nature, we have fellowship with God. If we say
that we have union and communion with God, If we say that we are
partakers of the blessings of God's grace that only come to
us in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, if we say that
we have fellowship with Him, that we have been redeemed by
His blood, that we are robed in His righteousness, that we're
in a state of friendship with God, if we say that we're holy,
and without blame before Him, in love, if we say that we've
been called by the Gospel to the obtaining of the glory of
our Lord Jesus Christ, if we say that we have fellowship with
God and walk in darkness. Now, there's two thoughts in
this, in walking in darkness. If we say that we have fellowship
with God and we walk in darkness, that is, darkness to the revelation
of the gospel of God's grace and sovereignty and electing
grace. If we say, and I've told you
before, there's, I mean, It's the never-ending story about
how many different ways people say that you're to be saved.
It just never ends. If we say that we have fellowship
with God and we walk, but we don't believe the gospel of God's
grace, this gospel, which is the power of God unto salvation
to everyone that believeth. Now, you say, I'm going to do
something. I'm going to tell you what the
gospel is. Because I've told you before,
if you walked up to a person off the street and said, do you
believe the gospel? They'd say, yeah, I believe it.
And if I said, what is it? Tell me what the gospel is. I ought to know this. Let me
tell you what the gospel of God's grace is. The good news. The
declaration of the good news of God. That Almighty God has
been pleased, according to His mercy and compassion, to show
mercy, grace, pardon and forgiveness to undeserving sinners of His
choice. Now, let's don't go any farther
than what the Word of God says. That Almighty God has been pleased
according to His good pleasure to show pardon, to pardon, to
forgive, to show mercy, to undeserving sinners of His choice according
to an everlasting covenant of grace that He Himself entered
into in the persons of the Father and the Son and the Spirit on
the behalf of people that He chose to show mercy based upon
the merit of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ shed in their
stead, paying their debt, and roving them in His righteousness,
God Almighty has chosen to show mercy to a people of His choosing. Now, just hold your place in
1 John. Turn over to 2 Thessalonians. I'm going to show you this. I
want you to read. If you don't have a Bible, get next to somebody
right now that's got one. I want you to look at this. 2 Thessalonians 2.13. 2 Thessalonians
2.13. But we are bound to give thanks
all way to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification
of the Spirit, and belief of the truth, whereunto he called
you by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ." Now let me ask you something. Does the scripture say that God,
whenever a man decided to exercise his free will, decided to save
him? No. It says, because God hath
from the beginning Well, when was that? From the beginning? When was that? It's always been. Has God Almighty always been? Yeah. Because God has from the
beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the
Spirit, setting you apart. God has a people that He set
apart through sanctification of the Spirit, And you're going
to believe the truth. What truth? The gospel by which
He's called you. This gospel that I just told
you. This is the gospel. That Almighty God has been pleased. Moses said, Lord, show me your
glory. Show me your glory. And this
is what God Almighty said. I'm going to have mercy on whom
I'll have mercy. and I'll have compassion on whom
I'll have compassion. Apostle Paul, under the inspiration
of God's Spirit in Romans 9, said, quoting that passage, "...so
then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth." But
what is it? It's God that shows mercy. Let
me tell you this. This is the gospel of God's grace.
God saves sinners according to His choosing. Somebody say, well,
that ain't fair. Well, I can tell you this. If
God Almighty doesn't choose to show mercy, let me tell you what's
going to happen. We're all going to hell. Can
you prove that? I sure can. The Scripture says,
according to God's electing grace, if God Almighty had not left
us a remnant, we would have all been as Sodom and Gomorrah. So whenever somebody says it's
not fair for God to save somebody, buddy, we better bless God Almighty
that God chose to show mercy. Because we already had our chance. We blew it in the garden. We
blew it. And I'm going to tell you something.
There wouldn't be an ounce of difference between me or you
and Adam. If we say that we have fellowship
with Him and we walk in darkness, that is, we walk not believing
the gospel of God's grace. The second point before I finish
that sentence right there, if we walk in darkness claiming
to believe the gospel, claiming that we do believe the truth
of Christ as it is set forth in the scriptures, but we walk
unaffected by that, what I'm saying is this, walking in darkness
and not even believe in the gospel. There's one darkness that I'm
talking about where you say, well, yeah, but I mean, we all
believe the gospel of God's sovereign grace. We believe that God elected
the people, that man's totally depraved, he can't do anything,
that Almighty God elected the people and Christ died for the
elect and the Spirit of God irresistibly calls him. If we say we have
fellowship in Him and have a head knowledge of the truth, but our
walk is inconsistent with what we say, and I'm going to tell
you what that is, I won't leave you hanging. If we walk inconsistently
in what we say we believe concerning the gospel of God's grace, the Spirit of God has revealed,
we lie. And do not the truth. If we walk unaffected by the
grace that we claim to possess, walk in a manner that is inconsistent,
and take pleasure in the ways of wickedness, we lie. The Lord said this, an amazing
passage of Scripture, Matthew 6.23, If therefore the light
that is in thee be darkness, how great is thy darkness. James,
under the inspiration of God's Spirit, said this, James 2.17,
Even so faith, if it hath not works. Now, we don't believe
in salvation by works, under no circumstances. But we never
are going to say that a new man created in righteousness, we're
never going to say that it's not going to evidence itself,
that life's not going to, it's going to. Even so, faith, if
it hath not works, is dead, being alone. We're not saved by works,
but without the evidence of God's regenerating power and true life
from above. It's truly not the faith of God's
elect. Now, I want you to just, if you've
got your bulletin there, I put a little article by Don Fortner
in there. Just look at your bulletin on
the back, on the back of the bulletin, today's bulletin, down
almost to the bottom, next to the last article. Don wrote this,
God's people, sinners saved by the grace of God, are devoted
to Christ, devoted to his gospel, devoted to his church. They walk like believers. They're
sinners, saved by the grace of God. But there's an evidence
of life that's there. They struggle, they struggle.
Man, I tell you what, if I find someone that claims to believe
the gospel of God's grace, And you never detect in that person
anything other than that they feel themselves walking about
six inches above the ground all the time. And they're always,
you know, humanly speaking, always on the mountaintop. God's people
struggle. They're in affliction. Almighty God keeps them. In subjection. Why? Because of pride. Look at
1 Thessalonians. Hold your place, 1 John, 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians 1, 4-10. Now
this is what I'm talking about if we say that we have fellowship
with Him. We believe, I believe the Gospel. I believe five points of Calvinism,
usually is what they're saying. But we walk in darkness. We don't
walk in consistency. Look at 1 Thessalonians 1. I'm
in 2 Thessalonians, hang on. 1 Thessalonians 1, verse 4, knowing,
brethren, beloved, your election of God. Now there's an encouraging
passage of Scripture. I want to know something about
that. Knowing your election of God. for or because our gospel
came not unto you in word only, now if it comes in word only,
There's going to be some inconsistency there. If it just comes in word,
I just, you know, I believe these certain doctrines. He says, Our
gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and
in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance, as you know what manner
of men we were among you for your sake. And you became followers
of us, and of the Lord. You received the Word in much
affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost, so that you were examples,
in samples, examples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia.
For from you sounded out the Word of the Lord, not only in
Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place. Your faith to
Godward is spread abroad, so that we need not to speak anything,
for they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we
had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the
living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, when
He raised from the dead even Jesus, which delivered us from
the wrath to come. I've made this statement before.
A believer talks like a believer. A believer walks like a believer.
They're not trying to prove that they've earned a righteousness
before God. They're going to be the first
ones to tell you. You're looking at the most inconsistent
person that you've ever seen. I believe that Almighty God's
done something for me. I believe He does. But I'm telling
you, man, I wish I'd walk like it, Carl. I wish I did. I wish
I didn't think like I do. I wish I had a consistency like
you do. I wish I walked like you do.
I wish I had more of a stableness like you do. I don't see myself
like that. That's a believer. A believer. They constantly see their need
of Christ. They constantly know their need
of fellowship with one another. I don't want to be with anybody
else. I want to be with you. I want to be with God's people.
I want to be where God is pleased to meet with His people. That's
what I want. I want to be where God is honored. I don't want
to be where man is lifted up, where man is told, well all you
got to do is this, that and the other and God will be pleased
with you. No he won't. Because everything I do is nothing
but filthy rags and I know that. I want to know Him. I want to
be found in Him. Light from heaven can't be contained
within a man without manifesting itself. It just don't. And speaking
of that regenerated sinner, those that stood before Him, the Lord
said on the Sermon of the Mount, you're the light of the world.
A city that's set on a hill cannot be hid. Grace, true grace, saving
grace, gives men and women a new motive and they have a new principle
of life and it sets them apart. They love God. They love God. And they don't put any confidence,
Mike, in themselves. They don't put any confidence
in themselves. Here's what they say, I am a sinner saved by the
grace of God. Life from above is not a vain
action. What a man does when he comes
to the worship of God That's what he believes, what he does.
He wants to hear, tell me as I've told you before, you tell
me one more time, you tell me one more time, how God Almighty
has been pleased to save sinners, because I truly believe that's
me. Tell me how the Lord has been
pleased to save His people. If we walk in the light, the
scripture says in verse 7, As He is in the light, we have fellowship
one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth
us from all sin. If we walk in the light of God's
revelation, the Lord has said some things
to us in this book. And I want to make sure, if I
stand here and preach, I want to make sure that I'm saying
just exactly what God has to say. And if I go somewhere and
I hear a man say something, and I can't back that up in the Word
of God, I don't plan to go back. If we walk in the light, if we
embrace the truth in opposition to all areas of error, If we
have a clear view of the truth, if we're made aware of ourselves,
if we walk in the light, let me tell you what the light, God
the Holy Spirit has revealed. Let me tell you what He's revealed
concerning man. We're all sinners and we're all
born spiritually dead. What does that mean? That means
you can't do anything. Here's what the light has revealed. The light has revealed that there's
only one that Almighty God's pleased with. The Lord Jesus
Christ. And here's what the light has
revealed. If I'm found in Him, how am I going to be found in
Him? God must have put me there. When
did He put me there? Well, God's Word reveals that
we were put there before the foundation of the world. But
let me ask you this, how do I know that I was put there? Okay, now listen, I'm going to
tell you how you know. There's only one way, there's
only one way to know. Is it because I feel like I was
put there? What's feeling got to do with
it? I mean, what's feelings? There's one way that you can
know whether or not Almighty God's done anything for you. If you believe God. If you believe
that of yourself, you can do nothing. Nothing. But if the
Spirit of God has given you a heart to believe that Almighty God
chose to show mercy to you and gave you a heart to believe it,
gave you faith to believe it, without faith, it's impossible
to please God. He that cometh to God must believe
that He is. Well, you say that you mean all
I got to do is believe that there is a God? No, the devils believe
that. The devils believe that there's
a God. Everybody knows there's a God. He is as He is revealed
in these scriptures. He that cometh to God must believe
that He is as He has set forth Himself in this Word. There's
a difference. I told you what somebody told.
Somebody in Louisiana one time telling them the gospel, the
gospel of God's grace. They told them of God who chose
a people before the foundation of the world and Christ died
for those elect. He died only for those elect.
Well, that's what the Lord said that. I didn't say that. The
Lord said that. I'm just saying what He said.
This person said, the God you're describing is my devil. Well,
I'm going to tell you something. The God that I'm telling you
about, unless He gives you a new heart to change that mind of
yours, He'll put you in hell. I'll tell you that right now.
If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship
one with another. Who? Fellowship with each other? Well, we do, but that's not what
this is talking about. We have fellowship with God. You see
what verse 6 says? If we say we have fellowship
with Him, Verse 7 said, if we walk in the light as He is the
light, we have fellowship one with another. We have fellowship
with Almighty God. The walk of a believer, the consistency
of a believer evidences something. They want to hear the truth of
God. And the blood of Jesus Christ,
I'm wrapping this up, the blood of Jesus Christ, not the blood
of bulls and goats, Not our works, not our will, not our prayers,
not our tears. The blood of Jesus Christ, His
Son. Now there's the merit of the
blood. The merit of the blood. The blood
of Him who is God in human flesh. Cleanseth, cleanseth. Continually clean. continually purifying us from
all sin. Original sin, daily sin, sins
of commission, sins of omission. Not only the things that I did,
things that I didn't do. To him that knoweth to do good,
and doeth it not, to you is sin. You say, I didn't even do that.
You should have. You should have what? You should
have loved the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul,
spirit. You should have, but you didn't. Christ did and imputed that righteousness
to us. Oh, the blessedness of that blood.
Who this side of glory can enter into this precious promise when
I see the blood? I'll pass over you. Not your faith, not your works. Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom
the Lord imputeth not iniquity. You're a blessed man if God doesn't
charge you with it. You did it. And in whose spirit
is no guile. We are on all accounts in ourselves
guilty before God. We're guilty. None righteous,
all have sinned. But here we see that by the blood
of Christ, justification before God, no
charge. Pardon, deliverance from sin
is assured for all who have been made to see their need of Him.
and see that in themselves there's nothing to offer God. I need
the Lord to do something for me that I can't do for myself.
I need Him to save me. I pray God bless these words
to our heart for Christ's sake. Amen.