Now, if you will, turn here in
the seventh chapter of the book of John, John chapter
7. Let me see what I'm doing here. John chapter 7, and let's begin
reading at verse 37. In that last day, it says, in
that last day, the great day of the feast. It had been there
seven days, and the eighth day was the seventh. Evidently, Jesus stood somewhere
on the outskirts of the city, and he viewed the people as they
were packing up their utensils, their tents, getting their camels
and dumpies loaded and ready. getting their families all together.
They'd been there, this meeting, for seven days. And he'd seen
them coming back home. And as he viewed them, he viewed
them at that particular time that they were as empty going
out as they were coming in. They went through their religious
motions for those seven days. The last day of the feast, that
great day, the women got the children all together, packed
the animals, and all the Jews went there one time a year. And there was a multitude of
people coming out of that Our Lord must have been standing
up looking down over them. He saw that they were as empty
now as they were when they came in and didn't help them. And Jesus stood and he cried. He said, If any man thirsts,
that is, if any man stands in need of any spiritual good, He
knew they didn't get any up there. They went to church, but they
didn't get any spiritual good out of it. They didn't understand. They didn't know who he was,
much less God the Father or God the Holy Spirit. They were divided
in their opinion as to who he was. Some thought he was John
the Baptist. Some thought he was Elisha. Some thought he may be some other
prophet He was a prophet. He was the last prophet. But
anyhow, he said that if any man thirsts, if any man is anxious,
if any man stands in need of any spiritual good, he said,
it's found in me. It's found in me. Any spiritual
thing that you need. I know you're coming away empty. and he pitied them, and he said,
if anyone stands in need of any spiritual good, it's found in
me. Let him come unto me. If any
man is thirsty, let him come to me. All that can relieve and
help you, all that can make you happy, all that can stay you,
Everything you need is in me. The first thing they needed was
life. I'm the way and the truth and the life. You need life,
you're dead in trespasses and in sins. You need life. Well, he said, Let him come to
me and drink. And he that believeth on me are
the scriptures that are said out of his belly. shall flow
rivers of living water." Living water only comes from a living
stream and a living Christ. But this spake he of the Spirit,
which they that believe on him should receive. For the Holy
Spirit was not yet given, because the Lord Jesus was not yet glorified. Remember our Lord said in the
seventeenth chapter of the book of John, He said, Father, I have
glorified thee on earth, glorify thou me. And when he gave up
the ghost, God glorified him. And many of the people, therefore,
when they heard this saying of a truth, they said, This is
the prophet. Others said, This is the Christ. And some said, Shall Christ come
out of Galilee? That's a Gentile city. I mean,
Christ is supposed to be a Jew. Why would the Messiah be down
in a Gentile city like Galilee? Hath not the scripture said that
Christ cometh of the seed of David out of the town of Bethlehem
where David was? So they were divided. There was
a division among the people because of him. And some of them would have taken
him. That means they would have harmed
him. They tried to kill him, maybe not in this particular
place, but in another place they tried to throw him down over
the hill. Some of them would have taken
him, but no man laid hands on him. Then came the officers and
the chief priests and the Pharisees, and they said unto them, Why
have ye not brought him? Some of the Pharisees had went
down to talk to him and find out who he was. And he said to
them, the chief priests and the Pharisees and the officers, he
said, Why have ye not brought him? Why didn't ye bring him
back? And the officers answered, Never a man spake like this man. Then answered them, the Pharisees, these Pharisees answering the
officers that said, Never a man spake like this man. They answered them and said,
Are ye also deceived? Are you fellows deceived that
has uttered this statement that they never heard a man speak
like this. You're deceived, too, like some of these other fellows?
Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on him? But these people who knoweth
not the law are cursed. These Gentile people down in
Galilee, they don't even know what the law is, and they're
cursed by God anyhow. Well, you've heard about old
Nicodemus in chapter 3. He had some inkling of... He was desirous, in a way, to
find something out about this man that he'd been hearing about.
But he didn't want to go in the daylight because people would
see him and they'd say, well, are you a follower of this guy
or what? So he went by night. Surrounded by darkness, he crept
in. You remember Nicodemus. He came
unto them. He came to Jesus by night, being
one of them. One of them members of the Sanhedrin
or Pharisees, Sadducees. But listen, he kind of steps
in the forefront. and in a way identifies himself.
Strange things about old Nicodemus. He said, How can a man be born
again? Can't he enter into his mother's
womb a second time? You don't understand this, he
said. Here he comes to the front. He
says, Does our law judge a man before he hears him? Let's hear
what the man's got to say and know what he's doing. And they
answered, and they said, Are you, Nicodemus, also of Galilee? Are you one of those down there
in Galilee who know nothing about the law and are cursed by God
by the law? Are you one of them? Nothing
good ever comes out of that town. Well, they answered and said,
Art thou also of Galilee? Search and look, for out of Galilee
ariseth no prophet. No profit ever come out of this
town. And so they just give up. They just give it all up. They all went home. Said the
meeting's over. We ever solved no problems. We
still don't know who he is. Just went on home. Shut the door. Went to bed. Drank some coffee.
Maybe watched the television a little bit. Went to bed. Every man went to his own house. Let me tell you this at the outset.
I won't stay long with you. Ignorance, prejudice, and fear
are members of the same family. Those three things, ignorance,
fear, and prejudice. What one is ignorant of is usually
he is prejudiced against it. What a man is ignorant of, generally,
normally, he is prejudiced against it. Now, ignorance brings fear. And we can, as human beings,
we can to be fearful of that which we know little about. So ignorance and prejudice breeds
or brings about fear, brings about a kind of blindness. This prejudice and ignorance
and fear brings about an unteachable spirit of blindness. Well, you know and I know, I've
said it many times and I don't say I understand it.
I believe it and I see evidence of it every day. are born by nature ignorant,
by nature, not as we are now. Most of us here now are in Christ. The light has shined into our
hearts in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ has been
revealed to us in the gospel as our sin bearer. as one who
bears our curse, as one who hath kept the law, as one who hath
established a righteousness that justifies us before God. We have
that life. But I'm talking about when we
were born. We were born in ignorance, all of us. born in ignorance in our natural
state, not as we are in Christ. We are ignorant in certain important
areas. We are ignorant as to how God
saves a sinner until the Lord, God, gives life. And when we
have the light, we begin to understand some things as to how God saves
us by the gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
gospel. Now, we're ignorant in important
areas until the Lord gives us light. And these areas that we're
ignorant in, They affect the way we see life, the way we view
life. They affect us. Most importantly,
they affect us like they did these people who
were divided on who he was. They had different ideas as to
who he was. Some said he's a prophet. Some say he's a good man. They
really didn't know who he was. Some said, well, he's down there
in Galilee and there's nothing good that can come out of Galilee.
They were divided and they didn't want to kill him. And the only
thing that stopped them was that these who went down to investigate,
they said, never in our lives have been confronted with such
wisdom and knowledge as this man speaks. We never heard anything
like this in our lives. We never heard things come from
a man's mouth as come from this man's mouth. They said why we
got so wrapped up in what he said We forgot what we went down
there for, overcome by the presence of this
man. The Pharisees said, Are you also
deceived? How about the rulers? Nicodemus, are you deceived or
are you one of them? You know how people are. You talk to them about God, and
they're ignorant of who God is. They'll tell you real quick,
you know, they'll give you an answer. Well, let me insist again that all
of us are ignorant by nature, and we need understanding. And one thing that we are ignorant
of by nature is the nature of God. Ignorant of the nature of God. He is the most important figure, being, on earth and in heaven. Controls
space. Controls everything. And we're
ignorant of his nature. We're ignorant of who God is
or what God is like. Ignorant. Because this ignorance
brings about prejudice and prejudice brings about fear. That's the
way we are, we're ignorant. If I was to ask you tonight to
give me one word that best describes God, just one word that best
describes the nature of God, what would you say? Would the
best word be good? God's good, isn't he? God's good. He said to that young lawyer
that came to him, and he came and he said, Good Master, what
must I do to gain life? And our Lord immediately said,
Why callest thou me good? There's only one that's good,
and that's the Father in heaven. So do you think and agree with
me here this evening The best word to describe God is good. You know He's good, He feeds
all humanity. Where would humanity get their
food if it wasn't for God? What would the animals eat to
sustain them if it wasn't for God? If God didn't send the rain,
If God didn't cause the sun to shine, what would we do? He's
a good God, a good God, fair and just, a good God. Why, he's good to all people,
saved and lost. Well, does not the Bible say
that the sun shines upon the just as well as the unjust? The farmer out there that curses
God a half a dozen times every day, his crop might be far better
than the fellow that prays a half a dozen times every day. God's
a good God. Good to all people. Protects His people. He's our
protection. He's our refuge. Well, would
you say the best word to describe God would be, He's a merciful
God? Well, would you say the best
word that describes God is He's long-suffering, that God's patient. He's patient. How long was it
that He put up with the old world? Patient, long-suffering. Well, what about kindness? Would that best describe God? What about graciousness? Would that best describe God?
There's only one word that describes God that I haven't mentioned
yet, and it's not love either. It's holy. That's the best word
that you can find to describe who God is. Holy God. Holy angels. Holy God. What does your Bible say on the
front of it? It's a good book. It's a gracious
book. It's a book full of kindness.
No, sir, it says Holy Bible. Holy, holy Lord God Almighty. Oh, it's not love. And I'll tell
you this, you'll never understand, including myself, the ways of
God Unless you understand the nature of God, holy, holy is
the best word to describe God. You'll never know how God saves
a sinner unless you know that God's holy. God's holy. You know what his
law says? His law says you'll be perfect
as your Father in heaven is perfect. That's what the law says. That's
the demands of God. God will not lower his demands. He will not set aside, he will
not lower his demands or his standard. He can't then still
be God. If he lowers his standard, then
he cannot be God. God is holy. And his holiness
demands that the penalty be paid for sinners that have offended
him. Holiness demands that because
he is a holy God. He said the wages of sin is death. He is not going to lower the
standard. The standard is just as high as it always was, absolute
perfection. That is the standard. Well, listen to me. Can you explain here tonight
God chasing Adam out of the garden for eating a piece of fruit off
of a tree? Can you explain that in light
of holiness and the love of God? What is so bad about a man walking
through the garden and taking one bite of a pear or an apple
or a pomegranate, whatever that was. Was that so bad that God
would chase him out of that garden and never let him come back again?
What's so bad about that? Would you curse a man for doing
a little thing like that? You said, no. I say, God will. You won't, but God will. Why? Because God's holy. God's
holy. He's not going to lower the bars. He told Adam. He said, if you
have everything in this garden that you want, but don't you
eat of the fruit of this tree, because if you do, you're going
to die. And when he did, God chased him out of the garden.
And today, we feel the effects of it, because if it wasn't for
that sin, we wouldn't die. We wouldn't grow old. We wouldn't lose our hair and
our teeth. Undertakers wouldn't have no
business. Ah, you say, no, I wouldn't do
it, but God did it. Who did it? The God of this Bible. He did it. I'll tell you another
thing God did, because He's holy. He drowned a whole world of people. He drowned a whole civilization,
thousands upon thousands of men, women, and babies. God drowned
it. No mercy did he show. Looked down from heaven to see
if there's any of them down there was doing good, and he said,
no, not a one of them. And he caused the rain to fall,
and caused the waters to break the ground underneath them. Rained for 40 days and 40 nights,
and killed every one of them, save eight souls. Would you do
that? Well, God did. because it's holy. You'll never understand anything
about the nature of God if you don't understand that God's holy. You say, what's the matter with
all these churches? Well, they don't understand that God's holy.
They're not worshiping a holy God. They're worshiping a figment
of their imagination, what they think God ought to be like. They
say, I wouldn't do it, so therefore God can't do it. I feel like
I'm better than God. Oh, no. He sent that whole generation
of people. He sent that civilization, that
society of people. He sent them all to hell in a
handbasket. And the reason was, he looked down and he said, the
thoughts and their imaginations are evil. For that. They didn't
do some of those things, they only thought of them. They just
thought about them. God said, you're wicked, you've
got wicked thoughts. I'm going to kill you. Killed
them all, save Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and Noah and his wife,
Hazel. And those three boys represent
all the races. that endures here today came
from those three boys, Ham, Sham, and Jacob. Oh, listen, only because of the
wicked imaginations of their heart. And some of them didn't
even carry out what they thought, they just thought it. The whole
world, eight people. He killed Thousands and thousands
of people just for taking some gold earrings, gold bracelets,
gold rings and melting them and making a golden calf out of them. He caused the earth to open and
swallowed them all up. Buried them alive, thousands
of them just for that. Would you do that? No, I wouldn't
do that. God will. God did. Oh, listen. God, this God, swallowed
this whole multitude of people. Why did he do that? Because they
wouldn't hear Moses. They wouldn't hear Moses, his
servant. They wouldn't hear him, or wouldn't
want to hear him. God said, I'll just kill you then. I wouldn't
do that. Well, unless a man experiences the
death of the Lord Jesus Christ, and unless we understand that God is holy,
there isn't much hope for us. We've got to understand that
He's holy God. That's His nature to be holy. You see, in the book of Psalms
it says, Holy, and Reverend is His name. I talked to this fellow
here one day that came to church this morning, Mr. Retton, and
he didn't mean any disrespect for me. I think he liked me.
No disrespect. He was talking to some fella,
and he introduced me to him. He said, this is Reverend so-and-so
and so-and-so. He said, that's what they call
you, isn't it? And I said, well, no. And they kind of were shocked
at that. And I said, there's only one
reverend, and holy and reverend is his
name. And I said, you look upon me,
a poor mortal man, sinful man, never done a good thing in his
life, not got not one ounce of merit to recommend himself to
God, and you call me holy? Reverend, holy is his name. Them guys stood by him. I know they said, when I left,
I know they said, he must be a self-righteous wretch. I didn't
mean to be self-righteous. I meant to tell the truth, that
God's Well, over in the book of Psalms, and
I'll not read it, but it's about the 5th verse, the 39th Psalm,
about the 5th verse, it says that God's holy, and
He says that every man in his best state, not in his worst
state, but every man in his best state is full of vanity and is
vain in his imagination. At his best state, not at his
worst state, at the best time in his life, God is hopeless. Well, I'm not just talking about Hitler
or Stalin or Castro. I'm talking about good men at
their best state, altogether vain. We like to think God's
like our grandfather, like a doting grandfather. We think our grandfather
understands. And we say about God in our talk, normally in our everyday conversation. We'll say, well, God understands. He understands. You know, we
do something and they say, well, yeah, but God understands. Yeah, He does understand. He
does understand. Ah, listen, I'm going to quit. Holy Temple, Holy Prophet, Holy
Mountain, everything about Him is absolutely holy. And you can't understand God's
salvation apart from understanding who God is, the nature of God. Well, we'll talk some more about
it.