Just nine verses here into 2
Kings chapter 13. I wanted to address something
that we've seen throughout, really, the books of 1 and 2 Samuel and
1 and 2 Kings. There's instruction in something
we need to talk about, I believe, in how the Scriptures define
a whole man's life in such simple terms. You live a life 60, 70,
80, 90 years, whatever. So many memories and so many
details, so many situations and circumstances and relationships. But what we read about here is
what happened in the sight of the Lord. In the sight of the
Lord. This man did that which was evil
in the sight of the Lord. That summed up his whole life.
That's what God saw. He saw all this stuff, ambitions
and relationships and prosperity and whatever. He became king
of Israel. But all that God saw was that
he was evil in his sight. And remember that these words whether somebody did right in
the sight of the Lord or did that which was evil in the sight
of the Lord, those words are not necessarily indicative of
whether or not they were a true child of God. But there is a
correlation. In chapter 12, we just saw how
the Jehoash did that which was right in the sight of the Lord
with one caveat added. It says all of his life, all
of his days, It was in all of his days in which Jehoiada the
priest instructed him. Leadership has great influence
on a life, but a man can't save another
man. You notice where we read about Jeroboam who made Israel
to sin. We talked about that this morning
when there was no king. Everybody did that, which was
right in their own eyes. There was no authority. There was no
leadership. There was no accountability.
So everybody just did what, they just followed their hearts. Well,
even worse than that, Jeroboam made Israel sin. There you are,
a leader having great influence over the people. He led them
into that. And here we know from chapter
12 that Jehoiada the priest made Jehoash do that which was right
in the sight of the Lord because when he was gone, it didn't end
up that way. When the influence of God's priest
was gone from Jehoash's life, Jehoash began to do evil, terrible
evil. So the fact that it says he did
that which was right in the sight of the Lord all his days, in
which Jehoiada influenced him. So him doing right all that time,
many years, that didn't mean he was a child of God. Achim, whom we know to be the Lord's, is King David. We know he was
a man after God's own heart. He was a child of God. He was
a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. His life is summed up
in the very beginning. This way, 1 Kings 15, five, because
David did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord and turned
not aside from anything that he commanded him all the days
of his life. Save only. save only in the matter of Uriah
the Hittite. That's 1 Kings 15, five. He turned not aside from anything
that God commanded him all the days of his life, save only in
the matter of Uriah the Hittite. We learn here how that being
a true child of God clearly doesn't mean no sin. Clarity doesn't mean no evil.
The matter of Uriah the Hittite, David did real good, except that
was a big thing though, wasn't it? That was a big one. And it's
mentioned because it was a big one. Because it's not that David
didn't have any other sin, that wasn't David's only sin. But
even if it was, he would be in hell now, wouldn't he? Unless God's priest, God gave
the priest the authority to tell David, The Lord's forgiven you. He's forgiven your sin. And you
shall not surely die. That's the authority that God
has given to his son, our great high priest. He has the authority to say your sins are gone. That's
who we're gathered before tonight. And of course, even that sin,
it's not the only one he committed. As we know, even when we're doing
that which is right in the eyes of the Lord, we're full of sin. So I wanted us to understand
the difference. There is that which is relatively right in
the sight of the Lord, but it's not sinless, it's not perfect,
it's not acceptable. None of our works are acceptable
to God, none of them. And yet, We can do that which
is right in the eyes of the Lord. Even this man that wasn't Jehoash,
he wasn't a child of God. He did that which was right in
the eyes of the Lord for a long time. So I think it's important
to have that understanding as we go through that. It's a separate
thing. It's not unrelated to our standing
before God, but it is separate from our standing before God.
And I say it's not unrelated. We'll talk about that a little
bit more in a minute. But even King Jehoahaz in chapter
13, where we just read in our checks tonight, he prayed, he
sought the Lord. He did that which was evil in
the sight of the Lord. That summed up his whole life,
but he sought the Lord in this one instance, and his prayer
was heard. The Lord heard his prayer, but
we'll talk about that a little bit deeper too. So those who
belong to the Lord, do that which is right in his
eyes in a general summary of their lives. David was full of
sin. We read David's life in the books
of Samuel. We know that Uriah the Hittite
wasn't the only problem. And yet, what God saw was that
he did that which was right in his eyes. Now that's, you could
say, well, that's true in Christ, but in Christ, there is no save
only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite. If Christ is your righteousness,
there's no buts. You do that which is right in
the sight of the Lord. Your righteousness is not yours.
It has nothing to do with what you do. It's what he did and
who he is. So that's not what that's talking about. It's a
picture of it. So there is that. Those who are lost, they can
do that which is right in God's eyes when they're influenced
by someone who does know God. When Jehoiah the priest instructed
him, he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord. And also in the case of our text, Those who are generally outright
evil in the sight of the Lord, and that sums up their whole
life, might do something right every once in a while. He sought
the Lord in this matter, and the Lord heard him. There is
that which is relatively right in the sight of the Lord. And
we have to acknowledge that in the scriptures. It's not righteousness. It's not perfect obedience. It's
full of sin. It's full of unbelief. It has
the wrong motive. just about every time. It's sinful, but it's relatively
right. It's relatively right to gather
and worship God instead of not doing that. But is our worship perfect? Is
it acceptable? No. We worship the one who is
our righteousness. All of it, all of it. So you
see how it's a separate thing. It's a separate thing. Not completely
unrelated, because when God saves you, puts a new heart in you,
you actually want to do that, which is right. Paul said, I
love the law of God after the inward man. The things that I
would do, I don't do them, but I would do them. I want to. But understand this, nothing
any man ever does, whether it can be summed up by God as being
right in his sight or evil in his sight, none of it is ever
acceptable and perfect and flawless, and does it contribute one way
or the other of man's righteousness before God. It's Christ or not
Christ when it comes to your standing before God. Only the
Lord Jesus Christ is good. Only he is good. He's the only
man that is good and ever was and ever will be. And only he ever did anything
that was good. You can't get in the last... He did all things well, but in
the lives of sinners, what we do, even though they're relatively
good, is not righteousness because of what we are. He was good,
he is good, and so he did good. We are not good. And you can't get clean water
out of a filthy fountain. According to the book of Job.
What we do though relatively good is not righteousness. What
Christ did is righteousness because of who he is. Pure and perfect
in thought, word, and deed. He was perfect in the sight of
God. When God spoke from heaven and
said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. He
only says that to the son. And when he says it to us in
glory, When he says, well done, thou good and faithful servant,
enter into the joys of thy Lord, it'll be because we're in Christ
and we're like Christ, we're with Christ. What Christ did, there's only one righteousness.
And it's what he did because of who he is. And the only way
a sinner can be righteous, not do, but be, is by grace through faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Turn with me to Romans chapter
three. It's been a while since we looked
at this passage of scripture and this is a passage of scripture
that we should look at often. Talking about the righteousness
of God as opposed to doing that which is right or evil in his
sight. As far as temporally speaking, in this flesh. Romans 3.19, now
we know that what thing soever the law saith, it saith to them
that are under the law. If the law doesn't apply to you,
then ignore the law. The thing is if you're a human
being, It applies to you. And why does, why? Why does the
law say anything to us? So that we can put it on our
wall and kind of use it as a litmus test, you know, I didn't do any
of that, I did pretty good today, is that why? No, it's to shut
you up. And to make you stand before
God and say, guilty. You see that? That's it. That's
what the law does. Our relationship with the law
consists of that right there. We shut up and own our guilt
before God. I don't really want that on my
wall, do you? I don't really want that on my wall. We don't
despise the law, we love the law of God. That's like, you're sentenced
to death, you're condemned to death, and they're gonna chop
your head off in, say, a month from now, and you say, well,
can I have the ax? I'm gonna put it on my wall for
a little while. No, that's condemnation. That's not, if you're encouraged
by that, and that's why people put it up there. They're encouraged.
They say, well, I've never cheated on my wife. I've never murdered
anybody. If anybody's going to heaven,
I am. No, that's not why God gave them all. And if that's
how you take it, you're in trouble. You're in deep trouble. Therefore by the deeds of the
law, verse 20, shall no flesh be justified in God's sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. Only thing the law can point
out to you, can teach you, that you can learn from it, is how
evil you are. You can know something about
your sin by the law. Now, you're not gonna know the
depth of it. You're not ever gonna know the
depth of it until you see Christ on the cross. Whenever God gives
you faith to see God's son crucified. for our sins, but the law tells
us what we are. That's why you have laws, right?
Why is there a law against stealing? Because people steal. That's
why God gave his law. The reason it says thou shall
have no other gods before me is because we're idolaters. And
by that law, we know our sin, we know. It reveals to us what
we are. Verse 21, but now the righteousness
of God without the law is manifest. How can there be righteousness
without law? Isn't that what righteousness is, obedience to
the law? There's righteousness without
law for us because of our substitute who obeyed the law perfectly
for us. Being witnessed by the law and
the prophets, Even the righteousness of God,
which is by faith, or you look that word up, it means by the
faithfulness, the trustiness of Jesus Christ. That's what
all the prophets wrote about. The Lord said, Moses wrote of
me, Abraham saw my day and he was glad. They wrote about righteousness
without the law by the faithfulness of Christ, by Christ's obedience
to God. And his obedience was obedience
unto death, even the death of the cross. Unto all and upon all that believe,
for there is no difference. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. That's the next verse. There's
no difference. Sinners, condemned, doomed. Being justified freely, by his
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. As gracious
as God is, what happened on the cross was necessary, wasn't it?
That's what Paul preached in the synagogues. He preached unto
them how that Christ must needs have suffered. If God's gonna save anybody,
that's how it's gonna happen. Verse 25, now, whom God has set
forth to be a sin offering through faith in his blood to declare
his righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through
the forbearance of God. Faith in his blood. Do you believe
that his blood is your only hope? That's what baptism says. I can
rise up alive today because Christ died for me and was buried. to declare, I say, at this time,
his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of
him which believeth in Jesus. In case that thought crossed
your mind, in case we care, most people don't, about God's character
in this thing. Wait a minute, that sounds great
for me, but how can God still be God if he just says, my sins,
it's okay, they've done nothing but evil ever. But no, the blood of Christ makes
it so that God can be holy. He can be righteous, he can be
unflexible in his justice. And still pardon me, because
Christ died in my place. Him being the sin offering for
my sin makes God able to be just and the justifier. through faith
of him which believeth in Jesus, justified by faith, but not by
the works of the law. Verse 27, where is boasting then?
And he went right to that, didn't he? He went right to that. Once the way God saves a sinner
is established, the first thing he said is, how are you gonna
get any glory out of that? You know why he did that? Because
all that religion is about is glory for man. It's up to you. Make a decision. Rededicate your
life. Join the church. Give your time.
Do this, do that, and the other. Live the Christian life. It's
all about robbing glory from God. That's what happened in
the garden. You shall be as gods. And I guarantee
you the remedy to that is not gonna have any glory in it for
you or me. And it don't. Where is boasting
then? It's excluded. Not if you're
saved by your works, not if you made a decision, not if you walked
an aisle and then got saved. It's not, you see that? By what
law? If works, no. No. If you distinguish yourself
from everybody else, then it's not excluded. You can give your
braggamony. Thereafter, world without end. But by the law of faith, if God
saves you by something he gives you, you're not getting any glory. And I'm not either. Therefore,
we conclude that a man is justified by faith by our union with Christ,
given us by God, He put us in Him, who is our wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption, without the deeds of the law,
without any of them, because you ain't ever kept a single
one yet, and you're not fixing to. You can do that which is right
in the sight of God all your days, but still, unless Christ
is your righteousness. You're a goner. You're a goner. Is he the God of the Jews only?
Are we talking about just the thing that he chose the Jews
and that's it? No, but the Gentiles too. Yes, of the Gentiles also.
It doesn't matter because you being who you are has nothing
to do with it. You doing what you do has nothing
to do with it. That's why Paul said, my heritage
as a Jew, the Hebrew of the Hebrews, that was everything to me. Now
it's done that I may win Christ and be found in him, not found
a Hebrew of the Hebrews, found to be in Christ before God. Verse
30, seeing it is one God which shall justify the circumcision
by faith. And how is he going to save the
uncircumcision then? Same way. It's by Christ, it's
by believing on the Son of God, that's how. Do we then make void
the law through faith? When I said a while ago, I'm
not gonna put the law on my wall. Why would I put the executioner's
ax on my wall? Am I then being disrespectful
to the law? No, no, we establish the law.
There is no law unless somebody keeps it. What's the point of
a law unless somebody keeps it and it ain't you? It ain't gonna
be me. When we believe on Christ and
we trust him as our righteousness, we honor the law of God. It's
not my rule of life. I don't want it all up as my
rule of life. Christ is my life. Look at verse one of the next
one. What shall we say then that Abraham, our father, as pertaining
to the flesh, hath found? Let's put a personal experience
onto this. For if Abraham were justified
by works, he hath whereof to glory, but not, not, not before
God. Now you might glory before men,
but you're not gonna glory before God. For what saith the scripture,
Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for
righteousness. That doesn't mean his faith was
so good that it made up for all his bad. That means that God
saves sinners apart from works, any works. That tells you right
there that faith is not a work. Without works, but with faith.
What does that say about whether faith is a work or not? Faith
is a grace. God gives it. If it's something you come up
with, it's a work. But he saves you without works
by faith. Now to him that worketh not is
the reward not reckoned. Now to him that worketh, verse
four, Is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of dead? God owes
you something. That's how people live. That's
why everybody complains when something happens and they don't
want that to happen. Well, God owes me better than
that. But to him that worketh not,
but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, declares not guilty those that
have never done anything good, but nothing but evil all of their
days. His faith is counted for righteousness
because it unites him to Christ. God-given faith, by grace through
faith in Christ, God saves us. Even as David also describeth
the blessedness, of the man under whom God imputeth righteousness
without works. He imputes Christ's righteousness
to you. Impute means to give the credit
for. Vicki and I learned that. Were you in that one, Jack? He
drilled that into us. Impute means to give the credit
for. We're given the credit for Christ's
righteousness, though we haven't done any work of righteousness
without works. saying, blessed are they whose
iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is
the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. You see how God saves a sinner. There are so-called preachers
that preach all their lives for decades and never tell a single
sinner how God saves a sinner. I said earlier in the message
that what we do is separate from our righteousness. Our righteousness is in Christ.
And we are created again in Christ. We're given a new heart that's
created in righteousness and true holiness. Christ in us is
the hope of glory. And so it's not completely unrelated
that if God gives you a new heart that desires, like Paul said,
I wanna do good, that you're gonna do that which is right
in his sight as a general rule of your life, just like it says
in our studies in the Chronicles and Kings and Samuel. You see
there that it doesn't mean that you don't sin, right? David did
that which was right in the sight of the Lord all of his days,
almost. And that doesn't mean he was
almost righteous. Everything he did was full of sin. That's
talking about something different, not completely unrelated, but
unrelated as far as it has to do with righteousness before
God. It's what the scripture calls
good works. It's not righteousness, it's
different, it's separate. God saves the sinner solely on
the basis of Christ's righteousness and sin offering. But we have, by salvation, the
Spirit of Christ dwelling in us, and that changes us. It changes
us inside and out. Romans 8, one, there is therefore
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk
not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. We just don't walk
after the flesh. Are we gonna get entangled in
the flesh? Does the flesh still bear on us all the time? Is it
always there? Is there ever a time when the
flesh doesn't have something to do with it? No. But our walk is not after the
flesh, it's after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of
life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and
death. For 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 foreseeing condemned sin
in the flesh. The law can't save you, it can't
make you better. It can't do that. But what the
law can't do, God sent his son to do it for us. That the righteousness of the
law might be fulfilled in us, fulfilled in us because of what Christ did, what
God sent him to do and he accomplished on Calvary. The righteousness
of the law is fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh,
but after the spirit. The righteousness of God is not
fulfilled in us because we walk after the flesh. The righteousness
of God is fulfilled in us because God sent his son to do what the
law couldn't do. And by his grace, he did that
work completely for us, but he didn't work in us. They that are after the flesh,
now here's the thing now, they that are after the flesh do mind
the things of the flesh. They that are after the spirit,
the things of the spirit. It's the way we reckon things,
and we reckon, we reckon. We don't mind the things of the
flesh. We're not always concerned with
and careful about and consumed with the things of the flesh,
because we reckon that if Christ died for us, we ought to not
henceforth live unto ourselves, but unto him. That's the work
of God. The matter is very simple. Our
minding the things of the spirit and not the flesh is not a supplement
to the righteousness in which we stand before God. That righteousness
is Christ, all Christ, only Christ. It's not Christ plus our good
works that makes us acceptable to God. It's Christ alone. He is the Lord, our righteousness,
period. Good works, the minding of the
things of the spirit is a definite result of what God did for us
and in us when he saved us. Christ's righteousness, his precious
blood shed for our sins, is what God did for us, without us, in
our place, as our representative, as our mediator, as our substitute. When the substitute goes in for
you, you're out of the game. When God reveals to us the work
that he did for us on Calvary in eternity, when
he chose us in his son, salvation's an eternal work and it's God's
work. But when he reveals to us what he did for us, how are
we gonna see that? That which is born of the flesh
is flesh. And that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Except
you be born again, you can't see. When God reveals to us what He
did for us, He does that. We see, we understand, we believe
by a work that He does in us. You see that? If He don't do
a work in us, we're never gonna experience what He did for us. We can't see the kingdom of God.
We can't enter into the kingdom of God without a new birth from
above. A new man, a new nature, a new
heart. It's really not that hard to,
The scriptures describe it pretty clearly. It's mysterious that
we could be two people, but read Romans 7. Tell me how many paws
there are. There were, not anymore. Turn
with me to Ephesians 4, 17. And this is, I'm gonna be merciful tonight
because I've got a lot left. But we'll, Let's look at Ephesians
4.17. I know that Sundays are a long
day, y'all, for us, but man, this is it. We go into this world armed with
what the Lord gives us on these days and nights. Ephesians 4.17,
this I say therefore and testify in the Lord, They henceforth
walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind."
You see that word mind again? They mind the things of the flesh. We don't walk after the flesh.
Don't mind the things of the flesh. having the understanding
darkened, being alienated from the life of God. You see that? There's got to be a new birth,
a new life through the ignorance that is in them. That's every
man by nature. Read Romans 1, and that's every
man. Because of the blindness of their heart, who being past
feeling, have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to
work all uncleanness and greediness, but you have not so learned Christ. Don't miss the way that's worded. It's not just that we're not
prone to that now, that we don't walk that way now, but it's our
learning of who he is that made it that way. You see that? Why are we not just plunged into
lasciviousness and uncleanness and greediness and mind that
all the time? That's all we care about. Because we've learned Christ,
because he taught us, we're taught of God. If so be that you've heard him. We always come back to it, don't
we? The only advice that there could ever be for anybody in
any situation, anywhere. So be that you have heard him
and have been taught by Him as the truth is in Jesus not just
people using the name Jesus this and Jesus that the truth as It's
in Christ that you put off concerning the former conduct, the old man,
which is corrupt according to the deceitful loss, and be renewed
in the spirit of your mind. Mind the things of the spirit.
That's not possible without God's grace, without him present in
our very soul. And that you put on the new man,
which after God is created in righteousness. and true holiness. Jehoash in
2 Kings 12 did right things because of an outward influence. When that outward influence was
gone, his inward evil was no longer restrained in that way.
Jehoahaz in chapter 13 sought the Lord out of desperation.
He didn't seek the Lord because he loved the Lord, because he
trusted the Lord. He didn't have any, he's about to be annihilated. And so everybody, when they're
in trouble, they always get real spiritual, don't they? You ever
noticed that about us? We're still prone to that, aren't
we? It's not the Lord they love,
it's getting out of trouble they love. They love escaping the
consequences of their sin. That's why when some false preacher
tells them, you can go to heaven when you die as wretched and
vile and having no interest in God whatsoever if you just come
down here and repeat after me. Well, that sounds like a deal.
Sound like a deal. The believer's not impervious
to that. We're not impervious to outward influence. That's
still important, isn't it? Iron sharpeneth iron, and that's
a desirable thing. We're not impervious to evil
influence. And we're not immune to tending
to neglect communion with God until we're desperate. especially needy, but believers
also have a heart of love for God. Love for his son. Because he first loved us, we
love him. Unbelievers don't love God, so
when they do something right, there's another reason for it
than that. Not love that drives them. It's reward or threat every
time, isn't it? Reward or threat. Well, bless God, we have the
spirit of Christ and the flesh wars against the spirit, but
the spirit wars against the flesh too. Thank God for that. Unbelievers
don't have the spirit of Christ, so there's no war going on. There's
no war against their fleshly carnal motivations and desires,
except again, prospect of reward or self-preservation, selfishness. So my prayer is that God will
teach us the difference between that which is right in the sense
that Jehoash did right things in chapter 12, the difference between that and
righteousness, which is in Christ alone. It is right in the sight of God
to seek him as the evil King Jehoahaz did. Though you'll see, even in God's
response to his prayer, it says he hurt him, but he hurt him
because the Lord knew the duress that his people were in, not
because he had any regard. Unto Jehoahaz. Jehoahaz doing
something right in his whole miserable life didn't save him. And God gives us a picture here
of what he will always do. He's gonna save his people Israel. He sent them a savior. His spiritual
Israel is gonna be saved. Whether somebody doing right
or not doing right. The elect of God, and how's he
gonna do that? How has he done that? He gave him a savior. He
gave him a savior, verse five. Jehoash was that savior in the
physical sense, in the conflict of the nation at that time against
the Syrians, but his name tells us who he's teaching us about.
His name is given by the Lord. Isn't that what it said? The
Lord gave them a savior. And that's what he did for us.
In the kingdoms of men, right things are done and evil things
are done, relatively speaking, but in God's kingdom, he has
given unto us a savior. Unto us a child is born. Unto
us a son is given, and the government shall be on his shoulder, and
his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the
Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. of the increase of
his government and peace, there shall be no end. Upon the throne
of David and upon his kingdom to order it and to establish
it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. We're saved
not because of something done by us, by any earthly man, earthly
king, evil or good. but by the perfect saving work
of the Lord of hosts. He gave us a savior. Let's pray.