Proverbs 19 and verse 20, hear
counsel and receive instruction that thou mayest be wise in the
latter end. The title of the lesson this
morning is One Word, Hear. Hearing doesn't just mean that
the words are spoken You consciously register them and recognize them. They enter into your ears. It
means to obey it. To hear counsel means to take
heed to it, obey it. You will not be wise in your
latter end just by knowing stuff. Wisdom comes with experience. Someone wiser than me once said
you don't know anything you haven't experienced And that's the truth doesn't
mean we can't take God's Word As it is and learn from it intellectually
we do but God will teach it to you And we'll see how in this Study I believe Lord will and
turn with me to James chapter 1 and Verse 18 of James 1. Of his own will, of God's will,
he begat us with the word of truth. With the word of truth. That
we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. Wherefore
my beloved brethren let every man be swift There's our word
to hear Seeing that God teaches us and births us again You must
be born again to hear to see or to enter into the kingdom
of God And seeing that that's how he does it be swift to hear Slow to speak slow to wrath. For the wrath of man worketh
not the righteousness of God, wherefore lay apart all filthiness
and superfluity of naughtiness and receive with meekness the
engrafted word. See the theme of this, every
verse takes us back to hearing the word, which is able to save your souls. It's life and death. It's spiritual,
eternal life and death to hear, hearing. But be ye doers of the word and
not hearers only. Deceiving your own selves. If you think the word of God
is an intellectual exercise only, you've deceived yourself. It's
to be heeded. It's to be done, it's to be acted
upon. For if any be a hearer of the
word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural
face in a glass. It's like a man looking in the
mirror, for he beholdeth himself and goeth his way and straightway
forgetteth what manner of man he was. If you just hear the
word and you don't receive it and By God's grace had it in
your heart and you just go your way in this world soon Very very
soon. You're gonna forget what you
heard You're if if you're one person
here and another person in the world It don't take you long
to become that other person in this world just soon You'll forget
what you heard and you'll go on with your life and you'll
live what you how you want to live You'll ignore God you'll
have no use for him, you'll major on yourself and not God. But whoso looketh into the perfect
law of liberty and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer,
but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deeds. We're saved by grace apart from
works, but being saved by grace, we work. It's not that complicated. You know why people complicate
that? It's because they really, really, really want to be saved
by what they do. They really do. And so they intentionally gravitate
back to that. Well, there you see the work.
We got to work. We got to work. No, you don't. You will work. If God saves you apart from your
works, he'll put you to work. Not that complicated. It's a
matter of cause and effect. God saves you, and then you act
like a saved person. That's just simple, isn't it? This man shall be blessed in
what he does, because he does it by faith in Christ. The Word
is Christ. The Gospel is a person. And so
what you're doing has to do with that person. His glory. His ministry. His worship. His service. It's not just what men call good
works. It has to do with Christ. The
Lord said of that woman who broke that alabaster box of ointment,
she hath done a good work on me. That's the definition of
a good work. Something done for Christ. Even when you do it for one of
your brothers, you're doing it for him, he said. You're doing
it for me. You've done it unto me. If any man Among you seem to
be religious and brattled with not his tongue. So you see he's
giving these practical Lessons there brattles that but deceiveth
his own heart this man's religion is vain Talk is cheap Pure religion and undefiled defile
before God and the father is this to visit the fatherless
and widows and their afflictions And to keep himself unspotted
from the world In other words, if the gospel
is truly received, you're gonna act like it. You're
gonna act like it. You're a new creature in Christ
Jesus. Now, of course, just taking heed
to any counsel is not what we're talking about. If the counsel
of a fool is that that you take heed to, you're not gonna be
wise as a result of that. And so maybe you're asking the
question in your heart, who do we listen to then? Well, it might
be wise to go with what God said about that. Who do you wanna
listen to? Matthew 17, one through eight.
Let's turn over there, because I don't wanna just quote the
one verse I have memorized. There, so let's look at Matthew
17, and look at the context of the verse that we probably all
have in mind. 17 And after six days Jesus taketh Peter
James and John his brother and Bringeth them up into an high
mountain apart and was transfigured before them and his face did
shine as the Sun and his raiment was white as the light and And
behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with
them. Then answered Peter and said
unto Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here. If thou wilt,
let us make here three tabernacles, one for thee and one for Moses
and one for Elias. While he yet spake, behold, a
bright cloud overshadowed them. And behold, a voice out of the
cloud, which said, this is my beloved son and whom I am well
pleased here. Hear, hear ye him. And when the disciples heard
it, they fell on their face and they were sore afraid. And Jesus
came and touched them and said, arise and be not afraid. And when they lifted up their
eyes, they saw no man save Jesus only. When Simon began to say,
well, let's honor, you know, you and the prophets, you know,
like, like a lot of religion does. Oh, we honor the Lord,
but we honor Mary too, and the saints, and we pray to them,
you know, because they intercede. No, there's one mediator between
God and men. As that nonsense was coming out
of his mouth, a cloud overshadowed them, and God said, here's the
one you need to listen to. Here's the one you need to look
to, my son. Everybody else is excluded. And
when they were able to see again, they saw no man save Jesus only,
hear him. The Lord has sent out preachers
to speak for him. When he left this earth bodily,
he sent preachers and he still does. And one of them said in
2 Corinthians 5 20, now then we are ambassadors for Christ
as though God did beseech you by us. And here's what he's told us
to say. We pray you in Christ's stead be reconciled to God. These are written that you might
believe on the son of God and that believing. You might have
life through his name. Be reconciled to God. On the
basis of what Christ did on Calvary, be reconciled to God. Don't straighten
up your life and turn over a new leaf. Be you reconciled to God,
for he hath made his son to be sin in your place, to be under
the wrath of God in your place, to be punished for your sin,
that you might be made the righteousness of God in him. Everyone who calls himself a
preacher is an ambassador of Christ those who speak for Christ
speak of Christ And they speak according to the Word of Christ
And that doesn't mean they say the name every once in a while
Means they preach him alone We preach Christ in him crucified
they preach him sovereign They preach him the Lord of glory
who does as he pleases with whom he pleases They preach salvation
of Him, not of the works of the flesh, not of the will of man,
but of God that showeth mercy in Christ. They preach Him successful. They don't preach that He made
salvation available. They preach that He saved His
people from their sins, as His very name indicates. By hearing the counsel of God,
is the way that God has purposed to save, to save sinners. For whosoever shall call upon
the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call
on him in whom they've not believed? And how shall they believe in
him of whom they've not heard? You see how all through the word
when it comes to the vital necessity of salvation, That word here keeps coming up
here. And how shall they hear without
a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent? It's
not just any preacher that volunteers and says, well, I'm called to
preach. I'm just looking for a place to preach, you know. You don't know if God sent them
or not. It's going to be clear. They speak not according to the
words of this prophecy. It's because there's no light
in them. As it is written, how beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring
glad tidings of good things. But they've not all obeyed the
gospel. For Isaiah saith, Lord, who hath believed our report?
So then faith cometh by hearing. Hearing by the Word of God To receive instruction means
to receive or take Discipline this is the word instruction
or discipline chastening and correction Correction so it's not just better than you've learned. It's
different than you've learned. You see the difference? Correction.
You don't just need to be educated. You need to be stopped in your
tracks. God stopped Saul of Tarsus in
his tracks. and said, now you're gonna speak
for me. And he taught him the gospel. You see what I'm saying? You don't just have a bunch of
knowledge and you just need a little more knowledge. Everything you
know, spiritually speaking, is wrong by nature. It's anti-Christ. You've got to be corrected. You've
got to be disciplined. You've got to be chastened for
what you think. And that happens by the word
of God. And that word correction, whether it's a rebuke or whether
it's a whooping in earthly things, the purpose is to change bad
behavior. You do that not when children
make a mistake. If they spill something at the
table, you don't want them doing that all the time. So you say,
now be careful when you're at the table. But it's when they
do something wrong that's self-destructive. That's when it's got to be impressed
upon them. You don't do that ever. So you see the word correction.
That's the scriptures. To correct your course, to change
bad behavior into good behavior, bad thinking into right thinking. Religious sinners, obviously,
by nature, think that, well, you know, God's up there, and
if we choose to do this, and if we do the right thing, you
know, he'll save us. You need to be corrected on that. God saves the worst sinners,
apart from what they've ever done. Your works are all filthy
rags in the sight of God. God just saves who he wants to
save because he loves them. And he's deliberately saved the
worst to show that it's not of works, hadn't he? Second Timothy 316, all the scripture
is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine,
for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect or mature,
thoroughly furnished unto all good works. There again, to hear rightly
to truly hear from God is to do. If the men who wrote the scriptures
had been left to give their opinions and their deductions, that would
not make a sinner wise. My opinion is probably not a
whole lot better than yours, but God inspired these words,
Paul said. This is given by inspiration
of God. And God's word corrects our thoughts,
our behavior, what we say. Hence my advice to everyone,
everywhere, all the time. You know what it is. Hear, hear,
hear from God. Mary chose that good part. You
remember what it was? Listen to Luke 10 38. Turn over
there if you'd like to. We're through, but I want to
read this to you. Because this is our text now, to hear, to
hear. We're exhorted over and over
to hear, to hear Him. Luke 10.38, Now it came to pass
as they went that He entered into a certain village and a
certain woman named Martha received Him into her house. And she had
a sister called Mary which also sat at Jesus' feet and heard,
because that's what we're doing. Sitting at his feet is symbolic
of what we're doing. We're sitting knowing what the
disciples said when he said, are you going to leave with the
rest of them that are offended by what I say? And they said,
where are we going to go? You have the words of eternal life.
That's what it is to sit at his feet, to hunger and thirst after
his righteousness. She sat at Jesus' feet and heard
his word. But Martha was cumbered about
much serving, and came to him and said, Lord, dost thou not
care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? Bid her therefore
that she help me. And Jesus answered and said unto
her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many
things, but one thing is needful. And Mary hath chosen that good
part which shall not be taken away from her." Where is she?
She's sitting at his feet, hearing, The Lord said, who is my mother
and who are my sisters and brothers? These ones that are sitting there
hearing. Wisdom doesn't have to only come
in your latter days, latter end. But this shows that it is cumulative. The more you hear of Christ,
the more you learn of Christ, the wiser you'll be. Grow in grace and in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen, let's pray.