verse 37 there as he spake a
certain pharisee a certain pharisee now the word pharisee seems like
a good time to to look at that again it's from a root word the
word pharisee means separate or distinguish separate to separate
or to distinguish to distinguish one thing from another thing
And that definition really tells us everything. Look at Luke chapter
18, just a few pages over. Verse nine, this is a very familiar, familiar passage and often preached
on, I imagine that you've heard, but think about what's happening
here in light of our text this morning. What the word Pharisee
means. Here's a person that has distinguished
himself. He's separated himself. And see
if that's not what happened here. In verse 9, Luke 18, 9, and he
spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that
they were righteous and despised others. Two men went up into
the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee and the other a Republican. The
Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee
that I am not as other men are. I'm separate. I'm distinguished. I'm different. On what basis? Other men are
extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this, publican.
But I fast. I do things. That was what separated
him in his mind and heart from sinners what he did. I fast twice in the week I give
tithes of all that I possess and the publican standing afar
off would not lift up so much as his eyes into heaven but smote
upon his breast saying God be merciful. The publican wanted Difference to be made But see he said I'm a sinner
I'm not any different than anybody else But he asked God to do something
to make a distinction Have mercy God be merciful to me The sinner
and then the Lord makes a distinction in verse 14 I tell you this man
went down to his house justified rather than the other and There's
a separation. For everyone that exalted himself
shall be abased, and he that unblemished himself shall be exalted. So there are
two distinctions made in that text. Two people are distinguished
from one another two times. They're separated. The first
time is in the mind and heart of the Pharisee and nowhere else.
Because God says there's no difference. You may think you've made a difference
between yourself and others by what you do, but God says there
is no difference. Jew, Greek, doesn't make any
difference. But in the mind of that Pharisee,
he distinguished himself, and that's what the word Pharisee
means. Deliberately did that they knew
that that's what they were doing. I'm not the same. I'm not as
other men are I'm separate I'm distinguished and What distinguished
him from that publican was what he did I fast I pray I do this
I give That means to recognize as distinct
or different and He distinguished himself. He recognized himself
as distinct or different from the publican. I'm not like him.
I'm not like him. And then our Lord distinguished
the publican from the Pharisee. And these are the two religions
and the only two. Everyone by nature is a Pharisee. Everybody. It doesn't matter
if you call your religion Baptist or Buddhism. It doesn't make
any difference. You're a Pharisee. You are someone who distinguishes
himself from others, makes the difference between salvation
and being lost to be something that you do. You're a Pharisee. The Pharisee
in Luke 18, he separated himself from the publican. He said, I'm
not like him. On what basis? I do these things. I do this.
I do that. I do the other. And he doesn't. Our Lord distinguished the publican
from the Pharisee on what basis? The publican is justified. No
sin. No sin. The Pharisee went down
to his house in his sins. Guilty. But on what basis is that distinction
made? God be merciful to me. And that word merciful there
means propitious. It means to be expiated. It means
to be atoned for. He went into the temple. He stood
before the mercy. He came where the mercy seat
was. He came where God said I'll commune with you there. Where
the blood is splashed upon the mercy seat. He said God be propitious
to me. Let that blood atone for me. That's what he's saying now.
That word atone or propitiate came to mean merciful because
a sinner knows that there's just one way God can be merciful and
that's by the through the propitiation the sin offering of Christ by
the blood, blood atonement, the precious blood of the Lamb. David
said in Psalm 143 7 hear me speedily O Lord my spirit faileth Hide not thy face from me, lest
I be like. I'm not different than anybody
else. I'm not separate, I'm not distinct in any way. Lest I be
like them that go down into the pit, I will be just like, there's
one reason that I'm not gonna go to hell like everybody else.
One reason. If the Lord hears me, and reveals
himself to me. Hide not thy face from me. Hear
me and don't hide from me. Reveal yourself to me. That's
the only difference. In other words, Christ. Reveal
Christ to me. Reveal Christ in me. Don't hide.
Ephesians 2.1. Listen to this. I probably should
have you turn to these, but I want to be brief and succinct. I want this clear Are we a Pharisee? Are we Pharisees? We are by nature.
There's no question about that. We are distinct. We are different.
We are separated in our own minds and hearts. That's how, that's
the religion of this world. We're different because of what
we do. We have, you know, the Lord, you know, the word goes
out to everybody, but only those who receive it, only those who
make a decision, only those who exercise their free will, exercise
their faith are going to be saved. There's the saved and the lost.
What makes the difference? It's up to you. Pharisee. Pharisee. That's just as clear
as a bell now. But listen to Ephesians 2.1. And you hath he
quickened, you hath the Lord given life to, who were dead
in trespasses and sins. Wherein in time past you walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince
of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the
children of disobedience. controlled by the same evil that
they are now. Among whom also we all, me, you,
everybody had our conduct in time past, in the lusts of our
flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and the mind, and
only that, that's all we cared about, the desires of the flesh.
And we're by nature the children of wrath, you know the next three
words, even as others. No difference. No difference
whatsoever. Well, then are we all going to
hell? No, there's going to be a difference. The Lord hath put
a difference between his people and this world. Even as others
but God. If not for him now, if not for
him who is rich in mercy for his great love, wherewith he
loved us. The difference between me and the child of disobedience
that even now the spirit of disobedience works in. The only difference
is God and the richness of his mercy. But God who is rich in mercy
for his great love wherewith he loved us Even when we were
dead in sins, even when we were just like everybody else, have
quickened us together with Christ, parentheses, by grace are you
saved. I love that. It's almost like
he whispered that part. By grace are you saved. Sometimes
a whisper is louder than a shouting. By grace are you saved. Are you different than anybody
else? No. By the grace of God, God made a difference. God made
a difference. Now this Pharisee in our text
thought and acted according to his nature. He marveled that
the Lord did not wash his hands before he ate. Because that was
a religious custom among the Jews. And the Lord claiming to
be the Son of God. He was claiming to be from God.
And this Pharisee had in his mind that it was God's will.
the traditions of the Pharisees, that's the will of God. If you
don't wash your hands before you eat, you're unclean and therefore
you're defiled. And so he marveled, it was astonishing
to him that the Lord wouldn't do that. He assumed that his
own customs were the very will of God. He was amazed when he saw the Lord Jesus not
conformed to that custom. And many in religion would be
shocked If they knew, for example, that we don't have an invitation
here. You know what an invitation is? Most of you probably do.
I was in it for a long time. I know exactly what it is. It's
basically a begging session, about a 30 minute or longer begging
session, trying to get sinners to do something for Jesus. You
see, that was the distinction. Now, that's what made the difference
in this Pharisee's mind. If I don't wash my hands, then
I'm defiled. It's up to me. It's up to me.
Me being clean is up to me. If religion found out, you don't
have an invitation, how's anybody going to get saved? Well, the
same way everybody that's been saved got saved by the power
and grace of God. I reckon, don't you? By the grace
of God. But no, you've got to have a
30 or 45 minutes, sometimes longer, singing the same song over and
over until somebody makes a decision for Jesus, you know. Boy, I could
go further into it than that. It's complicated. It's weird.
It's just weird. It has nothing to do. And they
just assume that that's God's way of saving sinners, don't
they? They just assume it. Oh, yeah. If you don't do that,
if you don't have an invitation, that's when people get saved.
No, it's not. No, it's not. It's utterly foreign
to the scriptures. Utterly. It's a horrible invention of
religion. And the reason they do it is
because they're Pharisees. It's up to you. There's got to be a time for
you to make your decision because if you don't make a decision,
if you don't do something, you're not going to be saved. What about
if God does something? You think sinners might be saved
that way? Maybe God can just save them. You reckon? By the
way he said he would? By the preaching of the gospel.
Instead of us doing a bunch of foolish religious nonsense that
has nothing to do with the word of God. Well this was like that. It was a common religious tradition
that had been considered necessary to holiness. You're unclean if
you don't do it. Gotta wash your hands before you eat it. And
you know our Lord set this up deliberately. He caused that
man to ask him to go eat with him and deliberately didn't wash
his hands. To bring about this astonishment
and this lesson. Our Lord set him straight on
it, didn't he? Boy. And before we go any further,
let me ask you this. Do you still have any religious
customs that are foolish? Well, you wouldn't think we would,
would you? And yet I know any legalistic nonsense that we cling
to because we were just brought up that way. I know some that
think you need to dress a certain way to worship. You know anybody
like that? You've got to dress a certain
way or it's just not right. I don't see that in the word
of God. I just don't see it. I'm sorry. Maybe I've missed
it. You know what? It's a distraction from the gospel.
If you can't, you know, preach the gospel through that, then
shut up about it. Others have deduced by their
superior reasoning abilities that certain doctrines that are
not taught in the Bible are necessary to salvation because they make
sense. They just make sense to them. I've heard a bunch of them,
and I can get very specific about it. It seems to them that if
you don't believe these complicated, often convoluted doctrines, these
things, you can't possibly believe what's actually taught in the
scripture because it's just an obvious deduction from what God
said. I think I'll just stick to what God said. Thank you very
much. How can the simple truth of Christ
crucified not be enough? How can that not be enough? Just
the simplicity that's in Christ. Oh boy, if God takes his hand
off of us for a millisecond, it won't be
enough. It won't be enough. We can never
exhaust the bottomless mine of the glorious gospel truth concerning
our Lord Jesus Christ and his soul-saving death on Calvary.
Accomplished. Salvation accomplished. What
else is there to talk about? Oh, there's all kinds of weird
stuff if Christ is not enough. But bless God, he is. The gospel
which our Lord is about to teach this Pharisee is not complicated.
You don't need brain power to believe it. You need faith from
God. That's what you need. You need
faith. Faith, by the way, to receive
it as a little child, not a theologian. If you receive the truth as a
theologian, you're not getting into the kingdom, he said. You've
got to receive it as a little child. Or you're not going to enter.
Mark 10, 15. Didn't make it up. Our Lord said, now do you Pharisees. Now do you Pharisees. You make
clean the outside. And what our Lord told him now
is what he also said in Matthew chapter 15. Let's look at it
together. Matthew chapter 15. Keep a marker there at Luke 11
because we'll come back to that. He said there in Luke 11 where
our text is, Now do you Pharisees make clean the outside of the
cup and the platter, but your inward part is full of ravening
and wickedness. Now listen, some think it's the
same story, different accounts of it. But I'm sure our Lord
taught this more than at one time and in one place. But Matthew
15, 1 through 20. And then came to Jesus scribes
and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, Why do thy
disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they wash
not their hands when they eat. But he answered and said unto
them, why do you also transgress the commandment of God by your
traditions? And that's what this washing
of hands was. It was never taught in the scripture
like that. It was a tradition of the elders. That's what they
said. They admitted that much. He said,
why don't your disciples, why do they transgress the tradition
of the elders? You can't transgress the tradition
of the elders. Transgression is against God
or it's not transgression. You can't sin against the elders,
okay? You know that. For God commanded,
saying, Honor thy father and mother, and he that curseth father
or mother, let him die the death. But you say, Whosoever shall
say to his father or mother, It is a gift by whatsoever thou
mightest be profited by me, and honor not his father or his mother,
he shall be free. You say, You don't have to honor
your father and mother. You don't have to take care of
them. As long as you just say to them, look, I know you need
this and that and this, but this, my resources are a gift to God.
I've got to use this for the ministry. And so I just can't
help you. You say that to your father and
mother and you say you're free as long as you, you know, are
spending it on your religion, thinking that you're honoring
God with it. God said, honor your father and mother. But you say this, thus have you
made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. Now remember that because that
has a bearing on something in our text as well. And he said,
you hypocrites. Well, did Isaiah prophesy of
you saying this people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth
and honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. They're saying, oh, this is for
God. when the God that they're talking about told them what
to do and they're not doing it. But in vain do they worship me,
teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. And he called the multitude
and said unto them, hear and understand, not that which goeth
into the mouth defileth a man, but that which cometh out of
the mouth, this defileth a man. You eat with clean hands or dirty
hands, whatever. That's not your problem. That's
not the defilement that you need to worry about. The defilement
you need to worry about is what's on the inside. What's in your
heart by nature. Your evil nature. This defileth
a man. Then came his disciples and said
unto him, knowest thou that the Pharisees were offended after
they heard that saying? Doesn't it just make sense? What
he said? Do you really think you're going to go to hell because
you got a little dirt on your hands and then ate? and got some
dirt inside of you, you're going to go to hell. He said, no, no,
your sin comes from inside of you. It doesn't go into you from
your hands. Sin comes from the inside. That's
the defilement. It's your heart. It's the evil
of your heart. That just kind of makes sense, doesn't it? But
the Pharisees, that was an abomination to them. The simple truth, simple. A child can understand that if
the Lord reveals it, and a theologian will never get it unless God
does reveal it. But he answered and said, Every
plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted
up. Leave them alone. Leave them alone. They be blind
leaders of the blind, and if the blind lead the blind, both
shall fall into the ditch. Then answered Peter and said
unto him, Declare unto us this parable. And Jesus said, Are
ye also yet without understanding? Do not ye yet understand that
whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and
is cast out into the trough? Don't we understand that? In a practical sense, that's
not defilement. That can't harm you. That can't, before God, make
you unclean. It doesn't even make any common
sense. 18 but those things which proceed
out of the mouth come forth from the heart that's the defilement
they come out of the heart and they defile the man those things
for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts murders adulteries
fornications thefts false witness blasphemies these are the things
which defile a man and they come from your heart but to eat with
unwashing hands defile if not a man That just sounds ridiculous,
doesn't it, that anybody would think that, and yet religion
is ridiculous. The best we can come up with
without the revelation of God is ridiculous. There are things in religion
that are practiced and believed right now that are more ridiculous
than that. I'm not even going to take the time to name them.
I'll bet you can think of a couple of them. But in order to ever
truly be clean, we're going to have to understand what dirty
is. That's what our Lord is teaching
here, how dirty we are. At least to understand, we're
not going to know how dirty the extent of it, but at least to
the point where you know you can't clean it up. You got to
understand that much about it, as far as how dirty you are.
You need to know that you making it better ain't going to make
it better. No matter how clean you make your hands or anything
about you, you cannot cleanse your heart before God You can't
do that Our Lord gives him a picture of a cup that is sparkling clean
on the outside But it's not just dirty on the inside. He said
it's full you see that in the text. Let's look at it again.
I You make clean, you Pharisees
make clean the outside of the cup and the platter, but your
inward part is full of ravening and wickedness. And notice this,
he's not saying that you drink from a dirty cup. He's saying
you are the dirty cup. You see that? You are full of
ravening and wickedness. Full. There's no room for anything
else. Ravening is extortion and robbery. Religion's all about that, aren't
they? Robbery always talking about giving it's stealing is
what it is. It's not giving Well, you tell
people that God, you know requires 10% and if you don't pay it,
you know You're not it's not gonna be right with God. That's
stealing because it's a lie It's a lie And wickedness is depravity,
evil purposes, and desires. It's a noun, not a verb. In other
words, it's what you are, not what you do. If you look up that
word wickedness, it is a noun. And that's pretty significant. We do wickedness because we are
wicked. Now, a sinner who knows this will not say, look what
I've done. This is what makes me, this is
why I'm not like that Pharisee. And here's why I've done this. I've done that. A sinner who
understands what dirty is, what sin is, is not going to say,
look what I've done. He's going to say, God have mercy. Like the other man there that
day did. God have mercy. I'm a sinner. I need your mercy
because I'm not different. I'm just like everybody else,
wretched and foul and corrupt. I need your mercy. The Lord looks on the heart.
We can't see the heart, but God looks on the heart. But we learn
something from God about the way that we're to see things.
I don't know that you're evil because I can see you're evil.
I know you're evil because God said you were. I know how evil
you are because God revealed it. That's how I know how evil
I am too. I can't see my own evil. You'd
think you'd be able to, but we can't. We've got to believe God. We've got to have faith. God-given
faith. We can't see the heart, but the
way we see things is not based on what we see, what we understand
by nature. It's faith. It's we believe God.
I believe what God says about me. I don't have to see a man's
heart to know If that man preaches and trusts the works and will
of man for salvation, he's defiled. Where I can't see, but I know
it's true because God said so. The Lord taught concerning his
disciples. Let me make this point as briefly
and clearly as I can. The Lord taught his disciples
concerning the Pharisees, those who separate themselves, those
who distinguish themselves from others. He said don't be like them, don't
pray like them, don't give like them. Don't be like them and leave
them alone, stay away from them. Here he calls them full of extortion
and wickedness and he said something else about them in verse 40 there,
you fools. Not only are you evil, but you're
out of your mind. You're idiots. You're an absolute
idiot. Now, all I want to do this morning
is just repeat what the Lord said. Don't be like them and
stay away from them. And I want to be clear about
that. Now, I know people say I'm hard-hearted and, you know,
maybe even talking nonsense when I say don't, you know, don't don't have anything to do with
them. Our Lord was particular about
that. We have to live in this world
and we have to function in this world, we have to do business
with this world. But the Pharisees particularly, those who were
leaders and teachers, people talk about, you know, as far
as going into business with them or Should I let my kids go to
a Christian school? Or when they're staying over
with friends, you know, maybe they'll go to church, but it's
just one time. It's not gonna be, it's a big deal. Don't do
it. They're snakes. Stay away from
them. Our Lord warns us against them.
Don't pray like them, don't worship like them, don't give like them,
leave them alone. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. And he explained very clearly,
that's their doctrine. Beware of the doctrine of the
Pharisees. A little leaven, leaveneth the
whole lump. He said in 2 John 1 10, don't
even bid them Godspeed. Don't do it. Don't have anything
to do with them. Chris, don't you want to see
prayer in the schools? I do not. I do not. I don't want my children
or anybody that I know or love or have any influence over to
have anything to do with the religion of this world. Now they
can have to do with religious people in ways that are necessary,
but don't go anywhere near the religion of this world. Don't
have anything to do with it. And the more, the longer I see
things and learn things and experience things, the more adamant I am
about that. Don't do it. Don't trifle with
it. And I know we can't keep our
children from this world, but we can, by the grace of God,
be wise and heed our Lord's warnings. I imagine there are parents of
over a thousand children in Pennsylvania alone that wish they could have
done things differently. Have you seen the news lately? In one state in this country,
Over 300 priests abused over a thousand children in Pennsylvania
alone and that's just the ones they know about. That's the religion
of this world now. They go around saying God bless
you my child and doing unspeakable things that I can't even talk
about in polite company. That's the religion of this world
and that's just the physical damage they do. The spiritual
damage is incalculable. Listen to me now. Listen to the
word of God about it. The spiritual harm cannot be
measured. We cringe at things like that,
but we don't have the slightest idea of what our Lord is talking
about when he says full of extortion and wickedness. Let's just trust
him and stay away. We're warned against the religion.
of this world and we do well to heed that warning. But here's
the question this morning. How can I be clean? I am the
religion of this world without the grace of God. How can I be
clean? I've got to be clean on the inside.
And I've got to be clean not to you, but to God. God has to
count me clean. Job asked this question a long,
long time ago in Job 25.4. How then can man be justified
with God? Or how can he be clean that is
born of a woman? Behold, even to the moon, and
it shineth not, yea, the stars are not pure in his sight. How
much less man that is a worm, and the son of man which is a
worm. In Job 9, he said, I know it
is so of a truth, but how should man be just with God? How can
I be clean? These friends were telling him,
you shouldn't have done it. Oh, you did this and that, and you're
being punished for it. He said, I know that I've got to be guiltless
before God, but how is that going to happen? How's that going to
happen? How's that going to be true?
Here's the answer. Turn with me to Mark chapter one. You could
probably quote most of this passage, but I want us to look at it this
morning. This is the way a sinner, a vile,
wretched, corrupt, full of extortion and wickedness sinner can be
clean before God. And I'll give you a hint up front,
it ain't by washing your hands. You already knew that. Mark 140,
and there came a leper to him. The very picture of uncleanness.
A leper was declared legally under the old covenant to be
unclean and unwelcome in the company of anybody because they're
so nasty and vile, and contagiously so. That's what we've been talking
about. Stay away from them. You know,
not that we're not defiled ourselves, that our Lord teaches us now. We are defiled. We are this on
the inside. There's no question about that.
And how am I going to be clean before God? A leper came to him,
beseeching him and kneeling down to him and saying unto him, if
you will. That old leper right there knew
the answer to the question. How can man be just with God? How can he be clean? That's born
of a woman. If you will. Wait a minute, I
thought it was up to the will of man. You thought wrong. It's
up to the will of the Lord Jesus. If you will, you can make me
clean. And Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand, and touched him, and said unto him, I will. That's how a man can be clean
that's born of a woman. A sinner can be clean before
God. Be thou clean. And as soon as he had spoken,
immediately the leprosy departed from him. and he was cleansed. Salvation is not up to the will
of man and it's not something you do. It's something he does. John said in Revelation 1-5 unto
him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. He can say with power and with
authority be thou clean because he did something about it. Because
of his precious sin atoning blood Whoever he wants to be clean
is clean. Whoever he shed that blood for
is clean. And hath made us kings and priests
under our God, to him be glory. Are we glorifying the one by
whose will and precious blood sinners are made clean? Well,
I don't want to glorify anybody else, do you? We are defiled
by nature. We must be clean. We cannot clean
ourselves. This is 1 plus 1 plus 1. You're defiled. You must be clean. You've got to be clean. You're
not ever going to see God or enter into his kingdom the way
you are. You can't clean yourself. Only Christ can cleanse a sinner. Lord, if you will. Simple, clear,
plain, the simplicity that's in Christ. Lord if you will,
God be merciful. That's how you're gonna be clean.
That's how you're gonna go down to your house today with no sin.
God be merciful, be propitious to me on the mercy seat. May
the blood, I pray that the blood is atoned for me. May there be
atonement. for my sin by that precious blood
upon the mercy seat. No sin. He went down to his house
justified, clean. He washed the sinners clean in
his precious blood. Our Lord said in verse 40, you're
a fool if you give attention to the outside and think you
can hide the inside. That's what he's saying there.
He said, didn't I? I made the outside of the cup and I made
the inside of the cup. I know what you are on the outside
and the inside and you've completely ignored the inside. You're trying
to make clean the outside. The Lord made both. You can't
hide from him. You can't fool him. Cleaning
the outside of the cup ain't gonna cut it. He made the inside
and he knows all about it and only he can clean it. You must
do business with him. If we say that we have no sin,
1 John 1.8, we deceive ourselves. And the truth is not in us. If
we confess our sins, if we say, God be merciful to me, I'm a
sinner. He is faithful and just to forgive
us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That's
why that man went down to his house clean Because he said,
God, I'm a sinner. I need your mercy. Would you
have mercy on me? I will. Be thou clean. That's how a sinner is saved.
In verse 41, it makes reference to what we read in Matthew 19.
Let's look at it again. I want us to understand this.
We've seen the heart of the message. It's about cleaning the outside
of the cup. And not the inside. And look,
you can't even clean the outside. He thought he had. He could fool
himself to that extent. People can say, well, I'm going
to turn over a new leaf and I'm going to start doing this and
I'm going to quit doing that. And now I'm clean. They at least
think they've cleaned the outside. But that ain't even clean. You're
still committing sin left and right. On the outside, much less
the inside. But boy, the Pharisees were offended.
You know why? At his teaching? Because even
a complete idiot knows I can't change the inside. We have that
much understanding by nature, but we don't believe that that's
necessary. We're that foolish. He made it clear to them that
it's the inside that must change. It's the heart that's evil. That
they must have a new heart. Look at verse 41. But rather
give alms of such things as you have, And behold, all things
are clean. Now this makes reference to what
we read there in chapter 15 of Matthew, where the Pharisees,
you know, they said to their mom and dad, I can't take care
of you because of this money, you know, is dedicated to the
service of God. When God is the one that said,
take care of your mom and dad, honor them, take care of them.
And so he's saying here, in other words, don't make the word of
God void by your traditions. Give alms of what you have now. Don't be looking to the future
or to the past. God has blessed you. God has
made clear what his will is. Act on it. Don't be a hypocrite. Don't change what God said by
your foolish tradition. And then he said this, and behold,
eat what you want. Everything's clean to you. It's
not about that. Honor God and eat what you want. That's the message of the gospel.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and then do what you want. Salvation is not by you doing
or not doing. But when God saves you, He changes
your want to, doesn't He? I don't want to dishonor Him
anymore. I don't want to change His Word. I don't want to manipulate
the Word of God. Paul said we preach without the
wisdom of man's word, without deceitfulness, without treachery,
honestly. That's the grace of God. So,
don't get caught up on unimportant stuff, religious things that don't matter. Look, I believe you ought to
dress nice when you come to the worship. It's the public worship
of God. But don't get caught up on, well,
I gotta, you know. Don't worry about it. Look, we come here
to worship Him. The disciples, I suspect, we
dress better than them on our worst day. You reckon? It's not about that. That's relative
and is in the eye of the beholder kind of anyway, doesn't it? Behold Honor him and eat what
you want. That's what he's saying to everything's
clean to you just Don't get caught up on the unimportant stuff and
neglect the weightier matters of the law He said that listen
in Matthew 23 23 1 to you scribes and Pharisees hypocrites you
pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin and have omitted the weightier
matters of the law and What are they? Judgment, mercy, and faith. All the things we've been talking
about today. Judgment, mercy, and faith. That's
what we need to be concerned about. We need mercy because
we're not going to be able to clean. The judgment of God is
upon us by nature. We're not going to be able to
change that, but he can. He can change us. He can give
us a new heart. He can give us faith in His Son. He can give
us life. You have He quickened which were dead. If Christ is not your righteousness,
you can never be righteous. You can't make yourself clean,
inside or out. But if Christ is your righteousness,
you are righteous. Well, that goes without saying,
Chris. Think about that, though. If
Christ is your righteousness, you're not going to mess that
up. Well, Christ is your righteousness,
but you've got to, you know, then Christ is not your righteousness.
He either is or he ain't. If he is your righteousness,
you are righteous before God, period. And we do what we do by his grace
because we love him. We also are going to do a lot
of what we do because we're wretched, vile sinners. But Christ is our righteousness. And now go act like it. Go act
like it. You're not righteous because
of how you act. Christ is your righteousness.
But if he has made you clean with his own precious blood,
then because you love him, keep his commandments. He said, if
you love me, keep my commandments. Not if you wanna go to heaven,
keep my commandments. If you love me. Do we? I can answer that this way. If he loves you, you love him.
If he first loved you, then you love him now. And he says to
you, do what I said. Do what I said. May God give
us understanding in grace this morning.