All right, brethren, let's go
to Romans. I'm sorry. That's incorrect. Let's go to
Luke chapter 5. Luke chapter 5. I'm sorry, Matthew 9. Matthew
9. Verse 10 says, And it came to
pass, as Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans
and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples. And
when the Pharisees saw, they said unto his disciples, Why
eateth your master with publicans and sinners? But when Jesus heard,
he said unto them, They that behold need not a physician,
but they that are sick. But go and learn what that meaneth. I will have mercy and not sacrifice. For I am not come to call the
righteous, but sinners to repentance." Now you know the Lord had called
Matthew He was sitting at the receipt of customs and he was
a publican. He was a tax collector. He was
a thief because they were notoriously thieves. And the Lord walked
up to him and said, follow me. And that word came forth with
power and he arose believing the Lord and followed him. But
he wanted his friends to meet his Lord. That's what happens
when the Lord saves you. You want those that you're nearest
to, you want them to meet the Lord as well. So he made a feast
at his house and invited all his friends to come. And they
were publicans and sinners just like he was. self-righteous, holier than thou
Pharisees, they saw him sitting there, saw the Lord Jesus sitting
there with these publicans and these sinners and it appalled
them. They said, why does your master
eat with publicans and sinners? And our Lord made that statement
to them, very, very, very important statement. He said, they that
behold, need not a physician with they that are sick. He told
them, go, learn what that meaneth. Learn, do you know what this
means? He said, I will have mercy and not sacrifice. I'll save
by mercy. I'm not going to save those who
try to bring me a sacrifice, who try to bring God their works. I save by mercy, not sacrifice. I came not to call the righteous. My preacher, I thought there
was none righteous. There are none righteous. It
means I came not to call those who think they are righteous.
I came to call sinners to repentance. My title is a question. Are you sick? Are you sick? And I want to answer
that question by answering a few more questions. I prepared this
for our young people Friday night, and I just wanted to go back
to something very basic and answer some questions. And this is the
first question. What is sin? What is sin? I actually let the young people
talk a little Friday night. I asked them to give me some
answers, and I got several different answers on what is sin. And we tend to think sin is the
things we do in disobedience to God, and that's true. That
is sin. But sin is what we are. When we come into this world,
born of our father, conceived in our mother's womb, we are
sin. That's what we are. In Psalm
51.5, the psalmist said, Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and
in sin did my mother conceive me. That doesn't mean that his
mother was doing something sinful. It means by the very act of conception,
when he was conceived in the womb, that whole being that was
shapen and that grew in the womb, his whole being was sin, nothing
but sin. Romans 8, 7, I quote this often,
the carnal mind is enmity against God. It doesn't say our carnal
mind is at enmity against God. It says our mind is itself enmity. Our carnal mind is enmity, hates
the true and living God. Most people, when they hear the
gospel, it's evident that the heart, the carnal mind is enmity
against God because it infuriates a natural man. When you tell
him that God does the choosing and passes by whom he will, man
hates that. It stains his so-called dignity. He defends him. His pride won't
let him bow to that. He hates to hear that God has
the right to do with his own what he will. He thinks all men
ought to have a chance. And he hates it. Psalm 5 9 says,
Their inward part is very wickedness, their throat an open sepulcher. The very heart that we're born
with is itself wickedness. Wickedness. We were conceived
from Adam to his children, to their children, down to your
father and mine. And all we got from Adam was
a corrupt, defiled, spiritually dead nature. We didn't sin to
become sinners. You realize that? We did not
sin to become sinners. We came forth sinning because
we are sinners. You do not have to teach a sinner
to sin. You don't have to teach your
children to disobey you. We didn't have to be taught that. Look at Matthew 15, just to your
right there, and listen to this. Matthew 15, verse 11. They were,
again, the Pharisees were accusing the Lord's people of defiling
themselves because they didn't wash their hands before they
ate. Now this was a tradition of the Pharisees that if you
don't wash your hands before you eat, you're going to make
yourself unholy. That's going to defile you. Let's
know what the Lord said, verse 11. Not that which goeth into
the mouth defileth a man, But that which cometh out of the
mouth, that defileth a man. Look at verse 18. Those things
which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart. They come
from the nature. And they defile the man. For
out of the heart proceed evil thoughts. He's not even talking
about Acts here. He's talking about something
that happens before the acts committed. In all of this, he's
talking about evil thoughts. The evil thoughts of murder and
adultery and fornication and thefts, false witness, blasphemies. Those are the thoughts of a man.
Scripture says God is not in all his thoughts. What's in his
thoughts? Those things. Those are the things
which defile a man. but to eat with unwashing hands,
and defileth not a man." We're the defilement. We're the defilement. By nature, now listen carefully
to this, the only thing we can do is sin. The only thing we
can do is sin. That's all we do by nature is
sin. Now, you and I are judging by
our standard. And we're looking and we look
at somebody and say, well, that's a good man there. He always acts
real nice and he's kind and he's generous and all the different
things, you know, mothers look at their children, oh, he's such
a good boy. Well, by our standard, he might
be better than another boy. And that man might be better
than other men. that even the very best things
a man is doing, God says, if he's a natural man, unregenerated
sinner, God says, it's all sin. Even his very best deed. The
plowing of the wicked is sin. You think about that. You know,
You see a man out plowing his garden. Here's an old fellow,
maybe he's retired and he's out plowing his garden and he's not
hurting anybody. He's not doing anything but plowing
his garden. But if he's outside of Christ,
even plowing his garden is sin. We all are as an unclean thing,
and listen now, all our righteousnesses, our very best deeds we do are
filthy rags. Filthy rags. God saw that the
wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart, listen now, was only evil continually. You believe you're that bad?
You believe you're that bad? I can promise you this according
to God's Word. Outside of Christ, you're a whole
lot worse than you think you are. Me too. I promise you that. You think of all the evil in
the world. Men want to blame, they want
to blame inanimate objects for the evil. Well, we get rid of
that object, nobody kill anybody. We was killing each other with
rocks. You know, change that environment
and it will stop the sin. It's not the environment. The
wickedness doesn't come from the objects that are used. It's
not from drinking alcohol and what have you. Adam didn't have
any alcohol. Adam didn't have a gun. Adam
didn't have anything. And he sinned against God in
a perfect environment. Where does it come from? Every single wicked thing that's
ever happened on this earth started in the heart of a man. Started
in the heart of a man. Same heart you have by nature,
same heart I have by nature. And listen to this now, you may
be sitting there saying, well now my heart, I don't believe
my heart's that bad. I'll tell you why you feel that
way. Jeremiah 17, 9 says, the heart is deceitful above all
things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? You and I couldn't
know the sin of our heart. You wouldn't admit it and I wouldn't
either. Oh, we'd say something like, well, I'm a sinner. Yeah,
I know I'm not perfect. I'm not as bad as that fellow. But the heart is so deceitful
it won't let us admit. All I am is sin and all I can
do is sin. It takes God to make a man realize
that. It takes God, the Holy Spirit,
giving a new heart and causing you to see that the nature you're
born with is just wicked. Men will tell you, you hear men
in this world say, you know, it's kind of the common saying
of the world, follow your heart. You know what God says? He that
trusteth in his own heart is a fool. That's Proverbs 28, 26. He that trusteth in his own heart
is a fool. Our sinful heart makes us think
that if I get to this level here, in my career, I'm gonna be happy. I'm gonna be content. I'm gonna
have everything I need if I just get to this level right here
in my career. That's a deceitful heart, making
us think we can find happiness in a job or in riches or in popularity
or whatever it is. It's deceitful. Pleasures of
sin are for a season. Scripture says. Just a season.
So if a man follows his heart, you know what he's going to follow?
He's following after sin. And when he dies, it's all gone. Everything that he spent all
his life trying to accumulate and going after is gone. And then he has to face God.
then he has to face God. Men's hearts deceive them into
thinking men will get to a certain position and a certain level
of fame and a certain honors and rich and certain money and
they'll say what this church at Laodicea said. I'm rich and
increased in goods and I stand in need of nothing. And God says
in reality They're wretched and miserable and poor and blind
and naked. And one day, they'll find their
heart miserably deceived them. When the scriptures ask a believer
Remember in Romans 6, what pleasure or what fruit had you in those
things in which you're now ashamed? Ask any believer this. What fruit
did you really have in all that that you're now ashamed of? A
believer will tell you, none. I didn't have any fruit. I got
nothing good out of any of that. Nothing. Nothing good. No one's
immune to this disease either. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. What is it? What's the glory
of God? What does it mean when you sin and come short of the
glory of God? We have to be as He is. You have to be as righteous as
God is, as holy as God is. And we've sinned and come short
of that. All of us have. All of us have. We were all struck
with fear when we heard that Chloe had a disease. Didn't that strike fear in your
heart? It struck fear in my heart. Why does this not strike fear
in our heart like that did? This is a far worse disease. And every man, woman, and child
outside of Christ has got it. That other disease, bodily diseases,
will hurt your body. This is going to have an eternal
effect on the soul if God doesn't intervene. Now here's my second question.
Can we cure ourselves of sin? Can we cure ourselves of sin? I have given you this illustration
before, but you know if you take a rag and you have your bucket
of motor oil, let me say that so you all understand what I'm
saying. I say it like this. motor oil. You have some motor
oil and you dip a rag in that motor oil and totally immerse
it so that that rag is soaked in oil. And you take that rag
now by itself and start scrubbing on that rag. Can you get it clean? There is no way. You say that
would be foolish. That is what we are doing if we try to purify
ourselves and cleanse ourselves and make ourselves righteous.
That's what we're doing. Scripture says, who can bring
a clean thing out of an unclean thing? Not one. Not one. God is righteous and He requires
perfect obedience to His law. And He just gave one in the garden. Just one law in the garden. You ever notice this? I noticed
this this week when I was studying. Remember when Eve looked at the
tree that God forbid and she saw that it was a tree that was,
I forget the exact words, but it was good to look upon. Do
you remember whenever it says there in Genesis when God made
all the trees? It says all the trees were good
to look upon. Go read that. It says they were
all good to look upon. Why did that one look so good
when all the trees were beautiful to look upon? Because that's
the one God forbid. That's the one God forbid. And she took of that tree and
broke the law. Now brethren, since Adam broke
it, he's the head and we all broke God's law right there.
The law of ten commandments God gave, scripture says, was given
to show us how great that offense was. That's why God gave the
law, to show you how great that first offense was. The law entered
in that the offense might abound, that it might abound to those
to whom God gives eyes to see. And you see how offensive we
are to God. So I can't keep the law of God. You can't either. Even after
God gives you a new heart, you still have this nature with you
that's sinful and mixes sin with everything you do so that we
still can't keep God's law and perfection. The carnal mind is not subject
to the law of God, neither indeed can be, so then they that are
in the flesh cannot please God. God's holy law requires every
sinner must be condemned to death. Not only must we fulfill the
law in a positive way, but for every sin, we've got to die and
pay justice. And we can't satisfy justice.
That's why hell is eternal. We can't satisfy justice. God's holy. He requires the nature
to be holy. Not just legally before the law,
but the nature has to be holy. We can't make ourselves whole
or pure because we're just that oily rag. That's all we are.
Job said, if I wash myself with snow water, make my hands never
so clean, yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch, and my own clothes
will abhor me. My own clothes won't even want
to be near me, I'm so dirty. So the answer is, no, we can't
cure our sickness. Are you sick? Am I describing
you this morning by nature? If so, then understand this,
we can't cure ourselves. We can't cure ourselves. Well,
here's the next question. What's the one cure for sin?
There's only one. There's only one. It's the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's the great physician. He's
the great physician. When He said, the whole need
not a physician, He's talking about Himself. He's the physician.
He's the great physician. This disease of sin is incurable
except by the blood and righteousness of the Lord Jesus. He became His people. He became His people to represent
His people and give to God everything His people could not give to
God. His people were flesh. He was made of a woman. His people
were under the law. He was made under the law to
redeem them that were under the law. His people were sin, the
spotless Lamb of God presented Himself, and He who knew no sin,
He made Him sin, made Him sin who knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him. And when sin was
laid on Him, we were under the curse because of our sin, and
when sin was laid on Him, He was made a curse for us. and redeemed every one of his
people from the curse of the law. What does that mean to be
redeemed from the curse of the law? That means this legal issue
we have for his people, for those he represented, this legal issue
is taken care of. The law is satisfied. It's all
taken care of. It can't ever be undone. The
law can't ever be broken by one that He represented because He's
the only one God's looking to. God's not looking to those He
represented, whether they try to keep it or don't keep it.
He's not looking to them. He's looking to Christ. So now
there's one more thing that needs to take place. Remember, we've
got to have a pure nature. How are we going to get that?
Here we are so sick that we don't even know we're sick. We're so
diseased we can't even confess that all we are is a disease.
How are we going to be cured? The physician has to come. He
comes through this word and he implants this word in us just
like an antidote is given to a sick person and he gives us
the immunization. He comes in and he creates a
new spirit, a new heart within. He does an operation that only
He can do. He takes the stony heart and
He gives us a heart transplant. He gives us a new heart. Oh,
we still have that old heart, but He gives you a new heart.
He comes and He gives you eyes where you couldn't see before.
Now He gives you new eyes to see. He comes and He gives you
feet so you can run to Him. He makes you to see everything
He accomplished on the cross. And when He makes you see what
His blood has accomplished, that blood purges our conscience. He doesn't come and sprinkle
literal blood on your conscience. He does something even better
than that. He makes this Word to have a cleansing effect within
us. He makes it purge our conscience. Our conscience was just focused
on a bunch of dead works by our dead flesh and He purges us from
that so that we can think clearly now and spiritually. He purges you of those dead works.
Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician? Oh yes,
there is. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. He
forgiveth all thine iniquities, and in doing so healeth all thy
diseases. That's how our diseases are healed.
We're risen in Him in His right hand. He comes to us, we're dead,
and we're like Lazarus, and He says, Lazarus, come forth. And there's
life for the first time. And we live now. And we behold
Him. And we come to Him. And He puts
a confession on our lips. He brings you to come to Him.
You see Him now as He is. You see Him as God. You don't
see the Lord Jesus as a helpless victim or a little baby in a
manger. You see Him as God now. And you see yourself as a sinner.
And you come to Him now, when you're made willing by Him, the
way you come to Him is you come to Him like that leper saying,
Lord, if Thou will, You can make me clean. You come asking Him,
Lord, if You will, You can make me clean. And everyone that comes to Him
and asks that. from a new heart, every single
one that comes and asks that, he says what he said to that
leper, I will be thou clean. And he cleanses them. He cleanses
them. He applies that balm of Gilead. And when he finishes operating
on his child, you remember that man in Gadara that was possessed
with the demons? He was always in the graveyard,
living amongst the dead. That was you and me, living amongst
the dead. That's all we do here in this
world, live amongst the dead. He was living amongst the dead.
He was naked. That's us, naked before God. God sees through all our fig
leaf righteousness and every pretension of goodness and He
sees the thoughts and motives of the heart. We're naked before
God. and they put chains on him, and
they tried to bind him, but he always broke the chains. And they put chains on us. They
tried to yoke us with the law, and they tried to give us rules
and church traditions, and they tried to give us everything else
under the sun, and we just kept breaking them all, breaking them
all, breaking them all. He was crazy, this man was. His mind was just here and there
and everywhere, just like ours was, just from one thing to another,
just looking for this temporary pleasure of sin all the time. And when the Lord got through
operating on him, Scripture says, he was seated at Christ's feet,
clothed, and in his right mind. And that's what he does with
us. He sits us at his feet, clothes us in his righteousness, and
for the first time in our life, we're in our right mind. We see
things as they are. So I have one last question now.
If Christ is the one physician, and you're sick and he's the only cure. Why do
you not come to the physician? Why do you not flee to the physician? He said, they that are whole
need not a physician but they that are sick. Are you sick or
do you think you're whole? Are you sick or do you think
you're whole? I told the young people this Friday night, and
I'll say it again, if you can hear this and walk out not believing
on the Lord Jesus, not confessing Him in believer's baptism, not
giving yourself lock, stock and barrel to Him, if you can do
that, you know what you're saying? I'm whole. I don't need Him. I don't need Him. But if you're sick, if you're
sick, what did Ravi and Debbie do when they found out Chloe
was sick? What did they do? Will, this summer, Will, or maybe
a couple summers ago, I lose track of time, but Will was riding
his bicycle, and there was a sprocket on his bicycle, it didn't have
a cover on it, and his foot slipped off the pedal, and I mean just
cut the calf I mean laid it open and he comes in the house and
there's blood everywhere and I mean it looked nasty. What
did we do? We loaded him up fast as we could
and took him to the emergency room. We took him to the physician
as soon as we could. See if you're sick, that's what
you'll do. You know, churches advertising
and making all this promotion trying to get people to come
in and come in and come in and doing everything they can trying
to make it appealing to people. Why doesn't the emergency room
do that? Huh? Because people that are sick
don't have to be persuaded to go. They go. And people that
are sick come to Christ. Listen to the scripture now.
If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He's
faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. Are you a sinner who's so sick
that you can do nothing to make yourself clean? Then you qualify
to come to Christ. That's right. He said, I didn't
come to call the righteous, I came to call sinners. In that day there shall be a
fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants
of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness. Where's this fountain? There is a fountain filled with
blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins and sinners plunged beneath that
flood lose all their guilty stains. This is what Christ said in Isaiah
118. Come now, let us reason together,
saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet,
they shall be white as snow. Though they be red like crimson,
they shall be as wool. I don't have to give you an invitation.
I don't have to beg. I don't have to do anything because
I know this. If He makes you know you're sick, they tried to shut those fellows
up, quit, be quiet, be quiet, and they cried the louder. Lord
Jesus have mercy on me. Nobody will be able to stop you. You're going to bust by everybody
you have to bust by and you're going to get to Christ if you're
sick. Alright, let's stand together. Father, we thank you for this
word. We thank you for Christ, the great physician. Thank you,
Lord, that you make your people completely whole. Lord, make some sinners today. We ask you to make some sinners
today. Make them know they're sinners. That's our prayer. We pray you'll
show some sinners today their sin. and make them flee to Christ. It's in His precious name we
ask this. Amen.