Let's turn to Matthew chapter
5. It's good to have you with us, Brother
John. I was pleased when I heard you were coming back up this
way. Thank you. In the context of this passage,
The Lord is teaching that he did not come to destroy the law
as he was being charged, but he came to fulfill the law and
the prophets. Read with me Matthew 5, verse
17. Think not that I am come to destroy
the law or the prophets. I came not to destroy, but to
fulfill. He came to fulfill the law and
the prophets. Some people teach that he's saying
here that he has not destroyed the law, the law's still in effect
for every believer. Well, if that's so, then you
have to also keep the prophets. Because he said here, I came
to fulfill the law and the prophets. He said, for verily I say unto
you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot, one dotting of the I,
one tittle, one crossing of the T, shall in no wise pass from
the law till all be fulfilled. Till all is filled absolutely
full. I've given you the illustration.
I'll give it again. That cup's not full. When that
cup is filled full, when it's fulfilled, you won't be able
to put another drop in it. That's what Christ did to the
law and to the prophets. He filled it so full, you and
I can't put another drop in it. Not another drop. There's not
even an eye to be dotted. All right? Now, read on. Whosoever
therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and
shall teach men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of
heaven." That's what all men are doing that are teaching men
to go back to Mount Sinai and keep the law. They're not doing
it. They're breaking it and they're
teaching others to break it. But whosoever shall do, who did
it? He just told us. Christ did it. He came to fulfill it. He did
it. Who's teaching? Whoever shall do and teach. Who's
teaching it? Who's teaching it right here
in this mountain in our text? Christ is. Christ is the doer
of the law and He's the teacher of it. The same shall be called
great in the kingdom of heaven. And He is the great one in the
kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you that except
your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes
and pharisees, you shall in no case enter into the kingdom of
God." The scribes and the pharisees were the most outwardly righteous
folks that walked the face of the earth. If you and I, you
and I would be scared to death to be around them. These folks
were so sticklers about the law that you would have said, I'm
embarrassed to even be around them. I'm fearful to even be
around them. Christ said that's not good enough.
That's not good enough. He's saying that He alone is
the righteousness we must have. Now here's what I want you to
learn from our text today. Christ alone is the teacher of
the law. Christ alone is the end of the
law. And Christ alone is the righteousness
God has provided for His people. Now first of all, Christ is the
teacher of the law. Verse 21. Christ says here, You
have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt
not kill. And whosoever shalt kill shall
be in danger of the judgment. But I say unto you..." Now he's
teaching us something. "...but I say unto you that whosoever
is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of
the judgment." He went deeper with this law, didn't he? Whosoever
shall be angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger
of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his
brother Rekha, that word is stupid, he shall be in danger of the
council. And the word council here means the Sanhedrin. That
means the council of men. If these righteous scribes and
Pharisees heard you call a man stupid, they'd bring you up before
the church. for their counsels, and they would discipline you
for doing such a thing, because in their eyes you broke the law. Christ says, but whosoever shall
say thou fool, thou moron, shall be in danger, not of counsels
of men, but of hellfire. You see, natural religious man
teaches, tries to teach the law. Paul said they are vain jangling,
teaching, trying to be teachers of the law, neither knowing what
they say or whereof they affirm. That's what the scribes and Pharisees
were doing. They were teachers of the law. They were teaching
sinners to keep the law in the letter. In the letter. Verse 21, he said, You've heard
it was said of them the old time, Thou shalt not kill, and whosoever
shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. The Pharisees
thought Thou shalt not kill meant murder only. the letter of the
law, murder only. And so they interpreted the law
of God as only the physical, only the outward act of murder.
And there was only, and that was the only way that it could
be made to appear that they kept the law. That was the only way
that others might think it was possible for them to keep the
law. And that was the only way they could enforce the law. Do
you get that? The only way a man can think
he can enforce the law is by just the letter, just by the
outward. That's the only way. You have
to make it to be just the letter in order for you to be an enforcer
of the law or a keeper of the law. You have to make it all
to be just outward in the letter because you can't see a man's
heart and I can't either. I can't enforce that. I don't
know what you're thinking. So I have to make it just in
the letter if I'm going to make it look like I'm keeping it or
that to teach who it's possible for you to keep it. And if we're
going to set up a council in the church to discipline folks,
we can only be looking at the law in the letter because that's
the only way you can enforce it. Outward. And so they compelled men to
obey by making them fearful of their councils and their judgment.
And so everybody that called themselves a member of this church,
the Pharisee, they tried their best to look outwardly righteous
before the law. They were scared to death if
they didn't. They were scared to death they'd be called into
the councils. It was a religion of mercenary reward and servile
threats. And that's what most religion
is. Most religion is, you've got to do these works. If you
do them, you'll get a reward. You've earned them. If you don't
do them, you'll get a whipping. We'll bring you before our councils.
And so that's some substance of most religion is that. And
what a pitiful, worthless religion that is. To serve mercenarily
for rewards, trying to indebt God to you, and at the same time
out of a fear that men are going to find out what you really are
and whip you. That's a ridiculous, absurd bondage
that I pray God will bring you out from under. If that's where
you are, I pray God will bring you out of it. Christ alone is
the one who can teach the law and truly teach the law. He said,
verse 22, I say unto you, but I say unto you, that's what men
teach you and here's what I say to you. Whosoever is angry with
his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.
And whoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger, not of men's
counsels, but of hell fire." Now, Christ has gone up right
now into Mount Zion. We saw that this morning, the
resurrection. He's gone up now into heavenly
Mount Zion. That's what earthly Mount Zion
pictured. Heavenly Mount Zion, where Christ sits at God's right
hand. You know where he was while he was doing this, while he was
teaching this? He went up into a mount. An earthly mount. But he was picturing that resurrection
to that heavenly mount. You know what he did there? He
gathered his disciples to him. You know what he's doing right
now? He's gathered his disciples to him. Here we are. There they
are in other places around the world. He's gathered them up. And you know what He's doing?
He's teaching them the truth of the Law. You know what He's
doing to us right now? He's teaching us the truth of
the Law in our hearts. And He will do it effectually.
He will really teach you what the Law says about you. Now,
it says in Isaiah 2, 2, just to back up what I just said,
it says, It shall come to pass in the last days. The last days
started when Christ came to this world. God hath in these last
days spoken to us by His Son. And it shall come to pass in
these last days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be
established in the top of the mountains, that's where Christ
is seated, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations
shall flow unto it. All his people out of all nations
shall come together to hear what Christ says from heavenly Mount
Zion as his gospel goes forth in his churches. That's what's
happening right now. That's what we have pictured
in our text. Now, you remember Saul of Tarsus. He was a natural
man, a religious man. He was a Pharisee of the Pharisees.
He thought he had kept this law. He said, it's touching the law.
I was blameless. And so he's going about now,
and all these folks who are saying Christ is the end of the law,
Christ fulfilled the law. He said, I hate that. They're
stripping me of everything I've ever held to and done and everything
I've tried to indebt God by. So I've got to put an end to
that. So he was going to try to kill these people, have them
put in jail, sentenced to death and killed and shut out this
gospel because he didn't want to preach that Christ is the
end of the law. He did not want that preached.
And on the road to Damascus, Christ from the heavenly mountain
spoke to this little man in his heart and he spoke effectually
And when he did, he taught him what the law said about him.
And Paul said in Romans 7, and when the commandment came, when
Christ taught me what the law really says to me, sin revived
in me. I saw my sin for the first time
and everything I thought was life died. It all died. That'll be The only time you
cast your care on the Lord when He does that. But the Lord Jesus
effectually teaches His redeemed children. Those He's bought by
His blood, He will effectually get the job done teaching you
in the heart what the law says about you. Every one of them. And what He teaches us is the
law is not only outward. The law reaches to the thoughts
and intents of your heart. The law reaches to your very
nature, which you are by virtue of being born of Adam's corrupt
seed, being conceived in your mother's womb by a corrupt seed. You came forth as soon as you
were born speaking lies. It came out of a corrupt heart.
You didn't have to sin to become a sinner. You sin because you
are a sinner. born a sinner, conceived a sinner,
came forth a sinner. Christ has to make you understand
that and believe that. And He teaches you that whosoever
is angry without a cause is guilty of murder. Now, again, religious
men take that and they do just the opposite. Religion always
does the opposite of Christ. Always. Religion takes this and
says, now Christ is saying here He didn't destroy the law, it's
still in effect. And what He's saying here is the law is not
just outward, it reaches to the heart. So it's even way broader
than it ought to be. So you got a lot more to fulfill
yourself. That's what religion teaches
you. If Christ was teaching that, if that's what He was teaching,
He was teaching then that righteousness comes by your obedience. That's
just the opposite of what He taught. That's the opposite of
why He came. That's not what He was teaching
at all. He was teaching you, you're guilty. You're guilty. And all those Pharisees that
look like they can make their boast that they're keeping low,
they're guilty. That's what He was teaching.
But the way you're going to hear that and believe that and say,
yes, it's so, is when he teaches you this in your heart. You're
guilty. That's the only way. Because
the Lord doesn't see as man sees. For man looks on the outward
appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart. 1 Samuel 16, 7. The Lord looks on the heart.
The Lord knows what you're thinking right now. Sarah, drop that lipstick
right there. And there was enough sin in your
thought that went through your thought, just sin, sent you to
hell. Pious thoughts went through your head. How dare she drop
that? It's okay, sir, you can pick it up. I didn't mean to
embarrass you. But I'm telling you, that's so. Thoughts, sins
in the thoughts of your heart, and God knows every one of them.
We're not getting anything by God. We can get stuff by mama
and daddy. We can get things over on the
preacher. We can get things over on our
neighbor and all that. Not with God. Not with God. Behold, thou desires truth in
the inward parts, David said. In the inward parts. The Lord
Jesus teaches His redeemed that we're not in danger of merely
the counsels of men. We're in danger of the judgment
of God. If it was just men, I'd have
made my shade. I can fool men. I can put a big
old blanket over my TV on Sunday and make folks think I don't
watch it. I can just watch it after they leave. I can hide
my bad books when they come in and try to examine the bookshelves
and just have them somewhere else. I know all the tricks of
the trade. I'm a natural born sinner and
I've got good at it. I don't let you see my sin. I
can hide it. I can't hide it from God though.
You can't hide yours from God either. But the Lord makes you
know the truth about yourself. He makes you to know What you
are, he shuts your mouth, he declares you guilty before God.
In other words, the Lord takes the law. See, if you just have
the law and I preach the law, it's not going to do you any
good. But Christ has to take the law. And Christ has to make
you, teach you that the law says to you, you're guilty. And shut
our mouths and make it so that we cannot have anything in our
hands anymore claiming we've pleased God. He's going to have
to make that effectual and teach you that. by using His law to
do it. It's Christ who teaches us everything.
That's why He's called the Prophet. He's the Teacher. He's the Good
Shepherd. He's the Pastor. That's what
the word means. He's the Pastor. He's the Shepherd.
And He teaches His people. He's the Bishop of our souls. And He teaches us. The law was
given by Moses. That's all. It was just given
by Moses. Grace and truth comes by the Lord Jesus Christ. He
comes in grace and teaches you the truth. In all aspects of
law and of grace and of mercy, He teaches you the truth by grace. Now listen, that's first that
Christ is the teacher. Now secondly, Christ is the end
to whom the law is used to bring His redeemed trial. He teaches
you what the law says, and then He's the end to whom He brings
you, using that law. All right? Verse 23. Therefore
if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest
that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before
the altar, and go thy way. First be reconciled to thy brother,
and then come and offer thy gift." Now the Lord is using the ceremonial
law here because He had not yet gone to the cross and put an
end to the ceremonial law. So He's using it because this
was the way to worship at that time that He was there. But for
one who is a Pharisee, A person who was a Pharisee, it was these
kinds of acts in religion, self-righteous, self-sanctifying acts that he
was doing that he put his confidence in. See, he goes out during the
week and he cheats somebody or does something like that, and
so he's got to make up for that. And so he comes to, we'll put
it in our terms today, he comes to church on Sunday. And that's
an offering to God to make up for that. And he sings loud to
make up for that. And he reads the Scripture, good
Scripture, to make up for that. And maybe he preaches to make
up for that. Or he says, Amen, Amen, Amen
to make up for that. And best of all, he picks out
the sin of somebody else and sits on a council to say, now
you shouldn't be doing that. We're going to have to bring
you up on church watch now and watch you for six or seven months
before we can let you get back into our fellowship. And see,
by all this religious work, then he goes out and he may go visit
somebody's house, take them a pie, or he may go over and he may
help poor old Miss So-and-so with something, and go over here
and check this one out and that one out, make sure they're living
right. And all these religious works are gifts he's bringing
to God to try to make up for his own action. I'll tell you
who's the loudest, most critical, most make-your-life-miserable,
is the Pharisee. It's the Pharisee. When he shows
up, he's going to criticize everything and show you what you're doing
wrong and this and that and the other. You know why he's doing
it? That telltale heart's got him and he's trying to make up
for it. That's why. Trying to make up for it. But
Christ teaches you that it's not your sacrificing that's the
end of the law. That's just tangling you up more
and more in guilt and rebellion against God. He says, stop it. Leave it off. Stop doing it. You mean you tell somebody to
quit making great sacrifices for God? Stop it. That's what he says. Stop it.
See, before you know true religion, you're going to have to have
what you thought you knew made into nothing. You're going to
have to unlearn what you thought you knew before you can really
be taught the truth. And so he stops you. Dead in
your tracks shows you all your religion's vanity, all your offerings,
all your gifts is vanity. And then Christ teaches His redeemed
to remember that brother that has something against Him. He'll
teach us to remember the brother that's got all against us, that
brother who we've murdered, that brother who we've been angry
against without a cause, who we've killed. Verse 23, He says,
there at that altar you remember your brother that hath offered
all against thee. Now this remembering is not going
to come just because you just happen, you just think it up
yourself. This remembering that we're talking
about here is going to come by the Spirit of God, by Christ
sending the Holy Spirit into your heart to bring us up and
just prick you in your conscience and make you know you've sinned
against this brother. It's this brother you've sinned
against. This is of God. This is of the
Holy Spirit that's going to do this. Else you'd get the glory
for remembering. God makes His child. He says,
this doing remembrance of Me, He's going to make you remember.
He's going to make you remember the brother you've sinned against,
the brother you're murdering. And who is the brother that has
ought against thee? Can you think of any brother, any man, any sinner, that you
could be angry against, that there wouldn't be some little
cause that you could be angry against them? If you've got angry
at me, I can tell you whatever it is, there's a cause. There's a cause. There's one
that there is no cause. There is no cause. The sinner
who's attempting to come to God by his obedience has offended
Christ Jesus the Lord, the firstborn brother among many brethren.
He is angry with Christ in his heart without a cause. He's a
murderer of Christ Jesus in his heart and the Lord Jesus Christ
has ought against him. And he's the judge, he says here,
who can deliver him to the officer and lock him away forever. That's
Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Son
of God, why is this such an offense to God? Why is it an offense?
You know, men don't... natural mind can't conceive of
this. Why would it be an offense for me to want to go to the law
and try to keep the law and teach other people to keep the law?
Well, if the heart's right and the motive's right, and it's
out of a love for God, there's nothing wrong with it. Where
it becomes evil is when others tell you that, for instance,
they say the Sabbath day is not a literal day. It's Christ, the
Sabbath. He's the rest we enter into. And the person gets angry
with you and calls you a heretic because you're saying, I'm not
observing a day anymore. I'm resting in Christ. He's my
Sabbath. And then they say, well, you can't have fellowship with
us then. What they're saying is that if you don't observe
that day, you can't be saved. They're making that out to be
a requirement. Now it's evil. Now you've turned
the law into a necessity. Why is that such an offense to
Christ? Turn to Romans 8. I'll show you
why. Romans 8. Here's why it's an offense. Romans
chapter 8. Here's why it's anger and murder
against Christ right here. Romans 8.3. in that it was weak through the
flesh." In other words, what you could not do because your
sinful flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful
flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. That the righteousness
of the law might be filled full in us who walk not after the
flesh but after the Spirit. The righteousness of the law
requires holiness of nature and it requires righteousness indeed
throughout the life, throughout and death, and it promises death
for all who disobey it. You've got to be holy in your
heart and you've got to walk righteously before the law all
your life or you will die. Well, Christ is that holiness
of heart. He walked this earth with a holy
heart. He is holiness. He is the sanctifier. He is sanctification. He walked
with a heart set on God in perfection all His days. And He is the one
who did nothing but righteousness all His days. Then went to the
cross and was made sin for His people and justified His people
bearing the penalty of the law on our behalf. And when He's
formed in the heart, that's when a man is made holy. Christ is
the holiness formed in His people. He is the new man in His child. The new spirit is the spirit
of Christ in you. And when He's put in you, you're
holy. And to say you're holy by your
works or by your deeds or by your law keeping is to count
Christ's vanity. And Christ is the righteousness
for His people by what He's done for His people. And to say now
that you've got to add something to it is to count Christ vanity. Let me show you that. Go to Galatians
chapter 2. And none of that thinking and
none of that doing is of Christ. He did not teach that to a man.
You say, well, couldn't He just have fallen into error? Christ
didn't teach Him that. The man came up with that on
his own. Look here, I'll show you. I've showed you this recently,
but I want you to see it again. Galatians 2.16, knowing that
a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the
faith of Jesus Christ, by Christ alone, by His work, by His doing,
by His dying. Even we have believed in Jesus
Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, by His
doing. And not by the works of the law,
for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. You won't
be justified as being righteous or holy by your works of the
law. Now watch this. But if while
we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners. If while we're claiming we're
made righteous and holy by Christ, we're found to commit the sin
of turning from Christ and going back to the law to add something
to what Christ did. Look at this. Is therefore Christ
the minister of that sin? Did Christ produce that? God
forbid. No, sir. That wasn't of God.
That wasn't of Christ. Look, for if I build again the
things which I destroyed, if I go back to the law, I've made
myself a transgressor. I did it. Not Christ. For I,
through the law, am dead to the law that I might live unto God.
Christ took the law out of the way for his people, nailed it
to his cross, so that now we can actually live unto God. and
not to men, cavilling and bowing and scraping to please men, and
be applauded by men." We can actually live to God. How? Look,
verse 20, I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live,
yet not I, I can't even boast of any holiness in me. What is
it? How are you living then? It's
Christ that lives in me, And the life which I now live in
the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. I live by
His doing. I live by His power. I live by
Him moving me and working in me and doing His good pleasure
in me. The same One who loved me and gave Himself for me is
working in me to do that. There's my holiness and my righteousness,
Christ. Now what is it if I frustrate
that and go back to the law? Why is that such sin? I do not
frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness come by the
law, then Christ is dead in vain. You see what I'm doing when I
claim I've got this high regard for the law, and I'm going back
to the law just because I want to honor the law, but in reality
what I'm really doing is thinking I have to keep it to be saved.
What I'm doing there is I'm saying Christ is not enough. I'm angry,
I'm full of enmity against Christ in my heart, and I'm crucifying
Him all over again. I'm killing Christ. I'm doing
just what He said we're guilty of in our text. Christ has to
teach us that. Christ has to teach us. He has
to come to you in your heart and teach you, I'm the brother
that's got all against you. And what I've got against you
is you're trying to fulfill a law that I was sent to fulfill. You're
trying to perfect holiness that I was sent to perfect. You're
trying to get the glory that I was sent to have. And I've
got all against you. I'll tell you what will happen
when He makes you to know that. He says there, you've been going
around saying thou fool to everybody else. The preaching of the cross
is to you that perish foolishness. You've been making me a liar.
You've been going around saying that you don't believe me and
making me a liar by going back and looking at your gifts you're
bringing and all your works you're doing and all your law keeping
that you're doing. You've been doing all this and
calling me a liar. When He makes you to see that,
He says, like He said to the Pharisee, I know that you're
Abraham's seed, but you seek to kill Me because My Word has
no place in you. If you were Abraham's children,
you'd do the work of Abraham, but you seek to kill Me, a man
that told you the truth that I heard of God. If we're not His, He'll say,
you're doing the deeds of your father, the devil. He was a murderer
from the beginning, and the truth of Bo not in him. You're just
doing what he did. But if we're his, and he makes that commandment
come, and he makes us hear that we're guilty and makes us die,
you know what's going to happen then? He said, when that voice
speaks, he said, and the light comes on, he said, you're going
to look at all those works of your hands. And it's going to
be like you're holding nothing but menstrual cloths in your
hands and you're going to say, get away from me. I'm sick of
that. I don't want anything to do with
that anymore. I count it all lost for the excellency
of Christ. It's nothing but dung. I want
to win Christ and be found in Him, not having any work whatsoever
that's of my hands, not anything that's by my hands according
to the law, but that righteousness which is by the faithfulness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to have Him as my sanctifier
and my sanctification, giving me this new heart to rest only
in Him. And I want to have Him as all
my righteousness for what He's done for me. I don't want to
do a thing myself. I want to come to God saying,
God, thank you for sending your Son. Thank you for sending Him
to redeem me. Thank you for sending Him to
work out a righteousness for me. I'd have never been saved
unless you had grace upon me. I want to give Him the glory.
Do you want Him to have the glory? That's what's going to happen
when Christ makes His law, makes you hear this law, and makes
you know He's the brother that's got all against you. And He's
going to say to you then, He's going to say now, stop your sacrificing. Now let me make a point here
before I go further. In the Old Testament, folks were
told they had to keep the law to be justified. That's what
the liars taught in that day. Let me tell you what the liars
are teaching in our day. You've got to keep the law to
be sanctified. It's the same lie. It's the same
lie. It's the same lie. And they do
it by dividing. Well, Christ is the interlaw
for righteousness, but not the interlaw for sanctification.
False religion is all about dividing. They want to divide doctrine.
They want to divide brethren. You got your clergy and your
laity. They want to divide everything. True religion is about union,
uniting. You can't separate righteousness
and holiness. It's all Christ. It's all Christ. You can't divide Him and His
people. We're one. We're one. And when He makes
you to hear this, you're going to cry out and say, Lord, what
must we do to be saved? I'm going to perish and I deserve
to perish. What must I do? And He'll speak
graciously into your heart and He'll say, agree with your adversary
quickly, right now while you're in the way with Him. You see,
I've been telling you, I told you Thursday night, now's the
time of salvation. Right now, you're still in the
way, on the way, on the way, and Christ is still, He's still
calling. His grace is being poured out
on His people right now. And He'll speak to you in your
heart and He'll say, now you agree with that brother you've offended
right now, quickly. And when He does that, you're
going to agree with Him. You'll go to him and you'll plead for
mercy, you'll plead for mercy, you'll agree with him. He says,
you agree with him, with your adversary. Christ says, in your
heart, your imaginations, your words, your deeds, they're all
against him. And he'll say now, agree with me. He'll say, you've
been going around saying I'm the fool. Christ will say, you've
been calling me the fool, calling me a liar. Christ will say to
you now, if you want to be really wise, you become the fool. And
then you'll be wise. And you'll agree with Him. Lord,
I'm the moron. That's what the word means. I'm
the moron. The godless moron. And once Christ has done that,
here's the last thing. Once He's brought you to His
feet to rest entirely in Him, He makes you worship in spirit
and in truth, and then the gifts you bring are the offerings of
sacrifice and praise from a heart of faith and love. He says there
in verse 24 in our text, at the very end, then come and offer
thy gift. Well, where do I come to? You
come to the altar. You come to the altar. I thought
you said we didn't worship like they did in the Old Testament.
We don't have an altar. We have an altar. Hebrews 10, 13, 10
says we have an altar. whereof they have no right to
eat which are still serving God after the letter of the law with
a literal altar and literal sacrifices and literal letter obedience. We don't, they don't have a right
to eat at this altar. This altar is Christ. Christ
is our altar. He is our access to God. You
couldn't come into that temple, you couldn't go into the Holy
of Holies until you went to the altar. Christ is our access to
God. And what happens is, is in Christ,
God says, I won't impute sin to my people. Just think about
that. God will not charge you with
sin. There's no sin. He said, I've cast them behind
my back. I've blotted them out. They're in the depths of the
sea. There's no sin to charge my people with. Christ put them
away. But there's so much sin in our flesh that when we try
to even come in here to worship God, sin's mixed with everything
we do. So that if it wasn't for Christ, we couldn't even worship
Him. But through Christ our altar, every voice of praise, every
thought of praise, everything that He's produced Himself is
cleansed and comes to God as perfect, holy, righteous worship
and praise and thanksgiving to Him. This is worshiping God in
spirit and in truth. It's all by Him. It's all of
Him. He said, what's greater, the sacrifice or the altar that
sanctifies the gift? That's what the altar was for.
Christ is that altar that sanctifies your gift. And that's why David
said, I'll wash my hands in innocence, compassing thine altar, O Lord,
that I'm published with the voice of thanksgiving, and tell of
all your wondrous works. My preaching, if I preach the
truth of Christ, telling nothing but the wondrous works of Christ,
there's so much sin mixed with it, God won't have it. But when
it comes into your heart by Christ, He's going to sanctify it, and
you're going to hear just what needs to be heard, and not all
my garbage that's mixed with it. and my sin is mixed with
it." You're going to hear the truth. How then do we love our
brethren? Well, the Pharisees show us this,
that whenever somebody is claiming to live by the law, they manifest
judgmental hatred of our Lord and judgmental hatred of their
brethren. You know how much God's preachers
put up with from God's saints? Why? Because I know how much
God has put up with me. You know what the best thing's
needful, what's most needful of all? To hear this gospel.
You know what religion will do for just the least little thing?
They'll keep you from hearing this gospel. They'll kick you
out so you can't hear it. We've got to cast out this devil.
That's what you need. You need the gospel. Paul, it
had to get to a serious, serious situation before Paul said, you're
going to have to cast that man out. And the only reason he was
cast out was because he was going to harm the rest of God's people
hearing the gospel. It got serious, serious. But
religion will cast a man out for nothing. That's judgmental
hatred of Christ and of brethren. But those who have given up all
hopes of law, righteousness, and fleshly holiness, who trust
Christ alone for righteousness and holiness, they are taught
by the grace that they experience to love one another, and to be
longsuffering with one another, and to be meek towards one another,
and to be self-controlling towards one another. Listen, the fruit
of the Spirit is love. joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness,
goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. That's all, that's toward your
brethren that He's going to make you, make work, create that fruit
in you. Brethren, we wouldn't need self-control
and we wouldn't need long-suffering if it wasn't for the fact that
you and me are still sinners. Would we? Why would we need that
fruit if it wasn't for the fact that my brother's going to need
me to be long-suffering with him? So God makes you long-suffering
with Him. Where do you get that? How do
you see that love? Where are you taught to bear
one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ? How
are you taught that? Whosoever hates his brother is
a murderer. And no murderer has eternal life
abiding in him. But hereby perceive we the love
of God. You that have eternal life abiding
in you, here's how we perceive the love of God. Because He laid
down His life for us. So we ought to lay down our life
for one another. When He makes you to behold what
He's done for you, how long-suffering He was to you, how He loved you,
how He was self-controlling towards you, how He was meek towards
you, all these things, He, by His grace, by His power, by working
in His child, will make His child, when it's needed, He'll make
His child do the same thing towards your stumbling brother. And you'll love your brother
the same way. You'll lay down your life being right. Me being right, that's not what's
important. My brother is what's important. Me having my way and thinking
my way is the best way, that's not what's right. Loving my brother
is what's right. I was thinking the other day
of things like the choices we're making over there to do on the
building. You could get upset about something like that and
about not having your way about that, about getting your way
about it. What's more important, getting
your way about the color of some curtains or the brother over
whom you're having your way as opposed to his way? Which one's
more important? That brother's more important. And that's what
He teaches you. It's... I can lay down my life. It's not... My life's... Bear one another's burdens. Love
one another. That's what He teaches you. But
it's only when He's taught you what this law says that you're
guilty. That's the only time you will be long-suffering when
you see in the light of how guilty you are how long-suffering God
was with you. And it's only when you've seen
how Christ has given His life and is the end of the lawful
righteousness that you will not take that brother back to the
law. You'll be long-suffering with it. The opposite of long-suffering
is to be a lawmonger. It's to bite and devour one another
using the law. That's the opposite of long-suffering.
And love, and meekness, and temperance. That's why there's no law against
it. The only way you're going to
rest and trust Christ to correct and discipline and instruct and
do it through His gospel is when you realize and have experienced
it yourself that that's how He does it. That's the only way.
I want to end now and I want to give you this. Before you
go today, be sure to get the bulletin. I sent it to you on
your computer, but I want you to read that article in the back
by Brother Maurice called, The Story of a Little Child. Let
me give it to you in my own words. because I experienced it myself.
I used to go to the farm with my grandfather, Curtis. My grandfather, Curtis, had this
big, big farm and he had cows and hauled hay and just did all
kinds of stuff. And I would go with him out there.
When I was six, seven years old, I put my boots on, you know,
and I had my big cowboy hat on and I'd go with him out there
to that farm. And I just, I wanted him to give
me something to do. Give me a job. Can I have a job
to do? I want to do something." And he'd give me some little
something that I could do, you know. Man, I'd go over there
and work at that. And all I had on my mind was,
I can't wait to see how he likes this. I can't wait to see how
he approves of this. And there'd be other men around
sometimes. I wasn't concerned with what they thought about
it. There was one person there that was my grandfather. What does he think about it? You see, when God has saved you
and Christ is everything to you, it's not about what men think
and getting their applause. what it's about. It's not about
being afraid of the law. It's not about being afraid of
judgment. It's not about being afraid of anything like that.
It's not about trying to get somebody indebted to you. It's
not about serving out of fear. It is Love has a fear of the
Lord and that admiration and that reverence and that longing
to please the Lord. That's the beginning of wisdom
because that's when you want to hear Him teach you and you
want to do what He's taught you and you do it not for any other
reason than that smile. That's it. That's what it is
to serve God and walk by faith constrained by His love rather
than law. It's the heart that's made to
love Him. Do you, men, do you have to have a set of rules upon
the wall and come in every day after work and say, now this
says I'm going to have to do this if I'm going to love my
wife. Okay, let me go do that. Well, I've got to do this if
I'm going to love my wife. Let me go do that. She ain't going to stay
with you very long, fellas, I can tell you that, if you've got
to have a law to make you love her. Love is the law. Love's what
makes you do what you do. And you don't have to have a
rule list to go by to know. Love just knows what to do. And
we're taught by Christ in the heart, led by the Spirit, so
that we walk after Him. And we just do what we do because
we want to. That's what Christ's teaching
all through this Sermon on the Mount. Don't listen to Pharisees
and what they teach you on that passage. They will take you right
back further, deeper in and out. They even make it more... They
tell you, you got more to do. You got to start now obeying
in the heart. Try it. How are you going to
control your dreams at night when you're sleeping? There's
a lot of sin that creeps up in your dreams. You're guilty. You're going to have to control
that too. That's the thoughts and attempts
of the heart. No, it's Christ. Christ is all. Amen.