Turn with me to 1 Peter chapter
1. 1 Peter chapter 1. Whenever a sinner is sanctified
by the Holy Spirit, he's brought into submission to God by being
brought into submission to Christ. When the Spirit of God purges
the conscience, the soul is purified from the
dead religious works by which we thought we could make ourselves
holy. and from the dead religious works
by which we thought we could make others holy. We're made holy from that because
that's unholy. The peaceable fruit that's yielded
within a sinner by the Lord's chastening hand, is that the believer is brought
to be made a partaker of His holiness, of Christ's holiness. By God's sanctifying power, When
the Lord sanctifies us out of our former way into Christ Jesus, we behold Him who is our perfection
of holiness. Our souls are purified. We behold
the way, the truth, and the life. And we are in the way, the truth
and the life. And He keeps us in the way, the
truth and the life. Kept by the power of God through
faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed. You see, it's all
ready. And He chose who He prepared
it for. And He, by His blood, prepared
it. And He's not going to have anybody
for whom He prepared it, not to enjoy it. It's just not going
to happen. And when the believer experiences
this power, when we experience this power, this is the power
the world's denying. When we experience this power,
we're made a partaker of the divine nature. Being made a partaker
of His holiness is to be made a partaker of His divine nature. What does that mean? What does
that mean? It means the Spirit of Christ
is in us. And it means that the Spirit
which delights to do things in submission to how it pleases
God to do them. How does it please God to save
sinners? God's way is for us to bear witness to the truth
that by Christ's one offering, He hath perfected forever them
that are sanctified. I've read everything I could
find in the past five years about holiness and sanctification.
And when men are talking about justification, they will talk
all about Christ. And when they start talking about
holiness and sanctification, you can read three or four pages
at a lick and not see even a mention of Christ. Christ is the believer's holiness. And anybody who hasn't been brought
from their former vain way into Christ who is the way of holiness,
they hadn't been made holy. Hadn't been made holy. And it
will be evident because men won't submit to anybody. Won't submit to anybody. How
do you account for people being so religious and so zealous in
religion? Well, Esau When his father said,
bring me some venison that I might give you the blessing, Esau did
that. He went out and hunted down a
deer for his father. You know why he did it? Because
he liked to hunt. But when his father said, don't
marry that whore, that heathen woman, who serves not our God,
He did it anyway. You know why? Because in His
heart, He hated His Father and He would not submit to Him. Why
is it then that men will hang on to all kinds of religious,
read the Scriptures, learn all kinds of religious facts, and
do all kinds of religious activities? But when God says, cease trying
to make men holy by your works, and stop trying to make yourself
holy by your works, and trust My Son, why won't they stop doing
everything and do that? because they manifest in their
heart, I hate God and I will not have Him to reign over me. That's right. But through this Gospel, the
glory that belongs to Christ because of what He has suffered,
And because He's now entered into His glory through this gospel,
by that very glory, with that very soul-sanctifying blood of
His, He enters in and He washes His children by the water of
this Word. Because it's the glory that's
His to do it. And therefore, the believer towards
our brethren and towards sinners who are yet without Christ, With
this new submissive spirit, as we are led of the Spirit of God,
we follow God's way, how it pleases God. And we repent from our former
ignorance. We have repented from it, from
that former way. And if we haven't, we haven't
repented of sin. That's right. Repented from our
former ignorance, our former vain way of trying to chasten
men into obedience by our power. That's how we thought we got
to be holy too. And as much as we may be offended,
as we walk in this way and do what God has said, Christ said,
give, shaken down, overflowing. That's how we give this Gospel
and the Word of Truth. Not in half measures, not watered
down, not a half basket full, a full measure. A full measure. And this is why you're going
to be persecuted. But as you're persecuted, the believer, though
we're often wearied and our hands become heavy and our knees become
feeble, This Lord who is our holiness and our justification
will not suffer us to be turned away from Him who is our holiness,
but will chasten us that we might be partakers of His holiness
and strengthen us in that new man so that we can continue in
His way, in that way which pleases Him. By holding forth the Word
of Life in the midst of a world that hates the truth of the Gospel.
And as much as possible, we endure those who are contending with
God by contending with us. And that's what's happening.
And we endure it as peaceably as we can. And we stay in this
way that God has put us into and has commanded us to follow
Him in because we know by experience, by what we've experienced ourselves,
by His power, that Without him bringing us into this way of
holiness and bringing another sinner out of that false way
and bringing him into this way of holiness, without him doing
that, no sinner is going to see God. It's going to be done by
Him. We know that by experience. We
believe that through faith. And we know it stated plainly
because God's given us eyes to behold Him and to hear Him. And
we see it stated plainly in His Word. And that's exactly what
Hebrews 12, 14 says, follow peace with all and holiness without which no
man shall see the Lord. That's right. We know by experience, by His
abundant mercy and power that except God worked this work of
separating sinners from the vanity of His mind into Christ the way
of holiness, man simply will not see God. Can't do it. He'll go on with His platform and His focus
being the yoke of man's flesh and power. The message of 1 Peter is this
message. Continue in the way God's put
you in and trust He's going to do the work He said He'll do.
Alright, let's look at 1 Peter chapter 1 verse 13. Wherefore gird up the loins of
your mind. You know that's exactly what
He said in Hebrews 12. He said, wherefore, lift up the
hands that hang down and the feeble knees. Don't be discouraged. Don't be discouraged. Gird up
the loins of your mind. That's what he said in Hebrews
2, lest at any time you let these things slip, let them fall out
like water, run out like water, just decide to become like the
rest of the world. Be sober. Sober minded, know
God's going to do the work and don't be drunk with the wine
of the fornication of the whore Babylon. And hope to the end
for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of
Jesus Christ. And I hope by the time we get
through this message you'll see that that's not only speaking
about that grace, that salvation that's going to be brought to
us when Christ returns, but hope to the end for the grace that
He's going to bring when He works in the hearts of a sinner right
here in the midst of you and reveals who He is. Hope to the
end of that. Keep holding forth the Word of
Truth and hope to the end. That's what He's going to do
when He reveals Himself. And do this as obedient children.
Now catch that word obedient. Obedient children. Children.
Children. not fashioning, not conforming
yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance. But
as he which hath called you is holy, and hath called you with
a holy calling, and hath called you into the way of holiness,
and hath made you ever with holy, So be ye holy in all manner of
conversation." Now get this word, all manner of conversation. Because
it is written, be ye holy for I am holy. Now, from chapter
1 verse 10 all the way to chapter 2 verse 11, Peter exhorts us
to continue in this holy way, which holy God with the holy
calling has called you into. And don't turn back again to
your former unholy way. Now read verse 18 with me, and
we're going to see where Peter starts. And this is what he speaks
about from verse 110 through chapter 2 verse 11. And it's
summed up right here in verse 18. This is the former lust that
we walked in in our ignorance before we were called into this
holy way. For as much as you know that you were not redeemed
with corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain conversation
received by tradition from your fathers. You see, you thought
you were redeemed. You thought you were made holy.
You thought you were justified. You thought you were accepted
by God in your former ignorance. by tradition of men handed down
to you by your will, by your denomination, by your
creed, by your religious knowledge, by your religious experience,
by these things. That's not how a sinner is counted
a child of God. Not at all. Not at all. Now,
we're going to look at these things more as we go. I want
you not to miss any of these messages because we're going
to see this. And I think as we go, we're narrowing
this thing down little by little here. We're going to see these
things little by little in these verses. But what I want you to
look at tonight is I want us to see that the glory in working
this work belongs to Christ because He's finished the work God gave
Him to do by His sufferings. Now, in verse 11, Peter says,
the prophets were told of the sufferings of Christ and the
glory that should follow. They wanted to know when Christ
would come and suffer and enter into His glory. Because they
knew something of what that glory was going to be like. They knew
something of what it was going to be like. But it was revealed
unto them, revealed unto them that It wouldn't be in their
day that Christ was coming and He was going to suffer and He
was going to enter into the glory that they were prophesying about
in our day. And Christ has come, He has suffered,
and He has entered into that glory. He said that in Luke 24.
Those walking on the road to Emmaus, He said, ought not Christ
to have suffered and have entered into His glory? And beginning
at Moses and all the prophets, He opened up the Scriptures to
them and showed them, this is what all the prophets have been
saying all along. You know how come all the prophets
said that about Christ's sufferings and His glory? They were speaking
by the Spirit of Christ. Now don't misunderstand here
that even though Christ came and suffered and died and then
officially was consecrated into this glory of being the head
of the church. Don't misunderstand that He's
always been the one to whom this work has been entrusted. And
it's always been by Him that the prophets spoke about what
He would accomplish. That's how when you read, because
it is written, they shall not be confounded that believe on
Him. The reason they won't be confounded, there's no possibility
they won't be confused that Christ is all, is because Christ is
not going to tell us anything about Himself that's not true.
And He's the one that moved the prophets to write it. And so
everything they wrote is everything that He's going to bring to pass.
Because the work's been entrusted to Him to glorify the great holy
name of His Father. And that's what He's going to
do. He has done it. And He's yet going to finish
by being the head of His church and working it in our midst.
And that's what He's doing now. By His suffering, He finished
justifying His people. His perfect obedience in doing
so is the perfect obedience of His people. and Christ is entered
into His glory, the glory of being head over His church as
prophet, priest, and king of His people, to wash His children
with the Word through the Gospel, bringing each and every one into
the obedience of Christ, whereby He'll use us to further the Gospel
and preach the Gospel, and through some earthen vessel that He's
broken, He'll shine for this light in another one and save
them. That's His glory to do so. All right, let's look at
the sufferings of Christ and how they perfected His children
forever. Turn with me over to Isaiah 53, 5. Isaiah 53, 5. We began to speak of holiness. Very often, men began to think
about chastening, rebuke, disciplining, Everything we associate
with obedience. Well, this is what the scriptures
say. Isaiah 53, 5. Christ was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.
Now, read this. The chastisement of our peace
was upon Him. And with His stripes we are healed. That word chastisement means
just what we associate with chastening. It means correction, it means
discipline, it means rebuke. Peace means complete soundness. When all the iniquities of God
the Father, of all His children that He gave to Christ, that's
the sanctification accomplished by the Father. He gave them to
Christ. The Spirit of God is going to come into their hearts
and would the blood of Christ purge the conscience from dead
works to serve Him. The whole of the work and the
glory of finishing this work in the earth and from His throne
in glory is given to the Son. Of course God the Father pleased
to do it that way. He pleased to do it that way. When all the iniquities of his
children were put on Christ, he bore that chastening, and
that disciplining, and that rebuking, and that correcting, and that
binding of God's mighty hand in their room instead. And all
who are in Christ are perfectly holy by his obedience. perfectly
holy by His obedience. Have been since God put them
in Christ because it never was a possibility that Christ wouldn't
do this work. He said, I'll be surety for them. And He was slain right then when
He entered as a surety. Right then. And all the justice
that His elect owed to the law of God because of our disobedience
was satisfied. The penalty was satisfied when
Christ was made sin in our place and bore the stripes from the
Father's rod of divine judgment. And at the same time as He justified
us, that perfect obedience of walking right into that suffering
is the perfect obedience. that you and I could never do
of our self. Now that's perfection of what
the spirit of the law teaches. And that's the justification
from the penalty of the law. Everything contained in the law,
Christ is. Everything. Everything. Everything God requires of you
in the law, Christ is. That law was given to tell you
and me we're everything. We're not. We're the opposite
of everything God requires. The opposite of everything. And
Christ came and manifest. He is everything God requires. The very spirit of the law. And
when he turns his child from our former ignorance, To behold
that the stripes that he bore is our peace with God. Our complete
soundness with God. That sinner's been purged in
his conscience. He got no more guilt before God.
And he knows now that by the will of Christ, he has perfectly,
willingly obeyed God totally, completely. And he's holy. And
God will accept him. And that's peace. That's the
peace that we have with God. Look over at Psalm 89. This is
the sufferings that all this we're looking at is in the Old
Testament. This is what the Law and the
Prophets bore witness to. You remember whenever the Lord
went into the Mount, Mount of Transfiguration, there was Elijah,
And there was Moses, the law and the prophets. That's who
they represented. And you know what they talked
about? The sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. And Peter said, let's build an
altar for all three. And God said, nope. You're not
going to exalt the prophets and you're not going to exalt the
law. the law and the prophets bear witness of the sufferings
and the glory Christ has entered into. You're going to worship
Him. Worship Him. And right before
that, before He did that, the Lord asked some men, He said,
now what do you think of Christ? What do you think of Christ? What do you think of Him? Look
at Psalm 89. In this Psalm, And David is the
king. And David was a type of Christ. And everything that David suffered
in his life, that God brought him into in his life, was to
show forth what Christ would suffer and why he'd suffer it. Look here in Psalm 89.30. The
Lord had promised him. Let's look at verse 27. He said, also I will make him,
my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth. This is speaking
of Christ. My mercy will I keep for him
forevermore, and my covenant shall stand fast with him. This
is the Father's promise to the Son. His seed, his children,
Christ's children, also will I make to endure forever in his
throne as the days of heaven. Now watch this next verse. If
his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments,
if they break my statutes and keep not my commandments, then
will I visit their transgression with the rod and their iniquity
with stripes." Does that scare you? Does that scare you? It
shouldn't. It shouldn't scare you. Watch
this. Why not? Why not? Notice that pronoun.
I'm going to visit their iniquity and their transgression with
stripes. How so? In the next verse, he tells us,
and note how the personal pronoun changes. Verse 33, nevertheless,
my loving kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer
my faithfulness to fail. What do you mean? He means that
the chastening that's going to go, that's deserved, that His
children have merited, their transgressions are going to be,
the rod's going to be poured out for their transgressions. But He's going to be the one
that bears it. If you read the rest of it, He
says there, verse 39, Or verse 38, "...thou hast cast
off and abhorred, thou hast been wroth with thine anointed, thou
hast made void the covenant of thy servant, thou hast profaned
his crown by casting it to the ground." You see that word profaned? It's the same word in Isaiah
53 that says, he was bruised for our transgressions. Same
exact word. He was bruised, he was profaned. He bore the chastisement, the
rod. and is our peace. But he didn't
take it from him. He says, verse 33, Nevertheless,
my lovingkindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer
my faithfulness to fail. He bore it, but God didn't suffer
him to... He didn't leave his soul in hell.
He didn't leave him in the grave. For the word of His covenant
was to raise Him to the everlasting throne in glory, and that's what
God did for His Son, raised Him from the dead. That's His suffering,
and that is the obedience of His people and the justification
of His people. Now, let's look at the glory
He's entered into. 1 Peter 1.10, He says this, Now
of this salvation, The prophets inquired and they
searched diligently to know it. Who prophesied of the grace that
should come unto you. They were hoping this grace would
be coming unto them in their day. And that He would enter
into that glory and they would have it. They searched what or what manner
of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify
when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and
the glory that shall follow unto whom it was revealed that not
unto themselves but unto us they did minister. They all were made
to know that. Moses said, the Lord is going
to raise up a prophet like unto me. That's right. Isaiah said, Rod's going to come
out of the stem of Jesse. A branch is going to come out
of his roots. The spirit of righteousness and holiness will be on him and
he's not going to judge. He's not going to discern with
his eyes like men do. He's going to speak righteousness
and truth and know the hearts of men. And he still does. Still
does. And He said, when He comes forth,
this is the glory. He's going to tame men like lions
and make them lie down. And though the men play on the
hole of an asp, He said, they're not going to be wounded because
He's going to keep them. He's going to keep His children.
Who moved the prophets to believe and to write that? Christ did. Was there any possibility it
wouldn't come to pass? He gave God the Father His Word
and it would. And He moved them by the Spirit
of Christ to preach what they preached and prophesy what they
prophesied. And He brought it to pass. Noah. Noah was a preacher of righteousness.
Remember that? How do you preach righteousness
if you don't know who the righteousness of God is? The righteousness
of God is Christ. How are you a preacher of righteousness
then if Christ hadn't come yet? Look over at chapter 3. Verse 18, it ends there saying,
by the Spirit. By the Spirit. It says here in
verse 19, it says that while Noah was preparing that ark,
by the Spirit Christ went and through Noah, it says, by which
also He went and preached unto the spirits in prison. That is,
those sinners who are now in hell. because they enter not
into the ark. But how did Noah preach? He preached
because Christ was preaching through him by the Spirit. That's how he preached. That's
how they prophesied and preached. And it was revealed unto them
He wasn't coming then by Christ Himself. By Christ Himself. But it was revealed this grace
is coming in the fullness of its manifestation in our day
when Christ has come. I want you to see this. I want
you to see this. We're going to see His glory
and what they were looking for to take place and what this glory
is and how He works it in the earth. We're going to see it
manifest best if we go over to Acts chapter 2. Peter said there, he said, that
same Spirit that ministered to them, He said, these things they
were talking about is what's been now reported unto you by
them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost
sent down from heaven. Now Peter was one of those men
who preached the gospel with the Holy Ghost sent down from
heaven. Let's see what Peter preached, what he preached. Peter thought, he thought, that
even though Christ had said, My kingdom is not of this world,
He thought that this was going to be a political kingdom. This
glory was going to be a political kingdom. Some of them said, Are
you going to now restore the kingdom to Israel? But now when
He poured out this Spirit, Peter understood the glory that had
been spoken about throughout all the Old Testament. Now he
entered into it and he stood up and preached it. And he quoted
the prophets and said this is what the prophets had been saying
all along. We can't read all of it, but we're going to read
this. Acts 2.22. Acts 2.22. When the Spirit was poured out
on them, let me just say this, and they began to speak in other
tongues, you know, I hope you know, they weren't doing this
mumbo-jumbo Bible junk that men stand up and do in so-called
holiness churches. That's not what they were doing.
They were speaking in foreign languages that they had never
learned before. Because at the day of Pentecost,
all these people from all these different tongues and nations
had come up to that mountain, and these men began to preach
by the Spirit of God in those people's own language. so that
when someone was sitting over here and he heard that one over
there speaking Aramaic to this one, but he spoke Hebrew, he
stood there and said, that man's drunk, listen to him talking,
because it sounded like drunkenness to him. But each one of them
that heard him speak in his own language was hearing the gospel
preached to them in pure, plain language they could understand.
It wasn't foolishness like you hear. But here was the message
they were all preaching. And this describes the glory
we're talking about. Acts 2.22. You men of Israel,
hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth a man approved
of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs which God
did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know, him
being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of
God, ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and have
slain." That's persecution. They wanted to starve Christ
out. They wanted to entangle Him in His words to turn men
against Him. They wanted to find something
in His character wrong so that men would reject Him. They wanted
to find anything they could so that men would reject Him. And
finally they just made up stuff and put Him on a cross and crucified
Him and thinking now we can go back to just our good old vain
religion that we love. and didn't have any idea that
by suffering the crucifixion in His own flesh, He was doing
everything He purposed from the beginning to do, and saved His
people and justified them by His own obedience and suffering,
and made them holy. And He says here, He said, Whom God hath raised
up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible
that He should be holding of it. Now he quotes some things
here from David, and that's what I just tried to show you, one
particular thing in Psalm 89, that he bore the stripes. He
suffered it. And it wasn't possible he could
remain in that grave because God's covenant to him was, when
you finish the work of making my people holy and justified,
which is the end of the law to all them that believe, which
is what the law has been declaring. When you've done that and declared
my holy character, my justice, my mercy, my goodness, everything
there is to know about me, when you've declared it and finished
that work, I'm going to raise you to be the head of the church
and you can work this obedience in everybody through the Word
of the Gospel, through the Spirit of God. So it wasn't possible
for him to be holding up. Look at verse 32. This Jesus
hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses, therefore
being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received
of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost. He, He, He, Christ,
hath shed forth this which ye now see and hear. He did this. He did this. For David's not
ascended into the heavens, but he saith himself, Thee, Lord,
sit under my Lord, sit there on my right hand till I make
Thy foes Thy footstool. Therefore let all the house of
Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus whom
you've crucified, both Lord and Christ." Now hold your place
there, and I want you to turn over and see what that means,
that He's Lord and Christ. Turn over to Ephesians. Ephesians chapter 1, verse 18,
Paul says, this is what he prays for. It's what he prays for. The eyes of your understanding, being enlightened that you may
know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches
of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the
exceeding greatness of His power to us who believe according to
the working of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ when
He raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand
in heavenly places." He said, I want you to know the power
of His resurrection. Now He's far above all principality
and power and might and dominion and every name that's named.
That means whatever our Lord Jesus Christ wants to do, He
does it. And uses everybody at His disposal
to bring it to pass. Everything. Everything. Alright, what does He say here?
He's put all things under His feet, gave Him to be the head
over all things to the church. which is His body, the fullness
of Him, of Him that filleth all in all." Peter says that's what
He's doing right here. That's what He's doing on the
day of Pentecost. Stay there in Ephesians. Look
at Ephesians 4.10. He that descended is the same
also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill
All things. These things are vessels, earthen
vessels called the elect children of God, called the redeemed purchased
by the blood of Christ. He's going to fill them. Fill
them with what? With the Spirit that they might know that He's
their complete righteousness with God, accepted in the Beloved. Go over to Ephesians 5.25. Ephesians
5.25. Husbands, love your wives even
as Christ also loved the church. And a husband won't have any
idea what that's talking about until Christ does this work in
his heart. He won't have any idea. He may
do it. He may do it in the way that
this world looks at it, to where you looked at him and thought
he's their June and Ward Cleaver. But it don't matter. He's still
as unholy as ever if Christ hadn't worked this work in his heart.
But look at this now, and this is what we're going to see throughout
1 Peter, that very thing I just stated. But look at this now.
Christ loved the church and He gave Himself for it. That was
His suffering. That was His suffering. Here
is His glory. That He might sanctify and cleanse
it with the washing of water by the Word. You see, He sent
forth Peter and all the other apostles. He gave gifts unto
men. He gave His pastors and His teachers
and His evangelists and sent them forth that He, through the
Spirit, might sanctify and cleanse every one of His children in
the experience of grace by the washing of water by the Word. That He, this is His glory, that
He might present it, the church, to himself a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should
be holy and without blemish." When you read the word should,
it don't mean, now you ought to be, it means that because
this glory is His, He's done it through His suffering and
entered into His glory to where He's going to bring every child
of God into the experience of it by grace to know, washing
us in the conscience from dead works to Him to know He's our
holiness, He's going to get the glory for doing that too. It's
His glory. All things are delivered unto
Me and My Father, He said, and no man knoweth the Son, but the
Father, neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and
He to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him. All right, now back
to Acts 2.37. What happens? He said, He shed forth this which
you now see and hear. Now what happens when He washes
His children by the Word through the Holy Spirit, sanctifying
us into the way of holiness? What happens then? What happens?
Now you remember, all these people are up there because the law
stated that's where they're supposed to go. The law stated that's
where they're supposed to go. That's how they're supposed to
be holy and accept of God, was to go up there and do these things.
And they're there thinking that by doing those things, that's
how they're going to be holy and accepted with God. That's
what their heart was. And it was nothing but utter,
absolute disobedience to God. But what happens when Christ
sanctifies the heart and purges the conscious from dead works
to serve the true and living God? What happens? Verse 37,
Acts 2.37, Now when they heard, when they heard, when Christ
spoke into their heart. They were pricked in their heart
and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, not to
the high priests, not to the priests, not to the scribes,
not to the Sanhedrin, not to anybody in Jerusalem who they
formerly were saying, now what should we do next? Now what do
we do next? We go over here and stand, what do we do next? How
do we wash in this bowl? What do we do next? Now they
turn to these men who were fishermen, nobody standing there in the
midst, they turned to them now and said, men, brethren, what
shall we do? What shall we do? It's called
submitting to Christ. And when you have been brought
to submission to Christ, You don't have need that any man
teaches you anymore because Christ is teaching you in the heart.
And the first way that that's going to be manifest, that Christ
is teaching you in the heart, is you're going to come to this
earthen nobody that God sent to minister to you and say, what
shall I do? What do I do? What do I do? Then Peter said unto them, repent, He's saying to them, you're going
to have to leave this former ignorance, this former religion
you're in. We're going to look at that later,
but I'll just tell you, remember when the Lord said, if you be
my disciples indeed, follow in my word and the truth will make
you free. And they said, we're Abraham's sons. We never have
been bondage to anybody. You don't know who my daddy was.
You don't know what religion I've been in all my life. You
don't know what my experiences have been. And the Lord said, he that commiteth
sin, he that commiteth sin is of the
devil. He's in bondage. What sin is
he talking about? Repenting of everything that
you thought was true and right and all the works you did in
it and all the profession you made in it. and believing on
Him. When it becomes dung, you will.
When it becomes a filthy rag, you will. Until then, you'll
contend with men because you're contentious against God. That's
what he said. He says, repent and be baptized. Every one of you, this will be
the first public act of obedience to Christ, being baptized. for the remission of sins." Does
that mean that I'm going to be baptized and that's going to
wash away my sins? No, I'm being baptized completely,
purged under, immersed in water to declare it's because my sins
have been remitted. They're gone. And you shall receive the gift
of the Holy Ghost. They had already received it.
It was already working in them. You're going to be taught by
the Holy Ghost more and more and more and made more free and
more free and more free from these former grave clothes. For
the promise is unto you and your children, to all that are far
off and as many as the Lord our God shall call. Well, let me ask you something.
Let me give you an illustration. The reason that Peter is exhorting
the brethren not to lose hope, not to become discouraged and
to tone down the message and to turn back to their former
ideology and their former way and think that that's going to
make holy saints of God, but to continue in the way is because
we receive is because without the Spirit of Christ, without
this Spirit working through the truth, religion without it is
not only not any good for you, it's absolutely detrimental to
your soul. When you take a balloon and you
fill it up, you blow it up, and you tie it off, cinch it down
real tight, You got something just swollen up, big as it can
get, with hot air. That's what knowledge, apart
from the Spirit of Christ in the heart, is. It puffs up. That's all it does. It puffs
up. Puffs up. But what happens when a needle hits a balloon? That balloon is laying in pieces
on the ground, broken and contrite. That's what happened when they
were pricked in their heart. That glory has been given to
the Son of the Father. Through the Spirit, the Spirit
comes forth and bears witness of Him through this Gospel. It
makes obedient children. And they follow Christ in obedience
by declaring Christ. And He continues to strengthen
them. He continues to keep us in the way and not let us turn
out of this way. And He continues to give us new
reasons to hope for the end, for the grace that He's going
to bring when He reveals Christ in the next one. And we hope to the end for that
grace that's going to be brought to us when He returns. I want
to show you one more Scripture. Hebrews 5 verse 7. Hebrews 5 verse 7. Remember whenever Paul
said to the Philippians, let this mind be in you which was
in Christ. This is how He said, in your
conversation adorn the doctrine of Christ. And He said, let this
mind be in you which was in Christ. He was equal with God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God, made Himself of no reputation.
He came in the form of flesh and He became obedient as a servant
and He obeyed God even until the death of the cross. Here
at Hebrews 5, look at verse 7. In the days of his flesh, when
he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying
and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, he was
heard in that he feared. He feared. He obeyed. He trusted the Father. Though
he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which
he suffered. that pinnacle bright shining
holiness was Him obeying the Father, being made sin for His
people and bearing the justice of God for them that He might
declare God just and the justifier. And it says, and being made perfect,
having perfected obedience for His people. and being made the perfect captain
of our salvation. He became the author of eternal
salvation unto all them that obey Him. That obey Him. Obey Him. When it says He learned obedience,
it means that He experienced it, It means that He is the Apostle
and High Priest of our profession. It means He knows, by everything
that He encountered, how to bring His children to be partakers
of His holiness by making them obedient to Him. So over in Hebrews
12.10, It says, don't despise the chastening
of the Lord. He's borne away the chastening
of the wrath in His own body on the tree. Now when He corrects
us and brings us back into the way, why does He do it? Why does
He not allow us to turn another way? He says there at the end
of verse 10 that we might be partakers of His holiness. Of His holiness. He knows how to make us obedient
to Him. Now look back at 1 Peter chapter
1 verse 13. And he said, Wherefore lift up
the hands that hang down in the feeble knees, make straight paths
for your feet, follow peace with all and holiness without which
no man shall see the Lord. Now look at 1 Peter 1 13. That's
exactly what Peter's telling us. Wherefore, gird up the loins
of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that
is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
As obedient children, not fasting yourselves according to the former
lusts and your ignorance, but as He which hath called you is
holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation. Because it is
written, Be ye holy, for I am holy, If you call on the Father,
you call Him your Father, do you? Who, without respect of
person, judges according to every man's work. It means He discerns
the heart. He knows exactly. Past the time of our sojourning
here in fear, for as much as you know that you were redeemed
with corruptible things of silver and gold from that vain conversation,
that former ignorance received by tradition from your fathers,
but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish
and without spot, who verily was foreordained before the foundation
of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you,
who by Him Do believe in God that raised Him up from the dead
and gave Him glory that your faith and hope might be in God.
Seeing ye have purified your souls. You know what purified
means? Holy. Seeing you've purified
your souls and obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfain
love of the brethren, love one another with a pure heart fervently.
Because your flesh is grass, and their flesh is grass, and
grass and grass ain't going to do nothing but end up being cast
into the fire and burned up. They ain't going to accomplish
anything. But He births His children by the incorruptible seed, by
the Word of God, and He says there at the end, and this is
the Word which by the Gospel is preached unto you. So when
He says, lay aside malice and guile and hypocrisy and envy
and evil speaking, that's what men are doing in their heart,
though they may be as pious as they can be outwardly when they're
trying to make other men be as pious as they are outwardly by
their power and their wisdom and their fleshly strength in
lessening and lessening and lessening this pure Word of the Gospel. Desire the sincere milk of the
Word that you may grow thereby. This platform that I'm teaching
you here, you can write books on this, but you're not going
to be able to charge a lot of money for them because folks
ain't going to buy this. But God's people will sell everything
they got and fall right in line behind Christ and know this is
how God saves His people because He was given him to of the Father,
chosen and precious by the Father. And he's been made chosen and
precious to us who've been chosen and are precious to God in him.
And so now we follow him. And we're not turned anymore
out of his way. He won't let it happen.