If you will take your Bibles
and turn with me to Acts chapter 22. Acts chapter 22, Lord willing, we'll
be looking at verses 1 through 30 this morning. Acts chapter
22, verses 1 through 30, the title of the message this morning,
Salvation by Grace, Not Religion. Salvation by Grace, Not Religion. Here in this chapter, and as
you will take the time today to read this chapter, I hope
that by the grace of God, that as you read this chapter this
afternoon, after you're hearing the message this morning, that
this chapter will open up to you, that you'll be able to see
clearly what is meant here for your hearts. by the Spirit of
God." Now, Paul here, in the beginning of this chapter, you
remember last week how the apostle was taken by the Jews and beaten,
and the noise of this went to the commander, the captain of
the army, and he went out with his soldiers and arrested the
apostle Paul, and now has brought him back. before the castle. And the men of the Jews followed
him, crying, away with him, away with him. They wanted him to
be killed. And the apostle asked the captain, he said, I need
to make a defense. Can I make a defense here? And
he said, well, sure, make your defense. And so Paul here in
the first verse, he turns to his brethren, standing there
in the chains, he turns to his brethren, kinsmen in the flesh,
and he makes his defense. But rather than making a defense
for himself, basically he's just declaring to him the gospel.
So when you read this chapter, you must understand that the
Apostle Paul is declaring the gospel of God's grace and how
God had mercy on him. How God had mercy on him. Now
there are three things that we can see clearly and learn clearly
from this text of Scripture. The first thing that we're going
to see is that salvation is not by religion. That's the first
thing Paul makes in verses 1 through 5. He tells us that salvation
is not by religion. And then you'll see in verses
6 down through verse 21, You'll see that the Apostle Paul
says that salvation is of the Lord. Salvation is of the Lord. And thirdly, we will see that
salvation, this gospel message, is hated by religious men. Now first of all, salvation is
not by religion. The Apostle Paul calls to his
brethren and he says this. He says in verse 3, I am verily
a man which is a Jew born in Tarsus, a city of Caecilia. Paul makes known to these people,
he says, look, I'm a Jew just like you are. I'm a Jew just
like you. I was raised in a Jewish family. I had a Jewish father and a Jewish
mother. I had Jewish siblings. I am a
Jew. My father was a Pharisee. He
tells us later in the next couple of chapters that his father was
a Pharisee and he was a Pharisee. And we find out later that he
even had a nephew that was close enough to the high priest to
hear of a plot to kill him. His family was dedicated and
faithful to the Jewish religion. So when Paul said, I'm a Jew,
he was telling them that, hey, I have a strong Jewish lineage
just like you. Just like you. He knew his lineage and no doubt
he was taught it by his father. But religious families, religious
bloodlines do not save the souls of men. Although Paul was raised
in a good religious family, it did not give him merit before
God. He said, I was a Jew just like
you, but that merited me nothing with God. All men by nature are
corrupt and sinful creatures, and sin is the only thing that
is passed down from generation to generation. The only thing
that we inherit in bloodlines is sin. Grace does not come by
the blood as these Jews supposed. You remember the Lord was speaking
to those Jews and He told them that if the Son shall set you
free, you shall be free indeed. And they said, we be Abraham's
seed. You see, they were looking to
their bloodline to save them. Jesus said, I know you're of
the seed of Abraham, but that doesn't save you. That doesn't
save you. I heard the story of a man who
was a Jew when he was being brought up. And he was being witnessed
to by this girl in his high school class, and she said, if you don't
know Christ, you'll go to hell. And the boy began to be scared. He was scared of that. He had
never heard that from his rabbi before. And so he went to his
rabbi and he said, Rabbi, am I going to hell if I don't know
Jesus? He said, son, hell is a Gentile
problem. The Jews believe that they are
not going to suffer the wrath of God because they're Jews.
Because they're Jews. But what do the Scriptures tell
us? What does God's Word tell us? Remember when Peter was preaching
to Cornelius, he said, I learned this, I perceive this, God is
not a respecter of persons. God is not a respecter of persons.
God's grace is not based on family affiliation or rooted, but is
rooted in His sovereign mercy and grace. Jacob and Esau, were
they not of the same bloodline of Abraham? And yet God says,
for Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. Now friends, you
can't get any closer than twins. You can't get any closer of family
relation than two people being born at the same time of the
same woman, and yet God said, I've loved this one and rejected
this one. Yet I'll tell you, this notion
is not far removed from our generation today. Do not think that it's
so. I hear it all the time. People
that have family members who are believers in Christ, they
think, well, because my family is Christian, that means I'm
Christian. No, that's a lie. That does not
mean you are a Christian because your family is Christian. Grace is not passed by bloodline
or family relations. The Scripture says, in John 1
chapter 1 and verse 12 and 13, it says, "...but as many as received
Him, to them gave He the right to become the sons of God, even
to them that believe on His name, which were born." Not of blood. Not of family relations. Nor
of the will of flesh. Grace. Salvation is not by blood,
not by the will of the flesh. You know, I have a son, I have
a daughter, and I long for them to be saved, but you know, I
cannot by my will save them. Cannot do it. Salvation is not
by blood. Second of all, we'll see in Paul's
message that salvation is not by religious knowledge. Look
at that in verse 3. Paul says, yet brought up in
the city at the feet of Gamaliel and taught according to the perfect
manner of the law of the fathers." Now Paul was brought up in the
best school that these Jews could recognize. He was brought up
by the best teacher that the Jews could produce concerning
the law. These men raised this man Gamaliel
up to such a high status that he was the only one that was
called a rabbin. Most people were called rabbis,
meaning my master. But Gamaliel was called a rabbin
in that he was our master. He was the master of all the
Jews concerning the law. Gil says, with respect to the
interpretation and observation of the law, which was according
to the tradition of the elders and not the literal genuine sense
of it, he followed and was of the sect of the Pharisees the
strictest among the Jews and the greatest esteemed among the
people. There was none that could compare
to the Apostle Paul in his education. None. He was the top of his class.
He was the brightest and best of his seminary. He was the valedictorian. He was the best. But the knowledge
of the law and the prophets could not save him. He understood the
finer points of the law and tradition. He could argue them with the
best of ability. but it was vain and empty toward
his acceptance with God. Paul's knowledge was not spiritual,
but rather carnal. He had the right words, he had
the right phrases, but he did not have life. Did not have life. And I'll tell you, friend, there
are many who are deceived in our day in the same way concerning
the Gospel, concerning the Scriptures. There are many religious people
that know the Scriptures forward and backward. There are many
religious people who have a great knowledge of even the grace of
God, even the things of the doctrines of grace. They have a great knowledge
of these things. Friends, if you think your knowledge
of religion is going to save you, you believe a lie. You believe
a lie. It doesn't matter what you know,
it matters who you know. Who you know. And friends, who
you know will affect what you know, but what you know will not affect
who you know. Faith is not something learned,
but rather something that is given. It is given, Philippians
1.29, it is given to us on the behalf of Christ, not only to
believe, but to suffer. Faith and suffering are those
gifts of Christ. You can't learn it. You can't
educate a man to salvation. Faith is not produced by empty
religion. Paul says, for God who commanded
the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. Friends, I preach not religion. I try not to convert a man to
Calvinism. That's not what I'm here for. I do not preach that a man may
be saved by his knowledge of doctrines, but that men are saved
through the preaching of the gospel, and as God uses that,
He commands the light to shine out of darkness into our hearts,
to give us the knowledge of the glory of God." Where? In the
face of Christ. In the face of Christ, seeing
Christ. It's God that gives spiritual
life. Number three, salvation is not by religious zeal. Look
at that in verse 4. The Apostle Paul says, end of
verse 3, he says, "...and was zealous toward God as you are
this day. And I persecuted this way unto
death, binding and delivering into prison both men and women."
There was nobody. These Jews could not hold a candle
to what Paul did against the church of Christ. Now, I'll tell
you what, they beat Him. They persecuted Him. But friends,
how many people did the Apostle Paul himself beat, haul into
prison and even kill against the gospel? He said, I was zealous
like you. I was zealous against this way. But friends, his religious zealousness
did not avail him anything to God. How many times have we not
heard, well, if you're just sincere enough, everything will be okay. If you just do your best, God
will accept you. If you just try your hardest,
God will be with you. Friends, that's a lie. You can
try all you want to, but if you're basing your relationship to God
on your religious zeal, you're as lost as these Jews. They were zealous, but they were
zealously wrong. God does not base His justice
off sincerity, but off strict, His strict and holy law. A man
may desire to be good and do good, but if he cannot perform
that which is good, he must be punished under the wrath of God.
Salvation is never based upon good works or zealous good works,
but must be based on the grace of God alone. The Scripture says,
for by grace you are saved through faith, and that faith is a gift
of God and not of works, lest any man should boast. If there is none that doeth good,
and no flesh shall be justified by the law, then salvation must
be by grace. It must be. If not, there is
no salvation. Paul says in Romans 7, 9, he
says, I was alive without the law once. In other words, I thought
I was alive. I thought I was doing right.
I thought I was doing good. Friends, when we confront religious
people in this world, they're going to think that they're doing
well. They're not going to understand
what you're talking about. You're talking about sin, righteousness,
and judgment. They say, well, I'm doing well. I'm alive. And friend, it's not
until the law of God comes in power that Paul said, but when
commandment came, sin revived and I died. If you're religious and you think
God will save you because of it, you're lost and in your sins. Second of all, the Apostle Paul
is not only telling us that salvation is not of religion, he is telling
us this. Salvation is of the Lord. He is of the Lord. In verses
6 through 21, the Apostle Paul gives the Jews his experience
of salvation, which is a picture of every believer in Christ. Every one of us have this same
experience of salvation. Now, it's not in the same manner.
None of us have seen a light from heaven. None of us were
riding on the road to Damascus to take prisoners of the church,
and none of us has seen a great light or heard an audible voice. But I'll tell you this, if you
have not heard the voice of the Son of God, you are not saved. Paul says, as I received letters
to Damascus to punish those Christians, as he was going on his way, he
was met by the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at that in verse 6, and
it came to pass. that as I made my journey, I was come nigh to
Damascus about noon, and suddenly there shone a light from heaven,
a great light round about me. And I fell to the ground and
heard the voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou
me? And I answered, Who art thou,
Lord? He said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. Friends, the first thing about
this salvation of the Lord is that God meets sinners on the
road of their rebellion. God always meets sinners on the
road of rebellion. Paul was not going to worship
Christ. Paul was not seeking God, was
he? He thought he already had God.
He thought him and God were friends. He thought him and God were good.
Everything was fine between them. He wasn't going to seek God. He was going to kill everyone
who believed in Christ in that city. He thought his religious family,
his knowledge and his zeal was enough. And so will every man
continue on that path to hell unless God comes and meets them. A man will never meet God. The only place a lost man will
ever meet God is in eternity, standing before the judgment
bar of God. And the only way for us to know
God is if God meets us in this life. If God comes to us. If God saves us. Matthew 11,
27 says, All things are delivered to me of my Father, and no man
knoweth the Son but the Father. Listen to this. Neither knoweth
any man the Father save the Son, and to whomsoever the Son will
reveal Him. Now friends, no man knoweth the
Father. How do you know that? Christ
said that, didn't He? No man by nature knows the Father. How
does He know the Father? Unless I reveal the Father to
Him. He must meet us. The grace of God. The grace of God sought me when
I was not seeking Him. The grace of God exposed my sin
and His holy nature to me. The grace of God cast me off
of the high horse of my religion into the dust. And friends, if
you have never been in the dust, you don't know who God is. Scripture says this, Lamentations
3, verse 29, "...he putteth his mouth in the dust, if so be there
may be hope." There is no hope unless we're in the dust. Let
me ask you this, have you been met by the Son of God? Have you
seen His holy perfections and deity? Have you ever been lost? I think that's a question that
this religious age needs to be asked. When were you lost? Because
everybody I talk to is saved. I find very few lost people. And yet they're still constantly
listening to false religion and false doctrine all the while
saying, I'm saved. Most people say, I was saved
when I was a young child. And yet they spend all of their
life in sin and neglect of the worship of God. Friends, if that's
so, you weren't saved at ten. If you were saved, there would
have been a change. There would have been a change.
If God met you, there would be a change. The Apostle Paul, there was a
change, wasn't there? When Christ met him, there was
something different. There was something different. This was the apostles' appointed
time of grace. Have you had an appointed time
of grace? Have you heard the voice of the Son of God? And
has He revealed God unto you by Himself? If not, you are still
on the road of rebellion and you have not known God's salvation.
Second of all, God gives faith in Christ by the Gospel. He not
only meets us, He gives us faith. When Christ met Paul, He did
reveal Himself. He did reveal Himself to him.
But if you'll notice this, He sends him to a preacher. Look at that in verse 10. He tells Paul, Arise and go to
Damascus, and there it shall be told thee of all things which
are appointed for thee to do. Why do you suppose Christ sent
him to Ananias? Have you ever asked that? Why
did Christ not tell him? Right there. He could have, couldn't
He? He could expose all those things
to Him. Why? Why did He have to go to Ananias
to learn these things? Because this is the means by
which God has chosen to save His people from their sins through
the foolishness of preaching. That's what it is. Christ could
have done these things, but it's not the manner of grace. The
manner of grace is to send a man and the man is to tell the man
how it is that he might have life. Faith comes. By hearing, Paul said. That was an experience, wasn't
it? He experienced that on that road.
Jesus said, you go listen to the man that I have prepared
for you. Faith cometh by hearing. And hearing by the Word of God.
Faith comes by hearing of the Gospel by man's sin of God. And this man Ananias, he was
sin of God to tell Paul the Gospel. And he did. Look at this in verse
14. And he said, The God of our fathers hath chosen thee, that
thou shouldest know his will, and see that just one, and shouldest
hear the voice of his mouth. For thou shalt be his witness
unto all men of what thou hast seen and heard." The first thing
that Ananias tells him about is election. They shy away from
that and they say, oh no, don't tell people about that at the
beginning. That's too much. Look at that. The God of our
fathers hath chosen thee. Hath chosen thee. He speaks to
him of the sovereign grace of God that he has set aside for
himself a people. A people. He did not choose them based
on anything in them or anything He would see them do, but rather
chose them for His own namesake. In Isaiah 43, verse 7, He says,
I will bring My sons and everyone that is called by My name, for
I have created him for My glory. I have formed him, yea, I have
made him. Believer, this should comfort
us that we always have been and are now and shall forever be
precious in the eyes of our God." Why? He said, I created you. I made you. I chose you. For who? For myself. I did it
for me. Not for you. I did it for me.
For my glory. For my own glory. For my name's
sake. He purposed to save and elect
people and has also put all that He has done to accomplish the
salvation of His people. Do you realize that everything
that happens in this world happens for the elect? Everything. Not
one thing happens for the lost, wicked vessels of wrath. Everything
happens for our good. Everything. Everything. Not only that, He shows them
election, but also the just one. He not only shows that God chose
a people, but that He gave Him to the Son, Jesus Christ, to
be their mercy seat and propitiation for their sins. Friends, the
gospel message is always centered and anchored in the Lord Jesus
Christ. If there is no Christ, if there
is no blood, if there is no resurrection, there is no gospel message. We must know that He honored
God in our stead. He suffered the wrath of God
in our stead. And all who God chose, Christ
Himself redeemed. He's the just one. He's the holy
one. He's the righteous one. And in
Him, we are made the righteousness of God. And He will gather us from all
corners of the earth. He will meet every believer,
every elect soul in the appointed time, at the appointed place
with His gospel. And that gospel will be, behold,
the just one. The just one, Christ. And number
three, he preaches the walking in the Spirit. The Apostle Paul
was not only delivered the gospel, but he was told that he should
be obedient to the commands of Christ. He says, be baptized.
Baptism is a command of Christ. and every believer in Christ
should be baptized according to obedience." He says, we're
witnesses. You're witnesses. Every one of
you that's experienced grace, you are a witness of God's grace. Everything I've told you about
salvation, you understand by your own experience. You know
these things that I'm telling you. I'm not telling you anything
new. These things you know. And you
are to be His witnesses. And lastly, the gospel will be
hated by religious men. Look at that in verse 22. He
says, "...they gave him audience unto his word, and then lifted
up their voices and said, Away with such a fellow from the earth,
for it is not fit that he should live." Friends, the religious
world, when they hear the gospel of God's sovereign grace in Christ,
they will say of you and me, you're not fit to live. How could
you say such a thing? How could you say that God chooses
some and passes by others? How can you say that God is sovereign
and man is responsible? I don't understand. I don't care. It's what God says. You're responsible
and God is sovereign. I don't cut off the edge of either
one of those things. Either one of those things. Not
for me to trim off any of that to make that palatable for anybody.
And when that happens, friends, people are going to be upset.
You start rocking their religious boats and tell them salvation
is not by who they know, who they are, or what they've done.
That it's completely, absolutely in the hands of God to either
save you or damn you. And they won't like that. And they won't like you. I'm afraid that many of the witnesses
of Christ have sawed off the edge of the gospel so much so
that they can be friends with this world. And that's not what
we're here for. We're here to be His witnesses
and to tell them exactly what God says. I pray that God blesses to our
hearts. Dismissed.