So when I was preparing this
week, actually, I shouldn't say I prepared much this week, to
be honest. I don't normally do two weeks
in a row. I'm not sure I ever have. And generally, the way
I have done this is as I sit there most weeks, I have ideas,
not ideas, but things that stick out to me, that Joe says, or
that thoughts I have, and that's something I'd like to preach
on someday. So I'll either send myself a message on my phone,
or I'll write it down. And that gives me plenty of time to kind
of ruminate on that thought for the next time I'm going to preach,
which could be a month or two down the road. Well, this week
I had six days and no one to listen to in between. And it
was a very busy week, a lot going on. And all of a sudden it was
Saturday. And I'm like, I don't know what
I'm going to preach on. Generally, I have an idea, and I did not.
I didn't know where to even begin. I wasn't exactly nervous about
it. It just, you know, it wasn't normal. So what I was doing is
just looking through some of my old notes, and I came across
some notes of a Todd Nybert message that I didn't even know I had.
Apparently I had gotten them from somebody a long time ago,
and it started as kind of a sermon on them, and I just stumbled
across it. It was called The Simplicity
of Christ. I clicked on it, and I really didn't know what it
was, and I'm like, I don't even remember doing this. But I remembered
the analogy that Todd Nybert used that stood out to me. And
it reminded me of the name of this message, being the simplicity
of Christ. And man, did it take the load
off me immediately. It is so simple, what we believe. And not just what we believe,
but what the truth is. It's extremely simple. And that is, by design,
it can be complicated for us. We try our best to complicate
the simplicity of the truth. We do. But that doesn't change
how simple it is. So what we had just read in verse
3 of 2 Corinthians 11, it says, Paul wrote this and was, you know,
not just worried or concerned, but he says he's fearful of us forgetting
the simplicity of Christ. For good reason, because to forget
the simplicity of Christ is to forget Christ, because it's simple.
The simplicity of Christ is that He is everything. Todd's analogy that I was referring
to earlier was a glass of water. I don't have one. I should have
done that. That would have been smart. If
I had a glass of water right here, just a glass filled with
water, it's very simple. It is a glass of water. And if
you add one drop of ink to that glass of water, it changes it
completely. Very small change. One drop. But it is no longer a glass of
water. It can't be defined that way. It can be described in a
million different ways. But it is no longer a glass of
water. That simplicity of changing a
glass of water by adding one drop of ink, changing it by very
definition, is the same truth of Christ. Adding anything literally
changes the definition of the subject. It no longer is what
it was. Christ is everything. That's
the simple truth. He's the truth. He's the way,
the truth, and the life. He is not one of the ways. He
is not the way along with a little of this. He alone is everything. And if you add a drop of ink
to that glass of water, it changes everything. You can't say that
Christ is everything and. Christ is everything but, then
it no longer is what it was. If you include and or but when
you're talking about the salvation through Christ's blood, you've
just like the water, completely changed the definition of the
subject. It's no longer what it was, in this case, the minute
you add or remove anything from the simplicity of Christ, it
is no longer Christ. You may be using his name, but
it's not the true Christ. Doing anything of the sort is
actually completely offensive to Christ. Even the tiniest change,
even the tiniest drop of ink in that water is not just, well,
didn't quite get it, but it was close. If you aren't preaching
Christ's blood, it's the only thing needed to have salvation.
You aren't preaching the truth. And even if you're saying it,
it's very easy to throw in an ant. This is why so much Christianity
today is dangerous. The difference between changing
Christ a little bit and changing Christ a lot is nothing. It's easier for us to recognize
the big change for people, but it's change nonetheless. That's
like saying two plus two is four is the truth. Two plus two equals
five is just as wrong as two plus two equals 100. Right? It's close. but it's no less
untrue than a hundred. Something that this world could
actually see as a good thing is those small changes. Christ
and the good things you've done since you've accepted him in
your life. That doesn't sound like a bad thing, right? People
think, what a good Christian. Something that the world praises
as a compliment to God It's absolute blasphemy and offensive to Christ. A little bit of wrong when it
comes to Christ is still completely wrong. Ask someone, do you believe
that nothing but the blood of Jesus can save your soul? The
only answer is yes. With a period at the end. If
it's yes, absolutely. Plus, I've been doing a lot better
lately. Yes, nothing but the blood. And
over time, the study and prayer groups, you start to grow closer.
No, those things aren't bad. Nothing wrong with study and
prayer. But if it becomes even the tiniest part of your righteousness,
drop of ink in the water. Nothing but the blood of Christ,
period. The sentence ends there. You
would think, as man, that would be a welcome statement to be
told, you have nothing to do. Christ has done everything you
need to be saved. You'd think we would sit back
and go, great, I have nothing to do. But that is so against
our nature. We want to be a part of it. We
have that tiny bit of hope in ourselves. Do we feel like we need to get
closer to God than what the blood will provide? It says, come to me, all you who
are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Jesus said that
in Matthew. Rest. There's nothing to do.
But yet, we want to try to find a way to add to it. It is absolutely
impossible, think about this, if the blood gets you as close
to God as Christ is, how can we improve upon that? It is absolutely impossible to
get closer to God than Christ already is. He sits at the right hand of
the creator of all things, and we are in Him. You can't get closer than that. Now, like I said earlier, we
have to deal with the shortcomings of the world we live in. We have
to feel emotion and day-to-day things and deal with the difficulties
of life. It's part of what we're doing
here. So as close as we are, as close as we are in Christ
and seated next to the Father, we don't feel that most of the
time. Sometimes we feel downright far
away. I can struggle with that a lot,
and I don't think I'm alone. I feel like sometimes I'm a slave
to emotion and it's super annoying. It really is. Like, some days
I can feel so close and feel so
blessed and understand how grateful I should be. And other days I
feel so far. Like I'm just, I want nothing
more than to be closer and there's nothing I can do to get closer.
And that struggle is real. But the beauty is that no matter
how we feel at the time, how we feel can't be trusted. Our
emotions, like I said, are just another part of this world. The
times when we feel close to the Lord, when we have the joy that's
evident, like it's obvious, it's in front of our eyes, that we're
with Him, that we're in Christ, that what He has done was for
me. And then there's times when we struggle, like how could he
possibly have wanted to do that for me? What I do on a daily
basis? We struggle both psychologically
and physically in this world when we search for the joy that
we had last week. When we feel close, when we feel
far, in reality, nothing has changed. From God's perspective,
which is the only perspective that matters, nothing has changed. You feel far. You're not. You're not. If you're in Christ,
you can feel farther away than anyone ever has in the history
of the world, and you're no farther away than the day Christ died
for you. Nothing about what Christ has
done has changed, right? The only thing that's changing
is what you're dealing with inside your head. The work that was done by Christ,
the sacrifice that He made hasn't changed. What He earned for you
hasn't changed. The place He prepared for you
in Him Next to the Father, blessed for eternity, hasn't changed. Great is thy faithfulness. That's
what that means. Every day is the same with God. With what Christ has done, it
can't, the power of what Christ has done cannot lessen. That's what we should look to.
Now, we're not always going to, but You know it's true, even
on the bad days, you know it's true. Christ can't fail. It's impossible. So what he has done, the stamp
that he has put, the seal, that you are his, cannot be changed
or undone, no matter what you're dealing with. It says, when things are difficult,
you can turn to Romans 8, verse 28, but most of you are very
familiar with 828 in Romans. And even if you're not, let me
read it. And we know that in all things God works for the
good of those who love him, who have been called according to
his purpose. The rough, less pleasant parts
of life are just as much a part of our salvation as the awesome
days that we feel great and things are wonderful. Every day is the
same when it comes to us being saved. It says this, all things
God works for the good of those who love him. The only good that it talks about
here, it's not talking about all things will work so that
you're going to have a pleasant life and you're going to have
comforts and happiness and money and a great family and that's
not what he's talking about. The good here is eternal life. Not eternal death. The only good that matters is
the salvation of our souls. Everything here is temporary.
None of this matters. It's all gonna go away. When
he talks about all things work for the good of those who love
him, the good is simply the salvation of their souls. Every moment,
every step, every breath is working towards the salvation of the
souls of his people. good, in our eyes good, pleasant,
unpleasant, all things. We can take comfort in that. And the rest of that scripture,
piece of scripture, it says, all things work for the good
of those who love him, who have been called according to his
purpose. What is God's purpose? Open to John 6. Verse 37. So we know that all things work
for the good of those who love Him, according to His purpose.
This is what His purpose is. And this is the will, this is
Christ speaking, of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of
all that he has given me, but raise them up on that last day.
For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son
and believes in him shall have eternal life. And I will raise
him up that last day. This is God's will. It's not
merely that all my people will go to heaven. For my Father's will is that
everyone looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal
life. It could have just said, if it
was just simply to send everybody to heaven, then it would have
just said that my Father's will is that everyone shall have eternal
life. It says everyone that looks to
the Son and believes in Him Everything is about Christ. God's will is that his people
will look to Christ and believe in him. Absolutely everything
that happens, everything that has ever happened, and everything
that will ever happen is to glorify Jesus Christ. And he deserves it. We as humans can't understand
the workings of God. We understand as much as we need
to, but we can't understand the way he's orchestrating this world.
You know, there's difficult parts of the world, difficult aspects
of life, natural disasters, politics. Even the pleasant things that
happen to us. We don't fully understand the depths of how
all of those things will glorify Christ. But we can rest in this truth
that everything that happens glorifies Christ. People always want to know the
meaning of life. It's Christ. It's Jesus. We don't know the complexities
of God's work. I don't know if we'll ever know. But I do know that we don't need
to understand the complexities of his work. Because he has made
what we need to know so simple. Joe once said that if God tried
to show us the complexities of himself, I remember this one
because it's funny, but it's very accurate. That would be
like us trying to explain the complexities of our lives to
a dog. Explain all you want. You can
spend a lot of time explaining your life to a dog and he will
never understand. Similar to us. We can't understand
the things of God. We're so limited. But we don't
need to. We need to know the simple truth
of Christ. And that's why he's made it so simple. Everything
is under him. He is salvation. He is Lord. We receive salvation, eternal
life, only because God revealed this simple truth to us. I mean, think of how simple it
is. There's no equation here. It's not like you need this and
this and this and this, salvation. Gotta have this up here and add
some of this and add some of this, salvation. There's nothing
to figure out. Christ. Salvation. That's it. He has done everything
that needs to be done for salvation of his people, everything. We
are bystanders. We've been revealed, the truth
has been revealed to us, and that's it. We are blessed enough
to know the truth. We have nothing to do with it,
we have nothing to add to it, we have nothing to take away. And someday, every single person
that has ever lived and walked on this earth will know that
Christ is Lord over all. And they will bow to Him. And that is enough. If you ever think that that's
not enough, then you need to add ink to your water. You need more than Christ. Then you don't know Christ. The simplicity of Christ. And the beautiful part about
this is that we hear this truth of who He is. The simplicity of it. I mean, to know Him. To understand even
a little bit of what He is for us and what He's done for His
people. And then to sit back and go, all we have to do is
rest in that. There's nothing to add. Just be thankful. That you can
sit here and believe that. That you have the truth. You
can't be shown the truth, or you can't believe the truth without
being shown the truth first. by God. So all we can do is praise
and thank God that He made Christ, Savior, Lord and Ruler of all,
known to you. That's how involved you are in
this whole equation. You've been shown. He's been made known to you.
God has opened your heart to see the truth of who Christ is,
the simplicity of his power and glory and final work that he
has finished. And you've just been made known.
You've been, you had the lights turned on. So the simplicity truly is that
simple. And we do our best to complicate
it. And we still will. Every day. We'll deal with that
stuff. Someday we won't. Someday we'll
all, you know, one at a time, drop this stuff that we deal
with. You know, it's scary to think
about death, but at the same time, it's really not. I mean,
we get to finally get rid of all of these things that we struggle
with every day. These emotions, these thoughts,
even our personality traits. I mean, so much of our personality
is just sinful. It's just created by this lifelong
pile of sins that we've created and talked on top of each other
over and over and over, all of that. We'll finally get to let
go. and be free, and to see Him for
who He really is. No more through these eyes. No
more through this junk. To see Him for who He really
is and see that true glory. I look forward to that day. Let's pray. Jesus, we thank you for this
day. We thank you for every day. We thank you that your truth
is not hard for us to understand. We thank you, though, that as
simple as it is, we can't understand it unless you turn the light
on. So we thank you that you have,
that you've shown the truth to your people. and that none of
your people will go through this life without eventually seeing
the truth of who you are, what you've done, and how we can rest
in that. We thank you, Jesus, for being
everything we need, for being all that we need. We pray this
in your name. Amen.