Going back to John Chapter 8. John Chapter 8. I titled this
message, The Emancipation of Sinners. The Emancipation of
Sinners. Whom the Son sets free, He is
free indeed. He's free indeed. Now back in
verse 30, it says that many believed on him. Many of the Jews believed
what he was saying. It doesn't mean they believed
savingly, though I'm sure some did, and many of them did on
the day of Pentecost. But they believed what he was
saying. And our Lord said to them, because our Lord would
not have anybody fooled he said in verse 31 and 32 if you continue
in my word here's the proof of discipleship here is the proof
you are my disciples here it is if you continue in my word
my gospel my teachings which is my doctrine then are you my
disciples indeed that doesn't make you my disciples it's evident
you are my disciples if you continue in my word my gospel the truth
you continue in it then are you my disciples indeed and you shall
know the truth they didn't know much then did
they when you when god first saved
you how much do you know Not much, you didn't know any more
than someone in elementary school knows. You know, we're babes
in Christ. Everyone starts out as a babe
in Christ. But the truth of the gospel,
he's speaking of the truth of the gospel as we sit and we listen
and we hear week after week after week, and I cannot stress enough
the importance of this week after week after week, line upon line,
here a little, there a little. That's how we grow. Till we grow
in grace and in knowledge of truth. And he says, you shall
know the truth and the truth shall make you free. And he says
over in verse 36, the son shall make you free. The truth shall
make you free and the son shall make you free. And the reason
he says this is because they're one. Christ said, I am the way,
the truth and the life. I'm not just telling you some
things that are true, though he does. But he says, I am the
truth. Apart from Jesus Christ, truth
does not exist. It does not exist. He's the embodiment
of it. You know, I know some things
that are true, and I believe the truth, but I'm not the truth.
He is. He is. And he says, you'll know
the truth, and the truth will make you free. Now here in verse
33, and I'm going to come back to this toward the end of the
message. But here in verse 33, after he said this, they answered
him. We be Abraham's seed and were
never in bondage to any man. How do you say we shall be made
free? Why do you say that? I don't
know who their history teacher was, but they didn't need to
fire him. They were in bondage all the time. They were in bondage
to the Roman Empire at that time. They had to pay taxes to the
Roman Empire. You think you're free? Don't
pay your taxes. You'll see how free you really are. But they were upset. They said,
how do you, how do you say this? We were never in bondage to any
man. And our Lord in verse 34, he
tells them what true bondage is. You see, they thought because
they were not, it locked up in jail. You know, just because
you got a, you know, it's like, I got a key to my house. I got
the only key to it. You don't have a key to it, I
do. Does that make me free? No, no. You take 90, probably
95% of this whole community, the bank owns it. They don't
own it, the bank does. Just don't make the payments.
You'll see who has the key to it. But our Lord is speaking
here of true freedom. What's really free? You know,
we value freedom a lot. But yet we're not free. We're
not free. Only those whom the Son sets
free are they free indeed. And He's going to speak here
of what we're really in bondage to. And they didn't know this.
They thought because they kept some rules and regulations of
the law that they were free. They were not free. They're not
free. Our Lord says this in verse 34,
Jesus answered them, verily, verily, truly, truly, listen
to me. I'm telling you something here.
I'm telling you something. I say to you, whosoever commit
a sin is the servant of sin. Whatever you actually serve is
what you're in bondage to, what you're a slave to. Whosoever
Committed sin that is their life. That is the tenor of their life.
It's the practice of their life I know we sin. I know every believer
here knows that they sin We you know, they're sinning everything
we do because we have a sin nature in us Paul said when I would
do good evils present with me that which I would do I don't
do and that which I would not I do I know that But that doesn't
define the life of a believer That which defines the life of
a believer, first of all, is faith. You believe God, love,
love to Christ, love to the breath. And it's a godly walk. The tenor
of a believer's life is a godly walk. But he says here, those
who commiteth, this is their life. This defines them. And
people think, now listen, they think because they're not a drunk.
They're not committing sin. If they don't do what we call
vices, you're the greatest one of all is self-righteousness. Someone said this, and this is
a powerful statement concerning that young man who said, Lord,
all these I've kept from my youth up. Matthew Henry said this. He said, don't let your morality
become your undoing. Don't let your morality become
your undoing. There's a lot of nuns, and this
is a tough statement. There are a lot of nuns who declared
celibacy, and they lived their life in a nunnery, only to wind
up in hell. That's the truth, isn't it? I'm
telling you that's the truth, because that doesn't save anybody.
It's good to remain that way because the Lord said, you know,
fornication is an abomination to Him, but don't ever look at
it as salvation. We never look at anything that
we do as salvation. You know, the things that we
don't do, the things that, you know, somebody has been allowed
to go into the depths of sin, and we say we haven't, only by
God's sovereign power. Only by God's sovereign constraint
have we not done what everybody else has done, that we say we
haven't done. Only by His sovereign constraint. The wrath of man
shall praise Him and the rest He'll what? The Bible says He'll
restrain. God Almighty restrains the human
race. He restrains us. And he says here, whosoever commits
sin, he's the servant, he's in bondage to sin. And the servant
abides not in the house forever, but the son abides forever. You
see, sooner or later, the servant, you know, he's got to go, but
the son never leaves the house. That's his house. That's his
house. The servant, it's not his house.
And if you're a servant of sin, he says, you can't abide in the
house. And he says here in verse 36,
if the son therefore shall make you free. And they didn't realize
he's talking of himself. But if the son whose house are
we, if we continue in the faith, but if the son. The son of God. Therefore shall make you free,
you are free indeed, indeed, you know, that supposes that
there is a false freedom. Because what he's saying here,
you are really free. You are genuinely really free,
if the Son makes you free, which supposes a false freedom, a false hope. And I'll get to this in a little
bit. But he says here, you shall be free indeed, But I know, now
listen, he said, I know you're Abraham's seed. You're not telling
me something I don't know. We never inform God. We never
inform God. You're not telling me something
I don't know, but I know you're Abraham's seed, but listen, you
seek to kill me. He knew their heart. He knew
their heart. He knew that crowd right there
that said that many of the Jews believed on him. He knew that
crowd. in a little while would be crying,
crucify him, crucify him. He knew that same crowd would
be crying, crucify him. And here's why, because my word
hath no place in you. And that means this, it has no
entrance into you. My word doesn't enter into you.
You don't hear what I'm saying. You don't care what I'm saying.
You don't get what I'm saying. It's just like water rolling
off a duck's back. It has no entrance into you.
My word has no place in you. And here's the difference. Here's
the reason why, because there's two different parents. We have
two different parents. I speak that which I've seen
with my father. He said, what I'm telling you,
I've seen. Now you can't see something unless
you've been there. And he's talking about being in, coming from the
presence of God, the father. I speak that which I've seen
with my father, and you do that which you've seen with your father.
We have two different fathers. As I told a man one time, and
I was telling him the gospel, and he was arguing with me, and
I stopped it, and I said, here's the difference. We don't believe
the same God. We don't believe on the same
Jesus Christ. We don't believe the same gospel.
That's why we are so different. That's why our message is so
different. That's why our hope is so different. It upset him when I said that. And I wasn't being belligerent,
wasn't being mean. I'm just saying, our God is different. We have two different gods. We
have two different, we believe on two different Christ. Now
one of them's a God and one of them's not. He said here God's
my father and I speak the things which I've seen and you do that
which you've seen with your father. And they answered and said to
him Abraham is our father. He's our father and the Lord
said to him well if Abraham if you were the children of Abraham.
You would do the works of Abraham you'd walk by faith just like
Abraham Abraham believe God you'd believe God too. If Abraham were
your father, you would walk in charity. You'd walk in love.
You'd walk by faith. That's how you'd walk. If Abraham's
your father, you'd walk just like him. And you'd believe me.
You'd believe me. But here's the reason why you
want to kill me. now you seek to kill me a man has told you
the truth there's nothing there's nothing more difficult on on
this flesh on human nature than truth i tell you something else too
there's nothing more powerful there's nothing more powerful
in this world than the truth and the truth you shall know
the truth Truth about God, truth about Christ, truth about yourself,
truth about humanity. You'll know the truth. He said,
I told you the truth. You know, truth is exposing.
It'll expose and it'll reveal whether you're a child of God
or if it's just hypocrisy. Truth is revealing. It's very
revealing. I told you the truth. and you
want to kill me. I told you the truth which I
heard of God. Abraham didn't tell you this.
You didn't get this from Abraham. Abraham didn't come from heaven.
Abraham did not come from the throne of God. Abraham didn't
come into this world and then tell what he heard. You know,
Paul said, I was taken to the third heaven and I heard things,
saw things unlawful to utter. I can't even put it into words.
But our Lord was able to put it into words. because he's God. He's God. He said, I came from
there and I can, I tell you the truth and you want to kill me
for it. You take this gospel we preach
here, you take this gospel and you tell it, you tell it, and
you'll see how angry people get over it. You'll see how angry
they get over the truth. It's the truth. Oh, my soul. But he says here
in John 8, in John 8, 42. He gives. He gives evidence. Of those who love God are those
who are children of God and those who are not. Jesus said to them. God were your father you see
back in 41. He said you do the deeds of your
father They said to him we'd be brought up born of fornication
in other words. We're not bastard Jews like those
Samaritans That's who they're referring to oh We have one father
even God God's our father. You know God's not the father
of all men and women God's the father of those who are born
of God and The whole human race traces back
to Adam and Eve. God created Adam and Eve and
then all of us were born from them. But now there are some
who are born of God. God is their father. And they're
claiming God to be their father and he says, God's not your father.
That's the truth. He's telling them the truth and
it's making them mad. God's not your father. Here's the evidence. Jesus said
to them in verse 42 if God were your father here's the evidence
now listen here's the evidence if God were your father you'd
love me do you love Christ Peter do you love me ever I'd say most
everyone here believes if you're especially if you're raised up
here you believe this the gospel story you believe it but not
everyone loves jesus christ not everyone has confessed jesus
christ followed christ if you love him you'll follow him i
promise you if you love him you'll confess it he didn't ask peter if he believed
him peter believed he knew that he said peter do you love me
And he asked, Peter said, do you love me more than these?
That's the first time he asked, do you love me more than these?
You see, after the Lord had been crucified and buried, and they
didn't see him no more, you know what Peter said? This is the
one who denied him and went away wet bitterly. After that, he
said, I'm going fishing. Now, he didn't mean recreational.
I'm going back to my job. I'm going back, I'm going to
go fishing. I'm going back to what I used to do. This is over
with. This is over with. I'm going to go back to fishing.
And you know what? Several of them followed him. They said,
we're going too. Be careful who you follow now. We're going too. And the Lord met him. Met him
on that shore by himself. Peter, do you love me more than
these? Is Christ all in all to you?
Is he all in all to you? You know, my dad, he said this. And this is, you know, I understand
when you get to their age, you kind of lose some judgment. And
dad knew better than this, but he said, I can't believe you're
moving away in our old age. I can't believe you're moving
away in our old age. I said, Dad, the word of God
says, he that loves mother, father, sister, brother more than me
is not worthy of me. You know I love you, but Christ
is more. Jesus Christ is more. I love my wife, but Christ is
more. I love you, but Christ is more. Peter, do you love me more than
these? That'll be tried. Somewhere down
the road, God'll try that. If God were your father, I sketched
out a note in there, a thing about preaching on it. If God
were your father, here's the evidence of it. You'd believe
me, you'd love me, you'd hear my words, and you'd persevere.
If God's your father, this'll happen. These are evidences of
it. If God's your father. For I proceeded
forth and came from God, neither came I of myself. He sent me,
God the Father sent me. And if God were your father,
you would love me. You can't help but love me. But here's why you don't love
me. Here's why you don't believe
me. Here's why you don't follow me. Here's why you don't confess
me. Is this reason why? You can't understand what I'm
saying. You cannot understand my speech because you can't hear
my words. He said, why can you not understand
my speech? Why can you not understand the
gospel I preach? Why can you not comprehend what
I'm saying? Because you can't hear my word. You're deaf, spiritually deaf.
You don't hear a thing I'm saying. They didn't hear what he was
saying at all. now let me deal with just go
back to verse 31 and 32 and 36 put those three those together
if you continue in my word my gospel my teaching then are you
my disciples indeed and you shall know the truth and the truth
will make you free and whosoever the son shall set free he's free
indeed you who believe You've been born of God. You'll
know the truth when you hear it. You'll know the truth when
you hear it. And you'll know it by revelation.
God will make it clear to you. He'll make it known to you. You'll
say, I see, I understand. I see. And you'll know it by
experience. You know, some know the truth
by instructions. They were raised up under the
gospel. But those whom the Lord saves, they know it by revelation,
they know it by experience, they know it by application of the
Spirit of God to their heart. His Spirit witnesses with our
spirit that we are the sons of God. You'll know the truth. You'll
understand the gospel. To the Jew, the religious man,
the truth is a stumbling block. The truth of the gospel, the
doctrines of the gospel, they are stumbling blocks. Christ
is a stumbling block to the religious man that Christ in this book
is. And to the Greek, the educated
man, the worldly man, is foolishness. It's foolishness. But to you
who believe, it's the power of God. It's the power of God. Now, I want to give you some
of the effects of knowing the truth, of knowing the Lord Jesus
Christ, who is the truth and being set free, emancipated. He said, I'll set you free. Here's
what we were set. Let me just give you a few things.
These are just a few things. We are set free when the son
sets us free through the truth. We are set free from lies. set free from lies. Paul wrote in 2nd Thessalonians
2 11 and 12 and for this cause God shall send them strong delusion
that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned
who believe not the truth there's one there's one of two things
going to happen we are either going to believe the truth or
we're going to believe a lie We're not going to just believe
nothing. Nobody just believes nothing. We are going to believe
the truth and we're going to believe a lie. And the Lord sets
us free from lies. All these lies that are told
on God, all the lies that are told on Christ, all the lies
that are told on us. He sets us free from it. And
then he sets us free from the bondage of ignorance. That word means this, lacking
knowledge or comprehension of the thing specified. It's written in Ephesians 4,
17, 18, listen. This I say, therefore, and testify
in the Lord that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk,
in the vanity of their mind, having the understanding darkened,
being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance."
That's a tough word, isn't it? That's a tough word. I don't
like to be called ignorant. Spiritually, I was ignorant. Through the ignorance that is
in them because of the blindness of their heart, He removes that
ignorance by revealing Himself. He removes it by the truth. You know, the world, especially
the religious world, is ignorant of God. Just believing there
is a God doesn't mean you know God. Just believing there is
a God doesn't mean that you have an understanding of who God is. Listen to Psalm 50, verse 21. These things, this is the Lord
speaking, These things hast thou done, and I kept silence. thou
thoughtest in your imaginations in your thoughts in your meditations
that i was altogether such a one as thyself you think i'm like
you you think i'm like you you know before before the truth
comes before the lord reveals himself to us we have we have
an imagination of god That he's like us. That's the only thing
we have to work with. The only thing we have to work
with is what we know. And we think God is like us. And he says, I'm not. I'm not. In Isaiah, my thoughts are higher
than your thoughts, my ways higher than your ways. You see, we think
we, the way we think naturally is the way we think God is. And
we think he thinks like that. He doesn't. He doesn't. And this is why truth is offensive. It offends our natural way of
thinking of God. We don't think of God as being
the sovereign. We don't think of God as saving
whom He will and passing by whom He will. We don't think of God
as having the sovereign right to do as He will with His own. We don't think of God like that.
You know, the world wants to think of God as this loving,
lovey-dovey, mushy, and, you know, just wants everybody to...
That's not who God is. God is who He is. He's not who
I think He is. God is not who I think He is.
He is who He is, just like I am who I am. And you are who you
are. God is who He is. God is sovereign. God is just. God is holy. God
is good. God is love. God is merciful.
But you got to understand them as they are in Him. God's love
is a holy love. It's not like our love. It's
not like human love. It's holy love. It's on a much
higher level. Go read 1 Corinthians 13 and
you'll have some understanding of what love really is. You'll
understand something about love if God gives you light. And then listen, the world, especially
the religious world, being ignorant of God, they're ignorant of his
absolute righteousness. He says in Romans 10 3. Were
they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and he's speaking
here of God's absolute. See, here's what they're ignorant
of. God's absolute righteousness. He can't look upon sin. He cannot
let one sin go. You know, when Adam fell, we
think of him as eating the fruit. We think of the fall as eating
the fruit, don't we? He took it down there. You know when the fall really
happened? When he thought. You see, the thought of foolishness
is sin. The second Adam thought of rebelling, he thought of doing
that. As soon as that thought hit him, the fall took place. The action was just, it was the
outward evidence of what went on inside. The Lord Jesus Christ
never even had a thought of sin. When Satan tempted him in the
wilderness, he never even thought for a second of sin, of sinning,
of rebellion. He never thought of rebellion.
That's our righteousness. His perfect obedience right down
to the thought is our righteousness. They being ignorant of God's
righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness,
have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
The righteousness that God provided for sinners in Christ, they've
not submitted to it. Because if they understood the
absolute righteous demands of God, they would never try to
produce one of their own, because they'd know they couldn't do
it. You can't do it. Only Christ can do that. And
I tell you this, we can be ignorant of many things and be all right,
but we can't be ignorant of God and ignorant of his righteousness
and ignorant of his demands and be all right. Can't do it. We cannot be ignorant of Jesus
Christ, his true person and work and be all right. And then he's
delivered it. Listen, we are set free from
the bondage of superstition. We are superstitious people by
nature. Paul said there in the book of
Acts, he said, I perceive that in all things you're too superstitious.
Let me give you some meanings of superstition. It means this, a belief or a
practice resulting from ignorance, fear of the unknown, trust in
magic or chance, or a false conception of causation. It also means this,
an irrational abject attitude of mind toward the supernatural,
nature, or God, resulting from superstition. It's a notion maintained
despite evidence to the contrary. Remember over in the book of
Acts, they built an altar to the unknown
God. a superstition, just in case
we missed one. You see that the altar to the
unknown God was plan B, in case plan A, in case we're wrong,
in case we are wrong, we're plan A, here's plan B, an altar to
the unknown God, that's superstition, it's superstition, superstition,
it comes out in many ways. Does a black cat running out
in front of you bother you? Huh? It crosses a road in front
of you? If you break a mirror, you break
a mirror. Does that bother you? That's
superstition. You know what you do if you break
a mirror? You buy another one. You just go buy another one. Black cat runs out in front of
you, Just try not to run over. But it's not going to do anything
to you. People are superstitious. You know, guys play baseball,
they wear the same socks over and over and over. Like those
socks really help them. That's superstition. He delivers
us from superstition. Walk under a ladder, I walk under
it all day. You're delivered from that. He
delivers us from superstition. especially in religious things
if we don't do certain things here sometimes they call it tradition
but tradition most of the time is superstition so what it is
and then listen the sun sets is free from the bondage of satan this is a powerful statement
there in verse 44 You are of your father, the devil, and the
lust of your father you will do. Now there's two types of people
in this world. And I get this from the word
of God, not my opinion. We are either a child of God
or a child of the devil. We are either children of light
or children of darkness. We're not on neutral ground.
One or the other. That made them so mad when he
said that. No one is on neutral ground.
We're one or the other. And Satan does not want you,
you personally, to hear the truth. Because the truth sets you free.
He doesn't care if you and I become religious. He doesn't care if
we make a false profession. He doesn't care if we have a
false hope. That's his strongest deceptions. He just doesn't want
you to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ of this Bible. And here's what the strangest
is. If you would have said he's a child of the devil, or a person
was a child of the devil, you'd think of that demoniac, don't
you? That's who we naturally think of, that demoniac. We think
of some cult out there. A child of the devil is one who
will not believe God, he will not believe on Christ, though
he be ever so religious, and he will not preach the truth. He'll not preach the truth. And then here, I've got a couple
of things here and I'm gonna finish. The Son sets us free
from the bondage of the law, from its rituals and ceremonies.
We're not having any ceremonies here this morning. We're not
going through any rituals. We're not doing any hocus pocus.
He sets us free from these things. He sets us free from the curse
of the law. The soul that sinneth shall surely die. You know, that
law, that curse is still in effect. It's still in effect. You're
only emancipated from it in Jesus Christ. Only in the ark are you
not going to drown. All outside the ark drowned.
I can't be more plain than this. The curse of the law is a very
real curse. And it's on everyone, on everyone
who believes not on the Lord Jesus Christ. says in Galatians 3 13 Christ
hath redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse
for us rich written curse is everyone that hangeth on a tree boy i tell you what i the longer
i live and i thank god i've lived long enough to realize that all
this belongs to jesus christ and all of this is going to glorify
jesus christ And I want to be, I want to be in Christ. I want
to be found in him. As Paul said, I want to be found
in him. I don't, as I've told you several times before, I was
a machinist having the machining business and owned a business
for 25 years. That knowledge is worthless.
Sooner or later, the knowledge you have in acquiring will be
totally worthless in this world. But the knowledge we have in
Christ, Paul calls it excellent knowledge. Excellent. Now I know we have to, I know
we have to be educated and I know we have to learn. We have to,
we have, we need that for a career to pay our bills. I used to say
make a living, but I don't like to call it making a living anymore.
You're either living or you're dead. You're either alive in Christ
or you're dead. What you do, you make money to pay your bills.
and you can have some comfort. But when you die, you're penniless,
and that's over with. And the only thing that matters
is my relationship to Christ. At the end of the day, that's
what really matters. If you did as many funerals as
I did, as I have, I think you'd realize it more than you do,
because you're standing there by a casket. 14 of them in the
last six years. You stand there by a casket,
you're really, I'm really laying at the heart. I'm speaking to
the crowd that's there. This person is, this person's
gone from this earth forever. That's what makes doing what
I'm doing right now so serious. This is so serious. But our Lord
sets us free from the bondage and curse of the law. He sets
us free from the bondage of sin, that sin nature. Brethren, we
serve, until the Lord saves us, we serve that sin nature. It
reigns in us like a king. It whistles when we come. It
brings us to our knees. Man drinks iniquity like water.
One day the Lord gives him life, and he's like, ooh, that stuff
is awful. You don't have a taste for it no more. You have a taste
for Christ. To have a taste for Christ is
to have a real taste for freedom, to really be free. I know we're
not free from the presence of sin or the presence of Satan.
He still molested us. There are some things that we're
free, but we're not completely free from until we die. But we
are free from the bondage of sin, that old sin nature. It
doesn't reign no more. It's not our master. It's not
our master. He says in verse 34, Jesus answered
them, Verily, verily, I say to you, whosoever commits sin, he's
a servant of sin, but you're not the servant of sin no more.
Listen to these three verses. Here in Romans 6, 14. For sin
shall not have dominion over you. That sin nature will not
have dominion over you. You're not under the law, you're
under grace. Romans 6 17, but God bethanked
that you were the servants of sin. I'm not I don't serve sin.
Oh, yes you do if you don't know Christ if you're not in Christ,
you're the servant of sin I Guarantee you got sins. You
don't want nobody know about you're the servant of The reason
the reason is two things reason I think more than this but that
Sinners won't come to Christ number one self-righteousness.
They don't need him Secondly, there's a sin they don't want
to drop. There's something they don't want to give up. And they
believe coming to Christ, they got to give it up. You were the servants of sin,
but you have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine,
which was delivered you. And then Romans 6, 22, but now
being made free from sin, not from its presence, not from sinning,
but from the guilt and power of it. from the condemning power
of it. And then the sun sets you free
from the fear of man. You don't fear what men will
do to you now. You have a right fear of God. Then it sets you
free, last of all, listen, last of all, it sets you free from
the fear of death. Fear of death. Now, people generally
are not, they're not walking around scared death is gonna
die, but when it comes time to die, that fear grips them. I've seen it, I've seen it. I've
seen people in the hospital, I've seen it grip them. The reality of death is right
in their face. I've seen the fear of it. I've
seen it. But the believer, We've been
delivered from the fear of it. It's just a door into glory. The grave is nothing more than
a door into glory. It's the passage. It's part of
the journey home. Dying is part of the journey
home. And death to the believer is the end of dying. You see,
death to the unbeliever is death. It's the death of all things.
And it's an eternal death. But for the believer, it's the
end of dying. I'm not dying no more. Death
has put an end to that. O death, where's thy sting? O
grave, where's thy victory? If the Son sets you free, if
He emancipates you, you are free indeed. You really are free.
You really are. All right.