I believe it clearly speaks of
Christ and his love. Now I'll have you turn to 1 Timothy
chapter 1. I want to pick up our studies there in a moment. A portion to you from Matthew. One of the Pharisees,
a lawyer, asked Christ a question, trying to tempt him, trying to
catch him up in his words. And he said this, he asked this,
Which is the great commandment in the law? And Jesus said unto him, Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul,
with all thy mind. He's quoting that from Deuteronomy
6, verse 5. This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself. On these two commandments hang
all the law and the prophets." Now look at 1 Timothy chapter
1 with me, verse 5. This is where we will pick up
this morning. 1 Timothy 1 verse 5 says, Now
the end of the commandments is charity. The word charity is
love. No one will argue that. Love. What he's saying here is the
end, or that is the point aimed at, the end, the point that is
aimed at, the purpose of the law, is love. Now what law is he talking about?
I believe he's talking about the moral law chiefly, turn with
me there to Exodus chapter 20. Now, have your Bibles ready this
morning. I'll have you turn several places. As I've said so many times, I
don't want to just tell you what I think. I only seek to deliver
unto you what God says from his word. And in Exodus 20, Nearly
everyone in here, down to the smallest child, could quote or
at least paraphrase these ten commandments or the moral law. And what Paul is saying, and
first to Timothy, is that the conclusion of the law is love. And what our Lord said there
to that Pharisee was, love is the fulfillment of the law. All
the law, the moral law, love to God. You're going to see love
to God in the first four commandments and love to man is concluded
in the next six. Let's read them. Verse three,
Exodus 20, thou shalt have no other gods before me. Verse four, thou shalt not make
unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that
is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that
is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself
to them, nor serve them, for I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children
under the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, showing
mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments.
Commandment number three, verse seven, thou shalt not take the
name of thy Lord God in vain. The Lord will not hold him guiltless
that taketh his name in vain. Verse eight, remember the Sabbath
day to keep it holy. Now those four commandments could
be summed up in love to God. If you love God supremely, you
have no other God before you. He alone will be the object of
your love and affection, your worship, and so forth. You'll
not make any grave an image. Not at all. Verse 7, you'll not
take the name of the Lord your God in vain. No, he's too holy. He's too righteous. He's too
lovely. His name is too dear to you. And the Sabbath day, Christ,
our Sabbath, you will believe his son. You will rest in his
son and him alone. And that is to show the ultimate
love for God Almighty, to believe His Son, who is the Lord our
Sabbath, who is our rest. All right, now verse 13, the
fifth commandment, Thou shalt not kill. Now he's talking about
men, men, man. Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness
against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not covet. My neighbor's house, thou shalt
not covet thy neighbor's wife, or his manservant, his maidservant,
his ox, his ass, or anything that is thy neighbor's. So you
see, verse twelve, I missed that, sorry. Honor thy father and thy
mother. So you see, the last six commandments deal with our
love to man. You see that? If you love as you should, love your fellow
man, you will honor your father and your mother. You will not
kill. You will not commit adultery against someone you love. You'll
not steal that that they have. You'll not bear false witness
or lie against someone you love. You'll not covet and so forth.
You see that? That's what he's talking about.
All right? Now back to the text in 1 Timothy. Now, nobody can
keep this law perfectly, can you? We've broken every one of
those points, every one of them. But that does not eliminate God
from requiring us to do so, does it? No. God and his law is settled in
heaven. It does not eliminate us from
the authority of that law, nor the command to keep it. I beg
to differ with men who say that we are not This law does not
apply to us. We're still not to have any other
god before us, or take his name in vain, and so forth, and not
to kill, and so forth. That's absurd to even have to
debate that, isn't it? God's authority is still very
much over us in this respect. It's still in force, and we're
to keep it. All right? But not to be saved
by. Don't think for a minute that
if you live up to these things best you can, that God will accept
you. That's self-righteousness, the
Scripture says. We're only accepted, the only
way we're accepted with God is by Christ coming down here and
living that law perfectly for us. See, God requires perfection. God requires not that we just be here in church on Sunday and
pretend to worship. He requires we worship the Lord
God, love Him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. Can anybody in here say they've
done that? No. Christ could, didn't He? Yeah,
he said, I do always those things which please my Heavenly Father.
Why? Because I love the Heavenly Father. So our obedience to the
law is not good enough, never will be. Christ is. His obedience was good enough.
The Father looked down from heaven, saw a man who'd kept that law
perfectly, and said, now there's a man I approve of. And the only
way he approves of you is if you come to that man and say,
Lord, would you make that mine? Would you make your obedience
mine? Do you understand what I'm saying there? Did you follow
me? The Bible calls that righteousness imputed or charged to our account. And that God Almighty takes what
Christ did, and for all those that believe Christ, he makes
it look like they're the ones that did it. That's good news,
isn't it? And anybody that's ever seen
that and believed that will never go about to establish their own.
They'll realize it's not good enough. Right? And they'll only
appeal, they'll only look to Christ. Only look to Christ. Our obedience to the law is not
good enough. God requires that we think perfect thoughts and
speak perfect words. You know, every idle word the
Scripture says, a man shall be held accountable for every idle
word. Thy thy words thou shalt be justified or condemned. How
would you like to be held? How would you like for God Almighty
to stand you up before Him someday and say, now we're going to try
you on every word that's come out of your mouth, every thought
you've thought? You wouldn't even want these
people in here to know what you thought this morning, let alone
all of your life. Would you? God sees. God knows. Well, how on earth, then, is
God going to accept us in Christ? He sees us in Christ. That's
the only way. Covers us in the blood of Christ.
All right? Now, the essence of the law,
though, is love. Love. Love to God, first and
foremost, and love to man. which God writes on the tables
of his people's heart. Not everybody. Everybody doesn't
have that. That's what we read over there, and I'm sure that
many people read in 1 John, the things we were reading, with
some confusion. He that loveth is born of God. And you look
out there and you think you see some people that love, you know.
Or he that says Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And you
say, well, there's a lot of people that claim that. Well, it goes
a little deeper than that. And that's what we're going to
talk about this morning. Love, the true essence of the law.
OK, now let's look at it here in 1 Timothy 5, verse 1. He says,
Now the end of the commandment, the goal of the commandment is
love, love to God and love to your fellow man. Now look at
the next phrase, out of a pure heart. a pure heart. Is your heart pure? Hmm? He says that's the end of
the commandments, what God absolutely requires of everybody, a pure
heart. Proverbs 28 says this, who can
say I've made my heart clean, I'm pure from my sin? Nobody. Christ's the only one that could
say that, too, wasn't he? The only one. He had clean hands
and a pure heart. He's the only one that could
say that. Who can say, I've made my heart clean, I'm pure from
my sin? Nobody. Christ's the only man
that ever lived that could say that. Jeremiah 17 and 9 says
this, the heart, the natural heart, is deceitful. Above all
things, desperately wicked, and who can know Him? Who can know
Him? But, now listen to me. Listen
carefully. God requires a pure heart. He says here in Ezekiel 36, He
says, a new heart will I give you. All that comes to God by
Christ in faith he gives a new heart. A new heart will I give
you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will take away
that old deceitful stony heart. Don't you all ever quote that
verse in Jeremiah 17 9 in reference to yourself if you're a believer.
It doesn't apply to a believer. The heart of a believer is not
deceitful. He's got a new heart. The scriptures are not confused
here. There is a principle of sin that troubles you, but know
ye not your own selves, that Christ is in you? The Lord asked
Peter, Do you love me? Do you know your heart? 1 John
chapter 3 says, Hereby shall we assure our hearts before him. God says, A new heart will I
give you. And this is what I was talking about earlier. We're
going to separate the sheep from the goats here this morning. The
Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than a two-edged
sword. It's able to pierce and to divide asunder the very thoughts
and intents of the heart. He said, A new heart will I give
you, and we need to be troubled if we do not feel as though we
have something of this new heart within us. A new spirit will
I put within you, I'll take away the stony heart, or stony heart
out of your flesh, and I'll give you a heart of flesh. A heart
of flesh. You know what? You ladies have
been in surgery, or any of you have seen an actual heart of
a human being. It's such a delicate thing, isn't
it? It's a fragile thing. A fragile thing. I wonder, I
wonder why doctors don't consider this. What makes that thing keep
popping? Huh? You ever wondered how a
heart surgeon could look at that and not believe in God Almighty?
What is making this do this? Disconnect the battery, would
you? It just pumps for years. How many millions of times does
it just pump, just pump, just keep pumping until God says quit
pumping? God said start pumping when the baby was in the mama's
womb, and He says when He's ready to take that soul back, stop
pumping. But this heart of flesh is such
a fragile little thing, such a tender little thing. You just
barely cut it with a knife or you got trouble. It's a tender
thing. A heart can be easily broken.
Easily broken. That's a heart of flesh. A new
heart, easily broken. By what? The Word of God. The Word of God. That's what
breaks the heart. A heart, a soft heart, tender,
sensitive, touched, moved, warm. A living heart that pumps is
warm. It's not cold. Feel of it. It's 98.6 degrees, isn't it,
Jenny? Or if not hotter, it's warm. Soft. It's receptive. A new heart is
receptive heart, repentant, believing. Now we're in 1 Peter, I want
you to turn there, 1 Peter chapter 1. He describes this pure heart,
1 Peter chapter 1, verse 22, 1 Peter 1. This pure heart is
purified, first of all, purified by faith in Christ. That's how
hearts made pure. We sing that song. What's the
title of that song? With hearts made pure and garments white
and Christ enthroned within. Cleansing stream. I see, I see. That's it. Hearts made pure. How do you make your, how does
the heart made pure? We make it pure. Clean up our lives,
you know. We quit eating fatty foods. Clean
up our arteries. I know what it's talking about.
Talking about a spiritual heart. And that's made It's made pure
by faith in Christ, and that's the work of the Spirit. Look
at 1 Peter 1, verse 22. He says here, seeing you have
purified your souls in obeying the truth. How? You just up and decide, accept
Jesus, and all of a sudden you were born again, you know? No,
through the Spirit. through the Spirit. A man can
receive nothing except to be given to him from above. You
have to be given a new heart, don't you, John? Given a new
heart. And that's the Holy Spirit that
does that. And he purifies the soul, makes it holy and righteous
before God Almighty by grace, are you saying? By grace you
make pure, holy, unblameable, unreprovable in God a pure heart. and a new heart and regenerated
by God's Holy Spirit. You see, I don't want to make
this too familiar or flippant, but the Holy Spirit is, as it
were, that physician who operates on this heart and does a transplant. The Holy Spirit. What man have
you ever seen go into an operating room and say, I've decided to
get me a new heart, and sit there on the table and proceed to operate
on himself? You say, that's absurd. That's
what people are saying in religion today. And God says, no, a new
heart I will give you. This must take place, though.
You must be born again. This old, corrupt, sinful heart
has to be taken out and a new heart given, one that beats for
God, beats for Christ. And it'll never
quit beating. Never quit beating. God's the one that gave it. It's
the life that comes from Him Himself. And He'll never die. And neither will you. With His
new heart. And now look at this, verse 22
there in 1 Peter. He says, now, this is the Spirit
that does this. Obey, you obey the truth through
the Holy Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren. Now see
that you do that. See, we do have that. We do have a new heart within
it. We do love the bread of it, not nearly as we ought to. My
little daughter is just as much, has all of the faculties to be
a woman that she could possibly have, right? But she's not a
woman yet. And part of my responsibility
is to see that she, that things take place in her life that cause
her to grow up to be a woman, make her responsible and so forth.
And God Almighty says this over and over to us. See that you
do it. See that you do it. See that you do. You do love
the brethren. If you don't, you're not born of God. If you don't
love that person sitting beside you, a brother, sister in Christ,
you're not born of God. That's what we just read, wasn't
it? And he says, but he reminds us now to see that you do it
fervently. You know what the word fervently
means? Actively. Fervent. When you're fervent
about something, you're active. You're always about it. See that
you do it. Actively. Actively. Unto unfeigned love
of the brethren. Unfeigned. Real, genuine, sincere,
heartfelt love. Okay? Is that love within you?
Huh? Is that love within you? Not
imperfection. No, it's not within anybody.
Me, chiefly. It's not in us to perfection.
It better be there in principle. All right? And I quote it over
and over again, Know ye not your own selves? And Peter said, See
that ye do this, love one another. See, the love of God is shed
abroad in the heart, and God Almighty is the one that has
to give that. But love has to be nurtured. Love has to be nurtured. Love
to God has to be nurtured even. Even though it's there, you have
to nurture it. How do you do that? By being
about the things of God. Love to others has to be nurtured.
How do you do that? By being around them. The old
saying is to know Him is to love Him. It certainly applies to
God, doesn't it? You really know him, you love
him, and it certainly applies to your brother, too. You're
not going to love anybody unless you get to know them and really
appreciate them. I know there's an old saying
that says absence makes the heart grow fonder. That's not true
in spiritual things. That's not true in spiritual
things. Absence makes the heart grow
colder in spiritual things. Absence from God, absence from
his people. Scott Richardson once said this.
I'll never forget that message he preached on love. And he said,
one mark of true love is this. True love desires to be with
the one it loves. I'll tell you, there's no way
you can fake that, is there? No way. True love desires to
be with the one you love. God said to the church over there,
He said, You've left your first love. Where are you? Claim to
love me the most? Doesn't appear that way at times. Well, for all those who truly
love God and love Christ and His gospel and love His brethren,
they must be about their father's business. I'm not bragging here at all. I'm just telling you. I'm just
opening up my heart to you. And I hope you can say the same
thing. My soul, I hope you can say this.
I'm not here because I have to be here. It is a duty. It is my reasonable
service. It's the duty of every child
of God to worship God. But I'm not here because I have
to be here. I'm here because I want to be
here. I want to be here. Those that love God are about
their Father's business. Where did you find Christ every
Sabbath day, hmm? He was in the temple, worshiping
with the people of God, wasn't he? Sure he was. And like I said,
now this is going to separate true worshipers from the false.
Let's read back there where I read in 1 John 4, OK? Let's read that
again in case you didn't follow along too carefully. 1 John 4,
look at verse 10 with me. Keep your place there in 1 Timothy.
1 John 4, 10 says this, Herein
is love, not that we love God. Nobody just decides to love God.
God has to make them love Him. We love sin. We love self, don't
we? But God makes us love him. He
loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation, a bloody,
bloody sacrifice for our sin. Beloved, if God so loved us,
we ought also to love one another. In other words, if God loves
such a maggot as we are, a maggot as we are, if God came
down to be amongst filthy, wretched, vile creatures like we are. Can't
we just rub shoulders with our own? Can't we learn to love our
own? No man, verse 12, has seen God
at any time. Nobody in here has seen God at
any time. If we love one another, God dwells
in us, and His love is perfected in us. Do you see that? Prove you love God. How can you?
Christ said, this is how all men will know you're my disciple.
You have love one to another. Look at verses 19 through 21.
We love him. Why do we love him? You say you
love God. You've got to be able to say that. The reason you hesitate
to say it is because you feel hypocrisy. You know how there
are times when you don't feel like you do. You've got to know
this. You've got to know this. We love
him, though, only because he first loved us. Now, if any man
say, I love God and hate with his brother, he's a liar. He
that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how is he going
to love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have
we from him, that he who loves God love his brother also. Now,
look at Hebrews with me. No, I want you to turn back to
1 Timothy first and look at another phrase there in 1 Timothy, then
turn to Hebrews 9. But in our text, 1 Timothy 1,
verse 5, it says, Now love is the end of the commandment out
of a pure heart, love out of a pure heart, and, for that is
an insincerity and in a believing heart, and of a good conscience. a good conscience? Do you have
a good conscience? Well, these are tough questions,
aren't they, this morning? Do you love God and love your
brother? Do you have a pure heart? Do you have a good conscience?
Those are tough questions, aren't they? a good conscience? Well,
let's look over here at Hebrews 9, then. Hebrews 9. You know what Paul said? Paul
the apostle said, Brethren, in Hebrews 13, he said, We trust
that we have a good conscience in all things. Now, he wasn't just talking like
one of these religious fellows today. He was He says, My conscience
bears me witness. The Holy Spirit bears me witness.
My conscience. He said, We trust that we have
a good conscience in all things. What is a good conscience, then?
What is a good conscience? Hebrews 9, verse 14. Hebrews 9. How much more shall
the blood of Christ, who through eternal Spirit, Holy Spirit,
offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience
from dead works to serve the living God. Now, the first thing
in a good conscience, the first thing you have to have in order
to have a good conscience is a conscience that's purged from
dead works to serve the living God. Dead works, or that is a
conscience who does not have dead works of religion that it
is looking to, and depending upon, and trusting in, and bragging
about, and self-righteous concerning, but a conscience that's totally
looking to the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ
alone. Listen to this. In Titus—or Jude, I'm sorry,
Jude. to it wrong. In Jude, he describes
three types of people who have evil consciences. Conscience
has been seared, and he says there's people that, like Cain,
they've gone the way of Cain. Well, that is, people who are
being religious, trying to be accepted by God by what they
do. You know the story. Cain raised him in a little garden,
and he thought, well, surely the Lord will be satisfied with
this. No blood of the blood. And God's got to provide a land
you'll have anything to do with it. That's right. And then he
talked about people who go after the error of Balaam. Now it's
all talking about works. Stay with. Balaam you know who
Balaam was. He was a double minded man who
Balaam was. He looked real religious at times
and other times he was as wicked as they come. But Balaam was
in that thing more than anything. He was in that thing for money. What he could get out of it.
Are you in this thing? Are you here this morning? Is it so you can get to heaven?
It better not be. That's Balaam. That's a conscience
full of dead work. And then he talked about those
who perished in the gainsaying of Korah. For that is those who
were desirous of recognition. Recognition. Korah and the fellas
said to Moses, you take too much on you. We can preach as good
as you can. Maybe you can. That's not the point. That's
not the point. But a good conscience, back to
the text, a good conscience loves and believes God because he is
God. A good conscience wants God for
who he is, not what they can get out of him. A good conscience
is in this thing, and I emphasize, is in this thing, to know God,
to win Christ, to be found in him. Not to be found in heaven,
but to be found in Christ, because they've seen Him as He is. All
out, all out, sincerely seeking. Paul said over in Romans 9, he
said, My conscience bears me witness before God Almighty,
before the Holy Spirit. I say the truth. I have great
heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart, continual sorrow
in my heart. Why? Paul said, I wish that I
could be a church from Christ for my brethren. So a good conscience,
first of all, doesn't look to anything about itself. It looks
to Christ and Christ alone. That's a good conscience. A good
conscience. Who worships God because he's God. Who's in this
thing, and I mean in this thing, committed. Not for what he can
get out of it, but for who he can get out of it. And secondly,
a good conscience loves the brethren. Why? Because the love of God
is shed abroad in their heart. I've tried to talk about this
before. The only reason you could give
for me loving an old, unlovely fellow like Henry Sword. Now,
Henry, I'm going to take that personally. I think you're very
lovely now. You don't, do you? You know yourself. And I know
something about what a scoundrel you are. And you and me, why
would we love one another? We wouldn't be associating together
right now if this wasn't for this, would we? Not at all. I'd be out there with my old
cronies and you'd be with yours. The love of God has to be shared
at heart for the brethren. And this is evidence by thinking
of the brethren, praying for them, desiring to be with them,
doing for them. You can't fake this. You can't fight this. It's either
the hurt or it isn't. Do you see how serious this is?
It's either the hurt or it isn't. You either love the world and
the things of the world, and rather be with the world and
the things of the world, or you love God. You can't have both. A double-minded man is unstable
in all his ways. He said in that same chapter,
he said, if any man loves the world and the things of the world,
the love of the Father is not in him. You see what it says, John? I'm not making this up, am I?
You see how this is going to cut right down the middle of
true religionists and false? I'm here this morning because
I want to be here, by the grace of God. I believe the love he
shared, the love of God, his love. I only love God because
I wasn't seeking God. I'm not taking a bit of credit
for that. I'm just telling you like it is. That's what Paul
said in Hebrews 13a. I trust that I have a good conscience
in all things. Yeah. And anybody who really
loves God does so. Because God put that love there,
and it must be there. Somebody just said, yeah, out
of that. It's true. It's true. If it's not there,
you don't know God. So, love of the brethren. Love of the brethren. You remember
what the law said, Romans, Exodus 20, 12 through 17? Love of the
brethren. Love fulfills that. Love fulfills
that. Now look at the text again, 1
Timothy 1. 1 Timothy 1, verse 5 says, and
you know, I ought to stay right there. I ought to just stay right
there until we finally come to the conclusion. Do I or do I
not have this with me? Lord, decide this doubtful case
for me. Decide it. Do I love the world? Is the world and the things of
the world uppermost in my mind, heart, and affection, or the
things of God? You remember that quote by that
fellow? There's nothing that reveals
an unregenerate heart more than to have the things of this world
uppermost in our mind, our heart, our thoughts, and our affection.
Nothing reveals it like that. If any man loves the world, the
things of the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
How much, how many times do we have to hear that? And I hope
that will so prick our hearts. It will cause us to go home and
get in the closet and not come out of there until we decide
this doubtful case. Lord God, would you tell me,
would you please prick this old heart of mine? That, Lord, I
just don't know. Who I love the most. Would you
please decide this for me? I'm not coming out of this closet
until you tell me. Because the word is serious.
Do I love the Lord or no? Now, here in the text, it says
a good conscience. I meant to show you that, but
you'll have to take my word for it. It said that in 1 John. Hereby
we shall assure our hearts before God. It says that in chapter
3. Verse 19, little children, let us not love in word, neither
in tongue, but in deed and in truth. Hereby we know that we
are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before God. If our
heart condemn us, God is greater than our hearts. He knows all
things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then we have
some confidence toward God, a good conscience. That says here in 1 Timothy 1,
verse 5, it says, a good conscience and faith unfeigned. Faith unfeigned. Wait a minute,
and I'll say something you can say amen to. Faith unfeigned. You know what
that's talking about? You know what that means? It
means you ain't freaking what you believe. Now, are you talking about hitting
down where the rubber meets the road? This one verse will flat
split our confession right down the middle of it. It'll lay us
open before God Almighty. Faith unfeigned. Faith unfeigned. Look at verse 19. Holding faith and a good conscience. Look at chapter 3, verse 9. Holding
the mystery of the faith and a good conscience. Look at chapter
4, verse 12. Let no man despise your youth.
Be an example to the believers in word, in conversation, in
love, in spirit, in faith, in purity. And on and on it goes
as two other references to faith and love and pure heart and a
good conscience. Faith, unfaked, unfaked. You ain't faking this thing.
Are you faking this thing? Am I faking this thing? I'm not
preaching that to you. Am I faking this thing? I've
got a confession to make. And many times I've had, I have,
faked this thing. But in all good conscience before
God Almighty, the general tenor of my life and my heart, I'm
not faking this thing. You've got to know that. You've got to know that. John
says it over and over in the Word. Hereby we know. We know.
We know. We know. We know, doesn't he?
We know. I counted that one time. How
many times he said, we know. How do you know? Hereby we may
know. The truth and assure our hearts before God. Faith unfaithful. Are you faking this thing? Do you have a true, sincere,
heartfelt faith and need for the Lord Jesus Christ? God help us to ask that. God
help us to ask that. It talks about those who call
on the Lord out of a pure heart. God won't hear anybody that sins
sincere. God doesn't hear any insincere
prayers. You know that? He said these people draw near
with their lips and their hearts on the roast beef in the oven.
It's on the ball game. It's on the new car or whatever,
you know. He said these people draw near
with their lips and their hearts are far from Him. The Lord will not hear an insincere
prayer. There are people who love in
word only. And true faith in Christ. Now here's what I'm saying
here. He mentioned love. They're both inseparably connected. You cannot have one without the
other. You'll not love your brethren. You'll not love God without faith
in Christ. You know which comes first? Faith in Christ comes
first. How about his faith? and love. Faith comes first, faith in Christ,
and that produces a love for Christ. Don't get too upset if
you don't feel like you love Christ as much as you ought to,
but I tell you this, you better know whether or not you do love
Him. I'll quote it again. No, you're
not your own self, brethren. How that Christ be in you, except
you be. Somebody quote the next word.
Except you be what? Reprobate. That is, having a
mind that's void of judgment. Peter, do you love me? Now, Peter
had just denied the Lord three times and went out and wept bitterly.
He was a most distraught man. If anybody felt like he was unsaved,
Peter did at that time, didn't he? Peter said, you know, in that
big act of religion of his, Terry? Yeah, they may leave you, but
not me. Who was the only one that spoke
out in open denial of Christ? Who was the only one? Peter. And if anybody's feeling like
a reprobate and apostate and a lost man, it was Peter about
that time, wasn't it? When the command came, you go
tell the disciples and Peter. Boy, that's sweet words, wasn't
it, to Peter. And Peter, you go tell that old rotten scoundrel. He didn't say that, but that's
what he was. You go tell old Stan, that old rotten, wretched,
unbelieving denier of Christ. You've done it, haven't you,
Stan? Just like Peter. But you go tell and Stan and Peter. And what did Peter do? I ain't
going up there. I've been a bunch of hypocrites,
and I'm a hypocrite, and I don't believe." No, he came to Christ. See, in spite of all the times
that he had, you know, miserably failed, in spite of that worst
failure of all, in spite of denying our Lord three times
like that, and going out and weeping bitterly, and I thought,
I bet he thought about killing himself like Judas did. He heard
about what happened to Judas, and he thought, I know better
than he is. Where's the rope? I guarantee you Peter taught
that. But when he got back to the Lord, what happened? You
remember the story, don't you? John 21, the Lord said, Peter,
do you love me or not? What did Peter say? I just don't
know. I really don't sometimes feel like it sometimes at all.
Did he say that? What did he say? Yes, Lord. I don't know which side of that. Yay, Lord. Asked him three times
to remind him of what he'd done. He denied him three times. He'd
have to ask us that 103,000 times, wouldn't he? But every time,
we'd better be able to say, Oh, yes, Lord, but I sure don't act
like it all the time. But you know. You put it here. You see? He cannot deny himself. If we believe not, yet he abideth
faith. He cannot deny himself. Barbara,
he cannot refuse that which he has provided. We love God. Why? Because we first loved God.
And he shared of all this love in his heart. Yes, Lord. Thou
knowest. Thou knowest. Unfeigned faith, real sincere
faith that says, God is holy, sovereign, just, and I know it.
If I got what was coming to me, I'd go to hell. I had a fellow
tell me that one time at work, Joe. A fellow said, I was talking
to him about the gospel, and he said, oh, I know, he said,
if I died right now, I'd go to hell. He didn't no more believe
that in the man in the moon, or else he'd be sitting there
and trembling, asking me, what, sir, what must I do to be saved? I want to go to hell. Wouldn't
he? If he really believed that? Well,
I believe that, and why am I not trembling? Because I'm holding
on to somebody. And I have asked, and I keep
asking, what must I do to be saved? I haven't arrived yet,
Paul said. But I apprehend that for which
I've been apprehended. Keep coming, keep hanging, denying,
yeah, but I keep coming back. Yes, Lord, You know I love You.
Sincere, unfeigned faith. Jesus Christ is the only Savior,
my only righteousness. Surely shall one say that. There's
not many more, though, is there? I know people say the name Jehovah
Sidkenoo, you know? Jehovah Witnesses, I'm sure they
know that name by heart. You reckon they believe Jesus
Christ is their only righteousness? Well, no, they don't even worship
Him as the Son of God. They don't need His righteousness.
They think going door to door will establish their righteousness.
But those who really believe Christ see Him and know Him,
and surely, shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness.
If I'm to stand before this holy God, Christ has got to stand
right in front of me, between me and a holy God, right? Only
man can't break that, Joe. He can't break that. That self-righteousness
will come out sometime or another. It will come out. You ask him to pray, it might
come out then. You know that will never come
out in the prayers of a believer. Never. You know, that Pharisee,
he prayed thus with himself. What about all that he'd done?
The publican prayed to God. And what was the sum of his whole
prayer? God, be merciful to me, a sinner. Be a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ,
have mercy on me. God, be merciful to me, the sinner.
And then the Holy Spirit of God, that's pure faith, unfeigned
faith. You can't fake that. That's the
reason we, you can fake, you know, get in the spirit of emotion
and all that, come down in front. People that do that, they have
to fake it from that day forward, don't they? They have to fake
it from that day forward. I remember when I was 12 years
old, I'm not not even going to get anywhere near getting through
my notes here. When I was 12 years old, I made
a profession of faith. I had some kind of experience,
an emotional experience, I remember, and that my father was preaching.
The truth was being proclaimed, the gospel. And I've told you
before, I could argue the doctrines of grace at an early age. And
you must know the truth. You must know the true gospel.
But I came running down the aisle one day, Susan Stapleman, the
same time. at the same time. Her name was
Thompson then. And one other, I forget who else it was, but
there was two or three of us young people. Susan was 13, I
was 12, and came running down the aisle, and I remember sitting,
like it was yesterday. Who's 12 in here? Somebody close
to 12, anyway, maybe one of the young men, Luke, or somebody
close to that age. But I remember sitting down on the front row,
and my dad sat down beside me, and he didn't say a thing. I
wish he had. I wish he'd have said everything
for me. That's what soul winners do today, you know. You know
you're a sinner, don't you? Yeah. And you know you believe Christ,
don't you? Yeah. Now you're saying, am I? Yeah,
you are. He didn't say anything. I was crying like a baby. And
all I could blurt out was, I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner. Jesus
Christ, He's my Savior. I know He is. And you know it
wasn't a week later. Now here I was, I came down the
aisle just bubbling and, you know, sobbing and snotting. It
wasn't a week later, we had a Bible conference. And one of the preachers
came up to me and put his arm around me and he said, hey, he
said, I think he said congratulations or something like that. And I
heard the good news. I heard the good news. And I
said, what are you talking about? You see? I had to ask him, what
are you talking about? Congratulations, what are you
talking about? Well, I heard you were made a
professional. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I did, didn't I? And my
life just soon after that revealed that that was a one-night stand.
A one-night stand. And I soon left the gospel, the
Leona gospel. I thought you made a professional
faith. I did, that's all it was. about twenty-one years old when
it started to work. They don't tell me where it finished,
because it hadn't finished yet. About twenty-one years old, I
started coming back to church for all the wrong reasons, and
I don't want to blame the best people that come to church because
they're supposed to. I'm just glad you're here. I
am glad that our children, I'm glad parents make them come.
They wouldn't hear the gospel otherwise. But I started coming
back having my eye on a little gal. I didn't have my eye on
Christ. I had my eye on a little gal. And I said, when I was 18, I
said, I'm going to come back to that little gal. And I did.
And I got her. Boy, she got a bad deal. But
anyway, I started coming back to church. Now, did I come there of my own
free will? Yeah. But the Lord intended it for
the foundation of the world. I didn't want what I got. I wanted
her. I didn't want what else I got. I was having a big old
time, you know, doing what I said. I was in good standing with Mom
and Dad, you know. They thought, well, I cut my
hair, Steve. Shaved my beard. Nothing wrong
with the beard. But, nevertheless, it got me
a good job. Started settling down. Looked
real good. Come to the church. Sunday morning,
you know, everything's just all happy. And one day I heard it. I was listening, wasn't looking
for it, but I heard it.