Let's go right back to that passage
that he read to us here in Matthew chapter 7. We see four things here in these
verses that Harry read to us. In verses 13 and 14, we see our
Lord's great command. In verses 15 through verse 20, we see our Lord's cautionary
words as a command. He has caution. Verses 21 through
23, we see our Lord's condemnation. He pronounces words of condemnation
upon those who look to their works for their salvation. And then beginning at verse 24
through the end, we see our Lord draws a comparison. Wise builders
and foolish builders. So here we have a command, we
have a caution, we have a condemnation, and we have a comparison. Let me go immediately into the
text here and see if Spirit of God will enable me to break it
down for you and present it to you as warnings from the lips
of our master. Never a man spake like this man. The very last verse of this chapter
talks about how people were astonished at his doctrine. Oh, God, give
us ears to hear what the master has to say, and give us hearts
that are receptive unto his words. In verses 13 and 14, we see a
command and a warning about following, following a crowd. He says, Ye in at the straight
gate. That is not an invitation. That is a command. Enter ye in at the straight gate. Now, in Luke, hold your place
here and look at Luke 13. Our Lord uses very similar in
Luke chapter 13 and verse 24. And I want you to just look at
this, remembering what I just read there in Matthew 7. Look
at Luke chapter 13 and verse 24. Our Savior is preaching, he was
a preacher. One of the first things written
of him by Mark is he went forth preaching the gospel. Our Lord
was a gospel preacher. And he said in verse 24, Luke
13, he says, strive to enter in at the straight gate. He says, for many, I say in you,
will seek to enter in and shall not be able. Now, I wonder what
brought about this. instructions that he gave to
his disciples. Well, look at verse 23. And we're
not at all lost as to the reason that he mentioned this again.
Then said one of them, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them, the subject
is salvation. Are there just a few who are
going to enjoy salvation? Just a few who will be saved?
And then our Lord proceeds to give this command to enter in
at the straight gate. So go back to Matthew chapter
seven. His subject there in Luke is
salvation. And that's a subject that really
lots of people are interested in, at least on the surface. All over America and a good bit
of the world and so-called evangelical circles, people were asked this
morning, do you want to be saved? Well, I want to be saved. But
there are all kinds of people that say they want to be saved,
because everybody's got a different definition of what it means to
be saved. Jailer said in Acts chapter 16
to Paul and Silas, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And he's not talking about merely,
I want to know what to do to escape going to hell. I want
to be saved. To be saved is to be delivered. It's to be delivered from this
terrible thing of sin. And not merely the penalty of
sin, but we want to be saved from sin itself, don't we? Won't
it be a blessed day when all the effects of sin that we experience
and that plagues us all the time. Won't it be a blissful day when
we won't know anything about sin anymore? Be gone. That'd
be salvation. So we want to be saved from the
power of sin, the penalty of sin, and ultimately the presence
of sin. It's deliverance, and it's deliverance
by the power of the grace of God. Because nowhere in this
book is salvation ever attributed to ourselves. You can't save
yourself. You can't deliver yourself from
the evil of sin. You can't deliver yourself from
the bondage of Satan. You can't deliver yourself. You
can't rescue yourself. You can't save yourself from
all the consequences of sin. Our Lord is talking about salvation. And the way of salvation is to
enter in at the straight gate. The word straight includes narrow,
that which is a confining space. You see, to enter into salvation,
you enter in the straight gate, who is Christ our Savior, who
is the way, the truth, and the life. Remember the master said
in John chapter 10, I am the door, by me if any man enter
in, he shall be, what's the next word? Saved, and shall go in
and out and find pasture. Here's the command of our Lord
Jesus, enter ye in at the straight gate. And then he mentions another
gate. There's another gate that is,
why? It's broad. The wide gate leads
to broad way. But that broad way leadeth to
destruction. It always does. And the word here which is truly
brings chills up my spine is the word many. Many. Many there be which go in there
at. Many. You're not one of the many,
are you? Oh God, make me to be among the
few, the few who are mentioned in the next verse. Because straight
is the gate, narrow is the gate. And by the way, that word straight
also includes the idea of that which is fixed and established. From old eternity, God has fixed
that way into salvation. It's a new and living way by
Christ Jesus, the substitute of sinners, the sacrifice of
God's own appointment. He's a way to God. He's a way
to heaven. He's a way to salvation. He's
a way to forgiveness. He's a way to righteousness.
He's the way. He said, I am the way. It's a
personal way. Somebody is the way. And our
Lord says, now enter ye in at the straight gate, because straight is the gate
and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life. Now
this narrow, this straight gate and this narrow way, it's so
narrow there's no room for you plus anything else. Your baggage can't go in with
you. Your Bible reading can't go in
with you. Your church attendance can't
go in with you. Armor against God can't go in
with you either. Your enmity against God can't
go in with you. The Spirit of God has got to
strip you down. He's got to bring us to the point
that we're just naked before God. We have no hope. Lord, I'm coming to you and I'm
bringing nothing. was a top lady who said, nothing
in my hands I bring. Simply to thy cross I cling. Naked, come to thee for dress. Helpless, look to thee for rest. Foul, foul I to the fountain
fly. Wash me, Savior, or I die. Do you ever get on your mind
some song and you can't get it off your mind? You know, for
years, I was in Arminianism, and some reason, the other day,
I got this song on my mind. Must I go empty-handed? Must I meet the Savior's soul? Not one soul with which to meet
him. Must I empty-handed go? That's
the only way to go is empty handed. Nothing. Nothing. What would you give him? What
would you present him? Oh God, help me to come before
you as a helpless sinner and enter into the straight gate
in through and by the Lord Jesus Christ. He is that narrow, that
straight gate, that narrow way that leads to life everlasting. He's the one himself who said,
I'm the door, I'm the way, and there is no other door, and there
is no other way. If you want an end to life, everlasting
life, he's the way. Few there be that find it. And
of this much you may be sure, you'll never find it till the
way is revealed to you. You see, the way is set forth
in the scriptures. All the Bible is about Christ
who is the way. He's the way to God. Our Lord
Jesus, His sacrifice, He's the way. His bloody death, He's the
way. His substitutionary work, He's
the way. There is no other way. But He
has to be revealed to you. He has to be shown to you. I began the message this morning
from Revelation 1.1, the revelation of Jesus Christ. He must be disclosed
to you by the Spirit of truth. Otherwise, you'll never find
the way. You see, all of us by nature, if we're left to our
own wills, if we're left to our own ways, if we're left to our
own ideas, we will perish just as sure as shooting. None are saved due to their own
will. We're saved due to the will of
God. It's His will that makes the
difference. Oh God, do not leave me to my
will. Because if you leave me to my
will, I know from the scriptures which set me forth in my own
depravity, if God leaves me to my own will, I will just follow
with the crowd. The broad road that leads to
destruction. And I want to remind you that
our Lord Jesus, he's not speaking to the profane and the druggers
and the drunkards and the harlots. He's talking to religious people.
Consider who his audience is. He's preaching to a bunch of
religious folks. And he says, here's my command
to you. Enter ye in at the straight gate.
The straight gate. And then, look, the next thing,
the next little section here, verses 15 through 19, here's
a caution to seekers. And it's a warning about false
prophets. He says, beware of false prophets. which come to you in sheep's
clothing, but inwardly they're ravening wolves." Now this wolf
here, this false prophet, he's not a mere hypocrite. Because a hypocrite is a goat
amongst the sheep. That's a hypocrite. But this
is what a false prophet is. He's a wolf. And he's disguised as a sheep
and as an under shepherd. And the wolf, you see a goat
can do a little bit of damage, but he can't do the kind of damage
that a wolf can do. Hold your place here and look
over at Acts chapter 20. This is one of the things that
burdened the heart of Paul. And he mentions this to the Ephesian
elders. Look what he says here in Acts
chapter 20 and verse 28. He's got the elders of the church
together. And he says to them, take heed
therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over the which
the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers or guardians to feed
the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood. For I know this, that after my
departing shall grievous, savage, Vicious wolves enter in among
you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall
men arise, speaking perverse things to draw away disciples
after them. The warning is of wolves, of
wolves. Goats are bad, wolves are worse. And our Lord over here, when
he's speaking to all of these people, he says, now beware,
beware of false prophets. He likens these false prophets
to wolves because they devour and destroy. He likens them also
to thorns and thistles. They hurt people. They do damage. And he also likens them to corrupt
trees. They produce bad fruit, and they
can't produce good fruit. And in the end, these bad trees,
he's gonna cut them down, because he didn't plant them anyway.
They're not of his own planting. You see, a false preacher or
a false prophet, he comes as a minister of Jesus, but he's
a minister of another Jesus. He comes as a preacher of righteousness,
but he's a preacher of man's righteousness. He comes as one
who sets forth the gospel, but he sets forth another gospel.
which is not the gospel of Christ. He comes as a beacon of light, but he is a preacher of darkness,
of error. He comes as one who would lead
you to life, but in reality he comes to lead you to death. False prophets. A false prophet
doesn't announce that he is one. He doesn't come in and show his
teeth and say, I'm a wolf. He's nice. He's very polite,
usually. People like him. Preachers don't get very far
if people don't like them at all. So a false prophet comes
in and he's a nice guy. Our preacher's so nice. A lady
one time told me of her pastor, said he ain't much of a preacher,
but he's the nicest pastor we've ever had. He visits everybody. Nice guy. This wolf comes in, he seems
as gentle as a sheep. He seems like he's mild-mannered
and he's peaceful. But if God would give us understanding
of the ruthlessness of these wolves, they come in to devour. They come in to destroy. They
come in to wreak havoc and cause damage. And there are many wolves
in this world on the prowl. You see them on television. You
hear them on the radio. They build big works. They have
huge followings. But our Lord said, beloved, believe
not every spirit. But he said, try the spirits,
whether they are of God. because many false prophets have
gone out into the world who confess not that Jesus Christ has come
in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. In 2 Corinthians 2.17, Paul says,
for we're not as many which corrupt the word of God, but as of sincerity,
but as of God in the sight of God preach we. In 2 Corinthians
chapter 11, he talks about the ministers of righteousness that
Satan has sent out, but they're not the ministers of God's righteousness. They're not the ministers of
Christ's righteousness. They're not the ministers of
imputed righteousness. They're the ministers who say
you produce your own righteousness. And the righteousness that you
produce, make sure you hear me very clearly. The righteousness
you produce is just soiled, nasty, dirty, filthy rags. And God detests them. There is
but one righteousness that God approves of. And that is the
righteousness of our Lord Jesus Christ, that righteousness which
is his innately, and that righteousness which by his obedience unto death,
even the death of the cross, he established for all of his
people. And we stand before God right
now in the imputed beauties and glories and righteousness of
the Lord Jesus Christ. These wolves, they prey on people. on the unsuspecting. We say,
well, how can a false prophet be identified? Well, not by his
profession. That's not how you identify.
Because he professes to know Christ. You can't identify by
his great zeal. Paul said of the folks there
in Romans chapter 10, he said, they have a zeal of God, but
not according to knowledge. I'd say when the Apostle Paul,
before he was converted, when we know him as Saul of Tarsus,
when he went around destroying the church as best he could and
arresting people and taking them in before the high priest and
then having them either stoned or put in prison or maybe murdered. I'd say he had a zeal there. Zeal is not the measure of truth. Zeal is not the measure of a
true prophet of God. Truth, truth is the measure. How does a man measure up according
to the word of God? If they speak not according to
this book, is what Isaiah said, there's no light in them. I don't
care how nice they are, and how kind they are, and how sweet
they are, and everybody in the community loves them. I heard
of a preacher here not too long ago, how so many people honored
him and spoke well of him. Beware when all men speak well
of you. We have a message that honors
God. We're not interested in being
honored ourselves. We have a message that debases
man. And we have a message that exalts
the Lord Jesus Christ and His work of redemption. We're not
trying to win friends and influence people. And if we're trying to
build the biggest church, we ain't doing such a good job.
That's not our goal. Our goal is to set forth our
Lord in truth as he's left us a record that stands forever,
Christ our Savior. Well, how can you know? How can
you know who these false prophets are? Well, I'd say by two ways,
their creed and their converts. Their creed, what's that? Their
doctrine, what they preach. Just listen to what they preach.
And you know, true preachers of the gospel preach salvation
by grace alone in all capital letters. Without any works. We preach God's purpose of grace. We preach God's purchase of grace. We preach God's powerful grace. We preach grace that is successful. Not grace that's trying to do
something for you and it needs your help, it needs your final
approval to really get the job done. That's not grace. That's
grace ruined by works. True grace is the message all
of God, all in Christ Jesus and none of you. addition we put into this salvation. Remember, this is about salvation
here. I'll tell you what the true prophet
of God does. Number one, he puts God in his
rightful place. We can't put him there, but we
set him forth as being there. Sovereign, holy, all powerful,
gracious, righteous, just, the sovereign ruler of heaven and
earth, the one whose will is carried out everywhere at all
times. He's held forth in the scriptures
as the hater of sin and the lover of righteousness. He's so holy
he can't spare the guilty. He's the God of electing grace. If you know Him, if you believe
Him, if you love Him, you love Him in the fullness of His character
for who He is. Now I'll tell you, God's true
prophets, God's true preachers put man in his rightful place.
Depraved, diseased, dead, defiled, and disinterested. I had the
privilege of visiting with Brother Al last Thursday. And we talked about a number
of things. About his service, when we have
his funeral service. He said, put me down in the mud.
That's what he said. Put me down in the mud. Exalt my savior, that's what
he said. I'll tell you what, we deserve
to be in the mud. Thank God he lifted us up out
of the miry clay and set our feet upon the rock, Christ Jesus. Preach man in his rightful place.
That's what a true prophet does. And a true preacher puts Christ
in his rightful place. He's the son of God, absolutely. But he's also the covenant head
of his people. He's the surety. He's the savior. He earned the title of savior. By living and dying, laying down
his life, suffering all the hell that God had toward his own elect
and who were covered with sin, Christ bore all of our hell for
us in his own heart and in his soul. He was the suitable substitute,
the successful savior. He's the mediator of the everlasting
covenant of grace. And these things I've said about
we put God in his rightful place and man in his rightful place
and Christ in his rightful place, the false prophet says just the
opposite. He makes salvation dependent
upon you. Have a false creed. You be like
the Bereans and search the scriptures. Whoever you're listening to,
listening to me, Bill, Ron, whoever you happen to be listening to,
Television preacher, radio preacher, whoever it is, take them to the
Word of God. Take their message to the Word
of God. And it better match up. If it
doesn't match up, you're wasting your time listening to them.
And for goodness sakes, don't send them a dime. If you contribute
to their lives, I kind of feel like you're going to be with
them when they perish. I have no sympathy for them. They are of their father the
devil, and the works of their father they will do. That's what
the Savior said. Their creed is wrong. But you
can also judge them by their converts, because like produces
like. As the child is more or less
reproduced, or as the parent is more or less reproduced in
the child, so the false prophet is more or less reproduced in
his convert. The result of their labor is
their converts. You see, a true prophet, a true
preacher of the gospel, his message is salvation by grace, salvation
by God. If you believe the message of
God's true preacher, you're believing the gospel. Bill and I, we're true Messengers
of God. Listen, I gladly open up my sermons
to scrutiny according to the Word of God. If what I'm saying is wrong,
somebody tell me. If you can take the Word of God
in its context and show me I'm wrong, please do it. But I ain't wrong. Well, you think you've got the
truth and nobody else does. Well, you know, that's kind of
right. That's the way it is up your
way, isn't it, Al? You got the truth. If what we're saying is right,
and it is, then what everybody else around here, as far as I
know, is wrong. And if I'm a true preacher of
the gospel, and they're not saying the same thing that I say, that
comes right out of the word of God, that salvation's of the
Lord, they're in trouble and their congregations are in trouble. God has blessed us with the truth. And we're not shamed. And I know,
years ago, when I was learning about sovereign
grace, I had a preacher came and visited Nancy and me. And
we had a little apartment back then. And he said, you're fixing to
ruin your ministry if you keep going down this road. And he was a trustee of the college
that I went to. He said, we've got big, big plans
for you. That sounds exciting, doesn't
it? But he said, you're going to
ruin everything if you keep going down this road. You'll never
amount to anything, he said. Well. I'm not really interested
in amounting to anything because I'm nothing anyhow. And I don't
think nothing can amount to anything. But my goal, God is my witness,
has never been to build a big work, build buildings, build
numerical break numerical attendance records and things like that.
My goal is just to be honest with people and be honest before
God. I'm not trying to please men.
You're not trying to please men. I know you're not trying to please
men. Paul said, if I try to please men, I'm not a servant of God. I want a clear conscience before
God. I can go home and go to sleep
at night because I know this, I have unburdened my soul in
preaching the truth of the free and sovereign grace of God to
sinners. I can sleep on that. I sleep
pretty good, too. We got one of them sleep number
beds, and Nancy, in the morning, she looked at it and said, boy,
you slept real good last night. I usually do. once I finally
get to sleep. Converts. Here's the third thing
quickly. So remember, beware of false
prophets. They're dangerous. And there's nothing worse that
I can think of than a counterfeit preacher. And we have a mess of them around
us. Thirdly, here's condemnation and warning about thinking that
you have eternal life based upon what you've done. That's the
problem here. He gets to it beginning in verse
21 through 23. He says, not everyone that saith
unto me, Lord, Lord, But there are people who say, I see them
on television, they're waving their hands, Lord, Lord. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. I watched a
little bit of a service yesterday. Somebody asked me to listen to
it. People waving their hands. I wouldn't call into question
their sincerity. But it was just empty, useless,
dead religion. That's all it is. He says, Not everyone that saith
unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven. Now,
wait a minute now. I say, Lord, Lord, don't you? So he says, not everyone that
says that shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that
doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. And the revealed
will of the Father which is in heaven is to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. The revealed will of the Lord
is in verse 13, enter ye in by the straight gate. It's not do
some work that you can brag about. It's entering into the Kingdom
of God through this compressed, narrow gate that leads to a narrow
way, and it's a fixed way, fixed from all eternity. Christ Jesus
Himself. It's He that doeth the will of
my Father which is in heaven. And here's this word many again.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied
in thy name and in thy name have cast out devils and in thy name
have done many wonderful works. That's doxology, that's a trilogy. I've done this, I've done that,
I've done something else. And then will I profess unto
them, here's the problem. I never knew you. I never loved you. Depart from me ye that work iniquity. See, the scripture says, the
Lord knoweth them that are his. Christ said, my sheep hear my
voice and I know them and they follow me. Our Lord said to Israel, which
is a type of the church, you only have I known of all the
nations of the earth. Savior said, I don't know you. They're professing what they
did. You know what is so glaring to me? What's so glaring to me, the
absence of this, it just shouts volumes to me. They didn't say,
you died for me. They didn't say, save me by your
grace. Lord, you're my only hope. They
bragging on what they did. That's the sure route to hell
right there. You go ahead and you see that's
that baggage. You ain't going in with all that
baggage now. See, the Lord, He draws a picture. The day of judgment. The sea
has given up the dead which is in them. And everybody's gathered
there at the judgment. And since the Father has turned
all judgment over to the Son of God, He's the judge. And here these people, when they
died, they went to hell, but there's been a mistake made.
It needs to be corrected. And they faced the judge. And
they say, wait a minute. We prophesied it. We preached
in your name. We preached Jesus. And we cast out devils. The devil
of drunkenness. The devil of being a drug addict. The devil of prostitution. The devil of loose living. We
cast it out of people. We've done many wonderful works.
We built hospitals. We fed the hungry. We took in
the homeless. We've done all these things.
Look what we've done. That's what they professed. But their profession means nothing.
He professes, and what he professes is absolutely accurate. I never
knew you. Get out of my sight. Last thing, and I gotta go quick
here. Our Lord makes a comparison,
and he warns against building on the wrong foundation. See,
really, this is kind of the culmination of this whole section. Remember,
this is the conclusion in Sermon on the Mount. Here are two builders. Both felt the need of having
a house, a refuge. They both are aware of the impending
danger of storms. One built his house on the rock.
The other built his house on the sand. One looked to Christ only and
said, he's my hope. On Christ the solid rock I stand,
all other ground is sinking sand. The other one says, you know,
I've done a lot for the Lord. God knows I've been faithful.
I've prayed. I've cried over people. I've
tried to win souls for Jesus. I've done this, I've done that. Well, you go ahead and build
on that kind of foundation. Let me tell you something. God's
gonna send a storm the likes of which this world had never
seen. And there are gonna be storms along the way in life,
and it's a good possibility those will blow your house down. But
if your house seems to withstand all the turmoil and trials of
life, there's a bigger storm brewing. The clouds are thickening. And someday a destroying storm
is what you're gonna have to face at the judgment. And that judgment's gonna sweep
everybody away who's not built on the rock. That's not hard
to understand, is it? Pretty simple. Build on a sure foundation. Christ our Lord, he's the rock. I know that I picked out another
song for us to sing right now. God leads us along, but I want
to erase that. Not permanently, but just closing
this service, and I want to sing 272.