Let's open the scriptures to
the book of Matthew. At least to begin with, Matthew
chapter 17. Matthew chapter 17. And then we're going to make
our way over to the book of John once again. John 8. We'll be
going there after we visit the 17th chapter of Matthew for just
a little bit. Our Lord Jesus never backed away,
never backed off from any spiritual truth. Even if it offended those
to whom He was speaking, He never sought to avoid any offense. If the Word of God, if the Gospel
of God's grace, if it offended Those to whom he was speaking,
well, it just had to offend them. But on those other occasions, that
is, those occasions when he spoke of things that were, well, not
of any spiritual consequence, He did avoid offense. He avoided offense. In other
words, if it's a scriptural issue, he dealt with it no matter what
the reaction was of those to whom he spoke, and of course
he reads everybody's thoughts, he knows everybody's hearts,
he knew whether men would receive the truth or reject the truth,
but that didn't keep him from setting forth the truth of who
God is, man's own sinfulness, the gospel of His grace. But
when He's dealing with other things, speaking about other
things or other matters that have no everlasting or spiritual
consequence, He avoided offense. That is evident here in Matthew
chapter 17. Look at verse 24. Matthew 17, 24, when they were
come to Capernaum, they that received the tribute money came
to Peter and they said, doth your master pay tribute? Now this is not giving a tribute
to the government of Rome. It isn't giving it to Caesar.
This is actually kind of a temple tax. That's what this is. You can go back and read of it
in Exodus chapter 30 on some occasion if you like, but every
male who was above the age of 20 had to give a half a shekel. That was like a tax or a tribute
that they had to give for the upkeep of the temple. This was
required of all the men, and so here's the issue. There's
not the Roman government, not publicans, not tax collectors,
but there were those who were in authority sitting outside
a synagogue, and they were collecting money for a temple tax. Actually, if you go back in Exodus
chapter 30, it's really a ransom that had to be paid. As you read
that scripture back in Exodus chapter 30, you'll find that
the rich didn't, they didn't pay more, and those who didn't
have very much, those who were poor, they didn't give less. Everybody had to pay the same.
It's a ransom price. And that pictures redemption
by the blood of the Lord Jesus. It pictures the ransom of His
people by His substitutionary sacrifice on the cross. What
did it take to redeem us? Not corruptible things, as Peter
says in 1 Peter 1, such as silver or gold. He specifically mentions
those there in 1 Peter 1. He says, you were redeemed in
the precious blood of the Lord Jesus, the Lamb of God, who was
without blemish and without spot, ordained to do that before the
foundation of the world. And so here is our Lord and Peter,
and they go most likely to the house where Peter lived. And as they were going there,
they go by the synagogue. or wherever it was that they
collected this. Maybe even they came to the door
of Peter's house, but they said this, they said this to Simon
Peter, does your master pay the ransom price? Does he pay the
temple tax? And verse number 25, he said,
yes. Yes, he does. And when he was
coming to the house, the Lord Jesus already inside the house,
it says Jesus prevented him. In other words, before Simon
Peter could say anything about it, The Lord brought this issue
up because He already knows. He knows all things. He read. He read Peter's mind and knew
Peter's heart. He knew of the conversation that
had taken place outside of Peter's dwelling place. And so He asks
him, He says, What do you think, Simon? He says, Of whom do the
kings of the earth take custom or tribute? Of their own children
or of strangers? And Peter said to him of strangers,
Jesus said unto him, then unto the children, children are free. That is, children don't have
to pay a tax. Our Lord Jesus, He wasn't obligated
to pay this tax, because it was a tax to keep up that house,
which was His Father's house. He's in the family, so is Simon
Peter. He's one of the people of God,
The Savior said this in verse 27, notwithstanding, lest we should offend them. In other words, He says to Simon
Peter, let's avoid any kind of confrontation here. Am I obligated
to pay this ransom money? No. Are you obligated to pay
it? No. This isn't an issue of any
everlasting value. This isn't either here nor there. So he said, we don't want to
offend them. We don't want to offend them.
So he says, you go down to the sea, cast a hook, take up the
fish that first comes up, and when you've opened his mouth,
thou shalt find a piece of money. You take that and you give it
unto them. for me and for you. You see, when it comes to issues
that are, let's say, indifferent, indifferent issues, got nothing
to do with spiritual things, got nothing to do with the Scriptures,
got nothing to do with those things which are of everlasting
value, our Lord Jesus says, confrontation because there's nothing else
that is the issue except the things of God. That's what he's
saying. So he said, Let's don't offend
them, Simon Peter. There's no question about the
fact that the people who tried to collect the money or came
to collect the money, they would have been members of the Judaistic
religion, Judaism. And they believed in salvation
by works. And they all did, unless they
were saved by God's free grace. But that's not the issue in this
situation. This is a matter of, and I'll
use the word again, indifference. It doesn't have anything to do
with heaven. It doesn't have anything to do with eternity.
It doesn't have anything to do with salvation. In other words,
this isn't worth taking a stand over, Peter. And I would say to you and me,
there's lots of things in this world that we might feel very,
very strongly about. We got, you know, we got, well,
this is my viewpoint on it. And you come across somebody
else who's got a different viewpoint on that, avoid the offense. Unless it's a spiritual matter. That's what our Lord is teaching
us here. Avoid the offense unless it's
of spiritual importance. In other words, don't offend
anybody over inconsequential matters. Don't take a life and
death stance over anything except the truths of this book. I think
that's what the teaching is. That's what our Lord sets forth.
We don't want to be offensive. We don't want to be offensive
over things that are of no spiritual consequence. By example, our Lord Jesus, He
teaches us, as it were, to sort of bend over backwards to just
keep from offending people. You don't want to be an offense
to people over things that are Don't have anything to do with
the gospel. Don't have anything to do with the Word of God. And
it may be something that we feel very strongly about. But as far
as the Word of God is concerned, it doesn't matter. It doesn't
matter. It has nothing to do with who
God is. Got nothing to do with man's
depravity. It's got nothing to do with how
God saves sinners. It's got nothing to do with the
veracity of the Word of God, the truthfulness of God's Book.
Got nothing to do with that? Well, then don't take a life
and death stand on it. Because you may offend somebody
to such an extent, when you want to speak to them about things
that are really important, you've built a barrier. You've built
a wall. You've already put an obstacle
up and they say, I'm not going to listen to that guy because
he believes thus and so or he has strong feelings about this
and I disagree with him totally. Don't make little things to be
big things. That's it. You know, you've heard
that expression, don't make a mountain out of a molehill. Well, I tell
you, most of the things that people argue about today and
disagree about today, as far as the things of God are concerned,
they're just little mole hills. Now, if you want to talk about
the gospel, how God saves lost sinners, you want to talk about
God's electing grace, You want to talk about this book? The
authority of this book? You want to talk about man's
condition? Our awful condition before God? The fall of man? Man's alienation
from a holy God? You want to talk about the only
way of salvation? Through the death of the Savior,
by His sacrifice, by His blood. Now those are issues to take
a stand over. Those are life and death issues. But these other things, just
be careful. Be careful. It's just not worth stirring
up an offense over many things. There's a verse in 1 Corinthians
chapter 10 verse 32, Give none offense, either to the Jews,
nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God. There's lots of
things. Just let them go. Let them go. And you know, look, our Lord
said, look over in Matthew 22. Here's another occasion. Look
at Matthew 22. Look at verse 15. Matthew 22,
15. Then went the Pharisees. Matthew 22, 15. Then went the
Pharisees. They took counsel how they might
entangle Him in His talk. And they sent unto him their
disciples with the Herodians, saying, Master, we know that
thou art true and teachest the way of God in truth. Neither
carest thou for any man, for thou regardest not the person
of man. You tell us, therefore, what
thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute
to Caesar or not?" Here's another inconsequential issue. And they
want to make a big fuss over it. Of course, they want to catch
him in his words. But Jesus, he perceived their
wickedness, and he said to them, why do you tempt me, you hypocrites? He said, show me the tribute
money. They brought unto him a penny.
He said unto them, whose is this image in this superscription?
They said unto him, Caesars. Then he said unto them, Render
therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto
God the things which are God's. When they heard these words,
they marveled, and left him, and went their way. Because they
were expecting him to take a stand. You see, most any Jew would say,
I don't want to pay taxes to Rome. Now this is the Roman government
that they're talking about collecting taxes. And just about any self-respecting
Jew would say, hey, I don't want to pay Caesar one dime. Our Lord says, we'll render to
Caesar the things that are Caesar's. In other words, this isn't the
issue. It's not something to get all
up in the air about. So by example, our Lord Jesus
teaches us that if there's any way, avoid the offense. Having said that, however, when it came to spiritual matters,
It came to the issue of denouncing error. He stood up for the truth. Never backed down. Never diluted
it. Never watered it down. Never
sort of took a step back from the issue of whatever spiritual
issue it was, lest he offend people. No sir, he never backed
up one bit. And you better not back up either.
Not when it comes to the gospel. If it's something that isn't,
it really isn't important. It has no eternal value. Walk
on eggshells. These things, they don't matter.
These inconsequential things, who cares, really, ultimately? When it comes to the things of
God, you better care. You better care about these things.
Our Lord Jesus, He didn't avoid being offensive on these things.
Look over at John chapter 6. Look at John chapter 6. I'll tell you this, when it comes to dealing with
people, Indeed, we have to be as wise as serpents and we need
to be as harmless as doves, don't we? You've just got to be careful
that you don't get sucked into a war or a battle that doesn't
need to be fought. Here's the war. The war is over
what is the truth and what is error. Now, there's something
to go to war over. Those things that have to do
with the gospel. And then false religion. If people have got to be offended,
they will have to be offended because we are going to stick
with the Scriptures, sovereign grace. God's free grace to the
undeserving through the Lord Jesus? Our miserable, awful condition,
our inability to do anything for ourselves, stand up and say,
free will is wrong! It's wrong! Salvation by works
is not according to the Scriptures! It's all of grace. Grace in the
beginning, grace in the middle, grace in the end. And if you
don't believe salvation by grace, you don't know God, I'll pray
for you. Don't back up on these things.
Don't walk on eggshells when it comes to that. Look here in John chapter 6.
And we've gone through John chapter 6. Our Lord Jesus, He set forth
Himself as the breath of life. He said, I'm the bread that came
down from heaven. There's a division on account
of it. He said, all that the Father giveth me, they shall
come to me, and him that cometh to me. I'll in no wise cast out
him. They got upset. He said, no man can come to Me
except the Father which has sent Me. Draw him, and I'll raise
him up the last day. That's what the Savior said.
And then some of them got so upset. Verse 60, many therefore
of His disciples, John 6, 60, when they heard this said, this
is a hard thing. This is so offensive to us. This is so intolerable. I'm not
going to tolerate this kind of teaching. That's what they're
saying. This is a hard saying or doctrine. That's what the
word saying is or doctrine. You say, I don't think anybody
ought to harp on doctrine. How can you set forth the Lord
Jesus without setting forth His teaching? You just can't do it. They said, this doctrine is so
offensive. Yes, it is. It's offensive to
the natural man. It's offensive to the flesh. But He didn't hold anything back. When Jesus knew in Himself, 61,
that His disciples, His followers, His pupils, His students, that
they murmured, that they grumbled, literally, that they grumbled
at what He had said. He said unto them, does this
offend you? He didn't say, I'm apologetic
that I offended you. I sure am sorry I said something
you didn't like. He didn't say, well, this is
really This is really a non-issue. This is inconsequential. No,
no, no, no! This is very consequential! This
is vital! This is the very truth of God's
Word! This is the revelation of God! He just said, does this
offend you? He said, what if you shall see the
Son of Man ascend up where He was before? Ascend up by way
of a bloody tree! Go back to where I came from.
The Father sent me. I'm going back to the Father,
having finished the work that He gave me to do. Is that going
to offend you?" He said, it's the spirit that quickeneth the
flesh, profiteth nothing. The words. Listen to what He
says. The words. The words that I speak,
their spirit, their life. Why do you folks always harp
on the Word of God, people say? Why do you always read the Scriptures?
Because the words that He speaks, their spirit, their life, there's
no life anywhere else. We're begotten by the Word of
Truth. There's life in this book. The
Spirit of God takes the Word of God. He creates life within
us. So if it offends you, I'll just ask God to make it
non-offensive to you. To where you'll say, you know
what, it is the truth. Because when somebody sets a
sharp edge of the Gospel, that's what cuts. That's what cuts. That's what you use. We use the
sword of the spirit. You take a knife, you pull a
knife out, and it's dull. I was slicing some tomatoes last
night. One of those knives that you
gave me, boy, I tell you, it'd just go right through those tomatoes
like that. But you take a dull knife and try to go through a
tomato, it just mashes it. Don't take the sharpness of the
sword of the Spirit off it. Try to blunt the edge, dull the
edge. It won't cut! Set it forth in
its purity, just as it is, just as God said it. And I'll tell
you what, He can cut with it if He's of a mind to. He can
cut all the way to your heart. All the way. He says in verse 64, but there's
some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning
who they were that believed not, who would betray him. He said,
therefore, I said unto you that no man can come unto me except
it were given to him of my father. Go back to Matthew chapter 15.
Look at Matthew chapter 15. Our Lord Jesus, He's preaching. He's in Jerusalem. Verse number
10, He called the multitudes. You folks come in now, I want
to talk to you. Everybody kind of close in here
a little bit. He said to them, hear and understand. Not that which goeth into the
mouth defileth a man, that which comes out of the mouth. That's
what defiles a man. Then his disciples, they came,
kind of pulled him aside, you know, and said, knowest thou
that the Pharisees were offended? Lord, you've offended the Pharisees,
these religious leaders. Boy, you've said something that
you've hurt their feelings. This is contrary to what they
believe. Want to back up on this just a little bit? You know, it's like some people say,
I think sometimes you guys are just too tough. You're too hard. I think most of the time we're
not hard enough. Tell you what, it's a narrow
way, isn't it? It's not a broad way, is it? It's not a broad way that leads
to life. It's a broad way that leads to
destruction. and many there be that go in
there at. It's a narrow way that leads
to life everlasting. Narrow. We go through that way
one by one and it's not enough room for you and your baggage
of self-righteousness. You got to check that at the
door. That baggage of self-righteousness, it's got to come off. That backpack
of self-righteousness that you've been carrying around, it's got
to go. It's a narrow way that leads to life everlasting. It's
narrow. I tell you, this gospel now, it is of such a nature that it is the gospel. It is
singular. There's no room for anything.
There isn't another gospel. There aren't many gospels. It's
not the Baptist gospel and the Catholic gospel and the Methodist
gospel. It's God's gospel. It's God's
gospel. The gospel of the gracious God. Well, they were offended, but
He answered and said. He didn't say, well, I'm sorry. I guess I went too far. No, He
didn't say that. He had said every plant which
my heavenly Father hath not planted should be rooted up. These Pharisees,
I tell you what they are, they're plants that my Father hadn't
planted. He's going to root them up someday. Leave them alone. Just let them
alone. They be blind, leaders of the
blind. And if the blind leave the blind,
both shall fall in the ditch. Peter said to him, would you
tell us what you're talking about? Would you tell us this parable?
Give us an understanding of it. Jesus said, are you also without
understanding? Don't you understand that whatsoever
entereth in at the mouth goes into the belly? It's cast out
of the draft. Those things which proceed out
of the mouth, they come forth from right here in the heart. They defile the man. In other
words, the defilement's already in you. In fact, you come into this world
with that defilement in here. That's the reason you don't have
to teach kids to lie. You don't have to teach kids
to steal. You don't have to teach kids to misbehave. They already
know those things. How do they know those things? Same way you knew them. They inherited it from you and
you from your father and your father from his father go all
the way back to Adam. He says, for out of the heart
proceed evil thoughts, and murders, and adulteries, and fornications,
and thefts, and false witness, and blasphemies. These are the
things which defile a man but to eat with unwashed hands. That
doesn't defile a man. We don't set out to offend anybody. Over to John 8. We don't set
out to offend anybody. I hope everybody receives a message.
Those of you who are watching, I hope you believe the truth
of the Gospel. But if you don't, if you don't,
we're not going to take it easy on you. I think you ought to
make it more palatable. I can't make it more palatable.
I tell you, it's mighty palatable to me. Here is what the psalmist
said, Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. I tell you,
it is good to me. This gospel is good for me. It tastes good, the message of
grace alone, in Christ Jesus alone, revealed in the Word of
God alone, by the power of the Spirit alone. That tastes mighty
good to me. Doesn't it taste good to you? But you take a natural man who
is used to eating the briars of the world, Used to eating
the thorny stuff that he's getting from his pulpit? He just doesn't want this. I
tell you, God's going to have to change our taste buds. That's
what He has to do. To where it's not offensive to
us. Here in John chapter 8. Our Lord Jesus, He makes this
statement in verse number 12. He said, I am the light of the
world. I am the light of the world. Don't you think he knew what
the reaction would be to that? He knew the hearts of these Pharisees. He knew how vile they were. How
hard-hearted they were. And he knew that when he said,
I am the light of the world, it's like, He just lit the fuse. He did! It just tore them up! But he didn't back down. No,
not at all. And I tell you, there's a very
intense confrontation and conflict It's set forth in the rest of
John chapter 8. He said, I'm the light. I'm the light of the world. And
I'll tell you what the light did. It exposed their intention
to murder Him. Look at verse 39. Verses 39 and
40. They answered and said unto Him,
Abraham is our father. Jesus said unto them, if you
were Abraham's children, you'd do the works of Abraham. But
now you seek to kill Me, a man who's told you the truth. You
see, He's the Light. I am the Light of the world.
And the Light exposed their intention to murder Him. And the Light exposed the reason
why they wanted to murder Him, and the reason why they didn't
believe what He had to say. Look at verse 43. He said, Why
do you not understand my speech? My language, my dialect. Even because you can't hear my
word. You don't have ears to hear. He said, why don't you
understand my speech? Why don't you understand my language?
Listen, we speak a different language. Our Lord speaks a different
language than the natural man can understand. The natural man
can understand the language of natural things. But the natural
man cannot understand the language that is spiritual, language that
is eternal, and language that is of God. That word speech, it's language,
it's dialect. People sometimes they hear us
preaching and say, I don't understand. What's he talking about? We're
speaking a different language. We're speaking a foreign language.
And it is foreign to us. The language of grace, I tell
you the language we understand, works. That's the language. I understand that language, but
I don't understand the language of grace. Not by nature. Not
by nature. I understand the language, if
you do good, God will reward you. I understand that language. But then, there is this language. There is none that doeth good,
no not one. What? What? It is a different
dialect. It is a different dialect. And
the Lord says, the reason you cannot understand what I am saying,
Because you can't hear my word. I'll tell you, the scripture
says, the seeing eye and the hearing ear, they both come from
God. God's got to give us ears to
hear. Ears to hear. Ears to hear the difference between
truth and a lie. In this whole context. Our Lord
sets forth the truth. He says in verse 32, He shall
know the truth, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall
make you free. Watch, it'll make you free. What
will make you free? The truth. And actually the word make and
free in the original are identical. He's saying you shall know the
truth and the truth shall liberate you to liberation. In other words,
it's the Word of God, the very truth of God's Word. That's what
liberates us to have liberty. Our Lord stood in front of Pilate. Pilate said, what is the truth? And there is truth standing right
in front of him. The Savior said, I am the truth.
I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto
the Father but by me. He set forth the truth. Look at verse 40. He says, Now
you seek to kill me, a man which hath told you the truth, not
a truth, the truth, which I have heard of God. Abraham didn't react like you
are reacting now. This is the truth. Look at verse
44. He said, You're of your father the devil, the lusts of your
father you'll do. He was a murderer from the beginning.
He didn't abide in the truth, because there is no truth in
him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own, for he's a
liar. He's the father of it, because I tell you the truth,
you believe not. Which of you convinces me of
sin, and if I tell the truth, why do you not believe? I tell
the truth, you believe a lie. And I tell you, there's always
this battle going on between truth and a lie. God, God, truth. And then every other false belief. You say, well, what is a lie? Anything contrary to the truth.
It's a bunch of lies. I can't list all the lies. You don't have to learn all the
lies, but you do need to learn the truth. It's just thankfully
just one truth. One truth. That one truth is
Christ Jesus. The Word of God is said to be
the truth. The Gospel is the truth. The
Holy Spirit is the spirit of truth. Then our Lord talked to them
not only about truth and a lie, but He talked to them about liberty
and bondage. Go back to verse 33. and said to him, ìWe be Abrahamís
seed. Weíre never in bondage to any
man. How sayest thou you shall be made free?î Never in bondage
to any man? Boy, they have short memories,
donít they? The Lord even told Abraham, He said, ìFor 400 years
your descendants will be in bondage.î You guys forgot about the Egyptian
captivity and bondage, didnít you? And you forgot about the
Babylonian captivity and bondage, didn't you? And he could have said any one
about right now. We're in captivity to Rome. But
actually, he's not talking about a physical captivity, but a spiritual
captivity. A spiritual captivity. He says,
if the sun shall make you free, That's what's got to happen.
He's got to make you free. Because you sure can't free yourself
from sin and slavery to Satan. There's liberty in bondage. Liberty
in Christ Jesus, bondage to sin. We've got to be freed. We've
got to be freed from the condemnation of sin. We must be freed from
the power of Satan. Must be freed from the love and
the servitude of sin and brought into liberty. Liberty
of full and free forgiveness. The liberty of access to God.
Listen, people of God, we have the liberty of freedom, the freedom
of access to God. We come to God Almighty any time
we want to through Christ Jesus. But Lord, we have a liberty to
do that! We have the liberty, we have
freedom from ignorance, spiritual ignorance. There was a time when
we didn't know anything. Or to use kind of a double negative,
we didn't know nothing. Not about God, not really, not
about the mess we are in, and nothing about the reason Christ
Jesus died on the cross, that God might be just, and the justifier
of everybody who believes in Him. We were all together ignorant
about that, but now we are liberated from that ignorance. We don't
have that ignorance anymore. He has liberated us from error. And then there's this disagreement
and he corrected them on Abraham's seed and Abraham's children. Well, he started talking to them
and they said, we're Abraham's seed. We're Abraham's seed. Our Lord said in verse 37, He
said, I know you're Abraham's seed. You're his literal offspring.
But you seek to kill me because my word doesn't have any place
in you. Does the word of God have a place in your heart? Thy word have I hid in my heart,
that I might not sin against thee. They said in verse 39, Abraham's
our father. Jesus said to them, if you were
Abraham's children, you'd do the works of Abraham. You're not the spiritual children
of Abraham. You are indeed the literal seed
of Abraham, but you're not his children. You're not his spiritual
children. Because if you were his spiritual children, you'd
believe me. And he goes on further in the
chapter, and we'll get to it. He said, Abraham rejoiced to
see my day. He saw it and was glad. He said,
if you were Abraham's children, you'd do the works of Abraham.
But you don't do the works of Abraham. Oh, you're his seed. But you're not his children.
Not his children. If you were the children of Abraham,
you'd forsake all for Christ like Abraham did. If they were
the children of Abraham, they would cherish the sacrifice of
the covenant, like Abraham did. If they were the children of
Abraham, they'd believe the Lord himself would be the sacrifice,
just like Abraham did. My son, the Lord will provide
himself a sacrifice for sin, a sin offering. You'd believe
just like Abraham did, if you were his children. and you'd
rejoice in me because Abraham rejoiced in me." Oh, they were
offended, but he didn't hold anything back. You see, we've got to preach
the truth in love. In love, not in a hateful, mean
spirit, but in love, set forth the truth. Got to be firm. Don't have to be firm. Hold the
line. Stay the line. That's what I
say to all of you. Stay the truth. Hold fast to
the gospel. That's what the Apostle Paul
told Timothy. Yeah, there's an intense confrontation
here. Intense conflict. Our Lord didn't
back down and you know what? Those guys didn't back down either.
you get to the very end of the chapter, they picked up stones
to stone him. That's pretty serious when you're
willing to kill over your religious belief. Well, let's sing the
closing song.