Alright, let's go to John chapter
1. The Gospel of John chapter 1. And our subject is receiving
the Savior. Receiving the Savior. John chapter 1. In the first
few verses of the first chapter, the Lord Jesus is presented to
us in a threefold way. He is the Word. He is the Word. Secondly, He is the Life. And
thirdly, He is the Light. And each of those speaks of His
deity. He is the Word. For He is the
communication of God to us. The Lord has manifested Himself
to us. The Lord has revealed Himself
to us. The Lord has spoken to us in
these last days through His Son. The Lord Jesus is God told out. He is the Word, that which we
need to know about God. The Savior has revealed Him. And the reason He has revealed
Him is because He is God. Nobody knows God better than
God. And we know that He is God because
in Hebrews chapter 1, the Lord addressed Him as being God. God called Him God. So He is
the Word. He is the incarnate Word. here in John chapter 1. Secondly,
he's the life. The life. All life originates
with him. And all life goes out to those
who've got life from this one who is life. That's all physical
life. Nobody lives apart from the life. We read in Acts chapter 17, in
him we live and move and we have our being. We live tonight because
the one who gives us life is life. He liveth is life. But he not only gives physical
life, he gives spiritual life. We're born of God. even as we're
going to see in verse 13. We're born of Him, born of His
seed. Our brother read to us from 1
Peter chapter 1, that incorruptible seed that liveth and abideth
forever. That seed that lives has given
us life. We live spiritually due to this
One who is life. All spiritual life comes from
Him. And all everlasting life comes
from Him. If He gives us spiritual life,
you can bet this, it is everlasting life. It's a life that will never
die. Because it's a life that He creates
within us. In fact, the Lord of glory comes
to us. And when He who is life comes
to us, death must depart. And therefore, we're alive forevermore. Forevermore. He is the Word. He is life. And He is light. He's the one who enables us to
see things that are invisible to the natural man. Those things
that we didn't used to see, that we do now see, is a result of
Him who is the light giving us light. He has illuminated our
darkened minds. We are therefore now children
of light. And we don't walk in darkness
anymore. You see, to walk in darkness
is to walk in error. To walk in darkness is to walk
in falsehoods. To walk in darkness is to walk
in ignorance. To walk in darkness is to walk
in blindness. We're not blind anymore. We've
been given sight. The light has shined in our hearts. And we see the very glory of
God in the face of the Lord Jesus. We see who God is. We have some
understanding of God. And we have some understanding
of ourselves, of our neediness, of our wickedness. And we have
some understanding of the necessity of the Lord Jesus and His blood
redemption. We were in debt to the law of
God. We owed a debt we could never
ever pay. The Son of God has come into
the world. He paid the debt. And all of
those for whom He paid the debt, we are debt free. And the Spirit
of the Lord Jesus, He comes to us and He gives us sight. He
illuminates us. He enables us to see, hey, my
sins which are many are all washed away. They're drowned in the
blood of the Lord Jesus. And we're robed in His righteousness. We're given eyes to see. He's
the light. He's the Word. He's the life. And He's the light. And notice
verse 9 of chapter 1. Of course, John the Baptist,
he's not the light. We see that in verse 8. He was
not the light. But he was sent to bear witness
of the light. Now look at verse 9. That was
the true light. This light that John is speaking
about. that this man who's inspired
to write this passage. The light that he's speaking
about, he's not a false light, he's the true light. He's the
genuine light. He's the real light. Now yes,
John the Baptist, he was a light. He was the light that reflected
the light of the Lord Jesus. In fact, you and I are said to
be the light of the world, aren't we? Go back to Matthew chapter
5. Matthew chapter 5. Our Savior
said these very words. Matthew chapter 5. And look at verse 14. Matthew chapter 5 verse 14. You are the light of the world. A city that is set, a city that
is fixed, a city that is established on a hill cannot be hid. He says, you're the light. You're
the light of the world. Now over in John, in John's gospel
and in chapter 8 and in chapter 9, the Savior said, I'm the light
of the world. He said it twice. I am the light
of the world. But he says to his disciples,
you're the light of the world. You're a city that's set, that's
fixed, that's established on a hill that cannot be hid. Now that doesn't mean that light
originates from us. It doesn't. We are reflectors
of the light. We're like the moon. The light
doesn't originate with us. The light originates with the
Son. The Son of Righteousness. The
Lord Jesus, who is Himself the light, and all light emanates
out from Him. But as that light of the Gospel
comes to us, we reflect the light. We share the light. This local assembly here, we're
a light that's set, we're a city that's set in this world, established
in this world, in this location, and we're here to shine the light. That is our sole reason for existing
is to shine the light. The light of the gospel. The
light of how God can be just and justify the ungodly. Now the light didn't originate
with us. The light doesn't come forth
from within us. As I said, we're reflectors of
the light, but it's our business to set forth the light of the
gospel. And the Savior says, you're the
light of the world now. Out here around us, all is darkness. Spiritual darkness, ignorance,
falsehoods, false gospels. False religions all out here.
And the Lord has put in this location His light. Oh, let's
shine the light brightly. We don't put it under a bushel.
That's what He says in the next verse. You don't put a light
under a bushel. What's a light for? To shine. To shine. And we shine the light of the
gospel. We dispel the darkness. This
is our responsibility in this area. And through whatever ministries
God is pleased to give us, we're to dispel the darkness of ignorance
and sin and sorrow by proclaiming the glorious gospel of light. You see, what is the cure for
ignorance? Truth. Honesty. What is the cure for falsehoods,
for false gospel? The true gospel. The gospel of
blood redemption. The gospel of justification by
an imputed righteousness. The gospel of free and sovereign
grace. The world around us is in ignorance. Listen, we were in ignorance. There was a time when we were
ignorant. We were in the dark. We couldn't see. But the light
shined within us. Christ Jesus Himself came to
us and He illuminated our darkened minds. And let me tell you something,
we're not in the dark anymore. We say, bless the name of God,
we're in the light. We're in the light. The light
of truth. The light of God's Word. We're
children of light. Let's be reflectors of the light. The light shines forth, and it
shines forth not only through our gospel, but in that passage
in Matthew chapter 5, through our works. That's what it says. Through our works, that men may
see your works. And we don't do our works to
be seen of men, but these are works of faith and works of love. Here's a noble ambition. Mr.
Spurgeon said this. I read it today. He said, here's
a noble ambition. Lord, help me today to improve
the lives of those whose path I cross, to make them happier
and to make them better off for having come in contact with me. And what can I do to make life
better for those with whom I come in contact? Tell them about Christ
Jesus. That's how I can help them. Say,
preacher, how can I help my neighbor? How can I help my friends? Tell
them about the Savior and pray for them. Say, I've tried to
talk to them and they just put up a big stop sign and they say,
I don't want to hear anything you've got to say. Well, don't
cast the pearls before swine. But you can sure pray for them. And if they won't weep over their
soul, you weep over their soul. If they won't cry out to God
on their behalf, you cry out to God on their behalf. You come into contact with a
lot more people than I do. Different folks than in the circles
that I travel in. You work with people, you live
around people, you communicate with them. What can you do for
them? Let the light shine. I don't know what to do, preacher.
I'm not an evangelist. I'm not a missionary. What can
I do? Well, if a message especially
blesses you, you can get a CD or a DVD and just take it to
your neighbor and you're not trying to cram anything down
their throat and say, their throat, but you can just say, listen,
this was a blessing to me, this message that our pastor preached,
or some other pastor as far as that goes, preacher of the gospel,
and it was especially a blessing, and I just want to give it to
you, and I'm not even going to ask you what you think about
it, because that's between you and God, but it was such a blessing
to me, I want to share this with you. Isn't that a good idea?
Take them a bulletin. Take them a bulletin. There's
a brother in the congregation up in Almonte, and he'd take
a fistful of bulletins. When he had a doctor's appointment,
he'd take a bulletin. He'd ask the receptionist, he'd
say, is it okay if I leave one of these bulletins over here
on the table? Our responsibilities get the
word out. We're the light. We're the light. Do what you can. And you can't
do what you can't do. You can't do what you cannot
do. But there are some things you can do. We're lights. John was a light.
And we're all lights, but we're reflective lights. Our Lord Jesus, He's the true
light. He's the true light. He's the
legitimate light. He's the opposite of fictitious
lights, and counterfeit lights, and imaginary lights, and simulated
lights, and pretended lights. He's the real light. He's the true light. What is
Satan? Well, he is very clever. And
what does he do? He transforms himself into what? An angel of light. An angel of light. You can read
about that in 2 Corinthians chapter 11. I know the world thinks that
You know, Satan, well, he's in the drug business, you know,
and all the drug lords and all this underworld activity and
prostitution and stuff like that. Well, there's no question about
the fact he's active in those areas, but his primary realm
of activity, I believe, is the religious realm. He works in
churches. He works in religious activities. He's a promoter of good deeds. He's a promoter of self-righteousness
and his goal is to keep people away from the blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
he transforms himself. In fact, that passage in 2 Corinthians
chapter 11, he transformed himself into an angel of light. That
word transform means masquerades. You've seen people at a masquerade
party and wear a mask. I wonder who that is behind that
mask. Well, he masquerades. He has a disguise. He has disguised
himself as an angel of light. I know people's ideas of Satan
is, he's red, he's got a long tail and he's pitchfork and he's
got horns and all that sort of thing. He's an angel of light. He's transformed. He's disguised
himself. He masquerades as an angel of
light. But his goal is to keep you away
from the light. That's his goal. That's his goal. Oh, he's a big promoter of self-righteousness. He's a big promoter of doing
charitable works. He's a big promoter of being
generous and you see these places advertise on the television,
send some money to pay for a children's hospital over yonder somewhere
across the big pond. Oh, that's fine with him. He just wants to keep you away
from Christ. He wants to keep you away from
the gospel. He wants to keep you away from
the light. The light. But our Lord Jesus,
He's the true light. He's the real light. He's the
real light in contrast to the dim and the shaded light which
was conveyed through the types and the shadows and the pictures
of the Old Testament. He's the real light. He's the
true light. He's the underived lights. There
are lesser lights which are borrowed lights, which are reflected lights,
but He is His own essential and underived glory. He's the true light. He's the
preeminent light in contrast to all that is ordinary and all
that is common. Look back at verse 9 in the text
again. That was the true light. Which
lighteth every man that cometh into the world. How does the
Lord lighten every man that comes into the world? Well, He does so by giving them
reason and a conscience. Which, read Romans chapter 1,
leaves everybody without excuse. He's given you the light of reason. He's given you the light of conscience. The heavens declared the glory
of God. My, what wisdom there is in creation. You read Romans chapter 1, these
things leave men without excuse. But the light of nature, reason,
and conscience, while sufficient to render all men without excuse
before God, it will never be saving light. It will never be
spiritual light. That's a special kind of light
that's needed by the Holy Ghost. That leads to verse 10 and 11. And as I read these five powerful
statements, Very powerful statements. There
are five of them. Notice this. I'll give them to
you and then I'll make comment upon them. Number one. He was
in the world. That's a powerful statement.
Number two. And the world was made by Him. Number three. And the world knew
Him not. Number four. He came unto His
own. And number five, His own received
Him not. My, what five powerful statements. Watch this. He was in the world. Now the world that He was in
is not our world. It's His world. He was in His
world. Now here's the question, when
was He in the world? I really don't believe that this
is specifically speaking about His incarnation, though He was
certainly in the world during the days of His incarnation.
But I don't think that's what John's talking about. He's speaking
about our Lord's great presence in this world in times past. There's a very real sense in
which the Savior, even before His incarnation, has been in
the world. He had to be in the world because
being God, He's omnipresent. He's everywhere. So ever since
He made the world, He's been in the world. He's been in the
world by His essence. He fills the whole world with
His presence. He's been in the world by His
power. He upholds and He manages all
things that happens in the world. He is in the world by His providence,
ordering and managing everything that happens. Governing all things
in order to bring everything to the end that He has already
ordained. He has been in the world as the
life of the world, as the light of the world. He was in the world. And the world was made by Him.
Which is exactly what John has said in verse 3. All things were
made by him, and without him was not anything made that was
made. Through faith we understand,
we read in Hebrews chapter 11. Through faith we understand that
the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things
which are seen were not made of things which do appear. The
world was made by Him. He was in the world, and this
world which had His presence was a world made by Him, number
three, and the world knew Him not. The Creator of the world was
in the world, and yet the world didn't recognize Him. The world
did not and does not. recognize its creator, its sustainer,
and its provider. Listen, God sends the rain upon
the just and the unjust. He makes the sun shine upon those
who curse His name and those who bless His name. Why, God
is always doing good things, merciful things to people throughout
the world. But the world doesn't know Him.
The world doesn't recognize Him. He's our Creator, He's our Maker,
He's our Provider, but we don't recognize Him. Why is that? What's the reason for that? Well,
it's due to sin. It's due to the fall. All of
our race has been plunged into darkness. The world knows Him
not. The world knew Him not as Creator,
the world doesn't know Him as Savior. The world refuses to acknowledge
the mercies that He does bestow upon them. And many in the world,
if they had their way, they'd just be glad if the name of God
was erased from everything. That's the man of the world. No wonder David says in Psalm
14, the fool has said in his heart, there is no God. Literally,
no God for me. You can have your God, if you
want your God, you can have your God, but no God for me. The fool
says that. God says they are corrupt. They've
done abominable works. There's none that doeth good.
The Lord looketh down from heaven upon the children of men to see
if there were any that did understand and seek God. They're all gone
aside. They're all together become filth.
And the word filthy means stinking, offensive, obnoxious to God. Well, preacher, that's not the
way to win friends and influence people. We're not trying to win
friends and influence people. We're trying to tell people the
truth. We're trying to shine the light on our condition. You
see, until we realize our condition, we'll never seek the mercy of
God in Christ Jesus. The whole have no need of a physician. Who does? Those that are sick. You got to find out you're sick.
Then you go to the great physician. Folks don't know they're sick.
People live in ignorance. They live in a make-believe world. Then we read, he came unto his
own. The words might be read, he came
unto his own people. not referring to his elect now,
not referring to his redeemed people who shall be willing in
the day of his power, but to his own physical people, to the
Jews, those to whom he gave the law and the prophets. He came unto his own. In the
Old Testament, he came unto his own in types and pictures. He
came unto His own through promises and prophecies. He came unto
His own in great power to deliver them from Egyptian bondage. He
came to them and redeemed them with a mighty hand, and He led
them through the Red Sea on dry path. He came to them at Mount
Sinai. He gave them the oracles of God.
He came to them at the tabernacle, appearing to them as a cloud
by day and a pillar of fire by night. He came to them throughout
the days of the Old Testament. He came unto His own over and
over and over again. He came unto His own in two thousand
years ago. He came unto His own in His incarnation. And the fifth statement is this,
and his own received him not. They didn't believe him. They
refused to obey his voice. Read through the Old Testament.
And what you will consistently find is the rebellion, the hard
heartedness, The idolatry and the unbelief of the nation of
Israel. That's what you find. Follow
their history. He came unto His own and His
own received Him not. Just like the scriptures said
that they would not receive Him. Then He came into this world
visibly. He came to His own visibly. And
His own received Him not when He came. They said, this is the
air that's killing. That's killing. His own received Him not. What
an awful thing. The Lord of glory has been in
this world from its very origin, by His presence, by His power,
by His providence, by His provision, But men receive Him not. Well, does that mean that God's
purpose has been frustrated? They received Him not? Does that
mean that man's unbelief has foiled, has in some way hindered
or rendered unsuccessful the design of God in salvation? Absolutely not. No. Because it says in the 12th verse,
but as many as received Him. Oh yeah, verse 11 says His own
received Him not, but not to worry now. That doesn't mean
that nobody is going to receive Him. There is a people who will
receive Him. They will receive Him as He set
forth in His Word. They will receive Him as their
prophet, as their priest, and as their king. They will receive
Him. Because the unfaithfulness, the
unbelief of some does not frustrate God's eternal purpose to save
a remnant according to the election of grace. Listen to this. You can look at it with me. Romans
chapter 3 if you like. Look at Romans chapter 3. He's talking about a people,
the Jews to whom the oracles of God have been given. Chapter
3 verse 1, Romans. What advantage then hath the
Jew? Or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way
chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of
God. For what if some did not believe? Shall their unbelief make the
faith of God without effect? Shall it ruin the faithfulness
of God, or the veracity of God? God forbid. That's not going
to happen. Let God be true, but every man
a liar. As it is written, that thou mightest
be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overcome when thou
art judged. Man's unbelief doesn't ruin God's
purpose. Actually, the rejection of our
Lord Jesus by the Jews fulfilled God's eternal purpose. Therefore,
the Gospel was sent to the Gentiles. And the Gentiles, many of them,
have received Him. Well now, what is it to receive
Him? Go back to the text real quick. What is it to receive
Him? Well, to receive Him is, as it
says at the end of the verse, to believe on His name. That's
the same thing. To receive Him is to believe
on His name. The Lord of glory, revealed in
this book, We receive Him as He's revealed. We receive what
He did. We believe on His name. What is His name? The Word. That's His name. You see, John
has been stressing that right from the get-go in John chapter
1. In the beginning was the Word.
Well, what is it to receive Him? It's to believe on His name.
What is His name? The Word! He's God incarnate. It's to believe Him as He's revealed
in the Scriptures. That's what it means to receive
Him. Well, what about those who receive Him? Well, then they
have the power or the authority to become the sons of God, even
to them that believe on His name. Now listen, if you're not a believer,
don't think for a moment that you can say accurately that you're
a child of God. You have no right to say that. But everybody who believes Him,
everybody who rests in Jesus Christ, Everybody who sees that
He is the answer to the issue of how God can be a just and
holy and righteous and yet justify ungodly people through the death
of the Savior, everybody who understands that and believes
that, you have the right, you have the privilege to say, I
am a child of God. I am a child of God. And your faith is the evidence
of that. To them gave He the authority
to become the sons of God. We have the right to say we're
His children. But then that leads us to this
question. Why is it that some do receive
Christ? After all, the text clearly says,
back in verse 11, His own received Him not. But now, here's a group
that do receive Him. Well, why is it that some receive
Him and others don't receive Him? Well, it's because one group is a birthed group. They're born
again. They're born again. Verse 13
tells us the reason why some are receivers of Christ Jesus,
which were born, now, not of blood, It's not in your heritage
or what your family tree is. It's like our brother read to
us there from Romans chapter 9. Just because the Israelites
said, we're the seed of Abraham, that doesn't mean they're the
children of Abraham. Many of these, all these Jews,
they could trace their lineage all the way back to Abraham.
But that's not why men receive Christ. It doesn't run in the
bloodline. And it's not of the will of the
flesh, that is, it's not of man's own free will. Nor is it of the
will of man. It's not a bunch of people wanting
somebody else to be saved. That won't do it. Which were born of God. Of God. God who is life. God who is light. He births us
into the kingdom. That's what the Savior said to
Nicodemus, you must be born again. You're not even going to see
the kingdom of God unless you're born. You've got to be born into
the kingdom. Who receives Christ Jesus? Those
that have life. Those to whom the light has shined. We receive Him. We receive Him
as a result of being born again. And I don't think it's a long
drawn out thing. I think that the new birth and
conversion or new birth and belief, they happen just like that. There is no evidence in scripture
that somebody has regenerated now and in 15, 20 years down
the line, they will finally believe the gospel. There is no evidence
of that. There is no illustration of that
whatsoever. In the Bible, it is just boom,
boom. You are born of the Spirit. You
have life and the evidence of life is belief. So if you believe tonight, it
is because you are alive. Why are you alive? Well, it's
not of blood. It's not of the will of man.
It's not of your own will. It's not the will of a bunch
of other people. Well, you're born of God. You're born due
to God's will. You're born due to God's Word.
And the evidence of the new birth is Do you believe on Christ Jesus? Or believe in Christ Jesus? So,
that question which I would put to you tonight is, have you been
born again? That's really not the question.
The question is, do you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ? And
if you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, let me tell you something.
You're one of God's elect. You've been redeemed by His blood.
You've been quickened by His Spirit, and your faith is the
evidence of all three of those. And all three of those, the purpose
of God, that's the origin of all of it. And you live because Christ Jesus
gave His life for you. And then He came to you in life-giving
power, and He said, Lazarus, come forth. And you did. You obeyed His voice. And you
believe Him. We're born of God. Alright, let's
sing a closing song. What about 199? That's a good
one to sing right now.