We'll stay right there in 1 John
chapter 2 where Brother Joe just read. I began studying for this message
and maybe one or two more because I received a note from a television
listener. Well, I say a television watcher
because some people watch but they don't really listen. But it was on this subject of
keeping his commandments, keeping the commandments of Christ. And
he talked about it. He said, well, you're talking
about me preaching salvation totally, 100% by the grace of
God. And he said, what about keeping
his commandments? You know, I've dealt with that
subject, but I got to thinking about that. Well, it's, it's
a good question really. And that's what this passage
talks about, especially there in verse three of first John
two here by note, do we do know that we know him, uh, if we keep
his commandments. And so that's the title of the
message, keeping his commandments. But I got to thinking about this,
um, People's minds today are on the resurrection of Christ.
And that's fine. If we truly know him, believe
in him, our minds are pretty much on that all the time. Not
just one day a year. But we do celebrate the resurrection
of Christ. And this first verse of 1 John
chapter two really states the essence of the resurrection. if you think about it. Look at
it, he says, my little children, this is John the Apostle speaking
to true believers. Children of God, that's who he's
identifying here now. He said, these things I write
unto you that you sin not. Now John's statement there is,
he's saying, I'm encouraging you to fight sin. To fight it. You know, believers, we've talked
about that, how believers are in a warfare within. It's not just a warfare without.
I mean, we're at war with the world and the devil, but we're
also at war with the flesh. Paul described that in Galatians
chapter five, the warfare of the flesh and the spirit. It's
an inner warfare. Unbelievers don't have that kind
of warfare. Now, they'll have struggles with
conscience. I mean, I had struggles with
conscience before I was saved. Before I was born again, everybody
does. Book of Romans chapter two speaks
of that. You struggles of conscience comes
from that inner voice, you know how it is. But now the warfare
of the flesh and the spirit is different. Because the warfare
of the flesh and the spirit always drives a sinner to Christ for
relief, for victory. Not to himself. You see, if you're
drawn to yourself to find relief and victory, that's not the warfare
of the flesh and the spirit. That's just conscience. One old
writer called it natural conscience conviction. And so you have a
bad day and you feel bad, but tomorrow you have a good day
and you feel good. And you say, well, now I know I'm saved because
I did better today. Well, that's not the flesh and
the spirit. That's just old natural legal
conscience. Self-righteousness. You see?
So there's a difference in this warfare of the flesh. Listen, if you can find relief,
if you can find victory, if you can find assurance anywhere but
Christ and Him crucified and risen, it's not flesh and spirit,
it's just conscience. If you know yourself by the power
of the Holy Spirit and conviction, you'll know that you have no
hope but Christ. And so that's what he's saying.
I want you to fight sin. But look here, he says, and if
any man sin, now the way that translation is written is kind
of confusing in this sense. People say, well, that means
if I sin, but what if I don't? That's not what it's saying.
It could be translated different ways, but the essence of this
is that as because you sin, because we're sinners, We have an advocate
with the father. Now an advocate is one who stands
in our place and pleads our calls, like a lawyer, a lawyer, a defense
lawyer. That's an advocate. It's like
a mediator. It's like a one who would defend
you, you see. And he says, we have an advocate.
Well, who is our advocate? Is it the preacher? Well, I hope
not. I hope I'm not your advocate. I'd be a very poor one, and I
hope you're not my advocate. But we have an advocate with
the Father. Now, that's significant, because
he's talking about children of God in relationship to their
heavenly Father. Now, he's not talking about creation
here. People say, well, God's the father
of everybody. Well, you could say that by creation
in a sense, but we fell in Adam and alienated from God. And what
did the Lord tell the Pharisees who their father was in John
8, 44? He says, you're of your father, the devil. So you've
left God. You fell in Adam, and then we're
born by nature, alienated from God, the scripture says. So who's
he talking about? The Bible says in Romans chapter
eight that the only ones who can truly call God their father
are those who have been given the spirit of liberty in Christ.
Do you know Christ? Do you believe in him? Do you
rest in him? So God is our heavenly father. Well, the question comes
then, how can God, who is a righteous judge, at the same time be our
heavenly father? Well, here's the answer. We have
an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. Now there's the essence of the
resurrection. Jesus Christ, the righteous. That's what the resurrection
is all about. Jesus Christ, the righteous.
And in that sense, we talk about Jesus Christ. He is righteous
in himself because he is God in human flesh. That's who he
is. He's the God man. But that's
not what this is talking about. Now that's included. Don't, you
know, he doesn't deny that truth. I mean, John's, in fact, John's
gospel, the essence of that gospel is the deity of Christ. How it
starts, in beginning was the word and the word was with God,
the word was God. John 1, 14, the word was made
flesh and dwelt among us, God man. But he says, Jesus Christ,
the righteous, and he's not talking about the essence of his righteousness
in his deity, that he is without sin. He is without sin. But you
see, there's a colon there. Now that wasn't there in the
original language, but it should be there. And what that means
is this, that the next verse is gonna tell you what he means
by Jesus Christ, the righteous. And here it is, look at verse
two. He is the propitiation for our sin. Now, what is a propitiation? When I listen to him, a propitiation
is a sin-bearing sacrifice that brings satisfaction. All right? You got that? A sin-bearing
sacrifice. Now, that makes sense. You know,
that goes all the way back to the Old Testament, you know.
Here he talks about the blood of animals, the lamb, the lamb
of God. That's Christ, you see. sacrificial
lamb. Isaiah 53, he bore our iniquities. That's the substitute, you see. All the blood of animals was
a picture of Christ, the Lamb of God, who would stand in the
place of his people and bear their sins by imputation, that
is, by the debt of our sins being charged to him, and he died to
satisfy the justice of God. Now, why was that necessary?
Because sin demands this. The penalty of sin is death.
The wages of sin is death. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. So that's what that word propitiation
means. And you've got to think in terms of satisfaction. The
debt's paid. Sin has been put away by Christ.
Righteousness has been established. And he says, for our sins and
not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
Now the whole world there doesn't mean everybody without exception.
It means for Jew and Gentile. That's what he's saying. He's
talking about all without distinction. Not all without exception. And
that's important because we need to understand that this blessing
of the advocacy of Christ, the blessing of the resurrection,
which is eternal life, is only for those who come to know Christ,
who are brought to know him by the power of the Holy Spirit
in the new birth. Unbelievers have no participation in this,
and those who die and unbelieve cannot claim it, you see. But
that's the essence of the resurrection, right there. And your bulletin,
if you've got a bulletin, look at the back of it. I wrote an
article on what does the resurrection of Jesus Christ prove. And the
reason I wrote that, I got to thinking about this. And I put
on there, men waste their time trying to prove to the world
that Jesus Christ arose from the grave. But the Bible gives
us ample testimony of the eyewitnesses of Christ. You can read that
several places, but mainly 1 Corinthians 15. I remember when I was in
seminary back in the late seventies, I had a New Testament professor
who did not believe in the literal resurrection of Christ. And one
of the students in our class told him, he said, well, if Christ
did not literally rise from the dead, then the Bible is false. And the professor said, well,
why do you say that? And he said, well, first Corinthians 15 talks
about eyewitnesses, eyewitnesses that saw the resurrected
Christ. And so that ended the discussion. Well, of course, at that time,
I wasn't a believer. But I said, well, big deal. There's
parts of the Bible that aren't true. That's the way I looked
at it. Still, you can get something out of it. But that changed. Thank the Lord. But anyway. The Bible does talk about eyewitnesses. And it is ample proof that Jesus
Christ arose from the dead. But here's the point that people
need to see, and those who have their minds on the resurrection
today. What does that resurrection mean?
What did it prove? Well, this is what it's talking
about. I've got four things here. I'm not going to just make my
sermon reading the bullet until you don't get me wrong there. But this is important. Number
one, it proves that Jesus Christ, as our substitute in surety,
died under the penalty of our sins. Christ took the place of
his people, his church, God's elect, and he died. He actually died. To be resurrected,
you gotta die, you see. And he died, he was buried, and
he arose the third day. And he put away the sins of his
people. And secondly, it proves that Jesus Christ has justified
all for whom he died. If he died for you, you're justified.
You know what it means to be justified? It means to be not
guilty. It means to be declared righteous in the sight of God.
And thirdly, it proves that Jesus Christ is the author and giver
of spiritual and eternal life to all whom he justified. If
he died for you, you're justified. If you're justified, you will
have eternal life. The Holy Spirit. will impart
life to your soul. And you know how you'll know
that? You'll truly believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as he is
identified and distinguished in the scriptures, in the word
of God. And then fourthly, it proves
the eternal security of all for whom he died. His resurrection
means this, there's no such thing as being saved one day and lost
the next, folks. People who believe that and are
celebrating the resurrection are just fooling themselves.
I'm sorry, I may sound mean, I don't mean to sound mean, it's
just true. It's just true. When he arose from the dead,
he sealed the salvation of his people. And that's the case. We have an advocate. What does
the advocate plead? Well, it says it, verse two,
he's the propitiation for our sins. When Christ, as Christ
standing as advocate for his people, he doesn't plead your
goodness or my goodness in our defense. That would be a very,
very poor defense. That would seal our doom. He
doesn't plead even your faith. No, sir. You know what he pleads? He pleads his blood, his righteousness. My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
frame, but holy lean on Jesus' name. On Christ, the solid rock
I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.
And that's what the resurrection means, you see. Well, he says
here in verse three, look at verse three. He says, hereby
we do know that we know him. Do you know Christ? Now that
word know is another interesting word. It means more than just
an intellectual or mental knowledge of the facts of Jesus Christ.
I've told you about a lady one time who was hearing me preach
down south and I was explaining. Some people say, well, we're
not just, we're not sent to explain and we're sent to proclaim. I
never had figured out the difference of those things, but I think
I can proclaim what I explained myself, but I don't know. You
all figure that one out. But anyway, I was trying to preach
the gospel, tell people what the gospel is. And she never
heard it. Been in church all of her life,
never heard it. And she asked me going out, she said, well,
I thought it was the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. Well,
those facts are included in the gospel. He died, he was buried,
he rose. But historical facts are not the gospel. You can know
and believe that he died, was buried, and rose, and still not
know the gospel. So what is he talking about if
you know him? Well that word know there has
to do with an intimate knowledge and love for and trust in Christ. That's what it means. It's not
just that you know who he is or know about him, it's you know
him. It's kind of like, it's the same
kind of word like the love between a husband and a wife. It's an
intimate knowledge. And this is an intimate knowledge
with Christ between Christ who is the bridegroom and the church,
which is his bride. And we come to know him by the
power of the spirit. We believe in him. We rest in
him. We plead him as our defense. You know, we're sinners. And
if God were to ever judge any of us, including me, And I'll
say it this way because it's kind of like an umbrella that
covers it all. If God were to judge me based on my best, what
would I deserve? I would deserve damnation. So
I've got nothing to plead in my defense that comes from me
or done by me. What do I plead? I plead the
blood of Christ. I plead the righteousness of
Christ. That's my defense. And I trust
in him and rest in him. I'm not trying to work to save
myself. He did all that in his obedience
unto death. How do you know he was successful?
He arose from the dead. That's how I know. That's the
testimony of God. He arose from the... How do you
know he put away my sins? He arose from the dead. How do
you know He established all the righteousness that I need to
be eternally, unchangeably accepted before God? I'll tell you how.
He arose from the dead. Now, He arose. What's He doing
now? He's my advocate with the Father. He's seated at the...
The Bible says that in other terms. He's seated at the right
hand of the Father, ever living to make intercession for His
people. Do you know that to say you believe
grace or to say you believe the gospel and claim that you can
be lost is to deny the advocacy of Jesus Christ? That's how serious
this thing is. So do you know him? Well, he
says, hereby we do know that we know him if we keep his commandments. Now, the way many people read
the Bible, they see the if statements. And I've told you about this.
They see them as conditional in the sense that, well, this
means you don't know him unless you keep his commandments in
a way of conditional salvation. And that's not what it's talking
about. It's evidence. In other words, the evidence
that you know Christ is you keep his commandments. Well, what
are his commandments? That's the key, isn't it? Most people's
mind go to the movie last night, Ten Commandments. That was on
last night. I don't know if you all knew
that. and they go to the Ten Commandments. That's not what
it's talking about. If it were the Ten Commandments, I'll tell
you what, you should not be here today. You should have been here
yesterday. Now that's right. Now I'll explain that in other
messages. I'm not gonna go into all that. He's not talking about
the Ten Commandments as giving Mount Sinai to Israel. What were
his commandments? I'll tell you what his commandments
are. It's anything he says. Anything Christ says is a commandment.
I don't ever see in the New Testament Christ giving His people suggestions. I don't ever see Him giving His
people options. He never says to His disciples,
go ye in all the world and preach the gospel to every creature,
if you have a mind to. He doesn't say that. He says,
you go. That's a command, isn't it? In fact, don't we hear preachers
today, and I agree with them, say the gospel is not an invitation,
it's a what? It's a command. It's not a suggestion. It's not an option. It's not
up for vote. What are His commandments? Anything
He says. Summarize them. Well, number one, His commandment
by His power and His grace to believe on Him, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. Look down at verse 22 of 1 John
3. Look over at 1 John 3. Look at
verse 22. He says, And whatsoever we ask,
we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments. There's
the keeping of the commandments. and do those things that are
pleasing in his sight that doesn't mean we're perfect in ourselves
or that everything we do is pleasing in his sight doesn't mean that
we keep his commandments perfectly we don't but look what he's talking
about verse 23 and this is his commandment that we should believe
on the name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another as
he gave us command to believe on his name means to believe
on him as he is identified and distinguished in the word of
God And there are certain things about him that identify him. His deity, his humanity, his
perfect sinless humanity, he's God-man. Who is Jesus Christ?
He's not some kind of a lesser God. He is truly God in every
sense and he's truly man in every sense without sin. And we can't
explain that and we can't, you know, we can't really figure
that one out in our logical minds. But that's okay. He's God, you
know. Who can figure him out? If you
could figure out God, you'd be God. Do you know that? But you
can't do that. I can't do that. That's who he
is. What did he accomplish on Calvary?
He didn't die to make you savable. He didn't die to try to save
everyone. He died for his people. He saved his people from their
sins. That's what the scripture says.
He's an advocate for his people. We believe on him by the power
of the Holy Spirit. This is the work of God that
you believe on him. It's not by our own power. It's
not by our own grace. It's not by our own wills or
our own goodness. It's by the power, grace, goodness,
and will of God. What makes the difference between
a believer and an unbeliever? It's not your goodness or the
fact that you're less stubborn or less optimistic. It's the
grace of God, period. Secondly, we believe His commandment
by His power and grace, we keep His commandment to repent. To
repent from dead works and submit to Christ for all of salvation.
He commanded, it's recorded, let me just read this to you,
Matthew 4, 17. From that time, Jesus began to preach and say,
repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Repent is not an
option, it's not a suggestion, it's a commandment. Repent. He
said, except you repent, you shall likewise perish. Repent
ye and believe the gospel. Acts 17, verse 30 says, God has
commanded all men everywhere to repent because he has appointed
a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he has ordained and that he has given assurance
unto all men and that he what? Raised him from the dead. Repent. Repent of what? Repent
of sin. But the world by nature doesn't
know what sin is. Oh, well, we know what sin is.
We read the papers. We see the drug addicts, and
the drug pushers, and the speeders, and the murderers, and all that.
And that is sin. What is the greatest of all sins?
Unbelief. All right? Turn to John chapter
16. Look at verse 8. And all this is in light of the
resurrection. You know, none of what I'm telling you would
be true if Christ had not risen from the dead. Let me show you
that right here. Verse 8, Christ is talking about
His going away And his going away meant going to Jerusalem,
being arrested, being tortured, being crucified, and dying for
the sins of his people, and ultimately going unto the Father. And he
says in verse 8, he's talking about the Holy Spirit, who comes
forth from Christ. And he says, when He has come,
the Holy Spirit has come, He will reprove. Now that word reprove
means to convict. You have any convictions? Things
you're convinced of that are true. that you live by, that
motivates you. That's what he's talking about.
Holy Spirit conviction. He says, He will reprove the
world of sin and righteousness and of judgment. Three things
there. Verse 9, Of sin, because they believe not on me. Now,
what is he saying there? In other words, the Holy Spirit,
when he convicts a sinner of sin, it's not the sense of saying,
like the man said, well, I know I'm not perfect, but I've never
done anything to deserve hell. No. No, that's self-righteousness,
actually. The conviction of sin comes in
light of unbelief of Christ. And what it means is this, that
without Christ, Without faith in Christ. Let's put it this
way. Without being washed in His blood. What can wash away my sins? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole? Without
being washed in His blood. Without being clothed in His
righteousness. Having His righteousness charged
to me. And without believing in Him.
Now here's what the world doesn't want to hear. Everything I am
and everything I do is sin in the sight of God. Even my best. The Bible says man at his best
state is altogether what? Vanity. Here's Cain. Remember Cain and Abel? Here's
Cain coming to God with the best works of his hands and God rejects
him. Now people speculate, well why
did God reject Cain? Well Cain was a mean guy. Well
you don't know that. There's nothing in the Bible
said about that. Well, anybody who would murder his brother
has to be mean. Is that what it says? It's not what it says.
He murdered his brother. That was sin. That was an awful
sin. But Cain was rejected before
that. Somebody said, well, Cain was not sincere. Well, how do
you know that? What gives you the right to climb into the heart
of Cain and the mind of Cain and go beyond what the scripture
says? I'll tell you what was wrong with Cain. He came to God
pleading his own works and not the blood of the Lamb. That's
the only thing we know according to the Scripture. In fact, it's
stated over in 1 John 3. And the reason that Cain killed
Abel was because Abel was accepted. On what basis was Abel accepted? The blood, which pictured and
typified and foreshadowed and symbolized the blood of Christ. You say, how could Abel know
Christ? The Holy Spirit revealed Christ
to him. Read Hebrews 11. So do you know that it's sin
to come before God expecting salvation and blessings based
upon your works, even your best works, your most sincere works?
Lord, Lord, haven't we preached in your name? Haven't we cast
out demons? Haven't we done many wonderful
works? What did he say? I never knew you. Depart from
me, ye that worketh iniquity. Iniquity means it doesn't measure
up. In other words, whatever you plead before God as your
acceptance with Him, it's got to measure up to righteousness.
And you don't have it. And I don't have it either. There's
only one. Jesus Christ the righteous. And
so, verse 10 it says, of righteousness, because I go to my Father and
you see me no more. That's His resurrection and His
ascension. What does that mean, righteousness? That means Christ
worked it all out. Christ did it all. How do you
know? He goes to the Father. Do you
know that if he had not put away sin by the sacrifice of himself
and paid the sin debt in full, he couldn't have gone to the
Father? He wouldn't have been raised from the dead because sin demands
death. He satisfied justice for the sins of his people, his sheep. How do you know? He came out
of that grave and he ascended unto the Father. And then he
says of judgment because the prince of this world is judged.
That's speaking of his crucifixion. Read it in John chapter 12. What
does that mean? That means Christ suffered all
the penalty due unto all the sins of all his people so that
they cannot be charged. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? And so we repent in the power
of the Holy Spirit from our dead works. What are dead works? It's
any work aimed at saving you or keeping you saved. other than Christ. Thirdly, we keep His commandment
by His power and grace to love the brethren. Look back over
in 1 John 2. He says in verse 5, well look at verse 4. He says,
he that saith I know him, that means to believe and rest in
him. And keepeth not his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not
in him, but whoso keepeth his word. Now, what are his commandments?
It's his word. In him, verily, is the love of
God perfected. Hereby know we that we are in
him. Now, that doesn't mean we love perfectly. But it means
that when a believer is brought by the power of God's grace to
keep his commandments, the love of God has reached its goal in
that person's life. That's what it means. That word
perfected means to reach the goal. In other words, the love
of God to his people has a goal in mind. It's their salvation
through Christ, and it's their living for his glory by the power
of Christ. And so how do you show your love?
Not by what you say, not by buying a Hallmark card, but by your
deeds. Love in deed, not just in word
only. And this love doesn't mean what
most people think it means. You know, the religious world
interprets love as compromise. In other words, tell me what
I want to hear, then I'll say you love me. But that's not the way it is.
In fact, somebody who tells you what you want to hear does not
love you at all. The only one who really loves
you is the one who tells you what you need to hear. Now you
parents know something about this with your children, don't
you? They don't always like what you say, do they? You don't always
tell them what they hear. Mom and Daddy, could I have a
hot fudge sundae with nuts on it for breakfast? What would
they love to hear? They'd love to hear you say,
yes sir, eat away, son. But you know better, I hope you
don't do that. No, you've got to have stuff
that's good for you. You've got to eat good, healthy
food. Well, I don't want to hear that.
Well, I'm saying this because I love you, you see. So, love
is not compromise. Love is telling the truth. It
tells the truth of who God is, that He's holy and righteous
and He cannot tolerate or commune with sin. The love that religion
preaches today is no more than what you hear on the radio in
these love ballads. It's some emotional high that
God is on, that He's just hoping you'll accept Him and receive
Him. That's not the God of this book. The love of God is in Christ. And people don't even want to
hear about a God who hates, but the Bible talks about it. Now
His hatred is not emotional. It's justice. It's justice. You want to experience God's
love. The only place you're going to find it is in Jesus Christ
and Him crucified and risen. And this love here is not just
common preferences, common prejudices, common culture, or even likes
and dislikes. It's a loyalty to the truth of
God that binds us together even when we just can't get along.
even when we just don't even like each other or like what
we do. But it's that common loyalty to the glory of God in Christ
that binds us together in Him. And then, by His power and grace,
we keep His commandment to worship Him. Didn't He command us to
worship publicly? He said, forsake not the assembling
of yourselves together as the manner of some is. We're commanded. Listen, that's not an option. We're commanded to, all right,
the commandment of baptism. He said, go in all the world
and preach the gospel to every creature, teaching them, discipling
them. That's a command. Baptizing them
in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. You
see, that's the believer's confession. You know, people talk about a
public confession and they talk about walking down an aisle and
telling people you're saved. That's not a public confession.
The public confession in the New Testament is believer's baptism.
Immersion in water, where you identify publicly with Christ,
telling, not to be saved, the baptismal waters are not going
to wash away your sins. Don't get in here unless you
know that the blood of Christ has already washed them away.
This is just a confession. publicly, identifying you with
Christ before the people of God. We have the command to take the
Lord's Supper. Why do we do that? Is that just something that we
come up with? No, Christ commanded. He said, do this as oft as you
meet together in memorial of me. We're commanded to follow
him, to love him and his word, not in order to be saved, but
because we already are by his grace. Everything he tells us
is a command. That's what he said here. We
keep his word, verse five, but whoso keepeth his word, in him
verily the love of God is perfected, completed, reaches its goal.
Do we love Christ? And if we do, the evidence of
that love, the evidence of our faith in Christ, the evidence
of our love for Christ and for one another is we keep his commandments. Do we always keep them? We never
keep them perfectly. Somebody said, do we always keep
them? We never keep them perfectly. That's why we have that inner
struggle, that warfare. But by his power and grace, we
believe on him. We repent of thinking that our
works could save us. We worship, we serve Him, we
love Him by His grace. All right.