Now let's turn in our Bibles
to Jeremiah chapter 31. Jeremiah chapter 31. I want to
read again verse 31 through 34. Jeremiah 31 verse 31. Now this
is a prophecy. of the coming of the Lord Jesus
Christ and the establishment of the New Covenant, the New
Testament. And the New Covenant is the fulfillment
in time of the everlasting covenant of grace made before time, the
purpose of God, the everlasting, eternal purpose of God to save
His people. Actually, we should put it this
way. It's the everlasting purpose of God to glorify himself in
the salvation of his people through the Lord Jesus Christ. And this
new covenant is the fulfillment in time of that great purpose,
the coming of Christ into the world. And to make it simple
for me and for you, whenever we preach the gospel, the good
news of salvation in the person and finished work of Christ,
We're preaching the terms of both the everlasting covenant
of grace and the new covenant, preaching the blood of Christ.
That's what the gospel is. If you want to know the covenants,
the eternal covenant and the new covenant, just listen to
the preaching of the gospel and you've got it. And that's it.
So he says, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I
will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, with the
house of Judah. Now, as you know, this is part
two tonight is part two of the message that I began on Wednesday
night entitled, They Shall All Know Me. I did an overview of
this passage here, and I showed through the scripture how the
house of Judah and the house of Israel there are types and
pictures, metaphors of spiritual Israel, God's people, redeemed
by the blood of Christ out of every tribe, kindred, tongue,
and nation. Now verse 32, this new covenant
is not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers
in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of
the land of Egypt. That's the old covenant, that's the law
of Moses. Now the gospel was in the old covenant. It was in
the old covenant in type, in picture, and in prophecy. But
it had not yet been fulfilled in time, and thus every believer
before the new covenant was saved the same way we are, but they
looked towards that salvation by promise. In other words, they
looked to the future. They looked towards the one who
was to come. They believed in the same Christ that we believe
in today. Moses did. And even before Moses,
Abraham, Abel, go back to Abel. His salvation, the gospel, was
the same as ours. But he just looked forward to
the promise. of the coming of the Messiah.
We look back at the Messiah who's already come, and that's the
only difference. That's a time difference. It's not a difference
in truth. It's not a difference in the
ground. The same ground upon which God saves me and justifies
me is the same ground upon which God saved and justified Abel.
That's the eternality of this message, isn't it? That's the
good news. Well, so the Old Covenant was in type and in picture. It
was made with a national people whose heart as a nation now had
not been changed by God the Holy Spirit. There were individuals
in that nation who were born again by the Spirit and who knew
the truth. Isaiah in his day called it a
remnant, a small part. But as a nation, they were unconverted. They were a rebellious, unbelieving
people. And this proves it. Look here.
Which my covenant they break. They broke that covenant. Now,
of course, according to the terms and conditions of that temple
covenant, we would have all broken that covenant because we're sinners.
But you see, he says, although I wasn't husband unto them, saith
the Lord. God did connect himself to that
nation for a temporary period of time. It's called in the book
of Hebrews, I believe it is chapter 9, the time of Reformation. Somebody asked me one time if
I hold to the doctrines of the Reformation. Of course, they
are not referring to what I think of when I say the Reformation.
They are talking about John Calvin, Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli,
and John Hus, and all those men. I go further back. I go to the
Reformation that is listed in Hebrews chapter 9. That is the
cross. And yes, I do adhere to the doctrines
of the cross, the doctrine of Christ and him crucified, buried,
risen again. But God did join himself to that
physical nation for a little while until his purpose for them
under that old covenant was completed. But now that's over. He says
in verse 33, but this shall be the covenant that I will make
with the house of Israel. And now he begins to give the
new covenant blessings. And these blessings are not temporal
and physical. They're not geographical, and
they're not ethnic. They don't apply to one specific
nation, like the old covenant did, the physical seed of Abraham. This new covenant is a spiritual
covenant. And it's only made with people
who are born again by the Spirit. They were chosen of God, justified
by Him, redeemed by the blood of Christ, and regenerated by
the Spirit. We'll see that in these blessings.
These are eternal blessings. These are spiritual blessings.
And he says here in verse 32, I will make this after those
days, sayeth the Lord. He says, I will put my law in
their inward parts and write it in their hearts. That speaks
of the new birth. It's not going to be like the
old covenant. where the majority of the nation,
the law of God was merely an external code written on tablets
of stone, not on, as Paul wrote to the Corinthians, fleshy tables
of the heart. This speaks of conviction of
sin and of righteousness and of judgment by the Holy Spirit.
This is a law that's in plan. This is the word of God. And
it's not just, it's not the Ten Commandments and the ceremonial
law that's fulfilled. It's the gospel. of God's grace. And all the ordinances and commandments
that go along with the gospel of God's grace, it's Christ in
you, the hope of glory. It's the Holy Spirit who dwells
within us. He's given us a new heart and
a mind, affections and a will. He's given us life within. That's
what he's talking about. You see, you can't have a heart
for the law under condemnation. Because as long as you think
you're under condemnation, you will run from the law. Or you'll
try to keep it in order to be saved. And that's worse. That's worse. Did you know that? That's worse
according to the Scriptures. The only way that you can have
a heart for the law is to see that law that is not against
you. That it doesn't condemn you.
That it doesn't require an obedience or a debt of a legal debt. Now, how can I see that? Look
to Christ, who fulfilled the law. We'll see that in just a
moment. And this thing about knowledge. Christ fulfilled the
law for me. I owe no obligation to the law
of God. A legal obligation. Because,
now I owe God a lot. Don't get me wrong. We owe God
everything. We owe Him our lives, our hearts, our minds, our families,
our time, our everything. But it's a debt of love. Not
a debt of law. And that's a big difference that
people don't see today. You see, most people today, preachers
are trying to motivate people to serve God, not out of love,
not out of grace, not out of gratitude, but just what you
can get out of Him. And that's not grace, that's
a mercenary. That's like a hired soldier.
You have no loyalty, you have no citizenship, you see, but
you're just getting paid. So you serve more to get more. That's what they preach, and
they call it grace. Now we know better. That's not
grace at all. That's like Saul. Remember King
Saul? He had to bribe his men to get
them to fight for him. David didn't have to bribe his
men, did he? They went and served him because they loved him. He
didn't even have to command them. He just spoke a word to himself
about getting a drink of water from his hometown, and three
men went and risked their lives for their king to go get him
a drink of water from the well of his hometown in Bethlehem.
That's amazing, isn't it? But that's the kind of service
that God requires of His redeemed people. So this is the new birth.
And then look here in verse 32. He says, he says, writing in
their hearts, and I will be their God and they shall be my people.
That's the spirit of adoption. This is a spiritual relationship
with God where we see him through Christ, not only or not as a
stern, judgmental lawgiver. Now, God is a judge. Now, he
must be just. But we see him as our heavenly
father. The Spirit of God bears witness with our spirit that
we are the children of God, whereby we cry, Abba, Father, Papa, Papa. Not a disrespectful thing, now,
not the big guy upstairs. No, that's junk. That's religious
junk. Don't ever refer to God like
that, my friend. I mean, that gets a laugh out
of people, but it's not funny now. Not the old man upstairs. No, he's our Heavenly Father,
and we respect him. We regard him. You see, this
is the way it's going to be under the New Covenant. If you're a recipient and a member
of this New Covenant, this is what you have. You see, this
is the privilege of grace. This is what's been freely given
to us in Christ. So we have the spirit of adoption.
And then thirdly, he says in verse 34, And they shall teach
no man, no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother,
saying, Know the Lord. In other words, like the prophets
who always complained of the people of Israel and Judah that
they didn't know God. And they had to teach them over
and over again things that they should have already known and
learned and understood and grasped. He says, for they shall all know
me. Now, that's where I want to major.
And I've got a lot of verses to go to, so I probably won't
finish this tonight. But you hold on with me. I want
you to turn to these verses. They shall all know me. from
the least of them unto the greatest of them, not just this group
over here, not just this group over here, this middle group,
but every one of God's children will know God equally. So he's talking about something
that we all who are saved know. It's not just something the preacher
knows, not just something the elder knows. It's something they
all know from the least to the greatest. And he says, so that's
that's saving knowledge. And then You see, under the old
covenant, Israel, they had the law, but the majority didn't
know God. Hosea, we'll turn there in just a moment. Hosea said
that in Hosea 4, 6, he said, my people are destroyed for lack
of knowledge. And so they'll know him. And
then he says, fourthly, here's a blessing of the new covenant.
He says, for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember
their sin no more. That's the forgiveness of sin.
That's the blessing of justification before God. Now, this is the
order that we see it. This is the order that is revealed
to us by the Spirit. And to forgive our iniquity,
God had to be just to do so. So what did He have to do? He
had to send His Son to die on the cross to bring about the
forgiveness of sins. For the forgiveness of sins is
by the blood of Christ. God is just and faithful to forgive
us our sins. How? By what? The blood of Christ.
He doesn't forgive me on the basis of my repentance. He doesn't forgive me on the
basis of my tears of remorse. He doesn't forgive me on the
basis of my promises to do better. He forgives me upon one ground,
the blood of the Lamb. And that's it. And so he says,
I will remember their sins no more. What he's talking about,
he will not hold them against us anymore. Why? Because he held
them against Christ. They were charged to Christ.
They were accounted to Him. They were imputed to Him. He
was made sin for us, Christ who knew no sin, that we might be
made the righteousness of God in Him. And Christ drank damnation
dry for His people, not just part of the way, not half, not
three quarters, not 99, 44, 100 percent, but 100 percent He drank
it dry. Jesus paid it all, the hymn says. Now, back here, he says, they
shall all know me from the least of them unto the greatest. What's
he saying? What is it they're going to know?
Every participant in this new covenant, every sinner saved
by grace, every redeemed, chosen, redeemed, justified, regenerated
sinner, what are they going to know? He says, they're going
to know me. Who is the me here? That's the God of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob, as you pray. That's the God of all grace.
That is the God who justifies the ungodly upon the ground of
the blood and righteousness of Christ. That's the God who promised
to save any sinner and every sinner who comes to him begging
for mercy in Christ. That's what he's talking about.
The God of salvation, Jehovah. That's the God of the covenant.
He said, they shall all know me. Now, how can we, who by nature
are ignorant and who by nature are in darkness, that's what
that means, and who by nature are in sin and sinners, how can
we know God? Well, it has to be revealed. Knowledge of God has to be revealed,
and it's revealed through the person and finished work of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now turn to Matthew chapter 11.
We'll start here. Matthew chapter 11. This is that
great verse where the Lord, He concludes by saying, Come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give you
rest. But look at what He says in verse 27. How are we going
to know God? Well, he says in verse 27, he
says, all things are delivered unto me of my Father. Now, this
is the mediatorial authority of the Lord Jesus Christ as God-man. And it's in light of the work
that he was about to accomplish on Calvary. And he says, and
no man knoweth the Son, but the Father. In other words, if you're
going to know the Son, it takes the Father to reveal him to you,
to point him out to you. And he says, neither knoweth
any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the
Son will reveal him. So it takes the Son of God, the
Lord Jesus Christ, to reveal to us who God really is. Now,
the Bible teaches us that in Christ dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, Colossians 2 and verse 9. That's the fullness
of the Father, the fullness of the Son, and the fullness of
the Spirit. So that if you are going to know God, savingly now,
put it that way, if you're going to know God savingly, as a loving
father, you see, God must be both a righteous judge as well
as a loving father. He can't be one apart from the
other. And that's the problem with people today. They either
have a condemning, righteous judge who whips you out of hell
into heaven all the way, and that's not the God of this book.
Or you have a loving Father who will just forget and look over
your sin and save you in spite of it. Neither one of them is
the God of the Bible. They're both idols. The God of
the Bible is one who is both a righteous judge who punishes
sin, as well as a loving Father who is gracious and merciful. How can He be both? There's only
one way, and that's where you've got to turn to the Christ of
the cross. That's where you've got to turn
to the cross of Christ, where God, as a righteous judge, brought
His full wrath and justice against all the sins of His people down
upon the substitute, the Lamb of God. And in doing so, brought
mercy and grace to His people. He's both a just God and a Savior. There's not but one way He can
do that. And that's how we have to know Him. Now, Wednesday night
I mentioned this term, Gnosticism. And that gets thrown around quite
a bit. Like I said, I've been accused
of being a Gnostic. A fellow accused me of being
a Gnostic. And the reason he said that I was a Gnostic, and
the word Gnostic, remember, means knowing ones. It's people who
know. That's what that word means, Gnostic. People who know. And
he said I was a Gnostic because I exalt knowledge. Well, my friend,
I'm here to tell you, and I'm going to show you in the Scripture,
first of all, the Scripture exalts knowledge. The scripture never
exalts ignorance. Never. All right? And a person
says, well, one fellow said, a Gnostic is a person who believes
that you can attain salvation by an intellectual pursuit of
knowledge. Now, the Gnostics back in the
days of the New Testament didn't say that. They didn't believe
that. The Greeks did. The Greek philosophers, some
of you studied them in school, they believed that you could
attain salvation, whatever they called salvation, by an intellectual
pursuit of knowledge. You could learn your way through
human instruments, reading, studying, into heaven, whatever they called
heaven. But the Gnostics didn't say that. What a Gnostic would
say is this. They would say that God has revealed
to me a special knowledge that he hasn't revealed to you. And
if you get it, you've got to get it from me. Now that's a
Gnostic. It's a special knowledge. Now
you notice here in Jeremiah 31 and verse 34, what does it say?
It says, they shall all know me. Not just an elite group to
whom he's revealed a special knowledge. You see, it'd be like
a guy came to a fellow one time down south and he said, I just
know this is true. And the fellow asked him, he
said, well, what verse do you go to? And he said, I really
don't have any verses, I just know it's true. And he said,
if God ever reveals it to you, you'll know it too. That's Gnosticism. You see, that's elitism. Here's
this special group and they've got a knowledge that they can't
explain it now. I've heard this, you know, well,
I see it, but I just can't explain it. Now, let me tell you something. We know and believe a lot of
things we don't really understand, but we can show them to you in
the scripture very plainly. But what does it say here? They
shall all know me from the least to the greatest. This is a special knowledge,
but it's a special knowledge that God reveals and gives to
every one of his children alike. You know, Bill, I know, Ron knows,
because we know him. Brother Shepard was telling me
about a preacher that called him, arguing with him about something
he wrote. And somehow, I don't know why,
I wish it wouldn't happen, but somehow my name comes up in the
mix. And the fellow said, well, he's a false prophet. Well, now
me, he's a false prophet. Brother Shepard said, well, why
would you say that? He said, well, because he believes
we're saved by knowledge. Now, I've never said that, and
I don't believe that the way he meant it. We're saved by Christ. But I want to tell you something
now. You're not going to get to Christ by faith without knowledge. Now, that's right. You're not
going to come to a Savior you don't know. Yes, you do have
to know some things, but now a lot of times when we start
talking about what does a person have to know to be saved, we
get in trouble. We do, don't we? And there's
a lot of people, there's some people, there's two extremes
that way. There's some people, they codify a system of doctrine,
point 1, point 2, point 3, point 4, point 5. And really, that's
a dangerous prospect because you keep adding to it. And they
say, well, you've got no point 1, point 2, point 3, you know,
going down the line. And it does get into an intellectualism.
And then there are others who go the other side and go too
far the other way and say, well, you don't have to know anything.
They don't know anything. They'll use this where Christ
said, accept you, repent, and become as a little child. Now,
when Christ said that, notice the context. You can read about
that, for example, in Matthew chapter 18. The disciples were
arguing there. And they weren't arguing about
how much they had to know. That wasn't the argument. The
argument that they had in Matthew 18 was, who's going to be first
in the kingdom? And the Lord said, don't you
understand the grace of God? It's not an issue of who's going
to be higher and lower. Listen, he who's low, he's going
to be high, and he who's high is going to be low. He said,
except you be converted, except you repent and become as little
children. Now, what's a little child? He's
humble. He's totally, listen, a little
child is totally dependent upon his parents for his or her very
life. And that's what Christ was talking
about. He wasn't saying you're going to have to stop knowing
anything and just become ignoramuses in order for God to save you.
No. No. That's not what He's saying
at all. You see, this knowledge that
God gives to His children, it is a special knowledge. It's
a knowledge that man doesn't have by nature. And you cannot
learn it in the history books or the philosophy books or the
science books. You can't go to the library and
mentally learn your way into it with the human mind. You can't
do it. It is a revealed knowledge. It's
one whom the Son gives. He to whom the Son will reveal. And He does it by the Holy Spirit. through the word preached and
heard and understood in the power of the Spirit. The truths upon
which our salvation is founded, the vital and essential gospel
truths, and which bind our fellowship, our fellowship together and our
unity together, They are truths that God by His Spirit reveals
to every child of God, from the least of them to the greatest.
Now, you can argue over who is the least and who is the greatest.
But I just know this, they all know Him. They all know Christ. They know the Father. And these
truths are revealed plainly and simply as they are clearly found
in God's Word. They're not higher truths given
to a special person or a special group that God revealed to some
elite group or elite preachers and not to all believers unless
they get these truths from that elite person or whatever. That's
not Christianity. All that is is just men exalting
themselves. That's all it is. But now let's
talk about this exalting knowledge. I want you to turn to Proverbs
chapter 1. Let's talk about what the Bible says. Now, listen,
you all know as well as I do, that's the only way we're going
to get our answers. What does God's Word say? You can run to
me or any other preacher and you might get an idea here or
there, get an opinion. We all have one. But what does
God's Word say? Well, look at Proverbs chapter
1 and listen to how God the Holy Spirit inspires Solomon to speak
to his son. And he says in the Proverbs of
Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel, to know wisdom. This is the purpose that these
Proverbs were written. It's the purpose of the whole
Bible. To know wisdom and instruction. To perceive, that means to understand,
the words of understanding. To receive the instruction of
wisdom, justice and judgment and equity. Think about that. To give subtlety to the simple.
to the young man knowledge and discretion. A wise man will hear
and will increase learning, and a man of understanding shall
attain unto wise counsels." To understand a proverb, I want
to know what that proverb means, and the interpretation That is
what it says, what it teaches, the words of the wise and their
dark sayings. And he says, the fear of the
Lord is the beginning of knowledge. That's a reverence and a respect
and a trust in the God of salvation through Christ. That's the beginning
of knowledge. But fools despise wisdom and
instruction. Now look down at verse 22 of
Proverbs 1. He says, how long, you simple
ones, will you love simplicity? Now, the simplicity, you know,
the Bible speaks of a simplicity that's good, the simplicity that's
in Christ. And what that is, that's that
one single message of the gospel of how all my salvation and everything
about it is wrapped up, founded on, centered around, and headed
by the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work on Calvary.
Stay it. Right there. Keep it there. Keep
it fixed right there. There's the key. Right there.
It's the key to the fear of God. The key to knowledge. Christ
and Him crucified and risen again. He's my hope. Paul said, I strive
not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. There may be a lot of other things
that I don't know. A lot of other things that we
may disagree on. I may turn to a verse of Scripture
and you say, well, I don't really agree with your interpretation
of that. Maybe yours is just as good. Maybe you're right,
I'm wrong. Maybe I'm right, you're wrong.
Maybe we're both wrong. But you stay with the simplicity
that's in Christ. That His blood alone washes away
all my sins. Simple message. His righteousness
alone gives me a complete, eternal, justified standing before God
forever and forever and forever. Simple message. But now here
when He says, In verse 22, how long you simple ones, well, you
love simplicity. The simplicity here in the Old
Testament is bad. He's talking about being gullible.
You'd be taken in by anything. You'd be a real good mark for
a con man. That's what he's talking about.
Now, how long are you going to do that, he says. And the scorners
delight in their scorning. You know what scorning means?
That means where something is real valuable, but you degrade
it. You degrade it, that's a scorner.
If you see, there's something real valuable here now. What
is that? It's the truth of Christ. It's the truth of the gospel.
Do you degrade it? Do you treat it as if it's a
common thing? As if it's no value at all? You see, that's a scorner.
So he says, how long will you scorners delight in the scorning
and fools hate knowledge? A fool hates knowledge. Look
at verse 29. He says, for they that hated
knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. You can't
fear God without loving knowledge. Do you know that? Oh, that I may know him, Paul
said. Oh, that I may know him. fellowship
of his sufferings, the power of his resurrection, all of these
things. Christ told his disciples in John chapter 8 and verse 32,
you know what he said? He said, you shall know the truth. And what? The truth will puff
you up? No, it will make you free. Somebody
says, well, there is a knowledge that puffs up. Well, hold on.
I'm going to get there. 1 Timothy chapter 2 and verse
4 speaks of God who will have all men to be saved. He's not
talking about all without exception there. He's talking about all
sorts of men. And how does this salvation come about? He says,
who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge
of the truth. Now, what is it to come to the
knowledge of the truth? It's to come to Christ as the
Lord, our righteousness, as our substitute, as our Redeemer,
as our High Priest, as our Sabbath. We were talking about this last
Wednesday night, and somebody asked, you know, talking about
trying to understand the relationship of the Old Covenant as it stood
back then and the New Covenant now. Well, let me, I can simplify
that for you very readily. It's this. You understand now,
if you understand how that Old Covenant is abolished and how
the New Covenant is set in force now, here's how you can tell.
Do you believe in a Sabbath day to be kept today? Now, if you
do, let me tell you something. If you do, you don't understand
how the old covenant's been abolished and the new covenant's been established.
But now, if you know that Christ is your Sabbath, then you've
got a handle on it. That's the knowledge of God.
Christ is my Sabbath, not a day. We meet on the first day of the
week. It's the Lord's Day. It's a special day. I don't have
any problem saying that. But Sunday's not my Sabbath.
Christ is my Sabbath. Sunday is not my Sabbath no more
than I'm out here building a tabernacle and putting on high priestly
garments. You see, that's over with. That's gone. Christ is
my tabernacle. Christ is my high priest. Who
gave you that knowledge, if you know that? God did. And that's
something He gives to all His people. We know that. He brings
us to a knowledge of the truth. Hebrews chapter 11. Look at it.
Hebrews chapter 11. He says here, in Hebrews chapter
11, verse 6, He says, But without faith it is impossible to please
Him. Now faith, saving faith in the
scripture is made up basically of three elements. The first
one is knowledge. God teaches us through the preaching
of the gospel and the power of the spirit, who he is, his holiness,
who we are, our sinfulness and our depravity. The fact that
we deserve hell based upon our best efforts to keep the law.
The fact that we cannot earn the least of his blessings, even
our best efforts to please God in the flesh are abomination
to God, man at his best state, altogether vanity. That is what
he teaches us. He teaches us of our sin, and
he teaches us of the great salvation that he freely gives in Christ. And that Christ and him crucified
and risen again. Christ who is none other than
God and man in one person. Who taught you that Christ is
God? Huh? God did. Through His Word. By
the Spirit. Oh, I know it's written here
on the page. John chapter 1. You can read it there. For example. It's written that Jesus of Nazareth
is God. Do you believe that? Do you really
believe that? I do. And you know why? Because they shall all know me
from the least to the greatest. Now, there are many people who
don't believe that. They don't have that knowledge,
you see. Why? Because it's not been revealed
to them. And they'll go along their merry
way and they deny it. But you see, God's going to teach
his people. They're going to learn some things. Not because
the preacher is such a great teacher. It's because Christ
is the master teacher. Isn't that right? He's the master
teacher. He can take dummies like us and
teach us. That's basically it, isn't it? That's basically it. But look here, in Hebrews chapter
11, now faith has three elements. It has knowledge, revealed knowledge. It has assent, which means agreement. I see it, I know it, that information
is planted in my brain and taken to my heart and I agree with
it. And then the third element is
trust. Trust. You see, you can have a knowledge,
and you can even be in agreement with it, and still not have trust.
I'll give you an example of it. What did James say? The demons,
the devils in hell, believe. And they tremble. They know there's
one God. The demons in hell, the devils
in hell, know and believe that God created this world. They
know and believe more than what a lot of people on this earth
do, who deny the existence of God, who deny that God created.
But they don't trust Him, and they don't love Him, and they
don't follow Him. You see, it's not faith just to know something
intellectually. You can know things intellectually,
and not agree with them, and not really believe, not trust.
You can know about Christ and His teachings, But do you trust
him as your only hope of salvation? Is he your all and in all? See what I'm saying? That's the
difference. So he says in Hebrews 11, 6, without faith it's impossible
to please God. For he that cometh to God must
believe that he is, he must know that God exists, and that God
is as he says he is, and that he's a rewarder of them that
diligently seek him. He rewards those who diligently
seek Him. And what kind of a reward is
it? Do you know that? Is that a knowledge God's revealed?
I'll tell you exactly what kind of reward. It's a reward not
of debt. It's not a reward you earn. It's a reward of grace. Because if you diligently seek
Him, you know how you're going to seek Him? As the God who justifies
the ungodly through Jesus Christ. You're going to see Christ as
the one who earned it all. That's knowledge. Now, as I said,
turn to Isaiah 45, and I'll hurry, and I'll pick up on this Wednesday
night, but this is something we need to see. What does the
Scripture say? Don't listen. Don't just listen to me. Don't
just listen to other preachers or other people and their opinions
on this stuff. What does the Word of God say? Now, the Bible
never promotes ignorance, never exalts ignorance, never represents
ignorance as something noble. You know, they say ignorance
is bliss. I got the information for you. That didn't come from
the Bible. Ignorance is not bliss. What you don't know cannot hurt
you. Now, you know better than that one, don't you? You know better than that one.
What you don't know can certainly hurt you. But look at Isaiah
45 and verse 20. He says, Assemble yourselves,
come and draw near together, you that are escaped of the nation.
They have no knowledge that do what? That set up the wood of
their graven image and pray unto a God they cannot save. That's
what ignorance leads to, idolatry. They have no knowledge that set
up this. And listen now, just because
they don't carve images out of wood and out of stone doesn't
mean they're not idolaters because ignorance begins in the mind.
God of their imagination. So he says in verse 21, now let
me fill you in God says, let me give you the knowledge that
God teaches to all his people. He says, tell you, let bring
them near. Yay. Let them take counsel together.
Who has declared this from ancient time. And what he's talking about
is all of the glories of God's purposes in salvation by Christ. Where did that come from? It
didn't come from man. You read about, Joe read about
Noah in Genesis chapter 9. Noah had this knowledge, but
it didn't start with Noah, did it? He says, who hath told it
from that time? Have not I the Lord, and the
name Lord there is Jehovah, the God of grace, the God of promise,
the God of a covenant. And there's no God else beside
me, a just God and a Savior." That's the knowledge. How can
God be both a just God and a Savior? How can He save a sinner like
me? How can He be merciful to me? How can He be gracious to
me? How can He love me and still
be just and punish my sin? Well, He says, He's a just God
and Savior. There's none beside me. He says
in verse 22, Look unto me and be ye saved all the ends of the
earth, for I'm God, there's none else. I have sworn by myself
the word has gone out of my mouth in righteousness and shall not
return. There is going to be justice now that unto me every
knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear." You remember where
that is quoted in Philippians chapter 2 concerning who? The
Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that right? And he says,
he is going to give him a name above every name. And he says,
surely shall one say in the Lord, in Jehovah. have I righteousness
and strength. Even to him shall men come."
That's Christ. That's a prophecy of Christ.
And he says, "...and all that are incensed against him shall
be ashamed. In the Lord shall all the seed
of Israel be justified, be declared not guilty and righteous, and
shall glory." Let me close with this. Turn to Romans 1. What
is all this talking about? The knowledge of righteousness.
That's what it's talking about. Let me show you two passages,
and I'll close for tonight. I'm sorry for going so long,
but look at this. Romans chapter 1, look at verse 16. Now, where
does this knowledge come from? It comes from God. It's communicated
to the hearts of God's people by the power of the Spirit in
the preaching of the gospel. And look at it. He says in verse
16 of Romans 1, For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.
Now, you can look back in Romans 1, 1-4 and find out who Christ
is. He's the God-man. He's the Messiah. He's the one who died, was buried,
and rose again the third day, and ascended unto the Father.
And he says, For it is the power of God unto salvation to every
one that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek,
that's the Gentile. Look at it, verse 17. For therein
is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is
written, The just shall live by faith. In the preaching of
the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. Well, what
is that righteousness? Turn to Romans 10. Romans 10. And listen to this now. This
is right in line with this thing about they shall all know me.
How are we going to know him? Look at verse 1. He says, Brethren,
my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they
might be saved. For I bear them record that they
have a zeal of God. They are religious. That's what
that means. But not according to knowledge. They're missing
some knowledge. But what is the knowledge they're
missing? What do they have to have? He says in verse 3, For
they, being ignorant of God's righteousness, that's God's justice
against sin, and going about to establish their own righteousness,
trying to work their way into God's favor, have not submitted
themselves unto the righteousness of God. Now, that's the same
righteousness of God that's revealed in the Gospel, Romans 1, 16 and
17. What is that? Look at verse 4.
What is it? For Christ, is the end of the
law, that's the fulfillment of the law, the finishing of the
law, the completion of it, for righteousness to everyone that
believeth. They shall all know me. They're going to know Christ.
That's what he's talking about. Now, there's some other details
there, but I'll pick up there on Wednesday night. But this
is something else, isn't it, when you look at it and you see
how, really, it's not complicated. Like sometimes we make it. Not
complicated at all. All right.