Now, turn with me in your Bibles
to 1 John 3. Now, I truly believe
this morning that I have a message that is truly for the comfort
and encouragement of God's people. And that's what I want to do
every time I preach, but it seems that in certain times that we
go through trials, as Brother Bill prayed. You know, this life
for a believer is a continual trial. It really is, isn't it? I mean, they just seem to never
let up. Now, some trials seem more burdensome than others,
more weighty. But we know the Lord has ordained
these trials for His children. He's our Heavenly Father, and
the Bible teaches that these trials that we go through, that
they are tests of our faith. They don't produce faith, but
they reveal faith. They help us to grow in grace
and in knowledge. They drive us to God in prayer.
They drive us to God in His Word. They wean us away from this world,
and they draw us nearer to Christ, who is our hope and our comfort,
for all comfort is in Him. I was talking to our sister Sue
Terry yesterday in the hospital, and she made a statement to me.
She said that one of the things that she's most ashamed of is
that when she is surprised by the power and grace of God that
He gives her in her comfort and in her trials. She said, I shouldn't
be surprised at that at all. And I thought about that hymn
that we were singing earlier. We sing that, you know, that's
a direct quote from scripture when we say, I know whom I have
believed and I'm persuaded that he is able to keep that which
I've committed unto him against that day. Now, that's not just
talking about the day of judgment, that's included, but it's also
talking about the day of trial. And Christ is able to keep that
which we've committed unto him even in times of trial. We've
committed everything to Him, haven't we, if we're trusting
in Him and resting in Him. So I want this message to be
a comfort, a time of peace, a word of peace to the people of God
and an encouragement. But I also want it to be an encouragement
to the lost to flee to Christ, because every message should
do that. Now, I spent a long time, many
sermons, teaching here from 1st John chapter 3 on the subjects
of love and hate, the love of brethren, the hatred of the world,
because I truly believe that it is one of the most important
subjects, truths that we can study and learn from God's Word
by the power of the Holy Spirit. And that's what John's subject
here. Look at verse 19. Look at verse 18. He says, My
little children, And he's speaking to children of God. Children
by God, by sovereign, divine, electing grace. Children by redeeming
grace, redeemed by the blood of Christ, justified in Him. Children by adopting grace. God
adopted us, the Scripture says, into His family. And children
by regenerating grace. We've been born again into the
family of God, into the kingdom. And that's what he's talking
about. Who are the children of God? They're children of the
promise, Paul said in Romans chapter 9. And that means we
believe a promise that God has made. And what is that promise?
It's the promise to save us and to keep us and to bring us to
glory by His grace through the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's
the promise we believe and we rest in Him. So he says, my little
children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but
in deed and in truth. Now that's John's subject. And
as I said, he's been talking about the love of the brethren,
that special love. You know, we're commanded by
God to love our neighbor, love all people as we love ourselves. But there is a special bond and
union. within the family of God, that
God puts there by His grace and implants within the hearts of
His people that cannot be broken. And it has its foundation in
His love for His people that is proven by the fact that He
sent His Son into the world to give His life for our sins, to
save us from our sins. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation,
the sin-bearing offering the satisfaction for our sins. And so this love is what John
is speaking of, and his subject here is love that's more than
talk. It's love that's more than just
something you say. But it's love, it's godly love,
divine love, that shows itself in two ways. Indeed, that means
in action, not what we say but what we do. and in truth. That is what we believe. And
as I said last week, you know, men have constantly tried to
put action and truth in opposition, obedience and truth in opposition
to one another, but the Bible never does that. You won't find
one scripture from Genesis to Revelation that puts God's truth
and doctrine of Christ at odds with obedience. They go together. And so, in fact, the Word of
God teaches us that we cannot act right unless we think right,
and God has to change our thinking. That's what He does in the new
birth, by the power of the Spirit, when He implants the Word within
our hearts, and that's our minds, our affections, our will, our
conscience. We have a new way of thinking,
you see. We don't think like we used to think, because now
we think in terms of grace. We think in terms of Christ and
Him crucified and what He accomplished for us. And therefore our obedience
and our activity and our deeds are to be done not aimed at salvation,
but out of love, out of gratitude to God for what he's given us
freely, which we did not deserve. And that's the difference, you
see. But now John said, now here's what you need to keep in mind.
What he does, he sort of in the rest of this chapter draws it
all together for the comfort and the peace and the encouragement
of God's people. And here's the key word. He's
talking about evidence here. He's not talking about causes
and grounds. He's talking about evidence.
He's talking about fruit. What he's talking about is an
evidence of a true believer, evidence of our faith, that our
faith is genuine, that it's not just something we say as a hypocrite
would and do something else. He's talking about that which
is the fruit of grace, not the cause of grace. What is the cause
of God's grace? It's God Himself, the Scripture
says. His sovereign will. It has nothing to do with the
recipients of grace, the objects of grace. Any sinner that God
loves and saves, that love and that salvation is given freely,
unconditionally, with no qualifications in the person to whom it's directed. Because, like I said, Anything
we have in salvation, we didn't earn it and we don't deserve
it. It's all because of God's sovereign grace. So what John
is speaking of here is evidence. And we need to distinguish between
grounds and causes. What is the ground of our salvation?
Christ and Him crucified. And then evidence is infringed.
And that holds true in this matter of assurance. I've entitled this
message, The Assurance of Faith. The Assurance of Faith. And what
I believe it's teaching us here is how we, as those who claim
that God is for us, as we read in the psalm there, God is on
our side. I know people say, well, it's
not that God is on our side, it's we're on his side. Well,
God the Holy Spirit directed the psalmist to write that down.
So I feel safe in using that terminology, that God is on our
side. Everybody says that. The Muslims
say that. I mean, these fellows who strap
a bomb to their chest and walk into a mall and blow up everybody,
they do that because they truly believe God is on their side,
don't they? Those kamikaze pilots in World
War II that dove into aircraft carriers, why did they do that?
They believed God was on their side. Now, let me ask you, was
their problem sincerity? Somebody says, well, they're
just not sincere enough. I'm going to tell you, they're
more sincere than we are. Their problem is not sincerity.
Is their problem hypocrisy? Well, it is in God's sight, but
now from man's point of view, they really believe what they
say. And they act on it. You say,
but they're wicked. Not to their family. Now to your
family they are. Their mom and dad says, well
done. We say wicked and evil. Now,
how can we know? Is there any standard by which
we can go on this thing, or is it just every man for himself?
Like in the time of the judges, they all did that which was right
in their own eyes. That's the problem now, isn't
it? How can we have any assurance of faith that what we say is
true, that God is on our side? That's what John's talking about
here. Now, let me make this distinction. Now, listen to this. The ground
of our salvation and what we believe is the Word of God that
teaches us and points us to the Lord Jesus Christ and what He
accomplished by Himself in His obedience unto death to save
us from our sins. We have no other plea but Christ
died for me. It has nothing to do with my
works. my deeds, even my love for you is totally excluded from
the ground and the cause of my salvation. It's totally His love
for me. It's totally His deeds, His work. You see that? Salvation is not
conditioned on what I do for God. It's conditioned totally
on what He did for me in Christ. Now, that's the ground and the
cause. But now there are evidences. Now, we could talk about them
in different terms. We could say the evidence that
Christ died for this one is that he's born again by the Spirit
of God. That's the new birth. You must be born again. That's
the evidence. That's the fruit of Christ's
death. He said in John chapter 12, when he used the analogy
of the seed that falls into the ground and dies and then brings
forth fruit. Well, he's speaking of himself.
He died, he's the seed, and from his death comes forth the fruit,
the life. And that is known by the power
of the Holy Spirit. Well, the Holy Spirit means a
lot of things to a lot of different people today, doesn't it? Somebody
says, well, I feel the work of the Holy Spirit, or I just sense
the work of the Holy Spirit, or I believe the Spirit's working
on this one, or working on that one. Well, here's what John says.
Here's what God's Word says in this particular passage. It's
love in deed and in truth. That's the evidence of the Holy
Spirit's work. That's the evidence. Now, how
can I tell my faith is really saving faith, or is it just head
knowledge? Is it just something I talk about?
Now, look here in verse 19. He says, "...and hereby we know..."
Now, listen to the language of God here. He says, "...and hereby..."
We know, now it's by this love in deed and truth. Hereby we
know that we are of the truth, and shall assure or persuade. Now, you remember we sang the
song, that's from 2 Timothy chapter 1. Paul said, I know whom I believe. I'm persuaded. You know, many
times I know Brother Ken Wymer made this statement here when
he was preaching, and I love this statement. Now, faith is
not a choice you make or I make. Faith is a persuasion that God
brings us to by the Spirit. And that's what he's talking
about. We shall persuade our hearts before Him, or assure
our hearts. It's the same thing. The heart
here is the conscience. Now, we can talk about the body,
the soul, and the Spirit. We don't understand a lot of
the technicalities of that, and we don't need to. We see the
conscience here. That's what he's speaking of,
the conscience. What is the conscience? It's the moral seat of the mind
or the heart. It's what drives us. It's our
sense of right and wrong. You see, before God saves us,
before He enlightens our minds, our sense of right and wrong
is just totally off, isn't it? That's what Brother Tim James
said, that by nature we're spiritually insane. We don't know the difference
between right and wrong. Now, that is in God's eyes now.
We know the laws of the land. We know that when a fellow goes
and robs a bank and gets caught, he goes to jail. Supposed to.
We know that. We know that we ought to be good
family men and women, good sons and daughters, good students,
hard work, all of that. We know that. But when it comes
to salvation, we don't know up from down, east from west, by
nature. We don't know that until God
teaches us. And so the conscience has to be changed. Our sense
of right and wrong has to be lifted to a higher plane than
what the totally depraved, self-righteous, dead-in-sin human being can reach. He has to be taught of God. He has to be convinced. And what
the Bible teaches us in our conscience, when God saves us, that there
is only one way that is right in God's sight of salvation. Isn't that right? Christ said
it, I am the way, the truth, the life, no man cometh unto
the Father but by me. That was his claim. Now, did
he back up that claim? Well, he backed it up very well. He backed it up with his perfect
life. He backed it up with his substitutionary death on the
cross. He backed it up with his resurrection. And he's backed
it up by the fact that he is now seated at the right hand
of the Father, making ever living to make intercession for his
people. And he rules and reigns and disposes over all things
to accomplish his sovereign will in heaven and in earth. And then
he's going to back it up again. He's going to back it up when
he comes back the second time. to judge this world and gather
His people. So, this, He is the only way. Now, whenever you are convinced
in your conscience that there's no other way but the way of grace,
the way of Christ and Him crucified, His blood alone, His righteousness
alone, you say, then, then you have an enlightened conscience,
a regenerated conscience, that's a regenerated person, you say.
And then you're enabled to love in deed and in truth. Now, The
heart, as it says, the conscience, he's writing not of confidence
before God in our justification and acceptance with him here,
because that's in Christ alone. That confidence only comes by
what Christ did, but love indeed and in truth is the evidence
that I am truly what? Resting in Christ for all of
salvation, following him. And the presence of this love
testifies to our conscience, as he says. that we are the children
of God. And by this brotherly love, we
can know that we're of the truth, that we're truly born of God,
that we believe what we say, that it's not just sham religion.
Now, we do look for and seek after and cultivate evidences
of salvation, but we do not plead those evidences as our ground
of salvation. And we do not expect God to bless
us based on them, and we do not plead them as our righteousness.
We look to Christ and Him alone. Now, turn back to Hebrews 6 there
that Brother Bill read. I want to show you something
here. This chapter is very similar to 1 John 3. What the Apostle
is seeking to do here in Hebrews chapter 6 is to inspire and encourage
believers to grow on to maturity. Don't stay babies. In fact, he
had sort of admonished them back up in chapter 5. He says, you
all have been in this thing long enough, you ought to be teachers.
Now, that doesn't mean that everybody's going to have a teaching ministry
or a public ministry, but they ought to have the knowledge.
That's what he's saying. They ought to have the knowledge
that is being taught. And he says you ought to know
better. Now, you've all seen adults who act like children.
And the first thing you think is, well, that person ought to
know better. He ought to know that that's not the type of behavior
that is appropriate for an adult. You young people, you're growing
up, you're going to hear that more and more. And thank God
you will hear it more and more. Some of them don't hear it enough.
And you say, well, it won't make any difference. Well, you know
better than that. You know better than that. But
now, you know, it's been my experience, when I was growing up, we wanted
to be treated like adults, but then we wanted to act like children.
That's that transition. And that's the kind of people
that the apostles are writing to here in Hebrews, sort of,
spiritually speaking. They ought to be adults. They
ought to be mature. So he says in chapter 6, he says,
let's go on. And when he says in verse 1,
therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, he's
not saying leaving them behind. That's not what the sense of
the wording is here. It's don't leave it behind. Again,
you young people, I'll get on to you just a minute more. As
you're growing up, we do not want you to forget the very first
principles of living and maturity and right and wrong that you've
been taught to get along in society. We don't want you to forget that.
I mean, it's not like each time you have a birthday, you forget
the year behind what you've learned and then start with a new slate.
So Paul's saying, no, we don't want you to leave it behind,
but we want you to grow from it. That's what he's saying.
In other words, you leave in the sense that you grow from
it and you build on it. And so he sets forth some things
there. And then he says this, he says,
now those who do not grow and those who actually get to the
point where they leave it totally, they're not saved at all. They
never were saved. John said that over in 1 John
chapter 2, you remember, when he said, they went out from us,
but they were not of us, verse 18 and 19. Well, that's what
the apostle is saying here in Hebrews chapter 6. Those who
leave it, they never were of us. But look at verse 9. Now,
here's the comfort. Here's the encouragement. He
says, But, beloved, we're persuaded. Now, there's that word persuaded
again. We are assured. Better things of you. And he
says, And things that accompany salvation. Now, notice he didn't
say things that save you. You see, only God saved you.
Christ saved you. It's by grace. But things that
accompany salvation, these are the fruits and the evidences
of salvation. You see that? And he says, and
though we thus speak. And look at verse 10. Now look
at this. He says, for God is not unrighteous to forget your
work and labor of love. Now, what is that work and labor
of love? Well, first of all, it's the work of God within his
children. The works didn't originate with
them. The Bible says, for we are his workmanship created in
Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained
that we should walk in them. So it's the work of God within
his people. Secondly, it is the fruit of
salvation, things that accompany salvation. Thirdly, it's the
fruit and labor of love. In other words, it's fruit, it's
labor and works not aimed at salvation, but it's Labor and
works because of salvation. You see the difference? It's
like a tree that's been planted and it's bearing fruit. The life
is in the root there. Like Christ said, I'm the vine,
you're the branches. The life's in the vine. We're
the branches. And if we're in Christ truly,
there will be what? There will bear fruit. We don't
produce fruit. I hear these people talking about
producing fruit. We don't produce it. You see? We bear it. We're his workmanship. If you're a tree bearing fruit,
you've been planted, created and planted by the water by the
Lord Jesus Christ. And it's labor of love. In other
words, it's not done in order to obtain salvation, but it's
because you love the one who gave it to you freely when you
didn't deserve it and didn't earn it and still don't. All
right. It's a labor of love. Look on
verse 10. He says, which you have showed
toward his name. Now, when it says show toward
his name, that means for his glory. In other words, this is
nothing you're going to take credit for. This is nothing that
you're going to boast in. God is glorified. And then he
says, in that you have ministered to the saints. The same thing
that John's speaking of over in 1 John 3. Love of the brethren
in deed and in truth. You've ministered. You've served.
That's what that means. When it says you've ministered
to the saints, that doesn't mean you stood up, got up behind the
pulpit and put some kind of funny-looking collar on. It means you've served. You're a servant. That's what
a minister is. I'm a servant of the church.
I'm not the CEO of the 13th Street Baptist business. I'm a servant
of the family of God." And so he says, and do minister. And
what he says in verse 11, he says, and we desire that every
one of you, not just some of you, not just the one sitting
up front, I want the one sitting back there too, and everybody
in between, every one of you do show the same diligence to
the full assurance of hope unto the end, assuring our hearts. Now look over at verse 11. 17
of this same chapter. Now, what about this assurance
now? Well, he says in verse 17 of Hebrews 6, he says, We are
in God willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise.
Now, who are the heirs of promise? Those who believe that promise
I mentioned earlier. Salvation, full and free, totally,
completely, through Christ. Heirs of promise, the immutability
of His counsel, God cannot change. And whatever he says, it doesn't,
listen, God never did anything wrong, never said anything wrong,
why would he need to change? If he changed, he'd either have
to change for the better or the worse. God doesn't, he can't
get any better, he's God. And he's certainly not going
to get any worse. He's God. So his counsels in him, he confirmed
it by an oath, that by two immutable things, that is his word and
his oath, his promise and his oath. in which it was impossible
for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, comfort
and assurance." Now who's to have this? Now look at it, verse
18, "...who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set
before us." Now what hope has been set before you? The hope
of Christ and Him crucified. Now have you laid hold of Him?
That's who He's talking to. Now go back to 1 John 3 with
that in mind. And look at what He says here. He says that, verse 19, hereby
we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our consciences,
that's what he's talking about, our hearts, before him. He's writing of the answer of
a good conscience before God and within ourselves, before
men concerning not the ground of salvation but the evidences
and the fruit. And as to the ground of salvation.
and acceptance before God. Free access into the holy presence
of God for communion and entitlement to the inheritance of grace and
glory, the only thing that can truly clear and cleanse the conscience
is that which perfectly satisfies God's law and justice, the blood
of Christ, His righteousness alone. But He has given us many
ways to prove and give evidence of the genuineness of our profession.
We say we love God, and we say we love the brethren. All through
the Bible, God gives us ways to express that in action. I'll give you some examples.
In John chapter 21, he's set by the shore of the sea with
his disciples. These were saved individuals.
These were regenerated individuals. And after the Lord came back,
after he was resurrected and appeared to them, They didn't
understand what their commission was, and they went back to their
nets, they went back to fishing. They weren't forsaking Him, they
just didn't know what else to do. They were going back to make
a living, just like many of you all make a living. And then the
Lord appeared to them, and you remember they fished all night
and they didn't catch anything, and then He said, cast your net
on the right side of the boat, and they pulled up all those
fish. And here they were sitting on the shore. And he looked at
the apostle Peter, and he was speaking to the whole group,
and he said, Peter, do you love me? Now, it's easy to say, I
love you. Those words get thrown around
today worse than probably any time in the history of the human
race. And people don't mean it. I hear
these preachers on TV saying, they look at their audience,
I love you. They don't love you. They don't even know you. Now
listen to me. I'm not being too hard here now.
You all have experienced it. People who say one thing, they
do another, mean another. I'll tell you how much they'll
love you if you write them a check. And that's about the size of
it. Just like that old country song, they said, send the money
to God, but make the check out to me. Well, now listen to me now. These
shysters and charlatans. Christ looked at Peter and he
said, Peter, do you love me? And Peter said, yes, Lord, I
love you. What was his next line? What
did he say? Feed my sheep. Don't scatter
them. Don't divide them. Don't upset
them. Feed them. Three times he said
that. Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep. How much does the preacher love
Christ? Does he feed the sheep? Or does
he starve them? Or does he scatter them? Feed my sheep. Love indeed in
truth. You really believe what you say?
And how does he feed them? With the Word of God. That's
what the sheep are fed with. God's Word. These are the words
of life, Peter said. to the Lord. These are the words
of life. A feast on the preaching of Christ
and Him crucified, whereby Peter said, desire the sincere milk
of the Word that you may grow thereby. If so be you've tasted
that the Lord is gracious. If there is grace in the heart,
there's going to be a hunger for the Word. And the one who
loves you and the people who love you, they'll feed you with
the Word. Not with their ideas and their
their rumors and innuendo and poison, but with the word of
truth, feed my sheep. You see, all of this, you see,
my love for God and for you and your love for God and for me
will not save us. You understand what I'm saying
now? It won't save you. The only thing that will save
me and you is His love for us. But my love for God and for you
and your love for me and for God and for me, that's an evidence
of his love for us. That's what John's teaching.
That's the difference. And he says, look here at verse
20, he says, For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than
our heart knoweth all things. Verse 21, Beloved, if our heart
condemn us not, then we have confidence towards God. Now,
here's the issue. God is greater than our hearts,
and we cannot fool God in these matters. Now, we can fool men,
we can even fool ourselves, but we can't fool God. You know,
there's no use talking about how much we love the brethren,
how much we love God, how much we love the Word, unless there's
a real hunger, unless there's deeds that back up the action. But here's the thing, when we
examine ourselves, now think about this with me. And I thought
about this when Sue Terry said this yesterday. She said, I'm
just so ashamed when I'm surprised because I know, this is basically
what she said, I know whom I believe. I'm persuaded that he's able.
And when I come to face these trials and these tragedies of
life, whether it be death, whether it be anything, I know, I can
tell you right now, I know He's able to keep that which I've
committed unto Him against that day. So when I do come to Him,
why should I be surprised? And I told her, I tried to give
her an out, and maybe I shouldn't have done this. I said, well,
maybe you're not just surprised, you're just amazed. But she knows
her heart. She knows the score. And that's
what this is saying. If our heart condemns us... When
we examine ourselves, if we're honest in light of God's Word,
what are we going to find? We're going to find this, that
we don't have anything to brag about. Am I right? I do love God, but I'm going
to tell you something. It would be foolish and hypocritical
for me to get up here and brag about how much I love God. Because I know myself. You see,
there's somebody I know better than you know. I know me. And when I want what I desire
is to see the perfection of love. More love to thee. That's what
we sing in that hymn. I want to love him more. I want
to love you more. But I have such a struggle within
myself and it's because I love me too much. That's right. Any of you all get to feeling
sorry for yourself, you know what your problem is? You love
yourself too much. And you know how I know that?
Because I'm right with you. I'm right with you. You see,
the Bible tells me if I want to see the perfection of love,
don't look at Bill. Don't look within. Look to Christ.
There's the perfection of love. So when I look within, I see
so much sin. I see so much weakness. So much
surprise, as Sue said. I too, I know, I mean, you know,
I'm just surprised. I shouldn't be. You know why? Because God's never changed.
He's immutable, and He's sworn an oath. He made a promise and
swore an oath. It means God's not, He cannot
go back. He says, I'm the Lord, I change not, therefore you sons
of Jacob are not consumed. You sinners saved by the grace
of God. So I look within myself and I see so much weakness, so
much sinful, so much deservedness of death. But he says this, he
says, if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart. And he knows all things. You
remember what Peter said there when the Lord asked him, he said,
Peter, do you love me? And then the third time he said,
Lord, thou knowest all things. You know I love you. I don't
love you perfectly, but you know I love you. God is greater. And you know what comfort that
gives? It's God that justifies. And the sinner who knows his
frame, but who's resting in the Lord Jesus Christ as his only
hope and righteousness before God. That's the one whom God
has justified. God sees, you know, you say,
well, you know, once you get to know that fellow, the less
you like him. Well, God sees infinitely more about me than
you could ever see. And yet he sent his son to die
for me. See what I'm saying? He's great, and He sees infinitely
more than even I see. Because when my heart condemns
me, God is even greater than my heart. You see, Satan, he'll
shoot his arrows of accusation, but they won't stick. Why? Because we plead the blood of
the Lamb. All right? We plead His righteousness alone.
And men will accuse me with their accusations. And some of their
accusations may be correct. I'm not going to stand before
you and tell you that I'm pure and innocent as the drifting
snow in those areas. But you know what they can't
do? They can't condemn me. Because God is greater than them.
He knows the score much better than they. He knows things about
me that they have never even thought of. And yet, He still
justifies me in Christ. But then when my own heart turns
on me, and it will, I mean, I get so down sometimes, crying and
wallowing around in the mud and the mire, and think, oh, I couldn't
be saved. God is greater than my heart.
That's what He's saying. You see, my salvation is in one
who should never surprise me. That's what Stu would say. He's
in one unto whom I've committed all things. And he's greater
than my heart. And then he says, beloved, if
our heart condemn us not, then we have confidence toward God.
Now, what is the uncondemned heart? Now, there's the key to
the understanding that, you know, if you say my heart doesn't condemn
me, you're not talking here about a self-righteous person. You
know, a self-righteous person cannot honestly say, my heart
does not condemn me, because when he looks within, he's finding
all kinds of things that he thinks are pretty good. So what is the
uncondemned heart, the uncondemned conscience? Well, turn to Hebrews
chapter 10, one of my favorite passages of Scripture. And I
wish, you know, there are certain passages of Scripture I go to,
and I'll try to memorize them. But when I get up here, I've
got to turn to him, because I'm afraid if I don't read him, I'm
going to leave out a word or something, and then somebody's
going to get me in the back there and say, you left out this word. So I don't have that much confidence
in myself in that way. But listen to this. What is the
uncondemned heart? When my heart doesn't condemn
me. Now look here. He says in verse, he's talking
about the death of Christ here in Hebrews 10. That's the whole
point. How the blood and righteousness of Christ has abrogated the law
of God, it's fulfilled. And he says that sins have been
forgiven and washed away and remitted by the blood. And he
says in verse 19, now listen to this, and having therefore,
brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest. That's the holy
presence of God. How do we have that boldness?
By the blood of Jesus. It doesn't add anything to that.
That's it. That's all you need. And then
he goes on, verse 20, by a new and living way which he, that
is Christ, hath consecrated, that is newly made. In other
words, my way into the holiest by the blood of Jesus is a way
that Christ made for me. It's not a way that I made for
myself. You see that? I didn't make it. He did. He's
the way, the truth, the lie. I didn't have anything to do
with making that way. Christ alone, which he hath consecrated
for us," he did it as my substitute and representative and surety,
"...through the veil," that is to say, his flesh, he did it
as God-man, "...and having a high priest over the house of God."
Christ is my high priest over the house of God. Now look at
verse 22. Here's the uncondemned conscience, the uncondemned heart.
"...let us draw near with a true heart," an honest heart. Sincere
heart. In full assurance of faith, having
our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies
washed with pure water. What is the uncondemned heart?
It's the heart that is set on Christ. That's what he's saying
there in 1 John 3. Look at it again. If our hearts
condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things.
Verse 21, Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then we have
confidence toward God. If your heart, listen to me now,
if you're a believer, loving indeed and in truth, regenerated
by the Holy Spirit, enlightened to the truth, you've seen the
holiness of God. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty.
You've seen the depths of your depravity and your sin. You know
your frame. There's only one way your heart
cannot condemn you. And that's by looking unto Jesus,
the author and finisher of your faith. That's it. Because, see,
then you have confidence towards God. Then you have boldness to
enter into the holiest of all by the blood of Christ. I'm washed
in His blood. I'm clothed in His righteousness.
As wretched and rotten as I am, as Paul wrote in Romans 7, verses
14-25, he said, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver
me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ
my Lord. And remember what he said in
the next line in Romans 8, there is therefore now, know what?
Condemnation to them that are in Christ. That's the only way
this old heart cannot condemn me. That's the pure heart, purified
by the blood of Christ. Now, the evil conscience is any
conscience that sets you on a road or gives you any comfort in anything
else. That's an evil conscience. Isn't
that something? Look at it. We have confidence
towards God. Well, my time has run out, but
I'm going to quit. That's the assurance of faith right there. A cleansed heart looking unto
Christ. All right. Let's sing that hymn,
Jesus Paid It All. Hymn number 125, Jesus Paid It
All.