I'm going to read some scriptures
this evening from Romans chapter 8 before I get in my message. And while you're turning, let
me mention a prayer request. Joe Angel, his wife Patsy, has
been diagnosed with a pretty serious type of cancer. Very
not good. And we certainly need to pray
for him and her. You know, we never know what
God's going to do from one day to the next. But please remember,
Joe. And Pat's in. She's got a young
daughter. She's got a young daughter. She's going to be her first year
of school, ain't it, going off to college. So we certainly want
to remember them. That's a grievous thing to deal
with. Grievous thing to deal with.
I want to start reading here in verse 35 to the end of the
chapter. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Why can't we be separated? Well,
the apostle asked the question, verse 33, who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justified them.
God justified us, who's going to separate us? And he said in
verse 34, who is he that condemneth? It's Christ that died. Christ
died to take away our condemnation. There's no condemnation down
to them that are in Christ Jesus. Not only did he die, yeah, he
rather has risen again, who is even at the right hand of God.
And there, bless his name, he makes intercession for us. So
the apostle asks, who? Three who's here. who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? Tribulation, or distress, or
persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is
written, for thy sake we are killed all the day long, we are
counted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these we are more
than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded
that neither death nor life nor angels, nor principalities, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor
depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. With me over in 1 John chapter
5 and verse 13. 1 John 5, 13. I read where the apostle says
nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of God that's
in Christ. And here in 1 John 5.13 it says,
These things have I written unto you that believe on the name
of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life,
and that you may believe on the name of the Son of God. Assurance
is what I want to talk about tonight. And who has it? I believe every child of God
ought to have assurance, ought to have assurance. Now, it don't
mean you have full assurance. Sometimes assurance is not as
strong as it is at other times. But we are so blessed of God
when you know that you've been accepted of God. What a blessing
when you know that you've been accepted of God. What a blessing
it is to be justified by God, be justified by Him, be reconciled
to Him. And then in spite of, and even
though we have this blessings of acceptance and justified and
being reconciled, what great blessings, but also what a great,
great blessing it is to be assured that you've been accepted, assured
that you've been justified, assured that you've been reconciled to
God. People talk about getting right
with God and that's what it means, but how do you get right with
God? God has to make you get right with Him, and that's what
we're talking about here. And we find both of these things
here, our acceptance and our assurance in this particular
verse that I read here. For these things have I written
unto you, that believe on the name of the Son of God. That's
our acceptance. I've written these things that
believe on the name of the Son of God. That's our acceptance.
We believe on the name of the Son of God. And then, that you
may know that you have eternal life. And that's our assurance,
acceptance and assurance. And I tell you, this verse of
scripture is probably one of the most familiar, one of the
most familiar verses in John's letter. It's used often. I've
used it many times over the years. And he had just made it clear,
he had just made it clear, and I preached on that last week,
that eternal life is found only in Christ. Eternal life is found
only in Christ, only in a person. And that's believing that Jesus
Christ is the Son of God. Ain't that what He said in verse
11? This is the record that God hath given to us eternal life. And where did He give us this
life at? It's in His Son. Everything God has for us is
in His Son. And if you have the Son of God,
you got everything that God has and everything that God ever
means for us to have when He have His Son. And that's what
He goes on to say in the next verse. He that hath the Son hath
life. He's got it. And he that hath
not the Son of God, if you don't have the Son of God, don't believe
the Son of God, don't trust the Son of God, then you don't have
life. You just don't have it. And John
made a great distinction all the way through this. This is
what life is, and this is what it's not. This is where life's
at, this is where it's not. This is how you get life, this
is how you don't. And so that's what he's doing
this evening. He wants to show us how those who possess this
life, this eternal life, this life in Christ, they should know
it. They should know it. And that's what he says. Three
times I believe in this letter. He says, these things have I
written unto you. And that's what he's saying,
these things have I written unto you that you may know. Now, when
he talks about the things that he's written, he's talking about
the things that he's wrote in this letter. And I'm going to
try to stay inside this letter and deal with the things that
was written inside this letter, because he wrote this particular
letter that they may know. They that believe on the name
of the Son of God may know that they have life. And here he is
in this letter, he teaches us what assurance is. And all this is one of his closing
final statements. But the first thing I want you
to know is that he's addressing a specific people. That's the
first thing he's doing here. He's talking to a specific people.
He's not talking to the world. He's not talking about people
who are not believers. He's talking about those who
are believers. He said, I wrote these things
unto you. And not only am I talking about
these things that I said before, and all the things that I taught
before, and I brought you up to this time. He told us about
the Antichrist that was already in the world. He talked about,
I read unto you that not that you don't believe the truth,
but that you do believe the truth. So he writes to a particular
people. And let me show you something
over here in 1 John 4. This is what he's talking about.
Not only what's been before, but his whole letter. He said
here in 1 John 1.4, he says this, write we unto you that your joy
may be full." Now he just said these things I'm writing unto
you that your joy may be fulfilled. Now back over in our text, these
things are written unto you that believe on the name of the Son
of God. He's talking about you, a specific people, those that
are believers. And so what he's saying here,
you put these two verses together And the purpose of John's letter
is that we may have our joy made full by knowing that we have
eternal life and that life is in his blessed son. When you
understand what you have in Christ and you have the assurance of
what you have in Christ, that's when you start having joy. It
produces wonderful joy in you when you put these things together.
And look to whom these things were written. He says to you,
unto you. that believe on the name of the
Son of God. And when he talks about the name,
that believe on the name of the Son of God, what he's talking
about, he's talking about the person. You that believe on the
name. And listen to what he calls him.
Again, he says, on the Son of God. And how many times did he
tell us, look what he said in verse five. Here at John chapter
5. Who is he that overcometh the
world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?
And so when he says that we, this name, the Son of God, he's
talking about his blessed person. He's talking about what his glorious
person is, and that he was God's Son, and that how he came into
this world, who he came into this world for, and what he accomplished
when he came into this world. He's writing to those who believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, who believe that He's the Son of
God, who believe that He's the Messiah, who believe that He
is Jesus in His humanity, that He's Christ in His office. And
that God, the scriptures tells us that He's the Son of God.
And we trust Him. It says they believe on Him.
They trust Christ. Not only do they know Him, but
they trust Him. And that's what the Apostle said. Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. Well, how shall they call upon
Him of whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe on
Him of whom they have not heard? And so that's why John says here,
we believe on the name of the Son of God. And we believe on
him because he's sin of God, witnessed by God. God gave a
record of his blessed son all the way through the scriptures.
So, oh my, I've written it, believe on the name of the son of God.
You know, when I was praying, I talked about that name that's
above every name. of all the names in this world
and there's some powerful names in this world. There's a lot
of people that their name carries a lot of influence, carries a
lot of power, carries a lot of weight. You can mention certain
people's names and there's people that have this great power just
because of their name and what their name conveys. But every
name that's ever been named under heaven From Adam to the last
soul born on this earth that Christ died for, there's only
one name that God gave a name above every name that's ever
been named on the face of this earth, and that's His blessed
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why He says we believe
on that name, that name that God gave Him a name above every
name. That name that says, that I,
thy father doeth hear me and hears me always. That name that
God himself even bore record and said, this is my beloved
son in whom I'm well pleased. This is my beloved son, hear
him. So this is the name we believe
on. And I tell you, how do we know that who he is? These things
I've written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God.
And what is it to believe? It's to trust Him. It's to commit to Him. It's to
bow to Him. It's to embrace Him. It's to
confess that everything I need I find in Him. And if I don't
need it, God ain't gonna give it to me. And He gives me everything. Gives me life, peace, joy, righteousness,
forgiveness, justification, acceptance. All things are in the Lord Jesus
Christ, His blessed Son. So I'll tell you, assurance of
salvation is a blessing reserved to those who possess salvation.
And I'll tell you, He's speaking here to a specific people. You! that ye may know, that ye may
know, that ye may know. He's talking to a specific people. He's not just out here talking
to every J. Clegg. No, he's talking to a
specific people. And then he has a specific purpose
in writing these things have I written unto you. He has a
specific purpose. What is that purpose? That you
may know that you have eternal life. Not only that you believe,
but you may know. know and when he talks about
knowing here and he's writing that you may be certain that
you have eternal life and this word know it means an inward
inward knowing it means an experiential knowing it's a heartfelt knowing
it's a heartfelt assurance let me you keep this and we read
this last week but john's gospel chapter 20 and verse 30 there's
a little difference in what he says but this was john's purpose
all the time that he wrote. But here he says that you may
know that you have eternal life. And you believe on the name of
the Son of God that you may know. But here he says something different. Verse 30, And many other signs
truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not
written in this book. But now listen to this now. This
is the same John. But these are written that you
might believe that Jesus is the Christ. Over here he says, I
write unto you that believe you who do believe over here he says
I want you to believe that you believe that Jesus is the Christ
the Son of God and that through believing you might have life
through his name over here he says we've got life through his
name by believing and we know that we have eternal life as
we go on here and all my soul so John Rice said all who ready
possess life possess it Be assured that they possess it. Be positive
that they possess it. And I know, you know, well, he
says we have the witness in ourselves, but here's the second thing I
want to talk about. Every child of God, every child of God should
have some assurance. They don't have to have full
assurance. They don't have to have perfect assurance, but they
ought to have some assurance. I learned years and years ago
that to doubt God, and to doubt your relationship with God, and
to doubt, when you start doubting whether you believe or not, if
you've cast your lot in with Christ, when you start down that
road, what you're actually saying is that God didn't tell me the
truth about salvation. What you're saying is that God
never let me know what salvation is. So what you're doing when
you start looking for assurance inside yourself, you ain't gonna
find it there. You've got to find your assurance
outside yourself. When I look at me, if some of
you all followed me around, just follow me around for 24 hours,
and you wouldn't have no confidence in me no more than I have in
myself if I watched myself. But I'm not looking at me. I
didn't die for me. I didn't put my own sins away. I didn't give myself faith. Christ
died for me. Christ put our sins away. Christ
gave us faith. And oh, every child of God should
have assurance. And assurance, what is assurance?
It's the certain confidence, certain confident knowledge that
we are believers or that I'm a believer and you're a believer.
It's a certain confident knowledge that we are believers or Christians
and all that the Bible says about believers is true of me. How
can I know what the Bible says about Christians, about believers?
Well, the first thing it says about them is, is that they've
been chosen of God. Have I been chosen of God? Have
I got evidence of my election? You know, the scripture says
this, I've been elected of God before the foundation of the
world. I was given grace in Christ before the foundation of the
world. Now, do I fit that mold? Do I understand that if God hadn't
chosen me, I never would have chosen Him? Had God not elected
me, I never would have chosen Him? Had He not chosen me under
salvation through Christ, I wouldn't have any salvation. And also,
I fit that criteria. I meet that. Yep, that's the
first thing. You know, that's what we're talking
about, assurance. Do I fit what God says about us as being Christians? He said, I have chosen you. You've
not chosen me. I've ordained you. Chosen in
Christ before the foundation of the world. And then, listen,
the scriptures tells us about being justified. That He was
delivered for our offense and raised for our justification.
And being justified, and that word justification means that
you're free from all guilt. When you're in a court of law,
and you go in trial and they've got all these charges against
you and the judge and the jury says not guilty, not guilty,
not guilty. You walk out of that court justified
before the law and justified before your peers. We stood in
God's court Condemned justly condemned over our sin our Lord
Jesus Christ took our offenses upon himself He went and faced
God for those offenses and when he come back. He was raised up
for our Justification before God that God in the courts of
heaven says I freely Justify them by my grace and that means
that there's not one charge Who is he that condemneth? It's God
that justified us Ain't that right? That gives you some assurance
for it. That's what I'm saying. How do
we get assurance? See what God says it are. And
my sins, here's another thing what the Bible says about us.
My sins have been completely and eternally forgiven. If there's
one sin, this is the long and short of it. And that's why I
said these things are written that you believe on the name
of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. How can I know that I've been
completely and eternally forgiven? The Scriptures tells us that
Christ, once in the end of the world, put away sin by the sacrifice
of Himself. He said in Colossians 2, having
forgiven you all your trespasses. And God said Himself, said I
will not remember their sins and iniquities no more. Why does
He not remember them? Because we don't have any. Where
they at? Christ took them away. He put
them all away. There's no more sin. If God left
one sin on me to deal with by myself, I would perish. Just
one. You say, what about sin of unbelief?
Christ died for all of our sins. People want us to categorize
sin. This sin here is worse than that sin. This sin is worse than
that sin. But you know what? The worst sin that God, two sins
that God regards as being absolutely horrendous. Unbelief to not believe
him is to make him a liar And the second thing is self-righteousness
putting your righteousness up against the righteousness of
his blessed son That's to not believe him. And then when you
don't believe him, you're going to bring your righteousness up
and say my righteousness Will be acceptable to god Oh, that's
that can't work. Can it? All right Let me tell
you another thing I've been accepted through christ and am a son of
God. I've been accepted in the beloved. Look what he said over here in
1 John 3, what? Talking about, and not only accepted
through Christ, am a son of God. Look what he says here now. Behold
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us. Now listen
to this, that we should be called the sons of God. Therefore the
world knoweth us not because it knew him not. Oh, he says,
we're sons of God right now. And let me give you another thing.
I'm talking about, do we fit this description? Do we, when
we look in the scriptures and we find ourselves in our, our,
our, you know, that we may know we have eternal life. How can
I know that I have this eternal life? Here's another reason.
God loves me. How do I know God loves me? How
do I know it? How do I know it? First of all,
he told me. He told me, said he loved me
with an everlasting love. Here in his love, not that we
love God, but listen to it, and this is in 1 John here, he loved
us. Not that we loved him, but that
he loved us. And everywhere you find the love
of God, God commendeth his love toward us, and that while we
were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Not only does God love
me, love me, And he expresses his love to me and makes me know. And I'm telling, let me just
tell you something. There's two things that only a believer knows.
Two things. Listen to me. Two things. Only
a child of God, a real Christian, a true believer, a real believer
knows anything about the love of God. They're the only people
in this world know anything about the love of God. And the second
thing is only the Lord's people, God's people know anything about
sin. And that's why they stand enamored
with the love of God that God would so love them that He'd
send His Son to be the propitiation for their sins and bear their
sins in His own body on the tree. Huh? Oh, but God who is rich
in love and in mercy, even when we were dead in trespassing sins,
quickened us together with Christ. By grace are you saved. And not
only does God love me, But He orders all things, everything
for my good. Everything. You say, well, isn't
this a pretty bad thing? Everything He orders for our
good. And sometimes, and I'm going to be honest with you,
and I'm sure you all think about this sometimes. Well, right this
minute, I don't see the good in it. It don't make no difference
whether we see the good. God said it's gonna be good.
And if we don't see it here, we'll see it in eternity. Ain't
that right? We'll see how, you know what?
You know what? Everything's gonna work out for
our good till we get all the way to glory. That's why he says
nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of Christ. And
I tell you, look at all the things that he cataloged in that thing
that he says that nothing would separate us from the love of
God in Christ. Life, death, angels, principalities and powers, height,
depth, width, oh my, any creature. Peril, sword, hunger, nakedness? No! Anything that can happen
to a believer was named right there, and none of them separated
us from the love of God that was in Christ. None of them.
And I tell you, if it won't, it won't ever. It just won't
do it. And oh, listen. And I tell you, God orders all
things for my good and for my salvation. And all of these things
I have. right now, right now. Okay, here
in John 5.13, These things have I written unto you that believe
on the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have
eternal life, and you may believe on the name of the Son of God.
If ever a believing person already had a full assurance, or no need
for an increase in our assurance, Why would John wrote this letter
and said, I've written these things unto you that you may
know and that you believe. Why did I write them unto you?
And he distinguishes believing from knowing. It's what he says
here, I'm writing unto you that believe. He makes a difference
between believing and knowing. He distinguishes between the
two. I'm writing unto you who believe. And the reason I'm writing
unto you that believe, that you may know. Believing and knowing
go hand in hand. If you know, If you believe,
you know. Oh my. Oh, only one person, you
know, and people, this is so sad, but there's people who believe
you can't have assurance until you die. You think it's presumption
to have assurance. Roman Catholics teach that you
can't have assurance. You won't know till you die.
But there's, and then there's people who constantly trying
to give other people assurance. And when somebody starts having
doubts and stuff, they'll say, well, get the deacons and the
preachers together and let's talk to them. Let's see if we
can talk them back into their experience. And I read something
today that, oh, it's just awful. They said, you might lack assurance
because you got saved as a little bitty child and you forgot how
it happened. How you gonna forget how God
saves you? And let me tell you something
about children. If they can be saved at five, they can be lost
at five. If they can be saved at seven,
they can be lost at seven. People don't understand that.
They say, oh, we get these little children saved. Let's get all
these little children in. Get them in where? Salvations
of the Lord. And it's a scary thing to think
that you'd talk some seven or eight-year-old child into a profession,
and then them live their life with that profession, and go
into the world and never, and then when they come back, somebody's
got to convince them, well, you had that experience when you
ascended. No, no, that's not what he's talking about. People,
preachers, and them are constantly trying to give another person
assurance. But I can't give you assurance and you can't give
me assurance. I cannot give anybody assurance. And I'm not going
to try. You know the only person who
can give you assurance is God Himself and the Holy Spirit.
And if He gives you assurance, there ain't nobody going to talk
you out of it. If the preacher gives you assurance, another
preacher will come along and talk you out of it, talk you
into another one. And the only thing that can give
you assurance is the gospel. You know, a fella told me one
time, and oh, this is true, and me and Shirley's talked about
it. When I'm sitting listening to the gospel, like we was last
week in our meeting, right while I'm hearing the gospel, I get
more, I have almost perfect assurance while I'm hearing the gospel.
Does that make any sense to you? Right while you're listening
to it, my, you just, that's it. Oh, that just gives you all this
assurance while you're listening to it. And the gospel gives you
assurance. Well, I've got to hurry on. He
only wanted these who believed, Christ, to have assurance, not
just those who merely profess to believe that they know God.
Look over here at John 1.6. Let me show you a couple things
that I'm talking about. He only wanted those who believed
Christ to have assurance, not just people who merely profess
that they believe God. And he made such a distinction.
Look what he says here in 1 John 1.6. He makes such a distinction here.
If we say that we have fellowship with Him, with God, with Christ,
and walk in darkness, we lie. We lie. And do not the truth. So if we say we're walking in
fellowship with God and staying in darkness over here, we're
a liar. That's the first thing he tells us. And look over here
in 1 John 2, 4. And here he goes again. He that
saith, I know him. And he's writing to us that we
may know him. and have this assurance. He that
saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments is a liar,
and the truth's not in him. So he's right here, said only
believers, not just those who make a profession. And assurance
is founded upon three things, and I'm gonna wind this up here.
Assurance is found upon three things. First of all, God's testimony,
God's character. John said here in John 1 John
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Our assurance rests upon the character of God. If He's light,
and we walk in His light, and we believe His word, and we believe
He is holy, that God is light, and that He also is love, we
rest on those two. That's God. Light, holy, love,
and grace. And you remove either one of
these, and salvation becomes an impossibility. You just imagine,
if you can, a God without one of these attributes. He's a loving
God, but He don't tell the truth. He's faithful God, but He's unkind. But this is the foundation of
our faith. God is light. Ain't no darkness
in Him. God is love, and He loves His
people. And here's the second thing that
gives us assurance. It's founded upon His Word. His
Word is sure. His Word is sure. Oh my! Look over here at 2.25. Let me
show you what I'm talking about. The things that God, when God
makes a promise, and you listen to God's Word, His Word is sure.
His Word is as sure as He Himself is. You know, His Word is forever
settled in heaven. Look what He says here in verse
25. John chapter 2, and this is the promise that he has promised
us. What is it? Eternal life. Now,
if God promises to give us eternal life, are we going to get it? Whoever he promised it to, they're
going to get it. He made a promise to Abraham,
and Abraham got the promise. And oh my, and that's what he
says here in verse 12 here of 1 John 5. 12, he said, he that
hath a son. That's what God said, that's
the record he gave. He has life. And if you don't, you don't have
life. And oh, this letter was written
to give assurance and it makes reference to Christ. You get
your concordance down and look it up yourself. He made reference
to Christ 35 times in these five chapters, 35 times. He made reference
to the Lord Jesus Christ. And oh my, so that gives you
an idea that we can't make too much of Christ. And if salvation's
in Him, the only hope we have is to have Him. And God make
us to understand and believe on Him. And that's why it says,
little children, I write unto you that you sin not, but if
any man sin, We have an Advocate. Who is He? Jesus Christ the Righteous. He's our Righteous Advocate.
Not only is He our Righteous Advocate, but He's our Propitiation.
Atoning Sacrifice for our sins. And then let me give you real
quick, let me just give you just a very, very few things. How
may we know that we have eternal life? Out of this book right
here. This five chapters. How may we know that these things
have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son
of God, that you may know you have eternal life, that you may
believe on the name of the Son of God? Well, he used the word
no 25 times, and I want you to look with me first in 1 John
2, 3. Talking about no, I'm just going
to give you a few no's and I'm going to wind it up. Talking
about no, how may we may know? He used the word no 25 times.
Hereby we do know that we know Him if we keep His
commandments. And there's two commandments
in this book that you believe on the name of the Son of God
and that's your loved one. That's on two commandments in
this book. And then look in 2.5. Look here. Whoso keepeth His
word in him, verily is the love of God perfected. Now listen
to this. Hereby know that we are in Him. His love is perfected in us.
And oh, look over here in in chapter 314. Here's something
we know. Here's another one of them we
know. We know that we have passed from
death unto life. He that believeth that Jesus
is the Christ is born of God. We know that we've passed from
death unto life. How do we know? Because we love
the brethren. Love them. Love them. And oh, and he says, my little
children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but
indeed in truth. Then look what he says in verse
19 of chapter three here. And here we go again with some
things we know. And hereby we know, we know that we are of
the truth. And because we know we're of
the truth, that shall assure our hearts before him. We don't
believe, God don't lie. And he can't lie. And we believe
him. We believe Him, 1 John 5, 2. Here we go again, and I'm gonna
quit. By this, we know that we love
the children of God when we love God and keep His commandments. We know, we know, we know. These are signs, these are things
that you can go in this epistle and look at. And that's why I
wrote that you may know that you have eternal life, born of
God, Passed from death unto life, all the things that we know.
And these things I wrote to you. That's why I write. I want you
to have this assurance. Certain assurance. Our Father, thank you for your
blessed presence this evening. Thank you for the Word of God.
Thank you for the assurance that you give your people. Thank you
for the truth as it is in our Lord Jesus. And he's the one
that taught us. The Holy Spirit brought us the
truth. We love your blessed truth. We cherish your truth. Bow to
your truth. Acknowledge your truth. God bless
the gospel tonight. Bless it to hearts, minds, and
understanding by the Holy Spirit. And again, we pray for those
that we mentioned. God, please be pitiful, be merciful,
and remember that we're all just dust. So pity us as a father
pities his children. And I, Lord, Bless and keep you,
dear people, so we can worship again together in Christ's holy
name. Amen. Amen.