All right. If you would like
to follow along, I'm going to be in Deuteronomy chapter 4. I wanted to get this in before
Walter gets to it, since he's headed that way. Might be a couple
of years, but he's headed that way. It's OK. I won't tell him. His wife's sitting right back
here. She can tell him. You can too, Mason. I won't say
nothing. Here you go. Deuteronomy chapter 4, I'm just
going to read the first two verses. Now therefore hearken, O Israel,
unto the statutes and unto the judgments which I teach you,
for to do them that ye may live and go in and possess the land
which the Lord God of your fathers giveth you. Ye shall not add
unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish
aught from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord
your God, which I command you. I'm gonna stop right there. Oh,
I do wanna do one other thing before I get started. On Wednesday the 29th, Pastor
Don Fortner passed away. He preached the truth. He preached
the truth. I don't know anything better
I can say about a man. But he wrote this on February
16th, 2020 in his bulletin just a couple of months ago. A few more nights than everlasting
day, a little more pain than endless pleasure, just a few
more sleepless nights than eternal rest, just a little more trouble
than everlasting ease, just a little more dying than eternal life. I like that. I do, I do. That also is the truth, if you
know Christ. But we make here, and there's
other places that we know. We preach, we teach, we speak,
we talk, and we tell people the truth of God. And we state firmly
that these scriptures right here, are the sole authority for what
we say. Anything I say, you're welcome
to look it up in the scriptures and see if it's there. I don't
have a problem with that whatsoever. And if you got any questions,
please submit them in written form. Now, let me know. I don't have a problem with that.
Because you understand, I'm not ashamed to own my Lord, nor to
defend his cause. And his cause is right here in
this book. But here we find this thought
of the scriptures being our authority affirmed in Deuteronomy chapter
four. Where it starts out, Now therefore
hearken, O Israel, unto the statutes, unto the judgments which I teach
you for to do them, that ye may live and go and possess the land
which the Lord God of your fathers gives you, giveth you. I'm gonna talk mostly today about
two words in this first verse. The two words are this, hearken
and do. Hearken and do. Now the word
hearken, guess what? It means to hear, but not just
that. There's a little more to it.
It actually means to hear intelligently, to hear attentively, and to hear
diligently. It's just a little more than
let it go in one ear and out the other. Now trust me, I deal
with a lot of people during the day when I'm at work. And a lot
of times, I must admit, sometimes I'm ashamed to admit, it does
go in one ear and out the other. That's not what Moses is telling
the people of Israel here to do. He's telling them to hear
diligently, hear attentively. To be honest, to a lot of people,
that sounds easy. It isn't, but to them it sounds
easy. But here's the thing. The scripture
is also clear in other places, and we'll get to it, not everyone
hears. Now I'm not talking about physical
hearing. I'm not talking about the difference between having
hearing ears and being deaf. John the Apostle, you don't have
to turn there, but in 1 John 4 and 6, he said this. We, speaking
of believers and speaking of himself, we are of God. He that knoweth God, what? Heareth us. But then he goes
on, because there is more. He that is not of God, heareth
not us. Hereby we know, excuse me, hereby
know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Guess what,
folks? Believers have both of those
in them. But the unbelievers, those not of God, All they've
got is the spirit of error. That's it. John states clearly
that some are of God and some are not of God. And that this
being of God and not of God, what does it do? It affects their
ability to hearken. It does. He's playing. John's not telling us. And I
said, John's not telling us they can't physically hear us. But
John's telling us the same thing that Paul told us in 1 Corinthians
chapter 2. And I'm going to go ahead and
turn back there for just a little bit. 1 Corinthians 2, verse 9. But as it is written, I hath
not seen, What? Nor ear heard. Neither have entered
into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them
that love him. But, and that's a good but there. That's a good but there. But
God hath revealed them unto us, again believers, by his spirit. For the spirit searcheth all
things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth
the things of a man, save the spirit of a man which is in him,
even so the things of God knoweth no man but the spirit of God. Now we have received, not the
spirit of the world. What did John say? Hereby know
we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Now we have received not the
spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God, that
we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things we speak. And those that are of God, heareth
us. And those that are not of God,
heareth not us. Which things we speak, not in
the words of man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth,
comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. He's not going
to tell us that they can't hear us, that they can't physically
hear us. No, no, that's not the reason
they don't receive them. Oh, it tells us here, the natural
man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are foolishness unto him. They're not foolishness, but
they're foolishness unto him. Who? The one who is not of God. They're foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them. Why?
Because they are spiritually discerned. Mm. John tells us, he that is
not of God, hearkens not. And Paul tells us, the natural
man, he that is not of God, cannot hearken, cannot hearken. You understand, I always think
about this, because this is one of the things that hit me in
my beginning days, reading the Gospels. And I will plead guilty to when I first read it, I didn't
get it, Mason. I didn't get it when I first
read it. Of course, I didn't know anything about the scriptures
at all. But eight times, eight times,
in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, three in Matthew, three in Mark, and
two in Luke, Jesus Christ is recorded to have said, what? He that hath ears to hear, let
him hear. Or he said, any man that has
ears to hear, let him hear. Whatever. But ears to hear. You understand, when I first
read this, and I'm going to make a confession to you, I thought
it was sort of like saying, if the shoe fits, wear it. Well,
that's true, but I wasn't thinking of it right. If you've got ears
to hear, you're going to hear. And if you don't have ears to
hear, you're not going to get it. And that's just as simple
as I can be. It wasn't an idle thing. It wasn't
a cliche. It wasn't just a zinger that
Jesus would put at the end of the sermons. No. He said it, and he meant it.
Every word he said, he meant. And he said, he that hath ears
to hear, let him hear. What about the people that don't
hear? He wasn't talking to them. Now, if later on, he gives them
ears to hear, guess what? They can read it, and then they
can hear. Oh, but Jesus Christ knew for a fact,
for a certainty, better than we will ever know, there are
those who will not hearken to his word. They will not hearken. Matter of fact, many of them,
thousands at one time, left him because of what they did here,
because of what he said. One in particular, John 6. No
man can come to me except the Father which has sent me. No
man can come under the father. I better read it because I will
mess that up. I get them all mixed up together. I'm sorry
I'm out of practice, folks. It's OK. John 6, let's see, 44. No man can come to me except
the father which has sent me. Draw him. I had it right. I will raise him up at the last
day. Then in verse 65 he says this, therefore said I unto you
that no man can come unto me except it were given unto him
of my father. Whoa, I remember reading this
the first time and it stopped me in my tracks. I never got
to 65 until I got past 44. You understand? I was looking
at the introduction to Deuteronomy, the book of Deuteronomy by C.H.
Macintosh. And he says, there is no such
thing as mere repetition in the word of God. God, that's good. That is right. Because the word
Deuteronomy means second law. And so some people think, well,
Deuteronomy's just kind of a compilation of everything that went on in
Exodus and Leviticus and Numbers. No, no, no, no, no, no. There
is some repetition. There is where things are repeated,
but we need things repeated to us. But here's the thing, when
he said this for the second time, from that, what he said, that
no man can come to the Father except it was given to him. No
one could come to Christ except what was given to him of my father.
From that, many of his disciples went back and walked no more
with him. And then Jesus Christ looked
at his disciples and said, are you going away too? Will you
also go away? Peter answered and said, Lord,
I love this answer, Mason. It's blessed my soul and still
blesses my soul to this day. To whom shall we go? Why? And thou hast the words of eternal
life. Oh my, oh my. And I can tell
you this, flesh and blood didn't reveal that to him. But my father,
which was in heaven, that was the truth spoken by Peter. And you know why? He had been
given by Christ to hearken, to hear his words. Those others
heard the words, and guess what? They're gone. That's what man
is. And I'm gonna tell you something,
you want a better picture of depravity, I can't give you one.
That the son of God, God himself, manifest in the flesh, walked
on this planet, told the exact truth, and people walked away
from him in droves. In droves, they left him. How
depraved is that? How depraved is that? Now, here's the question at this
time. We're talking about the difference
between hearing and hearing. Between hearkening and hearing,
but not hearkening. Well, where does the hearing
ear come from? The scriptures tell us. I'm not going to turn
there, because it's very plain. Proverbs 20 and verse 12, the
hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both
of them." Both of them. The hearing ear and the seeing
eye are both made by the Lord. Now, do I think this is a regular
ear with regular physical hearing? Or is this a spiritual ear? Actually, both is what I think,
Mason. is both. If you can actually hear, physically
hear, God gave you that, because he didn't give it to some. But
if you can spiritually hear, oh, that's the only way you're
gonna hear. We need to be thankful for both.
But that spiritual ear, being able to hearken unto the word
of God, That is a blessing from the Lord, and not everyone has
it. You understand, people have this
idea that we preach, and we preach, and we do. And we proclaim the
gospel to whoever will listen, physically. But you understand,
I can't make you hearken. I can't do it. I can't give you a hearing ear. Yes, what does it say? Faith
by hearing, hearing by the word of God. I can't give you faith
and I can't give you hearing. Only thing I can do is preach
the word of God. But the word of the Lord from
our Lord Jesus Christ to give you what? A hearing ear and a
seeing eye. That is well beyond my capabilities. I can't do it. I preach as a
dying man to dying men. Try to. God gives both. God gives physical
hearing and God gives the ability, the not natural ability to hearken
to his word. Matter of fact, a little further
on in Deuteronomy 29 and verse four, He is berating. Well, not berating, I guess.
Moses is telling the people about the covenant that was given. These are the words of the covenant
which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the children of
Israel in the land of Moab beside the covenant which he made in
them in Horeb. Excuse me. And Moses called unto all Israel
and said unto them, you've seen all that the Lord did before
your eyes in the land of Egypt, unto Pharaoh, and unto all his
servants, and unto all in his land. The great temptations which
thine eyes have seen, the signs and those great miracles, yet,
verse four, the Lord has not given you Heart to perceive and
eyes to see and ears to hear unto this day Understand there's great miracle
healing services come and believe No one has ever been saved by
seeing a miracle Not even real ones Not even real ones these
folks saw the Red Sea parted and and walked through dry sod. And you ask me, do you believe
that old fairy tale? No, I believe the word of God.
I don't believe no dumb movie by Charlton Heston, but I believe
the word of God. You understand? This word is
true. And by his grace, I can hearken
to it. I can hearken to it. And I hope
you can too. But see, this is the thing. They
saw all these miracles, they saw the signs. They saw a river
turn to blood, plague of locusts, and there were some of those
plagues that came on the people of, come on the Egyptians, the
people of Egypt, but they didn't come on the Israelites in the
land of Goshen. They could see the dividing mark.
God said, I'm gonna put a division between the people of Egypt and
the people of Israel, and God did. But here were all these
people, saw all these things, crossed the Red Sea, saw Pharaoh's
army drowned. Oh my. And yet, they still didn't
hearken to the word of the Lord. Soon as they got over to the
other side, they started complaining. They was murmuring and complaining
on this side of the Red Sea. They get to the other side of
the Red Sea, guess what? Nothing changed. Why? It tells us, the Lord hath not
given you a heart to perceive and eyes to see and ears to hear
unto this day. Hearken, hearken. But the second
word in this verse is that little word do. Hearken and do. Hearken unto the word of the
Lord and do. So, Well, I thought you were
a grace preacher. Well, thank you, I try to be. I believe I am, and I wanna say
it more clearly now and more concisely than I ever can. I
believe in do. I believe and preach works. Now, I preach works, I preach do. Not, not for salvation. But I preach do. I preach works. Because of salvation. That's
it. You understand? It says hearken
and do. It doesn't say do and hearken. It's a world of difference. Yes
there is, Mason. There's a world of difference. It's clearly stated in this verse.
Hearken comes before do. The Bible tells us to hearken,
hear diligently, and do. And I like that word. Just do,
that's all it says. Do it. Do it. And I looked it
up in the Hebrew. You know what that little word
do means? It means do. That's what it means. That's
it. It means do. Now specifically, in our text,
because I know the context of this statement, this is Old Testament. This is Deuteronomy, Book of
Moses, written by Moses, excuse me. Now therefore hearken, O
Israel, unto the statutes and unto the judgments which I teach
you for to do them. He's talking about the Old Testament
in this time, the law, Ten Commandments, And all the rest of the law is
also talking about the sacrifices and the offerings. You understand? Here's how it worked in the Old
Testament. You were to keep the law. And when you broke it, not
if, when you broke it, you were to offer a sacrifice. And if
you wanted to, if you wanted to, in certain cases, you could
make an offering. Something not required by the
law. A free will offering, you wanna call it that. But no, I'm
not gonna call it that. But you could make an offering.
A burnt offering. If you just wanna offer a burnt
offering to thank God for the salvation that he has blessed
you with. Now there's a sin offering. It's
different from the burnt offering, I'm not gonna go into this. But
this is all, it's talking about statutes and judgments, which
I teach you, and Moses has already said it all, what God told him
to say. I think in the next chapter,
actually in chapter five, he's gonna go back into the Ten Commandments
and explain them a good bit. But I'm not gonna go into that.
You understand, that's what it's talking about. That's the primary
context of this statement, By Moses to Israel is the law and
the sacrifices and the offering. But I'm here to tell you today
that this instruction in Deuteronomy four verses one and two has not
gone anywhere. Understand, if you're to hearken
and do, and that's what God says for us to do, what are we supposed
to do today? You are to hearken and you are
to do. because now we have commandments
from Jesus Christ. It's in the New Testament. It's
in the New Testament. In a nutshell, I'm gonna tell
you this. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and love his brethren. That's the commandments he told
us to do. Love one another is what he said. Love one another,
believe my word, Believe me and love my brethren. Love one another. That's the two commandments.
Guess what we are to do today? We are to hearken to his word
and to love his brethren. To love my brethren. To love
his family. Love the family of God. That
doesn't mean just us here. That means everywhere, everywhere,
anyone names the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that's my
brother. That's my sister in Christ. And
I don't even know him and I'm supposed to love him. You know
what, I fail at that too. I do. But oh, I don't need to offer a sacrifice
now. You understand, when I sin, I'm to confess my sin. Not to
you, but to him. And he's faithful and just to
forgive us all our sins. And it's not if I sin, it's when
I sin. But here's the thing, I don't
have to go find no bull or goat anymore. But I am to do, I am
to do. Believe the Lord Jesus Christ
and love one another. The problem today that we have
is the same as Moses time. Because this world, It's full
of people who want to do, but they don't wanna hearken. They
don't wanna. And I'm gonna tell you something.
You don't even have to ask them if they don't hearken. All you
gotta do is listen to them. And you'll understand that they
don't understand the Lord Jesus Christ. Moses had it in his day. What was it Chorus had? I'm holy
too. We're holy, we're all holy. Why
can't I be a priest? Why can't I offer a sacrifice
to God? You wanna know why? God said no, you can't. He made provision. The sons of
Levi were gonna be, there wasn't a fact that there weren't gonna
be any sacrifices. There weren't gonna be any offerings.
But it's gonna be God's way or it's no way. And God opened up
the earth and swallowed up Korah. Why? Because Korah didn't hearken
unto the word of the Lord. The Lord said, that's part of
the statutes and judgments. The sons of Levi are the only
ones that can offer sacrifices in that tabernacle in the wilderness. And Aaron was the only one who
could perform the sacrifices on the day of atonement, the
high priest alone. Now I'm not saying that Aaron
was any more holy than Korah, as a person. But Aaron was chosen
by God to do that sacrifice. The priests, the sons of Levi,
were chosen by God to do that sacrifice, and that's what God
told him. So you understand, he stood up
to Moses, Korah did. But he was disobeying and rebelling
against God, and against God's word. and the earth swallowed
him up, and everything that pertaineth to it. Nowadays we don't have
that problem, although they all think we're all holy, and they
think everybody's just as holy as everybody else, and they're
right in that, and they're wrong in that at the same time. Because
everybody's as holy as I am, I can tell you that right now.
But nobody's as holy as Jesus Christ. They wanna tell you to do stuff,
but they won't hearken. They'll tell you what to do to
be saved. They'll tell you. Understand,
salvation is by doing, but it's not your doing. It's not my doing. It's the doing of the Lord Jesus
Christ. They'll tell you what to do so you won't lose your
salvation. Oh. and they'll tell you what
to do to get everything you want. Now our Lord has promised, and
our Lord does, provide all our needs. But he ain't never promised
anybody to give them everything they want. But I know the health and wealth
of the gospel. I know the liars out there today preaching salvation
by works. Preaching you can be saved and
lost and saved and lost and saved and lost until hopefully you're
saved when you die. He that is enduring at the end,
the same shall be saved. That ain't what the scripture
says. It says he that endureth to the end. Not at the end, to
the end. Oh my. The reason they do wrong,
do wrong, is because they don't hearken. That's what Paul told
us. That's what John told us. That's
what Jesus Christ told us. They do not believe the Lord
Jesus Christ. They do not love the brethren.
Understand, we come and we preach. I'm not here to give you a burden
to carry. I can't carry my own. I had my burden carried, lifted
off of me. Now, I'm here to tell you to
go to Christ and to take his yoke upon you. Why? Because his
yoke is easy and his burden is light. But no, they want to throw
a yoke on him. Paul asked, why try to put a
yoke on somebody? that you couldn't carry yourself,
the law. Do. That's what they think. When
they say do, they think the law. When I say do, I'm thinking Jesus
Christ. Oh my, because he's the one that
did it all. Hearken and do are in the correct order. Hearken
comes first, and do shall follow if you hearken. How can you know what to do?
if you've not heard. For whosoever shall call upon
the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call
on him in whom they have not believed? But how shall they
believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear? without
a preacher. This is what God has given us
to do. And this is what we are to do. We're to preach the gospel and
we're to listen to the gospel. We're to hearken to the gospel.
Because in a way, hearken and do is the gospel. Hear the gospel and believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ. Hear his gospel and call upon
the name of the Lord. Believe his gospel and love one
another. Hearken and do. The scripture
is clear, the gospel is clear. His word we have. Excuse me. We preach his gospel. And those
that God has given a heart to perceive, ears to hear, and eyes
to see, they will hearken, they will do. Or as referencing Stephen, those who have, those who have. circumcised heart and ears, they
shall not resist the Holy Spirit. Those that don't have hearkened,
those who are uncircumcised in heart and ears, they will always
resist the Holy Ghost. Oh, but those who have been circumcised
in the heart and the ears, those who've been given the seeing
eye and the hearing ear, they'll hearken, they'll hearken, and
they'll do. Our Father, thank you for this
time together. Be with those who would be here
but could not. Thank you, Lord, for everything
you've given us and all the good and perfect gifts you've given
us in your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Be with Paul as he comes
to preach your word. And we'll give you all the honor
and the glory now and forever, because it is yours in Christ's
name.