Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening and now
for today's program. Welcome to our program. I'm glad
you could join us today. The message will be taken from
the book of 2 John. Our main text will be verse 9
of 2 John, the little book of 2 John. John wrote three epistles,
1 John, 2 John, and 3 John. So we'll be studying in 2 John
today. And the title of the message
is, The Necessity of Right Doctrine. The Necessity of Right Doctrine. And I'll show you that in just
a moment. I do want to start the program off today by acknowledging
those of you who watch this program and listen. I've told you in
the past that this program, Reign of Grace TV broadcast, is an
evangelistic tool of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia,
which is the church that I pastor. And I know many of you may live
close enough to Albany to visit our church services. So I would
invite you, I take this opportunity to invite you to our church services. We have a Sunday morning Bible
study at 10 o'clock. And then we have a main worship
service on Sunday morning at 11 o'clock. We also offer live
streaming if you have a computer or you have the ability on these
smart TVs to tune in to live streaming. Those services are
streamed live on the internet each Sunday morning. So if you
would like to come and visit us, we'd love to have you. Any
of you who'd like to write and just let us know you're listening,
we're always glad to hear from you. But we're so glad. And we
also, you'll see on the screen, we also identify our website,
our email, all of that information. So I just wanted to put that
out there. But let's get to the Bible study, the message, which
is the necessity of right doctrine. Now, so many people today have
such misguided views, misunderstandings of the issues of doctrine. The
word doctrine just simply means teaching. And of course the Bible
itself is full of doctrine. There are doctrines of other
religions, other beliefs, and then there is biblical doctrine
or what we might say Christian doctrine. There are people who
call themselves Christian who hold different doctrines because
they interpret the scripture differently. And although I will
acknowledge that there are some verses that are just not easy
to interpret, there are rules of interpretation that are laid
down in the scripture and in the hearts of God's people. that
I believe cause them to arrive at basically the same essential
doctrines. And that's what I'm gonna talk
about. I just finished a series on the issues of Bible interpretation
a few weeks back, a few months back maybe. And I urge you to
get that. How to interpret the scriptures,
rules for interpreting the scripture. And so those are important. Many
people, they just read the Bible without any thought. and without
any adherence to the rules of interpretation, and they come
up with all kinds of wild things that they believe. But listen
to what John writes in 2 John. We'll begin reading at verse
7. This has just got one chapter. It's a very short book. And he's
writing, I believe, to a church which he identifies as the elect
lady. Some scholars believe he's writing
to a particular lady, a believer, but that doesn't matter. The
message is the issue. Because the message is the same,
whether he's writing to one person, one believer, or a group of believers.
but he's warning them. First he commends her for persevering in the truth and
in love, but then he warns her. He warns this group of believers. Verse seven, he says, for many
deceivers are entered into the world who confess not that Jesus
Christ has come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. Now these deceivers that he's
talking about are people who claim to be Christians but who
denied particular doctrines that identify and distinguish and
form the basis of true Christianity. And that's a problem. Now that's
something we cannot overlook. He says this is a deceiver. One
who is out to deceive people. He says this is an Antichrist. That's the spirit of Antichrist.
You know, so many people today have their minds set on one particular
person whom they can identify as the Antichrist. But John in
his epistles, 1st John and 2nd John, in fact, the only time
you see the term Antichrist in scripture is in John's epistles
here. 1st and 2nd John. And John speaks
of and acknowledges a spirit of antichrist which is prevalent
in his day through these deceivers. And he says, listen, what is
antichrist? What is the spirit of antichrist?
It's a spirit of any person who comes claiming to be Christian
claiming the name of Christ, but who denies the doctrine of
Christ, the true doctrine of Christ. Now these particular
individuals here whom John identifies as deceivers and antichrists,
they were denied the doctrine of Christ's humanity. You see, the doctrine of Christ's
humanity is an essential doctrine, a truth, a teaching from the
Scripture. This person who is God, the second
person of the Trinity, the Son of God, he had to be made flesh
and dwell among us. Now the reason he had, and it's
all connected here. This is one thing you need to
understand about this doctrine. You see, the doctrine of Scripture,
the doctrine of the Bible, the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine
of Christianity is not a supermarket religion. Meaning by that, you
can't just go in with your grocery bag and pick and choose what
you want to take and what you want to leave behind. This doctrine
is essential. That's why I call this message
The Necessity of Right Doctrine. So listen to what he says. He
said, and I'll talk more about this doctrine of his humanity
as well as other doctrines, but look at verse eight. He says,
look to yourselves that we lose not the things which we have
wrought, that is have gained is what that means. You might
have that in your concordance. He's not talking about things
we've worked for, but things we have received, but that we
receive a full reward. Now the full reward has to do
with the final glorification, the final end, culmination of
salvation for every true believer, saved by the grace of God, redeemed
by the blood of Christ, washed clean in His blood, clothed in
His righteousness imputed. You see, everything that I'm
telling you here are essential doctrines of Christianity. And
everything that I have as a saved person is by virtue of who Christ
is in His person. God and man in one person. If He's not God, He couldn't
save me. If He's not man without sin,
He could not save me. And it has to do with what He
accomplished. That reward there speaks of the
redemptive work of Christ to earn and gain the salvation of
His people and all blessings of glory and grace by His merits. It's not the reward that I earn
or the reward that you earn. It's the reward of grace. You
see, the price of all salvation and blessings is the blood of
Jesus Christ. It's not us. It's not our works. It's not even our faith. Our
faith is in Christ. So understand that. And so he
says in verse nine, now here's the text. Whosoever transgresseth
and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine
of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. Do you see that? Now look what he says. Whosoever
transgresseth, that word transgresseth, transgression, has to do with
sin in the form of going too far, stepping over the line. It is a transgression of the
law. It is a breaking of the law. And it has to do with rebellion.
And so here's a person who claims to be a Christian. And he says,
I believe in Jesus Christ. He's my whole salvation. But
I do not believe he's man. I don't believe he was ever human.
And that was a particular heresy back in those days because there
were a group of cultists, mystics called the Gnostics who would
not accept the fact that Jesus Christ was a human being because
they looked at flesh, material flesh, physical flesh as being
sinful. And of course, Christ was never
sinful. He was a human being without
sin. He was made flesh and dwelt among
us, but He was without sin. And they couldn't accept that,
so they denied His humanity. Well, in denying His humanity,
they went too far in their own understanding, in their own rebellion. They denied Christ. And then
he says, whosoever transgresseth and abideth not, continues not
in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. You see, he says, he
that abideth continues in the teaching, the doctrine, the truth
of Christ. He hath both the Father and the
Son. Now what is the doctrine of Christ? Well, we could talk
about a lot of things, but we don't have time to go through
a systematic theology of Christian doctrine. And I will say at the
outset, there are things that believers can disagree on, but
there are things that true believers do not disagree on and cannot
disagree on. And that's the necessity of right
doctrine. And this is it, you can boil
it down to basically in the doctrine of Christ, we can talk about
number one, the doctrine of His person. Now, who is Jesus Christ? What think ye of Christ? You
know, that was over, I think, in Matthew chapter 22. I didn't
mark that on my lesson today, but it just come to my mind,
but it's a very important issue concerning the doctrine of Christ.
But what happened was a group of skeptics began to ask questions
of the Lord Himself, trying to trap Him, trying to catch Him
up. Of course, they couldn't do it.
He's the one who caught them up in their own trap, their own
web. You know, you've heard the old
poem, oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice
to deceive, and that's what they were. But at the close of their
little session, he posed a question to them. And the question went
like this. What think ye of Christ, the
Messiah, whose son is he? And they said, David's son. He's David's son. Now they were
right. In the Old Testament, through
the royal covenant that God made with David, it was prophesied
that Messiah, according to the flesh, His humanity, would come
through the seed of David. Romans chapter 1 speaks of that. How He was made according to
the flesh of the seed of David. and that's part of the gospel
message. And that refers to his sinless perfect humanity because
even though he was from the seed of David, he was not born in
sin like you and me. You see, we're born dead in trespasses. Man fell in Adam, and Adam brought
death and sin and death upon the whole human family. And when
we're born of Adam, we're born in sin. We're born dead in trespasses
and sin. We were ruined by the fall. But
Jesus Christ, the Messiah, in His humanity, He wasn't born
as a fallen, dead sinner. He was conceived by His holy
humanity. was conceived in the womb of
the Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit. And so he was born without the
aid of man. And he, in his humanity, was
sinlessly perfect. But they answered, well, he's
David's son. Well, the scripture says that.
Well, Christ posed another question. He said, how can he be both David's
God and David's son? Because David acknowledged Messiah
to be God. in the Psalms and in other passages
that we could go to. So how could he be both David's
son and David's God? Well, they didn't know. And I
want to tell you something. That truth, I'm going to tell
you how he can be both David's God and David's son. But it is
a mind-boggling truth that we cannot fully comprehend in our
finite minds. It's the incarnation. I tell
you how you can be both David's God and David's son, because
he is both God and man in one person. Now that's the doctrine
of Christ. Now, here's the thing. He had
to be both God and man in order to save his people from their
sins. Hebrews chapter 2 talks about
that. Other passages talk about that. All through. You see, man
cannot create life and give life. But this person who is man, Jesus
Christ, He does create life and gives life and that's attributed
to His deity. He's God. Only God can create
life and give life. On the other hand, God cannot
die for the sins of others. But this person who is God, he
did die for the sins of others, and that's to be attributed to
his humanity. He's God and man in one person.
Now, do I understand everything about that? Well, of course I
don't, and you don't either, nobody does. We're human. We're
limited. But this is what the Bible teaches. The Savior, Jesus Christ, who
is salvation himself, The Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah, he
shall save his people from their sins. His name shall be called
Emmanuel, God with us. The word was made flesh and dwelt
among us. This is what the Bible teaches.
The Savior is both God and man in one person. If he were not
fully God and fully man without sin, he could not have saved
his people. He could not have died for his
people. He's the surety of his people. The sins of all his people
were charged, accounted, imputed to Jesus Christ. And he, as God-man,
went under the curse of the law and died as the surety and substitute
of his people. And that's part of the doctrine
of Christ too. For whom did Jesus Christ die? People today say, well he died
for everybody without exception upon condition of their believing. That is not the doctrine of Christ.
That's the doctrine of deceivers. Jesus Christ died for God's elect. He was their surety. He is their
surety. and all their sins were charged,
accounted to him. And as a result of his death,
his righteousness, the merit of his obedience, and it's called
in the Bible, in the Gospel now, in the doctrine of Christ, the
righteousness of God. You see, the righteousness that
is imputed, accounted, charged to me, As evidenced by my believing
in Him, that righteousness is not of me. It's not of mere man. It's of God. It's the God man.
Jesus Christ is the Lord my righteousness. Now, this is the doctrine of
Christ. Now, here comes a person who says, well, I'm a Christian.
I believe in Jesus Christ, but I don't believe He's God. My
friend, they're not abiding in the doctrine of Christ. They've
transgressed. They have not God. That's a denial of Christ. Here's
a person who comes along and says, well, I believe in Christ,
but I don't believe he is man. Well, they don't, they're transgressing. They're not abiding in the doctrine
of Christ. You see the necessity of this?
You see the importance of it? Here's a person who says, well,
I believe he died for my sins, but only on condition of my believing
and my repenting or my doing this. Oh no, you've transgressed,
you've gone beyond it. You see it's Christ and him alone,
his blood alone, his righteousness alone that secures my salvation,
that demands my salvation, all in him. This is the right doctrine. Now, over in the book of 2 Timothy,
I want to read you a verse there because it's so important that
we see this. In the book of 2 Timothy chapter
4, the apostle Paul was writing to Timothy here, instructing
him in how to pastor a church, how to lead a church, a group. And he tells him, look at 2 Timothy
4, verse one. He says, I charge thee therefore
before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick
and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom. The quick and
the dead. The quick there are believers. The word quick there
means live. They've been made alive in the
new birth. The dead there are those who
are dead in their sins. They are those who have not Christ.
They don't have his blood to wash away their sins. They don't
have his righteousness to justify them. They stand on their own. So he said he'll judge the quick
and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom, that's the second
coming. And so here's what he tells Timothy,
verse two, preach the word. Preach the word of God. Preach
the doctrine of Christ. Preach the gospel of God's free
and sovereign grace in him. Be instant, in season, out of
season. Be ready, in other words, to
preach this word. Be quick about it. He says, reprove,
rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. In other words,
you reprove and correct point out the wrongs, show what's right,
encourage with all patience and endurance, and do it in love,
but do it with doctrine. Now, some people say, well, it
doesn't really matter what your doctrine is, it's how you live.
My friend, do you realize how unbiblical and unchristian a
statement like that is? Now, it does matter how we live. We don't deny that. But in Christianity,
in true salvation, how we live must be founded upon right doctrine,
what we believe concerning who Jesus Christ is and what he accomplished
on Calvary. If anybody tells you that it
doesn't matter what you believe, it's how you live, they are not
acting as a Christian. That's heathen doctrine. That's
pagan doctrine. Now again, How we live is important. The scripture teaches that. A
person who claims to believe the gospel, even true doctrine,
but who doesn't live according to that doctrine, well, it's
a false professor. But how we live is determined
by what we believe in doctrine. And so he says, you exhort with
all long-suffering in doctrine. Look at verse three now, 2 Timothy
4. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine."
What is sound doctrine? Well, it's right doctrine. True
doctrine. You know there are false doctrines.
Just like what John was talking about in 2 John. Those deceivers,
those antichrists who came denying the humanity of Christ. Those
today who deny the deity of Christ. There are people today who talk
about Christ being made a sinner. That's heresy. And the scripture
says, well, he was made sin, yes, in 2 Corinthians 5.21. For
he made him to be sin, Christ who knew no sin for us
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. But how was He
made sin? He wasn't made a sinner. He never
was a sinner. Sin never contaminated Christ. Sin never contaminated Him. Sin
never was infused into Him. He was made sin. Now how was
He made sin? The sins of His people were charged,
accounted, imputed to Him. You see, the doctrine of imputed
sin to Christ is one of the essential doctrines of Christ. When Christ
went to the cross, He went there as a guilty sinner, as a guilty
person who had sin put upon Him by legal imputation, but not
as a sinner. We're the sinners, but sin was
imputed to Christ. He was made a curse. He was brought
under the curse. The debt of the sins of His people
were charged to Him. So you understand that. And that's
why He had to die. He died justly under the wrath
of God the Father for the sins of His people. And in doing that,
he drank damnation dry. He finished the transgression.
He made an end of sin. He brought in everlasting righteousness
Daniel prophesied of. And that's the righteousness
that is imputed, accounted, and charged to his people. The doctrine
of imputed righteousness for the justification of God's elect
is an essential doctrine of Christianity. Now, as a result of that, they
are quickened. The quick and the dead, well,
there's the quickened, they're born again by the Spirit. In
other words, life, spiritual life, has to be imparted to them,
has to be given to them. They have to be given a new heart,
a new spirit, eyes to see, ears to hear. You must be born again,
Christ told Nicodemus. So God's people must be justified
based on righteousness imputed and they must be born again under
the preaching of the gospel as the power of God unto salvation
as the Holy Spirit gives life, gives a new heart. So he says
in verse three there, he says, for the time come when they will
not endure sound doctrine. They won't listen to it. They
don't want to hear the doctrines of Scripture. People today, many
people who claim to be Christians, sitting in churches every Sunday
and every Wednesday, they're hearing stories, experiences,
what they call testimonies, but they're not studying the Word
of God. And then there are parts of the
Word of God, the Bible, they don't want to study. Well, he
says here, they shout, they after their own lust, they heap to
themselves, teachers have an itch. I'm gonna pick up there
next week and do another message on this, the importance of right
doctrine. I hope you'll join us next week
for another message from God's word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1102 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia, 31707. contact us by phone at 229-432-6969
or email us through our website at www.theletterofgrace.com. Thank you again for listening
today and may the Lord be with you.