I've been thinking on a few verses this morning.
I've seen this conversation or statement
that was made, I guess it was yesterday, the day before yesterday, talking about the necessity of
preaching in salvation. Was there a need for a preacher
the gospel to be preached so that somebody might be able to
be saved. Of course, we've talked about
that before here. I think we are all here that hold to the
truth, believe that salvation doesn't come by our believing
and it doesn't come by gospel being preached. And that by any
means, and I want to go on record of saying this, that that by
no means discredits the preaching of the gospel. I'm not saying
that there isn't no necessity for the preaching of the gospel
in the purpose for which it's given to us. The preaching of
the gospel isn't to save people in the legal sense. The preaching
of the gospel is to save us in an experiential sense. It's to
save us from the wrong thinking about salvation and about righteousness,
about the testimony of Christ and what he has done. The preaching
of the gospel is to declare the good news of a already finished
salvation, an already wrapped up and done salvation.
The gospel is to declare to those who have been given faith, to
declare unto them their salvation and how it was accomplished.
That's what the gospel is. That's what the preaching of
the gospel is. It's for the encouragement of the believer. It's for the
edification, the building up of the believer. It's for the
continual reminder of the believer to keep these thoughts in front
of their head. I think it was Peter, maybe, that wrote that,
you know, I want to bring this to your remembrance. It's to
bring to our remembrance. And that's because the old Adamic
man wants to continue to cling on to his self-righteousness.
Now the damning man wars with that man on the inside that knows
that righteousness only comes from Christ alone, but that old
man wants to continue to dig out his own righteousness by
his own works, by his own self-righteous clothing whenever we've been
given a white robe of righteousness in Christ Jesus. And so the gospel
being preached or the believing and hearing the gospel isn't
what saves us. We are already saved, thus we
believe. And so the gospel or the understanding
of the gospel comes because we've already been saved. And if you
want to say you saved in the sense of being born from above,
because I know there's a connotation to that. A lot of people say,
you know, that I was saved back in 19 whatever, you know, They're talking about when they
believe they were born again. Now, some people have a date
in mind and they can say I was born again on this date. I'm
not that confident of when I was, so I don't know. I don't know
when I was born again. I can't say when I was given
life. I know whenever I felt a strong
conversion from wrong thinking to right thinking, I know a time
when God overwhelmingly put into my mind that what I had been
thinking was wrong, but even to that point, leading up to
that, truth was coming precept upon precept, line upon line,
here a little, there a little. I began growing in grace and
knowledge. So whenever that life began,
I don't know, I can't say, I'm confident in that, whether it
was from the time I was born, as some in the Bible are said
to have had, or whether it was sometime in time that the Lord
brought that in, that life in, or whether the life has always
been there, and there's just this development, because whenever
we talk about, when we talk about using the whole picture that
Jesus used of a conception and a birth, those are two separate
things. A conception is when life begins,
and a birth is when it's made manifest. There is a child that
is conceived and that conception is when that life begins, whenever
that seed of the man and the egg of the woman comes together,
then that life begins there, but that child is never brought
forth or manifested as a child until it's birthed. So the giving
of life and the manifesting outwardly of that life comes after a time
of development. And so we are in a time of development.
And then once that child is born, there continues to be development
in all of our life. I'm 51 years old, about to be
52 here in a couple weeks. I'm 52 years old, going on, developing,
still developing. I'm developing right into my
grave, but I'm developing, you know, these gray hairs. It's
in my beard and my hair, you know, these wrinkles and easily
bruised arms. These are developments in my
physical body. I'm still developing from who
I was conceived in and who I will be whenever I die. I continue
to develop. Well, as the child of grace,
we still are being developed into who we are. Now, that doesn't
change the nature of who we are in Christ Jesus. That inward
man is true holiness and righteousness. It is without sin and it is born
from above. It's a new creation. But there
is a development in that. And that development is a process
of learning. Well, whenever one is born from
above, and they are given life, that life begins to develop. And because of that life that
has already been given, there begins to be in that development
process, fruits of that life. And we see in the Scriptures,
the fruits of that life is faith. We see faith as the fruit of
the Spirit. We begin to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. We begin to follow the Lord Jesus
Christ. We begin to repent of our unrighteousness. And we begin to trust in Christ's
righteousness. We are given the gifts of the
Spirit. Love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness. Those are the things
that are being worked in us by the Holy Spirit. Those are the
fruits of this life that has been given to us. And so, this
may be an odd passage for us to go to prove the fact that
it isn't the preaching of the gospel that gives us life, but
it is the fact that we believe shows forth we've already been
given life, therefore that life preceded any preaching, any gospel,
anything that we read. Now again, I'm not taking any
importance away from the gospel. If I didn't believe that, I wouldn't
be here right now doing what we're doing here. But we need
to understand biblically where life comes from and how it is
given. The life is given sovereignly
by God, by the power of God. The power of God, the good news
of the Gospel is that it is God who gives life. Because we are
all in darkness. The natural man, the Adamic man
is in darkness. We are dead in trespasses and
sins. That means we are in spiritual
darkness. We are dead to anything spiritual. We have no sensitivity to spiritual
things. We cannot produce spiritual things.
We cannot receive spiritual things. We cannot comprehend spiritual
things, and there's a plethora of verses we could go to that
I don't have time to go to all those, but we know those verses. You know, the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God. We know these verses.
But we are in darkness. The Adamic man is in darkness. And unless there is light given
to him, then he cannot receive those things. He cannot perceive
those things. The preaching of those things
can't do anything. A preacher can preach the Gospel. A person can read the Gospel
all day long and it not have any effect on them. As a matter
of fact, we see people all over the world that are in churches,
or what they call churches today, that are hearing people read
the Bible, preaching messages, giving speeches, whatever they
are, and there is no effect. I've seen people myself, even
in Sovereign Grace circles, that have their whole entire life
grew up under Sovereign Grace preaching, true Sovereign Grace
preaching, and have heard it, and have heard it, and have parented
it, parented it, reconveyed it to others, stood for it, matter
of fact, and they have gone away, and they have left the faith,
they have left even belief in God at all, become debaucherous
as debaucherous can be and yet the preaching of that gospel
they heard over and over and over again and at some point
for a period of time even seemed to have embraced that but yet
that had no effect to them. They are now walking in darkness
and that walking in darkness proves that there never was really
light there. I got to thinking about this
in this first part of John. Let's go ahead and read that.
John chapter 1, and I'm going to start reading in verse 1.
And while the first 2-3 verses are very important, I'm mainly
wanting to get down a little bit further, but I'm going to
start at verse 1 just for our context. It says, In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Now we're talking about Jesus
Christ here. I think we're all Pretty plain about that. Verse
14 down there tells us very clearly that this is who we're talking
about. The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld
His glory as the glory of the only begotten of the Father,
full of grace and truth. Full of grace and truth. Now,
key on to that phrase, full of grace and truth. We're going
to get to that, Lord willing, eventually. But we're talking
about Jesus here. The context is Jesus. John is beginning his Gospel
with Jesus. Listen, John was given by God
to write this by the Holy Spirit. All Scripture is given by inspiration,
right? And John began to write about the Lord Jesus Christ. The Gospels are the good news
of Jesus Christ. And as we learned the last couple
of weeks, all the Word of God is about Jesus Christ. So whether
it's the gospels, or whether it's the epistles, or whether
it's the apocryphal prophetic verses, or whether it's the historical
passages, or whether it's the poetic passages, whatever the
case might be, it's all about Jesus. And John begins here with
Jesus, and he says, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God, So that tells me that Jesus predated all things. He was before all things. And
it says right here in verse 3, all things were made by him and
without him was not anything made that was made. So Jesus
is the one who made everything. Now here we go in verse 4. In
him, that's Jesus, was life. Now let's just stop for a minute
and grasp the greatness of what this is talking about. It may
seem insignificant, but grasp, if you would, the greatness of
what is being seen here. In Christ is life. There is no life outside of Christ. Because everything that was made
was made by Him. So that tree out there It has
life in it. Everything that is in that tree,
as far as that natural life is concerned, came from Christ.
He created it. And He gave it a life, a natural
life of a tree. Those birds that's out there
flying around, they have been given life and they have no life
apart from Jesus Christ giving life in their bird state life. sitting in here in the floor.
He has life. And that life came from Jesus.
Outside of Christ and him giving life, that dog doesn't have any
life. We have a natural life that we
gained from wherever we were born of Adam. That life that
God breathed into the nostrils of Adam and he became a living
soul, that life, every man that comes into the world, and that
includes women, men in general, generically, all men have life
in a natural way. Christ has given us life. And if he says no life, we would
cease to exist. The moment that he removes that
natural life, our natural bodies die. And that's because all things
consist because of him. I think that's what Colossians
says. that by him all things consist,
or is held together, is kept going, is put together, he has
created all things. But it says that all things were
made by him, and without him was not anything that was made,
and in him was life, and the life, and the life, and the life
was the light of men. I've heard it said, and I've
heard this verse used to say, because especially down in verse
9, it says, that was the true light
which lighted every man that cometh into the world. That verse
there is used by especially Methodists and people like that who believe
that there is a light that is within every man, this little
flicker, as small as it may be, that can, in some way, reach
out, in some sort of religious form, reach out and do something
spiritually. And they use this phrase right
here. I've even heard it among Southern
Baptists that said, there you go, God has revealed Himself
to every man. He has lit every man. Therefore,
every man has the ability to choose or to choose otherwise
because they have been given this life. They know. They've
been given to know the Gospel and everything. But brethren,
again, we have to take these verses in context with other
verses in the Bible that say just the opposite. And I think
we'll see that in our passages today. But he says here that
in him was light, and the light was the light of men. Now, I
was pondering on this verse and thinking about it, and I pray
that I'm not speaking in error here or taking this out of context
or taking this in the wrong direction. At least I feel that it is founded
in other places of Scripture that I hope that the Lord will
enable me to bring forth today. I think this is not talking about
everyone everywhere, but it is specifically talking to those
who are of Christ, the elect of God, those who have been put
into the world, but that are not of the world. He says that
in Him was life and the life was the light of men. The only ones who receive the
light of the knowledge of Jesus Christ, or the light of the knowledge
of the Father in the face of Jesus Christ, are those who are
His. Because He has said that He has
hid it from some, but has revealed it to others. What is this phrase,
the light of men, whenever it says that we have been given
light, what does that mean? What is that talking about? It
means illumination. It means revealing something.
Sometimes I may have to come in here in the living room in
the middle of the night for something and I come in and all the lights
are turned out and there's nothing here. I mean, it's dark. You can't see nothing. Well,
you walk in here and there's a couch. There's a couch and
there's a chair. There's a TV and there's a bookshelf. All that's here, but you don't
see it. But whenever you turn the light on, the light illuminates
what is already there. The light gives record or bears
testimony or makes manifest of what is already there. So the light comes because something
that is already there or to reveal something that is already there.
Now here we see that in Him was life and the life was the light
of men. Now, going back to thinking about
this topic of is it the gospel being preached that gives people
life? Well, how can it be? It says here that the life is
the light of men. It's the life that is given first
that becomes the light of men. The thing that reveals the truth,
and I think we'll see that that's the context, The light that reveals
the truth comes because of the life. The life has to be present
for light to be able to reveal. The Word of God cannot give light. Look if you would at 2 Timothy. Chapter 1, verses 9 and 10, we
read these often. It says, Who has saved us and called
us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus
before the world began, but is now made manifest, or brought
to life, if you would. What is being brought to light?
Our salvation. The work of God being given to
us. The grace that has been given to us. But is now being made
manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ who has
abolished death and brought life and immortality to light. See, the light is shedding light,
if you would. on the life and immortality that
was already given to us in Christ. Now, I don't think I'm taking
that out of context or reading into that something that's not
there. I'm trying to take that at face
value and I'm hoping that I'm speaking the truth. It says here
that Christ, who has abolished death, hath brought life and
immortality That means that the fact of one having life and immortality
is being brought to light, being made manifest, being revealed
to show forth by the Gospel, through the Gospel. See, the Gospel is not the one
that is giving life and immortality. But the Gospel is the one that
is bringing life and immortality, manifesting that it has already
been given to us. The Gospel is telling us the
good news that, guess what, child of grace, you have been given
life. You have been graced with the
grace of life. Life is a grace of God. Eternal life is a grace of God. Faith is a grace of God. Belief
is a grace of God. Repentance is a grace of God. And that is given to us because
of the grace of God. It is a grace given in grace. So we see here the Gospel cannot
be the instrument or cannot be the effectual way that someone
has been given life because the Gospel is the one that is manifesting
or bringing to light the fact of an already given grace, if
you see that in verse 9, the grace that was given to us in
Christ Jesus before the world began. The life was given to
us, the grace was given to us, the salvation was given to us
in Christ Jesus before the world began. Christ coming and His death,
His resurrection, His giving of life to us is being manifested
by the declaration of the good news. That's what the word gospel
means, the good news. The good news, what is good news? Well, good news is telling forth
something, reporting something, right? It's a report about something. If I go down and buy a newspaper
today, I guess they still have newspapers, I haven't seen one
in a long time other than jump flyers, but I guess they still
have the Tulsa, I mean the Tulsa World or the Joplin Globe. That's a newspaper. What's that
newspaper for? To report on things. It's giving a report on what's
going on around here. That's what the Gospel is. The
Gospel is a report of something. To report something. The Gospel
is there to bear testimony of something. Right? So it is the
testimony. So if we go back to John, it
says, In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The life being given to us is
where the light comes in. It can't come in until there's
first life. Life enters in when life is given
to us. Excuse me, light comes in when
life is given to us. And it says, and the light shineth
in darkness. Now here's where I get, I don't
think that verse 4 and verse 9 are talking about every man
everywhere. Because here we see the contradiction
as it would seem. In Him was life and the life
was the light of men. Notice before I go on to verse
5, notice it doesn't say it was the light of all men. Now in
verse 9 it does say that the true light which lighteth every
man that cometh into the world. Someone will say, well yeah,
but verse 9 says every man that cometh into the world. Now that could mean every man
head for head. If that's true, then that means
Jesus Christ has given life to every man that cometh into the
world. That means every man, woman, child, every person who
is ever born into this world has been given the life. And
what does the Bible say? It says in verse, well, I think
it's in another verse that we'll look at here in just a minute.
Yeah. I'm going to put a pause on that thought there. But it
says here that it is the light of men. It doesn't say all men.
It just says of men. And verse 9, while we can say
that is the light of every man, we must look and see, does the
Bible teach that? And if not, is there another
connotation that can be given to that verse that is in harmony
with the rest of Scripture? And I think we'll find that.
But look if you would, verse five I think gives us a little
bit of glimpse of this. It says, and the light shineth
in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not. Now, he's not talking about darkness
as just some, I don't even know the word to use for that, in
some sort of a abstract thing. He says the light shineth in
darkness and the darkness comprehended it not. So whatever he's talking
about in darkness has to have the ability to comprehend. So
he's not talking about the absence of light as far as me turning
the lights out in this living room. He's talking about something
else. Now, Matthew chapter 6 and verse
23, if you want to turn there, it might give us a little clue. Matthew 6 and verse 23. But if
thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness.
If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great
is that darkness? Now that almost sounds like a
contradiction or an oxymoron. If the light that is in thee
be darkness, how great is thy darkness? Wait a minute, isn't
light and darkness opposites? Doesn't everyone tell us that
darkness is just absence of light? That there is no really true,
that there is a true darkness, that darkness is just absence
of light. And that whenever light comes
on, the darkness flees. There's no darkness. Okay? But
it says here, if therefore the light that is in thee be darkness,
how great is that darkness? What's he talking about there?
How can there be light in you but it be dark? It means understanding. Again, if the understanding that
is in you be darkness, if the comprehension that is in you
be darkness, if the knowledge that is in you be darkness, how
great is that Darkness. See, we're talking about light
being given, or understanding being given, the revelation being
given, okay? And so here Jesus is saying,
if thy eye be evil, if who you are, the eye is the light of
the soul, it reflects or shows who the person is. If the eye
be evil, And we know that the Bible says that all men are sinful,
all men, that everything that we do are evil continually, that
our heart is desperately wicked above all things. We are evil. We are evil people. Therefore,
if the eye be evil, the whole body shall be full of darkness. If who we are is darkness, then
that's all we are is darkness and how great that darkness is.
And so Jesus here is saying, if therefore the light that is
in here, the understanding or the knowledge or what you perceive
is darkness, how great that darkness is. Look
over into John chapter 3. In the discourse with Nicodemus, Jesus said this in verse 17,
For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world,
but that the world through Him, latch on to that, that the world
through Him might be saved. Now, back in John chapter 1,
it says in verse 7, There came a witness to bear witness of
the light that all men through Him might believe. So it's through
Christ who is the light. And that light comes by way of
the life. Jesus is the light. He is the
testimony. Does not the Bible say that Christ
is the one who makes the Father known? That Jesus is the one
who bears testimony? to who the Father is. The Bible says that all three
witnesses of God, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit,
are three record bearers, are testifiers of who God is, and
they're found in Christ Jesus. They're one. And He is the fullness
of the Godhead, bodily, so Christ is the fullness of all who God
is, and He is the one that shines, His face is the one who shines
the testimony of God. So what we know as the children
of God know about Christ, or excuse me, about God, is found
in the face of Christ. So to know the testimony or the
life, what's revealed to us, our understanding of God and
His salvation, it comes through the face of Jesus Christ. So
if our I be evil, great is the darkness that is in us. So if
the light that we have is void and is in darkness, then we're going
to continue in darkness. We're going to continue looking
at ourselves as the righteous ones. We're going to continue
to see, not the testimony of God, but we're going to see our
own testimony in Adam. That we can be as God. We can
do what we want to do and be pleasing to God by our own efforts,
by our own righteousness. But he says here, back in John
chapter 3, he says, verse 18, he that believeth on
him is not condemned. But he that believeth not is
condemned already. because he hath not believed
in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation,
that light is coming to the world, and men love darkness rather
than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone that
doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light,
lest his deeds be reproved. So they don't come to Christ,
they don't believe on Christ, and this is talking about, he
compares this, this doing evil and this doing truth, he compares
that to believing and not believing. Coming and not coming. Those
who don't believe and they don't come, do that because their deeds
are evil. They're darkness. They're in
darkness. They love darkness. They don't love the lie. Why?
Because when they come to the lie and what the testimony of
the lie says, the testimony of the lie says there are none good,
no not one. The testimony of the lie says
that all of our righteousness are filthy rags. The lie tells
us that there is righteousness found in only one person and
that's Jesus Christ. The lie tells us that we are
deserving of sin and that all men are sinners. for all of sin
come short of the glory of God, and that God will not acquit
the wicked, and that we cannot do anything to gain God's favor,
that we are completely enabled and unable to keep the law of
God, And so the light gives testimony to that as who we are and gives
testimony that in Christ Jesus is life and that only He can
keep the law of God. Only He has righteousness and
unless He gives you that righteousness, you will continue in your darkness
or your wickedness or your unrighteous or self-righteousness. You will
continue in that. And so those who are in darkness
don't want to go to that light because that light tells them
that what they're doing is not good enough. and they think their
righteousness is good enough. Why? Because they've not been
given light to see that their righteousness is not good enough.
They're continuing to believe upon themselves. They're continuing
to not trust in Christ, but to trust in their own will, their
own efforts, their own duty, their own works of righteousness. And so he says right here, that's
why they're condemned already, because they're evil, they're
in darkness. They have no light. And they're condemned because
they cannot see the light. And they won't come to the light.
For everyone that doeth evil hateth the light. You want to
know why people hate the gospel of imputed righteousness alone? You want to know why people hate
sovereign grace? Right here. because Sovereign
Grace puts the death blow to their righteousness. The Gospel
of Sovereign Grace puts the death blow to your efforts, including
your efforts to get people saved. Sovereign Grace puts the death
blow to that. You preachers that are out there thinking that you're
saving people by your preaching, Sovereign Grace puts the death
blow to that. Salvation is found in no other. There's no other
name given among men by which men may be saved. And that's
Jesus Christ. And it's not you doing it for
Jesus Christ. It's Jesus Christ who's going
out and He builds His church. He gives life. He grants repentance. He gives the knowledge and the
understanding. He is the one who bears record
of who God is. He is the one who has the beautiful
feet that brings the good news, who is carrying the everlasting
gospel to the four corners of the world. He's the one who is
doing that, brethren. It is not you or I or anybody
else. For everyone that doeth evil
hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds
should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light,
that his deeds may be manifest, that they are wrought in God.
See, the difference between the two is the one person doesn't
want to come to the light because he loves what he is doing and
has faith in what he does and doesn't want to come to the light
that tells him he can't do it. However, the one who is, what
does it say here, who doeth truth, and I would push to say, and
I could be corrected on this, but this doeth truth means to
believe because the comparison here is between believing and
not believing, between coming and not coming, those that doeth
truth, or believeth, cometh to the light." They have no problem
coming to the light. Why? Because they know that their
deeds are wrought in God. They have no problem. They know
that everything that has been done for them on their behalf
was wrought in God and Christ Jesus. They have no... The Bible says that we have We
have boldness to boldly come before the throne of God. Why?
Because we have an advocate, one who stands in our place,
who has done all the deeds for us, who stands in our place,
whose name is above our head, whose righteous robes are being
clothed upon us. We come because we have been
clothed in His righteousness, and we're not coming in our own
works and our own righteousness. So I believe this is talking
about, this life that is being talked about, this life is given
to us so that the illumination or the revelation or the testimony
that is being made manifest to the children of grace is that
we might know that we are sinners and are in need of Christ and
the testimony of what Christ has done is given to us to believe
and we are given to believe it by Him. Look if you would at
1 John chapter 1. In verse 5 it says, This then
is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto
you that God is light. Wait a minute, I thought it said
Jesus was light. one and the same person, brother.
Jesus is God and there is no other. That God is light and in Him
is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship
with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. There's that phrase again. Do
it the truth, do not the truth. So what is doing the truth or
what is walking in darkness? Walking in darkness is continuing
to walk without the light of the knowledge of our sinfulness,
to continue to walk in our self-righteousness of we think that we can be accepted
of God, that we can be received of God because of anything that
we do. That our religious efforts are
being accepted by God. That our religious walk is a
walk that is pleasing to Him. But he says here, he says, If we say we have fellowship
with Him and walk in darkness or continue to walk in our self-righteousness,
continue to walk apart from the testimony of Christ, we lie and
do not the truth. So to me it seems that walking
in the truth or doing the truth is believing on what Christ has
said, the testimony that Christ has given. is to believe what
is being said about us and about God. To believe about who we
are in Adam and what we are in Christ. Who we are in Adam is
sin and darkness. But what we are in Christ is
righteous, holy, and without blame. And if we walk or doeth
the truth, We walk in the light of that. But it says, but if
we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship
one with another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us
from all sin. Does that mean that Jesus will
cleanse us from all sin if we start believing that? Is that
what that's saying? No, I don't believe so. I believe
He's talking about in our conscience. If we walk in the light, if we
believe the testimony, if we trust in the testimony, if we
are walking in the light, the light of the testimony of Christ
and His finished work on our behalf, if we are walking in
that light, then we have fellowship one with the other. And what
happens? The content of that light, the
blood of Jesus Christ cleansing us from all of our sin, giving
us a righteousness that we didn't merit or earn ourselves, the
blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. See, that's what believing the
light is. That's what walking in the light is. That's what
doing the truth is. It's to believe and to trust
and to walk in the blood of Jesus that cleanses us of every sin.
I'm not eradicating my sin by doing more righteousness. I'm
not eradicating sin and pleasing God by doing more religious things. The means of grace are not saving
me. The means of grace are not keeping
me. The work of God is keeping me.
The means of grace, the Word of God, the witness of the Spirit,
the preaching of the Gospel, those things are telling me what
God is doing by His power, but them and of themselves are not
the catalyst that is keeping me and doing these things for
me. The power of God is. And if we
walk in the light of the testimony of what Christ has done, that
the blood of Jesus Christ is cleansed from all of our sin,
we won't be deceiving ourselves. Whenever we say we have fellowship
with God, when we say we have fellowship with the brethren,
and that would say, love God, love your brethren, that's the
great commandment that Jesus has given us. If we say that
we have fellowship with God and fellowship with the brethren,
yet try to walk in our own righteousness, then we're deceiving ourselves.
Because those who are made righteous by the blood of Jesus Christ
don't listen and look to that testimony. They don't look to
the testimony of do, they believe the testimony of done. And he
says here, if we walk in the light, as He's in the light,
we have fellowship one with another, the blood of Jesus Christ, His
Son, cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, We
deceive ourselves. And the truth is not in us. What is sin? It's a transgression
of the law. So that means that you have not
kept the law. Right? To transgress the law
means you have not kept the law. So by implication, what we see
here is that sin is man's attempt to keep the law and cannot keep
the law, yet he believes that his fellowship with God and with
the brethren is in his continual trying to keep the law. You want
to know what an antinomian is? An antinomian isn't one who says
that we're under grace and not under law anymore and has done
away with the law and all. That's not the true antinomian.
The true antinomian is the one who thinks that he is keeping
the law. But He cannot keep the law. It says here, if we say we have
no sin, we deceive ourselves. Those who are self-righteous
believe that they are gradually, little bit by little bit, becoming
more and more without sin. Don't take my word for it. Look
into it yourself. Brother Larry and his wife can
attest to that. They've come out of movements
that that was their main gospel. Their main gospel was holiness
and being holy and providing your own holiness and righteousness. They believed. Listen, brethren,
people think that they become less and less sinful the more
they mature in the faith. The longer they're on the road,
The more they apply the means of grace, they become less and
less sinful. Listen. If you sin in one, you have sinned
in them all. It isn't about I've kept five
and missed five. It's not that I've kept 20 and
missed 700. Okay? It's not about that. If you can't keep them all, you've
sinned. If you can't keep it all, You
cannot please God. So your sin is not only transgressing
the law of God, but your sin is thinking that your righteousness
comes by you trying to please God, by your sinful trying to
please God. I don't think that came out right,
but I hope you understand what I mean by that. See, the sin,
singular, is the fact that we're trying to gain righteousness
by doing something we can't do. The sins are the culmination
of the sin of self-righteousness. The sin of self-righteousness
says you can do. Therefore, you try to do and
you commit sins because every time you try to do, you transgress
the law of God because the flesh profits nothing and it cannot
keep the law of God. It cannot do anything that is
pleasing to God. Everything it puts its hands
to is sin. The flesh profits nothing. And
if you think that you can do something in your flesh to profit,
that is sin. And to walk in the understanding
that what you do in the flesh is making an acceptance before
God or a keeping with God, is sin, you're walking in darkness.
And here it says, if you say you have fellowship with God
and fellowship with the brethren, and yet you continue to walk
in that darkness, that you have not been made aware that you
are completely sin and can do nothing, then you deceive yourselves
and the truth is not in you. You're not doing the truth. Because the truth isn't in you.
You can't do the truth. You can't walk in truth because
the truth is not in you. If the truth is in you, I am
the way, the truth, and the life. If the truth is in you, Christ
is in you, the life is in you, it's going to give light to the
fact that you cannot do. So if you are walking that you
can do, then the truth is not in you. The life is not in you. You do not have light. You are
not walking in light. but says, if we confess our sins,
He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned,
we make Him a liar and His truth is not in us. Notice the progression
in this. In verse 8, He says, if we say that we have no sin,
that's present tense, present perfect, that we have, meaning
we don't have now and we ain't going to have in the future,
if we have no sin, We deceive ourselves. If there
comes a point in your life where you believe that you have quit
doing some sin, you deceive yourselves. In verse 10 it says, and if you
say that you have not sinned, to those who say, well, I've
never sinned, then you have made Him, God, a liar and His Word
is not in us, in you. in us, anybody that would say
that. Now there may be some that say
that they've never sinned. I know that the religious leaders,
whenever Jesus accused them of stuff, they said, we don't have
anything to worry about. We are Abraham's seed. We don't
have need of salvation because we are of Abraham's seed. That
is almost as if saying, We don't have any sin. We can't sin because
we're Abraham's seed. And you know what is ironic about
that statement? That is exactly true. Not in them and the anti-type,
or in the type, but in the anti-type. The true Israel of God cannot
sin because they are the true children of Abraham. The spiritual seed cannot sin. The physical seed, all it can
do is sin. Anyway, that's off the beaten
path here. So if we say we have no sin,
we have made him a liar. Go back to John chapter 1. The same came, excuse me, and
the light that shineth in darkness and the darkness comprehended
it not. So the darkness here It's not talking about the absence
of light necessarily as part of an abstract thing. It's talking
about those who continue to walk after Adam. Those who continue
to walk after self-righteousness. In their self-righteousness.
It says, there was a man sent from God whose name was John. The same came for a witness to
bear witness of the light that all men through him might believe. Now, again, we've seen in John
chapter 3, he said, for God said, not his Son in the world to condemn
the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Okay? Through him that all men,
through him, might believe. Now, again, we've got to keep
in context what all the Scripture says. Not all men believe. Not all men have been given light.
As a matter of fact, remember what I said a while ago. Jesus
prayed to the Father. Father, I thank Thee, Lord of
heaven and earth, that Thou hast hidden these things from the
wise and the prudent, and Thou have revealed them unto babes.
So we know that there are some that this is being revealed on.
We know the Bible teaches that God has sent the Spirit to harden
their heart and to blind their eyes and to stop up their ears
so they cannot believe. and be converted. They cannot
see the truth and understand it. God has sent this upon certain
men that have not been chosen of Him and His purpose before
the foundation of the world by His grace. So we know the Bible
teaches that there is a whole group of people that will not
be given light. So we know this cannot be through
the explicit verses of Scripture. This cannot mean every man that
has ever been born. Verse 8, he was not that light,
John the Baptist, was not that light, but was sent to bear witness
of that light. That was the true light, which
lighted every man that cometh into the world. So if we see
here, every man that cometh into the world, I can only surmise
from the explicit verses that is talking about the ones who
believe on Him. And the ones who believe on Him
are the ones that He has given life to because that life brings
the light, the testimony of Christ, and it also brings the fruit,
the belief, the repentance. It says, He was in the world
and the world was made by Him and the world knew Him not. He
came unto His own and His own received Him not. And here it
is. This is why I believe that verse 9 is talking about people
of God. But, in contrast, He came into
the world, light came into the world, but the world received
it not. The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended
it not. But as many as received Him,
Now you can look, that word received is not an active thing on their
part, it's a passive thing on their part. As many that has
obtained, that's what Peter, the word Peter used, for we have
obtained. Those who have obtained life
faith, those who have obtained eternal life, that is a passive
thing. That is something that is given
to us outside of us, and it is not a work of ours. It's something
that is given to us. It says, but as many as received
him, to them gave he the power to become the sons of God, even
to them that believe on his name. The word even there is in italics,
they put that in to make the flow sound better, but to them
that believe on his name, it's just a reiteration of what was
before that, to become the sons of God, who are the sons of God,
them that believe on his name. This is not talking about two
separate people, the sons of God and those who believe on
His name. He's talking about the same people. He's reiterating
the fact. Those who are the sons of God
are those who believe on His name. By the way, verse 13, which
were born, not of blood, nor of the will of man, nor of the
flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And it says here, verse 14, And
the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory,
the glory as the only begotten of the Father. Now, look what
it says here, full of grace and truth. Now, I told you while
ago to kind of latch on to that here in a minute. We're going
to talk about it. John bare witness of Him, and
cried, saying, This was He of whom I spake. He that cometh
after me is preferred before me, for He was before me. And
of His fullness." Now what did it say here was His fullness
over here? Grace and truth. See, Jesus, the only begotten
of the Father, was full of grace and truth. And in verse 16 it says, "...and
of His fullness have all we received." So from His grace and of His
truth, we've all received. It comes
from Him. And grace for grace. There's
that phrase I was using earlier. And grace for grace. We have received grace for every
grace that God gives us. Remember I was saying a while
ago that we have the overarching grace in the fact that God has
chosen us before the foundation of the world, and in grace, that
was back in 2 Timothy 1-9, that in the purpose of God, that in
His purpose and grace, that He has saved us and called us with
a holy calling, not according to our work, But His purpose
and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus, but is now being
made manifest. What is now being made manifest?
The fact that we have been given this grace, this love of God,
this grace of God, this electing love of God. And in being given
this electing love of God, given this position of having light
and life in us, we receive every grace. So in the giving of grace,
we receive every grace that has been given to us. I would equate
that with all the spiritual blessings that God has given to us. Every
spiritual blessing that God has given us in heavenly places is
graces that God gives us. He gives us the grace of life,
the grace of faith, the grace of belief, the grace of perseverance. Of His fullness have we all received,
and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses,
but what? Grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ. See, this isn't about the law. The law doesn't bring this. The
preaching of the law doesn't bring this. The incessant trying
to keep the law does not bring this. But grace and truth came
by Jesus Christ. No man has seen God at any time.
The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father,
He hath declared this. Jesus is the one who declares
the Father. Jesus is the one who hath declared who God is
and has declared everything that God has done. I would liken that
to where Jesus has taken the scroll and has unraveled the
scroll that God has given to Him and He's the only one worthy
to unravel that and to declare who God is and to bring forth
the purpose of God, the declaration of God through all eternity,
from eternity to eternity, that Jesus Christ is the one who has
made God known in the flesh, and that in Him is life, and
that through His life and His life only, men receive life.
And the only ones that receive that light are the ones who have
been given to Him by the Father. And there's probably other verses
that I'm not thinking of that we could probably go to. But
we definitely know that in John chapter 6, a people was given
to Christ. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. And him that cometh to me, I
will know why he is cast out, for I came down from heaven,
not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me. And
this is the Father's will that has sent me, that all of which
he hath given me, I shall lose nothing, but shall raise it up
at the last day. And this is the will of him that sent me,
that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth on him may
have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day. Brethren, if we've been given
light or understanding to believe, whenever that Gospel is preached
and we're given to believe it, it isn't the Gospel Word itself,
it isn't the preacher himself that has made that possible,
it is the life of Christ that has already been existing because
you have already been saved, that is existing within you,
that is bringing that life and immortality to light. That preacher,
that gospel you're reading, is only making manifest what was
already there. And we declare that if it's there,
it's there not by any means of man, it's by the grace and truth
that has been given in Jesus Christ. If there's any conveyance of
truth, it's by Jesus Christ. I can't convey truth to you.
I've said that many times. You guys have heard that, said
that, we believe that here. That any conveyance of truth
is not by the man, it's by the Spirit of God who teaches His
people. That is by the Lord Jesus Christ. Alright, that's all I
have this morning. Does anybody have any comments? Father, we thank you for all
that you've done. Thank you for your son, Jesus
Christ. Thank you for the light that has been given to us. If
we have it, Lord, we know that it truly came from you. Lord,
we pray that we would never boast in our own efforts, in our own
work, in our own righteousness, in our own religious zeal. Lord, that we might truly be
given to us the inadequacy that we have in Adam. the inability
that we have of righteousness and that we should walk in the
light of the righteousness that has been procured for us in the
man Jesus Christ, who is our king, our priest, our father,
who is our Lord and Savior, who is our advocate, our representative.
We look to him and him alone for all that is pleasing to God. We look to him and him alone
for acceptance. And we pray, Lord, that we have
been accepted in the Lord. Thank you again for all that
you've given us. And thank you for the Word of God, which bears
testimony of Christ and all that he has done on our behalf. And
Father, we thank you for the people of God who have been blessed
to fellowship in this truth. Lord, we just pray that you might
continue to guide us and direct us in your Word, that you might
continue to grow us in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ. that you might keep us, Lord,
as we leave this place, bring us back together to be your will. And Lord, we just thank you for
all that you've done through him. It's in his name that we
pray.