Taught of God.

Seeking for the help of the Lord, I direct your prayerful attention to the book of Hebrews and chapter 8, reading from our text, verses 10 and 11. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws into their minds, and write them in their hearts. And I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people. And they shall not teach every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

Hebrews chapter 8, verses 10 and 11. start of the verse it is specifying what the covenant is that God will make, and this is in these gospel days. But we have in the previous verses the setting forth that there was to be another covenant. Our text says what that is, But the lead up to it is that the Lord would make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because they continued not in my covenant nor regarded them not, saith the Lord." So we have, when the children of Israel came out of Egypt, the commandments were given, the Ten Commandments were given, the laws were given. Even while the commandments were actually being given on Mount Sinai, the children of Israel were breaking those commandments And we have in Deuteronomy 29 verse 4, Yet the Lord hath not given you a heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear unto this day. But there should be a new covenant that is to be made and that is also anticipated and said to the children of Israel that he would do that and form a new covenant.

A covenant is an agreement, agreement that has two parties and is required that both parties observe the terms of that covenant. But it's very evident that the terms of the covenant is the law of God. We are not able to fulfill that. And so that covenant, as Paul says in where our text is, that covenant they break. The law of God, it is weak through the flesh. It cannot be fulfilled by man.

Romans 8 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemns sin in the flesh. 9 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, after the Spirit. And it is this new covenant, this which is in the Spirit, that which is taught of God, that which ensures that the people of God will know the Lord and will get to heaven. And this is what really is upon my spirit this morning, is the vital need of this teaching, of this covenant, the teaching in the heart.

If ever there was a day that we have means to learn in a natural way, it is today. We can go on our computers, we can ask AI any question about the scriptures, and it will come out with an answer, without us having to search through, it might not be a right answer, but we have an answer. We have programs, we can search the scriptures easy, we can learn in a natural way, never so easy as we have it today. Recalling things electronically, learning and studying, but with all of that, it will never ever save us all.

Even if we were able to answer every theological argument and know every truth and be able to write it down, to be able to articulate it, it would still leave us without God, without hope and without saving. we've sung in our hymn just now that we must not learn God's truth as schoolboys learn their task and we have in the word that is before us the emphasis they shall not teach every man his neighbor and every man his brother say know the Lord for they shall all know me from the least to the greatest and the emphasis is taking away from a natural learning to a spiritual learning and a teaching which is from the Lord. You must, of course, observe it is the will of God that he uses means, but it is how we use those means and our eye upon the teaching of the Lord and to be able to recognise how he teaches and the effect of that teaching on us so that we know that we are partakers of this covenant and of the teaching that is here. It is good for us to be able to discern the difference between what we may learn in the head and what is in the heart. and it's a lesson we are going to learn right through life and those of us in the ministry as well. How easy it is to think, well, we can prepare a sermon and we can just do it by intellectual study and it will be a dry intellectual discourse and it won't come from the heart and it won't come from what we've experienced. and it won't do the people any good.

But that is also reflected in the lives of the people of God as well. And so I want to look first this morning at the promises in the prophets and that which is confirmed by our Lord Jesus Christ concerning this covenant and concerning this teaching, the emphasis that scripture puts on it. And then secondly, the effect of God's teaching. And thirdly, the means God uses and what is actually taught. But firstly I want to look at the promises.

Remember what we read there in Deuteronomy, that God reminded them that as yet he had not given them to understand the law and to be able to keep it. Now we need to make it clear, like with the gift of the Holy Spirit. When the Spirit was given at Pentecost, then it was poured out so that everyone, all of God's people now, receive of the Spirit and are blessed with the teaching and life of the Spirit of God.

That does not mean that the Spirit did not exist before that time. He did. He is part of the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. It did not mean that He did not speak before or enlighten before. He did through the prophets. and his people in time past, but not in the same great way as is done today.

And so again with teaching, we mustn't think that Abraham or David, they weren't taught of God. They were taught of God. We have to look at some of the things, the ways the Lord taught them. But it is in a great measure now in these gospel days, right through the church and not just for the Jews, but in every nation, kindred and tongue, there is this promise of the teaching of God, the teaching of the people of God, bring them to know the Lord. And this is anticipated right through the scriptures. So I want to look at some of those scriptures In Isaiah 30, there's beautiful words there, in verse 20, where we have, and though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers. and thine ears shall hear a word behind thee saying, this is the way, walk ye in it when ye turn to the right hand and when ye turn to the left. And he's pointing to the teaching of the Lord, the instruction of the Lord, when we go to the 54th of Isaiah.

Of course, this now is speaking of the benefits and blessings that flow after Christ's death. Set forth in chapter 53, the sufferings of our Lord, and then the Church of God. Sing, O thou barren, that didst not bear the fruits and blessings that flow forth from Christ's death. And then we have the promise in verse 13.

And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord And great shall be the peace of thy children. In righteousness shalt thou be established. Thou shalt be far from oppression, for thou shalt not fear from terror, for it shall not come near thee. And the blessing and the teaching is this same teaching that there shall be a teaching, there shall be an instruction of the people of God.

And so this is why we read in Jeremiah 31, and we started reading at verse 31. Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant they prayed. The lower wasn't husband unto them, saith the Lord." This is the verses that Paul is quoting in Hebrews, bringing together the Old Testament teaching showing its fulfilment in the New Testament teaching. God hasn't changed His mind. This is a fulfilling of it. And then our text from verse 33, But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord.

I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts and will be their God and they shall be my people. They shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord. For they shall all know me from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

Then we have it in Micah. Chapter four, the same promises again, speaking again of these last days, the days of gospel days, the days from Christ first coming or from his ascension to the birth of the church through to when the Lord comes again. So from verse one in Micah four, but in the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains. It shall be exalted above the hills, and people shall flow unto it. And many nations shall come and say, Come, let us go up to the house of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths. For the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he again is speaking so very clearly what we may anticipate and expect in our days. But what of our Lord Jesus Christ?

Did he not speak of this as well? We know, of course, his whole ministry was a teaching ministry. He always taught them in parables and expanded those parables to those of his disciples. But in John 6 and verse 45, our Lord is speaking of what is written in the prophets. He reminds those of his hearers, it is written in the prophets, and they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh unto me. The oneness of the word of God and the expectation in these gospel days that the Lord will teach and instruct his people. There surely is something that we can remind the Lord of in prayer, be encouraged of, ask of the Lord, have our eye unto the Lord for his instruction, for his teaching, and that our eyes be open to see our teachers, to understand what the Lord is teaching to us.

And so it's good for us to be established in the promise and expectation of something that the Lord is going to do, has done, and will do, right through to the end of time. There is no uncertainty. It's not relying upon man's teaching. It's not relying upon us. It is the Lord's teaching. And there is none that teacheth like him.

And may we be encouraged then in what is promised and what is repeated here right through the scriptures. May be as we gather this morning that you say, well this is what I want to hear because I feel so ignorant, so in need of instruction, so in need of teaching, so in need of that that touches my heart. and to have it told, this is a gospel promise. This is something that we may ask and expect of the Lord to perform it. One great difference between the law and the gospel, the law demands, the law says you've got to do this and this and this, or to attain unto this, you've got to make the effort or it's on your part to perform it. The Gospel, it says, this is a term of the covenant.

This is what God will do for you. This is what will give you the token that it is He that's working in you to will and to do of His own good pleasure, that you have received the blessing of the Lord. Our Lord is exalted to give repentance and remission of sins unto Israel.

He doesn't say to His people, You must repent, you must have forgiveness of sins, you must attain to it, now it shall be given you. You must have faith, but it is the faith of Jesus Christ and he gives that faith. The gospel is good news for sinners and for those that cannot help themselves, those that feel their ignorance, those that feel their need of salvation, and their inability to attain to it themselves, those who feel that they have nothing in themselves, they need that from the Lord. And so with the teaching, this again is suited to God's people that feel they do not know the things of God, they need to be taught. And so it's encouragement where that need is, where it is really felt, in our souls.

Our Lord rejoiced in spirit. He said, I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and prudent and has revealed them unto babes. And the Apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians, that after in the wisdom of God, it pleased God through wisdom that man cannot attain unto God, to please God through the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. And it is that no flesh might glory in his presence.

We need these things taught and revealed to us. The Apostle Paul, writing this, as I believe it is him, in Hebrews, he would say, well, I learned. I learned at the feet of Gamaliel. I learned the Old Testament Scriptures. I knew them very well. And I trusted in my own righteousness. I thought I was righteous. I was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. But then will it please God to reveal his son in me?

Immediately he is brought down as a sinner, convicted under the law. And immediately, Lord, what would thou have me to do? and the light that God shone on what he already did know, what he had learned, but now he saw it so differently. And the one thing in that teaching of the Apostle Paul, it led straight to the Lord Jesus Christ, and he immediately preached that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. That was the immediate fruit of taking from a natural learning to a spiritual learning, and one in the heart brought him a changed character, and especially concerning our Lord Jesus Christ. So I want to think in the second place of the effect of God's teaching. If it had that effect with the Apostle Paul, and him wanting to convey that to the Hebrew church to show that this is the covenant in effect he had been a beneficiary of the covenant He had received it.

Well, what is the effect that is set forth? Well, we had it in Jeremiah. We had one of the effects that is set forth, and that is that the law shall be in the inward parts, righted in their hearts. And this is what is set forth in Hebrews as well. The covenant that it shall be, I'll put my laws into their mind and write them in their hearts. That shall be the effect of him. That is God's work to actually do that.

May we realize what that actually is when it enters into our hearts. So this is not something then that is just a mental ascent, but is profoundly felt within and persuaded of the reality of it in the soul. Something that, like the man that was born blind, won't think I know. or as I was blind, now I see that which has been taught in the heart is not easy lost and not easy argued against because it is put there. And we will know, we do know the difference where it is something that is just a theory and something that is then really taught inwardly. and we'll come in a moment to the methods that the Lord uses and to really enforce it and to lay it in the hearts.

But we must look in one way past the means and to see this is God's decree, this is God's opening up, God's teaching. Again, I want to notice regarding this, it is, It's not with fanfare, it's not with great outward display, but the Spirit's work, who is the revealer and teacher, He shall show you all things whatsoever I have said unto you, shall bring these things to your remembrance.

It is gentle, it is soft, but the effect, you see the effect with the apostles, how that they're not afraid of man anymore. They can preach the word boldly, they can see the fulfilment of the scriptures. The effect on them was really immediate. And with us too, our simple prayers, our poor prayers. The Lord knows where our hearts ascend to Him, where we're crying to Him. that he will open to us his word and grant us a life with it. You know, when we just are studying in a natural way, it is, we just go from one text to another, or one part of the word to another, and we're just studying it, trying to get it into our minds. But how different, when the Lord brings his spirit, One text after another flows in.

And there's warmth. There's love with it. There's wonder shown upon it. It touches our hearts. And it's not stilted and just constrained to little parts of it. But it opens up the whole word. We start to see it. so much more clear, that which I see not, teach thou me." That will be written in our hearts and minds. The other thing that is said here in our text, and again reinforced in Jeremiah, is that they shall all know me. It is a very specific thing of this teaching. Not know about me, but know me, or know the Lord. And that is a vital thing.

The teaching of the Lord leads us to know Him, to know how He acts, how he thinks, what is right in his sight. You know, we have a really deceitful heart, and one that would pervert the ways of the Lord. But when the Lord teaches, he says, this is really how I feel.

This is how I view you, and this is how I view my word, and this is how I view your life. Thou, God, seest me. Hagar said that, mindful. The Lord saw her where she was. And so if we are taught of God one of these things, we shall know more and more about the Lord, about his ways, about his holiness, his righteousness, about the methods that he uses of teaching and how he speaks to his people. But this shall be the effect. They shall all know me, even from the least to the greatest. Know, Lord, for all shall know me from the least to the greatest.

The third thing is that we shall be drawn to the house of God. We have this in Micah, chapter four, where there's foretold that all nations, they shall be drawn to the house of God, drawn to where the people of God are, and that is a fact of the teaching and the work of the Holy Spirit.

What a solemn thing it would be if we looked at all of the religions on the earth, and there are so many of them, and you think, how many poor people that are deceived and they're going to this false teaching and that false teaching, the children of Israel in their time, to idols here and idols there. What of God's people? But when we know that God has a people, an elect people, and he has a covenant, and part of that covenant that they shall be drawn to him and to his house, and shall be taught of him, then there is no uncertainty. And we will look for this, that unto him shall the gathering of the people be, not to some false god, not to where he is not. And where the Lord's people may come into those places, And then this same teaching will bring them out and bring them to be with the people of God.

Even if it means like Naomi has to go to Moab and her son Marlon marry Ruth. So Ruth then is brought out of an idolatrous nation and brought into Israel and into the line of Christ. But one example of one song. that was all in wrong religion, wrong nation, a nation where she would not hear the ways of the Lord and how the Lord brought her to know the Lord, to know Him and to really be, be not put off, she wanted to cleave to Him and His people.

But we have also in the word that our Lord spoke in John 6, that they should come unto himself. It says in verse 45, everyone therefore that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh unto me. He stated in verse 44, no man can come unto me except the Father which has sent me draw him and I will raise him up at the last day. And then he speaks of the teaching, the teaching and the drawing and the coming unto the Lord. There is a fruit of the teaching.

The Lord says, as reproof against those in his day, you will not come unto me that ye might have life. Men have all sorts of reasons why they would come to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we will have as well. But may we have these reasons that we are drawn and that we desire life of the Lord and the teaching of the Lord. When our Lord taught in parables, And the multitudes went away, and the disciples came to the Lord, and they said, interpret to us the parable.

And the Lord reinforced, before he taught them, he said, know ye not this parable? Speaking especially about the parable of the sower, how then will ye know all parables? And he emphasized with them first, they didn't know. They could not know, even though he'd plainly told them, he needed them. They needed him to teach them personally and specifically. We have also another effect that is mentioned in our text. And that is the Lord says that he will be to them a God. Verse 10. And I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people." A God and a people.

The children of Israel were brought out of Egypt by great signs and wonders. And then the Lord gave them His laws. And it was evident, not just to them, but to the nations round about, that He was their God. and that they were his people, just by the dealings that he had with them, how he acted towards them, how he worked for them, delivered them from their enemies, led them forth from the way. And so bound up with this covenant is also a token of being his people and the Lord being our God.

When the Lord ascended, he said, most beautiful to his dear disciples. Remember, he'd opened their understanding that they might understand the scriptures. In other words, really he had opened their heart, shown them what he showed later to Paul. But he said, I ascend unto my father and your father, my God and your God. And that joining together, of the understanding, the teaching and of the Lord being our God.

If you and I desire to know whether we are the people of God and whether the Lord is our God, you look to this specific sign of the covenant to be taught by Him and the effect of it is to bring us to Him and under His instruction and with His people We have another, going back to Jeremiah, what is said concerning the forgiveness of sins. It is joined with this as well. We have this in verse 34, at the end of Jeremiah 31 verse 34. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

God joins things together. It's said with marriage, of course, what God hath joined together let not man put asunder. And here the things that he's joined together, the teaching in the heart, The adoption is to be his children, him being our God, and we being his people. The forgiveness of our sins, the blotting out of our transgressions, being drawn to God, to the house of God, the people of God, coming unto the Lord Jesus Christ.

All these things are, you might say, in the same package of this covenant. what the Lord is performing and doing. So I want to look lastly at the means that God uses and what it is that the Lord is teaching. Very often the Lord is teaching by experience. It is those things we pass through. Jeremiah was told at one time, you go to the potter's house and you watch the potter on the wheel. And he saw the potter make a lump, crumple it up, make another lump. And Jeremiah was then taught the sovereignty of God.

Cannot God do this with you, with the house of Israel? David was keeping the sheath. And what was he taught there? When he comes to Goliath, he says that God that delivered me out of the poor of the bear and the poor of the lion, he will deliver me. out of thine hand." And how David taught the power and keeping of the Lord, the preservation of the Lord, but in the simple of watching the sheep.

You think of Moses. He had 40 years in Pharaoh's court, 40 years in the wilderness, and then he was to lead the children of Israel 40 years through the wilderness. The Lord used that experience, the teaching that Moses had through that time. That was what prepared him and what made him to know the Lord, to fear the Lord, to be meek over every man. The Lord had made him to be what he'd have him to be. And the Lord has said that with his people as well, going through the wilderness in Deuteronomy 8, that they were to remember all the way that the Lord had brought them in the wilderness.

And he says the reason, verse 2, why he had done it, to prove thee to know what was in thine heart. Well, the Lord knew what was in their heart and by nature, but he would put there the teaching and instruction. The main part of that was to humble thee, to humble thee, to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments or no. And he humbled thee and suffered thee to hunger, fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not. Neither did thy fathers know that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.

Elijah, he had to go into the wilderness. First he had to learn his weakness. He fled from Jezebel. He needed the angel to come to wake him, to strengthen him. Then he had to go 40 days into Mount Horeb. And then the Lord passed by. There was a great wind. There was an earthquake. There was a fire, but the Lord was not in them. And then the still small voice. What a thing to learn, a still small voice.

Judgements nor mercies, ne'er can sway the roving heart to wisdom's way. But when the Lord speaks with his still small voice, I've known those times in my life I've been so hard, so cold, so rebellious against the Lord, and one thing after another's gone wrong, and I've got more and more hardened, and more and more angry, and felt like throwing the Bible across the room.

And yet the Lord, and I've wondered, what will the Lord have to do to humble me and soften my heart, and to take away this rebellion and hardness? and all he has done is to bring something of which he's shown mercy and kindness and shown a blessing that he'd given me before and fulfilled, and it just broke my heart, softened me down. And you get such a sense of his mercy and grace and long-suffering, you never forget it. and the Lord will ever be teaching his people. He has not dealt with us as our sins deserve. All the time it is mercy, on our part rebellion and hardness, on his part mercy.

We go along, we think we can get away with living close to the world and we try and do it. Then we wonder why we're hard and cold and we can't escape snares and sins and why we feel so barren in prayer. And why the word is dry to us, until the Lord brings us to realize that we're far off from him. And like he says, except the branch abide in the vine, it cannot bear fruit. But we prove it in reality. And then at last, we cry to him, acknowledge our foolish ways.

And he comes, blesses, softens our hearts. and draws us to Him again. And the next time sin in the world starts to beckon, we remember the bondage, remember the darkness, and we fear the Lord. We're not then careless and hardened. The Lord has taught us that we are to fear His name. He does see us. He does know our thoughts. And when the Lord chastens and corrects us, Then we are made to see what we couldn't see before. Here thou the rod and who hath appointed it.

And these things are our teachers, instruction. And the Lord first became with me, the instruction, the teaching, in my heart with my total ignorance of the things of God. And the Lord will use things, real things in our lives, like Peter, He had to come down from, though all men forsake thee, yet will not I, to be humbled to remember to the end of his days he denied his Lord and Master three times that he ever knew him.

And with the Apostle Paul, the remembrance that he persecuted the house and people of God, gained use by God, the thought in the flesh, the messenger of Satan, to buffet him, blessed on the one hand, but balance with the trial on the other. My grace is sufficient for thee." And he had to prove that. He had to learn that in his heart and know by personal experience this was the way that he had to go.

The Lord primarily, of course, does use the word to teach and instruct. Paul, when he writes to Timothy, In his second epistle to Timothy, he sets this forth as one of those 3-16s, often trying to remember those passages by how the Lord has set them forth. John 3-16, the summary of the gospel, and here to Timothy 3-16, very important as well. All scripture is given by inspiration of God. and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, truly furnished unto all good works. He said before, but continue thou the things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them. Now, you might say, well, he's learned them From a child or from his grandmother, but I believe Paul is pointing, he's been taught of God. From a child that has known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. And we are to Use the means. Use the word of God. Use other helps. But may we always be warned not to be looking at them apart from the Lord. One of our hymns says, join prayer with each inspection.

And when we are doing that, we are reminding ourselves, I'm not able to learn, and if I was, it wouldn't do me good. to learn God's truths in this way without His shining, without His blessing in my soul, it is better that we have one thing that we know, one thing that has warmed our hearts, one thing that the Lord has taught us. Even if it is how deceitful our heart is, but the effect, as we said, will be to bring us to the Lord, not to fright us from Him. but to want to know more and more of him, to value his precious blood, to value his intercession in heaven, to value his teaching, to value his instruction.

And we will expect through our lives, as we have in the promise, thy teachers shall not be removed into a corner anymore. Expect that the Lord will use things to teach us and to fasten them in our hearts. So may the Lord bless this word, this word of the New Covenant, this description of what the New Covenant is. May there be those of you, may it be with myself, I'm able to say, Lord, I believe I know this New Covenant, that has made that with me. Thou has taught me and we are to value those things that we can say the Lord taught me this, he instructed me in this, this is laid out deep in my heart and the Lord has put it there and he will have all the honour and all the glory. May the Lord bless this word to us and bear witness to it by his spirit and bless us with this teaching in our hearts. Amen.

Taught of God.

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