If you would, turn with me in
your Bibles to Mark chapter four. Mark the fourth chapter. Before we begin, let's bow before
our Lord and seek his blessing. Our Father, how thankful we are
to be able to gather here together this morning and worship your
precious name. Father, I pray that you send
your spirit upon us this morning and that you would enable us
to truly worship you from the heart and spirit and in truth. Father, enable us by your mercy
and by your power to hear with ears of faith, hear your word
and trust in Christ our Savior. Let his name be exalted in everything
that is said and done here this morning. And what we Pray for
ourselves and our class this morning. We pray for our children's
classes. Father, that you'd use this time to plant the seeds
of faith in the hearts of our young ones. We're so thankful
that you've given them to us. And Father, pray that you would
bless your word to their hearts. Be with our teachers and enable
them to rightly divide the word of truth and cause them to be
a blessing to our young ones. Father, we pray for those of
our congregation who are traveling, who are away from us. Father,
we pray that you'd give them traveling mercies and give them
a good and refreshing time and bring them back home safely to
us when it's time. And Father, we pray a blessing
for your people that are going through deep, deep waters right
now. Sicknesses, heartache, and they're
bereaved, they're in trouble. Father, we pray that you'd be
with your people. We're so thankful to know that
in every situation, every deep valley, every dark night that
we're in, you are able. You're able to deliver. You're
able to comfort. Father, I pray you'd be with
your people in a mighty and special way. Again, Father, I beg of
you that you'd bless us in worship this morning. Cause your word
to to be a blessing and a comfort and encouragement and teaching
to our heart. Father, it's in Christ's name,
for his sake and his glory we pray, amen. Now I've titled the
lesson this morning, Take Heed What You Hear. Take heed what
you hear. And I would add to that, take
heed how you hear. How you hear the gospel. And
I say that because the scriptures teach both God's sovereignty
and man's responsibility. Now salvation is by God's free
and sovereign grace alone. It's by undeserved, unsought
for mercy and grace. And every gift that God gives
his people, whether it's a physical gift or a spiritual gift, every
gift God gives his people, it's a gift of grace alone. It's not
because we've done anything to deserve any of God's mercies,
anything that He, any of His blessings to us, if He gives
them to us, it's not because of what we've done. It's by His
grace and His grace alone. I hope you will never find anybody
that preaches more strongly salvation by grace alone than I do. I want
to make that so abundantly clear to us. Salvation is by grace
alone. From its beginning to its ending,
salvation is by grace. However, this is also true. I
am responsible for what I do. Now, I can't be responsible to
do something that would save me, but I'm responsible for what
I do in this way. There are consequences to our
actions, aren't there? If I go out and commit some crime
and get thrown in jail, no, I can't blame God's sovereignty on that.
That's my fault. That's the direct result of my
actions. And in context of our lesson
this morning, We're responsible to how we hear, how we hear the
gospel. We're responsible to believe
and there are consequences to our souls if we refuse to do
it. Now that's what the Lord's teaching in our lesson this morning.
And I would sum up the lesson particularly to this congregation
who's heard the gospel for so many years. Don't hear the gospel and do
nothing. Seek that when you hear the gospel
preached, you do not leave here unchanged. Seek that, seek that. That's what the Lord is teaching.
If you hear the gospel and you do nothing, it doesn't produce
any effect in you so that you do nothing, then you're not a
good ground hearer that we looked at last week because good ground
hearers bring forth the fruit of the spirit, don't they? And
that's not because we did something we're responsible to do. That's
by God's grace. But I think it's very wise for
us to keep this in mind. Now I'm talking to those who,
everybody here, you've heard the gospel a long time. Examine
yourself that you're not just a mere professor of faith. That you're not just a mere professor
of the doctrines of grace. Make certain that your faith
is in Christ alone. Make sure that faith in Christ,
that trust in Christ is genuine. All right, here's the first thing
I want us to see from our lesson. Take heed what you hear. If the
Lord's given you the light of Christ, you're responsible to
spread that light. Verse 21 of Mark chapter four.
And he said unto them, is a candle brought to be put under a bushel
or under a bed and not to be set on a candlestick? Now if
the Lord's revealed himself to you through the light of the
gospel, You have a responsibility to spread that light to other
people who are in darkness. Do whatever you can so that others
hear the gospel of Christ. Everyone's not a preacher, and
I'm not telling everybody, go out and be a preacher. I know
a lot of people are very uncomfortable in trying to talk about the gospel
to other people. They don't feel like they say
it right and so forth. I'll let you on a little secret.
Every preacher feels the same way whenever he gets done trying
to preach from God's word. But you can do something. You
can do something to help spread the gospel. You can do something
to help spread this light. If you would be in a dark house,
the electricity's gone out, there's a big storm going on, electricity
is out, nobody in their right mind would light a candle Or,
you know, find a flashlight. Clark, in his house, he can find
him a flashlight and turn that flashlight on and then put it
under a bushel gasket to cover up the light. Nobody in their
right mind would do that. If electricity ever goes out
here while we're in a, during a service, I have a lantern under
here. I can pick up and I can put here
and turn that light on. I could keep going. I could light
this. candle and light the way to a
door so everybody, you know, could get out safely. The last
thing I would ever do is turn this thing on and put it under
my jacket just so I could get a little bit of light to see
my way out and leave you all in darkness. I'd never do that. I mean, what kind of horrible
person would you think I was if I got this real nice lantern
and just hit it so I got just enough light for my own self?
That's selfish, isn't it? And a believer is not to do that. The Lord gave us the light of
the gospel. He's put the light of the gospel
here right where we live. And he gave it to us to dispel
the darkness and the ignorance of unbelief. First of all, he's
given us that light for our benefit, for our own hearts. The only
way any of us here ever believed on Christ is because somebody
cared enough about us to preach Christ to us. Somebody had to
tell us who Christ is. They showed us Christ, the light
of the world. Now they had to do that. Because
nobody can believe on a Christ that we've never heard of. Somebody's
got to tell us who he is. And aren't you thankful? Somebody
did that for us. Somebody did. Now we're all gonna
stay in the darkness of our ignorance. Ignorance of who God is, ignorance
of who we are, ignorant of how God saves sinners, until we hear
Christ preach. We're gonna stay in the darkness
of our unbelief until somebody preaches Christ to us, because
you can't believe on somebody you never heard of. Now when
you were in darkness, somebody came and preached Christ to you.
And that's one of the greatest blessings of your life. Somebody
came and preached Christ to you. Somebody came and set you free
from the burden of the law, telling you salvation's in Christ alone.
It's through faith in Christ alone. Somebody did that for
you when you were in darkness and God gave you faith to believe.
He gave you light to see. Now you do that for somebody
else. You do that for somebody else. Now again, I know everybody's
not a preacher. You can't sit down with people
at work or friends or somebody you know and go through the scriptures
and preach all this doctrine to them and point it out. But
you can tell them what God's done for you. You can do that. You can invite somebody to the
services. You can tell them, give them
a link to something on Sermon Audio. You can live your life
in such a way that people see Here's an honest, kind, hardworking
person. You can do that. You can do that. Look at Matthew chapter five. You have God Almighty has saved
you. He's made you a light in this world. Matthew chapter five,
verse 14. You are the light of the world.
A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men
light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick,
and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your
light so shine before men that they may see your good works
and glorify your Father, which is in heaven. Now, if the Lord
saved you, he's put the light of Christ in you. That's why
he says you're the light of the world. You're a light in this
world, God's made you a candle of his light. Now I know the
light that's in a believer is nothing compared to the light
of the sun, the S-O-N, nothing compared to the light of Christ,
but it is light. It is light. Now let that light
that God put in you, let it shine forth in this dark world so others
will know Christ, so that others will trust Christ. Now here's
a good warning for us to heed. Don't let your light so shine
before men that they see what a good little Christian you are.
Don't do that. Don't let your light so shine
before men that they praise you for all of your good works. Don't
do that. Don't let your light so shine
before men that people say, wow, look at all the doctrine they
know. Look at all these things, these hidden things of the scriptures
they know. Let your light so shine before men that they don't
see you, they see Christ and they glorify God. Don't let them
glorify you. Don't ever let that be your motive
that somebody glorifies you. The believer's goal in spreading
the light of Christ is that others will glorify God for his grace
and his mercy. Now this is just a fact of the
matter. The Lord has taught us the gospel here. He's given us
the gospel here in our town for generations. But the Lord did
not teach us the gospel. The Lord did not save us by his
grace for our own benefit, so that we could just keep it all
private. You know, like we got a little clique here. We're just
gonna keep it all amongst ourselves. We got this good news. We all
love it. We all love Christ. We all trust Christ. We're just
gonna keep it right here, you know, amongst our little selves.
The Lord saved his people so that his light would spread through
the world, so that we could be used to tell others about Christ. God causes his people to be born
into his family so that we can serve Christ. And we serve Christ
by serving one another, by serving others. And that same thing is
true of every blessing God ever gives us. He never gives us any
blessing for our own benefit. It's always so that we can use
it to serve others. Let me show you that in 1 Peter
chapter four. 1 Peter, the fourth chapter. Beginning in verse eight. Above
all things, have fervent charity among yourselves for charity,
love, so cover the multitude of sins. Use hospitality one
to another without grudging, as every man hath received the
gift. Now, whatever gift it is, whatever gift God, this applies
to every gift. As every man hath received the
gift, even so minister the same one to another. Use that gift
one to another. Not for yourselves, but for somebody
else. That's being a good steward of
the manifold grace of God. If any man speak, if God's given
a man the ability, the gift to speak and preach the gospel,
let him speak as the oracles of God. If any man minister,
and the word is like a servant, if it's waiting tables, if it's
helping somebody fix something, if it's working on the building,
whatever service needs to be done, if any man minister, let
him do it as of the ability which God giveth. that God in all things
may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be the praise
and dominion forever and ever. There Peter says the same thing
as what the Savior said, let this light shine. Whatever gift
it is God's given you, you use it to help others, not so that
you'll be praised, but so that God will. So his grace and mercy
and power will be praised. Now you have to do that. You
think what horrible horrible people that we would be if we
found the cure to cancer and kept it to ourselves. I have
a dear friend who has a family member with very bad cancer and
there's a trial and they think, oh, this trial is showing a lot
of promise. Maybe this trial is going to
really help cure this cancer. Well, it's just some guy in his
garage started this thing, just two guys. And one of these big
pharmaceutical companies bought it for billions of dollars. They
bought this drug for billions of dollars. And the conspiracy
theorists are saying this. They know this drug is going
to be used to cure cancer, so they bought it to hide it so
nobody else could have it. Now, I don't think that's true,
but if it is, What horrible, I mean, I just can't think of
the word strongly enough, what horrible people. Something like
that needs to be shared with the world because so many people
need it, right? The same's true more of the gospel.
If we know the gospel, I can't say how horrible we are if we
don't try to spread it to help others because everybody needs
it. Everybody needs it. Everybody
needs to know of Christ. You're the best thing that we
can do for anybody is preach the good news. There is salvation
in Christ for every sinner that needs it. You can say this without
reservation to every human being. If your sinner needs to be saved,
I got good news for you. Christ came to save sinners.
And we do that. Again, not everybody's a preacher.
Not everybody is a teacher. Maybe you are. Maybe you do have
the ability to preach. Maybe you do have the ability
to teach. You know, you mothers, I tell you what, you sure can
teach your little ones at home. You daddies, when you come home
from work, you can do the same thing. You can teach your little ones
at home. You can do that. You can support the teaching of the
words. There's so many things that you can do to help this
gospel be spread. Look back in our text, Mark 4,
verse 22. talking about letting this light
shine by teaching the word. For there's nothing hid which
should not be manifested, neither was anything kept secret, but
that it should come abroad. Now this is what the Lord's saying.
The gospel used to be hid, didn't it? In Old Testament times, it
was hidden. The types and pictures and shadows, all the ceremonies
of the law, Christ was hidden in those things. All those things
were pictures of Christ, but unless God gave you eyes to see,
you didn't know it. People might not have known that
the Passover is a picture of Christ, our Passover, being slain
for us. Maybe they didn't know that the priest was a picture
of Christ, our great high priest, the one that is to come. But
now Christ has come. See, we live on this side of
the cross. Now Christ has come and he's
fulfilled all those types. He's fulfilled all those pictures. He shed light on those shadows
so that we see, oh, all those things pointed to Christ. This
has been God's purpose all along. God's purpose was never that
we keep the law or earn a righteousness by what we do. God gave all those
ceremonies so we'd see our need of Christ. I can't do them. I
can't fulfill them, but Christ did. I see that so plainly now. God made it manifest. All the
Old Testament scriptures are open to us now, aren't they?
Salvation in Christ is not hidden in those things anymore. Now,
if you've heard the gospel and God's revealed that to you, go
spread that secret to others. Tell other people the answer
to it. Give them the key to unlock those scriptures so that they
can see Christ. Spread it abroad. If you believed
on Christ, God's given you the light to see Christ and believe
on Him. That's your responsibility. All right, number two. If the
Lord's given you ears to hear, you have a responsibility to
what you hear. You have the responsibility.
Don't you go listen and support a false gospel. You have the
responsibility to what you hear, and you have a responsibility
as to how you hear. Verse 23, the Lord says, if any
man have ears to hear, let him hear. And he said unto them,
Take heed what you hear. Now remember, the message of
the gospel is salvation by grace and grace alone. The message
of the gospel is it's all in Christ. You look to him for everything
you need. You come to him begging for mercy.
You look to him for everything that God requires of you. That's
grace, isn't it? That God supplied everything
that you need in the person of his son. That's grace. Yet you
and I are responsible. to avail ourselves to the means
of grace. And the means of grace is gospel
preaching. That is how God is determined
to spread this, the news of his son, the good news of the gospel,
is through preaching. Brother Henry said this so often.
We're responsible for what we've heard. And we're responsible
for what we could have heard. I'm responsible for what I could
have heard but did something else instead of hearing the gospel.
We're responsible for what we've heard and what we could have
heard. So the Lord says, now, if a man has ears to hear, let
him hear. Has God given you ears to hear
the gospel, to hear Christ? Then hear, hear. You know, most
people think that the Lord here is talking about spiritual ears
to hear, and that's certainly true, but let me ask you something. How in this world can you ever
hear with spiritual ears unless you first hear with physical
ears. You've got to avail yourself to the means of grace before
you can ever know Christ, before you can ever trust him. There's just nothing more important
in this world than hearing Christ preached. There's nothing more
important. Here it is, the first day of
the week, you'll not do anything this week more important than
what we're doing this very second. Here's why that's true, because
nobody's gonna be saved. Their soul will not be saved
until they've heard Christ preached. They can't be saved if they haven't
heard of the Savior and believed on him. You can't grow in grace
and knowledge of Christ until you hear Christ preached. You've
got to hear line upon line, precept upon precept, till you're built
up and grow in grace and knowledge of Christ. First Corinthians
121 says this, It's pleased God by the foolishness of preaching
to save them to believe. I know to the unregenerate man
who doesn't know any better, what we're doing right now seems
very strange. Here is a sinful, weak man of
the flesh telling other sinful, weak people of the flesh to trust
Christ. Here is a creature of the dust
attempting to take the word of God, the word of God himself,
and speak of the eternal God. Speak of things that you just
can't, the human mind cannot comprehend. That seems like foolishness,
doesn't it? But that's the way it's pleased
God to save his people. Romans 10 verse 17 says this,
faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. You've got
to hear Christ preach. The souls of God's sheep tell
you how they're fed. It's by the preaching of Christ.
Christ is the bread of life. God's children are fed by hearing
Christ preach. We grow in grace and knowledge
of Christ by hearing Christ preach, by learning more of Him. As you
go through this world, tough place to live, isn't it?
Tough place to be. Do you ever find yourself needing
a little comfort? Need a little encouragement to
keep going on? Let me tell you how the hearts of God's people
are comforted. Tell me about Christ one more time. Remind
me again of who He is, that He came in the flesh to obey the
law for a wretch like me. That He suffered and died on
the cursed tree of Calvary to save a wretch like me. Preaching,
look at 2 Timothy chapter four. You know, I'm not saying this
to, in an attempt to glorify the preacher. But preaching is so important. This was Paul's charge to Timothy.
Timothy, no matter what comes, you preach the word. This was
Paul's dying words to Timothy. Look at second Timothy four,
verse six. Paul says, for I'm now ready
to be offered. And the time of my departure is at hand. I fought
a good fight and I finished my course. I've kept the faith. Now Paul knows he's dying. Here's his dear young, young
brother, young son, he called him. He's going to leave him
to preach the gospel in this world where he's hated and despised. Paul's going to leave him to
do it on his own. And here's Paul's charge to him. Verse one.
Paul says, Timothy, I charge thee therefore before God and
the Lord Jesus Christ, who's a judge, the quick and the dead
at his appearing in his kingdom. And I promise you that got Timothy's
attention. Timothy, I charge you. Oh, he
loved and respected Paul. Paul said, I charge you before
God that you preach the word. Preach the word. Be it in season
and out of season. If somebody thinks it's popular
or if it's unpopular, Timothy preached the word. You approve,
you rebuke, you exhort with all long suffering and doctrine,
but the same preaching of the word. For the time will come
when they'll not endure in sound doctrine. After their own lusts,
they'll heap to themselves teachers having itching ears, and they
should turn away their ears from the truth and should be turned
unto fables. That's what, Timothy, that's gonna happen. People are
gonna be looking out for their favorite preacher, you know.
But Timothy, watch thou in all things. Don't worry about what
everybody else is doing. You endure afflictions. You do
the work of evangelists and make full proof of thy ministry. This is Paul's dying charge to
Timothy. You keep preaching the word so that God's sheep won't
be deceived. and they won't be led away from
Christ. Look at first Corinthians chapter or first Thessalonians,
excuse me, chapter five. Now this is God's commandment
to his preachers. Preach the word, preach the word. And God's commandment to you
and me is hear them. You hear them. First Thessalonians
five verse 20, despise not prophesies. Don't you despise preaching?
but you love it, you make yourself available to hear it. Don't despise
it. And you know, that extends to
God's faithful preacher too. Look at verse 12. And we beseech
you, brethren, to know them which labor among you and are over
you in the Lord, and admonish you to esteem them very highly
in love for their work's sake, and be at peace among yourselves. Don't you despise preaching.
Almighty God commands us to hear the gospel preached. Now that's
your responsibility. That's my responsibility. Hear
the gospel preached. Again, salvation is by grace.
Now I cannot save myself. I can't do anything to get God
to save me, but there sure are consequences to what I hear and
how I hear it. Look back in our text, verse
24. And he said unto them, take heed
what you hear. With what measure ye meet, it should be measured
to you. And unto you that hear, shall more be given. For he that
hath, to him shall be given. And he that hath not, from him
shall be taken, even that he hath. Now the Lord tells us it's
our responsibility. Hear the gospel preached as much
as is possible. As much as possible. If you care
at all for your soul, you'll be here to hear Christ preach.
or wherever it is that you live, if the gospel is preached in
your town, you'll be there to hear Christ preached if you care
at all for your soul. You know who finds their way
to the doctor? Sick folks. You know who finds
their way to hear the gospel? Sinners. That's who finds their
way to hear the gospel. And I know that takes a lot of
effort. People live lives that are so
busy. I know, oh my goodness. And especially
if you got children. I mean, you're just pulled in
10 different directions at once all the time, I understand. But
while you're raising your family and you're getting pulled in
10 different directions, let me remind you, parents, it's
your responsibility that you hear the gospel. And it's your
responsibility that your children hear it too. That responsibility
is on you. You fathers, you husbands. Brother
Henry said so often, now you're the priest in the home. It's
your responsibility that your family orders their life in such
a way they hear the gospel preached. And that takes effort. That takes
effort. Let me tell you, the Lord's not
gonna ever bless sloth or laziness in anything, ever. The Lord tells
us plainly here, the more effort that you put into hearing the
gospel, the more you're gonna get out of it. And if you don't
put much into hearing the gospel, much effort into hearing the
gospel, you're not gonna experience much growth for your soul either.
It's just the way it is. Second Corinthians nine. Second Corinthians nine, verse
six. But this I say, he which soweth
sparingly shall reap also sparingly. And he which soweth bountifully
shall reap also bountifully. Now that's just an obvious truth. The farmer that doesn't sow much
seed is not gonna have much of a harvest, is he? And the farmer
that sows a bunch of seed is gonna have a big harvest. The
same thing is true putting effort into hearing the gospel priest.
Galatians chapter six. Galatians 6, verse six. Let him that is taught
in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good
things. Be not deceived, God's not mocked, for whatsoever a
man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth his
flesh shall reap of the flesh, he'll reap corruption. For he
that soweth his spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. Now that's gonna take effort.
So Paul says, let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season
we shall reap if we faint not, if we don't quit. Now, I don't
want you to feel like I'm putting a burden on you, that you are
put pressure on you, you gotta be here every service. I'm not
trying to put pressure on you like that. But I do wanna show
you this. There's some effort needs to
be put into how you hear the gospel. And you can pray that
the Lord will enable you to hear. You can pray that the Lord will
enable you to learn and not just go through the motions. You'll
be diligent. Be diligent about your soul.
Exodus 15 verse 26 says this. Diligently hearken to the voice
of the Lord your God. Be diligent about it. Deuteronomy
6 verse 7. You know these things. God's
taught you these things of himself and the gospel. Thou shalt teach
them diligently unto your children. Be diligent about this. Solomon,
the wise man, said in Proverbs 4, verse 23, keep thy heart with
all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. And Peter
wrote in 2 Peter 1, verse 10, give diligence, diligence to
make your calling and election sure. Be diligent. Is my faith really in Christ?
Am I really trusting Christ alone? Peter said, if you do these things,
you should never fall. You know, we have the blessing
of the gospel right here in our backyard. Generations, I don't
know how many years it's been. Many. Don't take that for granted. The Lord could take it away from
us like that. Don't ignore it. Don't think,
well, I'll always be there, I can go whenever I want. Our Lord
said, you can ignore that blessing so long, he'll take it away from
you. He did to the Jews, didn't he?
He came to his own, his own received him not, and he took it away
from them. They're under judicial blindness
to this day. The warning in the book of Revelation
to the church at Ephesus is this. You've taken it for granted.
I'm gonna move the candlestick. Now I'm not gonna eliminate preaching,
but I'm gonna take it from you and put it somewhere else. But the Lord will always give
a word in season to a needy sinner. Now a smart aleck person seeking
doctrine and wanting to be a big old theologian, Lord doesn't
have a word for you. But if you're a needy sinner,
God will have a word in season for you. Then let's pray, Lord
enable me to hear as a sinner. If I do, Lord enable me to do
that, His word will be a blessing to me. All right, hope that'll
be a blessing encouragement to you.