It's good to be here with you.
It's a great blessing to be asked. I appreciate Brother Frank asking
me and appreciate all of your hospitality while we've been
here. Fellowship has been sweet. I appreciate Jason and Haley
and the girls putting up with us on the way here, getting us
here. It's encouraging to have them
here. They're used to me preaching
to them, and I'm used to preaching to them.
For some reason, it's a little different preaching somewhere
you're not used to preaching. It shouldn't be, but it is. It's
comforting to me to have them here. I appreciate them very
much. 1 John chapter 4. 1 John 4 verses 1 through 6. Beloved, believe not every spirit,
but try the spirits, whether they are of God, because many
false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the
Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth
that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God. And every
spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the
flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of antichrist,
whereof ye have heard that it should come, and even now already
is it in the world. Ye are of God, little children
and have overcome them because greater is he that is in you
than he that is in the world. Beloved, whether John knew it or not,
with this one word, he's already teaching us concerning a true
preacher of the gospel and a false one. with that one word. If God
sends you a messenger, he'll send somebody that loves you.
Every time. Every time. Solomon in the Proverbs,
he begins his exhortations, my son, my son, hear me. Hear me. You remember Moses. Moses didn't have any illusions
about the people that the Lord sent him to. He said, they're
stiff-necked and rebellious. But Lord, if you can't forgive
them, if you can't forgive them, blot me out of your book. Paul addressed the Galatians
this way in Galatians 4.19, my little children, of whom I travail
in birth again. until Christ be formed in you." Nine times in this book of 1
John, John calls them beloved. In verse one and nine times he
addresses them this way, my little children, little children. And
this is a fulfillment of God's promise found in Jeremiah 3.15. He said, I will give you pastors
according to my heart. which shall feed you with knowledge
and understanding. And what characterizes the heart
of God toward his sheep more than his eternal, infinite love
for them? I'm gonna send you somebody that
loves you like I do. Not as much, maybe, but somebody
that loves you. God's word is always to be delivered
with true love to those who hear. And this is very important now
because, as I said, we're talking about a passage here that deals
with false and true. Who's God's preacher and who's
not? Someone that God sends will love you and somebody that loves
you will not come to argue with you. He won't come to debate
points of doctrine. He won't come whipping you with
the law. or give you any reason to trust in yourself. Someone
who loves you is going to exalt Christ and he's going to shut
you up to Christ. He will not flatter you on your
road to hell. He's going to insist that you
do business with the Son of God. And he's going to either leave
you burning with the offense of Christ's cross or rejoicing. that there is true, full, and
free forgiveness in the precious blood of Christ, one of the two.
And I want to be that man how I want to be that man. Believe not every spirit. Anybody that stands up and says
anything, somebody's gonna believe them sooner or later, I think.
Somebody's gonna believe them. If they use the Bible when they
do it, even more people will believe them, or should I say
misuse it. And the spirit of error spoken
of in this passage gives people what they want. We're warned here, believe not,
because they'll give you what you want. There's really just
one basic error. There's really just one false
gospel. The gospel of man's will, man's
works, man's way. But it comes in many flavors
in order to get as many as they can. And they get many. There's
many of them, it says in the passage here. Many, many are
gone out into the world. And many follow them. If you're
a highly emotional person, Satan's got that for you. He's got some
holy rollers for you, you know, that'll tell you what you want
to hear. Get you worked up. If you're
excited, flesh excited. If you're self-righteous, particularly
and better than everybody else, you know, the Methodists, among
many others, got a seat for you. If you like rituals and outward
ceremony, and a lot of people, boy, that's their thing. Well,
you know who, you know who's waiting on you, don't you? Catholics
will indulge you in that. And most people are all of these
things, but some of those things are predominant in certain people
more so than others. Many flavors of religion, but
it all boils down to what our text says. There's Christ and
there's anti-Christ. There's Christ and not Christ. Just two. It's grace or works.
Abel and Cain. It's Your will or God's will. You are Christ. And you'll either
trust Christ or you'll trust yourself. You'll either honor
Christ or you'll honor yourself. You'll serve him or you'll serve
yourself. And you can't serve both. He
made that very clear. It'll be one or the other. Many
forms of error, but one truth. And many people like to study
all the various forms of error. There's a lot of different forms
of it, you know, and different names that they call themselves.
A lot of people dedicate much of their time to identifying
them and renouncing them and whoever doesn't agree with them.
It doesn't need to be that complicated. There's Christ and there's everything
else. That's what our scripture says.
Christ and Antichrist. It doesn't matter what Antichrist
calls themselves. There's just two. And if you
know him, you know what's not him by his grace. And here's what it boils down
to. You must know him. And that's why we have this test
that he is as to how you can tell the true from the false.
You must know Him. And listen to me very carefully.
He's all you need to know. He's all you need to know. You
don't need to know what to call all the particular strains of
false doctrine. You know what God calls them?
Anti-Christ. That's what God calls them. Not
Christ. Against Christ. And the warning here is for a
reason. Because many, he said, There's a warning here, isn't
there? Why is he warning us? Because many are false. Many are. And you think about
how many. I have a nephew that's got real
problems with drugs and has for years. He's in one program and
out of that and into another. And my sister told me, well,
you know, this time it's going to be okay because he's going
into a Christian counseling and rehabilitation program. And do
you know how much of a chance I thought
there was that that was a true group of believers that were
actually trying to help people get overdrawn? You know how much
chance I gave that? How much would you have? Would
you have thought, oh, well, maybe, you know, no, you know, without
even thinking about it, don't you? You know it's false. You
know it's anti-Christ. You know how you know that? Because
many, many, it's just so, it's just dependable, isn't it? It's
so bad. But he warns us and it comes
also with an exhortation. Try. Examine. Test. Discern, that's what that
word is, discern. Be careful, think about it. Test
it, try it, based on what? Well, how do we do that? I look
at the next verse, verse two. Hereby, know ye the spirit of
God, Every spirit that confesseth
that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. Every one of them. And I want
you to notice something here. Clearly, the way you tell is
about what they say. The word confesseth tells us
that. The word confess here means to agree with, to say the same
thing as another. That's very important, and we're
going to talk about that in a minute. But first of all, let's look
at this. It is by what is said that the
difference is known, and we're told what each will say. We're
told what they're going to say. This is clear. He's not going
to leave it ambiguous at all as to who's a true preacher and
who's a false preacher. It's going to be just as clear
as it can be. And here it is. We're told what they're going
to say. It's by what they say that you'll know. The false will
say something and the true will say this, look at it. They'll
confess that, here's what they're gonna, they'll confess that,
what's the next word? Jesus. What God's true spokesman talk
about is a person. A person. And do you know why? Because
they love you. They love you, that's why. And
they love you because they love him. And they love him because he
first loved them. And notice here also that it
is spirits that are talking. Did you notice that as we read
it, the spirits? Try the spirits, whether they
are God. And the spirits are the ones
speaking here. Hereby we know the spirit of
God, every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is coming,
and verse three, every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus
Christ, let me just say a couple of things about that real quickly.
In the case of the believer, we are not ever gonna say anything
worth hearing that is not the fruit of the spirit. When we speak the truth, it is
not I, but Christ, the spirit of Christ that dwelleth in me,
the spirit Who is it that takes the things of Christ and shows
them to you? Well, I may do that this morning. I pray that I will.
That's why I'm here, is to take the things of Christ and show
them. But you know who's really doing that? The spirit does that. He said, my spirit, I'll send
my spirit and he'll take the things of mine and show them
to you. If he's pleased to use one of
us to do that, bless his name. Bless his name. In the case of
the unbeliever, the false spirit, the very ones who are crying,
free will, free will, are revealing that they are in bondage to Satan
as they're saying it. It is the spirit of antichrist
that's saying that, and they're in bondage to Satan, taken captive
by him at his will, or they wouldn't be saying that. All the while
they're saying free, they're in bondage. The Lord said, I'll
set you free. If I set you free, you'll be
free indeed. We've never been in bondage. They proved when
they said that they were in bondage. Free will is a bad dream. They
can't even open their mouths and say free will, but as they
are puppets of Satan when they do it. It's the spirit of antichrist
that has found them. And they're captive at his will. Isn't that what our Lord said?
He's the father of lives and you're his children and you're
gonna say what he said. Because you're his children. And as I
mentioned already, confesseth means agree with or say the same
thing as another. Here's another way you know the
truth from the false. Did I make this up this morning
or am I saying something that's already been said by somebody
else? We just agree. That's what preaching
the Gospel is. We don't say anything new. If
I say something new, ignore it. We don't say anything original.
We just agree with God. We're just saying what God said
to the law and to the testimony. If they speak not according to
this word, it's because there's no light in them. They're anti-Christ. Listen to what Paul said in 1
Corinthians 15. Tell me if that's not what he's doing. 1 Corinthians 15 verse 3. For I delivered unto you, first
of all, that which I also received. He's
not just talking, he's confessing, which means saying what's already
been said. I'm telling you what was told
me, how that Christ, there it is, there's our text in it. Jesus
Christ is come in the flesh is the message of the man whom God
sent. And he loves you. That's why
he tells you about him. He doesn't talk about you. how that he died for our sins
according to the scriptures and that he was buried and that he
rose again the third day according to the scriptures. Paul's confessing. He's just agreeing with what
God said. He's just saying what has already
been said. That's so important. If a man gets up and doesn't
do that, he's anti-Christ. Just agreeing with God. All that he had to say about
Jesus Christ coming in the flesh was in agreement with the word
of God. To preach the gospel, to be a
true spokesman for God is to say what God said about his son,
Jesus Christ, who came. The spirit of truth confesseth
that Jesus. He will confess what has been
said in God's word about Jesus. Thou shalt call his name Jesus. And there's a reason for it.
For he shall save his people from their sins. Is that wonderful
to you? My Savior's name means He's gonna
save me. He's not gonna try to. He's not
gonna make salvation available to me. He's gonna save me. That's why He's called what He's
called. His name means literally And
you know, they have these sources that supposedly will tell you
what your name means. Have you ever done that? Put
your name in there and they'll tell you what your name means. It
tends to vary, so I'm not sure who to believe on that. But you believe the best one,
right? Whatever one is the best one. If you want to find out
what your name means, that's fine. But you know what? It doesn't
matter much what your name means. It don't matter that much. I
hope that doesn't offend you, but it doesn't matter. But you
need to know his name. And you need to know what it
means. You know what your name is? Your name is sinner. Unless and until God changes
it. He changed Jacob's name, didn't he? But our name is sinner by nature.
But his name means this, Jehovah is salvation. He, Christ is Jehovah, who is
salvation. Not Jehovah provides salvation. His name, Jesus, declares him
to be Jehovah God, who himself is God's salvation. Is the gospel
really that simple? You know, I know a lot of people
who would look at this passage of scripture and say, The true
preacher just preaches that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, that's
not really enough. He's enough. He's enough. Jesus. And they'll say this, they'll
say that he's Jesus Christ. He is the one anointed
of God to save his people from their sin. Anointed. He's God's anointed son. That's
what the word Christ means. It means anointed. The best I
can tell, there are only three types of people who were anointed
in the Old Testament. That is, officially anointed.
The word was used for other things, but I'm talking about publicly,
officially, according to God's will and ordination, anointed.
Kings. were anointed, David was anointed
king, even when nobody thought he was even a candidate for that.
Priests were anointed, some prophets. So why is Christ called the anointed?
Which one is he? He's all, he's all. He's the king of his people. He sent his preachers to preach
the kingdom of God, and in God's kingdom, Christ is all. He's
all authority given unto him in the kingdom of God. His name
is above every name, and he's exalted above all angels and
all creatures. He is our sovereign, and willingly
so, we bow willingly, don't we, if we're in his kingdom. He is
sovereign in creating us, not just physically. We are a new
creation in Christ Jesus and by Christ Jesus. He's sovereign
and ruling over us in our very lives. We pray to him, Lord,
guide my steps, direct me, use me, teach me, don't let me go. People who hate the sovereignty
of God say, well, that makes us a puppet. I don't have a problem
with that, do you? If I'm God's puppet, that's exactly
what I want to do. I don't want to take a step.
I love that passage of scripture, man deviseth his way, but the
Lord directs his steps. I do a lot of devising, but thank God he directs me every
step. He rules over us every moment
of every day. And as our king, we pledge our
allegiance to him. We bow to him alone. We worship
and serve him alone. He's our sovereign savior. We
know how he saved us, don't we? We didn't choose him, he chose
us. He told us that. It was written over his head
and he hung on that cross. From that cross, as one of our
brothers this week said, he said, Father, forgive them as his precious
blood, the very basis of our forgiveness, the very thing that
washes us from our sins so that God can justify us freely by
that precious blood. Father, forgive them. It's done. And as he did, it was written
over his head. This is the key. This is Jesus,
the key. That's what Christ means, anointed.
God's anointed king. He's our priest. He's our great
high priest unto God who offered himself for our sins. The high
priest couldn't go. He went into that holy place
once a year, the holiest of all, not without blood. And Paul said
our great high priest also had to have someone to offer. He
went into the holy place not made with hands, not with the
blood of bulls and of goats. with his own precious blood,
his own precious sin-atoning blood. And as our high priest,
the scripture says very clearly that when he did, he obtained
eternal redemption for us. He obtained it. He bought it
and received it for us. He has perfected forever all
of them that he sanctified with that precious blood. That blood
is my justification. Who is he that condemneth? It
is Christ. And that's what God's mail say,
Jesus Christ. How can I go into the presence
of God? I like that question that Todd
asked that Jehovah's Witness. Isn't that a good question? What
are you gonna say when God says, what are you doing here? To many,
he's gonna say, depart from me, I never do you. And you know,
even in that day, they're gonna be saying, but look at what we
did. Isn't that incredible? That's us. That's how blind and
deceived we are. How come you're coming in just
like what that person said to Todd? Look at our wonderful works. Depart from me. What are you
gonna say? I know what Paul said. It is Christ that died. I'm justified
and uncondemnable before God because it was him that died
for me. It behooved him to be made like
unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high
priest in things pertaining to God. And he's our great prophet. anointed to speak. What do we
say? What he said, we agree with him,
we confess him. He's our great prophet. God has
spoken unto us by his son. In these last days, God has spoken
unto us by his son, but from the beginning when he spake in
sundry times and in diverse manners unto the fathers by the prophets,
he's always spoken of his son. And he's our great prophet, John
118, no man has seen God at any time. Have you seen God? The only begotten son, which
is in the bosom of the father, he hath declared. And here's the difference right
here between the false and the true. The true will confess something
and the false will confess something and as soon as they do, as soon
as they do, What you hear coming out of their mouth, when that
person answered that question for Todd the way that they did,
right there, Todd knew, Antichrist, right? Antichrist. Matthew 16, 13, when Jesus came
into the coast of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples saying,
whom the men, what are they confessing? What
do they say? That I the son of man am. Some
say thou art John the Baptist, some Elias and other Jeremiah's
are one of the prophets. And he saith unto them, but what
about you? What about you? What's your confession? Peter
answered and said, our text in first John four, thou, you are
the Christ. the son of the living God. And
Jesus answered and said unto him, blessed. Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona,
for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee. They're
not saying that. They're saying antichrist. They're saying everything
but. But my father in heaven revealed
this to you. And this is what God's preachers
say, and this is what his people will hear. According to our Lord,
blessed are they that say it, blessed are they that know it,
Him, and blessed are those who hear, those that preach Him and
believe Him. And then this, He's come in the
flesh. God has come in the flesh. God's
preachers in the New Testament did not just talk about that
there is a Christ, but that Jesus is the Christ. This Nazarene,
they didn't just talk about him. It wasn't just, they didn't just
preach Christology. They pointed to a person. John
said, there's God's lamb. There's never been a lamb that
could ever take away sin. The bloods of bulls and goats
and lambs can never take away sin, but there's God's lamb that
actually takes sin away. Right there. There he is. And
we have to do that too. We have to identify a person. The religious Jews whom our Lord
said, you're of your father, the devil, they believed in a
Christ. The Jews still believe in a Christ,
but they don't know Jesus the Christ, who came in the flesh.
And that's life and death. We must identify him specifically. Acts 17, one, when they had passed
through Amphibolus and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where
there was a synagogue of the Jews, and Paul, as his manner
was. God's preachers always do this
now. as his manner was, went in unto
them in three Sabbath days, reasoned with them out of the scriptures,
opening and alleging, and in all of that it hasn't said anything
about what he actually said yet, but it's fixing to. Went in,
he opened the word of God, and out of the scriptures he reasoned
with them, opening and alleging what? That Christ, that Christ
must needs have suffered He's come in the flesh, and that's
why. He said, I came to do the will of him that sent me. And
this is the will of him that sent me, that of all that he's
given me, I should lose nothing, but raise it up again at the
last day. Opening and alleging that Christ must needs have suffered
and risen again from the dead, and that this Jesus, whom I preach
unto you, is that Christ. You see what they preached? That's
what God's preachers have always preached. Still do, by His grace. Acts chapter 2, let's look at
this one together. Acts chapter 2 verse 29. Acts 2, 29. Men and brethren,
let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that
he is both dead and buried, and his sepulcher is with us unto
this day. Therefore, being a prophet and
knowing that God hath sworn with an oath unto him that of the
fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise
up Christ to sit on his throne, he seeing this before spake of
the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell,
neither his flesh did seek corruption. Look at verse 32. This Jesus,
the one that David was talking about, who is he? This Jesus
hath God raised up, whereof we are all witnesses. Therefore,
being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received
of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he has shed forth
this which you now see and hear. For David is not ascended into
the heavens, but he saith himself, the Lord said unto my Lord, sit
thou on my right hand until I make that post, that footstool. Therefore,
let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made
that same Jesus. And in case you don't know who
I'm talking about, it's the one that you spit on and beat and
mocked and nailed to a cross, that one, he's God's Christ. And he's Lord, he's the king. When God spoke from heaven, how
many times has God audibly spoken from heaven? That doesn't happen
much, does it? I know somehow people seem to
have gotten some kind of message from God, you know, and they
like to put it on billboards and things and sign his name
to it. Can you think of anything more blasphemous than that? Put something like this, you
know, that love one another thing, I meant that, God. That's just,
that's repulsive. But you know, when God spoke,
what would God say if he spoke from heaven this morning? What
would he say? We don't have to wonder, do we? He spoke from
heaven. He spoke from heaven. And he
didn't say, you folks need to start doing this and you need
to stop doing that. You know what he said? This is
my beloved son. Here he is. He identified his son. He said, there's your hope right
there. You're in. You're in. And when
somebody stands up in a pulpit, you'll know. Now, you ought to
know. You've got no excuse. You should
clearly know whether they were sent from God or not. And they
say, this is God's beloved son. that came. And here's why he
came. He came to redeem the people.
He came in the flesh because it behooved him to be made like
unto his brethren. He can't be our faithful and
merciful high priest unless he's one of us. The high priest was
chosen from among the people. Man sinned. We need a representative
man who has no sin. and who is able by the infinite
power and worth of his precious blood to redeem us from our sins.
When a man stands up and says what God said, this is my son,
this is God's son, then do what God said, hear him. He loves you, I guarantee you
that, he loves you. You know that, don't you? remembers
you. You know he loves you. This is who we preach by God's
grace. I've had people ask me before,
what do y'all preach? Or what do y'all believe? I'm
sure they think that I'm avoiding the question when I say we don't
preach of what. But I'm not avoiding the question.
I'm answering the question the best way I know how. We don't
preach of what, we don't believe of what. The difference, the
very difference between true preaching and false is a who. It's not a what. It's Christ
or anti-Christ. Christ. In fact, look at verse
three in our text. Now we're told in verse two,
what would every spirit from God, the spirit of truth will
confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh And every spirit
that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come into play is
not of God. That's the spirit of antichrist.
You know the only difference between the two messages? One
word, not. Not. Just put a not in front
of everything I've said this morning, and you have the other
gospel, which Paul says is not another. We call it another,
it's not another, they're in the one. Just put a knot in front
of all, he's not the king, he's not sovereign. He's not gonna save his people,
he's trying to. He's not Jesus who shall save
his people. He's not God's only prophet. And we have these modern day
prophets. He's not God's priest in the
sense that when that priest went in there on the day, it wasn't
the day of possible atonement. It wasn't the day that you can
be atoned, maybe, if you do something. It was the day of atonement. He doesn't choose, we do. Just
put a knot in front of everything I've said. He doesn't save, he
makes salvation available, but he doesn't save. And that's just
when they mention him at all. Because the biggest way in which
they preach not that Jesus Christ is coming to flesh is just not
even talking about him at all. There's so many other things
to talk about. So many human problems, you know, that we need
advice about how to overcome and things about us that we need
to talk about. He's usually not even really
mentioned much. And it doesn't matter how accurate you are in
not preaching the person of Christ. There's Christ and there's not
Christ. That's the two. They may preach
doctrine. They may preach so-called Christian
behavior. They may preach against sin.
They may preach about how to overcome this disease or that
trial, preach about how to defeat the devil. It doesn't matter
if it's not Jesus Christ who came in the flesh. It's anti-Christ. It's not him. And as I said, it takes many
forms. The word anti means against, it means not, it means against,
it also means instead of. God forbid that we ever preach
anything instead of Him, no matter what it is. And if you know the
difference, if you know the difference, if you know a truth from a false,
this morning, you know some people can hear an anti-Christ message
and say what a beautiful Christian message that was. Don't take
for granted. If you know the difference, bless
God, because I'll tell you why. We have that in our text too.
And more importantly, more important than being able to just tell
the difference, do you rejoice in it? Because a little further down
there in our context, it's gonna talk about who will heal the
difference. between somebody who knows Him
and who doesn't, it's all about what they hear. And what it means is what you
want to hear, what you want to hear, what you desire to hear.
What do you desire to hear? Do you know Him when you hear
Him? And more importantly, does it delight your heart to hear
of Him? Well, then look at verse four. Here's why. You are of God. You are of God. What does that
mean? Of God, are you in Christ Jesus?
Who has made unto us wisdom. That's how we know the difference.
Righteousness. Sanctification and redemption.
Are you in Christ? You know how you got there? You
are of God in Him. Little children, little children. And have overcome them. Talking
about the spirit of Antichrist there, that word them is more
often translated him, and maybe talking about that you've overcome
the Antichrist, but it's the same thing, it's the same thing. But here's why, because greater
is he that is in you than he that is in this world. If you
believe not, in the spirit of Antichrist and have by the spirit
of his truth believed on the Son of God, there's a reason
for it. And that's him too. Because he is great, you are
saved. And I thank God for it.