If you will, I'd like for you
to turn with me to the book of 1 Timothy, chapter 6. While you're turning to my text,
let me express my gratitude once more for you having me here, and also my thanks to God and
His providence for arranging for me to be here. There's something which is not
common to our thinking in natural man, and that is the providence
of God. I believe in the providence of
God. I believe God arranges all things. Nothing blindsides Him or takes
Him by surprise. He worketh all things after the
counsel of His own will. So every time I stand behind
a pulpit, I want to be aware and remind both myself and those
I'm speaking to. This is an act of God's poverty.
We're not here by accident. We're not here by some freak
occasion. We're here according to the arrangements. The more I'm able to love this
assembly, the more I get to know you, experience your generosity,
your hunger for the gospel and your appreciation for it, the
more I love this congregation. My design this morning is to
feed Christ's precious lambs, to feed His sheep. Peter, do
you love me? Feed my sheep. Feed my sheep. that which I purpose for them
to have. Give them that which will make
them to grow. Strengthen them. Be enriched
by his gospel and be grounded and settled in Christ. Now, 1 Timothy is one of several
pastoral epistles. You that have studied the scriptures
are aware of that. These are letters written to
instruct both the minister and the people. as to their duties
one to the other. And in this sixth chapter, the
Apostle Paul is telling us that our attitude and conduct is very
important to the ministry to which we're called. It's very
important. I know we're not saved by works.
I know we're not saved by what we do. But you're gonna do something
and you're gonna say something and you're gonna be something.
And here he encourages us to do that thing which honors God. And I will tell you this, any
church that lives in a careless, who lives a careless and reckless
life, overindulging in its liberties, will suffer in its ministry to
the people. Your community will take one
look at you and they won't have time to listen to anything you
have to say. And also there's enemies. We
have enemies without and enemies within. Enemies you can see and
the kinds you can't see. And our attitude and conduct among these enemies needs to
be as it should. And so he exhorts us to that,
to withdraw ourselves from self-promoting arguers, disputers. He says here, he describes them
doting on questions with stripes of words, which always end in
envy, strife, and railings, and evil surmisings, and to recognize
them for what they are, perverse disputers of men. but men were corrupt minds, destitute
of the truth. Now here's the right attitude.
He said godliness with contentment is great gain. Godliness with
contentment is great gain. What is godliness? Godliness
is a true knowledge of God as He's revealed in Christ and our
desire to be conformed to that image. The result of that is
godliness. We see it in Him, we have the
promise of it in Him, and we have the promise of the fulfillment
in Him at His coming. God-likeness, godliness, with
contentment. And in the meantime, we have
the earnest of it by faith in Him. There is awaiting this unbelieving
world a judgment in which no man or woman has any hope of
being acquitted or justified. There is no hope. People say when somebody dies,
an unbeliever, he's wanted nothing to do with the gospel, nothing
to do with God's church, nothing to do with Christ his whole life.
And then he dies and we go down to the funeral home and talk
about, well, he's gone to a better place. I beg your pardon. I beg your pardon. This whole
unbelieving world awaits a judgment in which none of them No man,
no woman has any hope of being acquitted or justified. No hope for any to be spared
from God's justice. God is just. He said, I will
by no means clear the guilty. There's no reason to hope, well,
in that day, you know, I'll present my case and, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. There's no hope for
any to be spared from God's justice, no hope for some future clemency
or pardon based on his obedience to the law or some decision he
made or some determination that he set himself to do. There's
only one thing that stands between a holy God and sinful men, and
that is the Lord Jesus Christ. Period. There's nothing else. Nothing else is gonna do you
any good. All the hours you walk and the
hands you shake and the cards you sign, all the churches you
join, all the good works you make a sad attempt to do, none
of these things are gonna benefit you in the least. Only Christ,
only Christ can present you faultless before the heavenly Father. The only hope we have in this
world is for God to intervene in our lives and enable us to
believe. One preacher said one time, he
said, all you have to do is believe. Huh? You mean natural man can just
believe? as he can. He says, the natural
man receiveth not the thing. Only hope we have is for God
to intervene and enable us to believe. And believing on him
and believing in him is the only contentment that we have in this
world. Christ is all. That's what I'm
telling you this morning. Christ is all. And then in verse
12, the apostle exhorts us to fight the good fight of faith. Lay hold on eternal life whereunto
thou art called and hast professed a good profession before many
witnesses. Now this is my text. And this
is my subject this morning. Fight the good fight of faith. So let's begin here. What is
the faith of God's elect? I think you'd be hard pressed
to find anybody just going door to door that's gonna tell you,
no, I don't believe. They're gonna tell you they believe.
What do you believe? In whom do you believe? What's
the basis of your faith? What is the faith of God's elect? Our Lord said in John chapter
10, they said, if thou be the Christ, tell us plainly. Now
these are people who's supposed to be believers. They're supposed
to be preachers and teachers, master theologians. But they
didn't know Christ and he's standing right in front of them. And they
said, if you be the Christ, tell us plainly. He said, I told you. Now listen to this, but you believe
not because you're not my sheep. A man has to be enabled of God
to believe. It's the gift of God. Most religious people I talk
to have all sorts of answers concerning this thing of what
faith is. Answers that they've learned
from men and women pretending to be ministers of God. Pretending
to be taught of God. But I'm of the mind of Paul who
said, let God be true and every man a liar. Let's see what God
says about this thing of the faith of his elect. How does he define it? It matters
little how I define it, how does he define it? The Holy Ghost
tells us in Hebrews 11, one, that faith is the substance of
things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. Let me ask
you something. What visible, tangible substance
do I have to support my hope before God? None. None. But don't people worry
themselves all day long trying to find that? trying to find
something that they did, something that they might do, something
that they learned, something here, and they just keep looking
and looking and looking. You ain't gonna find it. You
can't see it. You can't see it. They look for
a visible, tangible substance, a dream, a vision, an experience. So where is the substance of
my hope? I believe God. That's what comes
down to it. I believe God. Abraham believed
God. It was counted to him for righteousness.
And he didn't just say that for Abraham's sake, but for us also. Faith is the evidence of things
not seen. What can we do, the Jews said,
to work the works of God? They were impressed. They saw
some miracles. They saw some things that no
man had ever done. And they said, what can we do
to do the works of God? He said, this is the work of
God, that you believe on him whom he has sent. That's the
work of God. Here's the miracle. The miracle
of all miracles, faith. You know, Paul had an experience,
a real experience, and sometimes when the occasion called for
it, he would talk about it, but not when he was laying the foundation
for faith. When he's laying the foundation
for faith over in 1 Corinthians 15, he said, I preached unto
you what was preached to me. He didn't talk about Damascus
Road. He didn't talk about being blinded and thrown in the mud
on his face. He said, you remember God sent
him down to a man's house. Why'd he send him down there?
To hear. And he said, I'm preaching unto you what I also received. Well, what'd you receive, Paul?
How that Christ died for our sins according to the scripture.
He was buried and raised again. the third day according to the
scriptures. I believe God, but where's the
evidence that I had it? Well, faith is not only the substance,
it's also the evidence. It's the evidence. Faith is that mysterious work
in the heart that enables men to believe. to submit himself to God and
to God's word and to God's witness. There's a work has to take place
in a man's heart before he'll sit and listen to you. You have
the gospel, you have the truth, you read it to him, you quote
it to him out of the word of God. You may even go over and
turn to the page and say, here, you read it. But he still ain't gonna look
at it till God enables him. When God enables him, then he'll
look at it. He'll look at it, he'll consider
it. It's a mysterious work in the
hearts of men and women that enables them to believe and to
submit themselves to God and to God's word. And then secondly,
faith is the gift of God. This faith of God's elect is
the gift of God. God gives it to you. You can't
earn it, you can't work it. You can't crawl, I read some
of these old writers, even grace writers, and I'm just almost,
I just don't know about it. Talking about crawling on glass
and doing all these things and pushing themselves to some experience
that somebody else talked about. That's not it. That's not it. There's nothing you can do that's
gonna warrant God saying, okay, I'll give you this faith. No,
it's sovereign grace. Now that's how it comes. God
picks a man. I'm telling you, Paul said he
was the chief of sinners. I feel the same way. I was doing
everything I could do to deny the word of God, to deny the
gospel of God. just religious to the hilt, self-righteous
to the hilt, going about, you know, doing this and doing that.
That's what Paul, he didn't know how else to say it. He just said
they're going about to establish a righteousness and have not
submitted unto the righteousness of God in Christ. And that's
what I was doing. I wasn't trying to earn faith.
I wasn't trying to buy something. I thought I had a right to it.
And then God just simply gave me the ability to hear and believe. And that's all. It's the gift
of God. You know who knows that? Believers.
Nobody else. Believers. They know that what
they know was given them of God. Faith is a gift of God. If he
doesn't give it, you can't produce it. I want to read you something
here in Ephesians chapter two and verse 10. Now Paul states
this fact, and you're very much aware of it. By grace are you
saved through faith. And that not of yourselves, it
is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. Now
listen to his next statement. For we are his workmanship, created
in Christ Jesus on two good works, which faith is, and repentance is, and love is,
and trust is. You're created in Christ Jesus
on two good works, which God hath before ordained that we
should walk in them. That's God enabling men and women
to believe. That's exactly what he's talking
about. You didn't do this. He did this. And he did it in
you. Faith is the gift of God. Why
does this one understand and that one don't? Huh? Our Lord tells you why. He tells
you why over Matthew 13, 11. He said, because it's given unto
you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but unto
them it's not given. It's the gift of God. Blessed
are your eyes for they see. Blessed are your ears, they hear. So faith is the substance and
evidence of our faith. Faith is the gift of God and
faith's object is Christ. Faith's object is not What do
they call it? I don't know what to call it.
It's just a mess to me, but they talk about giving money so you
can get more money back. They turn faith into some kind
of an investment. You give 100, God will give you
1,000. Where'd you get the 100? I thought
God gave that to you. Somebody told old Ralph, said,
you ain't gonna take the devil's money, are you? Talking about
somebody donated some money to his ministry or something. And
they said, you're not going to take the devil's money, are you? He
said, no, I wasn't aware he had any. I thought God owned all the cattle
on Thousand Hills. I thought it was all his. And
if he used some twisted man to donate to it, just thank God
for it and go on. The base object is Christ. It
locks in on him. It finds security in him. It
finds maturity in him. It finds glory in him. It finds
love in him. It finds everything in that man. Through this man, Paul said,
is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. Through this man. Well, how do believers acquire
this faith? They acquire this faith through
the preaching of the gospel, exactly what I'm doing to you
today. That's how it's acquired. Through the preaching of the
gospel and a powerful working within by the Holy Spirit of
God. These two things go in conjunction with one another. Paul told the
Corinthians that they were He said, I don't need any papers
from you or any papers to present to you. You're my papers. They were manifestly declared
to be the letters of Christ, ministered by us, written out
with ink. but with the spirit of the living
God, not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the
heart. They believed his report and they submitted themselves
to his authority and teaching by God's own confirmation in
them. That's right. So I don't need
no letters. God will write my letter right
on your heart. Yes, he will. And then he goes on to say, we're
not sufficient of ourselves to do anything. I ain't got no power
to cause men to believe or repent or do anything. Walk with God, I don't have that
kind of power. We're not sufficient of ourselves
to thank anything of ourselves, but our sufficiency, he said,
is of God, who also maketh us able ministers of the New Testament,
not of the letter, but of the Spirit. And that's all. This is the faith of God's elect,
a real work, a divine work, an effectual work, and the only
evidence we have of being heirs of God. We believe God. We believe
God. All right, here's the second
thing. How is faith, which is freely given to us, a fight? How is it a fight? I'm not fighting against it,
are you? It was given to me and I love it. I rejoice in it, I
thank God for it. That's not the fight. Well, how
is faith, which is the gift of God, a fight? Well, faith is
a fight in the sense that all the enemies of our soul want
to take it away. You didn't have any enemies of
your soul before you believed. You got along with everybody.
Ain't nobody fighting you over the word of God or fighting you
over some religious profession that you made. They was all behind
you. I used to wonder about that when I was in religion. Not claiming
that I had faith back then or anything else. I used to just
wonder about this thing. I'd read in the scriptures that
all these people of God were suffering. People despised them. Their own families despised them. They rejected them. They wouldn't
have anything to do with it. And I'd wonder, why ain't that
happening to me? Even the drunks in our family,
they praised me for joining the church. I didn't have no enemies. I wasn't suffering anything.
How come? Because I didn't have the faith
of God's elect, and I didn't know the truth. All of our enemies. I like to
watch old westerns. I probably worry Brian to death
over it, because that's all I watch when he comes over. I turn an
old western on, we sit there and watch it. He's about halfway
starting to like them himself. But in all these old westerns,
they had a stagecoach. And on that stagecoach, they
carried a strong box. In that strong box was a shipment
of gold or a shipment of valuables or valuable papers or something
in there of value. And they locked that box and
they put it in that stagecoach. Coach wasn't nothing. It was
just the means of transportation. It wasn't anything. Just an old
stagecoach. And then there was always an
evil man with a guy, and he wanted to get that strong box. And boy,
he plot and planned to steal the treasure. Now, until the strong box went
on stage, until they got knowledge of that, nobody cared one way
or the other. That stage just go on through,
nobody bothered it. But the minute they heard there
was a treasure in that coat, Then they began to devise plans
and do all these things. But there was a problem. Sitting
beside the driver of the stagecoach was a man carrying a big shotgun. And that's what they called that
job. He rode shotgun on the stage. Now, if anybody come after that
stage, he went to war. He went to war. He had that big
double-barrel shotgun. Boy, he'd level it down, blow
a man plumb off his horse. He'd protectin' that strong box.
Now, to the honest, he was evidence of security. He was doin' a good
thing, a good job. His office deserved honor. But to the lawless, his presence
was a threat. And to steal his treasure, he
had to be taken out of the way. Now listen to this. This is what
Paul said to the Colossians. He said, beware lest any man
spoil you. You know what the spoils of war
are. You conquer a man and you take what he has. You take his
valuables. He said, beware lest any man spoil you. How's he going
to do it? With a gun? No. Through philosophy. And vain deceit just out and
out lies. After the tradition of men, that's
what gives it a foundation. Well, everybody believes this.
You mean to tell me you believe what you believe and you don't
even pay any attention to the thousands and thousands out here
that believe contrary to you? It's vain deceit after the tradition
of men. Now listen, after the rudiments
of the world, that means basic principles of the world. And not after Christ. And Satan
and his ministers of self-righteousness appears in such a way as to make
you believe that they are there for your good. But in reality,
They're there to steal the song box. They're there to take the
treasure. Peter said they'll come in privily
and they'll bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord
to buy them. They'll deny his sufficiency.
They'll deny his divinity. They'll deny his lordship and
his right to rule. They'll deny his authority and
they'll deny his mission and purpose. He came to save his
people from their sin. This world denies that with everything
they got. Well, he can't save everybody.
If he did, everybody's saved, but he didn't. And we have the very treasure
of heaven in these earthen vessels that the excellency of the power
may be of God and not of us. We fight the good fight of faith
because it's God that worketh in us both the will and the do
of his pleasure. We fight this fight, but we know
it's God in us fighting this fight, enabling us to resist. My soul, you can't resist. Satan
takes men captive at his will. You can't resist him, but you
can when God works in you, you can. Let me see if I can illustrate
what I'm saying. Israel was given a promised land
by virtue of God's covenant promise to Abraham. But they were shocked
when they came up and sent the spies over, they were shocked
to find out it was already occupied. There was already folks living
within and armed to the hilt in walled cities. You know what
they said? They come back and said, we can't
go in there. We can't have the promise of
God. Why not? Joshua wanted to go. And old
Caleb, he said, this is like a tale already told. Let's go.
Let's get it. God said, we can have it, we
can have it. They wouldn't go. So God let them wander around
out in the wilderness for a while. When they come back, you know
what? They still had to fight. They still had to fight. But they discovered in the fight
that God fought for them. And he fought against massive
odds. And he left no doubt that the battle was the Lord's. We
have enemies without and enemies within. And oh, how often this
flesh has launched a full-scale attack on men and women, and
their desire is to take away that which God has given him.
Take away your rest, take away your trust. Try to put it over on yourself,
trust in yourself. It's a fight. Who's fighting? The world, false religion, and
to your surprise, maybe not some of you, because you've been on
this way a while, but your own flesh and blood, your enemies
shall be there of your own household. You know why? Because they can
get your ear and they can get your heart. That's why. To believe God, to believe on
and rest in Christ, to gather in his name, to worship him,
praise him, is a fight. It's a fight. And then within the flesh, that
which is flesh is flesh, our Lord said. And that which is
spirit is spirit. The flesh will never change.
Know that, read it in the scriptures. The flesh will never change. It's never gonna get better.
It's never gonna get wiser. It's never gonna get holier. And the flesh, Paul said, lusteth
against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. And these
are contrary the one to the other so that you cannot do the things
that you will. Not the spirit that grows weary
of preaching, it's the flesh. Huh? It's not the flesh that finds
nourishment in the gospel, it's the spirit. Flesh will always
rely on its own reasoning and works and will. It always will. It'll prefer that over anything.
Never the word of the gospel. The flesh will always desire
to be its own teacher and never submit to the means that God
has ordained. And let me tell you something,
the powers without are in league with the powers within. Nobody knows human nature better
than Satan apart from God. He knows human nature. He knows
how to get in league with it, to use it to his advantage. All right, here's the next thing.
How can I fight this fight? What do I do? What does it mean
to fight this fight? Do I publicly protest? Do I go
home, make me up a banner and get some folks together and go
downtown and have a little parade and march through there and protest? How do I do this? How do I fight these things?
You fight them by faith. By faith. John said, what, now
listen to this. Whatsoever is born of God overcometh
the world. And this is the victory that
overcometh the world, even our faith. You mean we fight this by faith? So what do we need to do? What
Paul said is you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk
in him. Rooted and built up in him, established
in the faith. All you mean to be rooted in
Christ is to be established in the faith. That's what I mean. And listen to this. Rooted and
built up in him, established in the faith as you've been taught.
abounding therein with thanksgiving. How does it come? You were taught. You were taught. My prayer and
faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And as a
preacher, it's both my duty and my desire to teach men and women
the gospel of Christ as it's set forth in the word of God. That's what he tells us in Ephesians
chapter four, isn't it? That's what these preachers,
he gave these preachers, he gave these apostles, he gave the prophet,
he gave evangelists, and he gave pastor teachers. That's what
he gave them for. Now, let me ask you something.
In the light of everything I've said here today, is your faith
precious to you? Is faith precious to you? What in you constitutes this
hope? Is Christ the object of your
faith? Is he the treasure? Is he the
treasure? Well, Peter said, unto you therefore
which believe, he's precious. He's precious. And how can you
believe on him? The gift of faith. You see what
Paul's saying here? We're gonna fight the good fight
of faith. Preachers, he said, are given
for the edifying of the body of Christ until we all come in
the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God unto
a perfect man under the measure of the stature of the fullness
of Christ. Christ be formed in you. That's what he's talking about.
All right, here's the last thing I want you to see. Why is this
called a good fight? I had some fights in my younger
days. I'm gonna tell you something, there wasn't nothing good about
it. It wasn't good before it started, it wasn't good while
it went on, it wasn't good afterwards. So why does he call this a good
fight? Fight the good fight of faith.
Well, first of all, because God purposed this fight to be for
your good and his glory. This inward struggle and warfare
is an evidence of salvation. Paul said, I know your election
of God, because our gospel came not in word only, but in power
and in the Holy Ghost, and you become followers of us and the
Lord, having received the word in much affliction. And of the Holy Ghost. You turn
to God from your idols. Why would God purpose his free
gift to be a fact? To prove to you that it is his
work. That's why. We're kept by the
power of God through faith. Isn't that what Peter said? Unto
salvation ready to be revealed in the last day. He'll run his
pure gold through the fire to burn away the dross and reveal
the pure gold of his grace And then thirdly, it's a good fight
because of what we're fighting for, what we're fighting for. Salvation by grace, the honor
and integrity of God our Father, His glory and the salvation of
His people, and the very hope. Without faith, it's impossible,
impossible to please God. And what are the prize of it?
What of the treasure? He said, fight the good fight
of faith. Now listen, lay hold of eternal
life. Lay hold of it. What God has
freely given, we fight to possess and we fight to keep it. God gave promised land to Israel,
but they still had to fight to possess it and fight to keep
it. and yet in all their warfare, the battle was the Lord's. May he be pleased to teach us
and work in us to possess this treasure that he's given us. Our Father, we thank you. We thank you for your grace.
We thank you for all the gifts All the things that you've ordained
and worked after the counsel of your own will and worked in
us and worked around us and arranged for us. And it's precious to
us. We thank you for that. You've
revealed it to us. Revealed us your love in it. And we appreciate it. We're thankful
for it. And we're willing to fight. Teach
us how. Teach us how. We ask you for
Christ's sake. Amen.