What I'm going to do now, you
guys can come on in, I'm going to actually open up in Psalm 32,
reading Psalm 32 all the way through verses 11. And we're
going to use Psalm 32 as a primer to actually give this back to,
give this to, yeah, so that they can catch the people that are
coming in if they don't have outlines. This is going to be
a primer to the question that was raised at the end of our
study last about first James chapter five verse 16, confess
your sins one to another. So I wanna do some delineation
and clarifying of that and help us get past what I consider a
faulty translation, which could have done a better job. Sometimes
in the scriptures, the idea of sin and fault has synonymity,
but like a lot of things that carry synonymity, synonymous
terms also have distinctions that are critical in particular
context. And we're going to deal with
that tonight. So tonight we are actually getting into the issue
of what does it mean to confess in the broader scope of it. So
I want to read Psalm 32 verses 1 through 11 just to get some
text in our hearing. And David will serve for us as
a model of a true believer who understands and appropriates
the past perfect finished work of Christ in his behalf as the
grounds by which he has sustained fellowship with God that is secure
for all eternity. David will serve as a model for
us tonight as one who understands the past perfect finished work
of Jesus Christ in his behalf as the grounds of his acceptance
before God and his security in terms of his eternal life forever. He will demonstrate to us that
it is both unwise and foolish to presume upon God in the area
of our weaknesses, our faults and our sins, merely because
we know that Christ has already finished the work. If you guys
remember last week, I wanted to address the two extremes that
go on in Christianity. One is a Catholic view of confession
that has the person going to the priest or has the people
engaging in what is called mass with the objective of Jesus as
it were through what is called transubstantiation being offered
up again and again and again and again creating psychologically
in your mind a repetitive atoning work of Christ upon every sin
that you commit. That framework, that mindset
would be contrary to the gospel. It would imply that Christ's
death on Calvary Street only merits a person when they go
through the confession of their sin and viewing Christ as being
crucified all over again and again. One of the triumphant
elements of the gospel is It is what? Finished. That's one
of the triumphant elements of the gospel. And the radical distinction
historically between Catholicism and the evangelical church has
been on the grounds of justification once for all established by the
death of Christ on Calvary. So that Christians are no longer
in this relationship with God where they are hanging between
heaven and hell by virtue of their sin. That's a radically
different view than what Catholicism holds on people, which they will
tell you that for you to believe in and rest upon the past perfect
finished work of Christ 2,000 years ago is presumption and
no soul should ever have that kind of freedom of conscience. Well, if that's true, what is
the purpose of the whole book of Hebrews other than to teach
us of the superiority of Christ's atoning work over against the
lambs and the bullocks that were offered up by the hundreds of
thousands throughout Israel's Old Testament sojourn. Every
day morning and evening sacrifices were offered morning and evening
as it were, letting the people know that they have sins that
they have to deal with in terms of God. But every time a bullock
is offered up, what it taught them was that their sins had
not yet been put away. And so they live with the guilt
of a not finished work based upon those sacerdotal or sacrificial
offerings offered up. And rue the day an individual
commits a trespass or sin and doesn't have enough money to
bring an offering to the priest. You guys follow what I'm getting
at? He's struggling now because he doesn't have a sacrifice.
Albeit, you know, without getting too far afield in the Old Testament,
God was so gracious in the sacrificial system. that a person could bring
just a flower, a half shuckle of flower, and that would be
legitimate as a token of his remorse and his grieving over
his sin, even though that bit of flower couldn't at all put
away his actual sins. The people in the Old Testament
were made to look for the Savior to come, not put their trust
in those sacrifices. The evangelical church under
men like Martin Luther and John Calvin and others departed from
the Catholic church because they understood that the gospel was
hidden. It was threatened. It had no
efficacy. So long as the church gave you
approval as to whether or not you were accepted before God.
and the gospel being revealed to us by virtue of the scriptures
being written in our vernacular and language, we now can read
the Bible with the help of the Holy Ghost and understand the
free grace of God in Christ, where the soul can rest upon
what Christ did 2000 years ago in hope for glory. Now, where
we are as we are working through and discussing the issue of confession,
Confession. I want you to hear David's language
because this will help us understand what happens when you and I enter
into that crisis of sin as well, and we have to go before the
Father. Verse one of Psalm 32, are you there? Blessed is he
whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed
is the man unto whom the Lord imputed not iniquity, and in
whose spirit there is no what. Verse one and two. opens up describing
a man who fully understands his justification before God. Verse one and two opens up with
a man describing his full understanding of what it means to be justified
before God. He opens up with a blessing,
a doxology. Notice it, blessed is the man
whose transgression is what? Whose sin is what? Covered, blessed
is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity in whose
spirit there is no God. Verse one and two tells us that
David was fully conscious of the atonement of Jesus Christ
by which God would never ever impute his sins to him. David
was conscious of this and he was rejoicing in this. Now he
moves to the subsequent verses that does not deal with our justification. It deals with our relationship.
See, when you understand justification, justification is what God does
for the center outside of the center, apart from the center. So that justification is not
an experience. It's a position. God justifies
men and women outside of themselves in the person of Christ so that
they may not even be aware that they are justified until the
gospel comes and reveals to them that Christ has put away your
sins. Are you guys following me? What
that means then is you don't think of justification in terms
of do I feel justified? Justification is not a feeling.
Like there are a lot of people in prison who feel like they're
not guilty, but they are. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? And there are some people who
are walking free because they have been justified by the legal
system whose conscious still vexes them. And this is the case
in religion too. Please make a clear distinction
between how you feel, which gets into the realm of personal sanctification,
and where you stand. Standing and status are two different
things. Where I stand before God and
how I am in my relationship with him constitutes two different
things. And where the believer who is truly a child of God rejoices
is in his position in Christ. because his position is secure
based upon not himself nor his circumstances, but what God did
in Christ 2,000 years ago. We rejoice in the doctrine of
justification. There is therefore now no condemnation
to those that are in Christ Jesus. Christ died the just for the
unjust that he might bring us to God. Therefore being justified
by what faith we have peace with God as Romans chapter 5 verse
1. Are you guys following me? So
justification is the legal declaration on the part of the judge that
you are not guilty based upon all of the demands of the law
being fulfilled by your substitute. and all of its righteous rewards
being also imputed to you by your substitute. You stand before
God if you are a believer in Christ, just as righteous as
God is. Tremendous. And that's precisely
what David is saying in Psalm 31, verses one, Psalm 32, verses
one and two. He opens up triumphantly establishing
his justification before he gets into what we call our experience. I needed to develop that because
sometimes we make such a broad distinction between what we are
in Christ objectively and what we're going through subjectively,
that we fail to put our hope and trust and feet upon our position. Now he gets the verse three.
After he's declared what it means to be justified, he says in verse
three, watch this. Now, when I kept what? Ah, I
want you to mark that word because the phrase here, keeping silence
is synonymous to, in the antithetical sense, contrary to confession. You guys got that? To keep silent
is contrary to, or what we would call antithetical to confession. To be silent is to not confess. And what happens, David says,
to the men or the women in a situation when they have broken fellowship
with God by their conduct when they keep silent. Watch this.
When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring
all the day long. Verse three describes the spiritual
and psychological, I'm sorry, the spiritual and physiological
depletion of the soul when the man or the woman who is a believer
in God fails to recognize their true, their true condition relationally
before God. When we fail to recognize where
we have fallen short in relationship to our Holy God and therefore
applied the blood, which is the grounds of our security by confessing
what we are and what we do on the basis of that blood, we are
now shutting ourselves off from active vital fellowship with
God. God must now withdraw himself
from you and begin to allow you to deplete in your soul so long
as you think that you are all right with God merely because
positionally you are justified. Are you guys following me? Is
anyone here lost so far? just because you are justified
doesn't square or resolve the personal relationship that God
requires of us in the realm of sanctification, in the realm
of conformity to Christ, in the realm of you and I walking Coram
Dale, in the realm of walking in the light. For those of you
who are new, let me continue to sit down these axioms that
will help you. Here's an axiom. This is very
important, just in case you don't know. The true believer, when
he's taught properly the gospel, has learned to rejoice in his
position, because his position is based upon God's unchangeable
purpose of grace in Jesus Christ. Our position is perfect, justified,
even according to Romans 8, 28, glorified already. Our position
before God is that we are just like Jesus Christ, and that will
never change. Are you guys following me? That's
what we rejoice in. By faith, we can see what we
are in Christ down the line, and we can know that we will
get there because God can't lie, change or fail. Are you with
me so far? But the process, that's the next P, is where we are now. In this process, we struggle
in the realm of transformation and relationship with God, which
is a dynamic that God calls us to operate in. What is that dynamic? Walking in the light. recognizing
the necessity and efficacy of the blood atoning work of Jesus
Christ that God has afforded us to be able to confess him
all the way to the point wherein we are ultimately glorified. Are you guys following me? Let
me help. I want to build this before we get into the case.
Me and a couple of brothers were just really ruminating over the
importance of this glorious truth. Often when you sing some of the
old hymns, which we love because they are so absolutely theological
rich compared to some of the newer hymns or newer praise songs
that are so theologically vacuous, they may aesthetically sound
good, but they have no rich theological doctrine. There is a fountain
filled with blood flowing from Emmanuel's veins, sinners, Did
you get that? Plunge beneath that flood. Wash all their guilty stain. Wash all their guilty stain. Now the verse is not describing
what merely happens at conversion, but what happens throughout the
process of their life. We are such as wash our robes
in the blood of the lamb until we meet him in the wedding feast
on the last day. The mature believer understands
that daily his robe of profession must be washed in the blood of
Christ because nothing else can wash away our stains but the
blood of Christ. Are you guys following me? Now
watch this, I want you to see the metaphor now. People are
watching those of us who have been redeemed, those of us who
have been taught the gospel, those of us who have seen the
glory of God, and they are wondering why we are washing our robes
every day. Because we've seen perfection.
And we understand that our robe, as of yet, is not perfect. But
there is a blood that every time we dip our robe in that blood,
it comes up white again, white. white again so that daily I can
continue my walk in fellowship with God, having washed my robe
daily by confessing God to be true. And every man a liar. Are you guys following me so
far? I'm just building a case for what it means to walk with
God every day. This is John, first John chapter
one, verse seven. If we walk in the light as he
is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood
of Jesus Christ, hear me now, presently, indicatively continues
to wash away our sins. That's the way it really goes.
If we are walking in the light, which means that if I'm walking
in the light, I'm being taught what God requires in terms of
my fellowship with him. Now, if you guys have grasped
this, what you also are recognizing is this, that there is a great
synonymity or parallelism between the Old Testament saints and
the New Testament saints, right? In terms of they understood that
it was necessary for blood to be offered up in order for sins
to be put away. They understood that they needed
to confess their sins before God. That's the whole point of
the sacrifices in the morning and the sacrifices in the evening.
Continual sacrifices meant that even though they were the covenant
people of God, that their basis for fellowship with God was not
based upon their performance, but the availability of the blood,
typified by the lambs that were offered, that allowed them to
sustain vital and effective fellowship with God. Are you guys hearing
what I'm saying? Getting ready to break into it now. When we
don't confess, and we'll get back to that in a moment, but
rather do what David says, keep silent. We are going to find
God withdrawing himself providentially and circumstantially until we
start to wither spiritually. Does anyone know what I'm talking
about? You will experience the incremental departure of the
grace of God in your mind. That is how you think. And in
your heart, that is your affections towards God. And even if God
needs to, in his providences in your life, where he will allow
reverses to take place, circumstances to occur, to get your attention,
that you are out of fellowship with God. Are you guys hearing
me? This is what David is getting
ready to explain in the Psalms. Do not be like the horse or the
mule that must be led about by bit and bridle. You and I were
created in the image of God. We're not horses or mules, even
though we act like them. And should God metaphorically
have to put a bit and bridle on us? You know what that means?
We are stubborn and rebellious like a wild ass. And you know,
God is saying, I don't if I have to do it, I'll do it because
the price I paid for you demands that I bring you to glory, even
if I have to make your life difficult. So now let's follow through with
the tax. Now that I have your attention market, when I kept
silence, my bones waxed through my roaring all the day long for
day and night. Here it is. I want you to mark
verse four. Your hand was heavy upon who it's called the conscience
called the conscience. This is what I was telling my
brother earlier today when the believer chooses to volitionally
harden himself or herself against God, God will allow the heart
to harden, but the conscious will be aware of what it's doing.
See, when God regenerates a believer, He gives him the light of Christ
and the light of his word in his conscious on a level that
unbelievers don't have. The unregenerate person doesn't
walk in the same light we do. We walk in the light of the Lord.
We walk in the light of scripture. We walk in the light of the presence
of the spirit of God so that our conscience is far more informed
than the unbeliever. You know what that means? You
and I are far more sensitive to God's will and precepts than
the unbeliever. You know what that means? When
you and I sin against God, we know it because the Holy Ghost
makes sure that you know it. I'll get into that more as I
make a distinction between trespass and sin, getting back to James
chapter five or 16 in a moment. But here's what I want to say.
It is very possible because David did it for a whole year. He hardened
a part of his heart. That's what it means to keep
silence. He hardened a part of his heart that allowed him to
watch the process unfold by which he had committed adultery with
Bathsheba and subsequently murdered her husband, Uriah. He allowed
the year to pass by hoping in vain that somehow he could cover
it up. Proverbs 28, 13. Are you guys
following me? Whosoever confesses and forsakes
his sin shall have mercy, but he that covers it shall not prosper. See, to cover the sin is the
same as to keep silent, is to cover the bosom, is not to open
the hands wide. Remember what we learned last
week? To confess means to throw it away, to open your hands wide,
to unload, to unload, to prostrate yourself. When the man or the
woman is standing before the infinite God, the righteous holy
God, and he knows that God sees everything, he is required to
confess that God is light and there is no darkness in him at
all. Are you with me so far? Watch this because we're going
to get back there in a moment. When a believer is confessing, he's
not going through rote, religious, ritualistic phrases. He or she
is acknowledging God to be who God is. To confess is to declare
the truth about God. When we confess God, we are in
the New Testament language, homo legale, we are saying the same
things about God that God says about himself. Are you with me? That's in your outline. So what
that means is, as we grow in grace and in the knowledge of
the Lord, As confessors of Christ and confessors of God, what we
do is say what God says. And we don't hold back anything.
That's what it means to be a confessor. As we're about to unpack and
see. Now watch the language. I want you to see how the language
works. For day and night, your hand
was heavy upon me. My moisture turned into the drought of summer.
It's a metaphor of a tree drying up. Take a pause. Salah. Now watch verse five. You see
how in God's providence, when he withdrew from David and allowed
David to go through the torments of a spiritual and psychological
depletion, you notice what it affected. According to verse
five, I acknowledge my what now stay right there. See, he has
now stopped being what silent. See it. So it took over a year. I want you to work with me now,
because we're going to unpack this. It took over a year for
God to show David that God was God. Now God's patient. Everybody that hits the dust,
having breathed their last breath, and have to go into the presence
of God, will come to understand that God is God. And that's one
of the things we struggle with, because really, if we had our
way, we would mold God over into our own image. Come on, am I
telling it true? But because God is God, he's
gonna always be God. And even though we don't like
God being God, by the time we breathe our last breath, guess
what we gonna know? God was God. See, God doesn't change, he's
immutable. He's unchangeable. You can't
change the unchangeable. All you can do is submit to the
unchangeable. Are you following me so far?
This is critical in the process. So what did David learn? Keeping
silent didn't do him any good God's hand was pressing down
on David right pressing down until it became Unbearable for
David and finally he spoke up. You know what he's doing right
now in verse 5 confessing Confessing he's agreeing with God look at
the text. I Acknowledge my sin unto who? Do you notice he acknowledged
his sin unto God? Notice that what it said it didn't
say he went to the priest Did he didn't go to the preacher?
He didn't go to your ride. He didn't go to Bathsheba. He
didn't go to his counselors. He went to who and I'm going
to make the distinction tonight that there's a distinct difference
between sins against God and trespasses against one another.
This is so very critical to understand. He confessed his sin to God.
He would have not glorified God and he would have not been confessing
had he went to the people and sought recovery of relationship,
but not going to God. See, confession is to be wide
open and to tell the truth about the situation based on what God
has said. To confess is to agree with God. And so this is what David is
doing. I acknowledge my sin unto you. Now watch this. And my iniquity
have I not what? See what we're doing? He's doing
what now? Confessing. Isn't he? He's confessing. Watch
this. I said, here it is. I will confess
my transgressions unto who? Park it. See, this is what I'm
getting at. Now, I want you to make sure
you get this. When we talk about confession, we are not talking
about a one-time act that people engage in when they are evangelized
and told to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. When we talk about
confession, we are not talking about what people do when they
accept the Lord Jesus into their heart. Are you guys hearing me?
That's not what we are talking about. The biblical doctrine
of confession knows nothing of a one-time formulaic structure
by which now you secure your eternity with God, even though
you don't know him because somebody said, repeat after me. Are you
hearing me? There is no such biblical precept
or precedent The Bible doesn't teach a one-time confession.
Confession is a lifestyle. Confession is a way of life for
the believer. Confession is what we do because
it's who we are. Are you with me? It's very important
that we know that. Watch this, I want to help you
now. You cannot confess what you don't know. No one can get you to confess
to the glory of God in seven minutes of a conversation. When
you have never heard the gospel preached, explained or expounded. where the Holy Ghost has not
had the essential time to take the gospel and bring it to the
depths of your soul and cause you to see the glory of this
infinite God and lay you low before his cross so that you
know why you are asking God to save you. Why are you hearing
me? This is why so many people after
they have been confronted by this superficial and false model
of confession go on living like hell and keeping silent because
nothing is going on in the soul. This is so very critical. And
Mark, this is a believer talking. David's a longtime believer.
I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord. And here, mark
this. I want this to be to you who are wondering, what is the
consequences of calling upon God? Here it is. Are you ready?
And you forgave the iniquity of my what? Isn't that amazing? And you forgave the iniquity
of my sin. I want you to mark this now.
David is not being presumptuous. David is not predicating the
result of his confession merely upon theoretical concepts of
biblical truth. He's not saying simply because
your word said I'm forgiven, I'm forgiven. He experienced
forgiveness. Are you hearing me? Because forgiveness
is a experience that is a result of the atoning work of Jesus
Christ being applied to the soul appropriate to the sin committed.
If you were to go back to second Samuel, I don't want you to do
it now. This is coming out of the context in which Nathan the
prophet, after about a year's time of David keeping silent,
had come to David and Nathan the prophet said to David, you
know, we got a problem. And David didn't understand what
Nathan meant, but what Nathan meant was God sent me to you
because you've been keeping silent. So I got a story to tell you,
David, because it's time for you to break, brother. So he
tells him the story and David's righteous indignation rises up
because he hears the story about this little ewe lamb being taken
by this rich man who had several sheep. And Nathan said, all right,
we got you now. You the man. You're the man and then by the
Spirit of God Nathan began to show David how God has seen Everything
David did from the beginning immediately David breaks watch
this and says I Have what sin? Now watch this as soon as David
Says it Nathan says the Lord Have pardoned your sin. David didn't know that. His experiences
didn't tell him that. As long as he was keeping silent
and God was pressing on him with the spirit and providentially
and circumstantially, David was in great fear. There was nothing
in his soul that said nothing in his conscience that said that
sin too was forgiven. Are you hearing me? But when
Nathan the prophet said, your sin is forgiven, I'll tell you
what, immediately that night, David realized that God was God
all over again. I want to make sure you understand
the fallout of that decree, just in case you're in trouble right
now. When God said, your sin is forgiven, David, because you
have now confessed the truth. It was already put away. but
now you will experience the power of forgiveness, the grace of
restoration and recovery, but there are going to be consequences
to your actions. Am I making some sense? So what
David was told, and this is what it means to walk in the light,
God says, I just want you to know, you messed up, boy. You're a king. You're not a pauper. You wanted the, choices servants
I will ever have in Israel and everyone saw what you did. What
that means is to the degree that your scandal has caused other
men to want to go out and commit the same kind of treacherous
crime. I'm going to have to discipline
that the child that is born to Beth Sheba will die. Your sons
will take your other wives and put them on a hilltop in a tent
and rape them publicly. Your family will be a mess. There are consequences to sin.
You guys got that? Your iniquity is put away, but
there are consequences to it. Some of us have lived long enough
to know that. We can act like God will not look at our iniquity
and not deal with our actions if we want to, but God is holy
and just and he sees the end from the beginning and he knows
how deep he must dig down into your soul to get you to be humble
enough to tell the truth. And unfortunately, or maybe fortunately,
we really see the hand of his holiness in our children because
of the consequences of our neglect. the hand of His holiness. And
you know what we learn to confess? God is just anyway. He's right
anyway. He's holy anyway. He's righteous
anyway, in spite of what I am going through. I want you to
hear how David describes this. Verse five is what believers
pray. Verse six, for this show, everyone
that is what? Godly. What is a godly man or
woman? That's a person that confesses
their sins to God. For this everyone shall, that
is godly shall pray unto thee. Watch this. In a time when you
may be what? Surely in the floods of great
waters, they shall not come nigh unto thee. You are my hiding
place. You shall preserve me from trouble. You shall come
pass me about with songs of deliverance. I will instruct thee, this is
God talking, and teach thee in the way in which you shall go.
I will guide you with mine eyes, this is God talking. Isn't that
what God says? Be not like the horse or as the
mule, which have no understanding, whose mouth must be held in with
bit and bridle, lest they come near you. David now reflects
in verse 10. Many sorrows shall be to the
wicked, but he that trusteth in the Lord, mercy shall come
pass him about. See it. Verse 11, be glad in
the Lord and rejoice ye righteous and shout for joy all ye that
are upright in heart. Now this is a man who had just
overcome a horrible year. He's saying rejoice. You know
why? Because God hasn't left him.
Are you guys hearing me? God hasn't left him. He has not
left him. So it's time for us to work through
some things. Go back with me in your Bible now to James chapter
five. I wanna deal with this distinction
that's critical and I'll show you how confession works in relationship
to this. My brother asked the question
last week, so how does confession one to another work? And he used
the text and I made a distinction between what his translation
had stated sin And what my translation, which is the King James Version,
has faults. And fortunately, it is true that
there is a radical distinction between the word fault and the
term sin. And I want to make that distinction.
It is important for you to know that there is a difference between
sin and fault. Listen to how this works in James
chapter five. Are you there? James is treating
the subject of spiritual and physical sickness and how faith
incorporated in the process of asking God to have mercy on the
sick person is a very pertinent aspect of that recovery process. Verse 13, is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any Mary? Let
him sing songs. Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of
the church. That word sickness there, can refer to spiritual
sickness or physical sickness. And let them pray over him, anointing
him with oil in the name of the Lord. Obviously, where medicine
was not as prominent today as it was in the first century,
oil was a very soothing medicament that was often used for people
with physical ailments, but it was not to be done in lieu of
potential or necessary medical care. Are you guys with me? Now
watch what it says. Let them anoint him with oil.
And then the prayer of faith shall what? Save the sick. Now, I want you to mark how James
is transitioning from a physical ailment to spiritual sickness
that is often combined with physical ailments, particularly for people
who are part of the church. And the prayer of faith shall
save the sick. and the Lord shall raise him
up. And if he had committed what? They shall be what? So now I'm
not gonna go into it in depth, but the elders here are not merely
praying with this sick believer that God would heal him in his
body, raise him up, renew him all over again. Lord, you can
do it. They are praying that, but what
they're really praying is, Lord, you are the one that knows every
man's heart. You know us all. Healing comes
from you. But most importantly, we are
asking, Lord, that you make manifest the secrets of the heart. I'm
getting ready to get into that. Help us to understand whether
or not at the core of this sickness is a spiritual malady. We are
elders in the church. We are not doctors. We are preachers
of the word. We deal in spiritual matters.
If this man is laying here because he is out of the will of God
or this sister is laying here because she's out of the will
of God and you have chosen to use a physical ailment to bring
her to her knees, help her see where her sin is so that she
might confess her sins and get right with God. That's what we're
praying. Are you guys with me? That's
what we're praying Lord because we don't know only, you know
So we come to you with our hands raised asking you to have mercy
on our sister Have mercy on our brother have mercy on this broken
family if you will and raise it up Are you guys hearing what
I'm saying? Are you hearing what I'm saying?
That's how that was done It was recognizing that God will afflict
with sicknesses to get you to sit down and actually deal right
with God. Quit hiding things in your bosom.
Quit covering up your iniquities and your sins. God's not to be
played with. And so the end result is that
their sins would be forgiven. Now, verse 16, look at it. Confess
your what? So the vast majority of you guys
have the word fault. and not the word what? Sin. Do you know why? Because while
the word fault is a consequence of sin, the
word sin is distinctly different than the term fault by virtue
of intentionality or unintentionality. Let me help you understand in
the Old Testament law, God put it like this. Every trespass
will be forgiven. We were there last week in Leviticus
chapter five. Every trespass that is committed
in ignorance will be forgiven. If you bring the proper sacrifice,
the sacrifice was synonymous to confession. The sin is forgiven
because God sees it as a trespass. You didn't know you had committed
trespass against God until it was made known to you. Are you
guys following me so far? Now watch this. This is where
walking in the light is critical because you and I trespass against
the Lord frequently and we don't know it. Now follow this and
we also trespass against one another. and we don't know it. While as yet we don't know it,
we are still confessing our faults because it may very well be that
I have offended you. Are you with me so far? This
is critical, critical to understand. This is distinctly different
than an open-handed or an intentional sin like we have just described
with David. And in fact, according to Numbers
15, Presumptuous sins had no sacrifice to be offered We learned
this and when we dealt with the law years and years ago People
who think that they can intentionally sin against God And then just
go ask God for forgiveness. Don't understand the gospel the
notion that you can go out and commit a Volitional, deliberate
sin against God is called high-handed sin. The word presumption in
the Old Testament, Numbers chapter 15, verse 30, Deuteronomy chapter
17, Hebrews chapter 10, I'm getting ready to go there. It's called
high-handed sin. You know what high-handed sin is? God, you
see me doing it, but I'm gonna do it anyway, and then I'm coming
to you. There was no provision for sacrifices in the Old Testament
for that type of arrogant hostility towards the glory of God. Are
you guys following me? So the notion of, and this is
why a Catholic view of penance and mass is so heinous, because
it allows the sinner to harden his heart and practice sin under
the presumption that he can go to mass or go to confession and
have that sin forgiven only to go do it again. This is why I
told you historically the mafia found a hiding place in the Catholic
Church under this defective model of confession. Are you guys hearing
me? And yet the law says no deliberate
volitional sin will ever have a sacrifice. See that's designed
for you and I to walk in the light. This is exactly what John
is forbidding in 1 John. Do not tell me you are walking
in the light when in fact you are walking in darkness. They
are mutually exclusive concepts. You guys got that? Very important
to understand this role. So now, notice what it says.
Confess your faults one to another and pray for one another that
you may be healed. You guys see that? So then, see
the word sin here? That's the Greek word, and we
have done this in our theology class, hamartia. That's literally
sin. That's open rebellion of God.
The word is described like in Romans chapter six, verse 23,
the wages of what? Sin is what? And the idea of
transgressing God's law in terms of sin against God is something
that is extremely serious before God. The wages of sin is death. The idea of false is the idea
of trespassing. Do you guys see the word there?
Trespassing. The Greek term is a, what is
called a transient preposition, para, parapetoma. And what it means is like you
have a line in front of you and that line is a no trespass line,
but you don't see that line. and you cross that line, what
have you done? You trespass. Even though you
didn't know, you trespassed. That's the idea of trespassing.
And let me say this again so we can move on and develop the
point. You may not intentionally sin against God, consciously
aware of sinning, but the concept of trespass means that you and
I are inadvertently going contrary to God's will frequently. and do not know it. It is therefore
both practical and edifying to stay in a mode of confession
before God, even though we are not consciously aware of anything
that we've done wrong. To walk in the light is to walk
in the truth of God's word and to thus know that, and we say
it in prayer often, Lord, if I've done something known or
unknown, forgive me for it. That's what we're talking about.
See what that destroys is presumption. It sustains the relationship
with God. It lets God know that we know
that he sees things that we don't see. This is why David says in
Psalm 19, go to Psalm 19. I want you to see it as we work
our way through this. David is thinking through once
again, the importance of his relationship with God. And in
Psalms 19 verse 13, here's what he says. And I want you to see
this. And then we'll make some more progression. We've got about
15 minutes before we open the floor for questions. In Psalm
19, here's what he says. I'm going to start at verse 9. The fear of the Lord is clean. enduring forever, the judgments
of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired
are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold, sweeter also
than the honey on the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant,
what's the word? See, so here's the other benefits.
So what God is incorporating now is scripture in our relationship. God incorporates scripture in
our relationship because scripture warns you before you do it. This
is Hebrews chapter four verse 12. The word of God is alive
and sharper than any two-edged sword. It is able to expose motives
and thoughts and intent. Areas of our thinking that you
and I don't have any conscious awareness of. When you read the
word of God carefully, it will actually anticipate your crime
and let you know beforehand you getting ready to commit a criminal
act. I'm telling the truth Emma. And this is why it's hard for
people to sit under faithful preaching and teaching because
the spirit of God works through faithful preaching and teaching
to pull up the skirts and show you your iniquity. to just pull
back the curtains and show you your schemes and mechanisms.
Like no one in the world can know what you were planning,
but God. And you thought I'll just go
to the study for 15 minutes. Five minutes into the study,
God nailed you. He nailed you. And that was you
and God. Well, that's the purpose of scripture.
Now watch this. When we are walking in the light,
that's what we want. If God leaves me to myself, I
will make a wreck of my life. If God doesn't show me my motive
and my intent, I will not be ready for the deceptive nature
of my own heart and mind, which will manipulate situations to
my own end. And it will never work out well.
It hasn't thus far. I need God to warn me beforehand
so that I can work through this lust to do something that I know
is wrong. Am I making some sense? When
you're a mature believer, you do. When you're a mature believer,
you know that you need God to go ahead of you and stop you
before you execute that particular deliberate crime. You need him
to do that. And because we know God does
things like that, we call on him to do that. Keep me, Lord.
Keep me, Lord. Keep me. And this is what David
is saying. The scriptures do that. So you
get up in the morning, you flip the book open, and the Spirit
of God has a choice text of scripture just for you. And you go, you
know what? I know this is the Lord. I don't
like it, but I know this is the Lord. Here it is. Moreover, by them is your servant
warned, and in keeping of them, there's great reward. Who can
understand his what? There it is. I want you to put
the other word there. Who can understand his faults? his trespasses. I want you to
hear this now. This is important. When you and
I are walking in the light, we are not professing that of ourselves. We are omniscient. We are not
professing to be all wise. We are not suggesting that because
we are Christians, we see things that other people don't see.
In a lot of ways, you and I can be more buffoons than the average
secular person. We simply have a third person
with us that's able to see things we don't see. Are you with me? Who can understand his errors? No one really can. That's called
the mystery of iniquity. That sin that works in your members,
that knows how to deceive you and get you to respond to a proposition
or a temptation until you execute it. Are you with me? As James
chapter one, around verse 14 or so, beloved, Do not say that
when you are tempted, that you are tempted of God. For God tempted
no man, neither can God be tempted. But every man is tempted when
he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Are you with me? Every man is tempted when he
is drawn away from the truth, drawn away from the light by
his own lust and enticed. There's Psalm 1 right there.
Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the what?
Ungodly. So if I am not watching the motives
of my heart, some ungodly counsel can come to me and actually couple
itself with my lust. and create an enticement in me
that can lead to the termination of sin. For when lust has been
brought to pass, it brings forth sin. And when sin is done, it
brings forth what? Death. So what we are saying
is, Lord, stop me before this process engages. Stop me before
the process engages. And the thing is, if you're a
child of God and you love God and you want to continue walking
in the light, what you want to be sensitive to is the impulses
of the heart. The impulses. You don't have
to even be cognizant of the proposition on an intellectual level. You
may not even quite know, I'll put your finger on that particular
thing that's getting ready to drive you into a dark alley,
to engage in things you shouldn't, but you know your impulses. You
know when you are now being enticed. And this is what David is saying,
the word of God will keep you. Notice this, who can understand
his errors? Cleanse down me from secret. What? There it is. Keep back your servant also from
presumptuous. What? Let them not have dominion
over me. Then shall I be upright and shall
be innocent from the great transgression. But the words of my mouth, the
meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight. Oh, Lord, my strength
and my Redeemer and so what David is acknowledging is his need
of God. He's confessing God and this is what we do confession
Go with me in your Bible to Matthew chapter 10. I want you to see
this My proposition to you is that confession is not a one-time
thing that is based upon somebody Telling you something about God
that you don't know and then you are made to agree with them.
That's not confession. I Confession is a way of life
based upon an ongoing revelation of God by which you are convinced
is true and thus you are ready to echo it. In Matthew chapter
10, this is what Jesus says. I'm in Matthew chapter 10 and
Jesus is talking about what it means to be a witness for Christ
and what it means to suffer for Christ. Verse 31, are you there? Fear ye not therefore, you are
more valuable than many sparrows. Here it is. Verse 32, whosoever
therefore shall confess me before men. Do you see that? Him will
I what? Confess also before my father,
which is in heaven. What is verse 32 talking about?
Witnessing. What is verse 32 talking about?
You who profess to be a Christian, being ready to tell people that
you are a Christian, no matter what the circumstance is. You
who will call yourself a Christian being ready to bear witness to
the reality that you're a Christian, whether it's on the job or at
school, at the gym, at the courthouse, at the hang news, before the
firing squad, for the glory of God. Confession is not just one
little act by which you enter into salvation. It's what we
do all our life. We are confessors. Are you guys following me? Go
with me in your Bible to Hebrews chapter 11. The Hebrew writer speaks about
it too, about confessing. Then I want us to see a few more
verses in relationship to this too. We are confessors because
we have come to know God. We are God's people and we confess
what we know. The Hebrew writer is describing
in the book of Hebrews, the journey of the people of faith and the
journey of the people of faith is one of confession as well. Hebrews chapter 11. And notice what it says in Hebrews
chapter 11. Let me see here. Start at verse
13. These all died in faith, having
received, having not received the promise, but having seen
them afar off and were persuaded of them, embrace them, and what?
Confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. Do
you guys see that? For they that say such things
declare plainly that they seek a country. And if, and truly,
if they have been mindful of that country from which they
came out, they might have had opportunity to return. But now
they desire a better country that is in heavenly where for
God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared
for them a city. And so the idea of confession
is having a revelation of God, having a revelation of his will,
and you now saying the same thing that God says about himself. Go with me now to Romans 10 deal
with the Romans 10 text. And then we'll go back to our
text and and close out Romans chapter 10. This here is the
text that has basically been taken out of context and made
to be formulaic when what it describes and it's important
that you understand that is the continual ongoing lifestyle of
those who are truly believers. I'm in Romans chapter 10 and
I'm going to start at verse 8. But what sayeth it? This is Paul
under inspiration of the Spirit making reference to Old Testament
scripture, namely the book of Deuteronomy where God had indicted
Israel for not believing God. And God said to Israel, you are
a people, Deuteronomy chapter 32, around verse 20, who have
no faith. I've been leading you in this
wilderness for 40 years, and you keep questioning whether
or not I can provide a table in the wilderness, whether or
not I can get you into the promised land. Well, I got you out of
Egypt, did not? Can I get you into the promised
land? But the first time the word faith is used in your Bible
is Deuteronomy chapter 32, verse 30, Verse 20 where God says Israel
had no faith It's the first time the word is used They were unbelievers
the ones that perish in the wilderness They would not confess Jehovah
as Lord So they couldn't enter into the promise. Do you guys
get the concept now now watch this? verse 8 But what's at the
word? It is not you even in your mouth
and in your heart. That is the word of faith, which
we preach. Now, when Paul uses the phrase
word of faith, which we preach, you know what he's talking about?
The gospel, the message of redemption in Jesus Christ. the salvation
that Christ accomplished on Calvary's tree, by which a sinner is justified
freely apart from works, that he is able to acquire and obtain
all of God's eternal salvation without him or her or them having
done one thing to earn it. The only way that it can actually
be obtained is by what? Faith. Faith is the substance
of things what? Hope for. The evidence of things
what? Not seeing. So when the gospel
is preached, what it comes telling you is about things God has already
done. The gospel doesn't come telling
you about things God has done and things now that you must
do. The gospel is not God plus, Christ plus. The work of Christ
plus your work. That's not the gospel. You understand
that, right? You understand that your work
plus Christ's work won't work. You guys got that right? Your
work plus Christ's work will never what? Work. See that's
called works religion. Even if 99% of the work was done
by God and there was still 1% that you have to do, like accept
him or receive him or believe on him or act in some kind of
way. If it depends upon you, then
you are a co-savior with God for your own salvation. Did you
hear what I just said? If it depends upon you at any
point, you now are a co-savior with God in your salvation. This
is the thing that fascinates me about my peer preachers in
this 21st century contemporary age, at the heart of the gospel,
at the door of salvation, which is where we are now, I find virtually
everyone that preaches publicly and abroad missing on this point
radically. They have either consciously
or unconsciously embraced a 99% plus 1% gospel. 99% God, 1% you. I'm talking about
our national preachers, the one people love. Here's how they
put it, God has done all he can do, the rest is left up to you. I'm trying to figure out what
God are they teaching? What God would leave anything
up to you to get done? Are you guys hearing me so far?
Let me help you understand that uneasiness in your soul if you
have it. Pastor, it sounds like what you
are saying is, I cannot contribute to my salvation at all. That's right. That's precisely
what I'm saying. That's precisely what I'm saying.
That when the gospel comes properly to you, it simply tells you what
God has already done. What God has already done. Watch
this. And it doesn't say, well, now the merits of God will now
only be beneficial to you if you do something. Here, watch
this. When the gospel comes to men
and women, either they are going to believe it or not. When the gospel comes and you
hear about the person and work of Christ, the gospel comes with
the aim of making some believe. When the gospel comes in power,
it comes with the objective of making some believe. Just in case you don't know,
The only reason you believe the gospel is because God gave you
grace to believe. You are not better than your
neighbor. You are not wiser than your neighbor. You are not smarter
than the next person in your pew. There was nothing about
you that got, and I hear this all the time. There was something
about you worth God saving you. No, that's the most ludicrous
statement that could ever be made. There is nothing about
you and I on a personal level for which God was compelled to
save us. This is what we call sheer grace. God saves the unworthy. If you are worthy to be saved,
that means there was some merit and value in you that God is
now obligated to respond to. This destroys grace altogether. Grace Is God doing something
for you that you don't deserve? Am I making some sense? Now watch
this. And if you discover that God's
grace is something you want, God gave you the desire. Because
there are billions of people around the world who have no
interest in the gospel. So here you are. Looking to Christ. Here you are trusting Christ.
Here you are interested in the Word of God. Here you are interested
in a relationship with God. Here you are fascinated about
this glorious being called God. Here you are looking forward
to growing in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord every day.
Here you are ready to be a part of the body of Christ. Here you
are ready to tell men and women about Christ. And you may be
such that you are ready to die for the gospel. Please understand
this. Please understand that that was a gift. That was a gift. This is why the doctrines have
to be explained consistently over and over and over again,
because at this point we are really dealing with a major heresy
when people are taught that somehow your salvation actually hinges
on your decision. No, it doesn't. It hinges on
God's decision. I have chosen you. You have not
chosen me. I called you, you didn't call
me. I sought you out, you didn't
seek me out. I revealed myself to you, you
didn't come say, hey God, I know you're looking for me, here I
am. No, nothing of that ever occurred. This is why God told
us to go into all the world, preach the gospel. Why do preachers
go hunt people down? So that God can reveal himself
to them. Are you guys hearing me? And
it is no mystery, you might as well dissolve this now, it is
no mystery, as to why some believe. John chapter 10 makes it very
plain. My she, hear my voice and they
follow me, another they will not follow. He said it in John
10 around verse 24 to the rulers. The rulers kept saying, will
you plainly tell us whether you are the Christ or not? He says,
I've been telling you ever since I got out of the water, but you
still won't believe me because you are not my she. Isn't that
what he said? If you were my sheep, you would
hear me. See, it's so very important for
you to understand that when God drew up the plan of salvation,
he had no intentions of failing at all. Now watch this. God cannot fail. God cannot lie. God cannot change. Let me let
me nail it down here. Then I'll take a few questions before we
close. Listen, if one person One person in the universe, one
person in this world from the time that Adam was created to
the last person born on this terra firma, tens of billions
of people. If one person for whom Christ
died, I want you to hear me now, dies themselves, fail to obtain
the salvation for which God himself died and go to hell. God's a
failure. I want you to hear this now.
This is why historically, the reason why, the reason why the
evangelical church is evangelical now was Protestant then. The
reason why the Protestant church had to leave the Roman Catholic
church was because Rome had utterly destroyed the heart of the gospel,
which is called the atonement. They make salvation based on
what Christ did plus what men do. When men began to study the
scriptures and understood that God is the one who drew up the
plan of salvation, Christ accomplished the redemption at Calvary's cross
and that the spirit of God is actually infallibly hunting men
and women down through the gospel and through the power of the
gospel preached. converting the hearts of men
and women so that they believe the gospel. Once they discovered
that the gospel was designed to hunt down and bring into a
saving knowledge of Christ without fallibility, their knowledge
of God, they stopped embracing what was called a work salvation
based upon Catholicism. The two systems are mutually
exclusive. Are you hearing me? They are
mutually exclusive. You can't buy a salvation that
is describing what God does in part and what you do, and a salvation
that's over here that says God did it all. All to him I owe. Are you hearing me? You can't
reconcile the two systems. They are irreconcilable. And
this is my battle in this present generation of which I say that
my contemporary preachers are either insincere, ignorant, are
committing high treason against God because the gospel they preach
is a works centered gospel that puts the dependence of salvation
on man rather than on God. And you can't read the Bible
careful and draw that conclusion. Are you guys hearing me? If at
one point in the whole process of salvation, it's dependent
upon you, Salvation is between God and you, and you are part
savior of yourself. This is very important to understand,
and this is what we confess as believers. As believers, we confess
that God justifies sinners apart from the works of the law on
the merits and obedience and blood of Jesus Christ 2000 years
ago. and that the sinners that God has justified apart from
the worst of the law are part of a group of people called the
elect of God chosen in Christ before the foundation of the
world out of every nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue from the beginning
of time to the end of time. The number is a number that no
man can number. Multitudes of millions and billions
of true believers who will come to a knowledge of Christ in their
lifetime, bow the knee to him as Savior and give glory to God
before they enter into heaven. Because God can't lie, change
or fail. Are you guys hearing me? That's
the gospel we preach. Now watch this. This was the
gospel of the missionaries in the days of John Huss, John Wycliffe,
and the brothers in the Reformation period. They went about preaching
because they were sure that God was going to save. This is a
wild thing. If I know that God has a gospel
that is certain to save people, then I'm going to be willing
to tell it. Because I know God's going to save his people. Matthew
chapter 121. And they shall call his name
Jesus. For he shall save his people
from their what? That's my point. He can't lie. He can't change. He can't fail.
And your salvation is not an accident. Your salvation is not an accident.
If you're a believer in Christ, that wasn't by happenstance,
brother Willie. At the right time, in the right place, in
the right way, the right words hit your heart. and blew you
up, turned you into a new creature in Christ. Next thing you knew,
you were believing the gospel. This is what we call the power
of the gospel. And what it's designed to do
is lay all flesh low and give glory to God alone. All right,
I'm opening the floor for a few questions. If you have any, get
somebody to take the microphone and then I'll take about five
questions and then we'll shut it down. We'll come back next
week and we'll close out, we'll open up actually 1 John 2.