We were regarding the second
verse as we make our way through this last chapter. We talked
about how important it is to recognize the reasonableness,
the reasonableness, as it says in verse two of faith, how that
faith is not itself an unreasonable concept or commodity or principle
in the gospel. And we talked about the need
to to be able to determine when faith is running across unreasonable
men, unreasonable and wicked men. And we looked at that extensively
last week. So we want to move forward, recognizing
that faith is actually born out of knowledge. Faith is born out
of knowledge. Now, faith is a conviction of
things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. Faith is
a conviction. It is a, it is a persuasion. I am, when I am walking by faith,
I am convinced there's a conviction of truth as it has been given
to me by way of information. And I believe that truth. That's
what faith is. Faith is believing God for what
he says. It's very important to know that
faith is not a leap in the dark. Faith is not challenging God.
Faith is not tempting God. You remember the devil tested
Jesus in the wilderness. And one of the temptations was
if you jump down off the pinnacle of this temple, since you are
the son of God, God will take you up. Remember his promise
in Psalm 91. So the devil was using scripture
to tempt Christ with a promise that was valid. But in this context,
it was being misappropriated, wasn't it? So when we talk about
faith, we're not talking about jumping off of some proverbial
cliff and expecting God to honor our foolishness. When we talk
about faith, we are talking about merely responding to what God
has said in a conviction that God said it and that must be
true. So therefore, with regards to
faith, it's very important to know that my faith and your faith
has to be fueled by knowledge. We talked about this before,
I won't go into great detail, but your faith is not static,
it's organic, that means it's living, it's alive. And like
any plant, I guess I have to go here a little bit just, you
know, faith is one of those concepts we could talk about a lot, can't
we? It basically becomes sort of
a overarching theme of the Christian life. And we never fail to benefit
when we define faith according to the scriptures in all its
various forms. Faith is not just a static belief
in a set of propositions only. Faith is a living organism in
the soul of the believer. It is part of his constituent
makeup. We are believers. And as a consequence,
our faith is, as I've said before, organic. That means it grows,
which also means it can diminish. which also means it can suffer
the ravages of drought and famine, which also means it can diminish
so much so that on some occasion you may wonder whether or not
you have faith at all. That's the nature of faith, it
is organic. But even in this sort of dynamic
where it may go up and down and wither and bear little fruit,
at the core of the nature of faith, as we're going to see
so vividly on Sunday, no matter whether you're abounding in your
faith or abasing in your faith, the goal of faith is to draw
you near to God through Christ. The goal of faith is to draw
you near to God in Christ. So I know I am operating by faith.
I said this about a year ago as we were working through our
studies. How do I know I'm saved? How do I know I am an object
of God's mercy? because all the difficulties
and troubles that occur in my life only draw me closer to God. That's how I know I'm his. That's
as simple as that. How do I know I'm his? All of
the sufferings, all of the troubles, the troubles I incur from my
own foolishness, the troubles that come from life in general,
the troubles that come from other people, all of them, all they
do, All they ever do is draw me closer to God. That's how
I know that I am safe. That's how you can know faith
has an object and that object is God. And it's always going
towards God. He made it that way. This is
this kind of a spiritual GPS system. You guys got that? Even
when you lose your faculties, that GPS system stays on point. Some days when the clouds clear
up, you realize you're on the right road. You're happy. And
in other days when that cloud settles in and you're, you know,
if you've driven across country, you know, the harrowing nature
of driving highway one and highway 10 going all the way through
Texas, Louisiana, that sometimes on stormy days, it can be really
bad. You're driving in the fog and
you are following this little white line. And sometimes you're
in the back of a big rig and you're just trying to, you guys
know what I'm talking about? Stay close, stay close, but not too
close. Well, sometimes that's how faith
is. That's how faith is. And when the smoke clears or
the clouds clear, We're still on course, but faith is always
rooted in a knowledge of God's word. So the apostle Paul asked
to not only, uh, pray for the word to be glorified in terms
of having free course, but also that we would be delivered from
unreasonable and wicked men for all men have not faith. You guys
see that all men have not faith. And so I guess I'll just touch
on that before I go to the next few verses, which is what I want
to do. Please do not believe that faith
is something resident in every human being. Don't buy that notion. You know what I know, because
we're sinners, what I know is that we actually hold to ideas
and notions that are not biblical. They come either out of our own
propensities and our own bench. We will formulate ideas and notions,
And then we'll pass them around to other people as true, especially
if we can frame it in a very catchy way. And, and, you know,
the idea that everybody has faith is an assumption that the whole
world holds to. Now we will assume that people's faith is in different
things. Some people have faith in money.
Some people have faith in themselves. Most people today are having
faith in themselves, aren't they? You will hear them quickly say,
I believe in me. And they're proud about that.
I believe when me has been the problem all their life and they
still believe in me. And my point is that true saving
faith, biblical faith is not something that everyone has.
And in fact, most people don't have it. True saving faith is
not something that everyone has. And we need to be ready to tell
people that when you say you have faith, you have to prove
that you have faith by first having a proper knowledge of
who God is in Christ. A man or woman does not have
saving faith who is ignorant of the Bible's doctrine concerning
God. If you meet a person and you
say, you know, the Bible teaches that God is one essence manifested
in three persons, distinct persons, equal in authority, equal in
power, equal in eternality, but very distinct in their persons,
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. And an individual says, I don't
see that. I don't believe that. I can't see how that can make
sense. That can't be true. At that point, at the core of
the revelation of God, we have a problem with faith. At the
core of the revelation of God, we have a problem with faith. You tell someone that it's impossible
for us to go to heaven, except through the propitiation and
sacrifice of Jesus Christ on Calvary Street as our sole grounds
of acceptance before God. And I said, I don't believe that.
I believe that if a person is sincere and good, if they live
in the jungles of Haiti or Ecuador, South America, Central America,
or anywhere in the Africas, Somewhere in the remote regions of the
world where they never hear the gospel, I believe they're going
to heaven too. Soon as you start hearing these kinds of notions,
what you know is they have a defective understanding of God and they
have a defective faith. It's very important. I was thinking
about this over the last two or three weeks. I'm going to
talk about it on our Monday program because I hear this notion. This
year has been in the church now for about 30 years. It's called
the wider mercy of God theory. And what it means by the wider
mercy of God is that Yeah, God did something fantastic through
Jesus. But, you know, he's so loving
that it's not possible that God would allow the heathen who never
heard the gospel to perish under the wrath of God, that somehow
these people and all these other religions will ultimately make
it in even if they don't know Jesus. Now, this is very popular
today. And even in your evangelical
church, they hold to this pressure pastors on this and see. you
will hear them say something like this. If they, if they are
consenting to this defective understanding of faith, they'll
say, well, you know, there are things about God that's mysterious
that I don't quite understand. They'll, they'll, they'll, they'll
shun the direct answer necessary to underscore the exclusivity
of the gospel. They will say something like,
well, you know, those things are just too big for us to get
our brains around. Well, they might be too big for
us to get our brains around, but God has given us a revelation
of himself and his purpose in his word. And what he's called
us to do is believe him. Now, here's the challenge. Here's
the challenge. When you seek to merge your faith
with your own understanding, when you try to combine what
you think things ought to be like versus what the scripture
says and when the Bible says not all men have faith, What
it means is faith is a gift from God. And it's given to those
who are called upon to believe the gospel. And not everyone
believes the gospel. You know that, right? And to
the degree that not everyone believes the gospel, not everyone
is a believer. For believers are people who
believe the gospel. But if you're going to believe the gospel,
you must have the gospel preached to you. You don't just wake up
believing nothing. To believe the gospel is to believe
the message of redemption concerning Christ, right? Now, if you're
going to believe that gospel, somebody has to preach it to
you, right? Now, if they're going to preach it to you, that means
they have to come where you are, right? It doesn't matter what
part of the world you are in. They got to find you, hunt you
down and tell you the good news of Jesus Christ, don't they?
Now watch this. Which one is easier to do? For God to just let people into
heaven willy nilly, offer him to raise up missionaries, to
cross land and sea, to find every one of his elect in the nooks
and crannies of every part of the world. Which one is easier
to do? Which one is the most appropriate
in our understanding of the gospel? Obviously the latter, right?
Here's the problem with the wider mercy of God, and I'll share
it with you expanded in the future. If God lets one person go to
heaven, apart from the blood atoning work of Jesus Christ
as their substitute and surety and redeemer. God has to let
everybody go to heaven apart from it. And then God cannot
bring men and women under judgment. Are you guys hearing me? He has
to. And not only that, God is a monster. because he has actually told
some of us to go preach this gospel for which some of us suffer
and die for the gospel we preach. When in fact, all kinds of people
will be going to heaven apart from the gospel. Are you guys
following me? Then he's the worst monster than
that. Because we are told that we better tell men and women
about Christ. For if we do not blow the trumpet
of their condition before God and they die in their sins, when
we knew the answer and remedy to their problem, we are guilty.
Are you guys hearing me? And then on top of that, why
would God save people outside of the message of the gospel
and then damn people on the inside of the message of the gospel?
For the gospel not only saves, but it damns. Whosoever believeth
on Christ hath life. He that believeth not is condemned
already. He that believeth and is baptized
shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned. There's
a curse that comes with preaching the gospel. Now watch this. If
I knew that the gospel would curse people who would not believe
it, and yet that person will go to heaven if they never hear
the gospel. Watch the logic. We should never preach the gospel.
That would secure everybody going to heaven. You guys follow the
logic? See, so we have to be careful
when we get this mushy sort of emotionalism that goes on where,
you know, I can't see how God can let people go to hell. Well,
now we're using our reason and we are becoming unreasonable,
aren't we? Very unreasonable. It's very important to understand
that there's something in the character and nature of God for
which he would have the economy of the gospel be the means by
which people are saved. There's something also inherent
in the accountability of human beings. For which if when they
hear the gospel, they don't respond, they will perish. There's something
inherent in the accountability of human beings. If they never
hear the gospel to stand before God and are still going to be
punished for their sins. You see the way the book depicts
the human race is already accountable before God. This is why Paul
would say, pray that the word of the Lord would be glorified,
having free course, even as it is with you and pray that we
be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men. And what I just
shared with you concerning the notion of the wider mercy of
God is part of the unreasonable and wicked men who are propagating
these things in the church. See, if we sold this unreasonable
doctrine, we destroy the necessity of the gospel, don't we? I would,
listen to me, ladies and gentlemen, I would never have preached the
gospel to my eight children if I knew that I could secure their
eternity by them never hearing the gospel. See it? See it? So let's work our way
through this a little bit more. After the apostle Paul says this,
deliverance from unbelief, we saw the context of Jewish hostility,
and that's rooted in works religion, political and religious. This
is just true. The real battle at all times
is between grace and works, legalism and faith all the time. The message
of redemption humbles men and it exalts Christ. And that's
where the problem comes in at the message of the gospel is
exclusive. We tell the world that Jesus
Christ is exclusively the way, the truth and the life, and no
one comes unto the father, but by him. And that will merit for
the church, the true church, Suffering and persecution which
brings us to verse 3 notice what verse 3 says, but the Lord is
what? Who shall? Establish you see
that little word establish that word actually means strengthen
Strengthen I want you to mark that now. Here's the faithfulness
on the part of God God is faithful to pump you up with spiritual
steroids and That's what our word is. I love it. God is faithful
to make you what? Strong. Didn't he? Watch this. You know how he takes
you through trials? And those trials, they show you
how weak you are, how vulnerable you are, how fickle you are.
They lay you low, don't they? But they don't destroy you. And
do you know the end result of those trials is the strengthening
of your faith. It's the strengthening of your
faith. But God, but the Lord is faithful who shall strengthen
you. I wish the King James would have
translated strengthen you. Establish you is the net effect
of strengthen. A lot of times the translators,
what they did in translating the Greek into English is to
give us the word that most translates into the result or the effect
of that root word. But sometimes they should have
used the root word. But the Lord is faithful who shall strengthen
you, here's the other word, and keep you from what? That's good,
isn't it? So here's the implications before
we move on to the gospel demands walking uprightly. So you become
a believer in faith like the Thessalonians had as a church.
The glory of God has manifested itself to you and you have turned
from idols to serve the true and the living God and to wait
for his son from heaven. You are sharing the gospel everywhere
and the word is spreading abroad. People are hearing about you
as a local church or you as an individual Christian. God is
delighted because God has called us to witness this year for grace.
The meditation is on witnessing and I want to inculcate us with
the growing responsibility of being a witness. I want that
to permeate our being because and we'll see this in the messages
to come. God is glorified when you who
are an object of his mercy and grace are willing to tell people
about Christ. Please listen to me. God is exalted,
he is glorified, he is magnified when you who are an object of
mercy and grace are willing to tell men and women about Jesus
Christ. One of my sisters, I saw her
at my favorite shopping ground last Saturday, the flea market.
I shop at the Goodwill too, the flea market. You got to be real
good to do the good will. How many of y'all know you got
to be real good to do the good? I mean, real good. Get some good stuff
there. You'll survive in the famine if you know how to do
the good will. But I saw my sister at the flea market last week
and bless her heart. She was kind of pining over the
fact that there was a person that she'd been knowing at the
flea market working there for a while now. And she had been
befriending this individual, working her way towards witnessing
to him. And she caught up with me as
I was getting my morning breakfast. And she said, how come it's so
hard sometimes to tell people about Christ? Isn't that honest?
I love honesty. I love honesty. Everybody, everyone
doesn't have the natural forwardness to tell people about Christ.
For some of us, it's a struggle, isn't it? Now, there are a lot
of reasons for the difficulty. But what I told her liberated
her. And I want you to hear this, please hear this. Because if
you have the ability to share the gospel with people today,
and then you wake up tomorrow and you don't have that ability
and you start scratching your head, wondering why I want to
share with you. Why? Okay. Sharing the gospel. I'm talking
about truth. I'm not talking about lies. Anybody
can do religion. I'm talking about telling the truth. And
when you share the truth of the glory of God, you know, you're
going to offend people. You know that the gospel is an
offensive message once you work it through. Now, you can start
it with this humanistic sort of, you know, salesman approach.
God loves you, has a wonderful plan for your life. And they
thank you for that. They already knew God loved them
anyway. You know that, right? And they thank you for reminding
them that God loves them. I mean, because everybody just
assumed God loves them. You know, God's there to love
me. That's that's a foregone conclusion. I mean, we don't
even need a God if he doesn't love us. I mean, we are worth
loving, aren't we? So once you get past the humanistic
approach of God loves you, has a wonderful plan for your life,
and they say, okay, so now tell me something about this God.
Well, God says all have sinned. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,
whoa. Hold on, I thought you just said
God loves me. You're telling me God is calling
me a sinner? Now we got the conflict going on, don't we? Because every
man proclaims his own goodness. And everyone is right in his
own eyes. And there's a way that seemeth
good unto a man, but the end thereof are ways of death. And
you realize going in that if you are gonna share the gospel,
you're gonna go in and you're gonna demolish every false assumption
that people hold about themselves, about God and about religion.
Now you're gonna be telling them you are, here's the word, wrong. So the gospel is offensive. And some of us know that, don't
we? And as a consequence, we don't want to share it. But here's
the reason why it's so difficult to share. And this is the word
I want you to get. The gospel. Preaching the gospel or sharing
the gospel is a supernatural thing. You have to know this. It is unnatural. It is supernatural. When you position yourself to
share the gospel, you are taking on an ambassador role for God
in a world that hates God. You are now breaking through
the bars of hell, penetrating the dark realm of Satan's domain
with the objective of shining light on all the deception that's
taking place in this world. That's a supernatural thing. It's not natural. You know, you
don't meet people every day that walk up to you. Hey man, you
look like you know the gospel. Would you share the gospel with
me? No, it just doesn't happen like
that. And so understand, sharing the gospel, and I'm talking sharing
the gospel, I'm not, again, I'm not talking about your religious
notions, because people have learned in the church how to
shave off the truth of the gospel and give people a bill of goods
that doesn't have any offense in it whatsoever. Am I telling
the truth? formulated and couched it in such a way that all God
is the bell hop to their sinful passions, ready to give them
what they need. If they will just accept poor
Jesus into their life. And I'm not, that's not the gospel.
Are you hearing me? That's not the gospel. The gospel
is about the glory of God and the person of Christ. And the
premise for the necessity of the gospel is because men and
women are on their way to hell. And if you aren't willing to
let them know, not that God loves them, but they're under the wrath
of God. Hey, I got a message for you.
You are under the wrath of God. So long as you don't believe
the gospel, you're under his wrath. You hate God and God hates
you. Whoa. When the last time you
heard somebody talk like that, but it's true. God is angry with
the wicked every day. God hates all workers of iniquity.
He hate those that are lying. There's six things the Lord hates.
Yay. Seven are an abomination to him. So there are some things
that God hates. Am I telling the truth? And I've told you
before, I know we'd like to use these little weird little syllogism.
Well, God hates to see it, but loves the center, but he's not
throwing sin in the hail. He's throwing centers in the
hail. Here you go. Diving in the hail saying, God
loves me. He loves me. He loves me. But
you're, you're perishing under his wrath. Are you hearing what
I'm saying? Now, once you start developing
the message like that, people aren't going to like it. Unless
God does something for them. Unless he prepares them to meet
God. And when he prepares them to
meet God, even though there's an initial offense, you know
what they say? I want to hear more. I want to
hear more. As the scriptures put it, what
must I do to be what? That's exactly right. That's
a wonderful day. That's a work of grace. That's a power from
God. Now, here's what the apostle says. Deliver us from these these
trials that would tempt us to apostatize and depart from the
truth, unreasonable and wicked men. But God is faithful who
shall establish you and keep you and keep you and keep you
from evil. So in your outline, you have
kept by the power of God. Do you guys see that kept by
the power of God? God is the one who grounds us.
That's what it means to be established. And God is the one who preserves
us. We are strengthened. That's the
term. So we are sealed. We are mediated for and we are
guided. What do you mean when we talk
about God keeping us from evil? The implications of being kept,
the word is guarded. God keeping you from evil. Here's
what I would say. It requires all three persons
of the Godhead for that to be done. It requires the father's
preservation of your soul for that to be done. It requires
the mediatorial work of Christ on your behalf continually. He
ever lives to make intercession for us. He is our great high
priest, is he not? It requires the immediacy of
the spirit of God to recover you when you fall or to keep
you from a gross error are to keep you from departing from
the faith. It requires the immediate supervisory
work of the Spirit of God to stop you in your tracks when
you are ready to sell the gospel. How many of you have ever experienced
the power of the Spirit of God to keep you from selling out
on the gospel? Have you ever experienced that?
And watch this. Here you are trembling in your boots, ready
to compromise, ready to just say whatever the people want
you to say, just so you can keep your job. You save face with
people. And then all of a sudden, in
like a second, there's strength for you to say, no, no, I don't
agree with that. I'm sorry, I don't agree with
that. And then all of a sudden, as soon as you find yourself
able to stand for God, he strengthens you to open your mouth. And now
you're ready to tell the whole truth. That's the grace of God. That's the grace of God. You
go away and say, woo, thank you, Lord. But that was the grace
of God. That was the grace. That was
the spirit of God keeping you. You know consciously that if
God didn't keep his hand on you, you would have compromised. because
in so many other little petty areas, we have a tendency to
do that, don't we? In so many little petty areas.
So understand when we talk about being kept, we are kept by the
power of God through faith, as it says in 1 Peter. Jude verse
24, keep your hand there, go to Jude. I just want you to read
one promise. And then I want us to see one more thing that
is essential to standing in these last days over against unreasonable
and wicked men whose teachings are so seductive that if we aren't
constantly strengthened by the word of God, we'll fall for it.
Jude 24, listen to what the language says. And let me start back at
verse 20 and go through 24. This actually, the whole book
of Jude is about apostasy. And what he does is he starts
at verse 20, I'm sorry, verse 19, showing us the effects of
men and women who do depart from the faith. He says, these be
they, who, see the phrase, separate themselves. Now, what Judah's
talking about is separating themselves, not from the local church, but
from the faith of the gospel. Because the gospel comes with
trials, it comes with difficulty, it comes with persecution. These
people finagled their way out of it being, see the word? What's
the word? Sensual. You guys see that? The word literally
means carnal. That means you're operating out
of your natural man. And when you and I are operating
out of our old Adamic nature, be sure of this. We have no power
to stand against the enemy's assault on the gospel. If a carnal
man, a natural man is not going to suffer for Christ. This is
why people are reshaping and retooling the gospel every day,
because they are trying to avoid the suffering. They want to come
off as being a child of God, but they don't want to suffer
for the gospel. And so as a natural man. The word sensual here simply
means they are driven by the flesh because they do not have
what the spirit, but beloved, but you beloved building up yourselves
on your most holy. What now here, here's what we
call an actual indicative. It's in the imperative in the
English, but it's actually in the indicative, but you beloved
are such as are building up your selves on your most holy faith. So your faith is something that
is working to build you up in conjunction, watch this now,
with praying in the Holy Ghost. So verse 20 actually describes
the nature and process of faith in the life of the believer.
It builds, faith builds through prayer. The assumption is we
better pray or we will fall. Verse 21, keeping ourselves in
the what love of God. You'll see that when we go back
to second Thessalonians 3 as well on a talks talk about how
important the component of love for God is and being able to
stand against the wiles of the devil. He says keeping ourselves
in the love of God looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ
unto eternal life. Now watch this. Here's a here's
an interesting caveat faith builds itself up through knowledge,
through fellowship with the brethren, in the context of worship, in
the context of prayer, in the context of witnessing, in the
context of depending upon God, the Holy Spirit. We are keeping
ourselves also in the love of God, but we are also looking
for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Do
you know what that means? In reality, every believer is
ready to check out of here any moment. In reality, The believer
is ready for Jesus to break the silence, split the clouds and
say, let's go home. Every believer is just in their
soul, one step away from glory. You believe that? Every believer,
that's when you're walking in your right mind. Now, sometimes
we get a little silly and we think we can build kingdoms down
here and we got whole agendas that last for decades. And the
last thing we want is Jesus to come. Am I telling the truth?
Well, when you are walking with that kind of construct, you are
not walking in the spirit. When you're walking in that kind
of construct, you have aborted the mission of preaching the
gospel. When you walk into that kind of construct, your priority
is not first seek ye the kingdom of God and all of his righteousness
and everything else will be added. Your, your modus operandi is
first seek ye what you need to clothe yourself and fill your
belly and to make yourself look good and be as comfortable as
you possibly can on this earth, which means removing every vestige
of trouble that would come our way or obstacles that would hinder
that objective in that end. And that's a lot of carnal Christianity
today. Carnal Christianity predicated
upon blessings and carnal and material things as a, uh, as
a, uh, an approval or an acceptance before God. I know God loves
me because he opened that door. He gave me this job. He gave
me this house. He gave me this, that, and the other. No, no,
no. You don't know. God loves you because of those things.
You know, God loves you because Christ died for you. Rose again,
the third day for you went to glory for you, sent the Holy
ghost to you, revealed himself by the Holy ghost to you. He
gave you his word, he gave you his promise, and he's walking
with you. That's how you know God loves you. But you don't
know God loves you just because he pays your bills. What about
the other brother or sister whose bills didn't get paid? God doesn't
love them? Perish the thought. See what I'm getting at? We have
to be careful that we don't turn God into a bellhop. We really
can do that. It's called idolatry. It's really
called idolatry. And what Judah's assuming and
what Paul is assuming when you read your Bible, this is a sort
of a backdrop to all of the epistles. This is what they're assuming
saints that if you and I are doing the gospel properly, we
are suffering for it. If you and I are doing the gospel
properly, we are suffering for it. And we, we as human beings
want to be rescued from our sufferings. I do. And so we can't wait till
Christ comes so we can be totally delivered from our suffering
to the degree that Christ is not coming. I have to settle
with my suffering being a form of sanctification. You guys got
that? Okay, if Christ didn't show up
today, today I'm being sanctified. It means I have to be more sanctified.
So while I'm still here, I'm going through sanctification.
But I'm like John in Revelation chapter 22. Even so, Lord Jesus,
come quickly. Because sometimes the troubles
get that bad, don't they? Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly. When you are thinking like that,
you are probably doing the right things. Now, verse 22 and 23,
deal with the task of evangelism. And if some have compassion,
making a difference and others save with fear, pulling them
out of the fire, hating even the garments spotted by the flesh,
see verse 22 and 23. You're doing ministry here. You're
you're regarding people's disposition emotionally, psychologically,
spiritually. and you're ministering to them,
distinguishing between where people are on a spiritual level.
Some people who are hard hearted, but you feel like you might have
some hope with them. You may have to rebuke sharply. You may
have to chastise. You may have to deal with family
members, brothers and sisters in Christ. Others you have to
be sensitive to because they are weak and and they're vulnerable
and you have to talk to them patiently and and gingerly and
you have to pray for them. That's what it means to make
a difference with some. But you're being compassionate to all of
them. Verse 23, others you are saving with fear, pulling them
out of the fire, hating even the garments spotted by the flesh.
What does that look like in ministry? Well, here's what it looks like.
An individual to whom God has given you some access to. We
don't have access to everybody. You got to be careful about that.
God didn't call you to witness to everybody. You'll get a blot
in your eye if you think you've been called a witness to everybody.
Not everybody wants to hear you. You don't have the right for
them to hear you. You don't get to just go up to people and say,
let me tell you something. They'll let you know something.
If you tell them, let me tell you something. But the ones to
whom you do have that privilege, cause the door was open. Sometimes
they will be in such desperate straight. That's the only way
they're going to be delivered is for you to plainly tell them,
can I be honest with you? You are on your way to hell. There's nothing about your life.
That's right. Now, see, the emotional preacher would reject that tactic
because they would think that I'm not regarding how that person
feels and they're right. I don't particularly care in
that moment about how he feels. I'm concerned about his soul's
eternal state, because I know that that person has hardened
his heart against God after so long a time engaging in whatever
transgressions and wickedness they are engaged in, and all
they want is somebody to affirm them. Here you are, the flames
is chittling up around your soul, and you want me to affirm you?
I'm gonna tell you, you're on your way to hell. To wake you
up, to alarm you, to let you know you need to fall on your
face right now. You need to seek God while he may be found. You
need to know that our God is a consuming fire. You need to
know that it's one thing to sin against law, but it's another
thing to sin against grace. Once you sin against grace, there's
nothing that's going to stop you. You can sit against law
and grace can deliver you. But once you sin against grace,
what's going to deliver you then? I remember what Jesus said. We
were working this through in one of our women's studies. I
so delighted in our beauty for ashes series. If you guys weren't
part of it, get the CD. It's really a good time. But
one of our sisters was preaching from, speaking from John chapter
eight, the woman that was caught in adultery. And there were a
number of questions that were elicited from that, solicited
from that text. And one of them I didn't get
a chance to develop. And that was where Jesus said to the woman,
woman, doth anyone condemn you? She said, no man, Lord. He said,
neither do I condemn thee. And I said, well, most preachers
will stop right there. But there was another command
he gave her. And that command was to go and sin no more. Go and sin no more. And one would ask the question,
what does that mean? That means to repent. That means to turn
from the lifestyle that led you to the brink of destruction,
where you were apprehended by the law of God through the religious
rulers, ready to be stoned to death lawfully because adultery
was meted out by stoning. But you were delivered by the
mediator, the Lord Jesus Christ, who delivered you from the law.
He's telling you, don't sin against grace. Don't now harden your
heart and say, now that I've been delivered from the law,
I'm going to continue doing what I'm doing because I'm under grace.
He's saying, go and sin no more. And what that means is understand
the necessity of a radical transformation, a renewing of the mind and a
changing of one's position that when you become a Christian,
you are more than just forgiven. I talked about this, too. You
know, you silly bumper stickers, religious notions. Watch this.
I'm not perfect. I'm just forgiven. Well, that's
not a proper definition for Christians. Please understand that. A Christian
is more than just forgiven. Think about the implications
of that for a moment. Think about people walking around
under the assumption that all they need to know is that they
are forgiven. Do you understand what kind of scandalous life
a person will live under the assumption that all they are
is forgiven? Do you understand that? Because
it actually denies the full implications of what Christ accomplished for
you on Calvary. It denies regeneration. It denies
a renewal of the mind. It denies being a new creature
in Christ. It denies the old man being crucified. It denies
the resurrection of the soul. It denies a new walk, a new life,
a new call, a new glory. It denies all that. It only falls
under the auspices of being able to trust that when they get in
trouble, they can get washed under the blood. Well, when God
called you by his grace out of darkness into his marvelous light,
he not only called you out, he changed you, put you at a new
disposition so that now you can live to God's glory. So that's
the, that's the sinning no more that we're talking about. It
doesn't mean that you don't sin. It means that you don't live
that sinful lifestyle that was indicative of your old nature,
where you were a drug addict or a prostitute or a philanderer
or an adult, just a notable sinner without Christ. It doesn't mean
we don't struggle with our sins. It means that we are true believers
and the tenor of our life now is for the glory of God. And
the struggle in our life is for the glory of God as well. The
tenor is for the glory of God. The struggle is for the glory
of God as well. So when Jesus told that woman
that was taken in adultery, go and sin no more. A text that
you might follow up on with that is John chapter five, around
verse 14, where Jesus had healed a leper. And when the leper had
come to him to thank him for it, he told that leper, Go and
sin no more, lest a greater thing come upon you. Lest a greater
thing come upon you. And here's the greater thing,
as I said. When Jesus did those healings,
it was to affirm his Messiahship. It was to affirm his Messiahship.
But those people who were healed were confronted with God. They
had a greater revelation of God than they did the day before
they met him. So to whom much is given, much is what? So that
man that day who was healed by Christ did not have the freedom
to simply walk away from Christ as if he had never heard the
message before. He was a living testimony of the power of Messiah. His job now was to respond to
that revelation of God's mercy in his life by giving his life
to Christ. That's what we mean. Go and sin
no more, lest a greater thing come upon you would be hell. So there's one thing to live
and to suffer the ravages of sin. It's another thing to die
without Christ and go to hell. So when the gospel is preached,
it's preached with the pain of death for people who reject it.
Does that make some sense? Very important for you to know
that. And I share these salty statements with you because I
want to remind you, this is the way Christ talked when he was
here. He let people know the consequences
of rejecting the gospel. All right, let's go on a couple
more verses here. Now unto him that is able to
keep you from what? And to present you faultless
before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. Look at what he says. Now unto
him that is able to keep you from falling. You and I know
this is true, don't we? Daily God keeps us from Falling
away. That's the term falling away
and daily God preserves us And here's the objective to present
us faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy
You know when this whole thing is over with and we stand before
the triune God Father Son and Holy Ghost The Lord Jesus Christ
is going to be exceedingly happy for his people which means there's
some investment in his own soul with our call out of darkness,
in our conversion by the gospel, in our life of sanctification.
There's some investment that Christ has even now with the
struggles that we go through. The struggles, therefore, that
we go through must be important to you because they're important
to him. They're all part of the end game. There's a day when
he will gather all of his children together before his father and
they will be his bride and he will be so happy, which means
the infinite God has poured into and invested in our crisis, in
our suffering, in our difficulty, because it will redound to his
glory and our salvation. Therefore, you must also treasure
your sufferings. There's an end game that will
keep us from being weary. He will present us faultless
before his presence with exceeding joy. God being exceedingly joyful. Then Jew goes into doxology. Go back with me now to second
Thessalonians. I want to share with you another key before we
break into the last part of second Thessalonians. I want to share
with you another key. This is an interesting statement
and it's very important. As the Apostle Paul shares with
the Thessalonians the importance of being kept and he shares with
them what God is doing to preserve them, he also lets them know
that there is something very important for them to do in this
process of which if we fail to do, we will find ourselves lacking
the strength that we need. chapter 3 verse 4 after he says
in verse 3 but the Lord is faithful who shall establish you and keep
you from evil and that's what the Lord said pray for in Matthew
6 right Lord keep us from evil and deliver us from evil for
thine is the power kingdom and glory verse 4 and we have confidence
in the Lord touching you concerning you watch this that you will
both do and and will that you both do and will do the things
which we have commanded you. Verse five, and the Lord direct
your hearts into the knowledge of God. Is that what it said? What did it say? Do you see that? And the Lord direct your hearts
into the love of God, into the love of God. Remember what Jude
says? keeping yourselves in the love
of God, praying in the Holy Ghost, building up yourselves in your
most holy faith. So let me say this about being
kept. If you really want to experience
the grace of God on a daily level, grow in your understanding of
the love of God towards you. Grow in your understanding of
the love of God towards you. Grow in your knowledge of what
it means for God to love you and all that he did in loving
you. See, the term that the apostle
is using is more than didactic, is more than information. The term that he's talking about
that I think is critical of which if people fail to utilize this
and implement this in their life, this is where in the midst of
trials, we have a tendency to grow sour, skeptical, and suspicious,
and sometimes just incredulous, unbelieving. You and I must immerse
ourselves in the love of Christ. The soul must commune with God. You must learn what it means
to talk with God and have God talk with you and to drink of
the word of God and to mark out pointedly the promises of God
to you, to you. You must be able to hear God
promising things to you, blessing you, instructing you, reminding
you what Christ did for you. Okay, I'm going to milk this
for a few more minutes before we go into verse six. This is
very important. Can I do this? So I'm going to
use the grand metaphor, and that's the metaphor of marriage, because
that's what I know. And if you've been married, you
know this, too, even if you're not married now. Here's what goes on in a
relationship. We have the privilege of learning
about each other. And we have the opportunity to
get to know each other. But the key to the relationship
being vital is using what we know and what we learn to love
one another. The key to vital relationship
is using what we know and what we learn to love one another. Let me say it again, because
I don't think it hits you. The key to a vital relationship
is using what we know and what we learn to love one another. Now watch this. It is possible
to be married to someone. The great metaphor of Christ
in the church. and know that individual and not take the knowledge
that you acquire through knowing them and turn that into love. It is possible to simply acquire
data and information about that person from observation and not
translate what you know into love. not use it as fuel to build
the relationship, not use that data in order to build a bond,
not use that data in order to shape your understanding. See,
here's how this goes. If I'm going to love my wife
passionately, I have to use what she gives me in order to build
what's necessary for me to respond to her effectively. I have to
be able to see who she is in all of her raw form. Then I have
to be able to assess what she does in her calling as a wife
and as a mother and as a sister in Christ. I have to take all,
listen to me now. I have to take all that data
and appreciate it. I have to take all that information
and appreciate it. That means I have to give value
to it. I have to regard it. You know, that girl been with
me for 32 years. That ain't no easy task. Not
with this brother. You know, she get two points
for that. Then she had eight children in this wicked generation
where having two children is not about it. This sister just,
she was down for eight children. See, now she get another two
points, doesn't she? See, now watch this. These are all objective
things that sustain my appreciation of her in the time when we're
at odds with one another. when there is no emotional feeling
that's immediately at hand for me to derive and say, she loves
me. Are you hearing me? And so it
is with the Christian. There are days when you will
not feel the love of God and you have to remember who he is
and what he did and how before he created this world, he named
you and chose you and sealed you and And then he came in time
and assumed your nature and took your place and underwent the
wrath of God in your behalf and gave you his spirit and gave
you his righteousness and secured you for glory and is transforming
you into his likeness. Even though right now you don't
feel that love, what's going to keep you is a knowledge of
him that you are learning and acquiring and you appreciate
it enough to fall in love with him all over again. You get to
now check yourself to even see. whether or not you know how to
love. That's good. Cause some people don't know
how to love anything other than themselves. Some people don't know how to
love. So, you know, what I'm talking about is so extremely
pragmatic because again, I was listening to a church. Somebody
was, one of our members was looking for some information and somebody
had directed them to this church. And she said, pastor, I don't
know about this church. So won't you check it out? She
sent me to, Lincoln, I plugged in over there and shown up wacky
stuff going on. I mean, just wacky stuff. And,
you know, it's so syrupy and and so groundless, not rooted. It was evident that they despised
sound doctrine, just despised it, just wanted everybody to
free to feel and do whatever they wanted to do like that's
going to secure you for glory. It's not going to secure you
for glory. You know what they're banking on? They're banking on
every time they come together, God doing something immediately
at that time that makes them feel like God loves them. Now,
watch this, you want to kill a marriage? You want to kill
a marriage? Demand that your spouse do something
for you every day that makes you feel like they love you.
Then your marriage will be dead. Am I making some sense? Your
marriage would be dead in the water. If every day you come
home, you know, what did you do today to make me feel like
you love me? Am I making some sense? Don't
do it. Don't do it. See, at that point,
you are totally disregarding all that they have done. See,
first of all, you know, when they said I do, Before the judge
and the preacher that was a that was they were they were they
were putting a whole lot of stock in you I just want you to know
that now Putting a whole lot of stock in you But what we are
talking about is given to us in john 17 3 you don't have to
go there and this is eternal life This is eternal life That
they might know you the only true god in jesus christ whom
he has sent How do we know God in all of his infinite transcendent
glory? Through his son, whom he has sent. Watch it. For God
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever
should believe on him should not perish, but have what? Everlasting
life. So how do I know that God loves
me? He sent his son to die for my
sins. How dare I ask him to show me
anything else that would constitute his love for me. I would be slapping
God in his face. He gave me himself in the person
of his son. And I'm saying, father, I need
more. That's ridiculous, isn't it? That's often what we say
when we get tired of the gospel being preached to, we need more. No, you don't. You need that
to open itself up so fully to you. that you just thank God
from the bottom of your soul every day that you're saved.
And those of us who are married, God gives you a revelation of
how that spouse hung in there with you. Break your heart and
renew your commitment to that individual all over again and
make you want to go out and get a brand new pair of pants and
a shirt. Get a haircut. You brothers and
get us some flowers and take her out. Even if it puts you
in a hole about 50 bucks. So what? That's called love. Act on it. And you ladies, I
can tell you, if you guys don't know how to love husbands, I
can tell you what to do. Just see me afterwards. I can tell you how to love your
husband. What can I do? I'll tell you exactly what to
do. You can see me after. I'll tell you exactly what they
want from you. And the Lord, now listen to it,
direct your heart into the love of God. See it? See verse five,
line eight? You know what that is? That's
exactly what we just did for the last 15 minutes. The last
10 minutes, as I was talking to you about the love of God
in Christ, the goal of the spirit is to direct your heart into
that love, to set you down in the middle of the greatest sacrifice. Any person could ever execute
that was secure you for glory that would exalt you Exponentially
in a way that you could never imagine that's directing your
heart back into the love of God back into the love of God I'm
not saying that there are not subjective Experiences of God's
love that are poured into our life daily. Yes, they are But
I am saying that the foundation of God's love for the Christian
is what God has done for us in Christ now watch and the Lord
direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patient waiting
for Christ you see that Now, the other thing I want to say
about that before we go on to verse six and shut it down. When
we talk about the love of God in Christ, in those contexts,
when it says you are to love the Lord your God, your God with
all your heart, soul, mind and strength. If you love me, keep
my commandments. Really what it's talking about is when we
come to know Christ, the love of God should be poured abroad
in our hearts so that we are willing to suffer for him. This is how he knows we love
him. This is how he knows we love
him. He knows we love him when we
suffer for his cause, just like he suffered for our cause and
we know he loves us. We suffered for his cause and
he knows we love him for he has done for us as an example, what
we should do for him. And that is be ready to suffer
for him. So when it talks about the love
of God in our hearts is actually manifested by your being willing
to suffer shame and reproach and ridicule and ostracization
and all of those things that go along with being a true believer.
Now, I'm just going to open this up right here. Just open up verses
six through verse 10. I'm just going to read it and
then we're going to open the floor for questions if you have
any. and then we're going to shut it down. We'll come back
next week and we'll unpack what we mean by the gospel demands
walking uprightly. Verse 6 through 10. Well, I better
read 11. Now we command you, brethren,
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw yourselves
from every brother that walketh disorderly and not after the
traditions which he received of us. for yourselves know how
you ought to follow us, for we behave not ourselves disorderly
among you. Neither did we eat any man's
bread for naught, but wrought with labor and travail night
and day, that we might not be chargeable to any of you. Not
because we have not power, but to make ourselves an example
to you to follow us. For even when we were with you,
this we commanded you, that if any man that if any would not
work, what neither should he eat? Verse 11. Watch this. For
we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working
not at all, but are busy bodies. This section is the way Paul
closes out his whole theological treaties on the on the part of
the Thessalonians, and it's fascinating what he's doing. And I'll just
share this with you. This is very I learned this over
the years. As a new Christian, you are always
debating in your mind, in your life, important doctrines, important
teachings. And it's hard for you to really
know which doctrines are more important than others. Now, there's
a general sense in which we could say they all are important. But
the reality is certain doctrines have priority over other doctrines
just on a pragmatic level. It's just true. Now, one of the
things I learned maybe about 10 years into my Christian life
was this. God cares about how we act. God really cares about how we
behave. I had a chance to watch in my
first 10 years of my Christian life. What happens when a man
or a woman says, well, I love God, but I'm going to do my own
thing. I had a chance to watch how people can go years and years
and years bearing no spiritual fruit to speak up. not growing
in a knowledge of God, not coming to know him more significantly,
not becoming more mature in Christ, stunning in their growth, seeming
to be stuck in the past, not discovering any spiritual gifts,
not committed more profoundly to the church, disengaged more
than that over time because they were listless and disengaged
and idle. having deceived themselves by
living on the periphery of biblical truth that basically left them
in what we would call the realm of the theoretical. In other
words, in Pilgrim's Progress, this would be called talkative.
If you guys remember the journey of Pilgrim's Progress, there
was a cat who sounded like he really knew the gospel. His name
was talkative. Until Christian came along and
deconstructed his whole flawed facade of just religious talk
without any substance behind it. And so there are a lot of
people who can talk to you about a lot of theoretical doctrinal
truths that have nothing to do with the practical Christian
life. Then there are others who will despise the term, the very
term I just used, practical Christian life. But what I just shared
with you for the preponderance of our class was very practical.
I just shared with you how to love your wife, love your husband.
I just shared with you how to practically engage the love of
God in your life so that you can endure trials. Nothing is
more practical than those things. I'll just share with you the
practical benefits of the revelation of the atoning work of Jesus
Christ for your soul. Nothing is more practical than
that. And so what I'm getting at is this. It is possible for
a person to say they know the God of order and yet walk disorderly. And the operative term in verses
six through 11 is the word disorderly. Paul intentionally used it three
times. You know what he said? After
you approach that individual and let them know your life is
whacked, do you avoid them? Because disorderly people are
contagious. They're contagious. Over the
years, I realized the thing that you do with them is not getting
tangled because they will talk you to a point where you're not
doing anything. And the next thing you know,
your house is all grown over with nettles and thorns and the
fences broken down thereof. And it's an evidence that God
has left it because only God can keep the house. Only God
can prune the yard. Only God can cause the vineyard
to bear fruit. Am I making some sense? And so
it's very important for us to understand this. God has given
us such a glorious message. The gospel. It is a glorious
message. God did it all, all to him we
owe, right? I mean, the message of redemption,
it is counter-cultural, it is revolutionary, it's still revolutionary. If God should ever give his church
his spirit again, we could turn the world upside down right now,
right now today, if you would do it. And we wouldn't have to
change one thing we're preaching. Just preach the same sovereign,
glorious message of redemption through Christ. And we've turned
the world upside down all over again. The capacity for it to
happen is in the message. The problem is in the people. The problem is in the church.
So what Paul does through every epistle is this. He says to the
church, adorn the gospel, adorn the gospel with good works. You be the people who are most
dignified in serving God explicitly. Pick up the trash, be to work
on time, go the second mile, be full of the Spirit of God.
Be ready to be patient. Be ready to give an answer to
everyone that gives you, that asks you of the hope of the calling,
which is within you. And couple that treasure of the gospel that
causes you to bubble up with Christ loving you, with adorning
it by doing the best job you can on your job, by being the
best student in your school room, by getting the best grades, by
being ready to help. All that requires the Spirit
of God. All that requires the spirit of God. And hear me, listen
to me now. The reason why this ethic, this ethic is absent in
our church is also the reason why people don't pay the gospel
much attention. Cause they really do believe
that we're Christians. Now, you know, I actually have
some concerns about that. Cause I, I'm hearing pastors
talk about being born again, but like they, they separate
being born again from, actually living for Christ. Like you can
be saved, but you don't live for Christ. Like to me, I ain't
never heard that dichotomy before in my life, but they do that. They say you can be saved, you
know, and your life can be so toe up that no one can even see
it. You, you don't even have to believe the Bible. You have
to believe the word. You don't even have to believe you're saved,
but you can be safe. Parish your thought, but that's how they
think. Are you guys following? But what the Bible really does
say is this. I just want you to get this.
When God deposits in your life, and eternity with God that is
irrevocable, irrevocable. You're his and he's yours. And
there's therefore now no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus.
Glory is yours only down here. Honor me. That's what he says. Adorn the gospel. And if you
don't have that mindset, the problem is our culture is so
rent with sin and evil and theft and crime, crookedness and wickedness
and lying and cheating is not our culture. If we are depicted
as behaving that same way, they see no significance in our gospel. I'm just telling you the truth.
I'm just telling you the plain honest truth. I told my kids
as my kids were growing up, I said, listen, we're poor. We don't
have a whole lot of resources, but what we do have is the knowledge
of God and God is present in our home. And I want you to know
this, if you carry yourselves with character, my boys, if you
carry yourselves with character, my girls, if you respect your
elders, if you use proper diction when you're around adults and
people who are in authority and you use a sense of decorum, have
a sense of etiquette, have a sense of dignity about yourself, so
many doors will open for you that you can't even imagine.
People are looking for young people who understand the basic
principles of etiquette and respect and decorum And especially if
you call yourself after the name of jesus christ and lo and behold
the doors open They open god opens doors doesn't
it I went way over my time way over my time. If you got questions,
we can talk If not, we can stand and pray. I need five seconds
five four All right. Here you go, G. Yeah. We'll shut
it down in a few minutes. Testing. OK. On Job 69, I was
reading. And it talks about a, find it
real quick. So 69, uh, 19, actually it says,
uh, surely even now my witnesses in heaven and my evidence is
on high. Uh, my friends for me. And actually
skipping to 21, oh, that one might plead for a man with God,
as a man pleads for his neighbor. I was actually reading out of
the NIV version. And it talks about more like
an advocate and that pleads for him with God. And my question is, is he referring
to Christ there? There's no other person he could
refer to. OK. The word there is daismen. It's
the go between. Oh, that there might be someone
that can stand between me and God and speak for me. Job was
in a trial where he did not understand what was going on and he needed
to know what God was up to. You and I are in a world where
we don't know what's going on and we need to know what God
is up to. And the only person that can let us know what God
is up to is Christ. The days man is the person that
lays his hand on God being like God and lays his hand on us being
like us. so that as God he can tell us
what God is up to and as man he can tell God what we're up
to. That way we can come to a knowledge of what God is doing. Christians
assert to know what God is doing, don't we? But the only way we
know is we have a God-man who speak for God and speak for us
as a go-between in order for us to know what God is doing.
Job is asking for Christ.