All right, let's take our Bibles. And to Curtis and Craig and Ed
and Doug and whoever else is brave enough
to stand up to preach. It gets easier all the time. And that's a joke. But I want to read to you out
of 1 John chapter 5. Since there's just 21 verses,
let's read the chapter. The subject this morning is faith, the faith of God's elect. 1 John chapter 5, verse 1. Here's an amazing statement.
I want you to see it in your own Bible. Whosoever, no matter
who it is, when it is, or where it is, whosoever believes that
Jesus is the Christ or the Messiah, what common denominator is there
between all these people from all over the world from every
generation? Whosoever believes that Jesus
is the Christ is born of God. Now that's a spiritual birth.
It's what the Bible calls being born again. It also uses the
word regeneration. Whosoever believes that Jesus
is the Christ is born of God. Absolute, no exceptions. To be born again is to believe
and trust and rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is to have the life of God
in the soul. And everyone that loves Him that
beget, that is, loves the God who birthed us into Christ, whose
and everyone that loves him that begat, loves him also that is
begotten of him." Here's what that means. Believers love each
other. It's family. You have to. You must. You do. Grace enables it. He brings it to pass. By this you shall know that we
love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God,
that we keep His commandments, and His commandments are not
grievous. That's pronounced correctly now,
grievous. But look what it says about the Lord's children. They
keep God's commandments. And yet we both know that we
broke every one of the Ten Commandments. Not one time, but gazillions
of times. We did before we were converted
and we have after we've been converted. This is not just talking about
outwardly, but inwardly. It's not just talking about the
hand or the eyes. It's talking about the mind. So how is this to be reconciled? Here it is. If you remember,
we're not turning there now or I'll never finish this reading.
Matthew 25, when our Lord is speaking about two classes of
persons, the only two that divides the whole human race, sheep and
goats, saved and lost, children of God and children of the devil.
It's the only two divisions there are in this whole world. And
he begins to speak about his sheep that they Did all these
things for Christ? They visited Him in prison. They
gave Him food when He was hungry and, you know, water when He's
thirsty and on and on and on. And they said, when did we do
these things? We don't remember it. Obeying God's commandment is
the natural result of being born again. It ain't something you
pin up on the wall and you say, now, on Monday I'm going to work
on this one and Tuesday I'm going to work on this one. That's pure
free will religion is all that is and it's dead as a doornail.
There's no life in it. All it does is fill people with
pride. So read these statements carefully and you will see the
wonder and glory of God's grace. Verse 4, Whatsoever is born of
God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that
overcomes the world, even our faith. Who is He that overcomes the
world? Here they are, real simple. He
that believes that Jesus is the Son of God. And if one overcomes, they all
overcome because Christ is our overcomer and we overcome by
virtue of being in Him. That puts all believers on a
perfect level. Verse 6, This is He that came
by water and blood even Jesus Christ, not by water only, but
by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that bears
witness, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that
bear record in heaven, the Father and the Word, which is Christ,
and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one. And there are
three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit and the water, and
the blood, and these three agree in one. If we receive the witness
of men, the witness of God is greater, for this is the witness
of God which He has testified of His Son. He that believes on the Son has
the witness in himself He that believes not God has made God
a liar because he believes not the record that God gave of His
Son. Now what is that record? This
book. This book. And here's what the record says,
verse 11, this is the record that God has given to us eternal
life, and this life is in His Son. And it ain't no place else. It's in His Son, in the precious
Lord Jesus. Verse 12, He that has the Son
has life. That's pretty simple, isn't it? Whoever by the grace of God and
the Spirit of God has laid a hold Christ with saving faith has
life. He that has the Son has life
and he that has not the Son of God has not life. Now that's called cut and dried. These things have I written unto
you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may
know that you have eternal life, and that you may believe on the
name of the Son of God." This is the confidence that we
have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears
us. And if we know that he hears
us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that
we desire of him. Now that doesn't mean that because
you believe God will give you a million dollars, you believe
him and then you can go ahead and start collecting it. That's
just stupidity. Reveals what we are and where
our wants are. Verse 16, if any man see his
brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask and
the Lord shall give him life for them that sin not unto death.
There is a sin unto death. I do not say that he shall pray
for it. And I have no idea and I can't
explain that to you. Verse 17, in all unrighteousness
is sin. And there is a sin not unto death. We know that whosoever is born
of God... Now this one will also surprise
you no matter how many times you've read it. We know that whosoever is born
of God sins not. The only way that can be true
is because we are joined and united by saving
faith to the gloriously, sinlessly perfect Lord Jesus Christ and
in Him we have no sin, none. In ourselves, we're still full
of sin. Now, if you want a detailed explanation,
try Romans chapter 7, about verse 12 to verse 25, and you'll find
it clearly explained. We know that whosoever is born
of God sins not, but he that is begotten of God keeps himself,
and that wicked one touches him not. And we know that we are
of God, And the whole world lies in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God
has come and has given us an understanding that we may know
Him that is true, Christ who is the truth, even in His Son,
Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal
life. Little children, keep yourselves
from idols. And if you have trouble with
that, beg the Savior to do it for you. All right, if you'll mark your
place at 1 John chapter 5, I invite you to turn with me to the book
of Romans Chapter 10, just one verse out of Romans 10. The faith that saves the soul,
the faith that is common to all of God's elect. They're the only
people with this faith. Romans chapter 10. Let us pray. Lord, thank you. We bless you. Thank you for your mercy to let a poor sinner sing a song so honoring and exalting
to the blessed Savior, how privileged we are. Lord, we come this day in this
place to lift up, to exalt, to magnify,
praise, to worship, to sing of and to preach of our blessed
Redeemer, your precious Son, this One who is the Christ, the
Messiah, the only hope for sinners. Lord, enable us as we continue
this hour to speak those words that you
would have spoken, those words that you intend to bless to our
souls. How desperately we need your
presence in our midst and upon your word as we read and speak
of it. Lord, without your presence nothing of any lasting purpose and good
takes place. We beg You, we plead with You
through the very One who intercedes for us, none other than our Savior. Lord, grant us Your presence.
We pray for Christ's sake, Amen. All right, the first statement
about faith is found in Romans chapter 10. How do we come to have this faith
if indeed we do have it? We either do or we don't. If
you look at verse 17 in Romans chapter 10, without trying to
deal with what's in front of this or after it, I take just
this simple statement, verse 17, so then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So this book is a message pertaining
to the Lord Jesus Christ. It starts at Genesis 1-1 and
ends somewhere about Revelation 22 and I don't remember the final
verse. But this book is all about Christ
and His purpose for coming, His purpose for dying, His purpose
in being raised from the dead, All has to do with this matter
of giving to those that God gave to Him in old eternity, for Him
to redeem, to be their surety, to stand for them in the covenant
of grace, that they may come to this place. Faith comes by
hearing. Now that doesn't mean that faith
doesn't come by reading, for there is a certain sense in which
the eyes can hear by what they read. So we're not trying to
make some artificial distinction, but I'm telling you it has to
do with hearing. The gospel must be heard. No salvation apart from it. Faith
comes by hearing. And hearing by the Word of God. We can't just preach anything. We must preach what's in this
book concerning the Lord Jesus and concerning ourselves. And
there are hundreds and hundreds of examples and illustrations.
The four Gospels are full. The book of Acts is full. For
that matter, all the books of Scripture furnish us with plenty
of work, plenty of room, for us to look at this subject of
our blessed Savior and Him crucified. One more time, so then, the word
so has reference to what has just been said. So if you look
through all the verses that lead up to verse 17 in Romans chapter
10, and then if you'll go further than that and think of all the
chapters and verses in the book of Romans that has preceded that,
And even that's not the end of the line. You can go further
than that. So then, faith comes by hearing. It doesn't come by trying. It comes by hearing. And hearing
by the Word of God. This Word is the written Word,
and this Word speaks of the living Word, which is Christ Himself.
You cannot divorce the Bible from the Son of God. It is about
Him. He is the primary subject of
this book in all places in our Bibles. Faith comes by hearing. Now go to 1 John chapter 5 where
we took our reading earlier. Just want to work on just a very
few verses here in 1 John chapter 5. Let's start at verse 9. 1 John
5, 9. If we receive the witness of
men, and we do in a thousand different ways, The witness of
God is greater, infinitely greater. For this is the witness of God
which he testifies concerning his son. Here it is. Here's God's, the summation of
God's witness of Christ from the beginning of time to the
end of time. This is so simple, there's not
a soul in here that doesn't understand the meaning of these words. The Bible's not hard to understand
because it's difficult. It's hard to understand because
it's so, because it's telling us the truth, the whole truth
and nothing but the truth. He that believes on the Son of
God has the witness, that is, the witness of the Holy Spirit
in Himself, who is also called the Spirit of Christ, whom the
Savior promised in John chapter 16. He that believes on the Son
of God has the witness in Himself. He that believes not God has
made God a liar. simply because he believes not
the record that God gave of His Son. Now let's make sure we didn't
miss it. Verse 11, and this is the record. This is the divine record. This
is the testimony and witness of God. This is what God in His
Word has said concerning His Son, the Lord Jesus. This is
the record that God has given to us eternal life. And this life is in His Son. That's the only eternal life
there is, is in Christ. Now there's also something called
eternal death. You understand that, I'm sure. Verse 12, He that has the Son. How do you
have Christ? By believing and trusting and
receiving Him. He that has the Son has life,
he that has not the Son of God has not life. He can have everything
else, but not this. Verse 13, these things have I
written unto you that believe on the name, the name of the
Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. It
is God's purpose for His children to know that they are believers,
that they have an interest, a saving interest in the Savior's blood,
that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may
believe on the name of the Son of God, which they've already
in that category, but they continue to do so. All right, one more passage. You want to know where it is?
Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews 11. Some of you are saying, oh no,
he's going through all this catalog of believers out of the Old Testament. Somebody called this chapter
the Book of God's Martyrs. There's a bunch of them in here. Only verses 1, 2, and 3. These three verses define for
us what faith is. Verses 4 through however many
there are in this chapter give us examples of people who possessed
this faith. I mean from the beginning, you
know, right on up to New Testament times. Hebrews chapter 11. Here's another definition now
for faith. Now faith is the substance. My margin renders that word substantiating. You can have either one you want.
Now faith is the substance, the essence, the being of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Faith must look through eyes
other than our natural eyes. It must be the eyes of the soul,
the eyes of the heart. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Now, when faith becomes
sight, you no longer need faith. You don't need faith to believe
that you're sitting there about half asleep on a church pew on
a Sunday morning. I'm only kidding. But you understand
what I mean? There's no purpose for faith
when that's the case. The evidence of things not seen. For by it, verse 2, by faith,
the elders obtained a good report. All you do is go to verse 4 and
just take off through the remaining part of this chapter and you'll
run into character after character, some of which may surprise you.
All right, verse 3, through faith, We understand
that the worlds were framed by the word of God so that things which are seen
were not made of things which do appear. When this world was
created, there was nothing from which to create it. God simply
spoke it into being. It says here, The worlds were framed by the
Word of God. That is, by God speaking the
whole universe into existence. Now, the general understanding
of faith is that it's something that the sinner has to come up
with in order to do business with Christ. Preachers have been
lying since longer than I've been alive in the South, in the
United States of America, particularly the state of North Carolina,
though I don't think it's any worse than any other. But preachers
have told us, if you'll believe, God will save you. My soul, we
just read in 1 John 5, 1, if you're not born again, you don't
even have faith. You cannot have it. And if you're
born again, you must have it. So why all the mix-up? Because
people hate the doctrine of the gospel of salvation as revealed
in this book. I do, you do, and everybody does
until God saves us by His grace. And then we love a Savior that
beforehand we despised. Now, don't get me wrong. We all
had a Savior and His name was Jesus. He just ain't the Jesus
of the Bible. No, he's one that's trying, hoping,
wanting, and you won't let him or help him. And that's an absolute
lie. And if you don't despise it,
you deny the truth of the gospel of God. And so do I. If we tip our hat to that other
gospel, you can tip your hat goodbye to this one because we've
left it. Now, you think that's hard. That's
just reality. Psalm 119, verse 128, Therefore
I esteem all your precepts, all of them now, concerning all things
to be right. And if that's true, and I hate
every false way, if you don't hate the false gospel, you don't
love the souls of men, not even your own. Something's bad or
wrong. We've missed Christ somewhere. So I want to talk to you just
a minute or two about this concept of faith that's
not really faith at all. It's just a man saving himself,
saving himself. I want to read and comment while
I read on a statement made by Brother Hawker in his poor man's
commentary on Hebrews chapter 11. verses 1 through 3. This gospel, he says, this Christ,
is to me substance. Remember that in our reading
just a second ago in verse 1? Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. In Proverbs 8, verse
21, we have these words, I will cause them that love me to inherit
substance, and I will fill their treasures. Again, 1 Peter 1,
verses 8 and 9. Speaking of Christ Jesus, whom Having not seen, we love. Have you ever seen Christ? No. Oh, I saw a picture of Him. There
ain't no pictures of Him. That's somebody's idol. You ought
to leave that alone. You made me lose my place. Whom
having not seen, you love. in whom, though now we see him
not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full
of glory, receiving the end, the result of our faith, even
the salvation of our souls." 1 Peter 1, verses 8 and 9. These people's faith in apostolic
days needed not the presence of what they believed
in. In other words, at this point,
when Hebrews is written, when 1 Peter is written, when 1 John
is written, Christ walks this earth no more. He's been raised,
ascended, and seated on a throne in eternal glory. So these people,
these believers that are described in these words did not need the
physical presence of Christ and neither do we. It's worshipping Him the only
way God can be worshipped according to John chapter 4 when Christ
talked to the Samaritan woman at the well and that is in spirit. and in truth, that is spiritual
worship and true worship, which means only praising our Lord
Jesus Christ. God's testimony for these New
Testament believers was enough. The testimony of the words of
this book, that's sufficient. That's sufficient. And that's
all we got from here on out. There's not going to be any more
Scripture. All right. One word more concerning faith. Faith is the gift of God. Edward said that in his Bible
lesson this morning. Faith is the gift of God. Now, if it's God's gift, it cannot
be something that I come up with on my own and get credit for.
You know, win points and travel miles and whatever else there
is. Faith is the gift of God. Ephesians 2, verses 8 and 9. Philippians chapter 1, verse
29. Christ is also the author and
finisher of our faith. Hebrews chapter 12, verse 2. So there's all kinds of statements
in our Bibles having to do with faith and Christ. And it is His
doing and not ours. When God gives us faith, when
He truly imparts faith to our souls, we do not all have the same degree
of faith. Well, how much do we have? Whatever
God is pleased to convey to you or to me. And the person with
the weakest faith and the person, now listen carefully, with the
strongest faith, who never speak of themselves as having strong
faith, but the weakest and the strongest, have an equal participation
and receiving from Christ Jesus the Lord. The weak faith is just
as saved as the strong faith. And God determines what it is.
He gives us whatever degree of faith we have. Therefore, it must follow that
what is God's gift cannot be man's merit. Hence, it must follow that the
glory of faith in the exercise of His people is entirely of
the Lord. We don't take our faith out and
look at it and say, my, that looks so good. I think I'll worship
my faith today. No, if you can do that, you don't
have the kind this Bible is talking about. Saving faith has one single
solitary object that is Jesus Christ of Nazareth,
the Son of God, the Messiah. He doesn't share that spot with
anyone. It belongs exclusively to Him. It may appear strange to some,
Mr. Hawker says, when I say that
I consider faith Now, you've got to listen carefully here.
You're going to miss this. If you've got this poor man's
commentary, look it up this afternoon or this evening. I consider faith as the act of
Christ upon my soul more than my act of dependence
upon him. And he can back it up with Scripture,
too. You watch this. In fact, let's just let that
be our last. I've got three minutes. No, I've got 30 minutes to go
on my calendar. Galatians 2. In verse 20, let me remind you
of what that says. speak to us from this verse to
help us to identify what this faith is that saves the soul.
Galatians 2.20, these famous words of the Apostle Paul, I
am crucified with Christ. I've been put to death when Christ
was put to death. Nevertheless, I live. Yet it's not really me that lives. Yet not I, but Christ lives in
me. And the life which I now live
in the flesh, here it is. I live, how? By the faith, not
of me or you, by the faith of the Son of God. who loved me
and gave himself for me." It ain't so much faith in Christ,
it has to be first and foremost the faith of Christ. Now let me read how he sets this
up and speaks of it. Mark the expression, not Paul's
life of faith in the Son of God, But the faith of the Son of God,
and there are like five places, I know there are four, and I
want to say five in the New Testament, that makes this distinction of
the faith, the faith of Christ. Faith of Christ. It is not Paul's
act upon Christ, but Christ's act upon him. And how is this
proved? The life of faith, like any other
life, is a life of receivings, not givings, similar to physical
life, or animal life as he calls it, which is entirely kept up
and preserved by receiving food and water and air and strength
and whatever else it takes to keep this physical person of
ours alive. This stuff does not come from
us, it comes into us. And that's how it is in this
matter of faith. All right? Watch this now. These
things are received to live upon. They're incomings, not outgoings. The incomings are first received
as the cause. The outgoings are exercised as
the effect. Now, if we can get that straight
in our minds, we understand this. Our faith does not cause God
to save us. God gives us faith because he
is saving us. Reader, if these things are so,
How does it reduce and bring low the pride of all our attainments? How forcible comes home the words
of the apostle, for who makes you to differ from another? And
what do you have that you did not receive? Amen.