You would turn to the Gospel
of John. Now if I say chapter 1 this morning,
I'm going to be meaning chapter 3. Okay? I've had a problem in
my brain this morning. I hope it's just old age. But
I'd start to write something down and I'd write John 1 and
I intended it to be John 3. So if you'll turn to the third
chapter of John, That'll be our home base this morning. And I'm not sure how much, how
many verses I can read and still leave time for our hymns and
a brief message. So let's read the entire description
and language between the Lord Jesus and this man named Nicodemus. It begins the chapter. and takes
us through the 21st verse. And it is verses 20 and 21 that
I'm going to try to speak about this morning. And I'm not sure at all that
when I finish, you'll be any better informed than you were
when you came. I hope you are, but I cannot
promise that. I've got one little skimpy sheet
of paper. And I wish I had more this morning. Sometimes that's all I want,
but not today. All right, John chapter 3, we
begin at verse 1. Everything in these 21 verses
now is connected. The Lord Jesus does not finish
with Nicodemus until the end of verse 21. And the 22nd verse
makes it absolutely plain that he's no longer involved in speaking
to Nicodemus. All right, verse 1. There was
a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews,
a member of what was called the Jewish Sanhedrin, which ran the
local affairs of the Jewish people unless it ran into conflict with
the country that was occupying them, which was Rome. And then
Rome always had the upper hand, unless they could make some kind
of pleas before Pilate or Herod or whomever to get things changed. And they could. I guess you could
say in their day, it's like in ours, you know, money has something
to do with changing politicians' minds, it's not a new fad, it's
just a whole lot more of them. A ruler of the Jews. Now this constituted more than
making decisions that governed the Jewish people, but it also
put him in what our Savior will refer to later as a teacher of
the Jews. He is a teacher of the Old Testament
law to the Jewish people. He's their instructor, or one
of them. Verse 2 says, the same came to
Jesus by night. And that is most important that
we notice that. Nicodemus would not have dared
come to see Christ in the daytime. You know why? other Pharisees
might see him, and it would be the end of his career. He comes
by night, and he said unto him, Nicodemus said to the Lord Jesus,
Rabbi, that word means teacher, we know that, and he's not speaking
for all the Pharisees, so maybe he's just speaking like we sometimes
do when we use the word we and we mean I. We know that you are
a teacher come from God. For no man can do these miracles
that you do except God be with him. The Lord Jesus answered
Nicodemus in verse 3 and said, Verily, verily, literally it
means amen, amen, I say unto you, except a man be born again. set to person be born again,
he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus is not a regenerated
man, at least not at this point. He's curious, he's interested,
he makes good questions at times, but he's not, he has no capacity
No part of his being that can receive divine spiritual truth. And we're all in the same boat.
That's how we come into this world. We're spiritually dead. We have no capacity to know or
to love or to understand or to believe God. These things are
all foreign to us. Religion can help you mimic them,
but it is not real. It will not last, and it certainly
will not endure into eternity. So Nicodemus is a very curious
man, but he doesn't understand what our Savior has just said
about being born again. Are you born again? If you are,
God did it, not us. Nicodemus is at least honest. and expresses bewilderment at
such a statement. He does not even know what it
means, let alone that he has been. And the truth is that when
you and I are born again, we can be born again and not even
know what the new birth is. And generally, that's the case.
We learn the definition later rather than sooner. Look how
it plays out. Verse 4, Nicodemus said to the
Lord Jesus, how can a man be born when he's old? See, he can
only understand things in an outward, physical, literal sense. And that's where all men are
by nature. We're born being able to understand
things outwardly, that we can touch, that we can hear, that
we can see, but we have no capacity by nature as we are born into
this world because Adam was a fallen being as our federal head and
representative. Adam passed on to every one of
the members of the human race to be born spiritually dead with
no spiritual capacity whatsoever. And Nicodemus shows that as clearly
as anything in the world. He said, do you mean a person
has to return to his mother's womb and be born a second time?
Our Lord said in verse 5, amen, amen, I say unto you, except
a man be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God. The first time he cannot see
the kingdom, this time he cannot enter. Now be careful with these
two words. In verse number five, except
a man be born of water, water. H20, cannot, does not, has not,
and will not wash away sin. Water cannot put sin away. This is far more than water.
This is the water of the Word of God, which is living, the
living Word of God, which is also the very person of our Lord
Jesus Christ, and not only born of the Word of God. Let's see,
how does James chapter 1, verse 18 put it? Of God's own will,
begat, that's birthed he us, by the word of God. The new birth does not occur
apart from statements in this book. A man who's never heard
anything about the Lord Jesus that's revealed in this book
cannot be born again because he's a stranger to this word.
If you've never heard the gospel, how can you believe the gospel?
If you don't know the Lord Jesus, how can you trust him? We cannot
trust a Christ that we do not know. So Nicodemus is in a predicament
to be sure. Verse six, that which is born
of the flesh is flesh. That's our native realm. That's
what we are by nature. That which is born of the Spirit
is spirit. Or perhaps it reads, that which
is born of the Holy Spirit is spiritual. Spiritual. We have no capacity for spiritual
things until we're born again, which gives us a spiritual life
in the soul. Verse 7, marvel not that I said
unto you, you must be born again. It's not optional. It's not,
well, if you feel like it, you must be born again, born from
above, born of God, born of the word, born, born of the Holy
Spirit. And now we read in verse eight,
that this process, this work that is called the new birth
or regeneration is strange in many ways. It is comparable to
the wind. the wind. Watch what it says
in verse 8. The wind blows where it will. It doesn't ask our permission.
We can't prevent it, though many people would sure love to try.
The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound thereof,
but cannot tell from where it comes And where it goes, so is
everyone that is born of the Spirit of God. The new birth
is completely spiritual, and it is intensely mysterious. We don't even know that it is
taking place until after the fact. I mean, even in ourselves. We may think we're having some
strange thoughts and strange feelings, and no doubt we are.
And may the Lord continue to give us such things. But we don't
know what it is to be born again. We're simply blind sinners having
their eyes opened, deaf sinners having their ears opened, dead
sinners having a new heart installed. The wind blows where it will,
and you hear the sound thereof, but cannot tell from where it
comes and where it goes, so is every one that is born of the
Spirit. Nicodemus answered and said to the Lord Jesus, How can
these things be? Jesus answered and said unto
him, Are you a master, a teacher in Israel, and know not these
things?" What you've been teaching these people. Same thing lost
preachers teach us. the works of the flesh, a religion
of works, not grace. I know, I've been there and done
that. You can't teach what you don't know. Verily, verily, verse
11, I say unto you, we speak, these are our Savior's words,
we speak that we do know and testify that we have seen and
you receive not our witness. You've expressed surprise at
what I've said, but you have not embraced, nor believed, nor
accepted or received what I've said. Verse 12, if I've told
you earthly things and you believe not, how shall you believe if
I tell you of heavenly things? If the new birth is incredible,
my, what about other things in regard to our life in Christ? that the believer lives by eating
the body and the blood of the Lord Jesus. Verse 13. I want you to look carefully
at this statement in verse 13. Our Lord says to Nicodemus, now
if he thought the new birth was hard to understand, try this
on for size. And no man has ascended up to
heaven, but he that came down from heaven. namely the Lord
Jesus himself. But he's not finished. Even the
Son of Man which is in heaven. The Lord Jesus in human flesh
is standing right before Nicodemus and yet he says, I am in heaven
this moment. Same time. Two places. Oh, but preacher, that's not
hard. He can do that as God. Oh, of course. It's part of being
God. You can't be God and not be everywhere
present. But that ain't what it says.
He calls himself related to that statement. What? The son of man. The Lord Jesus has two natures. One as the sinless perfect man
and the other as God. They are united, those two distinct
natures are united in just one single person. But when the Lord
Jesus speaks of being on this earth and being in heaven at
the same time, He says in my capacity as the Son of Man. The Son of Man. And when you
read your Bible, It would help us to understand portions of
it a great deal better if we would take careful note of these
two phrases, Son of Man and Son of God. One refers to His deity,
the other to His humanity. All right, verse 14. Here are
three verses in a row that are very important. The first one
has to do with God's remedy for sin, Christ is the remedy for
sin. Verse 13 says, 14, I'm sorry,
and as Moses lifted up the serpent, that was the brass serpent on
a long pole to be held up. When the flying serpents bit
the Israelites and those that were bitten, if they looked to
that brass serpent on the pole, they were cured and healed. And
if they did not look, they died. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
So the Lord Jesus was lifted up on the cross. And that brass
serpent on the pole was a picture of Him crucified. And if men
are to be drawn to Him to this day, it must be through the lifting
up of our Lord Jesus Christ. And not just Christ, but Christ
and what else? Him crucified. Crucified. So verse 14 is the
gospel remedy. Verse 15 is the result of the
gospel that whosoever believes in him should not perish but
have eternal life. Now for the reason, remedy, result,
and reason. For God so loved the world Christ
did not come and die on the cross in order for God to love His
people. Christ came and went to the cross
because God has loved His people from all eternity. So don't ever
say that the death of Christ changed God toward sinners. That is the most heinous thing
that could be said. No, Christ came as a result of
God's eternal love. As God, the Lord Jesus, shared
that same love and compassion. For God so loved the world that
he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him
should not perish but have everlasting life. It is not true that Christ
died for all men. It is true that he died for everyone
whom the Father gave him in the covenant of grace. And every
last single one of those persons must indeed be saved. Verse 17,
for God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world,
we'll see in a moment why that is, but that the world through
Him might be saved. Now speaking of His not coming
to condemn the world, verse 19 says, I mean, Number 18, I'm sorry. He that
believes on Him is not condemned. But he that believes not is condemned
already. Why should the Lord Jesus in
His death further condemn? Being condemned is condemned.
There are no degrees in that. Because the reason for that condemnation
that has existed since the fall of Adam in the garden, because
he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God."
Now, if you'll listen carefully, we'll read these three verses
and try to withhold comment. And this is the condemnation,
that light is come into the world and men, all men, Me and you
and everybody else. Men loved darkness rather than
light because their deeds were evil. For everyone that does
evil, do you do evil? Everyone that does evil. Now the King James renders that
doeth. And our word for that does, does
not exactly give us all the meaning of it. It is a continuous tense. It means He does and He does
and He does. It keeps right on. It's not a
simple statement of something that happens and then doesn't
continue. Everyone that does evil hates the light, neither
comes to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But
he that doeth truth not believes it, not hears it, does it. He
that doeth truth comes to the light that his deeds may be made
manifest, that they are not his own, but they are wrought in
God." Verse 20 and 21, John chapter 3. One speaks of doing evil. The other speaks of doing truth. Doing truth. He that does truth. Strange. Strange indeed. All
right, let's take just a moment in verse 20. For everyone that
doeth. I'm going to make myself use
the King James Word on that verb. Everyone that doeth evil. What else is true about us if
we do evil? We hate the light. We hate the
light. That's more than just sunlight.
It's the light of the world, the Lord Jesus. I know parents
and grandparents and great-grandparents and whatever other kind of parents
there are, they teach their children to say that they love Jesus while
they're still in diapers. But it is not so. It is not so. It is a deception. We cannot
truly love the Lord Jesus until we are born again. He that doeth
evil hates the light, particularly the light of the gospel. Neither
comes to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. His good works, His religious
works be rejected, much like the Savior does in Matthew 7,
21 through 43. He called those very, those were
very religious people now. He called them, depart from me
you workers of iniquity, I never knew you. Just one scripture
on verse 20, where did I put it? Oh, 1 Kings
chapter 22, and this is I shot myself in the foot earlier,
as you plainly saw, when I read too long. So I'm going to have to just
give you the highlights here in 1 Kings 22. The setting is this. Jehoshaphat,
who is the king of Judah, the southern kingdom, and Ahab, who
is the king of Israel or the northern kingdom are joining
forces to fight the Syrians. And they want a word from God
that He'll go with them. They don't particularly want
to go to battle if they're going to lose. So all the prophets that
Ahab housed and fed and so forth,
they all came. They all said the same thing,
the Lord will be with you and you'll be victorious. One after
the other, the same message, the same message. Well, the other
king, Jehoshaphat, he got kind of worried. You know, here's
40 different men and they're all singing the same song. And
here we are in our generation, the Baptists, the Methodists,
the Presbyterians, the Pentecostals, Catholic, Protestant, Anglican,
whatever there is, my soul. Jehovah Witness even, and Mormons,
put them in the mix. They're all saying the same thing.
You don't suppose it would be a lie, do you? Might not be a
bad suggestion. You better check it out and find
out. I got my religion from one of those churches, born and bred. Took me a long time to find out
I was still lost, and I didn't know a clue about who God is
and what salvation is. So Jehoshaphat says to Ahab,
listen, is this all the prophets you got? Ahab finally said, well,
actually, I have one more. But he never has a good word
to say about me, never says a good word about me. Well, let's bring
him in. So they went and got him. His
name is Micaiah. This thing starts at the very
beginning of 1 Kings 22. I did give you the right chapter,
didn't I? And let me see if I can find
where to start here. Oh, and in verse 11, one of the
false prophets even had him some horns made out of iron. And so he, you know, he brought
a, what do you call that? Ah, there's a word for that.
What is it? A visual aid, I guess you could call it, to show Ahab
what the Lord was going to help him to do. He took that set of
horns from that animal, or not really from the animal, that
were made out of iron, and in verse 11 he said, with these
shall you push the Syrians until you've consumed them. And all
the prophets in verse 12 prophesied so, saying, Go up to Ramoth,
Gilead, and prosper, for the Lord shall deliver it into the
king's hand. And then Micaiah comes on the
scene. And the messenger that was gone to call Micaiah spoke
unto him, saying, They're going to tell him what he's going to
say. Behold now the words of the prophets. We want you to
know what these other prophets have said, so don't you mess
up you know, the recipe. Declare good unto the king with
one mouth. Let your word, I pray you, be
like the word of one of them and speak that which is good.
And Micaiah said, as the Lord lives, what the Lord says unto
me, that will I speak. So he came to the king, and the
king said to him, Micaiah, shall we go against Ramoth Gilead to
battle, or shall we forbear? And he answered him. Now you've
got to see the irony in this now. He said, go and prosper,
for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the king. And
now Ahab is just put out. He doesn't believe him. And the
king said to him, how many times shall I adjure you that you tell
me nothing but that which is true in the name of the Lord?
And he said, this Micaiah said, I saw all Israel scattered upon
the hills as sheep that had not a shepherd. And the Lord said,
these have no master. Let them return every man to
his house in peace. And the king of Israel said to
Jehoshaphat, Now listen carefully. Did I not tell you that he would
prophesy no good concerning me but evil? Boy, when I read that again,
I just, I said, goodness, that's where we are. And if you'll read
a little further in that chapter, Ahab decided in going into battle
he would disguise himself so nobody would recognize him. So
he goes into battle and it says a warrior took a bow, and just
at a venture, not even aiming at anything, just shot an arrow
into the air. And it went through the joints
of the harness of Ahab's armor, just like it was a guided missile,
because God was guiding that arrow. What was it the poet said? Not a single shaft can hit till
the God of love sees fit. That's the believer's protection,
but not Ahab. All right, let's go back to the
New Testament, John. I'd like to work on that some
more, but that gives you a picture of he that doeth evil and the
strange circumstances in 1 Kings chapter 22. I probably said chapter
8, didn't I? Anyway, it was Bobey 22. One
more picture out of that verse. It's right here in John chapter
1. Yes, I mean chapter 1 this time.
Beginning at verse 45 in John chapter 1, Philip finds Nathanael
and said to him, we have found Him of whom Moses in the law
and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said to Philip,
can any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip simply said,
come and see. Come and see. Now here's a picture
of a man who does truth. His name is Nathanael. Now remember,
this will be his first sight of the Lord Jesus. He's evidently
a very religious man and an Old Testament worshiper of Christ. So that his only sight of the
Messiah is as he's represented to him in the sacrifices and
ceremonies of the worship of the Old Testament. Now, many
of those Old Testament worshippers are just like the worshippers
of our day. They're false worshippers. You can't read parts of the Old
Testament and not be overwhelmed by that fact. Read the book of
Malachi. I mean, the priests were in cahoots
with the people that came to worship. They worship God by
sacrificing sick and animals with all kind of ailments and
deformities and pretended that God accepted it by putting fire
under the sacrifice. Normally it would be God putting
the fire like He did for Elijah on Mount Carmel. But here is
a man whom the Lord Jesus describes as being an Israelite, with no
guile, no hypocrisy and no pretense. He is what he is. He doesn't
change appearances when he's before certain people. And when
Nathan lays eyes on the Lord Jesus and hears but one statement
out of his mouth, look what happens. Jesus saw Nathanael coming to
him and said of him in verse 47, Behold, an Israelite indeed,
in whom is no guile. Nathanael said unto him, How
do you know me? From where do you know me? In
effect saying, I've never seen you. And the Lord Jesus said,
Before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree,
he said, I saw you. Now watch this. Nathanael answered
and said unto him, Rabbi, You are the Son of God. First time he laid eyes on Him,
based on one single thing, the Lord Jesus saw him without being
present where He was. He concluded immediately that
the Lord Jesus has to be God. He said to Him, You are the Son
of God. You are the King of Israel. And
it was over. Decided just simply on that one
thing. That's a man that does truth.
Does truth. Alright, let's go back to chapter
3. Verse 21. First word I want to
remind you of in this verse is the word he. Let's see, is that
still an individual pronoun? He is speaking about a specific
and certain person. The things about which we are
to read in verse 21 are things that must be seen by us personally
and individually. We are not at liberty to take
these things as if we shared them in common with other people,
though we do. It is an intensely personal matter. this business of doing truth. Alright? So we have the word
He. Does. Doeth. Truth. Truth. Now the Bible has a lot to say
about truth. It talks about the way of truth. But the most glorious thing of
all in the whole book of the scriptures when it comes to truth
is that the Lord Jesus is the truth. Any man who does truth must do
so as a result of being in Christ and be enamored, overwhelmed,
and overcome by who he is and what he's done for poor sinners.
And if that ain't true of me, I cannot possibly be said to
do truth. He that doeth truth. Here's the
next thing. The opposite of verse of verse
20, it says, they hated the light. But here it says, comes to the
light desiring that all should see that all his works are actually
the work of God in him by his grace and through the very gift
of faith that God has bestowed. He that doeth truth comes to
the light. Why? That his deeds may be made
manifest that they are wrought in God. If you turn to the book
of Acts, I want just one verse to finish up with. I've got plenty
more here, but I'll have to do something else with them.
Acts chapter 17. You've heard this, I don't know
how many times. The question is, do I believe
it? Now, the God of the Bible is not the God of most, I want
to say 99% of today's professing religion, at least in America. I don't live anyplace else. I
don't, you know, my goodness, I just stick in Harnett County
most of the time, so I'll just talk about Harnett County. Most
of Harnett County religion is not worshiping the God of the
Bible. And here's how I know. This is important. You better
find out who God is. Here's one of the first things
we must know. Paul is preaching in Athens,
Greece, on top of a hill called Mars Hill, where all the relics
of the Greeks of generations ago and centuries ago is still
visible. And on top of that hill, they
had an altar to every deity that they could find anywhere. And just in case they had missed
one, they put an altar and it said, to the unknown God. And Paul said, that's the God
I've come to preach to you. the one you don't know. And every
gospel preacher must preach from the same vantage point. We declare
a God that you do not know and cannot know unless he sees fit
to reveal himself to you. And here's the test. There are
many of them, but this is one that cannot be missed. Verse
25, speaking of the God of the Bible, Neither is worshiped. God cannot be and is not worshiped
with men's hands as though He needed anything. God doesn't need me and He does
not need you. And when a preacher tells you
otherwise, he is doing just like Ahab's prophets. He's lying. Now, he may be convinced that
he's telling you the truth. because green stuff sometimes
changes a man's opinion, you know. I'm sure the prophets of
Ahab fared quite well when he was still living. God cannot
be worshipped when you tell men that he needs something from
you and you won't give it to him and he's too nice to take
it. Yeah, ask Ahab about that. God
can't be worshipped with the thought, the idea or the philosophy
that God needs me. Now, God uses men. He uses means. But He doesn't
have to use me. The truth is, we need Him. And until we know that, backward
and forward and left to right, in every way it can be known,
we do not know what it means to serve God. We must serve Him
with this idea firmly in mind that He does not need me." Well,
preacher, how are you going to keep the church doors open? Well,
if God doesn't keep them open, they can shut. There ain't no
need to have them open if He ain't here. Now, you can fill
this place up if you do the right stuff. But it'll be over my dead
body, and I think it'll be over a good many of yours. So, you
know. Hey, I'm getting the wrong book.
Y'all got me addled here. Chorus book number.