If you have your Bible with you
this morning, turn with me to the Gospel of St. Matthew chapter
7. Matthew chapter 7. I'd like to
read verse 21 down through verse 23. Not every one that saith unto
me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he
that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will
say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied
in thy name, and in thy name have cast out devils, and in
thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess
unto them, I never knew you, Depart from me, ye that work
iniquity. There are two other verses you
can just listen as I read them. One is found in the book of Revelation
chapter 3 and verse 1. And unto the angel of the church
in Sardis write, These things saith he that hath the seven
spirits of God and the seven stars, I know thy works, that
thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead. Thou hast a name
that thou livest and art dead. 1 John 3 and verse 18, My little
children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but
in deed and in truth. I want to speak this morning
a message that I've been thinking about bringing for some time
on reality in religion. Reality in religion. This is
a message that I believe that ought to be preached about at
least once every year in a congregation like this. Reality in religion. Now beloved, if we profess to
have a relationship with God, let us take care that this relationship
is a real relationship. Now what do I mean when I use
the word real? I mean that which is genuine,
that which is sincere, that which is honest and thorough. Not hollow,
not formal, not false, counterfeit, and sham, nor nominal. A real relationship with God
is not mere show and pretense. It is something inward. It is
something solid. It is something substantial.
It is living. It is lasting. Is our religious
perfection real? You say, Preacher, I don't know
whether my perfection is real or not. I am a very weak person. Well, you may be weak and you
may be feeble, and you may have many infirmities in your life,
We know there are babes in Christ, we know that there are young
men in Christ, there are old men in Christ, and there are
mature believers, but I'm really not dealing with that today.
What must be determined today is, is my profession that I have
made, is it a real profession? A want of reality is a feature,
I believe, of a vast amount. of perfections that are made
in churches in this present day. The want of reality. Now our Lord Jesus Christ, He
spoke very plainly and emphatically here in Matthew chapter 7, when
He said that not everyone that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, not
everyone who polyparents the word, Lord, Lord, he says, shall
enter in the kingdom of heaven. A lot of people can have Jesus,
as it were, weashed off on them. A lot of people can have the
name of Jesus planted into their minds very, very early in life. And they go through life talking
about the Lord and saying amen to some of the things that are
said about Him. But Jesus said they're not going
to enter the kingdom of heaven simply by just using my name. But it's he that doeth the will
of my Father which is in heaven. Now we know the will of the Father
which is in heaven. is that you believe on His Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the will of Him that
sent me, Jesus said, that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth
on Him might have everlasting life. It's believing on God's
Son. It's trusting in Him. That's
doing the will of the Father which is in Heaven. That's making
the Lord Jesus Christ to be the way the truth and the life in
your own heart and your own soul. So then he goes on to say, but
many will say unto me in that day, in that day of judgment,
in that day when they stand before me, in that day where all souls
will be gathered before me, both the sheep and the goats, many
will say unto me that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied
in thy name? And in thy name have cast out
devils? And in thy name done many wonderful
works? And the Lord says, and then I
will profess unto them, because they're simply not regenerate
people, they're only people gone through the motions, they're
only people that have had Jesus, as we said, weaned off on them
by their parents, or maybe by some personal worker. But anyway,
He goes on to say that I will profess unto them that I never
knew you, Depart from Me, ye that work iniquity. You're workers
of iniquity in reality. In reality, you're truly not
a true child of God in whom the principle of divine grace has
been planted. You're truly not a regenerate
soul, but you're a worker of iniquity. And He said, Depart
from Me. And He meant, you depart from
Me into everlasting burning, into everlasting judgment. So
if we measure the religion of our day by its quantity, belovedies,
there is not a lot of it. There certainly is. There is
a great amount of religion in our day, but if we measure it
by its quality and by its realness, there is very little indeed.
There are few really, that find that straight gate and that narrow
way which leadeth unto life. There be many whose profession
is not real. Now, brother, sister, the need,
the want of the hour is more reality in our relationship with
God. Is your relationship with the
Lord, your professed relationship, with the Lord, is it real? Well,
first of all, I want to show the importance of reality in
our profession. And in the second place, I'll
give you a test by which we may prove whether or not our own
profession is real or not. And thirdly, we'll make some
application at the end. But first of all, I want, if
I can, to show the importance of reality in our profession.
Are we all convinced of the importance of reality in our relationship
with God? You say, Preacher, surely you
don't think any one of us here are false or unreal? We are all sincere and true,
don't you know that, Preacher? Sure, we're all real, but my
friend, we all think we're real, but nevertheless we need, and
I don't want to be uncharitable and harsh and unkind, but I doubt
that everyone's religion here is real. I doubt it. I'm suspicious. And I believe I have a reason
to be suspicious. It would be a miracle of the
grace of God if everyone in a congregation this size, if everybody's religion
was absolutely real. My friend, we need to look to
this. Now this widespread delusion
that there is reality in all religion is why we preach on
this subject today. Because it's commonly held that
if you're religious, it's real. Well my friend, we don't buy
that. The Word of God don't teach that. The Word of God teaches
clearly that these relationships that we profess to have must
be examined. We must examine ourselves to
see whether or not we're in the faith. And so, beloved, listen,
I want men and women to understand. I want them to understand that
reality is far more rare and uncommon than is commonly supposed. It is far more rare than we commonly
suppose to find somebody whose relationship is genuine, whose
relationship is truly of God, and it's real in the soul of
that individual. Now consider this. Many of the
parables, I believe, were written to expose the danger of not being
real. The parables of the sower, for
an example, and of the wheat, and the tares, and the wedding
garment, and the ten virgins, and the talents, and the two
builders that are mentioned in the last part here of chapter
7 of the book of Matthew. They all bring out the difference.
between reality and unreality in our professed relationship
to God. They all show the utter uselessness
and the danger of profession without reality. And then again,
think with me about the language of our Lord Jesus Christ, about
the scribes and the Pharisees. Eight times in one chapter, that's
Matthew chapter 23, we hear him denouncing them as hypocrites. He says, Woe unto you scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, ye serpents! You generation of blind
guides, you generation of vipers, how can you escape the damnation
of hell? Why would he use such language
on these people who were more moral and more decent after the
flesh than the publicans and the harlots to which he ministered. Why would he so speak to these
individuals? The reason is, is to show us
the abominableness of false profession and mere outward religion in
God's sight. God detests it when a man has
only this outward facade. Now, there seems to be nothing
which is so displeasing to our Savior, the Lord Jesus, as hypocrisy
and unreality. Note again and look at this fact
with me. Again, there's hardly a grace
in the character of a true Christian of which you will not find a
counterfeit described in the Word of God. Number one, listen
to this. Is there not an unreal repentance
talked about in the Word of God? Did not Saul, Ahab, Esau, and
Herod, and Judas Iscariot, did not they have many feelings of
sorrow about sin? But was there repentance? Was
it real? But they never repented unto
salvation, did they? No, every one of them, while
they had some sorrow in their heart, it was not a sorrow that
led them to repentance that needed not to be repented of. Until
God gives you repentance, my friend, then you don't have it. You don't have it until God is
pleased to grant you true, genuine repentance. Has God ever given
you a disposition where that you would take a stand against
yourself and where you would take sides with God against yourself? Have you ever had that kind of
a feeling or disposition come over you? Where you could say,
I loathe myself, I glory in the holy God of the Bible, and I
love Him, and I hate myself, and I hate and loathe my sin. Have you ever had that? Have
you ever taken sides with God against yourself? Have you ever
been able to do that? Well, godly sorrow, we read in
2 Corinthians 7 and 10, work of repentance to salvation, not
to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world, work of death. And I know there's a lot of people
that are sad about their situations and their condition in this life. Maybe it's their health, maybe
it's their financial state, material state in this world, very sorry
about it. But my friend, that's not the
kind of repentance that is required in this business of a real relationship
with God. A real relationship with God
requires that God give you a disposition that hates sin, and that loves
righteousness, and that loves Him. A disposition that will
cause you to turn away and loathe the way of the world, the way
of the flesh, and the way of the devil. Now is it not written
of Simon Magus of Samaria that he believed, and yet his heart
was not right in the sight of God? My point is, there is even
a faith. Not only is there a repentance
that is unreal, talked about in the Word of God, but there
is a faith that is unreal. Now it tells us in the 8th chapter
of Acts about this man, Simon Magus, and how that his heart
was not right in the sight of God, but yet he said he was a
believer, and the scripture indicates that he was a believer. And Peter
said to him, he said, Thou hast neither part nor lot in this
matter, for thy heart is not right in the sight of God. Now,
beloved, I caution you, there is such a thing as a natural
faith. There is such a thing as a faith
that just comes through the years of hearing people talk about,
in a positive way, the things of God. People just come up with
a general faith in their system they just somehow or other believe.
But if you were to begin to really examine them, you would find
that their faith is no more faith than what the devils themselves
have. The Bible teaches that the devils,
in James 2 and 19, that the devils believe and they tremble. They're
not saved, but they believe. They have a faith, but they're
not saved. It's not a faith that reconciles
them unto God. It's not a faith that puts them
into the family of God. It's not a faith that enables
them to lay hold of the blessings of God in eternal life. And so
they have not the true faith of the gospel. And there are
many, many people that are talked into making this profession and
they're told to believe. And do you believe? Well, they
say, well yes I believe. I believe. But my friend, we
must remember that only a God-given faith based on the true testimony
of the gospel of Jesus Christ is saving faith. Only a God-given
faith. A faith which God Himself is
the author of. And until that, you know, no
man can call Jesus Lord except by the Holy Ghost. It's the regenerating
work of the Spirit of God in the heart that enables a man
to lay hold of Jesus as Lord and to believe on Him. In Matthew
16, you remember the testimony of the Apostle Peter when the
Lord Jesus asked him, Whom do men say that I the Son of Man
am? He went through the list. that is given there. But Jesus
said, Whom do you say that I am? And he said, Thou art the Christ,
the Son of the living God. And Jesus said, Well, Simon,
he said, flesh and blood didn't reveal that to you. You didn't
get that from your mama. You didn't get that from your
papa. You didn't get that from your grandfather, your grandmother.
No, no, no, no. You didn't get that from him.
Saving faith does not come from flesh. Saving faith comes through
the work of the Spirit of God in the heart. And you can have
a natural faith and go to hell. You can have a general faith
in Christ and go to hell. You must have a faith that comes
as the gift of God into your soul. No man can call Jesus Lord
but by the Holy Ghost. Now my friend, do you recognize
the fact that nobody can really believe that Jesus is virgin
born except somebody who receives that from the Holy Spirit. He
can't believe. You can't believe that. Surely
you don't believe. You know it only happened one
time in the history of the world. One time in the history of the
world, there was one who was begotten by the Holy Ghost in
the womb of his mother, and that took place 2,000 years ago, and
you're telling me that you believe that story? You tell me you believe
that? My friend, you cannot believe
that savingly unless the Spirit of God burns that truth into
your heart. Unless that same Jesus that was
formed in the womb of the Virgin Mary is formed in your heart
by faith, the creating power pleased to give it to you. And
so I tell you that it can be counterfeited. And be careful. Somebody says, oh I know so and
so is saved. My friend, be careful about that.
You say, well I think these people are saved. Well, you be careful
about making that judgment. Because only God knows those
who are truly His. And I'm telling you, true, real
perfection is very, very uncommon in our day and time. Because
there are not many that have been told the truth, just as
you just heard it. That the Spirit of God only can
begin a soul. The Spirit of God only can regenerate
and make alive. The Holy Spirit only can give
man the ability to close savingly with the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so, do you have the faith of devils? Or do you have that faith
which has been begotten in your heart by God's Spirit? Are you truly His? Couldn't talk
you out of it. Somebody says, look how ridiculous
this thing you believe is. You believe that this virgin,
this virgin had a son. You believe that? How ridiculous
can that be? Old preacher Barnard, he's dead
now. He died in 1968. But he used
to say, he said there's only two kinds of people that believe
in the virgin birth, and that's Christians, genuine Christians,
and idiots. There isn't anybody going to
believe that, I mean savingly, but a person in whom the Spirit
of God works it. And we must see that. That's
the kind of faith that's real, my friend, when you couldn't
be talked out of it. I mean, you get the most brilliant,
the most intelligent philosopher and scientist, and let him try
to talk you out of the virgin birth. There isn't any way that
anybody can talk a true heaven-born spirit, regenerated, blood-washed
child of God out of the truth of the virgin birth. You can't
talk him out of it. and he won't even dispute with
you about it. He knows it because Jesus lives
in his heart. He knows it because he's been
changed. He knows it because Jesus dwells
forevermore in his heart, in his soul. Now then, we've covered
the fact that there is counterfeit repentance and there's counterfeit
faith. There is an unreal holiness also. Now Judas Iscariot, his outward
life was as correct and straight as any of the apostles up to
the time that he betrayed the Lord. To the point where when
Jesus was talking about who it was that was going to betray
him, they asked, Lord is it I? Is it not? Because there was
nothing obvious about Judas Iscariot's life that indicated that he was
the one that was going to betray. He was a thief all the time and
he had the bag and bore what was in it. He was a thief and
a traitor according to John 12 and 6. But my friend, there was
nothing until he betrayed the Lord that would indicate that.
Now the person most likely to turn out to be a hypocrite in
this church is the one who gives the least reason for suspicion. The one who seems to be the most
unlikely person to be a hypocrite or one who has a false religion. One who has no true relationship
with the Lord. So there is a false holiness. Remember old Judas Iscariot. Then there is a counterfeit love
and charity. There is a love which consists
in word only, no deeds. No deeds. You remember we read
to you a few minutes ago that we're to love not only in word
but in deed. But there is a love which consists
in words only. tender expressions, a show of
affection while the heart has no love in it at all. One of
the indications the Bible says that we know we pass from death
to life is because we do have a genuine love for the brethren. We truly do love the brethren.
We do. We love them more than our own
brothers in the flesh or ever did as much. We're unable to
do so because they have been begotten by the same Father as
we have spiritually. And they're our brothers and
sisters in Christ. So there are tender expressions,
there are shows of affection, while the heart, while the heart
has no love in it at all. And we see this so much in religion.
We see the hypocrisy in religion. We see people talking about how
much they love the Lord, but they have no regard for God's
poor little children, for God's poor, afflicted, tested, tried
people. They got no time for them, and
they look down on them, and they despise them. Well, there's no
reality in that. That's a counterfeit love. Our text says, let us not love
in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. 1 John
3 and 18. And Paul said in Romans 12 and
19, let love be without dissimulation. well let's get it out from where
it's covered up and you know there's a lot of hypocrisy and
we mentioned that but we need to have a genuine love in our
hearts and if we do have that love is real and we will serve
one another because we love one another that love will move itself
and we will not love in word but in deed And we will not say
to our brother, go be warmed and filled when he has a need.
We'll see to it that his need is met. And then there's also
unreal praying in religious world. Without doubt this is true. Our
Lord denounces it as one of the special sins of the Pharisees. That for a pretense, He said
in Matthew, He said for a pretense they make long prayers No, it
was not that they did not pray, but they made their prayers for
pretense in order for somebody to see them and to think their
sin lay in this, that their prayers were not real, they were not
from the heart. All they wanted was somebody
to acknowledge them as being hyper-religious. Somebody would
look at them and say, oh, so-and-so, oh, these Pharisees, they are
so religious. Religiouses all get out, but
my friend, they wasn't saved. Their prayers were not from the
heart. Number six, there is a vain worship, a false worship in the
religious world. Matthew chapter 15 verse 7, 8,
and 9 speaks of this. Instead of true worship in spirit
and in truth Jesus said to the Jews This people draw nigh to
me with their mouth and honor me with their lips But their
heart is far from me But in vain do they worship me. They worship
me in vain because their heart is far from Him. They just draw
an eye with their lips and with their mouth. They honor the Lord. Well, what good is that kind
of religion? That kind of religion is vain, Jesus said. It's vain. They had solemn and formal services
in their temples and in their synagogues. but their fatal defect
about them was want of reality and want of heart faith. They had no true faith in the
living God. What shall we say to these things?
It ought to set us, I think, to thinking, to thinking a great
deal. To my own mind, they seem to
lead to one conclusion. They show clearly the importance
which the Word of God attaches to reality in religion. They show clearly what we need
to have and that we need to take heed to ourselves, lest our Christianity
turn out to be merely a surface thing, counterfeit, formal, and
unreal. Now, there's never been a time
since the Lord's Church in the world where such a vast amount
of unreality among professors of religion existed as today. Most of religion today is as
fruitless as a dead tree, and as dry and marrowless as an old
bone. It's not real, I tell you. Church
members, yes. Churches are full of members.
Zealous, yes. Evangelical, yes. Fundamental, yes. Real, no! They're not real. The religion
of the day is like Jonah's gourd. It came up in a night and it
perished in a night. No root, no life. They only injure
God's cause and give occasion to God's enemies to blaspheme.
Churches are full of fighting and carrying on in our day and
time under the name of God and in the name of God. And it all
just literally lends support and help to the devil and to
his crowd. Professing to be friends of the
gospel while practically inflicting on it the greatest of injury.
So, my friend, the importance of our profession. Well, the
second part of our message, and we must hurry here, we're to
test the reality of our own profession. We must, the occasion demands
it, honest, fair, reasonable, we must be honest, fair, reasonable
with our own soul. Dismiss from your mind, first
off, the common idea, the common idea that of course all is right
with an individual if they go to church at least once a week.
If you go to church at least one time a week, then everything
is alright. There are people that believe
that. Well, that, my friend, is not true. You must look further.
You must look higher. You must look deeper than this
if you would find out the truth about your never-dying soul.
Listen and take the test. Number one, if you would know
whether your relationship with the Lord is real or not, try
it by the place which it occupies in your inner person, in your
inner man. It is not enough that it is in
your head. That's not enough. We said that
before. It's not enough that you were
raised in this particular religion and that you understand it and
know about it in your head. It is not what you know. We have
often said it is not what you know, it is who you know. It
is who you know. It is whether you know Christ,
whether you truly know Him or not. It is not enough that you
can talk about the things of God. That's not enough. You may
be able to use the language of Canaan. I've met people that
could talk. I mean, they could talk. Their
tongue was loose on both ends, and they could talk about the
things of the Word of God, but my friend, they didn't have anything
in their heart. It was all in their head. Not enough that you have some
religious feelings. You say, I feel good when I go
to church. Well, I think sometimes that
that's a bad omen. I think it would be better, especially
if you're an unconverted, lost person, a person that has no
true spiritual foundation under them, I think it'd be better
if you went out of the building convicted, miserable, and feeling
desperate desperately your need of a Savior. Your relationship,
if it is real, given by the Holy Spirit, must and will be in your
heart. It'll be in your heart. Now then,
listen to this. It must occupy the throne of
your heart. That's what it must do. Only
one can be Lord in your life. The Bible says you cannot serve
God and mammon. If you're truly the Lord's, He
will be the Lord of your life. He will sit on the throne of
your life. It, that is your relationship
with the Lord, must hold the reins in your life. You know what that means? You
people in Montana, you know exactly what that means. The fellow that
holds the reins, he's the fellow that's determined where this
thing's going one way or the other. And so, the Lord, must
hold the reins in your life. It must sway the affections,
this relationship that you have with God. It must cause you to
love things that you used to hate, and it must cause you to
hate things you used to love. It will be in you, my friend,
to sway the affections of your life, and it must lead the will. The Bible talks about God being
in us to will and to do of His good pleasure. But my friend,
the way the Lord leads us after His will is by putting in us
His own Son and putting His truth into our hearts in regeneration,
the principle of grace that moves our will after Him to do His
will, to do the things that He would have us do. And it must
direct the taste of the individual. this religious profession. What is it that you like to do? What is it that you want to do
as an individual? Where are your tastes? My friend,
the truly begotten soul, the true soul, the true individual
that loves Christ and in whom Christ dwells, that individual
has a taste for the things of God. He has an appetite for the
things of God. I've seen it over and over again.
When God saves a person, they have an appetite for the Word
of God. They have an appetite for the
things of the Spirit. I mean, they've passed out of
death unto life. And now they want to feed on
the Living Word. They have a desire for the Word. They have a desire to hear it.
And they have a desire to make it a part of their spiritual
system. and it must influence the choices
and the decisions of your whole life. This relationship with
God will determine the decisions that you make in your life, what
you do with your life, where you go, just what you're about
in this world will be made by this relationship with God. Now this is important for us
to see it. It must fill the deepest, inmost seat in your soul. It is Christ, it is described
by Paul in the book of Colossians, it is Christ in you, the hope
of glory. Christ in you. Now is this true
of your professed relationship to God? If not, you may well
doubt its reality. Remember what we said about Simon
Magus. Thou hast neither part nor lot
in this matter, for thy heart is not right in the sight of
God. Remember Romans 10 and 10, For with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made
unto salvation. In the next place, we're taking
a test now. I mean, do you have something
in you, in your heart, that is moving you away from the world,
the mind of the world, and moving you toward God and His will and
His ways? Do you have that in you? If it's
not in you, my friend, you don't have it. It's not there. It's
not something you carry around in your pocket. Now something
you can take home, put up on the shelf, take it down when
it's convenient. No, no, no, no! It's got to be
in the heart! God will plant it in the soul. Now in the second place, if you
would know whether your experience is true or real, try it by the
feelings towards sin which it produces in your life. This is
absolutely amazing. The Bible says that if any man
be in Christ, he's a new creation. All things are passed away, behold,
all things become new. In a true heart relationship
with Christ, there is a very deep view of the sinfulness of
sin. It will not merely regard sin
as a blemish and a misfortune which makes men and women objects
of pity and compassion. It will see in sin the abominable
thing which God hates. The thing which makes man guilty
and lost in God's sight. The thing which deserves God's
righteous wrath and condemnation. It will look on sin as the cause
of man's woes. It will look on sin as the cause
of all our sorrow. It will look upon sin as the
mother of death and the cause of all of the strife and the
unhappiness that fills the world. It's the blight of God's creation. It's the curse which makes the
whole earth groan and prevail in pain this day. That's what
sin is. Above all, we see in sin the
thing which will ruin us eternally, except we find forgiveness of
our sin through a substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. It will
ruin us. It will send us all to hell if
we do not find mercy at the mercy seat. If we do not find mercy
through Jesus Christ and forgiveness of sin, it will ruin us. Sin
will hold us captive except except the chains be broken by the strong
man, the Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God, He has come
into some of our lives, and He has broken the chains. He's broken
the bonds that held us, and we have been delivered from Satan. We have been taken captive by
him at his own will, and God came and delivered us. Now we
hate sin and are sworn to fight against it till death. And that's
the way a believer feels. He hates it. You know that sin
crucified our Lord. It nailed Him to the tree. Do
you know that? It nailed Him to the tree. Well,
if we're in allegiance with Christ and He died to deliver us from
the works of the devil, surely we would be against them. And
my friend, if you find it not in you to fight with sin, then
the principle of grace is absent from your life. You will war
against sin. Now it's not that we as believers
don't ever sin. That's not true. Because the
Bible is clear about it in 1 John chapter 1. Verse 8, 9, and 10,
if we say that we have not sinned, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us. If we confess our sin, He's faithful
and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
If we say that we've not sinned, we make God a liar and His truth
is not in us. We do sin, but how about your
feelings? It's not that we don't sin, but
it's how we feel about it when we do. When we do. Is this your
feelings about sin, what we've described here today? If not,
then I think you have a reason to question yourself as to whether
or not you truly have a true relationship with the Lord. And
number three, we need to try our profession by our feelings
toward Christ which it produces. Now this, my friend, is extremely
important. Listen carefully. We need to
try our profession by the feelings toward Christ. which it produces. Nominal religion may believe
that such a person as Christ exists and did something or other
for mankind. It may show him some external
respect and even bow their head at the mention of his name. But heart faith, Holy Spirit
regeneration will make a man glory in Christ as the Redeemer,
the Deliverer without whom he would have no hope at all in
this world. Now, here you've got a man and
he was lost and undone. He had no hope. He was without
God, without Christ in the world. And the Lord came to him and
the Lord laid hold of him The Lord arrested him, the Lord sent
His Spirit home to his heart, and the Word of God to his heart,
and he was delivered! He was delivered from his sin,
and now he's glorying in the Deliverer, in the Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the Deliverer, and he's
the one in whom we glory. We have seen the glory of God
in His face! He's the one that God sent, appointed,
and He's the one that came down here for the express purpose
of delivering His people from their sin. And my heart is in
love with Him. I cannot help but love Him. I
cannot help but preach Him up. I cannot help but set Him forth
as the only hope of a sinner in this world, because He is
indeed the only hope. It will produce confidence in
Him. It will produce love towards Him. It will cause a man to delight
in Him. It will cause a man to take comfort
in Him as the mediator, the food, the light, the life, the peace
of the soul. That's what it will. Do you love
Christ that way? Does Christ mean this to you? Christ, I say it clearly, Christ
is the all in all to a believer. He's everything to a believer. And we love Him dearly. Do you
know anything of feelings like this toward the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you know anything about that?
Well, my friend, if you do, if you could say Amen, I mean from
your heart, if you could say Amen to these things, then I
have hope for you. I really do. I have hope for
you. This is the acid test. How does my soul feel toward
the Lord Jesus Christ? Could I stand to have him mistreated? Could I stand to have his truth
trampled in under men's dirty feet? Could I stand in any way
to see him denounced or in any way disgraced or dishonored? Could I stand, could I allow
it to happen and be in the presence of people who are doing so? Absolutely
not. Couldn't do it. Not a true believer.
Couldn't do it. They'd have to take their stand.
I stand with this man, the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm married to
this man, the Lord Jesus Christ. I've taken Him and no other to
be my Deliverer, my Savior, my Redeemer. Now, that's the way
I feel about the Lord Jesus. Now, if your religion is not
of God, You say, ah, Jesus is just another man for as I'm concerned.
He's just an example. Oh, we could just follow Him
as an example. No, no, no. That won't do. That will not
get your soul past the graveyard. You will never get out of the
judgment or miss the judgment of God unless Jesus Christ is
your all in all. Unless He's truly your Redeemer. Now number four, we're to try
it by the fruit it bears in your heart and life. Life from above,
true life in the Spirit, will produce in the soul who has it
repentance and faith, hope, love, humility, spirituality, self-denial,
usefulness, forgiveness, temperance, truthfulness, brotherly kindness,
patience, forbearance. These are things that the Spirit
will produce in the life of a believer. The degree now which these various
graces appear may vary in different believers, but the germ and the
seeds of them will be found in all who are truly the children
of God. Now, by their fruits, you remember
that being read to you this morning, by their fruits they may be known. Is this your life? Does this
picture your life? Well, number five, try your profession
by your feelings and habits about the means of grace. What is your
feelings about the Lord? How do you feel about it? Is
it a weariness to you and does it somehow or other constrict
you and you have to be constrained, as it were, to come? How do you
feel about the Lord's Day? Now, here at the New Covenant
Baptist Church, we do not believe that we have a day to keep but
a person to honor. 365 or 52 weeks out of the year,
of course 365 days also, we worship the resurrected Christ and we
believe He was raised from the dead on the first day of the
week. This is the Lord's Day. It's not the Sabbath. It's the
Lord's Day. Because we believe Jesus was
raised from the dead on the first day of the week And we meet on
the first day of the week, but we worship Him every day because
He's the resurrected, enthroned Lord Jesus Christ. Most of all,
He's enthroned in our hearts. Do you look upon this day as
a delight and a time of refreshment and foretaste of the rest to
come in heaven? Because Christ, you know, is
our Sabbath. He is our rest. He is our rest. The Lord Jesus said, come unto
me and I'll give you Sabbath rest. I'll give it to you. You
have rest in your soul. You may be doing things with
your hand, but you have rest because Christ
is the Sabbath. What are your feelings about
the public means of grace? What are your feelings about public prayer, praises? public preaching of the Word,
the ordinances of baptism of the Lord. So how do you feel
really in your heart about the means of grace? Do you just tolerate
them? Or are they things in which you
take pleasure without which you could not live and be happy?
I think a man who's truly genuine to say he would do about whatever
he had to do to be able to participate in the means of grace when he's
healthy, when he's able, when he's able to do it. He would
participate. He would be there. He would be
there to listen to the Word of God. He would be there to enter
into the fellowship of the believers. He would do that. He would take
pleasure in that. What about your feelings about
the private means of grace? Have you ever called for a prayer
meeting in your home with your family? Have you ever done that?
Have you ever said, now family, we got a crisis. We got a crisis
with one of the members of our family. We need to get together
and have a prayer meeting. We need to pray. Well, how do
you feel about that? Do you find it essential to your
comfort to read the Bible and to pray at home? I'm talking
about at home, your private. Your private home, the place
at home which the Bible would describe in a way of being the
closet, your closet. Do you find it essential to your
comfort to read and to pray? Are these practices irksome and
do you neglect them all together? You say, I just don't do it.
I don't read and I don't pray. I don't spend any time seeking
the Lord. I don't spend any time praying for my family with my
family. I won't do it. I just don't do it. Well my friend,
If the means of grace, both public and private, are not necessary
to your soul, as meat and drink is to your body, you have reason
to doubt whether or not you're in the true grace of God. Reason
to doubt. I'm just being honest with you.
I'm an old man. And I'm just being honest with
you. I'm telling you somewhere. I'm not saying you've got to
have a set time every day. I'm not saying that. I'm just
saying, is there times when the motions of the Holy Ghost is
in you, moving you, saying, you just need to sit down here for
a few minutes and take the book and read the book. And if you
ever had a time you woke up in the night when the Spirit of
God moving you to pray. I'm not talking about you sitting
aside this amount of time or that amount of time. That's between
you and the Lord. A lot of people do that and I would say Amen
to it. But I am saying do you have this
motion in you by the Spirit of God moving you sometime or other
to think about and to read and to study the Word of God and
to pray unto your God. Do you have it? Be honest about
it. If you don't have it, then my
friend, then the true grace of God, I doubt is in you. And I
think you need to face this. Now you go over these five points
of this test and see how you fare. See how you fare with it. Now, lastly, just a word of application. And I want to just use three
words and I'll be done very briefly here. First of all, inquiry. Inquiry. Is my profession real
or unreal? I'm not asking you about those
around you. You say, Preacher, you know I can spot a hypocrite
a mile away. I can, I can spot a hypocrite.
You know I really don't care. I really don't care whether you
can spot a hypocrite or not. What I'm asking you, what about
you? What about you? Quit hiding behind hypocrites.
The world is full of them. And you've met a lot of them
in your life. But quit hiding about them. What about you? That's
what I'm talking about. That's the point here this morning,
is you and me. Where do we stand about this
thing? Alright? So inquiry. This is
the question. What about you? Well, with the
Bible in your hand, and with judgment day honesty in your
heart, I believe that the truth is known by every one of us this
morning. I believe we know the truth.
I believe we do. Now, there may be a few here
that you say, well, I'm just kind of on edge. I really don't
know where I stand. But most of you know exactly
where you stand. You know whether you've got true
religion or not, whether it's real in your heart. Resolve to
find out if you're on edge. Resolve I'm going to find out
where I stand because I don't want to die with a false religion. I don't want to die with a relationship
with God that's not real. I want it to be real. If I'm
going to have anything that's real, it's going to be my relationship
with God. I wish I could find somebody
like that in this crowd this morning. Somebody would say,
it's going to be real with me, I'm going to die and it's going
to be real with me, and I'm not going to live unless it is. I've
got to know whether it's real or not. Well, the next word is
advice. I'll give you some advice. If
your conscience has been pricked by what has been said here today,
quit trifling and playing about this thing. Seek the Lord with
all your heart. Quit trifling with this. Your repentance may
be feeble, but if it's real, then my friend, if it's real,
that's what counts. It may be weak, And you say,
I don't know that I covered all my sin. My friend, if you got
the disposition that says, I just hate sin, I hate the ways of
the world, I hate sin, I hate the ways of sin, and I love God,
I just have a love of my heart toward the Lord and toward righteousness,
then my friend, make no difference how weak and feeble it is, that's
what counts. You got it? It's what counts.
And then thoughts of your unworthiness. Your faith. Let me mention your
faith. It may be weak also, but if it's from God, if it's the
size of a grain of mustard seed, it'll save your soul. If it's
true faith, the size of a grain of mustard seed, it'll save your
soul. Do you have it? And then, do not pay any attention to the
thoughts of your unworthiness. I'm giving you some advice. You
say, I'm not worthy to be saved. I know that. And it's true about
me too. I'm not worthy to be saved. There
ain't anybody in this building worthy to be saved. There ain't
anybody in this building that would say anything else other
than that I'm not worthy of the least of His mercies. Anybody
that's truly saved here will take that ground. And so don't
worry about your unworthiness. Don't let that keep you away.
All the fitness that He requires is that you feel your need of
Him. That's what He requires, that
you feel your need of Him. And so, if you can come to Christ,
your sin will never damn you. If you can come to Christ, your
sin will never damn you. Isn't that a wonderful thing?
It is indeed. Come in your true character,
just as you are. No acting, be real. Be all that
you profess to be. Don't put on a show. Don't put on a show. Though you
may err, be real. Though you may fall seven times,
may stumble, be true. If you fall seven times, the
Lord will lift you up. He'll lift you up. But be true.
And the last word is encouragement. To all who are following Christ
today in reality, My soul, don't you have struggles? You do. I
exhort you to persevere and not to be moved by difficulties and
by the many oppositions that you are going to run into in
your life. You may find few with you and many against you in this
world, and there may be hard things that people say about
you, but keep up the struggle against sin and the flesh, And
that does not mean you're lost when you have a struggle with
sin in the flesh, but rather that means that the divine life
is in you, or else there would be no struggle. There wouldn't
be any battle. There'd be no war. That's why
you got the struggle, is because the life of God is in you. And never be ashamed of your
service and your devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ wherever
it takes you. Don't be ashamed of it. Your
sin and your foolishness, be ashamed, but not of Christ. Not
of Christ. There's an old song, and I take
the liberty to read it. Jesus, and shall it ever be,
a mortal man ashamed of thee? Ashamed of thee whom angels praise,
whose glories shine through endless days? Ashamed of Jesus, sooner,
far, let evening blush to own the star. He sheds the beams
of light divine, or of this benighted soul of mine. Ashamed of Jesus,
that dear friend, on whom my hopes of heaven depend? No, when
I blush, be this my shame, that I no more revere his name. Ashamed
of Jesus, yes I may, when I've no guilt to wash away, no tear
to wipe, no good to crave, no fears to quell, no soul to save,
till then, no is my boasting vain, till then I boast a Savior
slain. And oh may this my glory be,
that Christ is not ashamed of me. That He is not ashamed of
me. So never be ashamed of being
hold-hearted about your soul and about your worship. If you're
seeking the Lord, don't be ashamed to say, I'm seeking the Lord.
I'm trying to find my way. I'm trying to find the way, the
truth, and the life. Don't be ashamed. Don't be ashamed. Don't go to hell. The devil will
laugh you into hell, my friend. He will. Don't be afraid of what
people say and people laughing at you. Listen, the years of
our lives are passing away. The clock of life is wound but
once. Who knows whether it will stop
at late or at early hour. On an old clock in a cathedral
in England it was written, when as a child I laughed and wept
and time crept. When as a youth I dreamed and
talked and time walked. When I became a full-grown man,
time ran, and later, as I older grew, time flew. Soon I shall
find, while traveling on, time gone. Will Christ have saved
my soul by that? Will He save my soul by that? Well, if you'd be found ready,
be a true, real follower of the Lamb of God.