Preaching the gospel to us this
morning, and I'm prayerful that the Lord will bless what he says. You know, like that passage that
John just read. In our natural state, we're out
of our minds. And it's only through the preaching
of the gospel and seeing a resurrected and thrown Christ who kept God's
law, obeyed it for his people. suffered and died for him and
ascended into heaven, to only accept the Lord, bless the preaching
of the gospel to us, and clothe us with the spirit we'll be put
in our right minds. No man can tame us. Religion can't tame you. It'll only make you two-fold
more of a child of hell than you would be otherwise. Andy? Morning, let's open your Bibles,
if you would, to Acts chapter 12. What we're going to examine
here this morning is a story about a prisoner, and something
with regard to prisoners they found, especially with long-term
prisoners, people who had been in prison maybe most of their
lives. They found there was a pretty high incidence of these prisoners
reoffending and going back into prison. And psychologists would
look at them and study them and say, why? Why, after all these
years that you've spent time in prison, and probably looking
forward to that day when you're no longer in prison and you have
the idea of freedom, why would you re-offend to come back? And
what they found was their comfort level was in the prison. It's all they knew. It's all
that they lived, and it's all that they wanted. We don't understand
and think that way, but people in this condition, that's what
they wanted to go back to. I wonder how many who have been
in the prison of false religion all their life and who have heard
the freedom that we have in Christ and the gospel would then also
like the dog turn back to its vomit and go back to the chains
of prison. How many? Because it does speak
to our experience. So let's read these first seven
verses here of Acts chapter 12 and examine this prisoner. Now about that time, Herod the
king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church.
He killed James the brother of John with the sword, because
he saw it pleased the Jews. He proceeded further to take
Peter also. Then there were the days of unleavened
bread. And when he had apprehended him,
he put him in prison and delivered him to the four quatrains of
soldiers to keep him, intending after Easter to bring him forth
to the people. Peter, therefore, was kept in
prison, but prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God
for him. And when Herod would have brought
him forth, the same night Peter was sleeping between two soldiers,
bound with two chains, and the keepers before the door kept
the prison. And behold, the angel of the
Lord came upon him, and a light shined into the prison. And he
smote Peter on the side and raised him up, saying, Arise up quickly. And his chains fell off from
his hands." So here we find Peter, the prisoner. He's shackled in
the prison. And he's got two chains chained
to him. There's no way he's getting out.
These two chains held him fast, and there's also two soldiers
in there with him. What I would like us to look
at this morning is, what are the names that these two chains
go by? And what happens when the chains
fall off? Those are the two things I want
to look at this morning. The title of my message is, When the Chains
Fall Off. Now this first chain, one of
the two chains that Peter was chained with, its name is presumption. Now presumption is, it's an idea
that is taken to be true, and it's the basis for other ideas,
but it's not certainly known whether it is true. Here's a
real world example of that. There are times that I walk out
my door to go run, just for some exercise, but I don't take my
keys. I'm under the presumption that the door's gonna be open
when I get back. And there have been times that
I've gotten back and Megan's left the house and locked the
door. So, and there I am under the presumption that I'd be able
to get back in. So, it's an idea that I had that
wasn't really based on fact, but it's what I thought might
happen. I wonder how many presume here this morning and in many
other places across our nation things about God, things about
how he saves, things about how to gain acceptance and favor
with God. I think we have to say, based
on what we do know that other folks believe, that there is
some presumption that what you do or what you don't do has some
degree of influence on God in a way where he would be favorable
to not doing or doing something. Now, these things stand in light
of scriptures that say, by grace are you saved, through faith,
and that not of yourselves, it's the gift of God, not of works,
lest any should boast. But yet, they believe this anyway.
They have a way of explaining that away. So, these are presumptions
that aren't always based on fact. Now, this chain of presumption
is a thick, heavy chain. This is often forged in ignorance
and in self-worship. That's how it's forged. I want
us to examine a few things about this chain of presumption. First
is the law. If you'll turn to Matthew chapter
23. And in verse 23, this is the
Lord speaking to the scribes and the Pharisees, those who
should know the law, those who should know the scriptures, that's
who he's speaking to here. He says, woe unto you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you pay tithe of mint and anise
and cumin and have omitted the weightier matters of the law,
judgment, mercy, faith, These ought you to have done, and not
to leave the other undone." So you can see kind of the ridiculousness
here of the scribes and Pharisees. There's nobody in here. Every
household gathered. You've got some spices in your
cabinets in your kitchen. They were purporting to have
kept the law by giving 10% of those spices. This is utter ridiculousness. And the Lord is calling them
out on it. He's saying, you're hypocrites. He's saying, you're
telling me that you're giving away some spices which basically
cost you nothing. in your cabinet, and that's your
way of saying you're keeping the law, but you're not keeping
judgment, mercy, faith, these things you ought to have done
and not to have done the other. He's calling them out on their
hypocrisy of saying that they're keeping the law, presumption
that, number one, the law can even be kept. How can we keep
the law? So you may keep these little
areas like giving away some spices as an offering toward the law,
but yet we're entitled to keep the whole law. If we are to keep
one area, you're commanded to keep the whole law. And so all
these other areas undone, you're guilty before the law by not
keeping those. So presumption, we can't stand
before the law. The second thing here, The chain
of presumption is the good things that you do. Turn with me back
a few chapters to Matthew chapter 7. And in verse 21 he says, not everyone
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 to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have
we not prophesied in thy name? Have we not preached in your
name? And in thy name have we not cast out devils? And in thy
name have we not done many wonderful works? And then will I profess
unto them, I never knew you. Depart from me, ye that work
iniquity. This I never knew you means I never loved you. It's
not just that I didn't know who you were, it's I did not love
your person. And he said that there is somebody
who will be in heaven, he that doeth the will of my father.
So he's saying that they have an idea, they have a presumption
that these things that they did, the father would be favorable
unto, would say that's a good thing that you did. And no doubt
their hearts were in it, and those aren't bad things that
they did. There's not, it's not wrong to preach the gospel. It's
not wrong to cast out devils. It's not wrong to do the things
that they said. Many wonderful works. There's nothing wrong
with those things. But it doesn't have anything to do with our
acceptance before God. That's a presumption. And the
Lord deals with them directly here in saying, it's He that
doeth the will of my Father. That's gonna be who in heaven,
not these things that you've said you've done. And what is
the will of the Father then? Because that's what I wanna know.
And John 640 says, and this is the will of him that sent me,
that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth upon him may
have eternal life. And I'll raise him up at the
last day. So he lets us know, have you seen the Son? And if
you've seen the Son, do you believe in him? That's who's gonna be
in heaven, not the people who are doing these works. So we
can't come under the presumption that we can bring works before
God and be accepted of him. Now we'll look at the third link
in this chain of presumption, that you can provide an atonement,
an offering that he will accept. Now I think most people have
the common sense if you ask them, can you provide an atonement
to God that he will accept, the obvious answer is probably no,
but yet why do we find people who start off conversations letting
you know all the things that they've given up for Christ?
That's an atonement. That's an offering saying, I've
given these things up, somehow accept me because I did these
things. And I actually tried to read into this a little bit,
and there's actually a pastor who came up with six things for
Christians that they ought to give up for Christ. He came up
with first, and this is music, you gotta give up music. Second,
politics. You can't be involved in politics
and care about that. Third, style of worship. You can't care about style of
worship. Fourth is the building, what the building looks like,
small, big, nice, you know, or not. your time, you've got to
give up your time to have Christ, and you knew this last one was
in here, money. They had to put that one in there
to be able to get money. So those are the six things that
this man gave to his congregation that he's supposed to be taken
care of to tell them, you've got to give these things up for
Christ. Now this is ridiculous. And how would the Father look
upon these things? in the light of his son giving
up his glory, everything that made him glorious, the son giving
up his communion with the Father, the peace that's afforded there,
the son being reviled, hated by men, coming here as the Savior
but yet spit upon, they denied who he was, They hated him. They said, we're not going to
have this man reign over us. They denied his person, that
he was not the son of God. They just said, this fellow,
that's what they called him, he's just some guy. They didn't
believe in him. And eventually they nailed him
to a cross and they killed him. And yet, we would bring something
before the father and said, look upon me with favor because I
gave these things up. His son gave all, and yet we
would bring that? This is an offense to God. We
cannot bring an offering. Look at Cain. One of the first
scriptures, examples in the Bible, it has to do with an offering
and acceptance before God. Cain worked hard. Cain planted
the garden. Cain picked out where he was
going to put things. He watered it. He nurtured it.
Make sure no weeds were in there. There was labor, there was thought,
there was care. His heart was in this to try
to do this for God. It wasn't just something he did
on a whim. There was passion in this. But
yet God rejected it because that's not the sacrifice that he commanded.
He said, not without the blood. He didn't bring the blood. So
we can't provide an atonement or an offering that God will
accept. And here's one more link of this chain of presumption.
If you will, turn over to 2 Timothy chapter 3. I'm going to read verses 1 and
7, and this know also that in the last days perilous times
shall come. So we know he's saying we're
in a perilous time. And what is one of the markers
of that perilous time? Verse 7, those who are ever learning
and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. knowledge. This is one of the markers of
a perilous time. Knowledge is basically in pursuit
of the truth. That's why you learn to try to
gain some understanding of what is the truth. The truth, he's
telling us right here, is you can learn and learn and learn,
but you're never going to come to a knowledge of the truth.
The truth is not found in facts. It's not found in what you know
and what you don't. It's not found in doctrines.
You can spend your whole life learning all the doctrines of
this book. It's not even found in a denomination. There's plenty
of denominations that say they've got a corner on the truth. But
the Lord said, I am the way, I am the truth, and I am the
life. He's letting us know, I am the
truth. So if you're someone who seeks
to know the truth, we ought to seek to know who He is. And in
finding Him, we will find the truth. In seeing His holiness,
in seeing His righteousness, in seeing His mercy to forgive
sinners, in seeing His kindness towards men in His long-suffering,
all these things that we see in the person of Christ and of
His Father, we will find the truth. And in finding that truth
about him, we're gonna find some things true about us as well.
We're gonna find that we're unclean. That's what Isaiah found, didn't
he? When he stood before the father and saw the king of glory
sitting upon his throne, first thing he said is, woe is me.
He didn't know that until he saw that though. Until he had
seen the truth of who God was, he couldn't have seen who he
was. And in seeing the truth of who God is, we'll see who
we are, is that we are unclean sinners, and we can't stand before
him, and we can do nothing that he can be pleased with. And here's
one more area I thought illustrated well this idea of a chain of
presumption. There was a king in Jeremiah's
name named Zedekiah. Zedekiah was the last king of
Jerusalem before Nebuchadnezzar came in and sacked Jerusalem.
And Jeremiah, one of the things the Lord told him to do is, you
go tell King Zedekiah, you tell him, I'm sending Nebuchadnezzar
here and he's going to sack the city. He says, if you stay in
the city, you're going to die. But if you come out, And if you're
captured, I'm gonna let you live, and I'm gonna let your children
live. But if you don't, you're gonna die. So this was Jeremiah's
message to Zedekiah all through the book of Jeremiah. He said
to him at one point, when it was coming close to time, the
Lord said, go into him again, tell him he's not come out. Jeremiah said to him, why will
you die? You know the truth. I've told
you the word of the Lord and yet you're still not doing it.
Zedekiah is presuming the Lord won't act on his word. Did Zedekiah
obey? No, he was listening to the false
prophets. And what were the false prophets saying? False prophets
were saying, you'll be fine. Stay in the city, we'll defend
it, we'll get through this and you'll be fine. What are the
false prophets of today saying? False prophets today are looking
at everybody that they're standing before and telling them, God
loves you, Christ died for you, and if you'll accept him, he'll
save you. You can make those works work for you, but you have
to do this. Well, this is in complete denial of what we just
read in Matthew 7, where he said, I never knew you, I didn't love
you. So these things aren't based on fact, they're based on presumption.
Did Zedekiah come out? He didn't. You know why he didn't
come out? Because he was afraid. He was
afraid that he would be mocked by the Jews who had already defected
to Nebuchadnezzar, and they would mock him when he came out. His
presumption was based on his pride. He couldn't get over his
pride. And what happened to Zechariah
when he came out? They sacked Jerusalem, they burned it to
the ground, they put out his eyes, they put him in chains
in prison until the day of his death. He knew the consequences,
yet he put out his own eyes because of pride and presumption. Woe
unto the man or woman who doesn't heed to the words of this book.
We have before us the same word of the Lord that we're called
upon to repent. and to seek Christ and to come
unto Him and to believe. That's what we're called upon
to do, nothing more and nothing less. So that's the first chain
of presumption. The second chain says it's the
wickedness of the will. Now, the first chain offers a
false hope. It's the idea that there is hope
when there really isn't none, because it's not based on anything.
But not this chain. Her way is dark. She offers no
hope. She destroys hope. There's no
peace. And it will cause you to seek
out other gods because you'll find no peace in where you're
at. So you seek out vanity. You seek
out pleasure. You seek out self-fulfillment.
The wickedness of the will is something that, it's a chain
that cannot be broken. And so let's look at some attributes
of it. First, this chain says, It's too late for you. You look
around. Others are hearing the gospel.
You're not hearing anything. You're not rejoicing in it the
way others are. It's too late for you. You've been cast off.
The wickedness of your will is telling you that you're looking
for an experience, and that if you don't have that experience,
then you're not saved. The wickedness of the will also
tells us and other attributes. Your sins are willful. Your sins
are numerous. How many are they? and you're
gonna be cast off because of them, how can you be saved and
keep going on the way that you are? You know what's in your
heart. God knows what's in your heart. How can God save you and
you continue to sin the way you do? Well, first, the wickedness
of will lets us know it doesn't even know what it's like to be
a sinner because a sinner sins all the time, not part of the
time, not a little bit of the time, all the time. So it's all
a sinner can do is sin. And if we're under the presumption,
under the deception of the wickedness of the will, if we can just stop
those sins, we'll somehow be okay? That's a self-salvation. Because had you not done it,
you wouldn't be saved. But if you would stop those things,
you'd be okay. What need do you have of a savior?
You're your own savior in that scenario. The wickedness of the
will deceives. It tells your heart that there's
gotta be something else. You tell me that grace is free
and all that I have to do is believe and nothing else? Gotta
be something else. Well, we can say regarding that,
the wickedness of the will has no love for Christ. Your old
man, the nature that you're born with, it has no love for Christ.
And anyone who can look at the gospel and see God's Son, the
sacrifices He's made and the salvation He's accomplished and
say, there's gotta be more. You've got no love for Christ
and you've never seen Him. Because if you see Him, you'll
find He's everything. His salvation saves. It's completed. And we'll find in Him everything
that we need. But to say there's gotta be something
more, we've never seen Him, not truly. And lastly, this chain
says that it's not right for God to choose some and to pass
by others. How can he choose some in eternal
election, pick them before time began, to keep them safe, but
not pick somebody else? How is that possible? It tells
me the wickedness of the will views itself as holier than God.
It says, I've got more and more authority and better judgment
than God, and I wouldn't do those things. I'm better than God.
It also tells me you don't see yourself as a sinner. You don't
see yourself as guilty before God, and the thing God ought
to do is to pass judgment upon us. And it's a mercy that he's
bestowed upon his people by putting them in Christ before the world
began. It's the only way that I can
be saved. This is a dark chain that no one can break. The wickedness
of the will, no matter how hard we try, we can never get beyond
it. So we read earlier, I asked John to read that passage out
of Mark 5 about the Gadarene demonic. It said he was bound
with chains and fetters. Now, these chains represent false
religion. False religion chains. It attempts
to chain a man into submission. Otherwise, why would you need
to chain him? Why would you need to give him rules? Why do you
need to chain him? because you're trying to make
him do something he doesn't want to do. It's against his nature. Otherwise, a chain's not required.
The chain says, stop sinning. Stop thinking the evil thoughts
that you do. Don't look at that. Don't think
about that. Tithe your money. Stop cursing
and adopt holy living. All these things are chains.
And if you don't accept Christ as your savior, then you're not
gonna be saved. These are chains that false religion
puts on people. And what happened to him? He
couldn't do it. He break free from those chains
over and over. It said they chained him multiple
times and he just kept breaking free because we're trying to
make him do something that he's not willing to do because he
doesn't want to do it. The chains do not change the
will. I think we can, kind of a real life example in a way
is, you look at these Las Vegas shows that they have where they
bring out these lions and tigers, you know, they have beat those
things into submission. But you don't see them yanking
on their tails because what's going to happen? It's going to
turn around and eat them. And one of the guys actually got
attacked, you know, one of those famous guys did by one of his
lions and jumped on him and, you know, mauled him half to
death. So, there's no chain. Just because you put chains on
someone and give them rules and regulations of false religion,
it doesn't mean that's what's in their heart. It just means,
I'm trying to make you do something. So, if we turn back to our text
in Acts chapter 12, so here we find Peter still chained
up. He's being made to do something
that he doesn't want to do. And in verse 7 it says, And behold,
the angel of the Lord came upon him. This is how salvation works. We're in chains, we're unable
to get ourselves out, but yet God in his mercy looks upon us
and says, I'm going to do something for that one. So the angel of
the Lord came upon him, and a light shined in the prison. What was
that light? That light was the illuminating
work of God the Holy Spirit. The illuminating work that gives
us life. This is the new man, Christ in
you, that quickens us together with Christ, that gives us eyes
to see, that gives you ears to hear, gives you a heart to receive
and to love the gospel. The light shone in upon him.
And he smote Peter on the side. You see, he is smoting because
he was quickened with his Lord. Our Lord was smote as well. It
pleased the Lord to bruise him. So just like our Lord, we are
bruised with him. We die and we become dead to
our sin. And in dying, it says, He raised
him up, saying, Arise up quickly, being alive in Christ. So these
are just giving us pictures of our union with Christ here. And
then it says, After he rose up, his chains fell off. You see,
going back to our Mark 5, the Gadarene Demonic, God gave him
a new heart, and how did we find him? What did the people of the
town find when they came to hear that the Lord was there, and
the crazy guy from the tombs, where was he at? He was seated. Clothes, he didn't wear clothes
before, he just ripped himself and cut himself up, and it said
he was in his right mind, and he was seated at the Lord's feet.
And what was their reaction to this? They were afraid. They don't understand it. But
what will he do? There's no chains upon him. You
know why they thought that? You know why they were afraid
and why they said the chains needed to be upon him? because
they knew what they would do under similar circumstances.
And the reason I say that is with regard going back to false
religion. If you don't put chains on a
person and tell them they have to do these things that they
don't want to do, what will they do otherwise? It's because they
have no change of heart and they know what the wickedness of their
heart would do if they didn't have those chains on them. But
yet what do we find one of the children of God who's been given
a new heart doing when the chains have been removed for him? He
was doing what he wanted to do. You hear that grace is free,
but won't that lead to sinning? That's what they say. You've
heard that. You tell people what you believe.
Won't that lead people to sin? You mean you just believe and
that's it? Those chains of religion are not on you anymore? The things
that tell you what you have to do? No. You don't have to do
any of those things. That's the response of someone
who doesn't have a new heart. It's a response of someone who
would do what they want to do, but we find God's child doing
what he wanted to do, seated at the Lord's feet, it says,
in his right mind. the chains fell off. He was no
longer bound to keep the law. You see, it's already been kept
in the person of Christ. No longer bound to keep that
law anymore. What about his works? Paul said, my works are done.
They're worthless. They don't mean anything. And
he says in Ephesians, any good work that I did do, it was foreordained
that I should walk in it. So how then can I glory in it?
You can't have any glory in your works. And even if it was a good
work, it was foreordained that you should walk in it. So you
can't look at that in a way and say, look what I did. What about
atoning for your sins? Christ did that. It's Christ
that died and has risen again. And his risen again is proof
that that atonement was effective. What about knowledge? Surely
that's good. No, I'm shut up to revelation. You see, I can learn a lot of
things, and it's good to know things, but those won't save
me. I need God, the Holy Spirit, to reveal himself to me from
his word, and he does that through revelation and the preaching
of the gospel. Well, what about your evil thoughts? What about
your sins? Because you're still having those.
That's right, and this old man will be dead soon enough. And
with all his lusts, with his nature, and with his sinning,
you see, we see darkly right now. We can see a little bit.
Mostly all we can see is this old man. That's all we can see.
But yet, there will come a day when the old man dies, and just
like Paul, the scales will fall off from your eyes. And then
we'll be able to know as we are known. Because right now with this old
man, all we can see is sin. All we can see is the old nature.
But yet we believe in our heart. The new man's in there. You don't
have to convince someone who has a second nature that there
is one. You see, we'll see that one day
and know it as we are known. And I look forward to that. So
my chains are off. The gospel makes us free in Christ.
There's nothing to be done. What about your faith? You gotta
do that? No, that's the gift of God. We're
told that. What about righteousness? No, it's all that I'll ever need.
You see, this is salvation. It's believing that He is able. See, it's not looking to anything
that I do or have done, but if I believe He's able, that's all
that's going to be required. All my hope is found in what
He did. I've got one more scripture.
Turn with me to John chapter 11. And in verse 21, then said Martha
unto Jesus, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not
died. But I know that even now, whatsoever
thou wilt ask of God, God will give it to thee. She knew the
facts here, didn't she? She knew the scriptures and she
knew the facts. But Jesus said unto her, Thy brother shall rise
again. Martha said unto him, I know
that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.
And Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life. And he that believeth in me,
though he were dead, yet shall he live. Martha here knew the
facts. She quoted them back to the Lord
and he kindly and long-sufferingly dealt with her impatience, and
how many of us can reflect on that experience as well, that
the Lord dealing long-suffering with us. He tells Martha, I know
that you know those things, Martha, but what you're not seeing is
I am the resurrection. It's not that the resurrection
will occur, I'm it, and I am the life. I'm the source by which
you will be quickened. I have that power. but I'm also
the reason for it. So I am the resurrection and
the life. And though he were dead, though
he were dead, yet shall he live. Is there anyone in here that's
dead? Anyone in here that's spiritually dead? Where you know that you
cannot worship apart from God giving you his spirit. You know
that you can't please him in the law. You know that everything
you do is sin. And that if he left you right
where you were, you'd be dead. You can hear nothing, you can
believe nothing. That's us, we're dead. And he's saying in here,
in his word at the end of this, in verse 25, though he were dead,
yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth
in me, they shall never die. He that believeth in me, in me. Salvation is a person. Salvation
is not a collection of facts to believe. It's believing that
he's able, believing in me. That's what he said. Yet shall
he live. And he said, he shall never die.
You see, his work is permanent. He that hath begun a good work
in you, he'll perform it even unto that day. You see, if he
has given you ever any ability to believe, even if you feel
you're in the dark right now, he will perform it until the
day of that day that he comes back. So whatever he does, that
work must be successful. He said his work is permanent,
and there's no end to his power and his work, and then he tells
Martha, believest thou this? Do you believe even this, Martha,
that I'm the resurrection, that I'm the life, and if you believe
in me, I have that power to raise you up? He didn't give her anything
to do, He didn't give her anything to say. He didn't upbraid her
for the foolish things that she said to him. He just said, Martha,
do you believe this? She says what? Yay, Lord. I believe
that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come
into the world." You see, believing in him sets the prisoner free. Believing in him causes the chains
of your past to fall off, causes the chains that you were chained
with in false religion, the law, your works, those fall off. It
causes the chains of your old nature even. One day we'll experience
that. That'll fall off too. He'll fall
away and we won't have him anymore. We're not bound by them anymore.
Has no more power over you, you are free. And if the Son, therefore,
shall make you free, you are free indeed. He has the power,
He has the will, and He's done the work, and He has the right.
Don't reshackle those chains that Christ has made us free
from. We are called upon to believe that He is able And in believing
in Him, those chains, they fall to the floor.