I want to begin reading in Luke's
Gospel, chapter 17, and let's begin reading in verse 1 and
read down through verse 10. And He said unto the disciples,
It is impossible, but that offenses will come. But woe unto him through
whom they come. It were better for him that a
millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast them to the
sea, then that he should offend one of these little ones. Take
heed to yourself, if your brother trespass against you, rebuke
him, and if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespass against
thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again
to thee, saying, I repent, thou shalt forgive him. And the disciples
said unto him, Lord, increase our faith. And the Lord said,
If you had faith as a grain of mustard seed, you might say unto
this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted
in the sea, and it should obey you. But which of you, having
a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say to him by and
by, when he is come from the field, go and sit down to meet,
and will not rather say unto him, Make ready wherewith I may
sit, and that I may gird myself, and gird thyself, and serve me,
till I have eaten and drunken, and afterwards thou shalt eat
and drink. Does he think that servant, because
he did the things that were commanded him? I think not. I trow not. So likewise ye, when ye have
done all things which are commanded unto you, say, We are unprofitable
servants. We have done that which was our
duty to do. My text is here in verse 5. It
is where you will find my text. It was a request of these disciples
to have their faith increased. Lord, increase our faith, they
said. And I want to consider this request
with you this morning that the apostles made. Now, you'll notice
how our Lord responded. And He often responded this way.
He didn't say, I will. Or He didn't say, I wouldn't.
The Lord often answers requests and our questions sometimes in
such a way that it makes us examine what we've even asked. One fellow asked the Lord Jesus
one time, Are there few that be saved? The Lord could have
gave him a simple answer. He could have said, There's going
to be a bunch to be saved. Or, There's going to be few saved.
But the Lord never answered that question that way. He answered
it in such a way, I'm sure, that it made the man think to himself,
Why did I even ask this question? Here's the way the Lord answered
that. He said, what you need to be concerned about is yourself. Will you be saved? Will you be
among the saved? And he said this to him. Strive
to enter in at the straight gate. You get in yourself. Don't worry
about who else is getting in or how many. And the Lord often
answers that way. And He answers these fellows
here in such a way that they examine themselves. concerning
their faith. Now, I've got basically three
points this morning. First of all, I want to look
at the request itself and what it implies concerning faith. And secondly, I want to look
at the reason for the request to start with. Why did they even
ask, Lord, increase our faith? And then I want to look at the
Lord's response to that request. And then through all of this,
I hope that we can see the nature of true, saving faith. So first of all, let's look at
the request, Lord, increase our faith. Now, these disciples and
these apostles were so ignorant about so many things, and I want
to show you that. Look in chapter 18 in verse 31. If these apostles had been on
this side of the cross, you and I would have been very, very
concerned about that. Because they didn't have any understanding
of the cross. They didn't yet understand that
Christ would raise from the dead. Look at this example in chapter
18 and verse 31. Then he took unto him the twelve
and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things
that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall
be accomplished. For he shall be delivered unto
the Gentiles, and they shall mock him, and spitefully entreat
him, and spit on him, and they shall scourge him, and put him
to death. And the third day he shall rise
again, and they understood none of these things. And this saying
was hid from them, neither knew they the things which he had
spoken unto them." Now isn't that amazing? That's absolutely
amazing. It's amazing to you and me, isn't
it? They understood none of these things. And another place He
said to them, you don't understand what I'm doing now, but you'll
understand later. And many of these things that
the Lord Jesus spoke to them, they never understood it this
time, but they understood later. Now, one of the things this teaches
us, if nothing else, it teaches us this, doesn't it? It really,
and basically in the long run, is not how much theology we know,
but it's who we know. Isn't that really what it comes
down to? It's who we know. And you know they knew Him. You
and I may not completely understand this, how they could have been
so ignorant at this time. But ignorant they were. But I'm
telling you, they knew Him. Who do men say that I, the Son
of Man, am? Lord, some of them say you're
Jeremiah or Elijah, one of the prophets. And he said, Peter,
who do you say that I am? He said, you are the Christ.
You're the Son of the living God. And how did he know that?
God the Father had revealed that to him. We are convinced, he
said, that you are the Christ. We believe and are sure that
thou art the Christ. So how much were they ignorant
of? My, my, they were ignorant of so much. So much knowledge
at this time they did not have. But I tell you one thing they
did have, and that's faith. That's faith. Lord, increase
our faith. Boy, I tell you they had that,
didn't they? And they knew they had that. Judas exempted. I don't
know for sure, and I can't put my hand on when these men come
to believe. There was a time when they didn't
believe, and there was a time when they were brought to faith
in Christ. And when that time was, Wayne, I don't know. But
believe they did. They come to faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus never rebuked
them for having no faith. He rebuked them for having little
faith. O thou of little faith!" He rebuked them for not exercising
your faith. He said, Where is your faith? Where is the exercise of your
faith? But He never said, You are destitute
of it. Because they weren't. They had
faith. Well, there have been times,
and there are times in your life where you wondered if you truly
believed the Lord or not. Do I believe Him or do I not?
Well, these men may have had times that they had some doubts
about it, but not here. They said, we believe. Lord,
increase our faith. And you notice something else
that we learned here about their faith is this. Boy, they put
a high value on it. Their faith was precious to them.
You say, Bruce, how do you know that? Because they said, we want
it increased. If you've got something that
you absolutely beg to get more of it, it's because you count
it precious, don't you? Their faith was precious to them. Their knowledge was weak, and
their faith may have been little, but boy, it was precious to them.
And they said, Lord, increase our faith. Faith is a peculiar thing, isn't
it? And you know what makes it precious?
I tell you, there's not much of it. It's a scarce thing, isn't
it? And did you ever hear any child
of God brag about how much he had? We complain about how little
we've got. And it's because it's so precious. Faith is a precious thing. You
can't be saved without faith. Thy faith has saved thee. What
must I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus and
you shall be saved. We walk by faith. We stand by
faith. We'll die in the faith. Without
faith, it's impossible to please God. A man can't have a thought. A man can't take a step. A man
can't give a dime. A man can't do anything pleasing
to God except he do it in faith. Faith is a precious, precious
thing. The Scripture calls it precious,
don't it? The trial of your faith is precious. The exercise of
it is precious. And boy, how precious is the
object of it. Oh, he's precious, isn't he?
He's precious. Oh, they said, Lord, increase
our faith. Why do you want your faith increased? Because it's
precious. It's precious. Here's something else they realized
about their faith, and it was this. They realized it was a
grace. Faith is a grace. Lord, you increase
our faith. Why did they ask Him to increase
their faith? They knew they didn't get it
of their own selves. They can't sustain it of their
own selves, and they can't increase it of themselves. When you and
I are born into this world, we're not born believing. Faith doesn't
lay dormant in our hearts, and someday we just exercise it.
We are destitute of faith until the Lord of Glory gives us grace
to believe. We believe through the working
of His mighty power, the same power that it took to raise the
Lord Jesus from the dead. There is no dead sinner that
can believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And there is no live
sinner that can maintain this this grace in His heart, neither
can He increase it. The only way it can be increased
is by Him that gave it. Now, isn't that so? Haven't you
experienced that? Oh, they said this faith, this
faith is a gift of the Lord. And they said, Lord, only You
can increase it. The Lord increased our faith. Boy, this should be encouraging
to everybody. I mean, if you're here this morning and you're
a lost sinner, you're a poor lost sinner, maybe you've been
thinking about this. Maybe you've had some deep thoughts
about this. And I know when the Lord first
began to deal with me and my heart got heavy over sin, I remember,
this has been 43 or 44 years ago, I remember sitting at my
kitchen table reading about believing in Christ. And I remember thinking
to myself, I can keep the law as easily as I can believe. I
can't believe. I've tried to believe and can't
believe. Well, if you're here this morning and that's your
attitude, listen to this. You're going to have to obtain
grace to believe. But the heart of Jesus Christ
is full of grace. And He can give you grace to
believe on Himself. And be like that poor old man
that was in that awful fix that he couldn't believe either. And
he said, Lord, I believe. Help, help my unbelief. And since faith is a grace, I
believe you'll grant it. I believe you'll grant it. So the request itself tells us
something here about their faith. It's their faith. They had it.
They counted it precious. They wanted it increased. And
it was a grace. He that gave it could also increase
it. That's the first point. My second
point is this. What was the reason for the request?
It just seemed to pop out of the blue when you first look
at this. You think, why even ask that at this place? There
was no indication that such a question should even be asked until you
begin to look at it closer. And then, You begin to see why
they ask, Lord, increase our faith. Why was it? It's because
of the subject that the Lord had been dealing with in verses
1 through verse 3. Talking about offenses. One person
offending another person. And one person sinning against
another person. If your brother sinned against
you, and he turned and said to you, forgive me, then you forgive
him. If he sins against you seven
times in one day, and he turns and says, forgive me, then you
forgive him. But boy, I want you to notice
here, it's very strange language our Lord uses. He says here in
verse 3, take heed to yourself. If thy brother trespass against
thee, you take heed to yourself. It seems to me that He should
have said, if you sin against your brother, you take heed.
But he doesn't say that, does he? Ain't this amazing? He said,
if somebody spins against you, if somebody has offended you,
you need to take heed. Seems like he puts the shoe on
the other foot, doesn't he? You take heed. This situation is so serious
that the Lord tells them here the only course of action, look
at this, is to rebuke him. Matthew 18, in this parallel
passage, he says, go to Him and tell Him His fault between you
and Him. Be up front with Him. Tell Him
what He's said to you or what He's done that's offended you.
Be honest about the situation. And then if He repents, then
you forgive Him. And that settles it. That settles
it. Boy, it's not that easy. If you've
ever been here, it's not that easy, and our Lord Jesus knows
it. Why isn't that easy? Well, here's
the problem we face. Sometimes it's difficult to confront
somebody that's did you wrong. I don't know about you, and you
may not think this about me, but I'm somewhat shy. I'm just
a little bit timid. I am. When you get up here among
friends, oh, I can be bold, man. But if I've got to go confront
somebody about such a serious issue, I'm somewhat timid about
it. I'm just a little bit apprehensive.
I'm afraid to do it. Well, if that happens, what's
going to happen then? I'm going to practice around
in my heart. Somebody said something to me, and it's deeply offended
me. Somebody's done something that's
offended me, and I just can't get up enough courage to go talk
to them about it. But I'm going to carry this around,
and then what's going to happen? I'm going to let bitterness build
up, resentment build up, hard feelings build up. Is that going
to help anybody? It sure ain't going to help me,
is it? Secondly, think of this. We're apt, instead of going to
that person and talking to him and rebuking him, we're apt to
confide in somebody else. Don't we do that? Can I talk
to you for a minute? Sure, what have you got? Well,
I've got to tell you what this fellow did to me. This brother,
here's what he said to me. And this just hurt me. It's offended
me. It's just upset me. Can I talk
to you about it? No, you need to go to Him. You need to go
talk to Him about it. Because if you talk to me about
it, I may let it slip and talk to somebody else about it. And
I may leave out just a little something. And after a while,
all these rumors have spread all through the church. And everybody
knows about it, but maybe Him. See how important this is? See
how serious this is? One thing this teaches me as
I study this lesson is don't be so sensitive. We can absolutely
let our feelings, as we used to say, out on our sleeves. Wear
your feelings out on your sleeves. And every little cross look It
just upsets me. Or somebody said something and
I perceived that he aimed that at me, and so I get upset. And after a while, if I'm going
to be that sensitive about every little jot and every little tittle,
I tell you, I'm going to be a miserable creature. I'll tell you this story that
happened to me one time. There was a man come to me and said,
These two ladies said something about you, and this is what they
said. And it was awful. Man, that went home to my heart.
And what I should have did is went right straight to those
women and talked to them about it. I should have did that because
it offended me so deeply. And man, I carried that, and
I carried that, and I carried that, and I got so upset, and
I couldn't pray, I couldn't worship. And I went one day to the Lord
in prayer, and I said, Lord, I forgive them. I forgive them. I forgive their awful things
they said about me and I forgive them. And I had some peace about
it. But you know something? Come to find out they didn't
even say it. He lied to me. He lied to me. They didn't even
say it. See how important it is to keep all of this up front
and to be honest, this is the only course of action that we
can take. And it's the course that the
Lord Jesus tells us to take. If this person has offended you,
Go to him and tell him his fault, and if he repents, then forgive
him. And here's the third problem
that we have. It's this business sometimes of forgiveness. You say, Bruce, I have no problem
with that. Well, that's good. God bless your heart. But I tell
you, Peter had problems with this. You remember, he asked
the Lord Jesus one time in this parallel passage of this. He's
talking about, if your brother turned and repented, forgive
him. He said, how many times, Lord? Can we put a limit on it? Till seven times? And you remember
what the Lord told him? Seven times, seven days. How
many times is that? 490 times. Now, I'm certain,
I'm certain that will probably never happen. But the Lord was
exaggerating this to teach us a lesson. If a brother sinned
against you 490 times and he turned and said, Brother, I have
sinned against you, forgive me. Then the Lord Jesus said, Forgive
him. Forgive him. I know some other things may
enter into this. I realize that. And we could talk about those
things. This is the matter if I hold a position and I sin,
and it may lead to distrust in that position. And we could go
into details on all of that. But we're not talking about all
of that, are we? We're just talking about somebody has done something
that offended their dear brother, and now this brother is to go
to him. And notice, the Lord Jesus doesn't beat around the
bush about this. He doesn't say, you know, you
have to try to discern all of this. He just says, if he repents,
forgive him. If he turns and says to you,
brother, I've sinned, forgive me. He doesn't say, try to discern
if his repentance is sincere or not. It's not your responsibility
or my responsibility to discern how sincere they are. They may be sincere and we don't
even realize it. But he said, if he turn and if he say, I repent,
then forgive him. Don't say, I'll forgive, but
I'll tell you this, I'll never forget it. And don't say, I'll
tell you this, I'll forgive you, but I'm going to keep my eye
on you. And if you do this again, I'm not only going to confront
you about that, but we're coming back to this. How do we forgive
people? The same way the Lord forgives
us. Do we not? Be you kind and tender-hearted,
forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven
you. How does He graciously forgive?
Oh, He tenderly and graciously forgives everything, doesn't
He? And here's what He said, I'll never remember it against
you again. That's the way to forgive, isn't
it? Freely, completely, graciously, lovingly. I'm not going to hold
any resentment against you. I'm not going to hold any ill
will against you. I'm going to freely forgive you
of what you've done to me. Lord, increase our faith. Lord,
increase our faith. It's not too difficult to forgive
little things. I've had people to come to me
and you've had People come to you, and I've went to people
and said, Brother, forgive me of this. And they said, My, that's
nothing, man, that's nothing. But this is talking about something
big. This is talking about something that's really wounded my spirit.
Broke my heart. It takes a little more grace
then, doesn't it? To forgive. Boy, it does. It
does. What does the context then teach
us about this request? In some way or another, faith
is connected with our forgiving other people. It must be, because
when the Lord was telling them here, if your brother sinned
against you and you repent, then forgive him, then they immediately
said, Lord, I need more faith. So what connection does faith
have in forgiving someone their sins? Well, let's look at it
this way. It's the very nature of saving
faith that shows me how much I owe. Is it not? No one has sinned against me. so greatly and so often as I
have sinned against the Lord." Faith shows me this. It lets
me see myself as I really am. Faith purifies the heart. And how does it purify the heart?
By showing the heart itself. I have sinned against God. I've
sinned against His law. I've sinned against His gospel.
I've sinned against Christ. I've sinned against His goodness.
I've sinned against His love. I've sinned against His patience.
I've sinned against the Holy Spirit. I've sinned against His
light that He's put in me. I've sinned against His warnings,
His encouragements. I've sinned willingly. I've sinned
ignorantly. You say, Bruce, that's awful.
You're telling me. And the half has not been told. My sin is so great, sometimes
it seems to fill my entire being. Are you the chief of sinners?
What has the Lord taught you about yourself? Has He not taught
you, dear child, that your sin against Him is much greater than
any dear brother has ever sinned against you? It's not a dear brother, a poor
fallen sinner like myself that I've sinned so against. It's
against a good God, a tender Father, a merciful Savior. That poor publican standing there
in the temple, smiting up on his chest, saying, God, be merciful
to me, a sinner. Can you imagine he'd had any
trouble forgiving his brother, thirsty? I doubt it. I doubt
it. If a brother had came when he
left that temple and said, my brother publican, I did something
to you, and I am so sorry. He'd said, oh, brother, you're
forgiven. Oh, he'd hugged his neck, but you're forgiven. You're
just seeing a cloud of sins. that God has forgiven me, I forgive
you. I forgive you. It's faith that enters in to
the enormous price that was paid to atone for sin and to secure
forgiveness of sin. Faith enters into the death,
the sufferings, the bloodshedding of Jesus Christ. Oh, we like
sheep have gone astray, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity
of us all. Look yonder to Calvary's tree.
See your sins in His body. See His soul being made a sacrifice
for those sins. He cried. Shannon, He shed blood,
but He shed tears for your sins. His soul was grieved. It was
heavy for our sins. He gave Himself for our sins. His time. My goodness, they interrupted
His meals. He went sleepless nights. Look
at Him in the garden. Look at Him in the judgment hall.
Look at Him on the cross. He gave Himself for our sins. It's faith that gets a hold of
this. I see what my sins cost. It don't cost me a thing to forgive
my brother that sinned against me. It cost Jesus Christ everything
he had and everything he was before he could forgive my sins. My sins took an enormous price. to put them away. His entire
person. Blessed be His name. And it is
only faith that can enter into this atonement. And it is love,
then, that springs out of this faith. Faith worketh by love. That woman there in Luke 7, weeping
at His feet. He looks at her and says, Woman,
your sins, which are many, are forgiven thee. And he said, She
loved much. She loved much. And he said to
her, Woman, go in peace. Thy faith has saved thee. If I have experienced forgiveness
of my own sins, then I have seen through the eye of faith. the
great sacrifice that it took to put away my sins. And brothers
and sisters, when a brother asks for our forgiveness, faith says,
I forgive. I forgive. Here in chapter 6, there is something
else here. Our Lord responds. Let's look
thirdly at our Lord's response. What does faith have to do with
forgiving sins? It causes the heart, it lets
the heart see its own sins, and it enters into that atonement.
Only by faith can we enter into that atonement for our sins.
And here in verse 6, he says something else, and we see something
else here about the nature of faith. If you had faith as a
grain of mustard seed, they tell us that that was the smallest
seed there is. a mustard seed, not very big.
You might say unto this sycamine tree, be thou plucked up by the
roots and be planted in the sea. In this parallel passage, the
Lord Jesus says, if you say to this mountain, if you have faith
as a grain of mustard seed, you could say to a mountain, be plucked
up and be cast in the sea. Now, let's don't take this literally.
Let's be careful. Don't get foolish about this.
He is not speaking literally. There has never been a mountain.
Have you ever seen any sycamine trees flying through the air?
We never have and we never will. It is not talking literally. He is talking from a spiritual
aspect. Faith removes great obstacles. They tell us this sycamine tree
had a a great root system. That one man said he witnessed where one had been blown, just
blown to pieces by a tornado. And a storm came down of hail
and had beat another one up, but he says he'd never seen one
plucked up by the roots. He said they got too great a
root system But the Lord Jesus says faith will pluck them up
with the roots. And what's He teaching us? Faith
will overcome those things that stand in our way. Faith removes them. Faith enables
us to go on. These obstacles won't stop us. That's what He's teaching. I've
got a hard heart. Well, faith overcomes it. There's
bitterness set up in my heart. I'm afraid to go to somebody.
I can't forgive I'm having problems. Faith overcomes everything that
stands in our way from graciously obeying our Lord and what He
tells us to do. That's what He's saying. Ain't
but one way to follow Christ, and that's by faith. Ain't no
other way we can follow Him, but by faith in Him. Who is He
that overcomes the world? But He that believes that Jesus
is the Christ, the Son of God, this is the victory that overcomes
the world, even our faith. Faith overcomes everything. Faith
removes obstacles. And you notice what the Master
said to you. It's not the greatness of faith. If you have faith as a grain
of mustard seed, it's not the greatness of your faith, is it?
Tiny, tiny faith. If you have tiny, tiny faith,
it's not the amount of faith that a man has. You know what's so strong? Nobody talks about how strong
their faith is, but these movie stars and these guys that don't
know what faith is. What is it about faith that's
so strong? It's faith's object. That's what
it is. If you have faith as a grain
of mustard seed, your object of faith will move this mountain. He'll move this sycamine tree.
Believe in God, the Lord Jesus said, for with God all things
are possible. Faith. Little faith, one man
said, exercised upon that almighty object can obtain great things
and remove great obstacles that stand in our way of obedience
to a gracious Lord. Christ teaching these apostles
here not to be overly concerned with the degree of their faith,
but learn to live in the exercise of that faith which they already
have. Lord increase our faith. Give
me more faith. No. Learn to live on the exercise
of the faith that I've already given you. Peter was told of the Lord Jesus
and was asked this question, Wherefore did you doubt? And
you remember the occasion of that, wherefore did you doubt?
Peter had just defied nature. He got out of the boat and was
walking on water. Remember that? And you know something? He could
have continued to walk on water, too. And yet the Lord Jesus said,
Oh, thou have little faith, wherefore did you doubt? He just had a
little bit of faith, but he's walking on water. It don't take
a lot of faith to walk on water. Just a little bit. If you're
looking to the object of that faith, which Peter was, Lord
bid me to come to you. And he said, come on. And Peter
kept his eyes on Jesus Christ the Lord. Never tucked his eyes
off of him. And he walked on water. You try
that. You think that's not a miracle?
You try. You think faith won't remove mountains? Faith lets you walk on water.
You'll become a water walker. And you know what he did? He
heard this big crashing, and he looked over there, and there
was a wave going over his head. And he heard something else crash,
and there was another big wave over there. And then he started
looking down and said, Myah, Myah, look at the black water! And you know what happened? He
started down. Why did he start down? He got
his eye off of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's exactly That's
exactly it. If you have just a tiny little
faith, but if you're looking to the object of that faith and
keep your eye upon Him, all obstacles is going to be removed. That's
what he's saying. It's not the greatness of faith.
It's a little faith looking unto a great and mighty God in Christ. That's it. We want enough faith to make
life easy. That's not the nature of faith.
That's not the nature of faith. Faith is what you use between
a rock and a hard place. Faith is what the children of
Israel used and exercised when they found Pharaoh behind them,
and the Red Sea in front of them, and the mountains on either side
of them. Faith is what we have to swim upstream with. Faith
is what we use to go one more mile when our muscles are aching
and our lungs are heathen and we are utterly worn out. Faith
is what enables us to say, though He slay me, yet will I trust
Him. We are not always given the degree
of faith to make running the race easy. But we are given a
degree of faith to enable us to run the race even though it
is difficult. If you have been given grace
to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, then live upon Him. Live upon Him. Every day, drink
of that atoning blood. Every day, eat of that bread
that was broken for you. Believe His Word. Believe His
prophets. And this will bring strength
enough for you to obtain the victory, even though you've got
little weak faith. Lord, increase our faith. No, live upon the faith that
you have. Exercise the faith that you have. Does that make sense? Now, let's wrap it up. In verses
6 through verse 10, we see something else about the nature of faith.
He told here in verse 7 about these two servants. One had been
out in the field working. He comes home, and his master
doesn't say, now sit down. And I'll serve you. He says when
he comes on, I'm going to sit down and you're going to serve
me. You're my servant. I'm the master. And then when
I'm finished, I'm satisfied, then you can eat yourself. I'm
not even going to thank you because you're doing just what I called
you to do. The Scripture tells us, and I
think the Lord hints here just a little bit, about there being
two kinds of servants in the Scripture. There's an unwilling
servant and there's a willing servant. You've got an unwilling
servant who is trying to serve the Lord Jesus Christ without
faith, and it's impossible to do it. And the Lord hints it,
a man here like that. And you can picture a self-righteous
man. You can picture a legalist. And he's upset. Because he just
feels like he's undervalued. He's just not appreciated. He's
been so faithful, you know. And he's looked at all the effort
that he's put forth in the cause of Christ, and he just feels
like that he's underappreciated. And he feels like the Lord hasn't
exalted him to the position that he should be exalted to. He's
serving the Lord because he's afraid if he don't, he'll go
to hell. You say, Bruce, there's people
like that? Oh, yes, there's people like that. The Catholic Church
yesterday morning and this morning is full of people that was drunk
as a skunk last night, but they had to come this morning and
take Mass or they're going to hell. And there's folks like that in
the Baptist Church. Boy, I've got to read my Bible.
If I don't, I'm going to hell. Boy, I've got to go to church.
If I don't, I'm going to hell. I've got to do this and do that.
If I don't, I'm going to hell. I don't even want to do it. But if I don't, I'm going to
hell. And there's other fellows. I'm going to do this so I'll
get stars in my crown. I'll get a greater reward. But you know something? They
don't serve well in me. Can you imagine this servant coming in
out of the field and his master don't even thank him? That sounds
harsh. But here's the difference. He's
the servant. He's the master. But the servant
that's unwilling, he don't like the master. He thinks positions
ought to be changed. And there he stands behind his
master, and boy, he's got his jaws locked. He don't even appreciate
me. Look at the fields I've plowed
for him. Look at the seed I've sowed.
I have worked until my back aches, and he ain't even said a word
to me about appreciating me and thanking me and how good a servant
I am. I went out in the wintertime
and fed his cattle. And in the summertime, I've sweated
and I've worn myself out. Man, look how much I've gilled
and look what I've done. Look how faithful I've been.
And then when I come home to the house up here, he won't even
let me sit down and serve me. And you know what he's saying
in his heart. This is what he's saying in his
heart. I hate his service. I hate his field, I hate his
cattle, and I hate him. Now there's people who are trying
to serve God and they hate him. They're unwilling servants. But
he tells about another fellow here in verse 10, doesn't he?
He's another fellow. When he's done all that he's
commanded to do, here's his whole attitude. I'm an unprofitable
servant. I'm just so grateful. He lets
me hang around. I ain't fit for anything. That's
what he's thinking about himself. Oh, he's worked. He's a servant.
He's labored. But you know something? He loves
his service. He loves his master. This is
what faith does. It lets you in upon who's the
master and who's the servant. It keeps people in their proper
places, doesn't it? I'm just a servant. And I ain't
worth anything. I am so vain. I am so empty.
I'm not worth anything. What do you think of your master?
Oh my, what do I think of my master? Oh, he's a sovereign
Lord. He's wonderful. He's good. He's kind. He's right. He's never
mistreated me. I'm just amazed that He'd send
me out to His field to plow. I'm amazed that He'd give me
seed to sow. I'm amazed that He'd let me feed
His sheep. I'm overwhelmed when I see His
face. Oh, as I work for Him and I get
a glimpse of His face, my heart, it pounds in me for joy. And
what do you think of yourself? I'm a sorry dog. I ain't worth
nothing. I ain't worth nothing. I'm just
lovingly amazed that He'd let me hang around and do anything
in His service and for His glory. See the difference? And here's
the only thing, brothers and sisters, that makes a distinction
in those two servants, a willing and unwilling servant. One of
them believes and one of them doesn't. One of them looks to his master
and he sees glory in him and beauty in him and sovereignty
in him and he bows to him willingly and lovingly and he sees in himself
so unworthiness. And it just makes him happy that
he's just an old dog that can hang around with his loving master. Lord, increase our faith. I was talking to a pastor one
day. Man, he was upset. He was so
down. I said, what's the matter with you? And he said, I just
got about 10 people to preach to. What do you say to somebody
like that? Man, he was discouraged. He said,
I've just got about ten people to preach to. You know what I
said to him? You don't deserve any. You don't deserve any. Who do you think you are? That's
what I told him. I said, who do you think you are? We're nothing, are we? If we've
got one to preach Christ to, what a blessing! And that him
let me get up here and preach to anybody, let alone a bunch
of people, But when we get to thinking we're
somebody, oh, we're something else, then we get to thinking
he ain't much. It's all about me. Faith says
this has nothing to do with you. It's got everything to do with
Him. Everything to do with Him. Lord, increase our faith. Lord,
increase my faith. God bless you, let's pray.