Now, if you'd like to turn with
me into your Bibles, we'll be in Hebrews chapter 13 again. Hebrews chapter 13. As I studied this, I learned
that time certainly is going by faster and faster. I don't
have to tell most of you all that, but two years ago, I preached
a message titled, What Clears the Conscience? And here in our
text, he's given the solution to that. That's not going to
be the title this morning. He says, live honestly. Live
honestly is the solution to a clear conscience. Now we know there's
only one thing that can clear the conscience, and that's the
blood of Christ. That's what clears the conscience. We made
that very clear two years ago. The blood of Christ clears the
conscience. But as I wanna look at this, I've titled this Live
Honestly. Live Honestly, and the reason
being so is there is no honest people in hell. And you'll understand
what I mean by that whenever I get finished. There's no honest
people in hell. If the Lord has made you to be
honest regarding yourself, honest regarding God, and honest regarding
the Lord Jesus Christ, then there's no honest people in hell. Those that he's made see that. God's people are honest about
needing the blood. They're honest about needing
His righteousness. They're honest about needing
His redemption. They're honest about needing His sanctification,
His justification. They're honest about needing
His election, His adoption, just as we heard in that song. God's
people are honest, honest towards the Lord. Let's read this text,
Hebrews chapter 13, two verses, 18 and 19. Pray for us, for we
trust we have a good conscience. in all things willing to live
honestly. But I beseech you rather to do
this that I may be restored to you the sooner." First question
I have for us this morning is, do you live honestly regarding
yourself? Do you live honestly regarding
yourself? Nothing will purge the conscience from dead works
but the blood of Christ. but the blood of Christ. Your
conscience cannot lead you to God, but nothing can purge the
conscience or give you a clean conscience before the Lord, but
the blood of Christ. Man looks in so many places to
try to comfort the conscience or to try to cover the conscience
or to try to even sear the conscience, even sear the conscience. But
here's what Hebrews 9.14 tells us, how much more shall the blood
of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without
spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the
living God? This is what he does for his people. This is what
he does. But only those who are made to
be honest, actually need the blood. Lord's people actually,
truly need the blood. It's the most valuable thing
to them. It's the blood that washed away our sin. It's the
blood that causes us to have a clear conscience before God.
It's the blood that made us the righteousness of God in the Lord
Jesus Christ. Without the blood, we have nothing.
The Lord said, when I see the blood, I will pass by you. But
for those who see themselves as self-sufficient pertaining
to spiritual matters, they're not honest. They don't live honestly
pertaining to themselves. Pertaining to themselves, they
don't live honestly. I'm being signaled, my suit's
messed up, hang on. Those who do not need the blood,
they're not living honestly. They're not living honestly.
They believe the lie and it sears their conscience. Only God's
chosen people live honestly. Not just with men and women.
Now we can take, as we said the first hour, and I'll reiterate
this, everything needs to be seen through the lens of the
gospel. If it's not seen through the lens of the gospel, then
we're gonna miss the point. He's saying live honestly. Okay,
well I'll make sure never to steal. I'll make sure never to
cheat. This is a spiritual matter. If
you're living looking to Christ, if the Lord's called you to be
honestly living about yourself, about God, and about the Lord
Jesus Christ, you're gonna live honestly the rest of the ways
too. It's just how it works. Looking unto Jesus, looking unto
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's just how it falls into
place. We live honestly, spiritually,
and only the Lord's people can do that because they've been
made alive, made alive. They've seen the truth. They've
seen the Lord's sacrifice was sufficient. They've seen that
they need that sacrifice. We need him, not ourself. I quoted this the first hour,
but it's not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according
to his mercy. His mercy is what saved us. His mercy is what loves
us. By grace he loved us. This is just, When we become
honest before the Lord, those that live honestly are made to
see themselves and to see him. We see ourself as blind, don't
we? We see ourself as lame, don't
we? Impotent, rotten. We got a bushel of apples. Boy,
they were pretty on the outside. They were, like, I don't know
if they were a bushel, there's a bag of apples, and I thought,
this is gonna be some good apples. They're out of season, and man,
they're nice and firm, and we got them and brought them home,
and the core on every one of them just about was rotten. Doesn't
do any good to have a rotten core. Doesn't matter how pretty
the outside is. Doesn't do any good, does it?
That's us. Rotten to the core. Sure, we'll paint a fair facade
for everybody to see, an illusion for people to see, but the truth
of the matter is, those who live honestly about themselves, they
see that the outside is the same as the inside. The heart's deceitful
and wicked, above all things. Who can know it? Well, this old
flesh is deceitful and wicked as well, isn't it? and out of
the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. If we're honest,
if we're honestly living regarding ourself, we see ourself the chief
sinner, the chief sinner. We're born sinners by nature,
by practice, by choice. We're born, David said, we were
born in sin, shapen in iniquity. I'm gonna make this statement,
and I hope we can understand what I'm about to say, but whenever
you sleep at night time, you're sinning. Did you know that? Even
when you're asleep. Why? Because you're sleeping,
and that's what we are. We're sinners. That's all we
can do. Somebody said, well, some sin's a lot worse than other
sins. In God's eyes, the wages of sin is death, period. One
sin, somebody said, well, there's greater degrees of punishment.
Listen. One sin is worthy of eternal
damnation. Do we see that? That's God, one
sin. That's what the Lord said, your
sin separated you from me. If we're honest about, if we're
living honestly about ourself, we're gonna see that all we can
do, all that we can produce, all that we can think, all that
we can say in our flesh is sin. Come from the womb speaking lies,
the scripture says. I use that baby as an example.
I saw a little baby the other day. It was crying. They'd pick
it up. I work at a daycare, and this
kid was on the floor crying. As soon as they'd pick it up,
it'd quit. As soon as they'd put it down, it'd start again. Pick it up, it'd quit,
and they'd put it down, it'd start again. The kid didn't need anything. The kid
was lying. It couldn't have been three months
old. Just wanted to be picked up, didn't it? Wanted what it
wanted to do. It's already its own little God and don't even
realize it. That's exactly what it is. That's us by nature. If
we're honestly living, we know that that's the truth. That's
me. I need a savior. I need to be saved, not part
of the way. I need to be saved all the way. And I need him to
do it all because I can't do any of it. If I do, I'll mess
it up. I know I will. I need a savior. Sin isn't just what we are, or
sin isn't what we do, it's what we are. Can you honestly say
that? Sin isn't just what we do, it
is what we are. Can you honestly say that and
believe that in the heart? Only God's people are honest. Only God's people can say, yeah,
I'm the worm. I'm no man. I'm the worm. I'm undeserving of salvation. This is what God's honest, made,
elected people know to be true about themselves, who they are,
what they are by nature. We have a depraved heart, a depraved
nature, a depraved mind, depraved actions. We need a savior. We need a savior. Can you say
that? Can you say that? Secondly, have
you been made to live honestly regarding God. We've heard about
us. What about him? You've been made
to live honestly regarding the things of God, who he is as the
sovereign creator. Not this little insignificant
puny God that men preach. I'm talking about God, the one
that he's sovereign over everything. All the inhabitants of the earth
bow to him and are considered, he reputed as nothing, and the
armies of the earth as well. He's not threatened, he's not
dictated to, he can't be controlled, he can't be constrained or restrained. Have you been made to live honestly,
pertaining to the things of God? He's God and I am not. Do you see him as completely
sovereign? Sovereign over everyone and everything? Do you see him
as, The only potent take King of kings and Lord of lords, the
alpha and omega. That means that salvation starts
with him and it ends with him and he's everything in between.
That's what that means. It means you don't have anything to do
with it. He does. Have you seen God that way? He's sovereign from everything,
from the smallest life form, and I think it's called an amoeba.
I looked at it, I don't know if you can trust Google with
this stuff, but whatever an amoeba is, that's what they said. And
all the way to the sun, the magnificence of the sun, that's our God. He's
sovereign over all of it, all of it. Nothing can change Him.
Nothing can threaten Him. Nothing can stop His hand. Nothing can even come close to
challenging Him. He's God. Have you been made
to live honestly regarding God. You've been made to live honestly
regarding His holiness. He's holy. You know what that
word holy translates? Other. Meaning everything you
and I are, everything we are, He's other than that. That's
the best definition. He's other than we are. The thoughts
we think, he don't think like we think. He said, my thoughts
are above your thoughts. They're higher than the heavens.
The things he does, the things he does is higher than we are.
Past finding out, the scripture says. Even the little bit of
knowledge that he gave in scripture, David said, such knowledge is
too wonderful for me. I can't attain to it. I can't process
this information. I believe it by faith, but I
don't understand it. The flesh can't understand the
things of God. You've been made to live honestly
regarding his holiness, his holiness. Think about this. He doesn't
sleep. Have you ever thought about that? I mean, let that sink in for
a second. He doesn't sleep. He doesn't need sleep. He rests
in Christ, the Sabbath. That's all the rest that he needed
on the Sabbath day. He rested. Well, that was Christ
that he rested on. He rested in. But he never sleeps,
never sleeps, never gets tired. Yet, but he became a man. Think
about the condescension in this though. He became a man and actually
did sleep. He actually did get hungry. He actually did get thirst.
Why? So that he could be touched with his people's, the feeling
of their infirmities. Remember when Lazarus died and
it said Jesus wept. Why did it say that? To show that his heart
hurt too. He understands what you feel.
We have a high priest that's been touched with the feeling
of our infirmities. That's amazing, isn't it? He doesn't think. New thoughts, yes, yet he thinks
on us, his people. He thinks on us. He is completely self-sufficient. Men said God wants this. No, he doesn't. He's not in want
for anything. He doesn't want for anything.
He already has everything. What would he want? If he wants
it, he's already got it. He don't need me and he doesn't
need you. That's the beauty about the covenant of grace is that
he chose a people Irregardless of who they are, whether it's
race, whether it's age, whether it's kindred, whether it's tongue,
he chose in the covenant of grace for his glory and for his honor
alone, according to the good pleasure of his will. Have you been made to live honestly
believing that he is high and lifted up like Isaiah saw him?
Isaiah said he's high and lifted up. He's seated and his train
filled the temple. The glory of God filled the temple.
There's no other room, no other room in that temple but his glory. And I love the thought that that's
our covering, that train. That's where we are, right underneath
that train. That's the place where he will not, that wrath
cannot come because that's his glory. That represents the cross.
It's a beautiful analogy. He's above all. Have you been made to live honestly,
realizing that he alone possesses salvation, because he alone is
salvation. Christ Jesus is salvation. And
if I'm going to have salvation, I have to have Christ, or I don't
have salvation. I've got to have him. I've got
to have his finished work. Have we been made to live honestly
regarding that he possesses salvation. You know what that means? If
you own something, and we have to pretend like we really own
things in this life because we pay taxes till we die. They can
come get your land whenever they want to. They say you own it,
but you got the deed, but then you know what I'm talking about.
That ain't how it is with God. He really owns it. He really,
really owns it. And none can take it away from
him. Let's say for a second you really, really own something.
And what would you do with it? Whatever you wanted to do with
it, right? According to the pleasure of
your own desire, is that not it? Well, pertaining to salvation
and our Lord, that's exactly what he does with it. Whatever
he desires, whatever he's purposed, whatever he pleases, and whatever
brings him pleasure, whatever glorifies him the most, that's
what he does with it. And I love the scripture that says, call
his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.
And the other part that says, this is a faithful saying and
worthy of all expectation, Christ Jesus came into the world to
save sinners. That's what he chose to do with
it. That's what he chose to do with it. Have you been made to
live honestly pertaining to this sovereign holy God that truly
saved his people in the person of Christ? Have you been made to live honestly?
Now to live honestly, means seeing that he chose you in the covenant
of grace. He chooses to save or none can
be saved. He chooses to deliver or none
will be delivered. He chooses to say live or remain
dead. Salvations of the Lord. We have no way of getting rid
of our sin as we heard the first little bit. Our sin is ever before
us, ever before us. You know we actually can't even
choose Him. Anybody ever said that? I think I've said that
before here, but think about that. You can't choose God. Do you know
why? Your nature's against it. You can't act against your nature. God doesn't act against His nature
either. He's holy. The only way that
you and I could be saved if he was just and the justifier, he
had to become a man and bear our iniquity, bear our sin, and
put him away in order for us to have part with him because
there's no way we can get rid of it, therefore there's no way
we can approach him on our own. That's called the gospel. That's
what he does in the covenant of grace for his elect. God will not acquit the guilty.
It's against his nature. Have you ever been made to honestly
live needing to be saved? Not one time. I'm going to, I've
determined I'm going to print some of those bulletins. I sent
them out an email and I don't know who else wanted to take
one, but that one message or that one article I wrote is a
I'll paraphrase, because I can't quote it word for word, but it
says something along these lines that a believer is not someone
that gets saved one time, someone that repents one time, but they
need to be saved right now from themselves. They need to be saved
right now, and right now, and right now. Now, as far as salvation
is concerned, salvation was a one-time transaction. Don't misunderstand
me. And if you're saved, you're saved in Christ Everlastingly. But is it not true that we, Lord
save me right now. Lord save me from, don't leave
me to myself, save me from myself. Lord keep me. And then he changes
our mind all the time, doesn't he, about him. I thought I knew
a little bit about his sovereignty, and I saw this, and I'm like,
well now I know a lot more. So our minds change. He constantly
gives us repentance. Constantly makes us believe and
trust in nothing but The Lord Jesus Christ is finished work
a believer is not one that just believed once and stop believing
a believer believes that's what a believer does. Either we have
been. Made to. Live the lie thinking
we can save ourself. or we have been made to live
honestly, knowing he has got to save me or I'll never be saved. I cannot save myself. First, I ask, have you been made
to live honestly regarding yourself? Second, I ask, have you been
made to live honestly regarding God? And lastly, Have you been
made to live honestly believing on the Lord Jesus Christ? Honestly believing on him? It's
one thing to know the stories. It's one thing to know about
him. It's one thing to say certain terminologies that a lot of religion
uses that I won't even worry about using at the present moment.
But do you live honestly believing on the Lord Jesus Christ? One
thing about our God that's true is that you can lie to me and
that you can lie to your peers, to your family, to your friends,
and they may never find out. You can even lie to yourself,
did you know that? Heart's deceitful above all things and desperately
wicked, but you cannot, cannot, cannot lie to God. He already
knows the truth. He already knows your thoughts
before you think them. That's God. That's God. It's like, well, how can that
be? Because he's God. We have to believe that by faith. We
don't understand it, but we believe it. Have you been made to live honestly,
believing on the Lord Jesus Christ as all your acceptance before
God, all of your wisdom, all of your righteousness, all of
your sanctification, and all of your redemption? Have you been made to live honestly
needing the blood, honestly needing the finished work of Christ,
honestly needing his cross that he hung upon when he laid down
his life freely to save his people from their sin? You've been made
to live honestly needing the Lamb of God that takes away the
sin of the world. You've been honestly made to
need a substitute, surety, one that can touch God and not be
destroyed, and one that can touch us wretched, vile creatures and
not be defiled. I love that everything he touches,
he makes pure, don't you? Everything we touch, we can corrupt.
Everything he touches, he makes pure. We've been made to do that
honestly, honestly looking to him. Do you keep the law? Do you try
to keep the law for righteousness? Or have you been made to honestly
know, are you living honestly? I can't keep God's law, not one
law, not one time ever. I need the one that kept God's
law perfectly, perfectly for his people, the substitute. Have you been made to live honestly? You honestly have a need for
the Lord to show you that your record's clean before him. And
the Lord said, it is finished. Do you honestly need that to
include you in that salvation? Yes. Yes, I do. Because I see there is no way
I can save myself. There's no way I can do anything
to get away from what I am. I'm carrying around my own worst
enemy. Every morning I wake up, there he is facing me in the
mirror again. Oh, wretched man that I am, who
shall be able to deliver me from this body of death? Have you
been made to live honestly, loathing yourself and needing the Savior? David thought that he could be
deceitful. Did you know that? He killed
Bathsheba. I'm sorry, that's wrong. Killed
Bathsheba's husband. committed adultery with Bathsheba
because she had conceived out of wedlock. And then the thing,
the scripture says, the thing which David did displeased the
Lord. And for about a year, nothing
happened. I don't know if David thought,
scripture's not clear on this, but I don't know if David thought,
I got by with this. I can't believe I got by with this. I don't know.
He may have went to the temple every day and offered sacrifices,
hoping that the Lord would accept it. I don't know. This is what
I do know. Whenever the time came for God
to speak to David, he sent Nathan the prophet down to him and he
gave him a story, an allegory. And you've heard me say this
a bunch. I'm going to tell it to you again.
He said there was a rich man that had many flocks and many
herds. And there was a poor man that had one ewe lamb. And he said he loved the lamb.
And he looked to it. He let it eat off of his table
and he held it in his bosom. He loved it. In the passing of
time, the rich man decided that he was gonna throw a feast, but
rather than taking of his own flocks and his own herds and
his own, what he had, he went and took the one ewe lamb from
the man that was poor, and he killed it, and they ate it. Now,
God knows how to get his people's attention, doesn't he? You know
that's true. And David would have been very
tender towards lambs. He'd have been very tender towards
sheep. You remember that was David's occupation in the beginning.
He was a shepherd. He was a shepherd, protector
of the sheep. He killed a bear and he killed a lion when they
came to try to take the sheep. The Lord did that to give him
the courage to face Goliath, didn't he? He said, Lord's gonna
be with me. That's what he said. So you can imagine he was wroth.
And scripture even says that. He said the man's gonna restore
unto him. And then he says, and he's surely
going to die. I think about he just pronounced
his own judgment on himself. Think about that's what we do.
We don't even mean to do it. We pronounce our own judgment
on ourselves, don't we? Nathan said, David, you are the man. You're the one that did that.
You're the one that did that. You took Nathan, or you took
Bathsheba's, you took Nathan's wife, Bathsheba, she conceived,
and then you sent Nathan to the farthest front, the hottest part
of the battle. You wanted him dead, but you
didn't want to actually do it yourself. And they killed him. You're the
man. And David said, I have sinned against the Lord. I have sinned
against the Lord. Only the Lord's people can live
honestly, can live honestly. And what do we hope to hear whenever
we approach God honestly? Fear not, for the Lord hath put
away your sin, you shall not die. The Lord did it, David didn't. Maybe he sacrificed a bunch,
maybe he didn't, but he didn't put away his sin, did he? Who
did that? God did that, God did that. To
live honestly before the Lord is to realize you're gonna have
to put away my sin, I can't do it. I can't do it, you're gonna
have to do it. Thou art the man, I can't do
it. Have you been made to live honestly
knowing that you are the man? Not like society says, hey, I'm
the man, I've got everything under control. No, the man, the
wretched, vile creatures that we are. You've been made to live
honestly before God knowing that. If you've been made to live honestly,
knowing that God is the only remedy, He's the only remedy. As we've already said, He's the
only remedy of God. If God doesn't say, fear not for I've put away
your sin, my sin's going to remain. Can you honestly say that that's
your only hope? God is your only hope. Do you live honestly, hoping
that when Christ died, you died in him? Therefore, you fulfill
the demands of the law in him. Therefore, there is now no condemnation
towards you because he put away that sin. That's living honestly
before him. Lord, you're gonna have to do
it. Is your hope, and are you able to say, I live honestly,
hoping that when he was resurrected, I was resurrected in him. That
means I've died and now I live in him. Dead to the law, alive
unto Christ. That's what baptism represents.
It's a confession of that. Buried with him in baptism, raised
again to walk in a newness of life. Can you say I live honestly,
trusting in his shed blood alone for my righteousness? Now in closing, I wanna tell
us this. You cannot live honestly and
cling to grace and to the law for righteousness. It's one or
the other, one or the other. It's either you're saved by grace
or you're lost by your dead works. That's as clear as I can be.
Works could be something, there's so many possibilities, you fill
in the blank. Just doing something as any part
of your salvation is a work. But those that are saved, they
live honestly knowing they're saved by grace through faith
in that not of themselves, it is the gift of God, not of works,
lest any man should boast. You cannot and I cannot cling
to grace and say that I had some work to do before I was saved
or after I was saved as part of my salvation. I started out
by saying this, I'm gonna say this again, there's no honest
people in hell. There is no honest people in hell whenever it pertains
to living honest about yourself, living honest about who God is,
what he has done, living honest about the Lord Jesus Christ and
his finished word. That's his people. And only his
people live honestly. If you can say assuredly, yes,
yes, I live honestly. Come to Christ. Come to Christ
with the eyes of faith. Don't move a muscle. We don't
have anybody ever come up here to the front. Don't move a muscle.
Come to Christ in the heart. Cry out for mercy. Say, Lord,
here I am. I'm honest with you, and I'm
honest with myself. You've made me thus. Have mercy
on me, the sinner. God makes his people the only
honest ones living. Makes us willing in the day of
his power. He makes us need his son alone
as all of our righteousness. Need his holiness, don't we?
He makes us live honestly knowing he is the only solution for our
sin and for us to have any part with God and God not destroy
us. It's only found in Christ. That's
what living honestly is. This is what living honestly
is. Thank God he makes his people live honestly. Let's pray. Father, we ask that you would
bless this to our understanding for your glory. In Christ's name,
amen.