I want you to listen very prayerfully
and carefully to the message this evening. It's entitled,
A Look, A Good Look at Saving Faith. Now John read for us from the
book of Romans, chapter 3, verse 28, Paul's conclusion. after spending the greater part
of chapter 1 revealing the corruption and evil of the Gentile people,
and chapter 2, the evil and corruption of the religious Jew, he came
to this conclusion in Romans chapter 3 verse 28, therefore
we conclude that a man is justified by faith. He's forgiven, he's
pardoned, he's redeemed by faith, without the deeds of the law,
by faith. And then the apostle wrote in
the book of Hebrews, without faith, it's impossible to please
God. Not difficult, but impossible.
For he that cometh to God must, must, must believe. He must believe. He must believe that God is,
and that God is the rewarder of them that diligently, diligently
seek him, seek his face. And our Lord said to the centurion
who brought him the boy possessed of demons, Our Lord said to him,
if you can believe, if you can, if you can believe, all things
are possible to them that believe. And that man cried out, Lord,
I believe. Help thou mine unbelief. And then the apostle wrote in
Ephesians 2 verse 8, for by grace, God's grace, grace for the guilty,
By God's grace are you saved through faith. Not apart from
faith, not without faith, but through faith. By grace are you
saved. Have you been saved through faith?
And that's not of yourself, it's the gift of God. It's not of
works. Not of works. Lest any man should
boast. And then our Lord said in John
chapter 3, He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life. And he that believeth not the
Son shall not see light, but the wrath of God abideth on him." Now, I can truthfully say that
I believe the Bible is the Word of God. I can say that. I do
believe that. But I believed that a long time.
In fact, I cannot ever remember a time when I did not at least
mentally accept the fact that the Bible is the Word of God.
Can you? I can't remember a time. When
I was a child growing up, we always had a Bible in our home.
My parents always took me to church. And I cannot remember
a time when I did not give mental assent to the fact that the Bible
is the Word of God. I've always believed. In fact,
I can't remember a time when I did not believe that Jesus
Christ is the Son of God. I never have had any problem
with that. We always celebrated Christmas,
didn't you? And Easter was the resurrection. And I've always given agreement
to the fact that He is the Son of God, that He did come into
this world, and that He did die on a cross. On a hill far away
stood an old rugged cross, the emblem of suffering and shame.
Can you ever remember a time that you did not at least give
mental agreement to that? I can't remember a time. But
I haven't always been saved. That's an impossibility. There's
got to be a time when I did not believe whatever believing is.
There's got to be a time when I did not trust whatever trusting
is. There's got to be a time when
I was not safe whatever it is to be safe. And I can truthfully
say that I've always believed that I was a sinner to some degree. I've never considered ever that
I can remember, well, I couldn't believe I was good. I wasn't. I remember when I stole the baseball
one time. I wasn't over seven or eight
years old. We were raised quite poorly. We didn't have anything.
And I went down to the Franklin 10-5 and Dime store, and barefooted,
overalls, you know, There's the prettiest bin of white baseballs
there you've ever seen in your life. A whole bunch of them.
They had a whole lot of them. I didn't have any. And I took
me one. I put it in my back pocket and
went home. I was a thief. A little thief, but a thief.
And I stand out in the backyard throwing that baseball up in
the air. And my mother came out. Well, she's nobody's fool. She said, where'd you get the
baseball? I said, I found it. You see, I was a liar too. I
wasn't only a thief, I was a liar. She said, well, where did you
find it? I said, down there at Miss Smith's Five and Dime store.
It was on the floor. On the floor, covering my tracks.
She said, well, you just take it back. Oh, I said, I couldn't
do that. She said, well, you take it back
and you tell Miss Smith where you found it. Because I think
she'll put it back on the counter and sell it. So I started back
to the store. We lived on the side of a creek.
And I started back to the store. And I don't know, I hate to admit
I'm a thief, hate to admit I'm a liar, but I sure ain't gonna
take that baseball back and give it to that lady and be embarrassed.
So I threw it in the creek. And I came back home, my mother
said, did you give it to her? I said, yes, ma'am. And she said,
it's all right, you know. Oh, my goodness. But I always
knew that I was a sinner, didn't you? Never had any problem with
that. I always believed that. And I
always believed that Christ died for sinners. They told me that
a long time ago. And I'm mental assent, you know,
mental agreement. I've never had a struggle with
those things. I've always believed them. I've always believed those things,
and I believe them today, and I've added some things to it.
I've added some things that I understand a little better, at least in
my head. I know now why Christ died on
the cross. I know why he died on the cross.
John read it from Romans 3. You see, I know this up here,
too. I'll get to here later. But I know up here, having studied
the Bible and having studied theology, I know that Jesus Christ's
death on the cross was not an accident. Because the Bible said
he was a lamb slain before the foundation of the world. The
Bible clearly says that. Lamb slain before the foundation
of the world. And I know that all of these
Old Testament pictures that John sang about, the ark, the brazen
serpent, and the Passover lamb, were pictures of a sacrifice,
pictures of a sin offering, pictures of the shedding of blood for
the guilty. See, the Bible says the soul that sinneth shall die,
and God can't change that and be God. Sin, when it's finished,
bringeth forth death. Be sure your sins will find you
out. That's true, and God can't change it and be God. So in order
to save a people, To be God, and to be just, and to be holy
and righteous, he had to have a substitute. A man had to die. But just any man wouldn't do.
Because just any man would be the son of Adam. And being guilty,
then he couldn't die for himself, let alone for anyone else, and
satisfy God's justice. So God sent his son, the perfect
son of God, who is without sin. Being God, he could He could
satisfy, and being man, he could suffer. And being the God-man,
as a representative of his people, then he could both suffer and
satisfy, and enable God to be just and justify sinners. I know
that up here. I've learned that from the Bible.
And I know why Christ was made of a woman, made under the law.
He didn't just ride down here on a white horse and go to the
cross and die, and rise again, but he was He was born like we
were born in order that he might be bone of our bone, flesh of
our flesh. You see that? I see that. And
I see how that he must be made of a woman. He must be an infant. He must be brought up in a home
like I was. He must be subject to coveting
baseballs too. He must be tempted and tried
in all points as I am to be my representative. He was tempted
at all points, yet he never sinned. As a boy, he was subject to his
parents. He never sinned. He never questioned
their authority. He never questioned his Heavenly
Father's authority. In him there was no sin. He was
brought up, bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh, born of a
woman, made of a woman, made under the law, and he was He
was tested by the Father, he was tested by Satan, he was tested
by flesh, he was tested by everything. Tried, tempted, and yet without
sin. He lived a perfect life. And
I see that, and I see why. Because I must have a righteousness. God's law hasn't been changed.
Like John said, do we make void the law? No, we establish the
law. Christ said, I didn't come to destroy the law, I didn't
come to whittle it down, I didn't come to make it less less demanding,
I came to fulfill it. And so he fulfilled every jot
and tittle of that law, and in our stead, in our room, in our
place, and Jim, he gave us that righteousness that God demands.
So God can have you now in that righteousness. God can accept
us because we did obey the law. We did die under the judgment
of sin. Christ died on that cross under
the judgment of sin. So a man satisfied the law, and
a man honored the law, and a man satisfied the justice of God,
so there's no claim on those for whom he stood. Because they've
met every claim, and every demand, and every commandment. And I
believe that up here. And many of you do. Most of you
do. Most of you do. But I'll tell you this. Here's
the question. Here's the question, and I've
got to handle this question. I do believe. I do believe. But I must constantly examine
myself whether I have a head knowledge or I have a heart,
faith in Christ. Now, there's a difference. Like
I'm saying, there's scarcely been a time that I didn't give
some mental assent to these things. It's always been true. And a
lot of it depends on how you were raised and how you were
taught and what tradition you were brought up in. And most
of our young people here could recite the five points of Calvinism
at midnight coming down the stairway on their hands because they were
brought up in those things. And they give mental agreement
to those truths. But, is it a hard thing? And I'll tell you, death
is too certain. It's just too certain to be presumptuous. And judgment is too short. The
scripture says, it's appointed unto men once to die. And somebody
in this congregation, either in this pulpit or out here, is
going to die in the next few weeks or months. Somebody here
is going to die. This congregation has never been
assembled just like this before, and it will never be assembled
just like this again. Time passes on. And it's appointed
unto men once to die. Death is real. Death is certain.
Judgment is sure. God said, and after that judgment,
some people, all of us are going to stand in judgment. And I'll
tell you, eternity is awful long. It's just too long to be presumptuous
in this matter of salvation. So I must constantly, and when
I preach to you, I'm preaching to me. Believe me, I am. I don't
want to be keeper of the vineyard and neglect my own vineyard. Apostle Paul said that. He said,
I want to win Christ and be found in Him. I don't want to just
be in religion. There's no feather in your cap
by being right. With me, it's being right with
God. Now, there's the question. And I do know this, that everything
that goes by the name of faith is not saving faith. Now, it's
just not saving faith. You say, I believe. Well, I do
too. I've always believed certain things. And I mean certain truthful
things. I've always believed them. And I go through this Bible,
and you know the scripture says, examine yourselves. There's no
way in the world I can examine you or you can examine me. Examine
yourselves whether you be in the faith. You can't even know
Kathy. Not truly. Nor she you. You've got to examine yourself.
Is that right, John? You don't know. Esther may belong
to the Lord, and she may not. But nothing you can do about
it. Examine yourself, whether you be in the faith. Know you're
not your own self? How that Christ is in you, except
you're a reprobate. Every time we come to the Lord's
table, we're told, examine, let a man examine himself. to see
if he discerns the Lord's broken body and shed blood. We're told
in the Scripture, give diligence, diligence, diligence to make
your calling and election sure. Wouldn't it be horrible to stand
in this pulpit thirty-five years and perish? Men have done it. Wouldn't it
be horrible, Martha sits in that office and types all these Sunday
School, all those books I've read, she's typed every word
of them. She's typed Everything in the Bible, from John to the
book of Revelation, played that organ. Wouldn't that be horrible
to miss Christ? I'll tell you, I don't want to
miss Christ. I don't want to miss salvation then. And I do
know this. I do know the most treacherous
place in the world is right here. It's exactly right. And right
out there, sitting there all these years, with this knowledge
up here, and Miss Christ down here. It's easy to do. It's easy
to do. Saul of Tarsus thought he knew
God. He killed everybody that disagreed with him. And I know, I can go through
this Bible, and I find that religious people had certain kinds of faith. And they could produce certain
things, astounding things. In the first place, now listen
to this, now I'll give you this briefly. Turn to John 8, 41.
John 8, 41. First of all, it says this, that
they own God, they acknowledge God to be their Father. They
didn't have any problem with that. They believed in God, and
they believed He was their Father. Listen to John 8, 41. Our Lord said, you do the deeds
of your father. And these men said to him, we
be not born of fornication. We be not sinners. We're not
Gentiles. We're not pagans. We have one
father, even God. Now those are the men who took
care of the temple and the tabernacle and the ceremonies, and they
were men who read the law. They were men who stood in the
temple and prayed and said, we be not like other men. We fast
twice a week, we pray, we give alms, we give tithes. We're not
adulterers, we're not extortioners, we're not unjust. And all these
things were true, openly and outwardly. And they said, we
believe in God, and He's our Father. I'll tell you something
else they did, and you don't need to turn to all these, I
can quote them, they speak well of Christ. Nicodemus spoke well
of Christ and missed Christ. When our Lord died on the cross,
he was still with the Pharisees, wasn't he? He was still one of
them. And yet, he came to Christ and
he said, you've got to be from God. No man can do what you do
except God be with him. He knew that Jesus Christ came
from God. He knew it and spoke well of
it. In fact, when they were having a confab and a council to condemn
Christ to death, Nicodemus stood up for him. You remember? He
said, our law doesn't judge a man until it hears him. The officers that came to arrest
him, they sent some fellas to arrest our Lord, and they came
back without him, and the chief priest said, well, where is he?
Well, they said, we couldn't arrest him, never man spake like
this man. I'll tell you something else
these religious people do, they reform the outward man. When
our Lord condemned the Pharisees, His disciples asked Him, who
then can be saved? They had a saying back in those
days that if two men went to heaven, one of them would be
a Pharisee and one of them would be a Sadducee. These men were
clean, moral, respectable. These men stood on the street
and prayed. You see a fellow standing on
a street corner with a Bible preaching, you say, I'd just
be too embarrassed. I couldn't do that, save my life. And I
sure admire him for doing that. He may not know God. The Pharisees
stood on the street corner and prayed. and prayed long prayers. They wore their phylacteries
extra wide to show they believed in the law of God. They enforced
the law. The Pharisees were the church
discipline committee, and when they found somebody in sin, they
stoned them. Now, that's a pretty strict discipline
committee. They were defending the law,
standing for the law. They had the law written on their
walls. They had the law written on their garments. They had the
law in their hands. They stood for the law of God,
didn't didn't know God. And I'll tell you something else
that religious people do. They get excited over the kingdom
of God. They get excited over the Messianic
kingdom. Yeah, they do. They get excited. Our Lord rode the donkey into
Jerusalem. Behold, O Israel, thy king cometh
riding upon the fold of an ash. He came riding in And those people,
thinking that the King of Israel had come, that the Son of David
had come, that it was time to set up a kingdom over in Jerusalem
and reign in righteousness, they took off their coats and spread
them in front of Him. They broke palm leaves off the
trees and spread them in front of Him. And they cried with one
voice, Hosanna, Hosanna, Hosanna to Him that cometh in the name
of the Lord. Blessed be the Son of David. Oh, they got, boy, they had a
whoop-de-doo revival that day. About three days later, they
were crying, crucifying. And there are a lot of people
getting excited over a kingdom in Jerusalem, and over the coming
King, and over a righteous world, and all these things. They did
then. And I'll tell you something else
religious people do. They experience sorrow over sin. Yes, sir, they experience great
sorrow. Simon Magus, who was baptized, And Peter said, your
heart's not right with God, you're in the gall of bitterness, and
God's going to judge you. He cried and said, pray for me
that these things not come upon Judas. The apostle brought the
money back, the money for which he sold the Lord, and cast it
on the floor and said, I've betrayed innocent blood. That sorrow,
he went out and hanged himself. They give large gifts to the
church. Ananias and Sapphira sold their house and cashed in
their bonds and brought most of it to the apostles. And God
killed both of them. I'll tell you another thing.
I go through the Word and I find religious people with some measure
of faith because they walk with apostles. Demas was Paul's companion. For a long time, he walked with
Paul. In fact, Paul, writing to the
church, said, Demas salutes you. He said, I salute you, and Demas
salutes you. That's how big he was. That's
how big he was in the church. Judas was church treasurer. Old Alexander the coppersmith,
wonder what he was. Homogenes, Phagellus, wonder
what they were. Paul mentioned them. Big men
in the church, officers in the church. And I'll tell you another
thing about these religious people, they perform great works in the
name of Christ and still never know it. Oh yeah, I'm telling
you the truth. They acknowledge God to be Father,
one God, They speak well of Christ, they reform the outward man,
they join the church, they get baptized, they get excited over
religion, they got a lot of zeal, they express sorrow over sin,
they give large gifts to the church, they walk with apostles
and preachers, they call them by their first name, they travel
with them, they preach with them, they perform great works in the
name of Christ, and even come to the judgment and say, Lord,
we preached in your name. And we did many wonderful works.
And he said, depart from me, I never knew you. Now let me
tell you something, if that doesn't shake you up, you can't be shaken.
If that doesn't bother you, who are you? Who am I? For some reason or other, we
think that we have a corner on God. Everybody else can perish
under the judgment of God, but not me. Not me. I'm a preacher. Not me. I've been in church all
these years. I'm a good boy, a good girl.
At least, partly so. But I'm going to give you four
things. There are four things, and I've looked at this for a
lot of years, and I've looked at it with a very personal, selfish
motive. A very personal, selfish motive. I want to know Christ. And I
believe there are four things that an unsaved religionist cannot
produce. I believe there are four things
Satan cannot imitate. He's an imitator, did you know
that? He is an impersonator. Satan is a counterfeiter. Yes,
he is. He's a counterfeiter. He's an
impersonator and an imitator. And he can come awful close to
the real thing. In fact, outwardly, his work,
now I'm watching what I'm saying, outwardly his work sometimes
looks better than God's work. You know what I mean, John, don't
you? Yes, sir. Outwardly. He mows his grass just a little
finer. Plants his flowers just a...
You see, that's all he's got is outward. So he has to take
good care of it. To deceive men. He uses it in
his subtlety and craftiness to deceive fools like us. If we
look at a fellow and say, boy, he knows the Lord. You can't
see his heart. He may not know God. God's work's
all on the inside. And the Lord, watch this now,
the Lord works on the inside and the Lord is not trying to
defend an appearance. He has nothing to defend. He
lets it all hang out on David and Abraham and Moses. He just
lets it all hang out. He tells the truth about them.
Satan wouldn't do that. Satan will cover up his false
prophets and make them look good on the outside. He'll never reveal
anything about them. But God just takes you in a room
and says, look at him. Let you see the whole thing.
But God does the work in the heart. And he doesn't have to
defend his work. It's a permanent work. It's an
effectual work. It's an eternal work. It's God's
work. And if the heart's right with God, the rest of it's alright
too. That's right. But here are four
things that the religionist cannot produce, and he can never experience,
and he hadn't experienced them, I guarantee you. Everybody here
who really knows Christ is going to say amen to these four things.
You're going to say, that's exactly what I see and feel. And you
who don't know Christ, you're going to say, I've never experienced
that. I may have believed the Bible,
I may have believed Christ died on the cross, I may have believed
these doctrines, but I've never experienced those four things.
Never. You never have, because if you
do, you know Christ. This is a heart work. It's something
man can't do. Here's the first one. Here's
the first one. A religionist cannot produce
a heart genuinely broken over his own sins. He cannot do it. Just cannot do it. No way in
this world. A heart broken over his own sins. My sins. My sins. Not defending them, not justifying
them, not alibying for them, not excusing them, not blaming
somebody else, just facing them as they are. Sin. My sin. My transgression. My iniquities. I am no good. That's what Job
said, I hate myself. That's what Isaiah said, I'm
a man of sinful lips. That's right. That's what Peter
said, depart from me Lord, I am a sinful man. That's what the
publicans said, be merciful to me, be center. Not a center,
be center. That's what the thief said, I'm
getting what I deserve. That's right. Every one of them. That's what the Canaanite woman
said, Christ is not right to give the children bread to dogs.
She said, that's so. And that's what I am. Now, a religionist may talk of
sin in general. Sin in general. We are all sinners,
preacher. That ain't what I say. It's not a we are all sinners
proposition. I'm the sinner. I'm the guilty one. Turn to Psalm 51. Let me show
you that. Psalm 51. Now listen to this. This is where it is. This is
the verbally inspired Word of God. This is David, listen, man
after God's own heart. This ain't Henry Mahan. This
is David, man after God's heart. This is the psalm of repentance.
"...brought out our transgressions..." No, sir, that's the way we talk.
My transgressions wash me throughly. Truly, from my iniquity, cleanse
me from my sins. I acknowledge my transgressions. My sin is ever before me." That's right now. David wasn't
talking in generalities. He was talking first of my sins,
my sins, the corruption of the great extent of them, the filthiness
and guilt of them. Huh? My sins. My sins inwardly,
outwardly. Sins of heart, sins of tongue,
sins of imagination. My sins, my sins are ever before
me, constantly before me. That's a heart broken over my
sins. That's what I'm saying. If you
never felt that, You've never cried for mercy. That's just
right. Now, that's all there is to it.
Do what you want to. You say, I believe those folks did too.
I told you about them. Look at the next verse. Against
thee and thee only have I sinned. Oh, my sin. I'm under this same first point.
Now, I feel my sin, and I know my sin's against God. It's not
against people. It's against God. I may do you
wrong, but Tom, I can't sin against you. There's no way I can do
you wrong, and cheat you, and lie about you, and upset you,
but I can't sin against you. Sin is against God. Sin is a transgression of God's
law, not man's law. God's law. And that's what David
is saying, I sinned against God. There are a whole lot of people
who get upset when they get caught. And they act like they're repentant.
They act like they're going to change their way because it's
messed up the situation, you know. I had a fellow here in
Ashton some years ago. He called me down to his house.
His wife and little girl were going to leave him. He was drinking
then, you know. And she said she'd had all she
could stand. And she had her backpack. And
I went down there and, boy, he cried. And I tell you, it was
sad. Watch a grown man just sit there
and cover the floor with tears. Get on his knees and hold his
wife and baby by the legs and beg them not to leave. And beg
me to keep them from leaving. I'll never touch another drop.
Boy, I thought this is real. This old boy's got something. Well, she stayed. Bless their
hearts, they usually do. One week later, he's doing the
same thing. But Paul called that earthly sorrow. Earthly sorrow. Now I'm going to shock you. I'm
going to tell you the truth. I've been in this pulpit 35 years,
36 years. I've never seen anybody saved
under those circumstances. Never have. Never have. What brings a man to Christ is
the knowledge of his sin against God. Not against his wife and
children. Against God. Against God. I've seen fellas
make professions of faith standing by caskets. It didn't work. I've
seen them make professions in hospitals. It didn't work when
they got well. I've seen them make professions
when they lose their job. It didn't work. But I've seen
men and women come to know they've sinned against God, and God's
angry. God's angry, and God's judgment's
against them. I've seen them sue for mercy
for Christ's sake, and I've seen them saved. You see, a refuge
built in a storm will disappear when the storm's over. Now, that's
right. Now, you just hang on to that,
because that's so. The man that's smart is the man
that builds the refuge in Christ because he knows there's a storm
coming. That's what Noah did. Don't you know when the rain
started falling, they started building boats? Now, you ever
thought about that? Old Noah built this boat. He
said, Noah being warned of God of things not seen, moved with
fear, prepared an ark for the salvation of his house. And when
they went into the ark and shut the door and brushed it down
light, and then they looked up, and it was doing something it
never had done before. It was raining. That old man
was right. And I bet you wood sold for a
thousand dollars a cord. Now they start building boats.
But you don't build one after the flood starts. You don't do
it. You build it believing God's
word that there's going to be a flood. I'm telling the truth. And genuine repentance is a godly
repentance. Am I telling the truth, John?
It's a godly repentance. Against thee and thee only have
I sinned. It doesn't matter about you.
It matters about God. I don't repent to you. I apologize,
but don't repent. Repent towards God. That's right. And I'll tell you, read on the
next verse. Verse 4 says, Against thee and thee only have I sinned.
I sinned. I did it. And I've done this
evil in your sight, now watch this, that you might be justified
when you speak and clear when you judge. Let me ask you a question. If God damned you tonight and
sent you to hell, come on now, you, you John, would he be just? Would you say amen? You wouldn't
like it, but you still have to say he's just, that's right. That's what David's saying here.
He said, God, when you speak, I never knew you. Depart from
me, you're just God. He said, Preacher, that's an
impossibility for a man to experience anything like that. By nature
it is, but not by grace. Not by grace. God gives this
broken heart. The broken heart is of God. I'm
telling the truth. And you can play the game, you
can go to the church and read your Bible and say, I believe,
amen, I believe it, amen. There's been millions before
you did the same thing. But only those. God saveth such
as be of a what? A broken heart and a contrite
spirit. That's what this book says. And
that man's heart is genuinely broken. toward God over his own
sins, and he justifies God in the condemnation thereof. I am
telling you the truth. And I challenge these preachers
today to say that from their pulpits. It's so anyway. Now,
we've got God backed off in a corner. That's what we've got. We think
we've got God under obligation to this generation. He's not.
He destroyed a whole generation the day of Noah and saved eight
people. God's not obligated. And he let
them destroy the city of Jerusalem and plow it up so soft. God's
not obligated. They said, let his blood be on
us and our children, and sure enough, it is. God's obligated to Christ and
to no one else. He that spared not his own son,
how shall he not freely give him all things? And us who died
in him with him. That's why he's obligated to
Christ, but not to you or me. That's the reason I'm pleading
for mercy. I want a broken heart over my sin, not yours. I don't
know anything about yours, but I know mine. Ever blessed one
of them, don't you? And they're against God. And
if he sends me to hell, he's just. That's right. Hell's going
to be full of religious people, and I don't want to be one of
them. Oh, here's the second thing.
Now, this is even harder. The false religionist will never,
never, never acknowledge that he has no goodness and no righteousness. I'm not throwing a comma. And the righteousness or goodness
he thinks he has is filthy rags in God's sight. That's what the Bible says. Turn
to Isaiah 64, 6. We have no goodness. In fact,
the Bible says there's none good, no, not one. The Bible says there's
none righteous, no, not one. The Bible says, God looked down
from heaven to see if there was any that did understand, any
that did do good. And he came to the conclusion,
they're all gone aside. There's none that doeth good.
Man at his best state is what? Vanity. Best state. Do you know how good a good work
has to be to be good in God's sight? Perfect. Perfect. He said plainly in Deuteronomy,
to be accepted it has to be perfect. Now you can accept imperfection. God can't. Why can't I accept
imperfection? I'm imperfect. I can't expect
anybody to be perfect, because I'm not. But God can, and God
does. Because He is. And His holiness
will not let him associate with unholiness. It won't. God can't
accept you and be gone. Isaiah 64, 6, listen to it, we
all are an unclean thing, unclean, like the leper of old, unclean,
unclean, and all our righteousness is, that's our goodness, that's
my prayer, and my offering, and my witnessing, and must striving
to protect my reputation, trying to do things right, trying to
raise my children right, trying to supply the needs of the home,
my wife cooking, washing, working, taking care of her children,
grandchildren, being nice, holding her temper. Most of the time, we say, we're doing pretty good
today. Doing pretty good. Y'all men go to work, you know,
and you You hold it in, you know, and, well, came home, did pretty
good today. It was filthy rags. Filthy, nasty,
unclean rags. In God's sight. Now, I liked
it, but God didn't like it. That's right. Because God can't
like anything that's un-God-like. And all our righteousness is
a filthy rag. We all fade as a leaf, and our
iniquities like the wind have taken us away. God said every
imagination of our hearts is evil continually. Every imagination. We love ourselves. We promote ourselves. We brag
on ourselves. We justify ourselves. We love
what's ours. Yeah, we do. We've never loved
God with all our hearts, therefore our love is filthy rags. We've
never loved our neighbors ourselves. Never, never, never, never, never.
We've never gone through one full minute without sin. Never,
never, never. Not even now. Not even in here. In my flesh, well, it's no good
thing. In my flesh, no man can please
God. Now, you can do what you will
with that, but I'll tell you that's true. And that person
who's come to Christ for righteousness has come naked. Fully, completely
naked. He's come admitting that his
righteousness is filthy rags and he's just shucked them all.
Nobody who's ever seen what he is by nature has ever expected
any kind of reward in heaven. Never, never, never. Any preacher
you hear talking about crowns and glory, rewards and glories,
a man who's never seen that his good works are filthy right.
He's never seen. He's expecting payment in return
for what he's done for God. And I've never done anything
for God. If anything's ever been done, God did it. Paul said,
I labor more abundantly than all of you. If not, I've never
done anything. Christ did it. He was pleased
to use of what? An earthen vessel. An earthen
vessel doesn't have legs. An earthen vessel doesn't even
have eyes. An earthen vessel doesn't even have a mouth. An
earthen vessel is nothing but an old piece of clay. It got
picked up from the ground, and God put some water in it and
fed His people. And that jug got nothing to brag
about, because it was in the hands of God when it was given
the water. He put the water in, and He put
the jug out there. And you talk about it. Won't
we crown the jug when we get up there? I'll tell you who's
getting the crown. He gets the crown. And I'm dead
serious. Like Brother Don Bell says, I'm
serious as a heart attack tonight. If you've never, if you get mad
at that right there, you've missed Christ, my brother, my friend. Because that's so, I've been,
I've given you that from the Word of God. My heart, By God's
grace is smitten, afflicted, and broken over my sin. My sin. I don't care what you did. It's
what I did. What I am. What I am. That's my problem.
What I did is not the big problem. What I am. Because I did what
I did because of what I am. If it wasn't what I am, I wouldn't
have did what I did. That's right. And I know that
every good thing I've ever done has been rotten to the core.
Good in eyes of men. One good in God's eyes. Well,
how do we pray then? Through Christ. How do we worship
then? Through Christ. And how does
God accept us? In Christ. And how does God look
on us with favor? In Christ. You haven't seen that?
Glory, what a revelation. That's why we need Christ. That's
why He's all in it all. That's why He has the preeminence.
That's why we preach Christ. Somebody said, all you do is
preach Christ. That's all there is to preach. You've got nothing
else to preach. You're not going to talk about
us. I'm not going to put your name on one of these windows
or on a pew. That would just make us more proud,
wouldn't it? We're bad enough now without bragging on each
other. As a good sermon, I knew it. Oh, we're so sinful. I'll tell
you the truth. Oh, here's the third thing an
unsaved religionist will never do. He'll never do it. He'll
never do it. He'll believe a lot of things.
He'll never do this. He'll never totally bow. Never
totally bow to the sovereignty of God. Absolute, unchangeable
sovereignty of God in salvation. Salvation is Alpha to Omega,
beginning to end, 110% of God and of Him only. And the unsaved
religionist won't have it. He won't have it. God's done
all He can do. It's up to me. God voted for
me, the devil voted against me, and I got to decide and vote.
That's the unsaved religion. It's all right for God to be
God in creation. Let Him create His world. With
whom took He counsel when He made the world? That's what He
asked. He asked Job, said, Where were
you when I laid the foundations of the earth? You know anything
about it? Stand up and tell me. Where were
you, He said, when I put the clouds in the sky and the sun
in the moon? Where were you when I made the
fowls of the air and the birds of the sea? Where were you when
I made the beast? Who did it? I did it, God said.
And I didn't take counsel with any human being. And it's all right, somewhat,
for God to be God in providence. If He wants to let it rain, it'll
be all right with us. If He wants it to snow, that'll
be all right, too. It's all right for God to be
God in providence, to some extent, somewhat, you know. We don't...
Every time somebody dies, they, you know, they start admitting
that God might have had something to do with it. Might have. But
I'll tell you, when you come to this thing of salvation, The
unsaved religionist will not have a sovereign God in salvation. He won't have. But I'll tell you this. Salvation's of the Lord. It originated
with him 100%. Originated with God. It was born
in the heart of God. Man didn't have anything to do
with It's of the Lord in its execution. Christ Jesus came
into this world and men did to Him what it pleased God for them
to do, what God determined before to be done. Everything they did was prophesied
back in the Old Testament. It pleased God to bruise them.
And I'll tell you this, sinners are dead. We died in Adam. They're
dead. They're spiritually dead. And I don't expect the spiritually
dead man to look to God anymore than I expect the dead people
in Rose Hill to look over here. You have to be quickened who
were dead in trespasses, and God came and gave life where
there was no life. That's right. Salvations of the
Lord in its application. He'll save whom He will. He said
to Moses, I'll be merciful to whom I will be merciful, I'll
be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and whom I will, I'll
harden. He told Pharaoh, I raised you
up for this same purpose, to get glory for my name. He said,
Judas was a son of perdition from the beginning. He said,
Jacob and Esau, before they were ever born, I said, The elder
will serve the younger. Jacob I love, he so I hate. Is
there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. He left us all alone,
we'd all perish. I call on God because he called
me. I seek God because he sought me. You don't believe that? You may be a child of a lesser
God. Is that what they say, Dan? Children
of a lesser God. That's you. We're children of
a great God. There can't be a lesser God and
be God. God cannot be limited in his power and be God. There
cannot be a power greater than the power of God. Who can resist
his will? Who can say unto him, What doest
thou? Is the Lord's arm shortened that he can't save? You see,
God can't save that man unless he lets him. You watch him. Saul
of Tarsus wasn't letting God save him. He was on his way to
kill some Christians, and God stopped him. And if God sets
His affection on you, He'll stop you. And if He doesn't set His
affection on you, you'll perish in eternal condemnation, unwarned. That's so. Salvations of the
Lord in its application. Paul said, God who separated
me from my mother's womb was pleased to call me by His grace
and reveal His Son in me. Salvations of the Lord in its
sustaining power. I'm kept by the power of God.
I'm saved by the power of God and I'm kept by the power of
God through faith and salvations of the Lord in its ultimate perfection.
Who's going to raise your body from the grave? God will have
to do it. The same God that raised you
from a spiritual grave will have to raise you from a physical
grave. Who's going to turn you into the image of Christ? Who's
going to give you life evermore? Divine life, spiritual life,
eternal life is not produced by man. It's not in man. It's
the gift of God. It's the life of God. That's
what Adam lost in the garden was life. Well, you say every
sinner's got to spark a light. If he did, he wouldn't die. If he did, he wouldn't die. That's
what the folks said to Paul. They said, where there's no law,
there's no sin. Paul said, how come babies die?
You know what he said? How come babies die? Somebody
said, well, babies aren't sinners, then why do they die? There was
no death till sin came. You say, we don't become sinners
till we reach the 12 years old. Then you won't die till you're
12 years old. Sin brings death. There was no sickness in this
world until sin came. There's no death till sin came.
That's right. You see, death reigned over them
who never sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression. Babies
have never performed any outward transgression against God, but
they got the sin in their nature. They're born in sin, that's what
David said, shapen in iniquity, conceived in sin, brought forth
from the womb speaking lies. My little granddaughter knows
to pray. You tell her to do something, she won't do it. Tell her not
to do it, and she'll do it. Every time. Why is that? Why, why is... You figured it out yet? I know
what it is. And you gave it to them. They're
daddy's sins in them. Well, you mommas, you're daddy's
sins in you too. Salvation's of the Lord. That
old leper had it right. He came to Christ and he said,
Lord, if you will, you can make me whole. Have you ever been
there? If you ever saved, you'll be there. Now, I'm telling you,
I'm telling you, this is something that God has to do. A person
who's genuinely saved is going to give God all the glory. Now, let me show you that in
1 Corinthians 1. I know I'm preaching too long, but I tell you, this
is This is so important. It would be better to straighten
this out now. 1 Corinthians 1.26. Listen. You see your calling,
brethren? See your calling? 1 Corinthians 1.26. Not many wise
men after the flesh are called. Why? Because they're smart in
themselves. Intellectualism, human wisdom,
foolishness of God. They can't turn loose of their
human wisdom. God hath not many mighty, not
many noble are called, they seek the honor of the flesh. But,
watch it now, God hath chosen the foolish things of the world
to confound the wise. God hath chosen the weak things
of the world to confound the things which are mighty, and
the base things of the world, that's us, and things which are
despised. Hath God chosen, yea, and things
which are not, there's nothing to them. They're from nothing's
bill. to bring to naught the things
that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence. But of
God are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us, us
despised, base, ignorant, foolish thing. Christ is made unto us
wisdom and righteousness. and sanctification and redemption. Who did it? God did it. Why?
Thy, according as it is written, he that gloweth, let him glow
in the Lord. We are all going to glow in something.
We are all going to glow in someone. Now I tell you, if you don't
have anything in which to glow, you can glow in the Lord. But
as long as you have something in which to take pride and glow
with, we are going to do it. Or here is the last thing. The
false religionist never can and never will, unless God saves
him, receive Jesus Christ alone. Alone. As his wisdom. He can't do it. Christ is my
wisdom. Christ is my wisdom. No man knows
God except in Christ. Did you know that? Impossible
to know God apart from Christ. No man has seen God at any time.
The Son hath declared Him. He's my wisdom. If you don't
have Christ, as far as spiritual things are concerned, you're
ignorant. I know you don't think so, because you can sit down
and straighten out anybody. But you're ignorant. Christ is our
wisdom. He is wisdom. And He's our righteousness. Christ is—and nobody—our holiness,
my holiness. I have no holiness. I'm not holy. It doesn't take you five minutes
to find that out. You're not either. But Christ
is holy, and He's my holiness. That doesn't give me a license
to sin. I'm not looking for a license. I'm not looking for a reason.
I want to be like Christ, don't you? But He's my righteousness,
and He's my sanctification. He's my sanctification. This
old nature never improves. You're a fool if you think it
does. Now we grow in grace and in the knowledge of Christ and
in love and faith by His mercy. But that old nature is not any
different. You'll have a battle with Him till you're laid in
the grave. And He's my redemption, the full price. Jesus paid it
all, all the debt I owe, sin left a crimson stain, and He
washed it.