Now it may seem to you that this is a very elementary statement. I believe that Jesus is the Christ. It may seem to you that I am perhaps putting too much emphasis on what I personally believe
about the Lord Jesus Christ. But my friends, a man can believe,
and the word believe can cover a lot of things. Believe and
faith mean different things to different people. But a man can
believe there is a God without knowing that God He can even
ascribe to that God certain attributes that are true of the living God. The Great Spirit, the Supreme
Being, the Almighty, the Good Lord. James said, you believe
there's one God, you do well. The devil believes there's one
God. So a man can have some kind of Understanding that there's
a God who controls all things and he might even have some reverence
for that God some respect for that God and Still not knowing and eternal
life my friends is to know God It's to know God. That's what
Christ said. It's to know God. I Know whom I have believed This is life eternal that they
might know thee the only true God in Jesus Christ whom thou
hast sent. And actually a man may even,
and whatever faith means or belief means to the average person,
he may believe that such a one as Jesus, and all the preachers
use the name Jesus, all the churches talk about Jesus. And he may
even have some understanding that a one called Jesus was born
into this world, perhaps supernaturally born, as the Pope believes in
the virgin. Of course, they put more emphasis
on the virgin than they do on the one who was born of the virgin.
But nevertheless, they believe he was virgin born and that he
lived on this earth, actually lived on this earth. a perfect
good life and had power, went about doing good, that he actually
died on a cross and that he rose again. They may go out to the
stadiums and to the other places early on a certain day, call
it Easter, and celebrate the resurrection of this one called
Jesus. They may even talk about Jesus
will come again. and still not know the Lord Jesus
Christ in his true character as he's revealed in the Word.
You see, it's not just Barnard said this one time. We were singing
a song. We have heard the joyful sound,
Jesus saved, Jesus saved. Spread the tidings all around,
Jesus saved, Jesus saved. Jesus saved. And he got up and
he said, it's not so. And, of course, everybody got
ready for a bombshell. What's he working on now, you
know? It's not so, he said. It's the
Lord Jesus who saves. It's not just Jesus. There are
a lot of folks named Jesus. I've said again and again, there
are people in Mexico who name their kids Jesus, but they can't
save. So it's not just Jesus that's
saved. It's a particular Jesus Christ. It's one who is defined
and described and revealed in this Word. He's the Lord. He is the Christ. He is the Messiah. He is the
Scripture's prophet, priest, and king. He died for our sins.
Not just He died for our sins. That's not sufficient. He died
for our sins according to the Scriptures. According to the
Scriptures, a man may I may be, like, they tell that story about
Willie Lear. In a certain sense of the word,
it may be a good illustration. They said in a cemetery of a
Yankee regiment, a company, there's a tombstone, here lies the body
of Willie Lear. He took my place. And the story
is, that back in the Civil War, when a man was was required to
go in the army, that he could pay someone to go in the army
for him. Is that an accurate thing? Somebody could be paid
and go serve for him? And this fella was drafted or
called into the service, and he paid this neighbor friend,
Willie Lear, to go in his place. He never did go serve. Willie
went for him. Willie got killed. And he erected this tombstone
in the memory of Willie Lear, who took my place. But now Jesus Christ could come
down, a man called Jesus come down and die on my cross, and
take my death at that particular time, and I'd still have to die
later. Unless, unless before the holy
law of God, and before the justice and righteousness of God, he
could so perform that death in reference to God, that God's
justice and law would be so totally satisfied that there'd be no
further claim on me. Jesus Christ must die for his
people in accordance with the Scriptures. He must die as the
Passover lamb. He must die as the sacrifice. He must die as the sin offering.
He must die as God required, as the law required, before the
Lord, at the time God required it, in such a way as God would
be pleased. See what I'm saying? So it's
not just enough to say, I know Jesus. Jesus who? That's what
I'm talking about. And this is the thing that we're
dealing with in this issue. I believe that Jesus is the Christ. I believe He is the woman saved.
In every fulfillment of that promise, I believe He is Abraham
saved. I believe He is that prophet.
He is that prophet. John the Baptist, in reply to
the questions, are you that prophet? He said, no sir. No sir. But I believe Christ is. And
that I believe the record that God has given concerning his
son. Now, I started out of my study,
down the hall, into the... And I turned to Mike, sort of
jokingly, and I said, well, let's go out one more time. One more
time. And Ronnie made the comment,
how many times have you been down that hall up to this pulpit
in 30 years? Then he said, I think of the
years I sat back there and I heard, but I didn't hear it. And he's pretty intelligent.
He's got a couple of degrees and been teaching school 20 years.
Looks like you could have understood that. Doesn't it seem like to
you that this man could have understood what I... There are
people that won't understand what I'm saying right now. Because
I said this before, didn't I? And yet, and yet he believed,
to some extent, these basics, didn't you? These basics. This
is God's Word. Yet, really you didn't believe.
You did, but you didn't. A man can be, he can be just
wrapped up in the ceremony. You were, Tom. So many years. Tom was in the Mormon church.
A deacon, an elder, and a priest. a priest. Going through all of these rituals,
and you didn't see, you saw the letter, you saw the word deacon,
it was in there, the word elder was in there, the word priest
was in there, the word sacrifice, offering, God, church, ceremony,
sacrifice, atonement, tabernacle, all these things. Y'all played
that game. But one day you saw the priest. And one day you realize
that you were a priest, but man didn't make you that priest.
God made you that priest in Christ the great Melchizedek. And I'll tell you, you can be,
you say, well, he lives his religion. A lot of folks live their religion
who don't know Christ. Oh yeah, we're all plagued with
this. Well, she's such a good woman.
And she just might split hell wide open. We're just plagued
with that. Gerald, how long did you go through
the motions in legalism, separationism, holiness, holiness? Whose holiness? Yours. One day I found out and
you found out you didn't have any holiness and wasn't apt to
get any, not the direction you were going. But you found out
there is a holiness. There's a holiness with which
the Holy God will be satisfied. There's a holiness that He will
accept. There's a holiness from the hands
of a man that God will be content with. And that's the man Christ Jesus.
And Charlie, you preached. You stood in the pulpit and studied
and poured over the scriptures and got up and taught people
and preached to people. But one day, by His grace, you
saw Him. What did you see? Him. You saw
Him. And this is what I'm saying.
I'm saying there are people sitting right here. And there are people
to whom I preach everywhere, and I was one of them one day. Zealous, sincere, I was sincere. Were you sincere, Charles? You
say, are these people in Arminianism and freewillism and semi-Pelagianism
and legalism and human holiness, Gerald, are they sincere? Were
you sincere? You're dead right you were. You gave just about
half everything you had to that church. Keep those liars in the
pulpit. Sincere, yes we were. Sincere. There are men who are so sincere
they leave their families and go to foreign countries to preach
nothing. Sincere and their folks were
sincere But they just haven't by the grace of God had their
eyes open to see him Him who he is What he did why he did
it and where he is now Just haven't got it. God has to open the heart
God has to raise the dead God has to give ears to hear and
I'll tell you this I Somebody talked to me the other day about,
what are you going to do about backsliding? There ain't no such animal. No
such. It is not a New Testament term.
It's an Old Testament term that has reference to an unsaved nation
called Israel. Isn't that right, Cecil? It's
an Old Testament term that has reference to a people that didn't
even know God. The nation Israel. They were
always backsliding. I hear these preachers all the
time, and next time you hear one, you shut him off. When he
says, here's the recipe for revival. If my people, which are called
by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and
turn from their wicked ways, I'll hear from heaven and bless
their land and revive them. Who's God talking to? He's talking
to a bunch of unsaved Israelites, a bunch of unsaved seed of Abraham
who did not know God, who were material people and blessed with
material blessings when they behaved themselves. That's what
He's talking about. But God's people, if my people
shall humble themselves, His people have been humble. You
don't have to break this glass but once. It's broken. And when
God breaks a man, he's broken. You mean God's people don't pray?
John Newton said a believer couldn't anymore live without prayer than
a natural man can live without breathing, because prayer is
the breath of a child of God. You see, the child of God is
not a physical specimen, he's a spiritual person. My physical
body breathes air. My spiritual being lives on God,
for I don't have any spiritual being. Is that right? Well, you
know it's right. Eternal life is the life of Christ. And it's no possibility for a
man to be alive spiritually who's not alive by Christ indwelling. It's not I that live, it's Christ. You see what I'm saying? It's
not I that pray, it's Christ that prays. You're looking at a physical
person who breathes. If I stop breathing, I die. You
can't see me. The spiritual being who's been
created in Christ Jesus. And that's a spiritual. If any
man be in Christ, he's a new creature. It's not just talking
about this flesh. It's talking about he is a new
creature in spirit, in attitude, in life. A new person's been
created. All God's people pray. You find
a man who doesn't pray, he's dead. You find a man who doesn't
breathe, he's dead. You find a man who says he's
a believer who doesn't pray, he never has lived. He may say
a bunch of words, he may go through motions, he may have the rituals
of prayer, but he doesn't pray. And seek my face? You mean God's
people don't seek his face? Why, they live on him. The glory
of God revealed in the face of Christ Jesus. They look on his
face and turn from their wicked ways We've already turned from
our idols to the living God. There's no such thing as backsliding
in the Word of God. The disciples said, to whom shall
we go? Ain't no place to go. There's a place for this body
to go, but my spirit, there's no place to go. My spirit lives
on Christ. He's my bread. He's my wine. He's my drink. He's my breath. He's my life. He's my hope. That's it Jim. That's what this
is the heart of this thing. This is what men do not see And
this is what causes an influx of profession down the aisle
Decision and they're sincere many of them. They don't want
to go to hell who does They all want to go to heaven They all
want to live in a sweet bind by they all want to meet mother
in heaven. Nobody wants to go to hell Yeah,
they believe there's a God. They believe the Bible's His
word. They believe somebody called Jesus died on the cross. They're
not pagans. This is the way America worships.
That's the way I worship. But there is a thing called salvation. There's a thing called revelation.
There's a thing called regeneration. There's a thing called a miracle
of God's redeeming grace in which somebody, man, woman, boy or
girl, by the purpose of God, by the will of God, by the power
of God's Spirit through the seed of the Word, is begotten and
made alive and will always be alive. Mindy, you and Paul thought
you'd never have a child. Married five years. I'm being
personal tonight, but we've got to get personal. But you thought
you'd never have a child. And then one day, by a miracle
of God, a child was conceived. And I'll tell you this, whether
that little doll in there is here with us or in glory, you've
still got a daughter. Well, maybe she'll backslide. Maybe she'll cease to be your
daughter. Oh, no. Ain't no way. She's here now.
She's yours. I'm his and he is mine. And nothing,
nothing, not height, nor depth, nor angels, nor principality,
nor demons, nor devils, nor Satan, nor things present, nor things
to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any creature can make me
cease to be a child of God. I'm His child. Now you can take
that other garbage and throw it away, and it's garbage. Somebody
said, aren't you afraid you're blaspheming? You don't blaspheme
the devil. You don't blaspheme a false god.
You don't blaspheme an idol. And that's idolatry. And that's
a false god. Of his own will begat he us with
the word of truth. We're begotten not with corruptible
seed, like persuasion and logic and illustrations and high pressure
and soul winning. We're not begotten with those
corruptible seed, but with the incorruptible seed, the Word
of God that liveth forever. That's how we're begotten. And
I'll tell you this, as the sun sinks in the west,
and as the shadows grow longer, and as life ebbs away, and as
His coming for me draws nearer, I'm less interested in any religion
per se or what anybody's got to say about this God they're
preaching. I'm interested in Jesus Christ
the Lord, who He is, what He did, why He did it, and John,
where He is. I want to know God. And if I
can find me a center, if I can find somebody somewhere that's
got ears to hear, and everybody doesn't, he that has ears to
hear, let him hear, but who's got them? We got ears for everybody
else but God. He that has eyes to see, he that's
got a searching heart and a willing spirit, he that can shake himself
loose from all the traditions and all what folks have handed
down, just shake himself loose without becoming a fool, but who can shake himself loose and turn his eyes on this Word.
find out who he is. I believe that Jesus is the Christ. I've reached the end of my search.
I've found him. I've found him whom my soul loveth. I've reached the end of the quest.
Eureka! I've found him. I'm totally satisfied. I don't want anybody Not interested
in any new thing. I'm not interested in anything
anybody's had revealed to him lately. I found him. He's the ancient of days. Nothing
about him is new, and yet it's new every morning. New to me. All right, let's listen to him
here in John 5, verse 31. He said, If I bear witness of
myself, my witness is not truth. if I bear witness of myself."
What's the Lord saying there? He's saying this. In other words,
He's saying all the preceding claims that I've made, that I
gave you this morning, He said I'm equal with God, I have power
to quicken the dead, all judgments in my hands, the fate of every
human being is in my hands, all power over all flesh, all honor
is due to the Son, and He's a sufficient Savior to all who believe. And
he will one day raise all the dead. Now none of that's true.
Not a word of truth in it. If he's the only one who said
it. You know what he's saying? And you know where that comes
from? If you have a moment, turn to Deuteronomy 19. Now this is
important. Deuteronomy 19. This is the law
of God. And you see Christ Jesus always
acted and spoke and proceeded according to the Scripture. In
Deuteronomy 19, it says in verse 15, Deuteronomy 19, 15, one witness,
one witness. What's a witness? A fellow that's
seen something, observed it, and knows it. One witness shall
not rise up against a man for any iniquity or for any sin.
In any sin that he sinneth, at the mouth of two witnesses, or
at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established."
That's the law of first mention in this matter. It goes all the
way through the Scripture. Let every word be established
by the mouth of two or three witnesses. Our Lord said it in
John 19. Paul said it in 2 Corinthians 13. Paul said it again in 1 Timothy
5. Let every word be established
at the mouth of two or three witnesses. Now then, this does
away with all you Mary Baker Eddy's, you Joseph Smith's, you
Buddha's and Mohammed's, and everybody else who has any private
revelation from God. Don't hear them. Now our Lord
said that, didn't he say that himself? He said, here stands
the master, the truth himself. And yet he obligates himself
and restricts himself by the very law of God, which is his
law. And he said, if I'm the only
witness concerning these claims, it's not true. And you just get
any preacher who stands up and says, now, in addition to this
book, I have this revelation from God. I said, I want to hear
the other three fellows that had it too. Well, if it's just
I'm the only one, then shut your mouth. Don't want to hear another
thing. Isn't that right? That's what
the Lord said. All right, Lord, who are your
witnesses? All right, let's look at some of them. First of all,
in verse 32, 33, we're going to get to 32 in a minute, but
33, he said, John the Baptist. John the Baptist. Well, he said,
who's this John the Baptist? Well, turn to Malachi 3. Malachi
chapter 3. And here he's talked about throughout
the Old Testament, especially in Isaiah and Malachi, but here
in Malachi 3, verse 1. Behold, I will send my messenger,
and he shall prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom
you seek shall suddenly come to his temple. Even the messenger
of the covenant whom you delight in, behold, he shall come, saith
the Lord of hosts. But he says there'll be a forerunner
before he comes. In Isaiah 40, it talks about
John the Baptist, the voice, crying in the wilderness, prepare
you the way of the Lord. In Luke 1, God came to Zechariah,
the priest, who was an old man and his wife Elizabeth, an old
woman. She was a cousin of Mary who bore Christ. And he said,
listen, let's turn to Luke 1 and look at that. And listen to what
the Lord said to Zechariah. Now listen to this. And the people
of Israel knew about this forerunner. The scripture prophesied it and
promised it and their rabbis taught it. But when John the
Baptist came, they didn't believe him. Look at Luke 1, 17. Here's
the angel speaking to Zacharias. And he said of John the Baptist,
he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias to
turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient
to the wisdom of the just Make ready a people prepared for the
Lord. And our Lord Jesus Christ said
here in John 5, verse 32, you sent to John the Pharisees sent
a committee out there in the wilderness to ask him who he
was. Remember Sunday school we studied that? They came out there
and said, are you that prophet? No. Are you the Christ? No. Are you Elijah? No. Well, who
are you? I'm that voice of Isaiah 40 crying
in the wilderness. Prepare you the way of the Lord.
John the Baptist, supernaturally born, supernaturally filled with
the Holy Spirit in his mother's womb, and sent of God to be the
forerunner of Christ. And Christ said, that's my first
witness. That's my first human witness. All right, secondly,
look at verse 36. And our Lord said, but I have
greater witness than that of John. The works that I do, the
work which the Father hath given me to finish. They bear witness
of me. The same works I do bear witness
of me. Nicodemus came to him and said,
no man could do the works you do except God be with him. The man whose eyes were opened,
he said, has it ever been heard or reported that the blind see? Now brethren, I don't need to
say this to you because you're smart enough to view these these
televisions, there's a pain in the side, and a pain in the head,
and a pain in the neck, and all this different thing, and breaking
these crutches and throwing them around. You know, there may be
some unusual and strange things happening. Our Lord said, in
the last days false Christs and prophets shall arise and do great
wonders and shall deceive many, if it were possible, the very
like. But there's not any genuine miracles of healing. The lame
walking, the blind seeing, the dead, it's not there. It's a
show that we're putting on. It's mind over matter. It's something
that can't be proven. You get all these people here
and some fella walks around and says his heart's beating better.
Well, he may be dead in two weeks, but nobody knows about that.
All we saw was when he danced down the aisle. But our Lord
actually healed. There was a man lying there 38
years. Imagine the condition of his
legs. Imagine the condition of his body. And yet, when the Lord
healed him, it says, immediately, he reached down and picked up
his bed. He didn't limp off. He picked
up his bed and put it on his shoulders and walked down the
road. That's the power of our Lord. Nicodemus said, no man
could do these things except God. Turn to Matthew 11. Listen
to this. John the Baptist was in prison. And he sent unto Christ, Jesus,
and he sent two disciples over there, and they came to the Lord
Jesus in verse 3 of Matthew 11, and they said, Are you he that
should come? Are you he that should come? In the full film
of the Scripture. Are you he that should come,
or do we look for another? And Jesus answered and said unto
them, You go show John again the things which you hear and
see. The blind actually receive their
sight. God made the eye and he can make
it see. And the deaf actually hear. And the dead are raised. And the poor have the gospel
preached unto them, and blessed is he whosoever shall not be
offended in me. There's your proof. There's your
proof. The works that I do, they bear
witness of me. Over at the third witness, John
5, by the mouth of truth or a witness, who is Jesus Christ? The forerunner
says he's the Christ. The work says he's God in the
flesh. And verse 37, and the Father
himself, which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Now
you haven't heard his voice and you haven't seen him, but God
the Father hath borne witness. At the baptism of the Lord Jesus,
the voice from heaven said, This is my beloved son. And the Holy
Spirit came in the form of a dove and abode upon him. And on the
Mount of Transfiguration, when our Lord was transfigured before
his disciples, again the Father said, This is my beloved son.
Now listen to another scripture in John 12. I want you to turn
to this one. You're so familiar with those
others, but you may not be familiar with this one. In John 12, verse
28, our Lord Jesus in John 12, 28, listen to this. He said,
Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from
heaven saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. And the people therefore that
stood by and heard it said, it thundered. Another said, An angel
spoke to him, and Jesus answered and said, this voice came not
because of me. I didn't need any assurance from
my father. It came for your sake. It came
for your sake. The father had borne witness.
You see, all of these so-called messiahs and religious leaders,
they have no witnesses. They're hot shots, personalities. Men with charisma who sprung
up and folks just follow them in droves. They don't lack for
supporters. But our Lord Jesus said, John
the Baptist, the works that I do, the Father himself. Now look
at verse 39. What's another witness? The Scriptures. Search the Scriptures. In them
you think you have eternal life. How did the Pharisees, Sadducees,
and religious people think they had life in the scriptures? The
same thing that a lot of people think they have life today in
the doctrines. Well, I believe God's suffering. You can perish
believing God's suffering. Well, I believe man's depraved.
Well, they prove that every day. Man has to be blind not to believe
folks are depraved. They're worse than animals. Well, I believe in the effectual
Holy Spirit. You can believe all those things
and not know God. People search the Scriptures.
I search the Scriptures. In the Scriptures, he said, you
think you have life, but these Scriptures testify of me. I cut something out and put it
in the back of my Bible a long time ago, and I've referred to
it often. We ought to honor the Scriptures.
Because every bit of this book is about Jesus Christ. The Old
Testament says someone is coming. The Gospels say someone has come. The Epistles say someone's coming
again. It's all about Christ. If you
read the Bible and do not see Christ, you need to re-read it.
You've misread it. The Bible is His story. It's
all the way a picture of Christ. In Genesis, he's the promised
seed. In Exodus, he's the Passover
lamb. In Leviticus, he's the scapegoat. In Numbers, he's the brazen serpent. In Deuteronomy, he's the great
lawgiver. In Joshua, he's the prophet,
priest, and king. In Ruth, he's the kinsman, redeemer.
In Psalms, he's the Lord, my shepherd. In Job, he's my redeemer. And in Song of Solomon, he's
the great lover. It's Christ. My friends, I've tried my best
here to keep us as a church from becoming even entangled in the
mechanics of a church. They're churches, they're people
who meet together as a body of Christ as a church, and they're
just so busy with business. They're so busy with meetings.
They're so busy with planning. They're so busy with voting.
They're so busy with social. They're so busy with all these
things. They never know and worship and love Him. I want us to learn doctrine,
but not doctrine without Christ. You don't arrive at Christ through
doctrine. Biggest mistake you ever made is try to convince
a man to be a Calvinist without first being a Christian. He'll
be a dead Calvinist. You arrive at doctrine through
Christ. You don't learn doctrine, you learn Christ. And as you
learn Christ, his doctrines reveal. You don't find out about a person
until you meet him. And once you meet him, he'll
tell you all about himself. But what we've done is we've
got this cold, dead, dry-letter doctrine if we're not careful. And I've done my best to try
to avoid that. If we build an image of Christ
and then we meet him, we don't recognize him. See what I'm saying? A man can
take the five points or the systematic theologies, books of theology,
and build him a God that is not the God of compassion and warmth
and love and mercy and grace and yet just. But what we need
to do by the Spirit's power is meet him. That's the reason you
have so many cold, regimented theologians. They're mean. Most church members are mean.
Most preachers are mean. They're cruel. Harsh. They're nothing like Christ. They're like his disciples. He
was sitting there, and the little children came around, and they
went over there, and they tried to get to Christ, and the disciples
tried to run away. He said, let these little children
come to me. A woman came, cried after them,
said, send her away, Lord. No, no, send her away, bring
her to me. The religious men picked up stones to stone the
adulteress, and Christ stooped down and wrote in the sand, he's
the only friend she had. But I tell you we can get so
enamored with our doctrines we miss Him. Get so taken up with
our principles and our tenets and our creeds and our discipline
and our rules that they become more important than people and
even the God that gave them. And you're ruined when you do
that because you just get meaner and meaner. And the longer your
list of rules, the shorter your list of friends. And after a
while, you are like Elijah. I'm the only one left. Well,
where you are, you ought to be the only one. I don't want to
be there. We got to meet him. And if a
man meets him, he'll define himself. He'll reveal himself. And he
just might make you like him. Wouldn't that be something? Wouldn't
that be something? Oh, wouldn't that be something?
to be like Him. But we search the Scriptures.
Well, I see this over here and this over here. Do you see Him
over there? If you can see Him, you can see this a lot clearer.
A whole lot clearer. I want to see Him. And then the
next witness He gives us is here in verse 44, 46. He said, had
you believed Moses, You would have believed me. He
wrote of me. The Jews revered Moses. Oh, I
tell you, they revered Moses. In fact, when Christ preached
to them, they said, we have Moses. If there was one thing that they
thought they believed, it was Moses. I tell you, I don't want
to be there. Our Lord walked up to these men,
and He said to them, Now if there's one thing they thought they believed,
it was Moses. If there's one person they thought they were
genuinely following, it was Moses. If there was one name revered
in their vocabulary, it was Moses. And our Lord looked at him and
said, if you'd have believed Moses, you'd have believed me. And I tell you, take all that
we claim of fundamentalist the blood, the book, the blessed
hope, the things I revere, my Baptist heritage, and forefathers,
and Calvin, and Luther, and to hear the Lord say to me, if you'd
have really believed, you'd have believed me. Oh, the witnesses. Well, I believe that Jesus is
the Christ, and I want to give you this in close. If you'll
give me just about five or six minutes of patience, I can give
you this right here. Our Lord brought six charges
against these religionists. Six charges. He said in verse
31, He said, you search the scriptures. And I do. And you do. And we're going to continue to.
And many people do. But I can truthfully say, can
you truthfully say? I can truthfully say that as
I search the scriptures, I do see Christ. I believe in a Christ-honoring
passion. I do believe in a Christ-honoring
way. I see Christ. I see him greater,
more magnificent, more sufficient. I see him every day. I believe that Jesus is the Christ.
Secondly, he brought this charge against him in verse 40, and
he said, you will not come to me. You will not come to me. Well, I asked myself this question.
Have I come to Christ? Well, what does it mean to come
to Christ? It's not come to the front, not come to church, not
even come to a doctrinal position. It's to come to Christ, to a
person. All right, let me show you this. To come to Christ,
number one is to recognize Him for who He is. You've got to
know to whom you're coming. Secondly, it's to address myself
to him, not to one of his servants. He didn't say you came to my
disciples or to my church. He said you came to me. You will
not come to me. So I came to him. I addressed
myself to him as I am and as he is. like the leper who fell
on the ground and worshipped him, and sowing him omnipotence
and all power, sowing himself all insufficiency and inability,
and he said, I'm in a mess, if you will, you can make me whole.
And that's to address myself to him. Can you do that? Well,
that's not just, that's not the way people get saved. Yeah, that's
the way people get saved. But walking down an aisle and
saying, I believe Jesus died on the cross, I believed that
ever since I could talk. But I addressed myself to Him.
Lord, be merciful to me, the sinner. Thirdly, to come to Christ
is to come away from everything in opposition to Christ and to
look to Him. You see, faith has a single object.
It's a living person. Faith has a single object. Faith
becomes obsessed with Him, Him, Him. A man said one time, all
you preach is Christ, Christ, Christ, grace, grace, grace.
Well, maybe that's a good sign. Maybe I'm saved. Maybe I know
the Lord. And then fourthly, it's to continue
to look to Him. is to continue. You see, this
thing of coming to Christ is not an isolated incident. Somebody
says, it's like, brother, I'll tell you a true story. There
was a preacher's son who's about, I'd say, 30 some odd years old.
And Brother Scott Richardson was holding a meeting at his
dad's church. And after the service one night, he said to Brother
Scott and to his dad and to another man in the church, he said, I'd
like to talk to you fellas. And Scott said, well, all right.
Let's talk. So they went down front to Foroch.
Pastor, Brother Richardson, this gentleman, and another friend.
Now the boy started out this way, he said, now, he said, I'm
saved. He said, I saved a ten-year-old. And I don't have any doubts about
it. And that's not the issue. Brother Scott was sitting there
holding his Bible. He got up and closed it and said, well,
no use me talking to you. He walked right out the room. And his daddy, the pastor, got
up and said, me either. And out the door he went. The
other fellow followed, left the fellow sitting there. You say,
that's not right. That's the right way to do it.
We've been playing games too long. He had declared that he
was saved and didn't want anybody to bother him. Now let me tell
you something. This thing of coming to Christ
is a continual coming to Christ. I'm coming to Christ right now.
In spirit, in heart, in faith. Repentance is not an isolated
act. We are repenting. We better keep on repenting.
I have believed, I am believing, I will keep on believing or I
never believe. And I'm not, I'm not being hard. Now this is just, this is, these
are the beginnings. These are the principles and
we don't even have to preach this way as folks have quit preaching
them. They're trying to give people an instant salvation like
instant rice, and instant oatmeal, instant everything else. Now
it's not that way, it's a work of grace. And it's a work that takes, it
takes a Almighty God from eternity past to eternity future to complete. He chose me in Christ before
the foundation of the world, that's when it started. And in
time, the Lord Jesus came down here and worked out that righteousness
and paid that debt. And that's when it was commenced,
continued. And I was born into this world
a rebel, a little rattlesnake. On my road to hell, the Holy
Spirit one day, I played religion, played everything else. And one
day, Almighty God, through His Word, let me know He was a God
of purpose and that Christ was an effectual Savior. And I was
born into the kingdom of God. But I was born just a little
bitty baby. And God's raising me now. And He's teaching me. And when I fall down and skin
my knee, He doesn't kick me out of the family. I'm still in the
family. He takes care of it. He ministers
to it. And that's what I'm trying to
mature. Are you? But do you know what
I'm eating? I'm eating the Word. The children's
bread. The bread and wine of life, Christ
Jesus. And I'm trying to grow. I feel
like I take one step and back up two sometimes, but I'm still
growing. I ain't standing still, that's one thing. And one of
these days, I'm going to plant my body, and take my soul to
glory, and make me just like Christ. Then he's going to come
down here and get my body, and from then on you can look at
me and say, well the Lord finished what he started, didn't he? He
always does. He always does, there's no other way. He that
hath begun a good work in you shall perfect it in the day of
Christ Jesus. And they're around, they're here
and there, God's babies, God's young men, God's old mature elders,
they're around. He said this, watch this verse
42, I know you, you don't have the love of God in you. He's
talking to these religious people. That love of God is love of God
for you. Christ said to those people in
Matthew, I never loved you, I never knew you. And secondly, it's
that love for God that He's given you. We love Him because He first
loved us. If God loves somebody, they're
going to love Him. Love begets love. When He reveals
His love, they're going to love Him back. And then this love
of God is a love which loves others. It's shed abroad in our
hearts, for he said, you can't love God and not love your brother.
He that loveth not his brother knoweth not God. So that love,
Christ said to these religious folks, you've got the doctrine,
you've got the orthodoxy, you've got the fundamentalism, you've
got the theology, you've got the ceremonies, you've got the
legalism, you've got the morality, you've got all these things,
but you don't have God's love. Neither his love for you, nor
your love for him, nor our love for others. You mean? And that's
just it. And we have some evidence of
salvation. John used it. He said, I know
I've passed from death into life because I love the brethren.
Know what he said? He said, that's my evidence.
One of them. And then next of all, our Lord
said in verse 43, you won't receive me. I've come in my Father's
name. Kent read this the other night, I know he's going to be
reading it again, Exodus 34, when he said, I'll proclaim the
name of the Lord. And he proclaimed his name, who
God is, who will by no means clear the guilty, who's merciful,
long-suffering, gracious, who's a just God and a righteous God.
Christ said, that's the name in which I've come. That's the
name. And you won't receive me in that
name. Now men today will receive him as Savior, but not as Lord. They'll receive him as a fire
escape from hell, but not as sovereign prophet, priest, and
king. But he comes in a definite name, the name of his father. And that name is declared in
all of his attributes and character, that his name declares all those. Christ said, I come in my father's
name, and you won't receive me in that name. That's the name. I wish I had time to go into
that. That'd be another sermon, but
receiving him in that name, in that name. This is what the fellas
are doing in evangelism. They're trimming this name down. They're making it more acceptable.
If you won't take Jesus for what he costs, then I'll offer him
to you cheaper. I'll give you a little cheaper.
I'll be a little cheaper dealer, you know, they say. I'll give
him to you cheaper. You can't. He comes in that name. And without that name and submission
to that name, you can't have Him. Can't have Him. Now that's
so. Let another come in His own name,
whom you will receive. But look at verse 44, the honor. How can you believe you seek
honor one of another? Is that what we're doing? Are
we seeking honor? Honor signifies acceptance and
praise. Turn to 1 Corinthians. It'd be
worthwhile to look at this a moment. It'd be worthwhile just one more
time to look at this. Listen to this. Are we seeking 1 Corinthians
7, verse 29. I say, brethren, the time is
short. The time is short. It remaineth.
that both they that have wives be as though they had none, and
they that weep as though they didn't weep, and they that rejoice as though
they rejoice not, and those that buy as though they possess not,
and they that use this world as not abusing it, for the fashion
of this world passeth away." We're just so wrapped up and
young, we're getting married, you know. And the guy's got,
he just loves his wife and dotes upon his wife, and that's fine
in its place. And then our children, and then
we're working, we build a home, we work so hard, we keep the
yard just right, and we work on our health, and we eat the
right things, and take our vitamins, and drink our orange juice, and
take care of this body. And then we have a sorrow in
the home, and something happens, a tragedy, and we weep, and we
mope, and I guess we have to, and all these things. He said,
listen to me. This thing of the honor of God,
and acceptance with God, and the praise of God, this is it.
This is it. To be found in Him, this is it. I count all things but loss.
that I may win Christ and be found in Him. What if it burns
down? What if I lose it all? What if
my help plays out tomorrow? I haven't lost anything. But
if I lose Him, I've lost everything. And this is what he's talking
about, the fashion of this world. Now put it down. You don't know
anything, possess anything, have anything, or are anything, or
have any relationship that'll last through eternity. except
one. That's with Christ and his family.
And the rest of it's rubbish. It's just play pretties. It's
soap bubbles now. And that's what he's saying here.
Those that have wives, you better be as a fellow that doesn't have
a wife. And those that weep as though they didn't weep, those
rejoice as if they didn't have anything to rejoice in. And if
you rejoice in this world, you hadn't got anything to rejoice
in, because it's going to turn to sorrow. And this is hard. I know this is so difficult,
so difficult to put these things in their proper place. And I
think you can give them their proper place. I believe you can.
I believe the Lord intends for us to enjoy in Him what we have. Enjoy in Him what we have, what
He's given us. Does that make sense? I know
it's a paradox. It's a paradox, but it's still
so. That we can enjoy the blessings
that he gives us and the good things he gives us, but let's
get them in the right perspective. Oh, if God takes my child, I'll
just die. No, you better not. You better
keep on. Is that right? Oh, if I lost
my wife, I just couldn't live! Wait a minute now, you got her
in the wrong place. You got her, and God just may
take her. I try to tell people, don't, don't brag too much about
eating the right things and having good health. God might take that
away from you, you're bragging too much. Don't, don't show off
your strength too much, God might whittle you down a little bit,
especially if you know Him. We boast in Him. Well, I can
go on and on with that because I'm working on that. Somebody
said, we usually preach on what we're working on. All right,
the last thing, and I'll quit. In verse 45 of John 5, listen
to this. John 5, verse 45. He says this,
if you'd believe Moses, verse 46, you'd have believed me. Well,
I can say this. I can say this. There was a time
when I didn't do much reading, Charlie, in the Old Testament.
Didn't do much, because it really, well, it just, I don't know,
it didn't mean much. But I believe Moses now. I see,
it's like Isaiah said, when God killed Uzziah, I saw the Lord.
And I open that old, like that scripture you read tonight in
the study. The Old Testament is, but you've got to have the
New to understand it. Wouldn't advise it anybody somebody
says how would you read the Bible start Genesis and go straight
through? No, I don't believe I would advise you I'd read the
New Testament and refer to the Old Testament But now if you've
been around a while if you've been around a while and have
some grasp an understanding of Christ in all of his and all
of his Fulfillment then get in the Old Testament start Genesis
1 if you want to But it'll be closed book without Christ and
some understanding of how he fulfills it all. Well, I believe,
I do, that Jesus is the Christ. I've reached that place in experience
and faith that I believe Jesus is the Christ. That's what I
want for you and for all of us. Thank you, thank you, thank you
for your word. And thank you that it's not a
riddle or there's much, so much. Let us not make any boast. We know nothing as we ought to
know. But we believe that we see Christ with eyes of faith
and have some understanding, at least a beginning of an understanding
of his glory. and our confidence is in him.
Oh, for greater, deeper, fuller understanding of Christ our Lord.
Be pleased in these days to help us, to teach us, to encourage us and comfort us. We pray in his name and for his
sake. Amen.