Now let's go back to the book
of 1 John, chapter 5. I have a great burden to be of certain benefit and blessing
to those who come here to hear me preach. This afternoon, a dear lady called
from up in West Virginia, and she said, I listened to your
program at 11 o'clock. She said, I can understand what
you're saying. She said, I live in St. Albans, and I've been to church after
church, and I just can't understand what they're saying. That's sad. Now, I'm speaking tonight on
the subject of faith. As Brother Ronnie prayed, it's
an important time for me and for you, for all who hear, who
have ears to hear. Because also, as he prayed, this
may be the last time that I'll preach the gospel of Christ,
and it could be the last time that you'll be privileged to
hear the gospel of Christ. And the subject upon which I'm
speaking and the subject that we're considering, we couldn't have a more important
subject than faith, because without faith
it's impossible to please God. He that cometh to God must believe,
must believe. And our Lord said all things
are possible to them that believe. He said if you can, if you can
believe, if you can believe. And he said over and over again,
we traced it in our classes this morning from Genesis all the
way to the book of Galatians, that Abraham believed God. He
believed God. He believed God. And it was counted
to him for righteousness. He believed God. Now, everybody here has some
kind of faith or you wouldn't be here. There are those here tonight
who have saving faith. They have confident faith. They can say quite boldly, with
David, the Lord is my shepherd. Or with Job, I know that my Redeemer
liveth. Or with Paul, I know whom I have
believed. Or with John, we know we've passed
from death unto life. There are others who have faith,
but it's so small. It's so frail. With John Newton,
they often cry, "'Tis a point I long to know." And oft it gives
me anxious thought. Do I love the Lord or no? Am I His or am I not? You go
through that. And then there's some seeking
faith. There's some here tonight with whom I've talked. And I
refuse to talk you into a profession of faith. I'm just not going
to do it. I'm not going to try to give you hope. Only God can
give hope. Only God can give faith. Only
God can give assurance. If a man can talk you into a
profession, another man can come along and talk you out of it.
If a man gives you some hope, another man will take it away
from you. But if you're joined in heart by faith through the
Spirit to the Lord Jesus Christ, nobody, nobody, can separate
you from Him. And I do pray that it may please
Him tonight by His Spirit to help me and in turn to help you. But now I know this, it's not
an easy thing. It's not an easy thing to discern
between saving faith and false faith. It's not easy. And anyone who thinks it is,
is deceived. It's not easy. A man can... Well,
if a man is deceived, he doesn't know he's deceived, or he wouldn't
be deceived. Deception is not known. Hypocrisy
is open, flagrant violation of what you feel, and what you see,
and what you understand. But deception is deception. And there are those who are deceived. And it's not easy to discern
between saving faith and false faith. If it were true, if that
were true, if it were easy, then we wouldn't have scriptures like
this examining yourselves, whether you be in the faith. Know ye
not your own selves, how that Christ dwelleth in you, except
you be reprobate? What about this one? Give diligence.
Diligence. To make your calling and election
sure. What about this scripture? Try
the spirits, whether they be of God. You should be trying
what I'm saying right now by the Word, by the Spirit that
dwells in you. Let a man examine himself. When
we come to the table of the Lord, Paul tells us, examine yourself,
and so let him eat. How about this Scripture? Take
heed, brethren, lest there be found in you an evil heart of
unbelief. How about this one? When the
Son of Man cometh, will he find faith on the earth? Or this one,
not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the
kingdom of God. Wouldn't it be tragic to miss
Christ standing here? But wouldn't it be tragic to
miss Christ sitting there? But wouldn't it be tragic to
miss Christ from anywhere? To be deceived. Well, false faith
can produce some impressive, impressive religious acts. For example, false faith can
excite the affections. There's a lot of praise the Lord
going on now that's not praising the Lord. There's a lot of hallelujah
that's not much hallelujah to it. False faith can excite the
affections. In fact, false faith does more
exciting than anything else. Sometimes false faith gets more
excited than saving faith. Saving faith usually falls down
as a dead man. Saving faith usually bows. False
faith usually gets more excited, emotional. When our Lord Jesus
Christ came into Jerusalem riding on the ass, they all threw palm
leaves before Him and they cried, Hail, blessed, blessed is He
that cometh in the name of the Lord. That was false faith, but
it was exciting faith. They were emotionally excited.
Our Lord, when He described the stony ground heroes, He said
they received the word with joy, with joy, much happiness and
much joy, much emotion. So emotionalism does not always
indicate saving faith, not always. Or we had a hallelujah time.
You can have a hallelujah time without God, without the Spirit
of God. Not always, the more noise that
a person makes does not mean that he has more of the Spirit
of God. He may have more of an evil spirit. I'm not discounting rejoicing. Rejoice in the Lord always, and
again I say rejoice. I'm not discounting happiness
in the Spirit. I'm just saying that false faith
can excite the emotions. And then secondly, false faith
can reform the outward man. Now these are ways we usually
try to discern faith. We say, well, boy, that person's
really saved. I've never seen anybody shout
like that. That person's really saved. I've never seen anybody
so happy. He just whistles all the time
or sings amazing grace or something like that, you know. That's the
way we discern if a person has faith. Here's another way, and
that is the outward man. He's saved because he sure cleaned
up his life. Well, listen to the Pharisee.
Lord, I thank thee I'm not like other men. I'm not an extortioner,
I'm not an adulterer, I'm not unjust. I tithe, I fast twice
a week, I give alms to the poor. This man was so outwardly moral
that before the throne of God he was reciting his credentials
and his merits and his righteousness. And then take this for example,
when our Lord said to the rich young ruler who had inquired,
what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He said, keep the commandments.
He said, I've kept them from the time I was a boy, from my
youth up. I've kept those commandments.
False faith can reform the outward man and can do a pretty good
job. In fact, sometimes, sometimes,
and I don't want to be misunderstood here, but sometimes the more
Outwardly holy people are those who are fathers from God. You
go through the scripture and you check on that. Sometimes
the folks who are the most outwardly pious and outwardly righteous,
and I tell you the reason is they're depending on those things
for their redemption. They're depending on those things
for their salvation. And they give greater attention
to that which is outward than that which is inward. The Pharisees
were a good example. You take what our Lord was here
on the earth. The people thought if only two men went to heaven,
one would be a Pharisee and one would be a Republican. And they
even asked the Lord this. When he condemned the Pharisee,
they said, well, who then can be saved? If these people aren't
saved, who is saved? These are the most moral people
on earth. And so false faith can not only
excite the affections and emotions, but false faith can reform and
do a mighty good job of it. A mighty good job. It can reform
the outward man. Lord, I thank you I'm not like
other men. And a lot of times they're the
most, I don't say the most spiritual, but the most moral people of
the community. The most religious people of
the community are people who solemnly and completely reject
the gospel of God's grace. And then thirdly, false faith
can not only excite the affections and emotions and reform the outward
man, but it can attain high office in the church. It can attain high office. Now
you go through the scripture and find men like Demas. Diostrophes,
Judas, these men attained high places in the church. As far
as I can determine, there was only one office among the apostles
and Judas held that office. And then fourthly, false faith
can be baptized with Simon, can give gifts with Ananias and Sapphira,
can speak well of Christ with the rich young ruler Nicodemus,
and do works of charity with the Pharisees. And false faith,
and watch this, this is what's astounding. False faith can persevere
as well as saving faith. And continue right up to the
judgment and defend itself before the throne of God. False faith. Well, surely he's saved, he's
been in church for 40, 50 years. Surely he's saved, he died. He died with a song on his lips. Well, false faith can even come
before the judgment and say, Lord, we preached in your name
and cast out devils and did many wonderful works, only to hear
Christ say, I never knew. So it's not an easy thing to
discern between false and saving faith. You certainly can't discern
it in anyone else. It's even difficult in yourself.
It's hopeless as far as judging whether another person is saved.
It's difficult even in your own life. Because false faith can
do many things. It can excite the emotions. It
can reform the outward man. It can aspire to high office
in the church. It can be baptized and give gifts
and tithe and do works of charity and even persevere to the judgment. But there are three things that
false faith can never do. I'm going to give you three things
that false faith can never perform. Satan is a counterfeiter, but
he can't counterfeit these three things. Satan is an imposter,
but he strikes out on these three things. Satan is an imitator,
but he cannot produce these three things. He can't do it, you can't
do it, and nobody else can do it. Nobody but a believer, nobody
but a saved, redeemed believer can produce these three things.
I don't mean one out of three or two out of three, I mean all
three of them. And where you find one of them in a person
with saving faith, you'll find the other. It's like the offices
of Christ, prophet, priest, and king. You cannot separate them.
And you can't separate these three things. And you say, when
I give them to you tonight, you may say, well, I've got one of
them. That won't do. I say all three of them. Satan
cannot produce them. He cannot imitate them. He cannot
counterfeit them. And here they are. Now, you listen
to them. Number one, false faith can never, Satan doesn't operate
this way, can never produce a heart. A heart, now stay with me, every
word I think is important. False faith can never produce
a heart that is broken before God over sin. Can't do it. Now, false faith
can speak of sin in general terms. False faith can speak of sin
in general terms having to do with a general race. But false
faith will never say, I am guilty. Just won't do it. Just won't
do it. Turn to Psalm 51. False faith
never prayed this way. Listen to it now. I'm saying
all three of these go together now. Don't take just one. You
say, well, I know I'm guilty. I know I'm a sinner. Yes. But
false faith can never produce a heart broken before God over
sin. Listen to David in Psalm 51.
Now this is saving faith. We know that it is because this
was a man after God's own heart. Have mercy upon me, O God, not
upon us, not upon the race, not upon the Jew, upon me. According
to thy lovingkindness, according to the multitude of thy tender
mercy, blot out my transgression. Wash me throughly, throughly
from my iniquity. Cleanse me from my sin. I acknowledge my transgressions.
My sin is ever before me against Thee. Thee only have I sinned
and done this evil in Thy sight that You might be justified when
You speak in judgment and clear when You judge me. Behold, I
was shapen in iniquity, in sin my mother conceived me." That's
not false faith. Can't do it. Can't get down there.
It can't get down there. False faith is full of pride
and ego and self-righteousness. It never takes its place in the
dust, at the feet of a sovereign Lord and begs for mercy. False faith will never totally
and completely receive and rest in Christ alone as the only Savior. Christ alone. Not Christ plus
anything. Not Christ plus my repentance.
Not Christ plus my faith. Not Christ plus my perseverance
or Christ plus anything. False faith will never receive,
bow to, and rest in Christ alone as the way, the truth, and the
life. Turn to Psalm 62. Psalm 62. The average person. You say, are you a Christian?
Are you a believer? Yes, I made a decision when I was 15. Or
another say, yes, I was baptized when I was 21. Or another said,
yes, I'm a Baptist, or yes, I'm a Catholic, or yes, I'm doing
the best I can, or yes, I've had an experience. Faith says,
Christ died for my sins. Christ died for my sins. Look
at Psalm 62, verse 5. Now listen to David again. My
soul wait thou only upon God, for my expectation is from Him. He only. I like these words,
only. Only, only, He only is my rock
and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not
be moved. In God is my salvation and my
glory. The rock of my strength and my
refuge is in God. Trust in Him at all times, ye
people. Pour out your heart before Him.
God is a refuge for us. He only is my salvation. Saving faith looks to Christ
only, rests in Christ only, believes in Christ only. All right, here's
the third thing. False faith in the third place
can never bow to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Now false faith,
we'll talk about Jesus the Savior, But he'll never talk about Jesus
Christ, the Lord and King. A sovereign Lord, called Jesus
Christ, is not in the vocabulary of false faith. Turn to 1 Corinthians
12. And what I'm saying is this.
Jesus Christ is Lord of creation. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and all things
were made by Him. Without Him was not anything
made that was made. Jesus Christ is the Lord of revelation. No man knoweth the Son, but the
Father, and no man knoweth the Father, but the Son, and he to
whom the Son will reveal him. Jesus Christ is the Lord of heaven
and earth. All authority is given unto me
in heaven and earth. He is the Lord of all flesh.
All power over all flesh is given to me, that I should give eternal
life to as many as thou hast given me. He's the Lord of the
living and the dead. He said, the scripture says,
He died that He might be Lord of the living and the dead. He's
the Lord of providence. He's the Lord of mercy. I will
be merciful to whom I will be merciful. He is the Lord of hell
and death. He has the keys of hell and death.
He is the Lord of life. The Son quickeneth whom He will.
He's the Lord of the atonement. I lay down my life. No man taketh
it from me. That's what I'm saying. False
faith cannot bow to, surrender, and receive Jesus Christ to be
absolute, unconditional, total Lord of his life. In 1 Corinthians
12, look at verse 3. Wherefore I give you to understand,
that no man speaking by the Spirit of God called Jesus calleth Jesus
a cursing. And that no man can say that
Jesus is the Lord. But by the Holy Ghost. By the
Holy Ghost. Now he, Barnard used to say,
I know who your Savior is, tell me who's your Lord. Tell me who's
your Lord. Now those three, and Jesus Christ,
our Lord, this is the character in which he was rejected. This
is the supreme, sovereign King, Lord, and God. King of kings
and Lord. This was the character in which he was rejected. They
said, we'll not have this man reign over us. He can dispense
his charitable gifts, he can feed the hungry, he can heal
the sick, he can give sight to the blind, he can raise our debt,
but he's not going to reign over us. Modern religion talks about
the benefits of Jesus the Savior. The Scripture talks about the
blessings and glory of Christ the Lord. This is the character
in which he was rejected when he was here on this earth. This
was the character in which he was accused to Pilate. They said,
he said he's a king. We don't mind him being a prophet
like John the Baptist or a prophet like Elijah, but he said he's
king. We have no king, they said, but
Caesar. We have a savior. We have a prophet. We have a priest, Aaron, sons
of Leith, but our king, Caesar. And I'm saying this to you, a
saving faith king is Christ, the sovereign, omnipotent, almighty,
omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Lord. This was the character
in which he was rejected, this is the character in which he
was accused, this is the character in which the soldiers mocked
him. Nicodemus came to him and said, we know your prophet. which
is come from God. No man could do the miracles
you do, except God be with you. The lawyers and the Pharisees
and the Sadducees, oh, Charlie called him, Master, that's teacher. Teacher, teacher, teacher. But
when our Lord Jesus Christ said, I am the Father of one, they
picked up stones to stone him. And he said, now many good works
have I done among you, for which of these do you stone me? They
said, we're not stoning you for good works. But because you're
a man and you say you're God, and you're not going to reign
over us. We have no king but Caesar. And the soldiers sat
him down in that chair and put that crown of thorns on his brow.
Do you wonder why they did that? They were mocking and ridiculing
his kingship, his sovereignty, his right to rule and reign.
He cannot reign. He can sit in his almshouse and
give out alms. He can sit in his hospital and
heal the sick. He can sit in his mortuary and
raise the dead, but he's not going to sit on the throne. And
false faith will take him as Savior, Savior, Savior, personal
Savior, any kind of Savior. Have you accepted Jesus as your
personal Savior? I hope you haven't, because that's
a shortcut to hell is what that is. I'm serious. Have you bowed to
Christ as your Lord? Now that's another question.
Everybody in town has accepted Jesus as their personal Savior,
and they're serving self, they're serving Satan, they're serving
sin, they've got a dozen masters. And those soldiers put that crown
of thorn on his brow, and they said, And they put that purple
robe on him. One of them went out and got
a hollow reed and put it in his hand. And there he sat with that
crown of thorns and that hollow reed and that old dirty red robe
on his shoulders. And there that bunch of mocking
soldiers, pagans, were bowing in front of him. That's all right. That's all right. You make fun
of it. But he's God's King. He's God's King. And there was
one in that whole crowd, just one, in that whole crowd of Pilate's
outfit, and Herod's outfit, and Caiaphas's outfit, and the soldier's
outfit, and at the crucifixion there was one who said, Lord,
you're coming into a kingdom. Remember me. And my Lord took
him with him. He didn't accept him as his personal
Savior, see, so he bowed to him as his Lord. That's right. I don't know whether anybody, I
know somebody understands what I'm talking about. I don't know
whether everybody does or not, but I'm telling the truth tonight. If thou shalt confess with thy
mouth, Jesus to be Lord. I don't find anywhere in the
pages of this book where you say by accepting Jesus as your
personal Savior. Find it, Bruce, anywhere. Just
find it. It's not there. Not there. But I found some folks
in there that bowed to Him as Lord and submitted to Him as
Lord, surrendered to Him as Lord, received Him as Lord and were
saved. That's a fact. What was the charge
up over His cross? You know, when they crucified
a man, they always put what he did. He killed somebody, or he
sold out his nation, or he murdered, or he's a thief. They put over
him, the only charge against him, Jesus of Nazareth, King
of the Jews. And they put it in three languages,
Latin, Hebrew, and Greek. Latin, Hebrew, and Greek. Let
the whole world know that we're rejected, And we've turned on
and we've crucified Jesus Christ in the character of king. That's
what we put him there for. He said he's king. He said he's
king. He said he's king. And I'm telling
you this, false faith will never, it'll never, you can scrub it,
and you can kick it, and you can twist it, and you can hang
it out to dry, and they'll never own his lordship. Personal Savior,
yes, sir. Healer, yes, sir. All these things,
but not Lord. Not sovereign master. Won't do
it. Now, faith is difficult to define. I want you to turn to Hebrews.
I want to give you something that I gave on television last
Sunday. Somebody here might have heard
it. I hope I can improve on it tonight. But I think this is
important. Now, faith's hard to define,
but I'm going to try to define saving faith. I've shown you
what false faith cannot do. It cannot. It cannot take its
place before God, before God with a broken heart over my sin,
my sin. Just can't do it. Can't receive
Christ only as the only Savior. In this thing of justification
before God, we're passive, Jim. Totally passive. Don't contribute
one thing. One, you say, that's antinomianism. Call it what you
want to. Put any kind of name you want on it, but it's Bible.
In this thing of redemption and justification and salvation,
there is nothing that a sinner contributes in any shape, form,
or fashion. We're redeemed because Christ
died for us, and Christ obeyed the law for us. And false faith
will, and that's what I say. You say, well, I got faith, and
I don't believe that. It's a false faith. Because no man is justified
by the law in the sight of God. No man is justified by works
in the sight of God. We're justified freely by His
grace. Freely by His grace. And no man,
no false faith will bow to Christ as Lord. Lord of salvation, creation,
providence, supreme, absolute Lord. But now wait a minute.
Someday every knee is going to bow, and every tongue is going
to confess that he's Lord. That's the objective of God in
this thing of redemption. His Son is going to have preeminence.
He says every, God's given him a name above every name, and
every knee will bow. Every knee will bow. Every tongue
will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Lord. Now, here's some things from
chapter Hebrews 11, let me give you this about faith before I
get into these points right here. Just jot this down in your mind. First of all, this is what I
know. Saving faith is the gift of God. In other words, God's
the source of it. You don't whip up faith. It's not a product
of the human heart. It's not something you discover
somewhere. Faith is the gift of God. The
source of faith is God. That's the reason the disciples
said to Christ, Lord, increase our faith. Increase our faith. And then
Christ alone is the object of faith. Never feeling, never experience,
never conditions, never decisions. He's the object of faith. My
faith is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and His righteousness. He's the object of faith. Look
to me and be saved. Look to Christ. And then the
Word of God is the foundation of faith. It's the foundation. Faith comes by hearing and hearing
by the Word of God. I know that. And then trial is always the
test of faith. Faith will be tested. It's not
going to be easy. It's going to be tested. Your
faith's going to be tried. It'll be tried in many ways.
It'll be tried by Satan. It'll be tried by the world.
It'll be tried by the flesh. It will be tried by your friends.
It will be tried by your family. It will be tried by pain and
disease. It will be tried by death. It
will be tried in every way. Faith is going to be tried. Alright,
now look, here are some remarks about faith in Hebrews 11. This
is called the Hall of the Faithful. And it tells us in Hebrews chapter
11 Verse 1, faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence
of things not seen. By it the elders obtained a good
report. Now watch verse 3. Through faith
we understand that the worlds were framed with the Word of
God. Now this is what I'm saying about faith. I hear people talk
about blind faith. You just got to have blind faith.
I don't want any blind faith. Faith's not blind. Faith sees. Faith understands. Now faith
may see through a glass dimly, but it sees. Faith may know in
part, but it knows. Faith may preach in part, but
it preaches in truth. By faith, he says here, we understand
that the worlds were framed by the Word of God. We understand.
Faith is not blind. It understands. It's been taught.
Let me give you this. Our Lord said, no man No man
can come to me except my father which sent me drawing. And I
will raise him up again then at the last day. And they shall
all be what? Taught of God. He that hath learned
of the Father cometh unto me. What did you learn from the Father?
You learned who he is. You learned your condition as
a sinner. You learned your inability. You
learn that Christ is the Redeemer. You learn that through Christ
God can be just and justifier. You learn these things. You understand.
Faith understands. That's what it says. By faith
we understand. He that seeth the Son and believeth on him.
That doesn't mean seeing with the natural eye. It means we
see who Christ is. We see that He is the Savior.
He's the Redeemer. He's the one that has come to
redeem. We see. So often you take your little
boy, you're working with him there, and you send a son, he's
asking you how to build an airplane. You see this part, you see this
part goes here. You see that? What do you mean? Does the boy see? Of course he
sees. He's got an eye. No, you're saying, do you understand
it? And that faith understands. It
sees. He that seeth the Son and believeth
on him hath everlasting life. He understands. Faith understands. Not everything, by no means.
He understands that God is holy and righteous and he's a sinner
and that his only hope is Christ. He understands that. Secondly,
verse four, by faith able offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice. Faith never comes to God. Listen
to me. Faith never dares come to God
without a sacrifice. No way. Now faith never, no faith
never, it knows, faith knows enough about God's holiness and
the atonement to know that without the shedding of blood there's
no remission. By the law almost all things were purged with blood
and without the shedding of blood there's no remission. It's like
young Isaac as they started up the hill with his father Abraham
and the boy was walking along thinking. Abraham had just told
the servants, the lad and I will go yonder and worship. Worship. The lad and I are going yonder
and talk to God and go into God's presence. And the boy was walking
along up the hill with his father and he was thinking. The boy
was a child of faith. And he knew this. You don't go
to God without a sacrifice. And he said, Father, here's the
wood and here's the fire. Where's the lamb? That's what
he said to her. Where's the lamb? Now faith,
if you've got saving faith tonight, you understand some things. God's taught you. You're taught
of God. And you don't dare come to God without a sacrifice. You
don't come by silver and gold. And you don't come by your good
deeds and sit there and feel real religious and real accepted
of God because you are a good girl or you're a good boy. or
you haven't done this, that, or the other, and you feel real
accepted, no, no you don't either. Apart from the blood of Christ,
you feel real rotten, real corrupt, and real filthy, and real guilty.
But in, we're cleansed by the blood. The blood of Christ cleansed
us from all sin. It's the blood that make us atonement
for the soul. Without the shedding of blood,
there's no remission. We're redeemed with the precious
blood of Christ. We have forgiveness through his
blood. You see, all the way through
the scripture. Blood, most precious. Cleansing, atoning, redeeming
blood. Wouldn't dare, faith wouldn't
dare come to God without a sacrifice. I don't understand the preachers
of our day. I don't understand. They're talking
about everything but the sacrifice, everything but the substitute,
everything but Christ, everything but the cross. God's not going to do anything
for America apart from Christ or for anybody else. Faith never
comes to God without a sacrifice. In verse 5, by faith, Enoch.
was translated that he should not see death. He was not found
because God had translated him. But before his translation, he
had this testimony that he pleased God. What does it say over there
in Genesis about it? It says he walked with God. Faith
walks with God. Faith walks in a world, in a
natural world, but it walks with God. Faith walks with God. His presence, I like that song,
He walks with me and talks with me along life's narrow way. And the joy we share as we tarry
there none other has ever known. God is personal and real. And faith walks with God. Faith
doesn't just have to go to church to get in touch with God. You
know, I feel like sometimes that we call these buildings by the
wrong name. And the Church of Christ wears
that out. They have a little sign that Church of Christ meets
here, Church of Christ meeting place, and that might be better
than this thing. Where are you going? Going to
church. What do you mean? Going to a building. Well, we call this a sacred desk
and this is a sacred building. There's a sense, there's a sense
in which it's dedicated to the glory of God and so forth. But
brethren, faith doesn't just come here to seek the Lord. Faith walks with God. Wherever
I am, God is present and real. I worship him and pray and fellowship
with him. You see what I'm saying? Enoch
walked with God. And then here in verse 7, it
says, by faith Noah being warned of God of things not seen as
yet moved with fear. Faith moves. Faith obeys God. Noah obeyed God. Faith obeys
God. And then down here in verse 10,
faith expects. Talking about Abraham, said he
looked for a city which hath foundations, who build, and makers
God. Faith produces hope, confidence. God is going to someday call
me home. God is going to someday give
me that inheritance Christ purchased. It's reserved for me. Now, we
have degrees of assurance. Some of us don't have as much
assurance as others, but faith has assurance. I don't know,
I can't say that it's, I can't say that it's always full assurance. It's not, but faith has assurance.
Abraham looked for a city, and faith does look to God in hope. It has some hope. It has a strong
hope. And then last of all, look down
at verse 13. It says, these all died in faith,
that is, faith perseveres. Faith continues. Now this troubles
me more than anything in the world about our generation of
church members. We're constantly seeing a turnover
among people in what we call the church. And that's sad. That's disappointing because
saving faith, these people died in faith. They continued in faith. They walk with God until they
walk right out of this world into heaven. And we see this enthusiasm and
zeal and religious fervor, and then it slows down and then folks
just, you know, are not much interested anymore. But if I
understand saving faith, if I understand saving faith, it not only continues
and perseveres, but it actually gets more interested, and more
concerned, and more hungry. Blessed are they that hunger
and thirst for righteousness, they shall be filled. He gets
more interested in the word. It gets more concerned about
the relationship with God as days go by, instead of becoming
less interested. You're 76 years old. Aren't you
more interested in his word now than you've ever been? More interested,
more concerned, more dedicated, more conscientious, more aware
of the soon coming of the Lord. Faith continues. Saving faith
does. I'm forever hearing people say,
well, we used to attend church. We just kind of got out of the
habit. I believe I can say that worshiping God's never been a
habit with me. Never been a habit. It's always
been an interest, a desire. of concern. Faith continues. May God give
those in this congregation who have no faith, may give saving
faith. And those who have a degree of
faith may increase it. And those who have confidence
in Christ, may he strengthen you in that confidence. Our Father, we believe that we've dealt honestly
and truthfully from thy word with ourselves tonight concerning
faith. We believe that faith does understand,
not everything, but we do understand that thou art God, beside thee
there's none else.