Double Darkness: Natural and Religious

Now, if you will turn, please,
to Galatians 1, the Apostle writes in verse 13
of Galatians 1, you know my story. You know about my life, he says.
You've heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion. Now that beyond measure I persecuted
the Church of God and I wasted it, you know my story. I was a religionist to the extreme,
he said, a religionist who did not know God. I was a self-righteous
Pharisee who did not know that I was a sinner. I hated the gospel
of Jesus Christ, not knowing it was the only way to God. I
persecuted people who believed the gospel. I hailed them into
prison who trusted Christ. In fact, he says, when I met
the Lord, I was on my way to Damascus armed with papers, official
papers, which entitled me to put in prison anybody who named
the name of Jesus Christ. But I met the Lord on that road,
and he revealed himself in me. Paul's conversion was a remarkable
conversion. The great persecutor became the
world's greatest preacher. The captor became the captive
of the Lord. The chief agitator became the
chief apostle. What a remarkable conversion.
But my friends, I'm here tonight to tell you that all conversions
are remarkable. When God brings a sinner from
the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of his dear Son, it's
a miracle. When God raises a man from a
spiritual tomb and gives him eternal life It's a miracle. When Almighty God turns one who
hates him into one who loves him, it's a miracle. It's called
a new birth. It's called a new creation. And
every conversion, contrary to public opinion in this day, every
conversion to Christ is a miracle. And conversion to Christ is much
more than a mental acceptance of religious facts. Now, believe
it or not, conversion, redemption, regeneration, salvation, or whatever
term you want to use to describe it, is much more than giving
mental acceptance to a few facts about God and about Christ and
about his death and about his resurrection. And conversion
is a whole lot more, contrary to public opinion in this present
day. Conversion is a whole lot more.
than a decision to live a moral life or a religious life or a
decision to adopt certain doctrinal principles and convictions and
beliefs. Paul had all this. He had all
this before he met God. He said that. Over in Philippians
3 he told us that. He had all these things. And
here in verse 14 he tells us that. Look at it. And I profited.
You know my story. I profited in the Jewish religion.
I was a success. That's what he's saying. I was
not a failure. I knew everybody who was anybody.
And they looked up to me. I was above many my equals in
my own nation. I was more zealous in the traditions,
in the creeds, in the catechisms, in the doctrines, in the orthodoxy,
in the theology. In the holy days, in the feast,
in the fasting, I was more diligent in prayer, in the law, than anybody. Paul wasn't a nominal religionist.
Paul was extremely successful. He believed in God. He believed in God. He believed
the Bible was the Word of God. You couldn't get Paul to say
that the Bible had errors and contradictions in it. The Old
Testament, he didn't have. The New Testament, he had the
Old Testament. But he believed in God. He believed the Bible
was the Word of God. Every jot and tittle he believed.
He was orthodox to the extreme. He was a diligent student of
the scriptures. Paul was accused by one ruler
of studying so much that he had lost his mind. He said, much
learning. Paul's made you crazy. You've
studied too much, son. You need to take a vacation.
You've just been in those books too much. He was a student, a
diligent student of the Word. He lived a blameless religious
life. No one could charge him with
a violation of the written law. He kept the Sabbath day. He kept every religious feast.
He kept the Passover. He was the accepted leader of
the religious people. I wish there was some way tonight
that I had the ability to draw a picture of this extremely,
exceedingly religious man, Saul of Tarsus. You couldn't believe
how religious he was and how dedicated and how devout and
how consecrated to what he believed, to his denomination, to his position,
to his doctrine. He was consecrated. He was devout,
and he would have destroyed anyone who disagreed with him. But he
didn't know God. He did not know the living God.
He didn't know himself. He didn't know God. He didn't
know himself. He didn't know he was a child of wrath. He didn't
know he was under condemnation. He was walking this religious
road perfectly content, perfectly and absolutely persuaded that
he was right. in his worship, he was following
the Old Testament scriptures. And he was so strongly convinced
and sincere that he was right, that he was willing to commit
to prison anyone who disagreed with him. In fact, when they
stoned Stephen, the deacon, the first martyr of the New Testament
Church, the first man who died after our Lord was crucified
and rose again, Stephen, this man saw a Tarsus This man of
great power and position and prestige stood over there and
held the coats of those who threw the stone. He didn't actually
take part in the stoning, but he held the coats of the men
who did. He agreed with them that Stephen ought to die. He
was doing it. You talk about sincere. I've heard people say,
well, preacher, it doesn't matter what you believe. If you believe
in God, just so you're sincere. You won't find it. Are you that
sincere? Will you put to death a man who
disagrees with you? Are you that convinced of what
you believe? Are you that persuaded that you
are right? Saul was. You talk about a man
who was sincere. He bloodied his hands. He sawed
his hands with the blood of men who disagreed with him. So extremely
sincere. You know my conversation. You
know all about it. I'll tell you this. There is
no darkness like religious blindness. I want you to turn to Matthew
6. I want you to listen to this. Years and years and years ago,
I was listening to Brother Ralph
Barnard preach, and he got over here in Matthew 6 and did a little
work on this verse 22, and it gave me an understanding of that
verse. for the first time in my life.
I want you to look at Matthew 6. Now, this is not worth our
time if we do not make a personal application, like Ronnie prayed
a while ago, teach us thy word, lead us into thy word, that we
may experience it. He says in Matthew 6.22, the
light of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye be single,
or sound, if it be The whole body is going to be full of light.
But if your eye be unsound, evil, your whole body is going to be
full of darkness. If, therefore, the light that is in you be darkness,
how great is that darkness! That's the Lord speaking. What
does he mean, Pastor? All right, stay with me. Here's
what our Lord is saying. The light of the body is the
eye. In other words, what you see and the spiritual eye, what
you understand, gives you illumination. It illuminates your whole being.
It illuminates your whole being, what you see and what you understand. We're talking about not these
eyes here. We're talking about a spiritual eye. We're talking
about the eye of understanding. What you see and what you understand
illuminates your whole being. Now, if what you see is right,
and if it's sound, and if it's true, and if it's according to
God's word, if your understanding, if your eye of understanding
is sound, and you are taught of God, then your whole being,
your heart, your mind, your principles, your conviction, your attitude,
your whole being is going to be full of light and full of
illumination and full of understanding. and motivated by that which you
see. The light of the body is the eye. Now, that's true naturally. If I could not see, there's no
way that as I stand before you that I would know where Jack's
sitting, I wouldn't even know whether he was here or not. If
I was laying in here blind and not a sound was made, I wouldn't
know whether anybody was here or not. I would know who was
here or if they were even here or if the place was packed, you
see. I have no light. But now what
makes me see Ed Ballard sitting there and know who he is and
think about him and see Mike and Debbie sitting here and think
about them and understand who it is and the smile on their
face and so forth, I understand. My heart reaches out to them.
My understanding, my affections are all influenced by what I
see. You understand what I'm saying? The light of the body
is the eye. And if I can see good, my whole being is illuminated
by what I see. My understanding is cleared up.
That's true spiritually. That's true spiritually. The
light of my whole being is my eye, what I see. Oh, someone
says, you see? Yes, I see, I understand. And
if what I understand is sound, if what I understand is true,
if what I understand of God is true, if what I understand of
myself is true, if it's sound, if it's clear, If it's factual,
if it's according to God's Word, if what I understand about sin
and what I understand about substitution and what I understand about redemption
and what I understand about eternal life, if what I take into my
eyes, my spiritual eyes, is sound, my whole body is going to be
illuminated, my whole being will be illuminated. I'll have the
right thoughts about myself. I'll have the right thoughts
about you. I'll be able to forgive, I'll be able to show mercy, I'll
be able to love, I'll be able to pray, I'll be able to put
things in their proper perspective, I'll be able to understand the
value of things, spiritual and material and natural. You see,
if your eye is sound, then your whole being is going to be straight.
But now watch this. But if your eye be unsound, If the information you're taking
in is wrong, suppose I'm drunk, I see two mics. That ain't right. There's not two mics here tonight.
I look out there and see four doors. That's not right. They're not four doors. My whole,
my perspective is all off. It's all wrong. I'm getting the
wrong information. And as I walk toward the door, I'll go in the
wrong door. I'll hit the wall. You see, I'm getting it wrong.
If your eye is unsound, and if your spiritual eye is unsound,
whole body is going to be full of darkness. You see what he
is saying so far? If your eye be evil, if your
eye be unsound, if what you understand about God, I was preaching this
morning, who God is. Now, if you don't understand
that, your conception of God is all wrong. You don't know
how to pray, you don't know how to praise him, you don't know
how to approach him, you don't know how to plead for mercy,
You don't have a mediator, you don't understand substitution,
you don't understand the atonement, you don't understand your sin,
you don't understand your inability, you don't understand God's command,
you're going to go about it all wrong. Then you'll take part
in burning candles and counting beads and bowing and scraping
and crawling on beds of glass and making crusades to the Holy
Land and all this foolishness. Your eye is unsound, so your
whole understanding is unsound. You've taken in false preaching,
you've taken in false words, you've taken in false doctrine,
you've taken in the commandments of men instead of the word of
God, and so your whole understanding is perverted. Are you with me
so far? That's what Christ is saying
here. Now, the light of the body is the eye. What the body, what
its response is, is going to be dictated by what it takes
in. If I'm out on the street and I'm fixing to cross the street
and I look and there's a car coming, my body's going to respond.
I back up, let the car by. If I don't see, my body's going
to get in trouble. And he said if your eye is sound,
if your spiritual eye is sound and you're taking in truth, your
whole body's going to be full of light and understanding and
wisdom, spiritual wisdom. But if your eye of understanding
is unsound, your whole body's going to be full of darkness.
Now watch this next line. If therefore the light that is
in you be darkness, how great is that darkness. In other words,
if your eye of understanding is unsound, and what you call
light, what you call wisdom, what you call spiritual understanding,
if it's darkness, you've got a double You've got a double
darkness. You've got a natural darkness
and you've got a spiritual darkness. You've got darkness among darkness.
Here's what he's saying. The man without any religion
at all, the man without any opinion of God, any opinion of himself,
any opinion of Christ, the man without any religion at all is
better off than a man with a false religion and a false idea of
God. The heathen is in darkness. But
the religionist is hedged about with a darkness that surrounds
a darkness. The Gentile had no knowledge
of God. The Gentile had no understanding
of God. He had no prophets, he had no
law, he had no gospel, he lived in darkness. Now for God to be
revealed to his heart only required that his darkness of undelete
be penetrated by the divine revelation, that's all. Here's a man who
has no religion, he has no preconceived notions of God, of Christ, of
the gospel, of the cross, the resurrection, of the gospel,
or anything else. He's just a heathen, he's just
a barbarian, he's just an unbeliever. Now all you've got to do is penetrate
his unbelief with divine light, with the truth of the gospel.
That's all. He's naked. All you've got to
do is bring him a robe. He's dead. All you've got to
do is bring him the message of life. All you have to do is take
him to the doctor. But Saul of Tarsus, an ever-religionist,
he had no knowledge of God, which was darkness, but he had built
up through the years and through his religious studies and through
his orthodoxy, he had built up a false idea of God. He not only
had no knowledge of God, but he had a false knowledge of God
and a false knowledge of righteousness and a false knowledge of the
law. And before his natural unbelief could be dealt with, God had
to deal with his false religion. You see what I'm saying? Here's a natural heathen. He
knows nothing about the gospel. He's in darkness, the darkness
of unbelief. He doesn't understand. But if
you bring him the gospel, you don't have to tear down anything
to get to him, all you've got to do is get to him with the
gospel. But when you come to a religionist, he's in darkness.
But the first thing you've got to deal with is not his darkness
by nature, not his sin by nature. The Holy Spirit has to deal with
his religious forts that he's built up. The Holy Spirit's got
to deal with his religion. This is our problem today. We
can't get to a man's natural problems. Because he's got too
many religious fortresses out there. He's got too many religious
beliefs. He's got his religious orthodoxy
and what he thinks about God. You come to tell him what the
Bible says about God, he's already got his opinion of God. And his
God has to be slain before you ever begin to deal with his need
of the living God. He's not just naked. He's wrapped
in righteous rags. You see what I'm saying? He's
not just naked. The heathen is just naked. He knows he's a sinner. Take the woman who came in when
Christ was having dinner in the Pharisees' home. And he was lying
there, and this woman was a harlot. And she came in and bathed his
feet with tears and dried them with her hair. Now, she knew
she was a harlot. She knew she was a sinner. She
knew she was doing wrong. She knew she had sinned. She
knew she needed help. All Christ has to do is minister
to her with the gospel and tell her about his grace and his love
and his kindness and mercy to sinners. I came to seek and to
save the lost. But now wait a minute. Here sits
the Pharisee up here. He's just lost as she is. He's
just as dead as she is. He's just as wicked in his heart
as she is. He's just as naked before God
as she is. He's just as much on the road
to hell as she is. But you think Christ would accomplish
one thing by talking to him about grace and mercy and love and
the cross and the blood and the atonement? He's got to have his
gods killed. He's got to have his religion
destroyed. He's not just dead, he's double
dead. He thinks he's alive. Before
the sinner can be raised, all God has to do is speak. But before
the religious man can be raised, God has to kill him and then
raise him. He's not just without hope, he
thinks he has hope. Turn to Matthew 9. Let me show
you something over here. If that light which is in you,
that religious light which you think is light, if it be darkness,
how great is that darkness! How great is that darkness! naked,
but all clothed with self-righteous rags. And God comes to minister,
and he says, I've got a robe for you. I don't need a robe.
I've got a robe. The horse's got a bunch of holes
in it. Lord, if you'd just patch it up right here and back here
a little bit, you know, and sew the pocket, I think I could make
out all right. No, the Lord has to do it. The
Lord has to strip him, break him down. Double darkness. Double
darkness. Come to a man, I want to tell
you about the Lord. Oh, I know about that. You see, I've been
in church longer than you have. I was raised in a church. My
brother was a preacher. My dad was a preacher. Somebody
else in the family is a preacher. We've been pillars of that church
for years. We've got religion. Don't you
waste any time. Because God Almighty, by the
power of his Spirit, has to kill that sinner, has to shut his
mouth, has to strip him. This is the reason there are
so many unsaved preachers. They're in double darkness. They've got walls of resistance
and walls of rebellion and walls of religion built all around
them, and they cannot be penetrated. It's the reason there's so many
lost church members, is these preachers have given them a hope.
They're not without hope, they have a hope. They've got light,
they'll tell you, I've got light, that light's darkness. But it's
right, and God says, Christ says, how great is that darkness! How
impossible to do anything with it. Look at Matthew 9, verse
11. And here our Lord was in verse
10, Matthew 9, 10. It came to pass as Jesus sat
at meat in the house, many publicans and sinners came and sat down
with him and his disciples. Here's these people in natural
darkness, you know. They're sinners and they know
it. They're publicans and sinners, and our Lord wasn't ashamed to
eat with them, talk with them, minister to them. He came to
save sinners. He came to save the lost. But when the Pharisees
saw it, they said to his disciples, why does your Master eat with
publicans and sinners? Well, what are you? But we be
not sinners. We be not sinners. And when Jesus
heard that, he said to them, they that are whole do not need
a doctor. He wasn't implying that these
men were whole, but they that are sick. But I'll tell you the
first thing a man's got to find out before he seeks a doctor,
he's got to find out he's sick. And if he never finds out he's
sick, he'll perish under the power of that disease. Christ
said, you go, verse 13, and learn what that means. I will have
mercy, mercy, and not sacrifice. I am not come to call the righteous,
those who think themselves righteous, those who believe themselves
righteous, those who are in darkness hedged about by darkness, those
who are in a refuge of lies, hiding in a false refuge surrounded
by a protective wall of religion. It's hopeless. Let's go back
to the text, now, Galatians 1. That's that double darkness.
That's what Paul was in. All right, how'd Paul get out
of it? Well, let me show you. Galatians
1. I'll be a lot briefer than I
was this morning. Galatians 1. He said, you know my life story,
you know all about it, you know what I was. Paul's conversion,
you know, Paul called his conversion a pattern conversion, a pattern
to those who should afterward believe. He's a pattern of all
men who are brought to Christ, but in particular, Paul is a
pattern of those who are brought to Christ out of religion. Now,
I'll tell you the story, the life story of everybody here
who had religion before you met Christ. It's right here. What did God do first? What's
the first thing he did? He stripped you of your false
religion. He showed you that what you believed
was not true, what you professed was not real. What you claimed
to know about God was actually error. God had to slay your false
ideas of God before he revealed to you the truth of Christ. And
Paul gives his story here now in six statements. Let's look
at it briefly, Galatians 1.15. But when it pleased God, when
it pleased God. Now, my friends, everything begins
with God. Creation began with God. In the
beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. Man began with
God. God said, Let us make man. The
kingdom of grace began with God. Paul said, I thank God for you,
brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning
chosen you to salvation. Love began with God. We love
him because he first loved us. Christ came from God. When it
pleased God in the fulness of time to send forth his Son into
the world, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
that were born under the law, God sent Christ, for God so loved
the world, he gave his only begotten Son. We didn't send for Christ,
God sent Christ. The death of Christ came from
God, it pleased the Lord to bruise him. The preaching of the gospel
came from God. It says, "...pleased God by the
foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe." So everything
starts with God. Paul is going to talk about being
delivered from this double darkness, from this death within death,
from this refuge of lies within a refuge of lies. He's going
to tell how God delivered him, and he starts where every man
has to start, when it pleased God. That's where it starts. Secondly, when it pleased God
who separated me from my mother's womb. Now, don't call me a fatalist,
and please don't call me a hardshell, and please don't call me an antinomian,
and please, if you don't mind, don't call me anything like that,
but just understand this is what God's word teaches and I must
preach it and I believe it. That those who are the objects
of God's grace now always have been the objects of God's grace.
I can't explain that, I just know the Bible teaches that.
That's what God's word teaches. That those who are right now
the objects of God's grace and of God's love, since God does
not change, he said, I am the Lord, I change not. I declare
the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things
that are not yet done, saying my counsel shall stand God doesn't
change, God doesn't learn anything, he knows all things, God doesn't
forget anything. God's all-wise. And whatever
God does in 1978, he intended to do, he purposed to do, he
planned to do, he foreordained to do, he predestinated to do
before he started this whole thing. That has to be so, or
you make God a changeable, mutable, finite creature. While the scripture
teaches that God is immutable, which is unchangeable. God is
infinite. The reason the Bible uses foreknowledge
in reference to God, whom he foreknew, is because God knows
it because he decreed it. He doesn't know something is
going to happen because he looked in the future and saw it was
going to happen. He knows it's going to happen
because he ordained it to happen. He foreordained Those men who
crucified Christ, when Peter preached to them after the crucifixion,
he said, you with wicked hands crucified the Lord of glory,
but you did what God determined before to be done. Him being
delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of
God, you crucified, but God is the first cause of all things.
And those who are now the objects of God's grace were always the
objects of God's grace, unless you've got a puppet God, unless
you've got a God who doesn't know what he's going to do, unless
you've got a God that's confused, unless you've got a God that's
defeated. He said, I am the Lord, I change not. The gifts and calling
of God are without change. And God said to Jeremiah, before
I formed the in thy mother's womb, I knew thee, I sanctified
thee, I ordained thee a prophet. Before I ever made you, I set
you apart." And that's what Paul is saying here, when it pleased
God, who knew me and who loved me and who separated me from
my mother's womb. Brethren, even when Paul was
standing there holding the clothes of the men who were stoning that
precious saint of God, he was an object of God's love. That's
right, but God commended his love toward us in that while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When Christ came down
here and died on the cross 1900 years ago, that was 1900 years
before you were born. But he came because he loved
you, and because he would redeem you, and because he would pay
your debt. Turn to John 6. Now, listen to
this. John 6. And it's unfortunate
that we've labeled the truth Calvinism or fatalism or hardshellism
or any other kind of ism. It's just truth. John 6, verse
37, Christ said, "...all that my Father giveth me shall come
to me. Him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out." I came down from heaven not to do my
will, or your will, or anybody else's will. I came to do the
will of him that sent me. And this is the Father's will
which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should
lose nothing, but raise it up again at the last day." That's
so. So what I'm saying is this, whom
he foreknew, he predestinated to be conformed to the image
of his Son. And whom he predestinated, he called. And whom he called,
he justified. And whom he justified, he glorified. What shall we say to these things?
I say, if God be for me, who can be against me? He that spared
not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him freely give us all things? Who can lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, ye rather,
is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who ever
liveth to make intercession for us. Nothing can separate us from
the love of Christ. That's so. We love him because
he first loved us. Herein is love, not that we love
God. But I'll tell you this, you don't love him enough now
to be saved. You're saved because he loves you. God's not merciful
to you because you're good, he's merciful to you because he's
good. That's right. God's not merciful to you because
you're gracious, he's merciful to you because he's gracious.
God doesn't come your way because you love him. You don't love
him enough now to influence his affections. No, we don't. I wish we did. But I'm telling
you this, he loves us. He loves us. He said, turn to
Romans 9, let me show you something here. He sent old Jeremiah down
to the potter's house and told him to watch the potter work
and learn something. And we could do the same thing. In Romans
9, verse 21, here the Lord says, Hath not the potter power over
the clay? Now, we're clay, and God's the
potter. Now, who's got the power? You
reckon that clay could form itself, and God says, well, clay, you
can be good if you want to, just straighten yourself up and make
yourself into a pretty little vase and I'll put some roses
in you. Has not the potter power over the clay of the same lump,
human nature, Adam's son, of the same lump, to make one vessel
under honor and another under dishonor? What if God, willing
to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with
longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction,
and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the
vessels of mercy which he had aforeprepared unto glory, even
us whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the
Gentiles? He prepared me for this a long
time ago. That's right. And what Paul says
here, and this is what I'm saying, this is what I'm saying, Paul
was darkness, natural darkness, but he was surrounded with spiritual
darkness. And how great is that double darkness. And the people
I'm preaching to in this generation, they don't know God, but they
think they do. They don't know God, they don't
have God, they don't have salvation, they don't have redemption, but
they think they do. And what I've got to penetrate by the
Spirit of God's power and by the Word of God, I've got to
penetrate this darkness that surrounds that darkness before
I can get to this natural darkness. And God's got to tear down their
forts and tear down their false conceptions and tear down their
false ideas and rip off their fig leaf aprons of self-righteousness
and expose their darkness. And when he does, boy, they'll
reach out. They'll reach out. And God doesn't convict you by
revealing to you what you think you are, he convicts you by revealing
to you what you are. And God Almighty doesn't reveal
himself by revealing himself in the character you think he
is, he reveals himself in his true character. He's got to tear
down what you think he is. Here's the third thing, that
God separated me from my mother's womb and he called me, and he
called me by his grace. The old-timers used to talk about
a general call and an effectual call. There are two scriptures,
Matthew 20.16 and Matthew 22.14, that say the same thing, many
a call, few are chosen. Can you handle that? Many a call,
few are chosen. Well, this many a call, the call,
there is a call of nature. God has not left himself without
a witness. He says the heavens declare the glory of God. He
says that men can understand the power of God by the things
that are made, which leaves a man without excuse. Most all men
believe there's a God, and they found that out from the general
revelation of nature, the general calling. They may have never
seen a Bible, they may have never heard a preacher, but even the
old Indians here in America talked about the Great Spirit. And even
the heathen talk about some kind of God. Well, God, even that's
light, even that is a call of nature. And then there's a call
of conscience. He talks about in Romans how
that every man has a conscience, and his conscience excuses or
accuses him so that he's without excuse. God has written his law
on every man's heart. You can't find a man or woman
in this world that does not know right from wrong. That's the light, that's the
call of conscience. And then there's a call of judgment over
in the book of Amos. You read that text that says,
prepare to meet God? Well, there's a whole lot that
went on before that. We see the sign, here's what's wrong with
the signs on the road, you know, prepare to meet God. That's just
part of a scripture. What God said to those Jews,
he said, I've sent judgment on you, and you haven't returned
to me. I've sent pestilence, ate your
crops up, you didn't return. I sent war and killed your young
men and you didn't return. He said I sent famine and you
did without food and you didn't return to me. Now, he says, prepare
to meet God. These are calls, calls of providence,
calls of judgment. Then there's the call of gospel
preaching, what I'm doing right now. I do it over the television
on Sunday. How many thousands of people
listen, but they listen and then They just turn it off and they
go their way. They go their way. They have no real conception
of what's been said. But now brethren, this call,
Paul's talking about here, God called him. He called him. He'd gone through this nature
and law and conscience and preaching and orthodoxy and reading the
scriptures, but one day on that road, he met God. And God said,
That's far enough, Saul. And God struck him, and God blinded
him, and God broke him, and God unsaddled him, and God put that
old proud rebel in the dust. He unhorsed him, Roth used to
say. He put him down in the dust,
and he lifted his eyes to heaven, and he said, Who art thou? And
our Lord said, I'm Jesus of Nazareth, whom you persecuted. And he said,
well, Lord, what will you have me to do? Well, he said, you
get down there to a certain place and it will be told you what
to do. And God sent him down to that street called Straight,
and God sent Ananias a preacher to him and preached the gospel
to him. And Ananias said, now, why do
you tarry? Get up and be baptized and confess
the Lord. And this is what I'm saying.
God, every one of his objects of mercy, I don't care how proud
they are, what a rebel they are. I don't care if they come out
of the pulpit or out of Parliament. It doesn't matter if they come
out of the jail or from the judge's bench. It doesn't matter if they
are a cartoner or if they are a contractor. It doesn't matter
if they are a doctor or if they're the dumbest fellow in town. God's
going to need his own. And he's going to meet him with
a faithful preacher and a faithful gospel and a faithful word from
this brother. And that fellow's going to be
awful glad to hear that. That's the call. Turn to 2 Timothy
1, verse 9. And brother, you don't, you're
not, you can't be the same when you hear this gospel, when you
hear it with the heart. When you hear it with the heart.
I know a lot of people hear it with the ear and say, well, that sounds pretty
good, you know, that sounds about right. But when you hear it with
the heart, it just, it takes over. It dominates your thinking. It dominates your spirit. It dominates and controls your
life. It just, you're just a new being.
And a man being Christ, he's a new person. It's not something
you can take once a week on Sunday and listen to it and lay aside
until next week at the same time. It's a subject and a person and
a life that controls your thinking all week long. You meet the Lord. In 2 Timothy 1 verse 9, he saved
us and called us, and called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace which
was given to us in Jesus Christ before this world ever began.
It was given to me before the world began. But one day, turn
back to Galatians, one day when it pleased God, That's what Paul
said, it wasn't pleased him. It wasn't pleased him. Who separated
me from my mother's womb? It pleased him one day to call
me. He called me by his Spirit, he called me by his Word, and
he revealed for her, he revealed his Son in me. Now, the difference
between being saved and unsaved is whether or not God reveals
his Son just to you or in you. You think about that a little
bit. There's a word there to reveal his Son, not just to me,
but in me. Judas knew who he was, but he
wasn't revealed in Judas. God reveals Christ to us. He's revealed to us in his Deity,
in his incarnation as our representative, He's revealed in his righteousness
before the law, he's just and justifier, he's our mediator,
he's our Lord and King, he's revealed to us. But let me tell
you this, if God the Holy Spirit reveals the Son of God in you,
then his life is implanted in you, and his grace is implanted
in you, and his Spirit is implanted in you. And this thing of salvation
is not just to accept Jesus as your Savior. That's not scriptural
language, incidentally. It's to receive Christ as your
Lord. Now, think about that a little
bit. When I receive Christ, I receive him into myself. I eat his flesh
and drink his blood. And he said, if you don't eat
my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you. That's
what he said. You accept me in a position,
accept me in a place of service, accept me as being what I say
I am without receiving me into your being. Paul said this, I
prevail till Christ be formed in you. Then he said again, Christ
in you. That's the hope of glory. Jesus Christ, to most people,
is like an insurance policy. They all fixed up for heaven,
they open the drawer and throw it in, shut the drawer, and say,
now when I need that, I'll come back and get it. And I'll run
down to the church and pay my premium every Sunday. I'll give
them a time. They'll pay my premium on that
insurance plan. I got it all ready. I'm not in
the company. I'm not really interested in
the company. I don't have a part in the company. I don't vote,
I don't care what the company does, I just got that policy,
and I go down to church and pay my premiums on Sunday, and let
them know I've still got the policy, so they won't counsel
out on me. But I'm not interested in the
company. Well, I'll tell you this, the true policy of security is
to join the company. That's right. It's to become
the president's son. That's right. It's to take part
in the board meetings, that's what it is. It's to move in,
and Christ moves in, in me, in me. Now watch this, that I might
preach him among the heathen. Paul was a chosen vessel to preach
the gospel to the Gentiles. That's what he's talking about
here. Why did God reveal Christ to you? Well, he said in Matthew
11, because it seemed good in his sight. That's frustrating.
He said in Psalm 106, he saved you for his name's sake. He said
in Ephesians 1, 6, 12, and 14, to the praise of his glory. He
said in Romans 8, 29, that he might have a people like his
son. He said in Ephesians 2, 4 through 7, that he might show
the exceeding riches of his grace. That's why he saved you. That's
why he revealed Christ in you. And we're going to glorify him
whether in life or in death. Now look at the sixth thing,
and I close. And immediately, when God did this work of grace,
I conferred not with flesh and blood. What does that mean? It's
a twofold meaning. First of all, Paul said, I didn't
go to other people and find out what their experience was so
I could compare mine. I didn't go to other people,
not even the apostles, to find out their opinion. so I'd know
if I was right or wrong. I didn't go to other people and
seek their advice. The Lord revealed himself to
me, and the Lord's word will be my rule. This is one of the
most tragic things that these so-called soul winners, God help
them, God's private secretaries who are going around and telling
people whether they're saved or lost, talking them into a
profession, giving their advice, giving their opinion, giving
their experience, and they're making folks two-fold more the
child of hell than they are. That's tragic. Christ said, he
talked to those religionists in his day, he said, well, you
come from sea and land to make a proselyte to your religion,
and when you've made him with your experiences and opinions
and advice and doctrine, he two-fold more the child of hell than you
are. Well, preacher, what do we do? Preach the gospel to people
and leave them alone. Pray for them. I'm not going
to stand down here tonight and plead for you to make a decision
before it's everlastingly too late. If God's working in your
heart tonight, he'll be there in the morning, I guarantee you.
He doesn't move out until he finishes what he started. I'm
not going to get down here and plead for you, oh, the train's
leaving the station. If you're not on board, it'll
leave without you. We're going to sing one more verse, just
one more verse. If nobody comes, we're going
to close. Oh, please won't you let God have his way? He'll have
his way. He'll send you to hell or take you to glory. But he'll
have his way, I guarantee you that. His will is going to be
done. And he'll break you by his word
and by his spirit, or he'll break you in judgment, because Ebeneez
is going to bow and confess that Christ is Lord. And I'm not asking
you for any favors. Jesus Christ is not in your hands
to do anything with you. You're in his hands. And the
question is not, what am I going to do with Jesus? The question
is, what's a sovereign Lord going to do with me? I sure hope he
shows me mercy. I surely do, don't you? And that's
what I want. That's what I'm saying to people.
You better quit conferring with flesh and blood. And I say this
after I finish this message tonight. Don't run to Brother So-and-so
and ask him if Brother Mahan is telling the truth. Don't even
come to me and ask me to explain it. Why don't you buy your Bible
and get in, get along, and say, Spirit of the Living God, if
that preacher is telling the truth, I sure want to know it.
I don't have any prejudice built up or any tradition to defend.
I don't have any custom to defend. I don't want to go to hell defending
my preconceived notions of God. If that preacher is telling the
truth, show me! Huh? I dare you to do that. This preacher better be telling
the truth or somebody better show him. That's right. That's
the way I feel about it. I want to know God. I don't want
to know what the Baptists say about God. I want to know what
God says about God. And Paul said, I didn't confer
with flesh and blood, I didn't look out the fellow that knew
the gospel before I did. And watch this, the second two-fold
meaning I said. Now watch this, you better be
careful right here. He said, when it pleased God,
who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by his grace
to reveal his Son in me to preach the gospel, I didn't confer with
flesh and blood about this matter. I didn't talk to Peter, James,
and John. And I didn't confer with my own flesh and blood either.
No, sir, he said I didn't. I didn't stand debating and reasoning
the matter to see if a relationship with Christ would be advantageous
in my business. You sit and listen to God preach
his word through the Holy Spirit, and you say, now, wait just a
minute. If I accept that doctrine, so-and-so is not going to like
it, and I just might lose my job if I start walking that way. See, I'd have to leave my church.
I've been there since I was a kid. That preacher doesn't believe
that. It wouldn't do for me to believe him not to believe it. And I'd
have to give up my Sunday school class And my wife's not going
to like it at all, because she believes that everybody saves
himself by his good works. She's not going to like it. And
Mom and Dad didn't believe it. And I reckon they in heaven.
Now, that's what you confirm with flesh and blood now. Now,
that's what you're talking about immediately. When God revealed
his Son in me, I didn't talk it over with flesh and blood. Either Peter, James, or John,
or Saul, or Tarsus, either one, God said it, that was sufficient,
I bowed, I surrendered, I received it, his word. And he did it, sure
enough, it cost him a whole lot. But he gained a whole lot. He
wrote something like this, he said, The sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared. with the glory which
shall be revealed when Christ comes. Our Father in Heaven make us
bold to preach the truth, and O God, reveal to our hearts Christ
who is the truth. Lord, we don't want to preach
to men doctrines. A man is no better off who leaves
one doctrine and goes to another, even if the one he adopts is
true, if he doesn't know Christ. if Christ is not revealed in
him, if he is not brought to love the Master, to bow in submission
to the Master, to receive Christ Jesus into his heart. The Lord
enable us to preach Christ, the truth about Christ, the truth
about men, the truth about thy glory, thy salvation, and reveal
it to our hearts. Lord, reveal Christ in us, for his
sake and in his name we pray, amen. Let's sing number 235. Stand,
please.

Double Darkness: Natural and Religious

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