Let's open up our Bibles to the book
of Mark, chapter one.
The book of Mark, chapter one.
Again, it's a great privilege for me to
be here with you.
It's a great privilege to participate in worship
with you.
And it is my prayer and my hope
that God, our only hope.
Will work among us this evening.
Before I read the text, let's go to
the Lord in prayer.
Father, every moment I live.
I am more and more aware of my
great need of your salvation.
My great need of Christ and father, here
I am.
I stand before you where angels fear to
tread by the blood of your son, Jesus
Christ.
And I know that you hear me.
Father, the desire of my heart.
And the desire of your servant, Jeff Knoblet,
his heart.
Is that you would do a work among
us.
That would surpass us, that would go beyond
everything we deserve.
And everything of which we are capable.
That you would do so, Lord.
For your own glory, for your own good
pleasure.
To vindicate your truth.
And Lord, as I am here, I am
aware.
That all men are dust.
But Lord, we've said our hope in you
and we have refused, Lord, using.
Tools of manipulation.
Quaint stories, we have refused to romanticize the
cross.
We have refused to tickle ears.
And with a great desire, we have desired
to put forth your truth.
Lord, help us.
Help us.
Save lost and dying men and women and
children this evening.
Save them from hell.
Strengthen your people.
And teach them, oh God.
In Jesus name, amen.
Before I begin, let me put what I'm
going to say in context.
I want you to feel a little bit
of the way I or any other preacher
of scripture would feel before you tonight.
Here in this place, imagine yourself for a
moment to be a medical doctor.
And you know, through your training, you know,
through the wisdom given you, that one of
your dearest, most beloved patients has cancer, a
deadly, deadly, deadly cancer that will consume his
life in so short a period of time.
Now, there is a cure.
But you also know in your heart.
That he will not listen.
You will use all your strength, all your
planning, all your wisdom, all your intellect, you'll
gather and amass together all the information, all
the proof that you can so that when
he comes into your office, you can put
x-rays up to the light, you can
show him tests, you can show him everything
in your ability.
You work so hard to make him say,
sir, if you do not at this moment
have this operation required of the you will
die.
And yet he does not listen.
Imagine a parent who has lived their life
in the world and carry the scars from
it, alcohol, drug abuse, all sorts of things.
But now they have children and they see
their teenagers, who are far too wise in
their own eyes and know nothing, begin to
stray into the same dark world.
And the parent pleads and pleads and begs
the child.
The parent does everything in their power to
convince the child.
Listen to me, child.
I have been there and I bear the
scars of the very place you are going.
And those scars will never be removed, not
in this life.
And yet the child refuses to listen.
So it is preaching in America, it is
easier for me to preach in Europe, it
is easier for me to preach in Africa,
it is easier for me to preach in
Asia, it is easier for me to preach
in South America than it is for me
to preach here.
Because you have an inoculation that keeps me
from you and keeps the gospel from you.
You have a deadly, deadly inoculation that has
numbed you.
So that you cannot feel the truth, you
cannot sense the truth, you have been convinced
that it is OK with you.
You have cultural Christianity that deadens the heart
and yet sends more men to hell than
the most wicked brothel or tavern in this
town.
And I beg you, I plead with you
to listen, to listen to what is being
said.
You are the one, you are the one
with the ailment, you are the one with
the disease, you are the one with the
sickness.
You have just enough religion to damn you.
And you know it not, because as Paul
warned the church in Corinth, you compare yourselves
by yourselves and that is not wise.
Most of the people sitting here tonight, at
one time in your life, you repeated the
sinner's prayer.
You asked Jesus to come into your heart
and then some preacher, who knew about as
much of the Bible as you did, told
you that was good enough.
And you've lived your life with no desire
for God, no desire for holiness, no desire
for serving him or anything of the sort.
But you're OK.
And if I were to knock on your
door tomorrow and begin to witness to you,
you would tell me, preacher, don't worry about
me.
I'm OK.
I already did that as though Jesus Christ
were a flu shot.
Some impersonal serum that you receive into your
bloodstream that keeps you from hell.
And that is so wrong.
Now, here in Mark chapter one, Jesus comes
to Israel and in verse 15, he says,
The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of
God is at hand.
Repent and believe the gospel.
Nowhere in the Scripture does it say, do
you want to go to heaven?
And if so, repeat this prayer after me.
Nowhere, but all throughout Scripture, it says the
way of salvation is through repentance and faith
in Jesus Christ, acknowledging our sin, acknowledging our
need, acknowledging that there is absolutely nothing in
us to merit heaven or reconciliation with God
and throwing ourselves upon Christ.
You said, well, preacher, I did that.
Well, if you only did that past tense,
you didn't do it.
This command here in the Greek is present
tense imperative, and that's very, very important to
a Greek scholar.
What Jesus is saying is this.
The time is fulfilled.
Look at some of you.
I see you.
You're as nonchalant as though you were watching
a movie and you don't know that your
very destiny may be determined tonight and you
may spend an eternity in hell while you
sit back there in that comfortable pew and
know not that God is reaching out to
you.
Be afraid.
Be very, very afraid.
This is present tense imperative, what Jesus is
saying, these commands, and this is what he
is saying, he is saying this.
The time is fulfilled.
The kingdom of God is at hand.
Now spend the rest of your life repenting
and believing the good news.
You see so many people today in America,
they say, well, I repented.
The question is, are you still repenting?
Because if you are not still repenting, you
didn't repent.
Then because he who began a good work
and you will finish it.
Is your life marked by increasing knowledge of
God's will and greater and greater brokenness over
your disobedience?
Are you growing daily in the knowledge of
God, and is it leading you to a
deeper spiritual life that humbles you more and
more before God and causes you depend to
depend more and more upon his grace?
Because if not, be afraid.
And then I go and I visit houses
and they say, I believed.
Well, that's not really the question.
The question is, are you still believing?
Are you still hoping in Christ and Christ
alone?
So many people I talk to in America,
the conversation will go something like this.
Do you believe in Jesus?
Well, yes, I do.
I believe in him.
I trust in him.
If you died right now, would you go
to heaven?
Well, I believe so.
Why?
Well, I'm a good person and I try
to do well and I go to church
and I asked him to come into my
life.
Do you see?
Do you not see that you've contradicted yourself?
You're either trusting in Christ and Christ alone
or you're trusting in your own merit, your
own goodness, your own religion.
But the true Christian, his life is marked
by a continuous repentance and a growing repentance
throughout all the days of his life.
And his life is marked by increasing and
increasing dependence upon the grace of God in
Jesus Christ.
So that when you reach that final day
as an old man or old woman, you
breathe your final breath.
You are more broken and more humble before
God than when you began.
And you are trusting more in Christ than
you ever could have at the first.
And that's what I want you to see
before I go into our next part.
I have to cause you to see something.
I served for many, many years in South
America where so many people believed they were
going to heaven, even though they were in
the mafia, even though they were terrorists, even
though they were prostitutes.
They believed they were going to heaven because
when they were infants, they were baptized.
And you say, well, I can't believe such
a thing.
Who would believe such a thing?
And now I face the people in America
who, although they be full of sin, full
of worldliness, no passion for Christ, no desire
for the things of God, they believe they're
going to heaven.
And why?
Because one time in their life, probably when
they were around eight or nine, they prayed
a prayer that they repeated after somebody else.
And because the preacher wanted a big church,
because the preacher wanted to report about how
many people supposedly got saved and because the
evangelist wanted bragging rights, the truth was not
told.
And the truth is this.
I am a Southern Baptist and the great
majority of Southern Baptists are lost.
And not only do I say that, but
I could line up so many leaders behind
me right now that would tell you lost,
lost, lost.
Lost, but not only lost, hardened, hardened, hardened.
That they could sit under preaching such as
this and not hear, that they could look
at their own daily lives in the mirror
and not see a Christian is not so.
I must not be Christian.
And that's what we're going to talk about
tonight.
Now, I want us to go to Second
Corinthians, chapter 13.
Second Corinthians, chapter 13.
Now, before I read the verse, let me
put forth another common occurrence in America today.
Well, let me start by saying this.
How do you know that you're saved?
You ever thought about that question?
How do you know that you are a
Christian?
You say, well, in my heart of hearts,
I know.
Well, the Bible says that the heart is
desperately, even deceitfully wicked.
Do you really want to trust in your
heart?
You say, well, I know that I know
that I know that I know I was
there when it happened, I know.
The Bible says that the knowledge of man
can be, well, quite bad, that there is
a way that seems right unto men and
it leads to death.
How do you know that you're saved?
Well, the answer is often given this way.
Well, I know that I'm saved because I
believe and everyone who truly believes has eternal
life.
I know that I'm saved because I believe.
OK, now let's take the question one step
further.
How do you know you believe?
Because if I were to go into every
bar right now in this city, in this
county, in this state, I would dare say
that over 95 percent of the people right
there, right now, drinking, drunk and looking for
sexually immoral relationships would tell me that they
believe too.
So what makes you any different from them?
What makes me any different from them?
You see, this is the logic and that's
the problem.
They don't teach logic anymore.
You see, this is the logic.
How do you know you're saved?
Well, because I believe.
But how do you know that you believe?
I mean, after all, if so many people
in this country today are saying they believe
and we know that this is no longer
a Christian country.
Then somebody is deceived.
Now, that's not such a bad thing when
it's somebody.
But what if it's you?
And even worse, as a father, I say
this, what if it's your children?
How do you know that you have saving
faith?
How do you know that it's just not
a delusion and a lie?
Well, usually when someone comes to a pastor
in America and says, Pastor, I don't know
whether or not I'm saved.
You know what the pastor usually does?
And you'll know this because it's probably happened
to you sometime in your life.
The pastor will say, well, was there a
point in time in your life when you
prayed and asked Jesus to come into your
heart?
And the person will say, well, yes.
Well, were you sincere when you did that?
Well, I think so.
Well, then you're saved and you need to
stop worrying about it.
This is just the devil bothering you.
Is that not the usual counsel in the
Southern Baptist Convention in these modern times?
Yes, it is.
So now comes the question, is this biblical?
No, not at all.
It's not biblical.
It is so hard.
It is so easy for us as Southern
Baptists to look at the Pentecostals and say
they're not biblical.
It's so easy to point out the Lutherans
and the Catholics and everyone else.
But we cannot hear the words of our
Lord when he says, Physician, heal thyself.
We have done a great injustice in our
evangelism.
Evangelism is not the key.
Good evangelism is the key.
Biblical evangelism is the key.
We're like machines.
These churches today, just machines pump those little
children into children's church.
Get them to say, you know, when I
asked the ministers this one time, I said,
you know, how do you deal with your
children?
They say, well, we ask, you know, I
watch them.
This is what they did.
How many of you children want to go
to heaven?
Have you ever seen a little child raise
their hand and say, no, I'd rather go
to hell?
How many of you little children want to
go to heaven?
Vacation Bible school, it's the same.
How many little children want to go to
heaven?
Oh, I do.
I do.
How many of you love Jesus?
Oh, I do.
I do.
Pray this prayer.
If that is not heresy, nothing is.
And then what happens to all those little
children when they hit about 15?
They start rebelling against their parents.
They start living in immorality.
They could care less about the things of
God.
They live in drunkenness and they do so
much more than what their parents could ever
believe of them because their parents are blind.
And then hopefully sometime after a life of
just absolute ungodliness, maybe when they're around 30,
they rededicate their life because they realize they
need a little religion.
My dear friend, if I could bring the
leaders, theologians and leaders and pastors and churchmen
to stand behind me, I could fill this
entire place with men who would say, Amen,
this is what is happening.
And we have to be warned.
How can we know that we are truly
Christians?
How can we know that we truly believe?
Well, you have the church in Corinth, don't
you?
Many of them were living as Christians ought
not live.
So what did Paul, the apostle, do?
Did he go to them and say, well,
let me ask you a question.
Let's nail this down.
Was there a point in time in your
life when you prayed and received Jesus to
come into your heart?
No, he didn't do that, did he?
Look what he did do in 1 Corinthians
chapter 13, verse 5.
2 Corinthians chapter 13, verse 5, he says
this, test yourselves.
Now, notice present tense, test yourselves to see
if you are in the faith, examine yourselves.
Or do you not recognize this about yourself
that Jesus Christ is in you unless indeed
you fail the test?
He is warned by some of the behavior
of some of the people professing Christ, identifying
themselves with the church in Corinth.
And he goes to them and says, you're
not living like Christians.
You need to test your lives, examine your
lives in the light of Scripture to determine
whether or not you truly are believers, because
there are many of you here who are
not.
We need to open up the Bible and
find out what does the Bible say about
what a Christian is, and we need to
compare our lives to it.
You know what a Christian is in America?
Someone who prayed a prayer and asked Jesus
to come to their heart.
We have reduced the gospel of Jesus Christ
down to a superstitious, popish prayer.
How can we examine our lives?
My dear friend, that is what we are
going to do tonight.
I am not going to rant and rave.
I am not going to entertain you.
I'm going to teach you.
We are going to open up a book
of the Bible that was specifically written so
that you could compare your life to it
and determine whether or not you're truly a
Christian.
And I pray that God will make you
sensitive.
I pray that God will open up your
eyes.
There are some of you here who are
genuine Christians.
And when we go through this, the Word
of God is going to testify to you
that you truly are a believer and you're
going to rejoice.
There are some of you here who are
genuine Christians, but you struggle with assurance.
You struggle with sin.
You struggle with doubt and so many things.
I assure you, by the grace of God,
if you will hearken unto these words that
are going to be preached, you will walk
out of here tonight so full of confidence
in your salvation that you will be exploding
with joy.
And then there are some of you inoculated,
fine people, but in your present state, you're
nothing more than fodder for hell because you
have enough religion maybe to make you reputable.
You have enough church to console your conscience
or maybe to sear it.
But you know not God.
Now, before we begin on this journey, why
am I saying these things so hard?
Why do we build tombs for the prophets
and yet we hate those who preach to
us?
I'm coming to you from a long line
of preachers that used to be quite common
100 years ago.
But not many of them are around today
because we build churches on programs and slick
presentations instead of the preaching of God's word,
because we care more about our visions and
our building programs than we do people here
tonight.
I am not here to win you.
I am here to preach to you that
you might be one to Christ, that you
might see your need for salvation, that you
might repent and be saved.
Enough of this foolishness, enough of playing games.
This is heaven and hell.
This is eternity.
This is the difference between being saved and
being damned.
Let's turn to the Bible, to first John,
first John, chapter five, first John, chapter five.
John tells us why he is writing this
book.
He says, these things I have written to
you who believe in the name of the
Son of God so that you may know
that you have eternal life.
John has written this letter to us so
that by studying this letter, by reading this
letter and comparing our lives to what this
letter says, we will know with biblical assurance
whether or not we're truly born again.
That's the purpose of this letter.
This letter was the cornerstone of counseling in
the old days.
So what I plead with you now is
that you will go with me through each
test and pray, be in an attitude of
prayer, even if you hate me, even if
you're angry with me because of my words.
Pray to God and say, oh, God, show
me through these tests whether I truly know
you or not.
Chapter one, verse five, this is the message
that we have heard from him and announced
to you that God is light and in
him there is no darkness at all.
Now, when it says God is light, it
means two things.
One of them is preached prominently today, but
there are two very prominent truths here.
First of all, God is light.
There is no immorality or sin, moral darkness
or decadence in God.
God is holy, holy, holy.
God is just, just, just in him.
There is no deception.
There is no sin.
There is no lie.
But John also has another meaning here, a
very important meaning in this verse he's given
us.
There was a group of false teachers, the
beginnings of Gnosticism that entered into this church,
and they were teaching that God was this
dark, esoteric figure that you could not really
know.
You couldn't really know who God is and
you couldn't really know what his will is.
Sounds like postmodernism today, doesn't it?
Oh, there is a God.
We just don't know who he is.
And I'm sure he said something.
It's just no one's heard it.
You know why that's so convenient?
You know why it is so convenient to
have a God out there that no one
can understand and a will of God that
no one has heard?
You know why that is so convenient?
Because then you can be your own God.
Then you can do what you want and
think you have an excuse, as long as
media, as long as government can say there
is a God, but you can't know him
and say there is a right and wrong,
but it can't be discerned.
Then every man is a God unto himself.
Now, if you really want to play the
game smartly, what you do is you say
enough about God, but not too much, enough
about his will, but not too much.
That way you can go to church, but
your life is never changed.
This God that no one really knows.
This will that no one really has the
right to preach.
But John says, no, God is light.
And what he means by that is this.
God has shown you who he is and
God has shown you his will.
And you are without excuse.
Now, when he says God is light, he's
saying this, that God has revealed to you
who he is and God has revealed to
you his will.
That's very important as we go on.
Verse six, if we say that we have
fellowship with him.
Bypass the new commentaries, study the word, go
to the old man.
What does this mean?
If we say we have fellowship with him,
if we say we are Christians.
If we say that we are born again,
if we say that we are the people
of God, if we say that we have
eternal life, if we say that we are
going to heaven, but we walk in darkness.
We live a style of life that contradicts
everything God has told us about himself and
contradicts everything he has revealed to us about
his will.
If we say we are Christians, but we
live a style of life that contradicts what
God has told us about who he is
and what he desires, we lie.
That's exactly what it says.
He says, and yet walks in the darkness.
We lie and do not practice the truth.
The phrase practice the truth is very big
with John.
Why?
Because he doesn't care about you feeling the
truth and he doesn't care about you believing
the truth, because the evidence of whether that's
true or not, do you practice the truth?
Because if you don't, your confession is a
lie.
Do you see that?
That God's word would break through the wall
of religion that may hold you captive, that
inoculating shot that keeps you from God's spirit,
that he would break through and show you
what he's talking about here.
When he uses the word walk, peripateo means
to walk around, talking about a style of
life, it's not teaching perfection here.
He's not saying that the only true Christians
are those who are perfect, because none of
us are perfect.
What he's talking about is not sinless perfection,
but a style of life.
If I were to look at the life
of a true Christian, would I find sin?
Yes, I would find sin.
I'd find struggling with sin.
I'd find brokenness.
But if I compared their style of life
with an unbeliever, I would see a tremendous
difference.
And that's very difficult to say here in
the South.
Why?
Because there hardly are any unbelievers.
Everybody's a believer.
So when you compare yourself to another person
who calls themselves a believer, you're comparing yourself
with yourself.
And that is not wise.
What the Bible says is a believer.
That is the example that you should hold
up before yourself to determine, am I a
Christian?
Do does your style of life reflect that
you know who God is?
You know that he's holy.
You know that he's just.
You know that he hates wickedness and loves
righteousness.
Does your style of life reflect that you
know the true God of the Bible?
And does your style of life reflect are
you walking in what God has revealed to
men through his word about his will?
Are you walking in his will?
Are you walking in a path of light?
Could you take your life right now, sit
down with me or some other counselor and
say, I'm walking in the light and it
means this.
I'm following these commands.
I'm seeking him in this way.
I'm seeking to conform my life to him
in this way, this way, this way and
this way.
Or the only thing you can raise up
for your defense is that you prayed a
prayer one time and you go to church
every once in a while on Sunday.
Bubba tailgate Christianity that will send you straight
to hell.
Now, he says, but if we walk in
the light as he himself is in the
light, we have fellowship with one another and
the blood of Jesus.
His son cleanses us from all sin who
is cleansed from their sin by the blood
of Jesus, the one who walks in the
light.
That doesn't mean they are saved because of
the way they are walking, they are saved
by faith, but the way they are walking
demonstrates that they truly have faith.
Does your life demonstrate your faith or contradict
it?
It's a very important question.
Now we go on the next test, verse
eight, if we say that we have no
sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth
is not in us.
Now, what does that mean?
The greatest evidence is gone.
Verse nine, if we confess our sins, he
is faithful and righteous to forgive us our
sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
If we say that we have not sinned,
we make him a liar and his word
is not in us.
What does it mean?
It means this.
One of the greatest evidences of true conversion,
one of the greatest evidences of Christianity, listen
to me.
One of the greatest evidences of Christianity is
that when a true Christian sins, the Holy
Spirit convicts them of their sin.
God the Father may even discipline them for
their sin.
He will bring them to repentance and he
will bring them to confession because a true
believer cannot hold on to his sin.
And one of the greatest evidences that you
are not born again, that you are not
going to heaven and that hell will be
your eternal abode is that you really don't
have a problem with sin.
It's your friend.
I ask believers this sometimes and the sad
thing about it doesn't terrify them.
They don't even know what I'm talking about.
I ask them this question.
When was the last time you wept over
your sin?
When was the last time you were broken
over your lack of conformity to Jesus Christ?
Another question.
If a brother or sister in Christ came
up to you and rebuked you or the
pastor came up to you and lovingly rebuked
you about something in your life that was
not in conformity to the will of God,
would you get mad and leave the church?
Because that's what most Christians would do.
Or would you say, give me a time,
pastor, give me a time, brother, sister, that
I may meditate on these things.
Because if what you say is true, I
want to let go of it.
I want to repent.
I want to be conformed to the image
of Christ.
My wife is from Spain.
When she came to America, the first thing
she said to me, you know, is the
first thing I noticed about Christians in America.
I said, what?
She goes, they are so thin skinned that
no one can walk up to them and
rebuke them.
And yet we consider that to be one
of the principal ministries of our pastors and
our elders.
To walk up and personally rebuke us when
we were not living right.
But if a man does it here in
America, he'll be fired.
Why is that?
From the very beginning, have I not said
the great majority of the church is lost?
The great majority of people call themselves Christians
are lost.
You begin to approach them about their sin,
and the first thing that's going to come
out of their mouth is judge not lest
you be judged.
And they do not know that they're twisting
that scripture all to pieces to make it
say something Jesus never intended it to say.
My dear friend, a genuine Christian.
Do you want to know?
Perfect.
Let me just give this to you.
I'll read it to you so you'll believe
it's there.
Let me give you what I consider one
of the greatest descriptions of a Christian.
But to this one I will look.
To him who is humble and contrite of
spirit and who trembles at my word.
Does that describe you?
Do you tremble at God's word?
When God's word speaks to you, are you
contrite and humbled before it?
Do you desire to repent?
Do you desire to confess?
Do you desire to be in the right
way?
Or do you just get angry?
As I've said, I said last night I
believe I did.
That whenever there's a move of God in
a church.
I've seen sometimes a move of God sweep
through a church and people broken over their
sins.
It is always the same.
The most godly, the most devoted, the most
Christ-like people in the church are the
ones who come forward weeping over their sins.
And the most ungodly, worldly, carnal people in
the church are the ones that sit back
there cold as a stone.
They have felt nothing.
And why have they felt nothing?
Because they are not spiritually alive.
What is your relationship with sin?
An unbeliever, he does not care about sin.
He does not hope to discern sin in
his life.
If he sees sin in his life, it
doesn't bother him.
It does not bring him to confession.
He does not repent.
But a true Christian is just the opposite.
When he hears of sin in his life,
he's moved to contrition, to humility, to brokenness,
to tears, to confession.
People sometimes will tell me, I've got a
new relationship with God.
And I ask them, do you have a
new relationship with sin?
Because if you don't have a new relationship
with sin, you don't have a new relationship
with God.
If your relationship with sin has not changed,
your relationship with God has not changed.
As I read from Ezekiel last night, I
think that most Christians here totally identifies with
it.
It says in Ezekiel that God will spend
all the days of our lives cleansing us
from our filthiness and destroying the idols in
our lives.
I have walked with the Lord for almost
22 years.
And I can testify that those 22 years
have been 22 years of Him disciplining me
and breaking me over my sin.
And when I want to walk away, I
can't.
And yet I see so many people claim
to know Christ, and yet they're running around
like a dog cut free from the rope,
running in the yard wild.
With no control, no discipline.
Now, let's go on to the next test,
the third one.
By this we know that we have come
to know Him if we keep His commandments.
My goodness.
How simple.
How straightforward.
The only way to take the blade off
of this is to twist it.
Just look at what He says.
By this we know that we have come
to know Him if we keep His commandments.
The logical opposite of that?
If we do not keep His commandments, we
can have no assurance that we ever came
to know Him.
And look, He goes further in verse 4.
The one who says, I have come to
know Him.
The one who says, Oh, oh, look at
me.
I've come to know Him.
He's Lord.
He's my Savior.
I asked Jesus to come into my heart.
The one who says, I have come to
know Him, but does not keep His commandments,
is a liar.
So much for, well, you can't look inside
my heart, you can't judge me.
No one has to look inside your heart.
Do you keep the commandments?
Now, are we talking about absolute perfection here?
Absolutely not.
We've already talked about that.
That one of the greatest evidences that a
person is a Christian is that they will
acknowledge the sin in their life and struggle
against it, repent and confess.
Then what is He saying?
He's going back to talking about a style
of life.
Remember what I said last night?
That last passage?
Depart from me.
I never knew you.
You who claim to be my disciples and
lived as though I never gave you a
command to obey.
That's exactly what He's saying here.
People who profess faith in Jesus Christ and
yet live as though God never gave them
a command about anything.
As a matter of fact, not only do
they not obey, they don't even know what
the commands are.
American Christianity, the knowledge of it can be
summed up in this.
I know that I prayed a prayer.
The Bible says that anyone that is truly
born again, there is no need to teach
them of God, for they will all be
taught of God, by God.
And that they will be given to the
commands of God.
Are you given to His commands?
An unbeliever prior to being converted, myself at
the University of Texas, prior to being converted.
What?
I didn't care about the Bible.
I didn't care what it said.
I didn't seek to know God's will from
the Holy Writ.
If I broke God's law, it was no
big deal.
There was no feelings of a need for
restoration or repentance or anything.
I lived as a man who was without
law.
How many people today profess faith in Jesus
Christ, and yet the Bible has nothing to
do with their life?
I mean, absolutely nothing.
I'm not talking about someone who has a
quiet time, you know, four hours a day,
every day of the week.
No, I'm talking about people who come to
church, Southern Baptists who come to church day
in and day out, day in and day
out, every Sunday, and yet the Bible throughout
their daily lives has absolutely nothing to do
with them.
They do not know and they do not
care to know what God has said, what
He has commanded.
Do you see that?
Am I talking about you?
Are you a person who has a form
of religion, but you deny the power thereof?
You have a form of religion, but the
commandments of God mean nothing to you.
You've never looked in Scripture to figure out,
to discern or know how God wants you
to talk, what He said about your tongue.
You've never looked in Scripture to know what
He said about your heart.
You've never looked in Scripture to find out
what He says you can look at and
not look at.
That's obvious by all the TV you watch.
You've never looked in Scripture to understand how
you're supposed to submit to His Lordship in
your marriage.
You've never looked in Scripture to find out
what He said about raising children.
You've never looked in Scripture to find out
what He said about how a church is
supposed to be run.
Isn't it amazing that throughout the entire New
Testament, one of the foundational bedrock truths of
the New Testament with regard to the church
is the need to practice church discipline?
And yet the moment that a man gets
bold enough and brave enough to follow God
in this area, a great majority of the
people in the church leave.
Now isn't that amazing?
It's just fulfilling God's Word.
They went out from us because they were
not of us.
You say, how can you talk this way?
Don't you see, somebody has to talk this
way!
I should preach like a dying man to
dying men and preach as though I'll never
preach again.
If this is not heaven and hell, if
this is not judgment day or salvation, then
I'm just going to quit and go back
to the farm and be with my family.
I can find a lot better ways of
making a living than this.
And I'm not going to preach just to
hear myself speak or to tickle somebody's ears.
And why is it?
Because I love you too much.
I have little boys.
When I saw those little children come up
here, the only thing I could think of
was my little boys.
And the only thing I could pray about
was, oh God, that they might know the
truth.
It's the false prophet who uses you, tickles
your ears, tells you stories and a joke,
and then gives a punchline at the end.
And since all the Southern Baptists had been
trained very well, they all come forward and
they accounted a great move of God.
But here we're talking about you.
Dear lady, dear sir, dear young person, answer
me, answer me, is it well with your
soul?
Is it well with your soul?
I'd be careful not to laugh.
Let's go on.
Verse 6 of chapter 2, another test.
The one who says he abides in Him
ought himself to walk in the same manner
as He walked.
Now you say, oh my goodness, if we
take this literally, all of us are going
to hell.
No!
Begin to think again about a style of
life.
A style of life.
The best way I can teach this verse
is to give you an illustration from my
childhood.
I was raised on a farm, horse ranch.
And my father was from the old school.
Every morning between 5 and 5.30 my
father would come into my room, even as
a tiny boy, and say, Paul boy, get
up, no rest for the wicked.
It's the first verse I ever memorized.
No rest for the wicked.
And it was back in the days when
it was still legal for parents to kill
children.
So the moment he said, get up, they
ought to bring that law back.
The moment he said, get, you were up.
And now my dad, I was afraid of
him.
He was a big man.
He was a strong man.
He was smart.
He was all the things I wanted to
be.
I respected him, but I was afraid.
But at the same time, I did respect
him, and I wanted so much to be
like him.
And when we would walk out in the
morning to feed the horses, many times there
was snow on the ground.
My dad would put on his big boots,
and I'd put on my little boots.
And he'd take off walking across that snow.
Now the one thing that I desired more
than anything else as a little boy was
to be like my dad.
And so I would stretch out as far
as my stride would permit, and where he
left a footprint in the snow, I would
try to reach that footprint.
And I'd walk across that barnyard in that
way, stretched out, walking, stretching as far as
I could.
Sometimes I would fall down.
Someone from the outside looking in on me
would have thought it rather ridiculous.
I'm stretching out farther than I can go.
I'm trying to do something totally impossible.
But, if they would have had a discerning
heart, they would have known that the greatest
desire of that little boy's heart was to
put his foot where his father's foot had
been, to walk in the footsteps of his
father.
If I look at your life, if anyone
looks at your life, will they see that
desire in you?
Will they be able to see, yes, someone
who is attempting the impossible, someone who looks
foolish in their attempt, someone who falls down
quite a bit, but do they see the
greatest desire that this man has is to
walk in the same manner as he walked?
Young person, can the students around you, do
they just see that sickening, syrupy, cultural Christianity?
Or can they honestly look at you and
say, man, I mean, that guy's not perfect,
and sometimes he should think before he speaks,
and all sorts of other things, and sometimes,
well, he's, you know, not perfect, definitely.
But there's one thing about that boy, more
than anything else you can tell, he desires
to be like Jesus.
Whom do you desire to be like, sir?
The richest man in Alabama?
The most respected in a country club?
The most admired in the Rotary Club?
Young person.
The greatest athlete?
The prettiest girl?
Your beauty will fade.
The most popular?
The this, the that?
Even my own self, I have to look
in the mirror and say, preacher, heal yourself.
What do you desire most?
To be a well-known preacher?
Or to be like Jesus?
Because that's a test of whether you've even
come to know Him.
Do you desire to be like Jesus?
Now, another test.
Verse 9.
The one who says he is in the
light and yet hates his brother is in
the darkness until now.
The one who loves his brother abides in
the light and there is no cause for
stumbling in him.
But the one who hates his brother is
in the darkness and walks in the darkness
and does not know where he is going
because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
One of the greatest evidences that a person
has truly become a child of God is
that they will love the children of God.
Now, this word brother here is not referring
to someone from another race.
I always thought that quite amusing.
There's only one race and it's human.
We should love people of all colors, all
sizes, all shapes.
Yes, most certainly, but that's not what it's
teaching here.
It's also not talking about loving the poor.
We should love the poor, but that's not
what this is talking about.
It is also not talking about so many
of the things that people think that it's
talking about.
When it says brother, it's talking about another
person who has been born again by the
power of God and in the family of
God.
Do you love the people of God?
Young people, let me ask you a question.
When you can have some free time on
your hands, who do you fellowship with?
The clique in your grade school?
The clique in your high school?
The beautiful people?
And what do you talk about when you
get together?
That ought to terrify you because most of
you know that you do want to associate
with the clique and the beautiful people and
when you get together, you do not talk
much about Jesus.
You know that I'm speaking the truth.
And don't think I've singled them out.
What about you, sir, ma'am?
Do you desire to be with the people
of God no matter who they are?
No matter where they are?
And no matter how they treat you?
Because you're family and you're bound together with
the bond of the Spirit.
Remember what Jesus said.
I was naked and you clothed me.
I was hungry and you fed me.
I was in prison and you came to
visit me.
You know what's amazing?
So many people who have prison ministries use
that verse as the biblical basis of their
ministry.
That's not what that verse means at all.
I learned what that verse meant when I
left this country and went to other places
and saw the prison systems.
You see, you go to prison in Peru
and if someone doesn't come every day and
bring you food, you're going to starve to
death.
If someone doesn't come and provide clothing for
you, you're going to go naked.
And what Jesus is talking about when He
says that, He's talking about this.
He's talking about people who their testimony of
their faith in Jesus Christ was so solid,
so sure, they were arrested for their faith.
They lost their homes, they lost everything because
of their following Jesus Christ and they were
thrown in prison.
Now, don't you think those prison authorities are
sitting there going, okay, let's see who brings
food to these guys.
Because whoever brings food to these guys is
going in prison too.
Let's see who brings clothes.
Let's see who visits them.
Because whoever does, well, they're a Christian too.
Only a Christian would visit this guy.
Because anyone who comes here is going to
be identified as a Christian and thrown in
prison.
And that's exactly what He's teaching.
That a true Christian is known because they
will lay down their life for their brother
and sister in Christ.
And they will be willing to be scarred,
misunderstood, and even hurt by other brothers and
sisters in Christ.
And when other brothers and sisters in Christ
fail them, they will be merciful to them.
Not run out because they've been offended.
Birds of the feather flock together, my grandmother
told me.
It seems that she was rather biblical in
saying that, wasn't she?
Do you love the people of God?
Do you desire to be with other believers?
Do you know one of the reasons why
the pastor extended the meetings?
Because he heard that people were getting together
during the day just to talk about the
condition of their souls.
In America, that's unusual.
Most people get together for fellowship to talk
about football.
Talk about things.
But it must be a work of God
when people get together just to pray.
When people get together just to talk about
how wonderful Jesus is.
When people get together and say, show me,
is there anything?
Brothers, look at my life.
Is there anything in my life that you
can see that I need to repent of?
Please help me.
Tell me.
I'm open.
That's a work of God in America.
Is that you?
Do you desire to be with the people
of God?
I hear so many people say, well, I
can worship God in my bass boat.
Or I can worship God out here, you
know, in a tree stand.
Or I can worship God there.
But that's not what God said.
Because it's not just about you worshiping God.
It's about you serving brothers and sisters in
Christ.
Have you ever found yourself outside the people
of God mocking them, laughing at them, calling
them a bunch of hypocrites and everything else?
Guess what?
The word Satan in Hebrew means slanderer.
You're doing the works of your father, the
devil.
Verse 15.
The final test.
Do not love the world nor the things
in the world.
If anyone loves the world, the love of
the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world, the
lust of the flesh and the lust of
the eyes and the boastful pride of life
is not from the Father, but is from
the world.
The world is passing away and also its
lusts.
But the one who does the will of
God lives forever.
I am 42 years old, but in 42
years, I have seen too many people die.
My brother died.
My father died in my arms out in
the middle of a field.
I preached my sister's funeral.
I lived for years in a war zone,
stepped over dead people just to get my
mail.
I became very wise on the day my
dad died in my arms.
Oh, I was unconverted.
I became a drunk, but at the same
time, I became very wise.
I realized something.
Strong men grow old and feeble.
Beauty fades.
Leaves fall from trees, turn into dust and
are blown away by the wind.
Empires are built and they crumble just as
fast.
If there is one thing that I would
like to stamp upon your heart is that
this world is passing away and you with
it.
And the word here can also be translated
not simply that the world is passing away,
but the world is being pushed out.
If this is your place, this place of
yours will not last forever.
It is being pushed out.
It is passing away.
The mass of humanity are like a bunch
of foolish men dressed up in clown suits,
banging drums and walking right off a cliff
into the eternal abyss.
Are you one of them?
Do not love the things of this world
because if you do, God says...
Have you ever heard someone say, there's not
room in this town for the two of
us?
Well, God looks at the world and looks
at your heart and says, there's not room
in this heart for the two of us.
If you love the world, you do not
love God.
If your hopes are in this world, you
do not love God.
Yesterday, I was nine.
Today, I'm 42.
Tomorrow, I will be 85.
And the day after that, I will be
dead.
Don't you see that?
It passes so quickly.
You say, I'm young.
I was young.
I'm strong.
I was stronger.
But it passes away.
It passes away.
You're after wealth.
Your wealth will rot.
You take great pride in your beauty.
Your beauty will fade.
There are many women in this building right
now, possibly in their 80s, that were much
more beautiful than you are now, teenager.
You want to be the man.
There are old men here that could whoop
five of you boys.
They will soon pass away.
What I want you to see is that
it's coming, it's coming, it's coming, it's coming.
Someone came to me one time and they
said, I don't believe Jesus Christ is coming
back for a thousand years.
And I said, it really doesn't matter.
You're going to see Him inside a 70.
Because whether He comes here or you go
there, there's going to be a meeting.
There is going to be a meeting and
prepare to meet your God.
You say, well, I'll meet that God.
No, you won't.
You'll melt before Him like a tiny wax
figurine before a blast furnace.
But He has offered reconciliation through His Son.
I will close with one last thing.
We'll skip over several chapters.
Go to chapter 5.
He who has the Son has the life.
He who does not have the Son of
God does not have the life.
Someone said to me one time, Jesus is
all you need, Brother Paul.
I said, no.
Jesus is all you have.
Outside of Him, there's nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
Nothing.
And one of the greatest signs of being
a Christian is not just that you love
your brother.
You love Him.
Not the benefits you receive from Him.
Not streets of gold or gates of pearl.
Not simply escaping hell.
But you love Him.
I have read the prayers of old, old
men that have said things like this.
Oh God, I love You so much that
if You can get glory out of condemning
me to hell, let me be condemned to
hell if You'll just be glorified.
We live in a consumer Christianity.
You look for a church that won't rile
your conscience.
You look for a church that has activities
for you, sort of like a Six Flags
over Jesus.
But do you look for Him?
I heard one great church growth expert saying
one time, they asked him, how did you
get your church to be 10,000?
He goes, we just meet people's needs.
Everyone applauded and I began to think about
what he was saying.
So then, all the people come to your
church because you meet their needs.
You meet their selfish needs.
What about Jesus?
I'd rather have a church built on Jesus
where three people came and all of them
being in my family than to have a
mega church that was built upon the bones
of unconverted church people to whom I would
not tell the truth because I did not
want to lose them.
I don't flatter people, but that's one of
the reasons why I have such respect for
the man who stands in this pulpit and
the men and the women who have stood
with him.
And I don't flatter people.
Do you want a church?
You say, we want to be seeker friendly.
Fine.
Just realize this, there's only one seeker and
it's God.
And if you want to be friendly to
somebody, be friendly to Him.
Do what He wants.
It's His church.
It's not yours because you're His.
Do you come for Jesus?
Do you want Jesus?
Do you, my dear friend, do you wake
up in the middle of the night sometimes
with your heart warm, tears running down your
face, desiring Jesus?
Do you wake up sometimes lifting your hands
to heaven because you desire Jesus?
Do you want to be with other brothers
and sisters in Christ because they're talking much
about Jesus?
Do you want to hear people sing because
they're talking about Jesus?
Do you want to hear a preacher preach
not because he tells stories, but because he
speaks about Jesus?
He speaks about Jesus.
Just want Jesus.
I'm going to finish with a story that's
probably been changed a million times and I
do not know the true root of this
illustration.
But it's a fine one.
It proves the point of this text.
There was a famous artist in Europe who
drew his inspiration from his son.
Oh, he loved his son.
His son and he would paint together all
the time.
And then one day, his son was taken
off to war and he befriended another person
there in war, another soldier in the foxhole.
And the soldier always wanted to know how
to paint, so the boy began to teach
him how to paint and they became very,
very close.
And then one day, coming out of the
foxhole, the painter's son saw the rifle.
The other boy didn't.
So the painter's son took the bullet and
died.
The old man, the old painter, was crushed.
He sat there in his huge home surrounded
by priceless works of art and they meant
nothing to him because his son was no
longer there.
Then one day, he got a knock at
the door.
The boy was standing there, the soldier, and
said, Sir, you don't know me, but I'm
the reason your son is dead.
He took what should have been mine and
his blood spilt on a foreign field and
now I stand here before you.
He said, Sir, he had sort of an
old bag in his hand, a brown paper
sack, and he pulled a picture out of
it and he said, Sir, before your son
died, we just, well, we painted together when
we could and I'm a miserable sort of
a talent, but, Sir, this is a picture
that I painted of your son because I
love him.
I love him still.
It means more to me than anything and
I just didn't know what to do.
I can't replace him.
I just, here, Sir, I know, you know,
you're one of the greatest talents in the
world and I have no talent at all,
but here, take my offering.
The father took it, considered it a prize.
He went into his gallery, pushed back all
the priceless paintings he had painted and put
that one right front and center.
A few weeks or months went by and
the old man died.
A great auction was to be held.
Sotheby, everyone was going to be there.
They sent out wires all around to every
nation, every continent, that these paintings were up
for sale and on the day of the
auction, the room was filled with the greatest
buyers throughout the world.
The auctioneer slammed down the mallet.
He said, this auction will begin.
The first piece to be auctioned off is
this.
And he pulled back the cape and there
was the picture that the soldier had painted.
The room filled with laughter and then disgust
and then anger and impatience.
Someone said, we have come here to buy
paintings, not this drawing.
And the auctioneer said, no, this is to
be auctioned off.
Who will give me a thousand dollars?
They laughed.
Who will give me five hundred?
They scoffed and were angry.
We don't have time for this.
And all of a sudden in the back,
that soldier stood up.
He couldn't handle it anymore.
He was filled with rage.
He was filled with pity.
He was filled with sadness.
He stood up and he said, sir, sir,
I have in my possession six pounds.
Sir, that painting means more to me than
anything else in the world because that painting
is of the very son who died to
give me life.
Sir, I have six pounds and it is
all I have.
I'll sell myself into slavery.
I don't care what you ask of me.
I will give it.
Just give me that portrait.
And the auctioneer slammed down the mallet.
He said, sold.
People let out a sigh of relief.
Well, finally we're going to get on with
the auction.
And then all of a sudden the auctioneer
slammed the mallet down again and said, the
auction is over.
You can imagine the anger, the yelling.
What do you mean the auction is over?
We have come from afar to buy all
these paintings.
He said, the auction is over.
And he read the will of the old
man.
The one who takes my son gets it
all.
To the wind with your religion.
To the wind with your petty morality.
To the wind with Southern Baptist church life.
I'm not about any of that.
I want the son.
I want him.
I want the one who died, yea, rose
again on my behalf.
I want him.
I want him to consume my life.
I want him to be everything.
My greatest sadness is that there is so
much of me left that has not been
given to him.
The true Christian will love the son.
This is not about escaping hell.
This is about loving the one to whom
love is due.
Are you in love with Jesus or do
you have just some puny, impotent religion that
carries you to church once a week but
does not change your life and does not
warm your heart?
Is your heart warm?
An old brother came up to me the
other night.
You know who you are.
His earphone is falling out of his ear.
He can barely hear.
And he said, Brother Paul, when you spoke
about Jesus, my heart was strangely warmed.
And you know what?
I bet that dear old saint will come
up to me tonight and say the same
thing while other people will walk out of
here in anger hating every word I said.
But don't walk away in anger.
Come here.
Fist a cuff.
Stone me.
Beat me.
But do not leave this building without Christ.
And do not leave this building with a
cold, cold religious heart.
Do not.
Let's pray.
Father, we come before you.
And oh God, I feel so weak.
God, I desire much.
I desire much for the salvation of people
here tonight.
I desire much for the Spirit of God
to revive our hearts.
I desire for Christians to be strengthened, for
the doubting to cease, for them to be
swallowed up in the confidence of Christ's grace.
And I desire, Lord, religious people who knows
not God, to at least say, I don't
know now.
I don't know.
And bring them, Lord.
Lord, you know our hearts.
You know the heart of the pastor and
the elders that we will stay here all
night if necessary.
Just, Lord, put a seal upon their hearts
and do not allow them to leave.
Oh God, in Jesus' name, Amen.