Can I Be Sure of My Salvation

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Well, before I get into the message, just a quick update. It's good to be back home. Kim and I and the kids were in California.
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They're still there for a little bit longer. And thank you for your prayers. It was good to see grandma almost every day.
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It was good to go to a conference, four weeks vacation, and then one week for a Bible conference. It's not very often
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I get to sit where you get to sit, have my Bible open, sit next to my wife with a cup of coffee and learn about the
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Lord and his word. So a good time of refreshment. Almost everyone I ran into said, you're on vacation for five weeks.
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What kind of church do you pastor? And I said, a very generous, good church.
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And to have the leadership we have here, I heard Steve and Dave and Pradeep, were knocking it out of the ballpark preaching.
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And I want to say thank you to those men. It's a testimony to what God has done in our church, right? That we can,
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I don't want this church to be built on me. I want it to be built on Christ and his word. And one day
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I'll quit or you'll fire me or I'll move or something or second coming. And let's not talk about that issue.
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Although I'd like it to happen. The church is built on his word. And so people come and people go.
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But it's the word of God that stands firm. And so almost everyone that I talked to first thought,
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I can't believe you're gone for that long. And then they thought, I wish I could be gone that long. And so thank you for your love towards me.
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And the Abendroth family. Every one of you fits into one of these four categories.
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Four categories that each of you would find yourself entering into one, are already in one.
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Four kinds of people in the world. Now I ask you the question, in which category do you find yourself?
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Four categories from R .C. Sproul. Number one, those who are not saved and know they're not.
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The first category, people that say, I know I'm not a Christian. And in real life, and from God's perspective, they're right, they're not a
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Christian. They're not a Christian and they know they're not. Category number one. Category number two, people who are saved, but they're not sure they are.
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From God's perspective, of course, signed, sealed and delivered based on the perfect work of Christ. But they don't have assurance to know that they are.
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First category, I'm not a Christian and I know it. Second category is,
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I am a Christian, but I don't know it or I don't feel it or I don't experience it. Third category, those who are saved and sure about it.
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I am a Christian and I know that I know that I know God has saved me. And then you know the fourth category, those who are not really saved, but somehow think they are.
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Those that aren't really Christians and from God's perspective, they're not, but somehow they think they are.
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Four categories, where do you find yourself? In which category would you place yourself? Today, I'd like to talk about the topic of assurance, the assurance of salvation.
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And if you had to go to one place in the Bible that would help you with assurance, one book of the Bible, you would open up your
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Bibles to the book that's listed in your bulletin, 1 John. Sometimes I wish they wouldn't have put that in there so you'd have to think about it.
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Turn to the first letter of John. Earlier, I read from the gospel of John.
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This is different, this isn't the gospel of John, same author, this is the epistle or letter of 1
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John. Snort near the back of your Bible, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Jude and Revelation.
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So go way to the back of your Bibles, 1 John, to talk about this issue of assurance. It's a very important topic for several reasons.
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The first reason is, if you have false assurance of salvation, it's the worst mistake you could ever make, true?
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If you think you're going to heaven but you're not, that is a very problematic situation.
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Satan is a liar and a deceiver and certainly some people buy into the lies, some people believe his deceptions.
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And the biggest lie in the universe is, thinking you're going to heaven, but when you die, you end up in hell, that's a big deception.
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And sadly, in the US churches, there are all kinds of carnal people and they think they're going to heaven, they think they're just because they're a member or something, they're going.
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George Gallup said, quote, we find there is very little difference in ethical behavior between churchgoers and those who are not actively religious.
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The levels of lying, cheating and stealing are remarkably similar in both groups.
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Eight out of 10 Americans consider themselves Christians, yet Gallup said only half of them could identify the person who gave the
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Sermon on the Mount and fewer still could recall five of the 10 commandments. Only two in 10 said they would be willing to suffer for their faith.
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Assurance is an important topic because some are in that one category that says, I think I'm a Christian, but I'm really not.
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They buy into Satan's lie. The Puritan Thomas Brooks says, Satan promises the best, but pays with the worst.
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He promises honor and pays with disgrace. He promises pleasure and pays with pain.
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He promises profit and pays with loss. He promises life and pays with death.
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Since we believe in Satan and how he blinds and how he veils and how he disguises and how he lies and how he lures and how he masquerades, then this is an important topic for those in the category of not save but think they are.
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There's a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death. This topic is also important because if you're a
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Christian and know you are, it's still good for you to examine yourself, isn't it?
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Isn't it good to say, you know, I wanna know if I'm a Christian. Gee, am I really a Christian? Does my life match up to what a
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Christian's life matches up to? It is good to examine yourself. Second Corinthians chapter 13 says to see if you're what?
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In the faith. This is also an important topic because too often, people base their assurance on something that happened in the past instead of what their life is like right now.
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I'll get into this more later. Make no mistake, if you're saved, it was an event that happened in the past.
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It happened in a moment. Regeneration happened in a second. But the response to that regeneration that happens in the past sometimes confuses people.
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That is to say, if I ask you the question right now, how do you know you're a Christian? Would you say, because I remember 12 years ago when
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I accepted Jesus in my heart, I remember 15 years ago when I walked the aisle, I remember 20 years ago when
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I said, I'm a sinner, God, you're a savior. Please take me. Or would you say something like this?
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I know I'm a Christian because I am believing in Jesus right now.
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I know I'm a Christian because right now I'm trusting in the resurrected Christ for my salvation.
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See, when we talk about how do we know we're a Christian, too often we default to our response to God's salvation in the past.
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When you'll see 1 John today, how do you know you're a Christian? The answer to that from the apostle, the beloved one whom
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Christ loved was, what is your life like right now? I am believing right now, it'll be a present tense.
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I'll never, I'm getting ahead of myself, but that's all right, that's just what we do. I go to Germany in January, and there's this man that I know named
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Christian, not Christian Andres in our missionary, but another man, he's a young man, 22 years old.
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And there's another lady, oh, I can't remember her name.
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Call her Sally, I guess. From my sabbatical,
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I knew they kind of had liked each other and I heard through the internet that they were now courting with a view towards marriage.
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And I said, how's Sally doing? How's your relationship with Sally?
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Now he speaks German, probably all kinds of other languages and just a little bit of English. How's it going with Sally?
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And he said, I am liking Sally. It's not that I used to like her,
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I started to like her, but I am present tense right now, I am in the process of this very minute, this very minute as you're talking about her,
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I am liking Sally. That's how 1 John is gonna talk about salvation.
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While salvation is a past done deal, salvation happens in a split second, if we could even use time.
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God makes you alive once in time, when it comes to assurance, you'll see John talk more like,
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I am believing, I am confessing, I am trusting right now versus somehow going back to the past saying,
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I remember that day I was baptized and I'm in and I'm good. And you'll know why that happens because anybody can say,
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I remember the day I was baptized and then live like hell, somehow grasping assurance. But it's much easier to say right now,
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I am liking Sally. Can't believe I forgot her name.
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Too often people hear the gospel and respond to it positively as an unbeliever, but then it doesn't catch.
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These beside the road are those who have heard, the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart so that they may not believe and be saved.
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And those on the rocky soil are those who when they hear, receive the word with joy. These have no firm root, they believe for a while and in a time of temptation fall away.
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This is an important topic because the Bible somehow has a way of making our thoughts line up with it.
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We live in a culture of, I was saved because of in the past and the Bible's culture is, I know
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I'm a Christian today because that past has an effect on me today and I am believing
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Jesus today. The last reason I think this is an important topic is because if you're saved and have surety of your salvation, it's a joy filled life, isn't it?
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To know that you're going to heaven. I drive past the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and before they had nets underneath, the workers would work and I have the note here, 23 men fell to their deaths while they were initially constructing that bridge.
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Then they put the nets underneath it, 10 more men fell and were saved from their death but more importantly from a bottom line perspective, they worked 25 % harder, 25 % more got accomplished when the nets were underneath there.
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When you know you're going to heaven, what's the worst thing that can happen? Oh, I'm gonna go to heaven when I die and so I can work for the
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Lord knowing that I have assurance. If you ever fly, I challenge you, watch people who are hovering around the ticket booth, walking back and forth with their briefcase, drinking their coffee, every time there's some announcements, perking their ears up,
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I guarantee you I know what those people are doing. Those people are flying what? Standby.
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They're flying standby and so too for Christians. If you think you're not gonna go to heaven, you're not quite sure, your life revolves around trying to find your assurance, trying to grasp assurance instead of doing the work of the ministry.
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Now, how do you get assurance before I get into the text? Well, there's two different kinds of assurance.
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The first assurance is what Jesus did in Calvary. It's an objective fact.
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The second kind of assurance is the Spirit of God, Romans 8, testifies to my spirit, especially in times of trial and trouble and persecution that I am a
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Christian. And also subjectively, there is statements of what
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Christians do in the Bible. Then we find ourselves doing what these things are and therefore we make the deduction.
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If Christians do this, I'm doing this, therefore I should have assurance.
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And that's what we find in 1 John. I think our church needs this because before I left, I was hammering away on what passage of the
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Bible? Matthew 7, 13 and following. You say you're a Christian, prove it.
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You could be deceived. Watch out for false teachers, enter. And so you get this refrain of, are you really a
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Christian? Whack, whack, whack. I had people come to me and say, I don't know if I'm a Christian after that sermon.
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I preached that same sermon in California and a lady came up to me last Sunday and she said, I've never questioned my salvation for 20 years, but now
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I'm wondering. You know what I told her? I said, that's what the passage was supposed to do.
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But the Bible teaches more. So why don't you go home tonight and read 1 John? After you've examined yourself, after you've kind of looked through these issues and said, could
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I be deceived? Could I have bought into a false teacher and all his lies? You go home and read 1
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John and you'll say, in seed form, in immature form,
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I do what the Bible says Christians do. And if I do what the Bible says Christians do, that's a good sign that I'm a
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Christian and your assurance will increase. Let me give you five tests that all
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Christians pass according to 1 John. Five tests that all
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Christians pass that should help you with your assurance. Or if you're not a Christian, I hope it drives you to know assurance.
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But I'm really after today, you, the congregation, the saved ones, because I want your assurance to be bolstered after I tried to cream it a month ago.
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Simple tests, five total. Now, before we get into these tests, turn with me if you would to 1
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John 5 so you can see where I'm going. In our postmodern age, relative truth, people can't know truth.
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I would disagree. You can know truth and you can even know subjective truth that you're saved.
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Look at 1 John 5 .13. You can know with the boldness of Stephen as he faced death that you're a
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Christian. That was his purpose, that's why he wrote. He wrote with multiple purposes that we might have joy, chapter one, verse four, but also look at what he says.
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I love these easy purpose statements. No decoder ring necessary. 1
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John 5 .13. John, why did you write? These things I have written.
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Chapter one, chapter two, chapter three, chapter four, chapter five. I have written to you who believe in the name of the
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Son of God in order that you may what? Know that you have eternal life.
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Postmodernism, you can't believe, you can't know, they can't know that you know. Here, even the subjective assurance, the feeling that I feel saved, the experience of knowledge that I know
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I'm saved can be known. You ought to know it. You ought to know if you're saved or not.
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By the way, it's only the grace of God that he would grant us assurance because he didn't have to do it.
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We could live our whole lives justified, redeemed, reconciled to God and never know it.
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And then you'd get to heaven, you'd go, wow, I made it. But God in his grace doesn't just give us forgiveness of sins.
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He says, I want you to know. You can know if you're my child or not. How good of God to do that.
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Verse John, when you begin to read it, it's kind of tricky. Because I like the linear kind of proposition, if -then statements, and John writes like someone who's more
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Hebraic and he doesn't write with a linear fashion. He writes almost with a cyclical fashion, circular.
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He'll come to a topic and then he'll go to another topic. But then he'll come back to that first topic. Kind of sounds like your senior pastor, doesn't it?
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And he just comes back. And it's almost his way of teaching because if you don't get it the first time, he'll come back and revisit it the second time.
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And so it has this flow where you try to outline it and you think, I'm going to go crazy outlining this because it almost can't be outlined.
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We call this a general epistle because if you look at chapter one at the beginning, chapter five at the end, you won't see church locations given.
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You won't see people named. It's a general church. He probably wrote it at Ephesus, probably had it read at Ephesus, sent around instead of a specific place.
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I'm writing to you Thessalonica. I'm writing to you at Colossae. I'm writing to nobody in particular.
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It's a general epistle. He talks about eternal life and how you can know that you have assurance of that eternal life that you may know.
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And I'll ask the question to start. Do you know that you're a Christian? Do you know for sure when you die and that last dying breath comes out, you think
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I'm going to see Jesus face to face? Five tests that every true
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Christian passes. I have one other thing to say before I get into that.
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Turn with me to 1 John 5, 18. This is something that's technical, but it's important.
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Different Bible translations translate things differently. And I think the NAS does a horrible job here.
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1 John 5, 18. You need to understand how things are translated.
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You need to understand what a present tense verb is or you'll miss this book. Actually, if you don't understand it, you'll have zero assurance.
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NAS says in 1 John 5, 18, we know that no one who is born of God sins. What? Well, if I get assurance based on me not sinning, guess what?
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I'm never going to get assurance. If I'm not supposed to sin, then that's going to be problematic.
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How many people here have the ESV? The ESV translates that same verse.
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The one who does not keep on sinning. I am liking Sally. That's what that same thing is.
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The one who does not keep on sinning, present tense is the one who knows they're born of God.
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NIV, sometimes I criticize it, here I'll commend it. NIV is right when it says in 1
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John 5, 18, we know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin. Here's what he's saying.
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The language of 1 John has present tense language and it's not I've never sinned in my life, it's that I'm not in the pattern of habitual continual sin as conduct, as behavior, as a walk of life.
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You see someone and you go, oh, he sins once in a while, but his life is not typified by the word sin.
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So when you're reading this, it's probably best to read the NAS with an ESV next to it or NIV because otherwise you're gonna say to yourself,
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I'm undone because I don't get this present tense, does not keep on sinning.
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Last comment before I get into the five tests. You are not saved by keeping these five tests.
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You are saved by the work of Christ Jesus, by the work of the Father, by the work of the
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Spirit. As you respond in faith, turning from your sin, responding in faith to the work of God done on your behalf, you're saved by grace alone, through faith alone, by Christ's work alone, correct?
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You're not saved by doing these five, but if you are saved, you will what? You'll do these five.
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Very, very important distinction. Question number one, five tests in the form of questions.
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Do you regularly confess your sins? Do you regularly confess your sins?
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There's these five strands of thought that if you boil 1 John down, this is kind of the essence at the bottom.
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And the first one is, do you regularly confess your sins? Turn with me to 1 John 1 .8. You're going to need to have your
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Bibles and we're gonna be jumping all around because like I said, with this kind of paragraph thinking that John does, we've got to look all around because he reiterates lots of these ideas.
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I did not say, do you perfectly confess your sins, but regularly, is it a part of your life?
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Is it present tense for you? 1 John 1 .8, we say that we have no sin.
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If we say that, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.
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If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
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Christians confess their sins. There's a man named Bob George and he says,
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Christians are to never confess their sins because Jesus paid for them all at Calvary. What's wrong with that statement?
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Never confess because they're already paid for. Well, they are paid for, but we're still to confess, how?
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Judicially before God's holy law court, paid. It is finished. But in a family relationship, we still go to our father and say,
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I've sinned. If my children sin, when my children sin, third class conditional, they will sin.
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I don't say, you've just sinned, I'm kicking you out of the family. You no longer have the right to bear the grand name,
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Abnero, you can't do that. No, they are still in my family, but they know there's been a problem of communion, fellowship has been broken.
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And so they say to me, the parent, Daddy, please forgive me. Christians are forgiven before the court, but in the family of God, they need to ask for forgiveness.
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The Greek word for forgive, excuse me, to confess is, let me break it up into two words and I think you'll get it.
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Homo lagas, homo lagas, what's homo mean?
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Same, what's lagas mean? Word, it's the same word.
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God says it's sin and I with God use the same words, it's sin. I agree with God, I see sin from God's perspective.
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You do that? You say, when I sin, I don't see it from the culture's perspective. I've got a syndrome,
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I've got a disease, I've got some kind of issue. I somehow, it was my environment.
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Somehow it was the woman you gave me, God. I mean, you could say all kinds of things, but you go,
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I'm gonna say the same word that God does. And that word is, I've sinned.
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That's what Christians do. They say, I've sinned, I agree with God. I accept that.
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I'm gonna look at it from God's perspective. I'm gonna take his side. Everything in us wants to run and not profess our guilt.
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By the way, just a little heads up, if you ever get pulled over by a police officer, the best thing you could ever do is to say the same word.
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You confess, the same word, homo lagas. You don't have to say the word homo lagas to him because he wouldn't really take it the right way,
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I guess. But if you put your hands on the 10 and two position and you say, officer, you're right.
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I was speeding, I'm guilty, I deserve a ticket. Nine times out of 10, when you say,
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I'm gonna look at it from the officer's perspective, by the way, he's not gonna give you a ticket. Even in California, where you're at the beach and you're supposed to be off the beach by 10,
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I didn't see the sign. And all of a sudden there's a policeman up there writing tickets and I ran up there and I said, officer, have you already written the ticket for that white pilot up there?
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Yes, I said, oh, I said, I should have read the sign. Totally guilty.
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Man, what a bummer. How much is it? He said, $23. I said, well, that's the price you pay for not paying attention.
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And he goes, you from around here? I said, do you want me to be?
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I said, well, my wife grew up here in Santa Cruz, but I live in Massachusetts. Is that a rental car? I said, no, it's grandma's.
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And he walked over and he said, now we can't give grandma a ticket now, can we? And he ripped the ticket up. Evie to the rescue one more time.
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Say the same thing. Here's the officer. There's one in authority. I agree. I confess.
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It's the same thing with God. Christians, and I look in your eyes and you're Christian people, we confess our sins.
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It's almost like there's a pressure on us, like the atmosphere that pushes and forces down on our lungs.
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You're forced to breathe. And Christians do the same thing with confession. Sometimes if you're having a bad day or you're moody or down and things aren't going right, you may want to stop yourself and say, when's the last time
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I just agreed with God about my sin? God, cleanse me. God, forgive me.
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And God's faithful and just to forgive us, isn't he? When we concede, when we admit, if I like that in a child, how much more is
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God pleased to say, yes, my son has paid for it, please. I'll never forget one time, one of my kids did something wrong.
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I've told you the story, I'm sure many times. They did something wrong. And I said, talk to me.
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Why? What? How could you do that? What's going on? And the kid said,
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I wasn't thinking. Not good that you weren't thinking right, but good for thanks for being honest.
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You agree? Say, well, you know, I don't really have that many sins to confess.
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I just kind of wait till the end of the night and get it all over with. Now lay me down to sleep. I pray to the Lord, my soul, to thank you for what
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I should have before I wake. I just say, well,
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Lord, if I've sinned against you in any way, thought, word or deed, haven't done something glorifying to you, just please cleanse me. Jesus' name, amen.
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A Puritan gave some questions to ask Christians to help them increase their confession life.
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Get them on tape or you can email me if you want. I'll just give you the questions quickly. Have I been fervent in prayer?
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If not, that would be a good thing to confess. Have I thought or spoken unkindly of anyone?
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Have I given thanks to God after every pleasant occurrence or time? Have I sought to center conversations on the other person's interest and needs and ultimately toward God?
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Or did I turn it into a conversation about my own interests? Have I been careful to avoid proud thoughts or comparing myself to others?
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Have I been impure in my thoughts or glances? Have I been leading in my home or only reacting to situations?
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Have I over or under eaten, over or under slept, over or under worked?
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You ask yourself those questions and immediately you say to yourself, I probably need more time to confess than I thought
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I did. You say, well, if I think about sin, it's kind of just a downer.
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The good news is you never ought to think of sin without thinking about the Savior. That's exactly what
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John does. Look at chapter two. Look at chapter two. Right after he's talking about confession in chapter one, verses eight and nine.
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We'll skip over 10 for a little bit. We go to chapter two, my little children, can't you just hear this apostle?
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My little children, I'm writing these things to you that you may not sin. If anyone sins, we have an advocate with the
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Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. If you sin and you confess your sins, you ought to be thinking just like John does.
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It immediately makes me think just not terminal thoughts, I'm a sinner, I'm wretched. Just like those people that read
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Romans seven. Oh, wretched man that I am. That's not where you should finish because there's another chapter in Romans, many other chapters, but the next chapter is, there is now therefore what?
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No condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. Yes, if you talk about your sin, you realize that you're impoverished, but then you'll immediately think about the one who can forgive sins, who has forgiven sins,
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Jesus Christ, the righteous. And don't you love the way
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John talks about Jesus? We have an advocate. We have someone who comes alongside, same word used of the
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Holy Spirit, comes alongside of. Now, if you think of advocate, you ought to be thinking courtroom. And all of a sudden, you need someone to represent you.
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You need someone to plead for you, to stand next to you and say, this is my client.
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Now, if you're a human advocate, here's what you would do. Judge and jury, this is why my client's not guilty.
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The cops did a bad job, tainted some evidence. Somebody's really out to get them, and they planted the evidence.
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Oh, there's some technicality, I'm gonna try to get this person off because paperwork wasn't signed right.
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For whatever reason, that advocate says this, this person is not guilty as charged.
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And if they are found guilty, then that advocate would say this, if they are found guilty, then at least don't give them the maximum sentence.
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Let them do some community work. But Jesus the advocate is different than other advocates.
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Here's Jesus advocacy, don't forget it. Your honor, my client is guilty to the core.
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In thought, word, deed, omission, commission, that person did it. With reckless abandonment, that person sinned.
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They lived in sin, they loved the sin, they cherished that sin, and they did that sin knowingly.
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And when it comes to the way I think about the judgment, give them the book, throw the book at them.
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Make sure that no glory is robbed from the judicial justice system.
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Who wants an advocate like that? But that's Jesus the advocate. Oh, I forgot.
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This advocate will also say, the law must be kept.
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My holy law must be kept. And the punishment that this person who deserves punishment, this punishment, instead of giving it to them, in this particular case,
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I have paid for. Because I'm just not the advocate, I'm the lamb who's taken away their sins advocate.
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Isn't that interesting? You don't have to go before God and say, well, I'm gonna confess my sins to God. I sure hope he doesn't throttle me for my confession.
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I sure hope he doesn't somehow do something to kick me out of the family. Jesus the advocate is there and he has already paid for our sins.
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Oh yes, God the Father might chasten us. He might give us discipline, but the discipline will never say,
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I'm yanking the title Christian away from you. So John says, when you sin, don't you dare forget that you have a perfect advocate who has made a perfect atonement, who has perfectly applied that atonement and who gives a perfect final salvation.
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When you sin and you confess your sin, quick default to the atonement. George Smith said, the atonement is the central truth of Christianity and the great theme of scripture.
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We don't have to be like people in Romans 1 who say, you know what, I'm gonna try to figure out how
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I can get off of this trial for sin. The pagan in Roman 1 ignores
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God. The moral person tries to be good. The religious people say they know
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God and does a religious activity. And we the Christian then can say, we don't need any of that.
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We can just say, I agree with your word and I'm guilty, but I have Jesus Christ who's paid for that sin.
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And it had to be Jesus. Who else could pay? How many people know the hymn, there's a green hill far away?
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I didn't think so. I didn't either. Cecil Francis Alexander, there was no other good enough to pay the price of sin.
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He only could unlock the gate of heaven and let us in. So now we've turned to owning the sin, confessing the sin, to praising this great advocate that we have.
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That's how Christians act. We love the atonement. When Bozo heard from Anselm about a thousand years ago about this atonement,
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Bozo said, nothing more reasonable, delightful, desirable could the world hear.
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Therefore, I hence conceive so great confidence that I can hardly express the greatness of my heart's exultant joy.
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To know I have an advocate in heaven who's paid for my sins and who will stand there on my behalf, not guilty, not guilty because I have paid.
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He said, I wanna sing. I wanna sing. God's faithful and just, the text says.
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And so he's not gonna say, I'm gonna punish Jesus and I'm also gonna punish you. You bet your eternal life that if Jesus has paid for your sins, you're not gonna have to pay for them in hell, are you?
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No double jeopardy. The top lady said in Rock of Ages, payment cannot
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God twice demand. First at my bleeding surety's hand and then again at mine. Look back in verse 10 please of chapter one.
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Christians confess their sin which leads them to talk about the Savior. But those who never confess, listen to verse 10 of chapter one.
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Maybe they don't confess because they think they don't sin. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us.
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Show me a person that says, I'm sinless. I don't sin. I'll show you somebody that doesn't know the first thing about Christianity, our forgiveness, our an advocate.
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They make God a what? Is there another verse in the Bible like this? That kind of talk makes
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God a what? A liar. Because God says, everybody's a sinner.
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Romans one, sinner. Romans two, sinner. Romans three, sinner. Maybe you wanna ask yourself these questions to help you confess better or more regularly.
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Do you confess your sins because you've ultimately sinned against God or just because you're caught?
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That is to say you may sin against your wife, but the ultimate sin is not against your wife, it's against God the
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Father. Remember Psalm 51? Did David sin against Uriah? Did David sin against Bathsheba?
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Did David sin against his army? Did David sin against Israel? Yes, but in comparison to God and his glory and these people,
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David said, against thee and thee only have I sinned and done evil in your sight.
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You could also ask yourself this question to help you with confession. Do I say the same rote prayer of confession every single time?
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Just kind of a rote deal. It's a formal thing. Just kind of get it out of the way.
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One said, some see confession wrongly as a kind of glib rattling off words by rote and God is a kind of slot machine, forgiving in a kind of mechanical auto way.
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This can be hollow, insincere, trivial, just going through the motions. It can misuse
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God and cheapen his forgiveness. It is no more serious than a casual transaction at a store as you pass by the cash register.
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If you're a Christian, you'll confess sins. And if you're struggling with assurance and confess sins, maybe you start going a little deeper in your time of confession.
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Prussian King Frederick the Great was touring a Berlin prison. Everybody falling down before him.
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I'm innocent, I'm innocent. He'd say to one man who didn't say anything, why are you here?
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Armed robbery, your majesty. Are you guilty? Yes, indeed, your majesty. I deserve my punishment.
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Looking at the jailer, Frederick said, release this guilty wretch at once. I will not have him kept in this prison where he will corrupt all the fine, innocent people who occupy it.
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You want your insurance to go up? I don't. I wish Massachusetts could get Geico, but that's another story.
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Do you want your assurance to go up? Number one, ask yourself the question, do I regularly confess my sins?
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Test number two. Put in the form of questions.
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Every Christian passes this to some degree or another. Again, there's baby steps, there's new maturity steps, there's struggling steps.
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You can regularly confess Jesus Christ as the son of God.
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Do you regularly confess, I can say it this way, all the truths that the Bible contains about Jesus?
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The Bible teaches something about Jesus. You say, I confess that, I say the same word. Look at chapter five, verse one, if you would, please.
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Chapter five, verse one. Christians don't just confess present tense sins, they also confess
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Jesus as Lord. It's not that I used to believe in him, I did believe in him, but I am liking
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Jesus right now. First John 5, one, whoever believes that Jesus is the
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Christ, the Messiah, the sin bearer that was to come is born of God, and whoever loves the
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Father loves the children born of him. Let me put it into an interpretive translation.
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Chapter five, verse one, First John. Whoever is believing in Jesus right now is born of God.
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Are you believing right now? It's just like John 3, 16. We sometimes mess it up because of our translators.
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For God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son that whoever, well, that's not in the translation.
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Here's the translation, and it matches up perfectly with the writer of First John. Oh, the same guy, the apostle
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John. For God so loved the world. For God loved the world in this way, that those believing in him should not perish.
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Present tense, are you believing? It's not past decision.
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Are you believing in Jesus right now? I think it would be better for us, instead of saying to people, when did you receive
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Christ? When did you repent? When did you become a Christian? Well, that's interesting, but that should be maybe conversation two.
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I think it would be better to talk to people like this. What evidence is there in your life today that shows you're a
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Christian? Right now, are you believing in Jesus right now?
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Look at First John 2, 23. Basically, what I'm doing is giving you an overview, kind of a jet tour.
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This will be part one, part two will be next. A jet tour of First John, but since it doesn't divide itself out like a book of Romans does, we are just jumping around to the five major themes.
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The second theme is confessing Jesus and all He has done and all that He is, all who
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He is. Verse 23 of chapter two, First John. Whoever denies the Son, see, this is the flip side.
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This is the contra. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father. The one who confesses, there it is again, the
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Son has the Father also. Chapter three, verse 23,
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First John 3, 23. And this is His commandment, that we believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ.
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That great confession that Peter had in Matthew chapter 16, Jesus said, who do you say that I am?
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And Jesus says, you are the Christ. That confession of Peter's, that the
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Spirit of God gave Peter, must be your confession. It must be if you want assurance, if you call yourself a
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Christian, you are believing in what Jesus said. Not just what Jesus said about Himself, but what the
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Old Testament prophets said, the Old Testament writings, the New Testament apostles. You say to yourself,
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I believe what the Bible says about Jesus. That kind of person shows himself to be a
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Christian. And it's funny because when I meet a new Christian, I don't have to do all kinds of critical, use critical apparatus to show them all the minor deviations in the
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Bible. I basically say this, did you know Jesus was virgin born? No, I didn't. See right here?
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Okay, I believe. Because the heart of the Christian says, I believe in God's Word.
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Look at 1 John 4, it's everywhere. It's like someone took a salt shaker, made big huge holes in the top, and then just shook out these themes in this text.
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1 John 4 .15, whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, abides in Him and He in God.
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Do you believe Jesus is God in the flesh? Do you believe that He existed in eternity past and then cloaked
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Himself with human nature? Well, I hope you do because 1
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John 4 .2 talks about Jesus as not just the Son of God, but the Son of Man. By this you know the
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Spirit of God. Chapter four, verse two. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
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And every spirit that does not confess, see those confess words? Jesus is not from God. Matter of fact, it's worse.
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If you're not confessing Jesus, agreeing with God about Jesus, this is the spirit of the what? Of the who?
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Antichrist. Of which you had heard is coming and now is already in the way.
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I believe Jesus is fully God. I believe He's fully man. Whatever the Bible says, I believe. That should give you assurance because Christians believe that way.
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Look at chapter four, verse 14. We believe He's the only Savior. If you believe you can get to heaven through Buddha, Allah, transcendental meditation,
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Hinduism, you name it. You ought not to have assurance. And here, 1 John 4, 14.
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And we have beheld and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
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Notice that? The Savior, not a Savior, not one of many. Not just for Christians. I'm in Santa Cruz.
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We're at Mount Hermon Conference Center, Christian Conference Center. Not the week we went to the conference where there was excellent
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Bible teaching from Dallas Seminary profs, but another conference. And I begin to talk to a couple of the ladies there because I asked to borrow a chair.
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And I said, well, I'd love to sit and read. And she's like, well, what are you reading? Because she didn't want to loan me the chair because she thought
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I just was going to use it for something else, but I really wanted to sit and read. I said, my back's killing me. I'd love to just sit and read.
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Well, why would you want to read? I thought, this is going to go nowhere. But I said, well, I'm a pastor and I'm reading a book.
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She's like, is it a book for pastors? Yeah, you know, do you want to see it? She said, I have some Bible questions for you since you're a pastor.
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Great. Guess I won't be getting much reading done today. Although I thought to myself,
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Jesus never thought that way. And, oh, I'm interrupted. People just came and interrupted him and he ministered to them.
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She said, when a Jew dies, who's not born again, do they go to heaven?
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I said, well, if you want my opinion, it's one thing. But if you'd like to know what the Bible teaches, and I assume you do, that's why you're asking.
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The Bible says that everybody was born a sinner based on the fall, based on their own sin.
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God's going to hold them accountable. And you can't get to heaven unless you're completely holy.
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And you can't make yourself holy because you're sinful and everything you do is tainted with sin. So someone has to grant forgiveness from the outside of you.
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And the only one who ever was perfect and bore sins of other people and was raised from the dead is Jesus. And so unless you believe in Jesus, the
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Messiah, to take away your sins, I don't care if you're a Jew or you grew up in a Christian family, you're going to go to hell.
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That's just what the Bible teaches. She couldn't believe that I said it. I thought, what kind of conference am
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I at? And I said, who are the Bible teachers this week at this conference? She said, oh, you know, that one really funny guy.
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That guy doesn't talk about the Bible much, but just tells all those jokes. You know,
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Houston, we have a problem. And I think I know what the problem was. So I finally, after all this, I went and I sat my chair over by the, actually by where the
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Arnold's kind of are for their lifeguard things, but it was right by the exit. When they came walking out, they walked all the way around away from me just so they wouldn't have to interact with a person who says, you know what,
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Jesus is the only Savior, no matter what. And in light of this book,
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I'd have to ask those ladies. Now, maybe you don't understand something. Maybe I didn't show you clearly enough in the
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Bible, but if you're a Christian, you'll believe A, the Bible. And if you're a Christian, B, you'll say,
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I might not agree with it. Society pluralistically doesn't agree with it at all, but there's one Savior.
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There's one mediator between God and man. It is only Jesus. And you'll say, what? And if you believe it in this kind of culture, your assurance should go up.
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You ought to believe if you're a Christian, the claims of Christ. He'll soon return.
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You should say, I believe that. And you just go through your mind and say, what do I believe about Christ? I believe
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He's God. I believe He had divine names. A divine honor was given to Him. He's got divine attributes. I believe it all.
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I believe He's omniscient, omnipresent. Everything that the Bible teaches, I believe it. I am believing in Jesus, His name,
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His work, His person right now. You know what John would say? That should give you assurance because only
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Christians believe it. You should believe in the death of Christ so much that you say
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He could forgive any sin and any sinner, even the worst. Nazi war was over.
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World War II was over. Nuremberg had a variety of men there.
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And a Lutheran pastor named Henry Garricky began to do chapel services for those
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Nazi prisoners who are awaiting their trial and one day would be executed.
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He started having services. Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, who was the chief of the
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German Armed Forces, he showed up. Fritz Sockel, he showed up. He was the Nazi head of labor and supply.
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Wilhelm Frick showed up. He was the minister of the interior. And week after week after week, he begins to preach the gospel.
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And some of the men, eight of the men, according to this account, responded positively to faith in Christ Jesus.
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Well, there was one other man who used to scorn this pastor, but now bent the knee to Christ Jesus, according to this author.
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Ribbentrop. It's now day for him to die, convicted as a war criminal.
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October 16th, 1946. The pastor, Pastor Garricky, came for him.
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Together, they walked down, according to this account, the corridor and then onto the scaffold. As the noose was placed over the former foreign minister's head, he was asked for last words.
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Unlike some, he did not say, "'Heil Hitler.' He said, "'I place all my confidence in the
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Lamb "'who made atonement for my sins. "'May God have mercy on my soul and into eternity.'"
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If you're a Christian, you believe just like when Jesus saved the thief on the cross, that his blood is powerful enough and precious enough to save the worst sinner at the worst time of his life, when everyone else would say, "'Kill him.'"
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You believe that, don't you? That's a sign you're a Christian. Let's pray. Father, I pray for the four categories of people today here.
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I pray for those that are Christians and know it that you just give them continuing sweet joy, knowing that they're a
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Christian and that they didn't save themselves, they can't unsave themselves. Father, for those who are
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Christians struggling with assurance, I pray you'd use these words from 1 John to help them get assurance that they might know.
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I pray for those who somehow think they're Christians, but aren't. I pray that you would not give them sleep, rest, slumber, until they've done business with you by your strength.
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And I pray for those who just have listened today and think this is a bunch of hogwash. Father, I pray that like that Nazi man and like Paul on the way to kill
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Christians, that you'd open their hearts and radically save them. In Jesus' name, amen.