3 Essential Christian Truths Part 2 (Trinity and Faith)

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Cultish: Looking Into YWAM (Youth With A Mission) - Part 4

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If you want to turn your Bibles to Romans chapter 5,

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Romans chapter 5, and starting in verse 1, hear now the word of the living and the true

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God, therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our

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Lord Jesus Christ. Thus far is the reading of God's holy and inspired word.

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Let's pray. Father, I pray that you'd bless today as we open your word and we learn from you.

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Lord Jesus, you are the one to whom we cling. We have no righteousness that avails or counts before the throne other than yours.

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We do not seek to establish our own righteousness but to cling to the righteousness of another.

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We want, as the inspired apostle says, to have a righteousness that comes from God through faith.

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I pray, Lord, today as we talk about three essential truths, that you'd bless the pastor, the teacher today, who in myself has no business being behind this pulpit, but because of you, because of your work,

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Lord, we have the ability to boast in you, to be called and forgiven and to be used by you.

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I pray that you would equip us, challenge us, even in the areas where we're not fully equipped, the areas where we thought we knew something but we realized we were not even able to articulate it or we discover that I'm not even sure

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I really saw that in your word. I pray that you would challenge us to be able to, Lord, herald your truth, to hold up your truth in this local church.

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I pray that we make much of Christ today, that people forget the pastor and remember what they learned from you.

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In Jesus' name, amen. So there it is, Romans 5, verse 1.

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If you don't know that verse, I encourage you to get to know it. Have it rooted into your hearts and minds and souls.

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This is an anchor. This is an anchor truth from God's word. It's a promise. Notice something, and we're going to go into detail here and sort of get into Romans 5 as part of the essential truths and how we're justified before God through faith in Christ alone.

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But I want you to notice what's there. At the start of it, Romans 5, verse 1, what's there?

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It says, therefore, therefore, because of everything I've said before this, because of that foundation, because of those truths, therefore, since we have been, that's past tense, justified, declared righteous by faith, we have, presently, peace with God through our

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Lord Jesus Christ. If your gospel does not bring peace, it's not the gospel.

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This is the gospel. I don't care about your baggage, where you come from, the contradictory things maybe going on in your own mind, maybe you think about your own sin and you think about your own failures.

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This is the result of the gospel. If you don't have this peace with God now, then you don't have

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Paul's gospel. You don't have Christ's gospel. You don't have the gospel of the inspired apostles.

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This is the result of the gospel itself. It's good news for a reason. Yes, it's good news of a kingdom.

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Yes, it's God's good news, but it's good news about salvation and forgiveness.

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That's meaningful within the Christian faith. I mean, that's the core part of what we believe. Like what's so great about Jesus, right?

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What's so great about Jesus? What makes Him stand alone in the history of religion and idolatry and paganism?

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What makes Christ so unique? Of course, we know about the uniqueness of His life and His person.

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We know about Him as God in the flesh, the incarnation. We know about that, all the amazing miracles of Jesus, the historic miracles of Jesus, Him rising from the dead.

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Yes, Jesus is unique in terms of the miracles and all that, but you realize, of course, other religions, though may not be able to demonstrate it, it's not the same historic authenticity, all of those things, they make claims about miracles too, you know, but what makes

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Jesus so unique is that He brings a gospel. He brings a gospel of peace, and the beautiful thing about the gospel and knowing

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Christ is that this is the end. This is the summary of the whole thing, is that if you have trusted in Jesus Christ, you have been declared righteous.

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You've gone into God's court, and He's made the declaration, I declare you righteous, even though in yourself, you're not.

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And if you're honest with yourself, and you know your own heart, and you know your own mind, you know your own life, and your own present, and your own past, you know that doesn't make any sense.

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How can a holy and righteous and good God, how can the perfect judge look into my life and say,

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I declare you righteous? And the answer is, because we're in Christ, we have the righteousness of another.

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That's Romans 5, through and through, two humanities, you're either in Adam or you're in Jesus. So who are you in?

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And you're only in Christ through faith. And so Paul makes this declaration, therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God presently.

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This is really important in terms of what no other man -made religion does. They don't even attempt it, because it's all about ultimately how they can work together with their gods or goddesses to somehow have enough righteousness or be clean enough to be accepted by those gods and goddesses.

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The Bible says it's not even possible, because God is truly God, and He's truly just, and He's truly holy, and He cannot merely just pass over sin.

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God has to deal with your sin. If He's going to be a just God, He has to respond to my sin. And the beautiful part of the gospel, what makes it such great news, is that God in Christ declares you righteous because of the righteousness of another.

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He substitutes everything on your behalf because of you, because of His love for you. And it ends in peace.

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Man -made religion doesn't give you this. It doesn't give you peace with God. At any moment, hostilities can break out again.

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One of the things very early on as I was learning from Pastor James was how he used to talk about this particular text in different dialogues with cultists or other religions,

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Roman Catholicism specifically, and he made the point, I remember it years ago,

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I remember it when I first heard it, when he was in debate with Rome on this issue.

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Rome's gospel does not bring peace. It will not bring peace. At any moment, the ceasefire can break apart and you and God can be at war again.

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It doesn't bring peace. You might go in and out of peace with God and His other religious systems your entire life, but the gospel is good news and because of the work of another, nothing to do with you at all.

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You come naked and you come empty -handed. You have nothing to offer. You come and receive the gift of eternal life and it leads to peace.

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Do you have peace today? Do you have peace today? Is that peace a peace that lasts, that's eternal?

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Because you see, this gospel, Paul's gospel, is not a temporary ceasefire between you and God. It is a gospel that brings true peace, and that's the glory of the message of the gospel.

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And that's part of these three essential truths we're talking about. I mentioned the last time we spoke,

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I mentioned the supremacy of the Word, the supremacy of the Trinity, and the supremacy of faith.

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Those three essential truths, and as I said at the beginning of service today, these are truths that Christians must let goods and kindred go, your mortal life also.

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These are three essential truths. You hold these tight. These are definitional to true biblical faith.

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And I mentioned last time that the apostles demonstrate throughout the New Testament itself that there's room within the unity of the faith and within the fellowships to simply say, do what you're doing to the glory of God.

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There's going to be disagreements amongst the body over things maybe God hasn't specifically talked about and you have to work through principles.

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But basically the apostle Paul has to deal with issues of conflict as this new church is forming together with all these different people from different backgrounds and different traditions.

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Now they're going to worship Jesus together in a fellowship and serve God together. They're going to be united together by faith, and they have all these differences.

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And Paul's essential thing he says to them is, hey, shut up, don't fight over it, be unified together.

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But where will the apostles demonstrate to us, where will they show that they will not tolerate a difference?

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Always on two points. Number one, God. And number two, the gospel itself.

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If you've got the wrong God, then you're worshiping an idol. It's the same as going to an altar of stone or stubble or hay.

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It's a false god. False gods can't see, speak, hear. They can't communicate. They are sovereign over nothing, and they cannot save.

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They cannot save. A false god, even by the name of Jesus Christ, will not save you.

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There are Jesus Christ's galore, galore in our culture today.

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They existed in the first century as well. The apostle Paul has to deal with it in 2 Corinthians chapter 11. He's worried about the church, that they would accept a different Jesus, a different gospel, and a different spirit.

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He said, you might even put up with these guys who are bringing these false Christs in, a different Jesus. The wrong

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God was something the apostles put their foot down. Their theological foot would go down over the wrong

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God. I read to you the apostle John in his very, very short letter. He basically is talking about the beginnings of Gnosticism.

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And it's just, maybe some people, what's the big deal? What's the point? The Gnostics were denying that God took on flesh because they had a perspective of flesh in the world, in the material realm, that it was evil, and God would never sully himself with that kind of thing.

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And so they would say, well, yeah, I believe in Jesus. Sure, he's the Messiah. But no, God didn't take on flesh because that's evil.

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John says, anybody teaching that is antichrist, antichrist. Don't even let them into your house.

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Don't let them into your fellowship. Don't let them disrupt your unity in the truth. And so the apostles demonstrate these are areas that you do not allow wiggle room.

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And of course, over the gospel, the apostle Paul demonstrates, just in Galatians, very early on, that this was a specific area where he was willing to say to people, even your behavior is giving the idea that the gospel is this way when it's really this way.

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So the apostle Paul confronts Peter because of his behavior that may give the wrong impression about the gospel.

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And of course, the apostle Paul in Galatians says what? He says in Galatians chapter 5 that he hopes these guys, they want to circumcise and add that one law, that one thing to the gospel.

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He says, Christ has become of no benefit to you. Whosoever of you attempts to be justified by law, you've fallen from grace.

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So he says, choose. You want to talk about Jesus and grace and all of that? But if you're going to add this thing to faith in order to be right with God, go the whole way, go the whole way of the law.

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He says that you now have abandoned grace. And of course, the apostle Paul uses the serrated edge, and he says, it's been sanitized, of course, in many modern

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English translations, these guys, I hope they go all the way and cut themselves off.

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It's not very meek and mild there, or sweet, right? But he's serious. That's how serious it is.

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And so we talked about the supremacy of the word, the supremacy of the trinity, the supremacy of faith, and I offered you a challenge.

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Can you defend sola scriptura? Can you defend it? Not do you have it on a t -shirt that you bought from reformedt -shirts .com.

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Is that really a place? I think it probably is. Right? I got it on cups. I got the solas on some cups, right?

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Reformed. Listen, I believe early, maybe the last decade, tons of people, I think, joined the reform clique because it seemed cool, right?

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You could wear plaid shirts, have long beards, and drink IPAs or something. Everyone's like, I like that crowd, right?

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Sounds cool. You can have a cigar in the reform community. Sign me up, right? Whatever it was, people joined the reform community.

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And you see that it doesn't take very long for this person to apostatize or just abandon the reform community.

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They didn't understand in the first place, but they had the mug. They got the t -shirt, right? They went to ReformCon or whatever, right?

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They have those sort of commitments that aren't real commitments. I don't really know why. I kind of like this community.

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This seems maybe cool or like a neat brand. If you're reformed because of anything like that, you're not reformed.

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And you shouldn't be reformed for any of those reasons at all. You need to believe in Sola Scriptura because Jesus did.

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You need to believe in Sola Scriptura because Paul did. Can you defend it? Do you know why?

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We're not going to do a whole lesson on that again today. It's in the last series or sermon. So if you want to go watch that, go watch it at Apologia Studios on YouTube or Facebook to get that.

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I want to talk just for a moment about how important this is, especially today. You need to be able to defend this. And you need to know why.

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Not just for debate, brothers and sisters. Not just for fights in coffee shops or on Facebook, which I hope you're not spending a lot of time doing.

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You don't want to know this truth so that you can look like the hot shot theologian who knows how to crush people who believe differently.

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You need to believe this truth because it's the very reference point of your certainty. How do you know what you know?

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How do you know? And this goes into everything. It goes into everything. It will bleed into your marriage. It will bleed into your relationship with your kids.

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It'll bleed into your relationship with your church. It'll bleed into your relationship with your job. It'll bleed into your relationship with government when they give tyrannical decrees and try to engage in totalitarianism.

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Why do we say defiance to tyranny is obedience to God? Because we recognize that God has spoken in history.

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It's distinctive of the Christian faith. God has spoken. And therefore, I know,

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I have certainty because He's spoken. We have to recognize in days like ours, or many of you are losing your jobs because of wicked decrees from the top, you have to recognize, why resist that?

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Why not just go along? And Christians have to recognize that God has spoken. If there is no transcendent word above all of us and above every human government, then that means that government is

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God. Government becomes God. Government acts like God. Government gives decrees like God.

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How come Christians in history have resisted and rejected totalitarian governments?

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Why? Because we recognize there's another king, Jesus. Don't you know that was actually the accusation against the early

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Christians, of course, right? As they're bringing in there in Acts 17 and they're complaining about them, they're saying they're going clean contrary against the decrees of Caesar.

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They're saying there's another king, Jesus. And you see the early apostles, of course, engage in conflict where they're told to do things, stop preaching in this name, stop teaching in this name.

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And they say what? We must obey God rather than what? Because they had a transcendent word.

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They know there's two voices. There's the voice of God and there's the voice of this guy. There's the voice of God and there's the voice of this religious leader.

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There's the voice of God and there's the voice of Caesar. And I recognize, of course, that God has created authorities.

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He's created these areas. But ultimately, I know what God has spoken in history. And when your word contradicts

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His word, you are to be rejected. And it doesn't matter what the cost is, you must be rejected.

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Brothers and sisters, this truth of sola scriptura, what's inside of it, a revelational epistemology,

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God has spoken and that's how I know is going to be essential in the days to come.

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It's going to be essential. Why are you doing what you're doing? Why do you believe what you believe?

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And ultimately, sola scriptura, yes, we say it's the sole infallible rule of faith for faith and practice for the church.

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Of course, we recognize that that's the test. We say, what does this guy say? Does it line up with a certain word of God?

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You're testing all things by Scripture as you're commanded to. We recognize that. But sola scriptura, in the heart of it is

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God has spoken and that's how I know. So, the essence of sola scriptura will go across your entire life.

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Why do you call the cops on the guy you see stealing someone's car stereo? We don't even have car stereos anymore, right?

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That's old, that's old school, right? Why do you call the cops on a guy burglarizing a house? Like you know the theft is like wrong or something, right?

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Like it's an absolute. Who says? Why are you complaining about slavery? What's wrong with kidnapping and enslaving people?

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According to the Christian worldview, we have an absolute standard which does away with slavery in the world everywhere we go.

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But who says kidnapping somebody, enslaving them is wicked and wrong? If you challenge atheists and humanists on this point, they'll say, well, you know, no, it's not absolute.

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You know, it's just sort of like we've decided as a culture that we can do these things. Fantastic. Tell that to Hitler. His culture decided a lot of things.

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And so did Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot and all the rest. If it's up to just the culture and society to just determine what is right or wrong, then right and wrong changes every 40 years.

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Oh, doesn't that sound like where we're living today? Doesn't it sound interesting?

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We abandon God's word. We abandon Christ as the king over this nation. We abandon his transcendent law.

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And what do you get? We don't know that a boy is a boy or a girl is a girl. We don't know what marriage is. We don't know what's just or unjust.

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Things change constantly. Just even in the last two years, things are changing dramatically. Why? Because we do not have a nation that stands on a transcendent word.

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How do I know? Because God says. That's how I know. So this issue of the supremacy of the word has to do with God has spoken.

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Here it is. You hear it a lot from us. It is not just simply to put on a t -shirt. It's not simply just part of our crew.

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We like to use this. It is a meaningful question. By what standard?

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By what standard? You're making moral claims. How do you know? By what standard? You're telling me that this is right and this is wrong.

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This is up. This is down. By what standard? How do you know that? It's just your preference. You feel like it's true.

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Try to go on the street to do evangelism with the Latter -day Saints in our community. Try to do it with a lot of emotional arguments about your experiences and all that you've experienced with God.

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Try to tell them, you don't understand. I've experienced God in my life in tremendous ways. I had this experience and that experience.

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What are they going to say back to you? Well, I've prayed about the Book of Mormon and I've had a burning in my bosom.

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And then, of course, you get the next religious guy who says the same thing. You don't understand. I've felt closer to God than I ever have in my life by being in this temple or in this service or going to Mass.

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I've never felt closer to God in my life. Fine. Let's have you all fill a stadium up and start comparing stories about your religious experiences.

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How do I know what's true? By what standard? And from the very beginning in the

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Garden of Eden, I tried to demonstrate this last time I spoke. From the Garden of Eden, it was, this is the voice of God.

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He gives a word. He has a self -attesting authority. He gave them a charge.

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And then along comes the serpent who says, hath God said? Did God really say?

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Now, what was, and this is, I'll end on this point. What was the, what were Adam and Eve duty -bound to in that moment in the

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Garden? What were they duty -bound to? When God had said, and the serpent comes along and tries to deceive

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Eve by his craftiness, as Paul says, what were they bound to?

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How should they have reasoned through this conflict of voices? I've got the voice of God. I've got the voice of this

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Satan character over here. Two different voices. How should they have reasoned through that? Should they have just said, well, let's put it to the test?

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Or should they, should she have obeyed God based upon some other principle? Like, nah, I'm not really hungry right now.

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I guess I'll walk away from the tree. Nah, I might get fat when I walk away from the tree. Whatever the case may be, by what standard ought they have to actually engage that day?

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And the answer is, God said. We don't like that.

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Oh man, people, people today do not like that, right? How can we believe that?

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Well, because God says. Politicians, especially today, that profess faith in Jesus and engage in, quote -unquote, conservative issues, do not want to say, because God says in his word, we've changed as a nation.

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Because it wasn't very long ago when this nation was given these great graces and gifts from God, people who were at the top and in leadership used to swear allegiance to the triune

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God of Scripture. You had to be a believing, baptized Trinitarian Christian to be in some political offices.

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And they had no problem quoting Scripture to make their case. And so the question is, by what standard?

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Next is the supremacy of the Trinity. We talked about, if you have the wrong

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God, it's idolatry. It doesn't even mean, it doesn't even matter if you use the same name.

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It doesn't matter if you use Christian terminology to give us a false God. It's meaningless.

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Muslims have a Jesus Christ. They say they believe in Jesus Christ. Peace be upon him.

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They believe in him. A completely different Christ. Didn't die for your sins. Not God incarnate.

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That's a false Christ. Can't save you. But they say they believe in Christ. The Mormons have a different version of Christ than Jehovah's Witnesses do.

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Satan's brother, or the first and greatest creation of Jehovah God. Which is it? We have different Christs in Christian science, with the

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Rosicrucians, and all down the line you'll see different Christs. The Bible actually tells us that Christ can be known.

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God's Word is so clear that you can say to somebody who's preaching a false Christ, that is not

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Christ. This is God's revelation about himself. This is the true Christ, and the only Christ that can save.

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John 14, 6 says, I am the way, the truth, the life. No man comes to the

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Father but by me. The supremacy of the Trinity is that if you have the wrong God, you have idolatry.

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If you have the wrong God, this is another important element, you have no basis for certainty in terms of moral claims and who's in charge.

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Follow me on this, because this is actually very, very important. Take for a moment, say, well, we've been talking about it, so it's in our area, let's do this one.

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Let's say that you say, let's choose Joseph Smith's God. Let's choose the

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God of Mormonism. Can we have certainty there? Well, let's try it.

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Let's go one step above. Well, why are you doing this? Well, because Elohim, the

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God of this planet, told me that this is the right thing to do. Question, how does he know?

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Didn't he used to be a sinner like you? A man who progressed and sinned and ultimately became a

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God one day? P .S., doesn't he have a God before him? So isn't there a God before him who has authority as well?

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So which authority do I believe? Oh, by the way, didn't that God have a God before them? Who's the head

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God? Is there a head God? Who's the ultimate authority here? Because there's a lot of different voices here. Who do I believe?

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Who do I trust? So paganism or polytheism doesn't actually give you a grounding for certainty.

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Only the God of these scriptures gives you an ultimate, because this

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God is eternal. Because this God is the first and the last. Besides him, there is no

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God. This God is the beginning and the end. This God says, there is no God formed before me, neither shall there be after me.

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He says, is there a God besides me? Indeed, there is no other God. I know not one. This God yields to nobody.

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There is no God above him, below him, before him, behind him. He is the standard.

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It is his character that's the standard of righteousness and holiness. God is love.

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And so what's the standard in scripture? Love does no harm to its neighbor. So I don't do harm to my neighbor because God is love.

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And I'm made in his image. Well, what's that look like? And then we see in his law, what's his character like?

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What's love like? This is the ultimate standard. If you have the wrong God, not the triune

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God of scripture, you have no basis for certainty about moral claims or who's in charge.

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Now, let's start with a definition made by somebody I kind of like in the forgotten trinity.

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I memorized this, I think, when I was 18. Within the one being called

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God, there exists eternally three co -equal and co -eternal persons, namely the

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Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Do you have that memorized? You should, because when somebody asks you, what do you believe about God?

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What do you believe about the trinity? And maybe they have a misunderstanding of what Christians historically have taught regarding the trinity, or they have a misunderstanding in their own mind about what that looks like in terms of what does scripture say about that.

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It's good to have a solid working definition you can work through with scripture in terms of definitional.

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Why? Wrong God? Idolatry. Wrong God? No salvation. So, within the one being called

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God, there exists eternally three co -equal and co -eternal persons, namely the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

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So, how's this start? Let's put you to the test. You ready? I'm going to call you by name, all right?

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Just kidding. So, you woke up real fast, didn't you? Okay. Start with the foundations.

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When we talk about the triune God of scripture, where does it start? It starts with the constant claim of scripture that there is only one true and living

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God. One God. And that's it. Now, stop for a second. You don't have to answer out loud, but this is where I'm going to challenge you as your brother and as your pastor.

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I'm going to challenge you on this. If I was to ask you to defend that truth that there's only one God, can you do it?

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If I was to ask you right now, give me a verse right now. In your mind right now, give me the verse. Can you do it?

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Okay. You gave me one, maybe. Let's try this again. Give me a second verse that you understand in context, you know where the

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Bible says it, and you can go right to it, and you can explain it. Do you have a second verse for me that says there's only one

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God? All right. Now, you're being challenged now.

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Well, okay, maybe that's just two different proof texts. Do you have another, please? Do you have three portions of scripture that you can go to and you can actually say to somebody, no,

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God says here in his word clearly that he's the only God. Do you have it memorized? Is it in your heart?

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Can you tell people this is the God that you worship? This is the God that you say you've dedicated your life to, that you serve, that you raise your children to serve.

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Can you tell people how you know there is only one God? How about this? How about a fourth verse?

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And can you do it in context? How about a fifth verse? Now, with this particular one, we can go all day long.

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I could sit for the rest of the series here, a sermon up here, and say, how about number 22? How about 56? Do you know?

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Can you do it? Now, I'm not trying to belittle you, brothers and sisters. I'm trying to challenge you because the days ahead of us are looking very, very difficult, and we need to know what we believe, why we believe it.

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We need to be able to defend it. Can you defend your belief in the Trinity? How does it start? The belief of the

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Trinity begins with strict monotheism. There is only one true and living

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God. That's what the Bible teaches. You can do Isaiah 43 .10, Isaiah 44 .6, Isaiah 44 .8.

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You can go through the scriptures and demonstrate. The Bible says there is only one true and living God.

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Can you do it? Do you have those verses memorized? Next, Scripture teaches us that there is a distinction in persons.

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The Bible tells us there's only one God, and yet we see in Scripture that the

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Father is God. The Son is called God. The Holy Spirit is called

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God. And somehow we learn in Scripture over and over that Jesus is not the Father.

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The Father is not the Son. The Son is not the Holy Spirit. There are three distinct persons within this one being of God.

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And that's clear all the way throughout Scripture. You see a plurality of persons, and yet a distinction between those persons.

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And this is vitally important because in the history of the church, God has allowed heretics to rise up and plague the church.

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So we get to the Bible to respond with the Word of God against errors concerning the nature and the persons in the

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Godhead. Jesus is not the Father. Jesus is not praying to himself.

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Jesus is not sending himself. It's very important. So do you know where to go to show that?

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Can you demonstrate that the Bible teaches that the Father is called God, the Son is called God, the Holy Spirit is called

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God, and yet these are three distinct, co -equal, co -eternal persons. Can you demonstrate that?

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Because there's people going door to door in all these neighborhoods. Well, actually, the Jehovah's Witnesses now are just writing letters.

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Have you gotten one of those yet? They're apparently highly fearful of COVID, so they don't go door knocking anymore.

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So they write. I mean, I think Jehovah's Witnesses are walking around town with hands like this right now because they've gone from knocking on doors to writing letters.

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My brother -in -law got one of the letters in the mail, handwritten out, long, you know, full -page letter, doesn't know him from Adam, and she's just handwritten letter.

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I mean, I can't imagine what their hands feel like after doing all this work, but they're going door to door saying that Jesus Christ is the first creation of Jehovah God, that he didn't exist eternally in face -to -face, intimate relationship from all eternity with the

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Father. That's what they're telling people. Do you know how to actually refute that? Can you defend the truth? You're going to need to.

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And you walk with Christ as you know him, and as God calls you to give all people a reason for the hope that's within you.

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So go to the text here in terms of two. I'll give you two. These are really, really important. You need to have in your toolbox, in terms of the distinction in persons and the deity of Christ.

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We can't do an entire sermon today on the Trinity. Go read the Forgotten Trinity, and I want to challenge you with these truths today.

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That's what today is for. John chapter one, verse one. I hope you just have this memorized. You didn't even need to go there, right?

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In the beginning was the? And the word was? And the word was

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God. Very good. Isn't that beautiful? Somehow that's just so beautiful and easy. Just Christians just get it.

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Good. We need it. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

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He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him. That's Jesus.

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And without him was not anything made that has been made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

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The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was

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John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him.

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He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. The true light which gives light to everyone was coming into the world.

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He was in the world, and the world was made through him. Yet the world did not know him.

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He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

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And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. Go down to verse 18 now.

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Beautiful. No one has ever seen God, the Father, the only

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God, the unique and one of a kind God, who is at the

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Father's side. He has made him known. So if you just had John chapter 1, verses 1 through 18, what are you getting?

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Jesus is fully God. He created everything in existence. He has always existed, and he is at the

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Father's side. And the text says, in the beginning was the word.

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In archaean halagos. I'll leave it to Pastor James to explain what all that means, except to say, you go back and back and back and back and back with no reference point to stopping.

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Go forever ago. And Jesus was already there. So much for being created at a point in time.

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No, Jesus is eternal. The same yesterday, today, and forever.

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Are you seeing it? And it says, and the word was with God. Prostanteon.

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He was toward God. Face to face. An intimate relationship with the Father. And the word was

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God. What are you getting there? The distinction in persons between the Father and the Son. And yet, Jesus is fully

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God. And Jesus has always existed. Do you know these things?

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Can you defend these truths? Because listen, this is the God you worship. Is this just ritual?

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Right? Is this just something you do, a community? You're comfortable with? Or is this the God that you worship? That you know? That you love?

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That you long for? That you grow in? That you share with others? Do you know these truths?

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Are they rooted into your soul? Next, in terms of the distinction in persons, I'm doing this again today to challenge you, but also to point to the clarity of Scripture in these points.

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In John chapter 14, verse 15,

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Jesus says, If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the

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Father, and He will give you another helper to be with you forever.

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Even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows

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Him. You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.

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Interesting, when people try to speak about the Holy Spirit of God, like He's a force, or sort of a feeling, or something like electricity.

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How does Jesus talk about the Holy Spirit? He. He will do this.

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Him. But notice this particular point of this chapter. This is,

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I think, beautiful. In verse 25,

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Jesus says, These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you, but the helper, the

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Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.

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What are you getting in Scripture? You're seeing the foundation of strict and absolute monotheism. There is only one

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God, none before, none after. Even before the mountains were brought forth forever ago, He is God.

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He's the eternal God. First, last, beginning, and the end. Not even knowing another God. So only one God, right? Yeah, I think only one

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God. Only one God. Right? And yet Jesus comes in. He is God in the flesh.

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And when He speaks about the Father, He's speaking about the Father. And when He speaks about the Holy Spirit, as a distinct person and a

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He from Himself. But in this section, look what you have here. But the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the

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Father will send in my name. Notice the distinction. He, the Holy Spirit, will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.

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Jesus makes a distinction between Himself and the Father. And the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And He refers to the

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Holy Spirit as Him and He. And if you read the book of Acts, you see that the Holy Spirit of God speaks to God's people.

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Tells them what to do. Speaks. And lying, in Acts chapter 5, to the

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Holy Spirit is not lying to men, but lying to God. That's from the apostle

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Peter. So, the supremacy of the Trinity. Essential.

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We need to know the God that we worship. He is, after all, the God that we worship.

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And He's the God we're going to spend all eternity with. What is the use of all of this if you don't know

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Him? If you don't know Him, and you don't love these things. Here's the truth, listen.

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If these truths are not rooted up into your mind and your soul, you will easily abandon them.

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Apostasy happens generally. Of course, people are not truly saved in the first place. They went out from us in order to show they were never really of us.

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But apostasy takes place, truly, you see it all the time, with all these people today deconstructing, right?

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I'm deconstructing. We have famous old Christian musicians falling into apostasy, embracing atheism.

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You have famous pastors falling into apostasy and deconstructing. And it's amazing to me, when you hear them describing their experience and trying to actually explain

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Christian doctrine, you wonder, how did this person get by for so long, deluding everyone into thinking they were a

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Christian? Why? Because when they describe what they believed as a Christian, you go, yeah, that's not

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Christian orthodoxy. And we don't believe that. It was amazing. Actually, we were in Utah.

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Pastor James is a little crazy. He will go somewhere and schedule a debate that most people would probably prep for six months and take a six -month hiatus and break.

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He'll book them back to back to back to back. And so we had a public debate with some atheists.

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He had another public discussion. And in the final night, I always forget the guy's name. What's his name?

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You don't remember either, OK? What's Alma? Was it Alma? No, no, no, no.

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The guy that was the ex... Lee Baker. Got it,

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OK. Lee Baker. He was a famous ex -Mormon.

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He was a Latter -day Saint, Utah, and all of a sudden professed his faith in Jesus. And it was like off and running.

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Apparently, apparently, every time I hear the word apparently now, I think of that kid. OK. Apparently, as soon as he made a profession of faith in Jesus, people like evangelicals in the area were like, this is phenomenal.

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We have an ex -Mormon here. Can you teach us? And he was off to the races. I guess he spent just years and years and years teaching

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Christians, going on the radio, talking about Jesus and the Trinity and Sola Scriptura.

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And Pastor James gets in a debate with the guy because now he's an apostate. Now he's a Jew? He calls himself some kind of Jew.

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He says Jesus is a false prophet and all this stuff now. But what's amazing in that debate, it was so crystal clear.

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It was embarrassing at times. You were like, this guy never understood the Trinity. He never understood

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Sola Scriptura. And he said he taught Sola Scriptura on the radio. And he was clueless as to what it was.

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Amazing. And you look at these people and their stories of deconstruction and wonder, like, how did you ever get like this?

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And of course, we know God opens the eyes of the blind. God gives hearts to people so they believe. He raises the dead to life.

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God is sovereign over salvation. But in terms of, like, the means of getting there to apostasy, you realize these people never knew the truth in the first place.

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They couldn't defend the Trinity. They couldn't defend, like, how they know the Bible is God's word, why they believe it's true. They couldn't defend why they believe that Scripture is the sole infallible rule of faith and practice for the church.

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They couldn't do it. I am desperately trying to protect you from apostasy. If you know the truth, truly, and have true saving faith, and you know why you believe what you believe,

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I believe that you can be protected from apostasy in many ways. And finally, the supremacy of faith.

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The supremacy of faith. Here's a point, and this is true. All man -made religion exalts human work, human merit, or obedience as the defining thing in terms of how

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I have peace with my God. Give me the religion, and you'll find it. You see it in Islam.

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You see it in Roman Catholicism. You see it in Mormonism. You see it in the

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Jehovah's Witnesses. All human beings, no matter the

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God, no matter the system, attempt to find peace or reconciliation somehow within their system with their

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God through their cooperating with grace to produce good works so that they'll be acceptable, or it's just straight away,

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I've got to be righteous in myself and acceptable in myself through my good deeds and through my life of obedience so that this

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God will somehow accept me and forgive me. It's all human religion attempts to ultimately highlight and exalt human performance and will to somehow find acceptance with their

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God. Doesn't matter the God, doesn't matter the system. Every man -made religion does that. The gospel is distinct amongst the religions of men throughout all history in terms of this gospel is a gospel that gives glory to God and to God alone.

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It is His power. It is His plan. It is His work from beginning to end. Now, here's why religion despises the biblical gospel, because there's no glory in it for you.

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Ever. Never. This is a gospel that is a story of something that God does, that He gets the praise for,

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He is glorified for. You're the recipient of the grace, and throughout the halls of heaven for all eternity, everybody will be extolling

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Him, His majesty, His glory, and His work, and you will get no praise and no glory for it at all.

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Are you okay with that? I am. That is the substance of the gospel.

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There's a debate, a famous debate. If you haven't heard it, you should hear it. It's between Dr. Gordon Stein and Dr.

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Greg Bonson. Some of you guys are like, what, what? Okay. It's a famous one. It's epic, right?

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It's one of my favorite debates ever. You can listen to it a hundred times, and every time you'll learn something new.

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Now, I'm not going to go over the whole debate today and all the amazing things you could learn through that debate, except this point. When Gordon Stein was being challenged on his explanation of morality and why anybody could say this is good or this is not, or why are you asking bags of protoplasm to do good things and to be good to one another?

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Who cares what the descendants of bacteria do to one another, right? I mean, that's what's being challenged of the atheists there.

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Like, why? I mean, you're in the image of God, so I know why you're doing it. You're suppressing the truth, but I want to know why you think that we should be good to one another or do good things.

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And one of the things that Gordon Stein really stuck with me, said really stuck with me. Not only was his answer completely confusing and muddled and, you know, meaningless, but he said something.

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Go listen to that debate. You'll see it's near the end of the debate. He says, and in an atheist ethic or an atheist system, he says, when you do good things, you get the credit for them.

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That's what he said. I thought to myself, here it is, the religion of men.

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I'll do these good things because hopefully I'll get the credit for it. I did this. I went to mass.

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I did penance. I did this. I went to the temple. I did temple ceremonies. I did baptism for the dead.

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God, can I please be okay? Will you look at my lifelong record and just please give me some mercy?

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But look at all the good that I've done. You know, my robe is, it's a little stained.

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I mean, it's a little ragged. There's, it's tattered and there's some holes in it and some blood from people that I hurt and there's some tears there that all the injustices that I, but can you please see there's a little white.

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It's a little clean. All man -made religion is like that. Christians don't want that robe.

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Yours, your sin, your past, your present, your future. We want to be hiding in Jesus, covered in his robes of righteousness.

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I don't want the father ever to look at my life and my record as a basis of my peace with him.

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I want him to look to Jesus. Amen. I want him to hear the words of his son.

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It is finished. That is the gospel that brings peace.

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It is finished. It's done. Do you stop and think about that for a minute now in terms of like what we did at the beginning?

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Romans 5 .1. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Do you ever think about that? Like, how come we can say that and rejoice in that truth every single day with all the trials, all the difficulties, all the evil around us, all of our own sins?

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You know, why, how come you can say that? Because it's finished. There's nothing left.

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Ever. You remember that when you fail, brothers and sisters. You remember that when you have a bad night with your spouse, when you're filled with anger and jealousy or bitterness against another brother or sister in Christ, or you fail completely with lust.

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You remember that. When God brings you to a place of repentance, we don't sulk for five days as a

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Christian when brought to confession and repentance because somehow we've got to come climbing back to God, crawling, becoming righteous enough.

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Okay, now he accepts me again. Don't do that. You're accepted because it is finished.

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It's done. There's nothing left. You don't go into God's presence sulky like that, trying to climb your way back to peace with God.

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We have peace with God. Why? It's finished. It's finished.

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But do you know, can you defend that? So let's do it. Test again, right?

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Again, I don't want to belittle any of you. I want you to answer in your mind. Okay?

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I want you to quote in your own mind. If I was to say to you, prove to me that the

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Bible teaches that you are justified by faith in Christ alone, apart from any work.

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Got it? Okay, hold it. All right, now give me number two.

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Can you do it? Again, I'm not trying to make you feel bad or belittle you. I'm trying to challenge you as your brother.

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I want to challenge you. How about another one? Ready? Number three.

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Do you have a third verse for me? And not just a proof text, but do you know where it's at?

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And do you know what's said above and below, so that you can explain that you're not just proof texting, just ripping text out of the

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Bible, making it say something that you want it to say? The cults do that. Christians shouldn't live that way.

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This is God's Word and God's revelation, and we need to handle it like it is. Okay, that was three, right?

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Let's say that we are forgiven or justified, made right with God through faith and faith alone. Can you give me, what did

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I say? Three, right? Is that three? Can you give me four? This is another one of those fairly easy ones in terms of this truth is given over and over and over and over and over again.

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Can you give me four? How about this? Five. Can you give me five?

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Brothers and sisters, we need to know what we believe and why we believe it. Let's go to a quick text, just in terms of making sure that we know where to go to find these truths.

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It's all over the New Testament, but go to Romans chapter three. I'm just going to give you the burst, because this is the section

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I want you to be in. Memorize it. Memorize it. Can you memorize three chapters of Scripture?

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Yes. Yes. And by the way, I said at the beginning of Romans 5 .1, therefore, having been justified, we have peace, right?

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So you know that. Well, the therefore is there for a reason, because something was said before it that led up to him saying, and in summary, you have peace with God, because all this is true.

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So Romans 1 through 3 is Paul basically establishing that everybody knows God. They spread the truth of God in righteousness.

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They answer for all the idols in the world, is that no one wants the true God, because we're such hostile rebels that we create our own gods, and we worship them in place of God, because we don't want them in our knowledge.

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Every human being is going around like this in a fallen state. I don't want to see.

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I don't want to know. I don't want them in my thinking. And Paul demonstrates that the Jew and the Gentile are in the same place, completely same place.

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Even the Jew who has the Torah in their hands is in the same place. They're not justified because they have the possession of the law of God.

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They'd have to actually do what's in the law if that was their standard, and they don't. You tell people not to lie, you lie.

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You tell people not to steal, you steal, right? So they're not safe because they own the

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Bible, and they're Jewish. And in Romans 3, Gentiles too. So what is it? Everyone's in the same place.

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All have sinned, fall short of the glory of God. There is none righteous. No, not one. No God seeker.

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All of humanity lumped into one atom, fallen humanity.

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And so Paul's point in Romans 3 is after he says, this is the condition of every human being, he says in verse 19, chapter 3, now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

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For by works of the law, no flesh, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.

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What's the law do? Closes your mouth, shows your sin. Listen, you want to take

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God's perfect law and say, all right, let's see how I'm doing. James in James 2 says, whosoever should keep the whole law and yet stumble in one point, he's guilty of all of it.

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Right? You break one point, you've just now broken, you're a transgressor of the law. You're guilty.

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And God's law is a reflection of his own character. How are you doing? Think about your life and your mind.

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How are you doing? You want to use the law to be justified, to stand in God's court and say, all right, let's go ahead and get that perfect law out that reflects your perfect holy character, and let's put my good deeds on the table and see how we're doing.

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That's not going to last a second. We're toast. We're done.

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We're condemned. We're judged. We're guilty. And that's why Paul says, by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin, and this is the glory.

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But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe, for there's no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified.

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That is courtroom language. It is forensic. It is legal. It is courtroom.

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Proof is Romans chapter 8 very clearly. Go read it later in terms of God as the judge.

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He is already declared righteous. We won't do that right now. You are justified by his grace as a gift.

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By his grace as a gift. It wouldn't be inappropriate to say very reverently,

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Paul, did you just stutter? Because by his grace as a gift is like saying it's a gift gift.

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What kind of gift is it? It's a gift gift. A what gift? It's a gift gift. It's that kind of gift.

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By his grace as a gift. If your gospel is not like that, it's no gospel at all.

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It saves nothing. Nobody. By his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom

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God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by what?

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Faith. That's how we receive this gift. That's how you receive the work of Christ on your behalf.

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Through faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over previous sins.

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It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

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There is the point I was talking about earlier. I don't even like to use the word circle back any longer.

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Some of you know why. Okay. I said at the beginning, this is the true

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God. He can't simply as a holy and righteous judge say to people, yeah, I really like you.

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I'm just going to let your sins and injustices go, right? Ah, you know, you really tried. You put in the old college try.

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I'm, you know, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna forget all those things. That's a fake God. Can you imagine a judge in a courtroom doing such a thing?

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Like standing before criminals who are like guilty. They profess to be guilty. There's eyewitness footage and they're just guilty.

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And can you imagine a judge standing on the bench saying, yeah, you know, guys, you made, you made a good argument. Prosecution.

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Very good. You got all this evidence. You got the blood. You got the gloves. You got, yeah, the eyewitness footage.

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Yeah, all that good. But you know what? He's nice. I like him. He's got a great sense of humor.

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And you know, he's only bad sometimes. If you look at other parts of his life, there are punctuated moments where he's kind of likable.

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So on that basis, I say we let him go. Every person in the courtroom would say, excuse me, you have a duty to be just.

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You must, for the sake of the victims, be just. And this is what Paul is saying here.

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God has been merciful and gracious, passing over former sins. But now at the present time, demonstrating his righteousness so that he would be just.

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And the justifier, the one who has faith in Jesus. What's that mean? God doesn't let anybody's sins go and just say,

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I'll pretend they didn't happen. No, he's a just God. And he says, I can't just pretend they didn't happen.

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So what I'll do is instead of punishing you, the guilty, I will give it all to my son.

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He'll take all of it. He'll take the guilt. He made him who knew no sin.

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To be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. This is the glory of the

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Christian worldview in the gospel, brothers and sisters. Romans chapter 3, verse 27.

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Then what becomes of our boasting? Ah, there it is. If it's you're rotten, you're wicked, you're a sinner, and you can't do it through law, you're just guilty.

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And God does it as a gift. Paul's point is, so what becomes of our boasting?

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It is excluded. By a law, by what kind of law?

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By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

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That's Paul, an inspired apostle with authority saying what?

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We, we conclude that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

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That's the apostolic message. Does yours fit that? Because that's the apostolic message.

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That's what they were preaching. Or is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles also?

01:00:05

Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one who will justify the circumcised by law. And the uncircumcised by faith, and the uncircumcised by faith, and the uncircumcised by faith, and the uncircumcised through faith.

01:00:12

That's Jews and Gentiles. He says, do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means.

01:00:18

On the contrary, we uphold the law. Tell that to every modern -day

01:00:23

Western evangelical who says the law of God is irrelevant in a new covenant. Not according to Paul.

01:00:29

You are not saved by your works. God saves you as a gift gift, by his grace, as a gift, and you are saved apart from works.

01:00:39

And because of that, you establish the law. Because I'm saved,

01:00:44

I establish the law. The law does matter in our day. And I'd say a lot of the cultural decay around us is because Christians in this most recent generation or two did not believe that the law had any bearing in the world today.

01:00:59

So they didn't speak prophetically to the world around them. They said, we're saved by grace, not by works.

01:01:05

So that law is just this big oppressive, you know, system over there. How you doing? How'd that work out for you in 2021?

01:01:12

Not so well. Finally, I'm just going to read through here. I want you to hear it because you've got to be able to defend it.

01:01:18

I want you to know one section of the explanation of the apostle that leads to Romans 5 .1.

01:01:24

What then should we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.

01:01:33

For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.

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Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. Get this and you will get a devastating critique of all religions that ape

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Christianity, but then end up being a works salvation system. Here's what he says. How about Abraham?

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He's the forefather. God promised to do all this through Abraham. How was he justified? And what is it?

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Abraham believed God and it was credited to him, counted to him as righteousness. So here's the thing.

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Ready? If you don't have that kind of Abraham faith, you don't have biblical faith.

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Well, what was it? Well, Abraham didn't deserve this relationship with God.

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He offered God nothing. God himself walks through the part of animals. So Abraham was not a part of that.

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This was before he offered his son Isaac on the altar, and it was hundreds of years before the law was given.

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So what's Abraham have to offer God? Doesn't even have the Torah yet. All he has is the promise of God that says,

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Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. If you don't have an Abraham kind of faith for salvation, you don't have biblical faith.

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You're not a child of Abraham. You say, well, what did he do? He believed God. Yeah, but what else?

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He believed God. He trusted in God. And he was credited righteousness.

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The Paul's whole point is if you are truly a descendant of Abraham and an heir of all these promises, you got to have an

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Abraham -like faith. What was it? Empty hands. What was it? Offering nothing.

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What was it? Outside of being justified by law. What was it? Just receiving, just trusting.

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That is gospel faith, living faith. True faith. Sons and daughters of Abraham kind of faith.

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And here's what it says. Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due.

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You're working for it? What you get isn't a gift. It's a wage. That's not the gospel.

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Because the gospel is a gift gift. So if you're working for it, it's not a gift you're receiving.

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It's a wage, not biblical faith. And now it says, and to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly.

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Some of your translations say the wicked. Justifies the wicked. His faith is counted as righteousness.

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You know that Joseph Smith in his translation of the Bible completely perverted that text because he did not like that thought.

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Wait, what? You don't work and God declares the wicked to be righteous?

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That can't be. It must have meant something else, right?

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God's just declaring wicked people to be righteous. How? Because Jesus. Not because they really are righteous, but because of Jesus.

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God isn't lying. You're righteous in his son. But he declares the wicked, the ungodly to be righteous.

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How do you see yourself in this whole transaction? Do you see yourself as kind of righteous, kind of good, doing your best?

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How about we see ourselves like Paul wants us to? The wicked. And God declares you righteous.

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And here is the summary, and then we're done for today. Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom, get this,

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God counts righteousness apart from works. Are you ready? Think about yourself before the throne of God now.

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You have Jesus, this gift, and here's what David is saying. And you need to ask yourself, do I understand that?

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Do I know that? Do I believe that? Do I understand what this gospel really brings me? It says, just as David, just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom

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God counts righteousness apart from works. All of your labors, all of your attempts to obey.

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That needs to be because I know God and I love God and I'm going to bring glory to God. But if you think in terms of how

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God counts you righteous, it's apart from anything you've done. It's apart from anything you're doing.

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He counts you righteous apart from anything. Apart from your commitment to homeschooling.

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Apart from your being spectacular mothers who love your husbands and care for your kids.

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Apart from you being a hospitable person. Apart from you going to do evangelism. Apart from you going to your

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Bible studies. Apart from you feeding the poor. God counts you righteous apart from your works.

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Apart from all of it. He counts you righteous. He charges up to your account righteousness apart from any work.

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And here it is. Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered.

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Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. Is that your gospel? Is that what you believe?

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Is that what you teach? Is that what you can defend? Because here's what happens. According to David, God counts you righteous apart from any of your works.

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And he doesn't count your sins against you. So you've got positive righteousness coming from God and a not counting your guilt.

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You say, well then, that's glorious. What happens? Therefore, having been declared righteous by faith, we have peace with God.

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Through our Lord Jesus Christ. Can you defend these truths, brothers and sister? We need to be able to.

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Because if we know God, we want to love the God that we know. We want to understand him.

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And we want to understand these truths. They will change you. You know, I have done thousands and thousands of counseling sessions with professing believers.

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Believers struggling with things like loneliness, despair, anxiousness, fear, feeling guilt and shame.

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And I just want to share with you my strategy as a pastor. My goal never as a pastor is to sin against you by giving you a motivational speech.

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Hang in there. You can do it. Take these tips from Jeff Durbin as though that'll help.

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No, my strategy is very simple. I try to find a thing that you're forgetting about, about God.

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I try to find a thing that you're forgetting about, about his promises. So I listen. Where are you broken?

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Where are you not believing? What do you not know about him and what he said?

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So when I find it and I do my best to be accurate, I find it. And I say, here's the problem.

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You're anxious because you're not believing this about God. This is what he says about himself. You're believing something else. That's why you're afraid.

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You feel guilt and shame constantly as a repentant person. You're sulky all the time in God's presence and walking around depressed and feeling shame and guilt because you're not listening to God when he tells you that you have peace with him, that he's given you eternal life, that he does not condemn you, that he will never lose you, he will never forsake you.

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You see, these aren't just theological points to debate at a coffee shop or on Facebook. This is the stuff that will actually transform and heal you.

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Do you want to be healed? Then you need to know who God is. You need to know why his word is supreme and you need to know how you have peace with him because brothers and sisters, that's everything.

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It's everything. You and I are not promised tomorrow. We're not promised a week.

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You're not promised a year. Many of you guys are getting old now. And no, I'm joking. Okay, totally joking.

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Just breaking the ice. My point is, is that we're mortal and we're limited. And the one thing that is sure is that you're dying and you're going to face this

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God. You are going to die and you're going to face this God. All your plans, all your building, everything you're investing in.

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Glory to God. Praise God. We're post -millennialists. We're going to win the world to Christ. Amen and hallelujah. But you're still going to die.

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And guess what? 50 years from now, nobody's going to be talking about you. Did you get that?

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No one's going to talk about you. Even the giants of history, people rarely talk about them.

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They're not on the front pages all the time. People aren't constantly remembering you. No one's going to remember you.

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Right? So your work here, your labor here needs to count to make sure they never forget

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Him. Because if you invest in Him and His kingdom and His glory, all your work was valuable and meaningful because His name will endure forever.

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Not yours and not mine. But you're still going to face Him. And the question is, are you going to be facing

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Him in your rags or in His righteousness? Let's pray. Father, I pray you bless the word that went out today for Your glory and for Your kingdom.

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I pray that You, Lord, would allow these truths to be rooted in us as a church. I pray that we would know them and we'd be able to defend them in Jesus' name.

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Amen. So now we're going to come to this table that speaks to us about the work of Jesus to bring us to that place of righteousness in His eyes.