The Sermon on the Mount 3

The Sermon on the Mount 3

Well, as we began a couple of weeks ago working through the Sermon on the Mount, beginning in Matthew chapter five, we have seen over the last couple of weeks how Christ has been delivering the Beatitudes, describing for us the character of those who belong to the kingdom.

So far as we have come through this, Christ has brought us low by showing us the poverty of the spirit that one feels and that we see our true bankruptcy before God and how that understanding guides us into mourning over, grieving for the sin that is within our lives, sin that we once and oftentimes even still excuse.

That acknowledgement of our bankruptcy and the grieving of our sin brings us to a point where we in meekness submit ourselves before the Lord rather than continuing to self-exalt and self-assert, which then leads us to a desire where we hunger and thirst for that righteousness, which we know that we do not in ourselves have.

And so we seek after a righteousness that cannot be satisfied with ourselves, it cannot be satisfied with worldly things, it cannot be satisfied with mere external religion, but it is the very righteousness of Almighty God.

That brings us down to verses seven and eight in Matthew chapter five, as we deal now with the next two Beatitudes and what we see is that where these first four formed a foundation, we now move into what is seen as the fruit of those foundational things, the changes that are wrought in the people of God as we continue to look at not only the characteristics that have already been described, but also the way in which we live as a result of those internal characteristics, and they begin to now describe our more of our internal characteristics, but also our external characteristics and the way that we live in this world marks of supernatural grace given to those who have been redeemed by the King.

We see that the one who has found mercy becomes merciful. The one who has been cleansed longs to be pure. Ultimately, as those brought near to God, the fruit of these characteristics are that we begin to look and act and be like the God that we serve.

Mercy and Purity as Kingdom Marks

And so when we come to these two particular Beatitudes, again, focused in verses seven and eight of chapter five, we are going to be faced with some questions. As we begin to expound on exactly what is being revealed to us, we are brought to a place where we first must ask, do we bear the merciful spirit of our Father?

Secondly, we must ask if God has truly dealt with our heart, or are we simply seeking to live this polished, completely outward life with no true inward change? As we go through this morning, we will see that these are not light questions.

These are probing questions. These are differences between profession and possession, between merely calling on the name of the Lord and actually being His, and as we just sang a few moments ago, Him being ours.

There are many who are outwardly respectable, but they are inwardly corrupt. They may speak a lot of grace, but they're harsh. They are proud. They are cold. They are not only unloving, they are also unforgiving.

We know each of us, people who can speak doctrine with super precision, yet their hearts remain untouched by grace. So as we are exposed to these beatitudes, Christ refuses, and the words of Christ refuse to leave us resting in external things.

Rather, it pushes beyond appearance to the very heart of the matter. And so this morning, we will once again read Matthew chapter five, verses one through 12, and then we will focus in on verses seven and eight.

And having found your place, I invite you to stand in reverence for the reading of God's holy, inerrant, authoritative, sufficient, complete, and certain word. As we read from Matthew's gospel, the fifth chapter, beginning in the first verse, following through to the 12th verse, we find these words.

Now, when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and after he sat down, his disciples came to him, and he opened his mouth, and he began to teach them, saying, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil things against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Our most gracious and merciful Father, we give you thanks for your holy, sufficient, certain word. Father, we confess that apart from your grace, apart from the power of your spirit, apart from the truth of your word, we are neither merciful nor are we pure in heart.

Father, we have often been hard where we should have been tender. Our hearts divided, where in truth they should be wholly yours. Father, we ask now that by your spirit you would press the truth of this text deeply into our hearts, that we would show mercy as those who have received mercy, that our hearts would be purified, being cleansed from secret sins, that we would be granted a sincerity of our hearts.

Holiness in our life and single-eyed devotion to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Father, give us strength not merely to hear these words, but to be searched, to be humbled, to be conformed to them.

We ask that you bless this time, cause it to bear fruit in us for your glory and for our good. Father, we ask all of these things in the blessed name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. You may be seated.

Understanding Biblical Mercy

So as we open up this particular passage this morning, we are confronted with another word that very similar to meekness a few weeks ago is often misconstrued. And so just like the word meekness, we need to see and understand that merciful or mercy or the demonstration of mercy is not the act of a weak person.

It is not the act of a soft individual. When we talk about mercy and we talk about biblical mercy, we talk about mercy that one, doesn't deny truth. It doesn't suspend the command in scripture regarding the responsibility of the individual.

It doesn't eliminate us from needing to pursue holiness. It is certainly not the kind of mercy or compassion that excuses sin when we define that word mercy. Using the world's standards, what we see is a mercy that makes peace with sin.

We see a mercy that calls darkness light. And we see a mercy that removes the need and the necessity for repentance before Almighty God. But when we look at the word of God and we seek to understand as we see mercy revealed to us in scripture, how exactly it's defined and how exactly it's demonstrated, what we see is that mercy is this gracious disposition of the heart that has been regenerated, the new heart that has been given to believers.

And in that new heart, in that regenerated heart, we have this movement by misery that we see around us. And we act to relieve that misery, but we do so in a way that is in accordance with the word of God.

We do so according to the commands of God. We do so according to the truth of scripture. We do so by Christ and the restoration of the fallen. This is one of the reasons why it is so important that we in the church are honest.

Why we in the church are not filled with self-righteousness. Why we in the church understand those foundational beatitudes that we've already discussed, how we are poor in spirit. We have nothing of our own to bring.

Because only then, only when we understand who we truly are, the position that we were truly in before the saving work of Christ in our lives, can we truly demonstrate mercy. Can we show what it looks like to have a fallen person restored to the power of the Holy Spirit according to the word of Almighty God.

Mercy prays for those who stray. Mercy forgives the offenses around us. It helps the burdened. When I'm talking about burden here, I'm not talking about a financial burden or a natural burden of some physical need.

I'm talking a spiritual burden, the weightiness of sin. The weightiness of rebellion against God. The believer who truly understands their own need, their own spiritual misery, will have mercy on the spiritual misery of others.

They recognize themselves to simply be one beggar showing another beggar where to find bread. Thomas Watson put it very memorably and very simply when he wrote these words, the more godly, the more merciful.

You see, the closer that a man walks with God, the more his life bears the stamp of mercy. As with all things, our chief demonstration of this is demonstrated no more clearly than in the mercy that God himself demonstrated towards us.

Scripture reveals God as holy, as just, as righteous, as true. But at the same time, scripture delights to speak of the mercy of God, defining him as the father of mercies and the God of all comfort. Mercy is not in conflict with the holiness of God.

God demonstrates, maintains his holiness while being merciful. He doesn't lower his standards to show mercy. God remains just. He remains holy. And he demonstrates his mercy to the gift of Christ. The redemptive work of Christ on Calvary's cross.

And then even as we move beyond and into the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. At the cross, mercy doesn't just triumph by ignoring sin. Mercy triumphs at the cross by providing satisfying justice in the sacrifice of the son.

And then as we move beyond the cross, that mercy doesn't leave us in our sin, but rather through the work of the Holy Spirit in the sanctifying process in our life, purges us of sin, transforming us according to the power of God's word, moving us closer and closer, leading us to mortify sin in our lives, to seek to live in a certain way.

Every true act of mercy in the believer is a reflection, however faint, of God himself. If we look at what it says in the text, blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. This understanding of what mercy means helps to see what it means when Christ says that they shall obtain mercy.

Mercy as Evidence of Salvation, Not Merit

Now, to be clear, we are not talking about salvation by merit. Christ is not teaching salvation by merit. If Christ were teaching salvation by merit, you could get rid of Beatitudes 1, 2, 3, and 4, because then you could do something to earn it.

It would mean that you had some merit to bring, but you and I have none. He's also not saying that our mercy of individuals purchases God's mercy. This is not a if we do, then we receive scenario. This is the opposite.

This is teaching and demonstrating to us that those whom have been shown mercy will be merciful. They will be the partakers of divine mercy. They will continue to live under that mercy, not in an act of bartering for it, but as evidence that that mercy has been received.

The merciful are blessed, not because they demonstrate mercy, but because they are already citizens of the kingdom of God. If we go forward into Matthew's gospel, we get to Matthew chapter 18. In Matthew chapter 18, one of the things that we find there is the recalling of the unforgiving servant.

That servant was condemned not because forgiveness was earned by forgiving, but because the merciless spirit that he demonstrated shows that he has never truly reckoned with the greatness of the mercy that he had been shown.

The fact that he had been forgiven his debt, and yet turns around his great debt, and yet turns around for a much lesser debt, and refuses to show mercy. This reminds us that judgment will be merciless to the one who has shown no mercy as James tells us.

Again, this is not because works save, but because faith devoid of mercy is a dead faith. Faith that is stripped of any actions resulting from the change in your life is dead faith. Grace changes the disposition of our soul.

Mercy changes how we approach life, and so it confronts us. And to help you a little bit, because typically, again, when we think about mercy, we think about people in need, we think about situations, but let's get real for a moment.

Are you merciful in your homes? Are you patient? Or do you become irritated by every little inconvenience? Are you quick to forgive? Are you quick to apply it to someone's account as a debt that they owe?

Are you tender toward the fallen? Or do you secretly become pleased by their shame? Are you compassionate towards sinners? Or just angry at them? Do you really care for the souls of men? Or is your only interest to win the argument?

You see, all of these things, are ways that our lives demonstrate one way or the other. Do you pray for those who trouble you? Help those who cannot repay you? Do you bear with the faults of others as those who have a daily need of being bared with ourselves?

Mercy reveals itself, especially where pride naturally reigns. Mercy reveals itself where pride naturally reigns. It shows up when we've been wrong. It shows up when we've been hurt. It shows up when we encounter something that is contrary to what we want to live.

Mercy, therefore, is not natural to us. If you don't believe me, I just invite you to take a drive or go to Walmart. Either one of those two things will probably reveal to you how unnatural mercy is to you very quickly.

See, we don't have to go very far. And let's be honest, those are two things that are very low on the it matters totem pole. Grace is opposite of the flesh. The flesh knows revenge. The flesh knows distance.

The flesh knows coldness. The flesh knows self-justification. Mercy, grace teaches us to remember how Christ has dealt with us, how often he has borne with our slowness, our unbelief, our wandering, our repeated failures.

It also reminds us of how often he has dealt with us based not on our sins, but that he restored us when justice would have swept us away. Charles Spurgeon once preached on the Beatitudes, and on this particular one, he made this comment, saying, a man is not saved by being merciful, but if he is saved, he becomes merciful.

That is the distinction, brothers and sisters. That is the distinctions between a works-based faith and works based on faith. It is the truth that if a man is truly saved, he becomes merciful. It's not salvation by human kindness or by human action, it is salvation by sovereign grace that has transformed the heart, that produces a human kindness that cannot otherwise exist.

Don't make a mistake. Mercy is not temperament. We can walk out of these doors, we can go down the road, we can find many people who are naturally warm, naturally gentle, naturally sympathetic. They have this bubbly personality.

They never meet a stranger. And we can say, oh, these are very good people. They're so merciful. But that's not what this is. It's not the same as the supernatural mercy that flows from the truth of God, that is demonstrated and results from submission to God and his word, a heart that is humble before God.

Because even someone who demonstrates this temperament of mercy has no humility before God. Because you see what happens is it's still all about us. The actions are done because of the way it makes us feel.

Mercy as Biblical Truth, Not Worldly Compromise

Word of God declares something regarding mercy that is directly contradictory to what the world declares. The world would define mercy as being that which cannot rebuke, cannot correct, cannot speak hard truth, must simply accept what is being given to it by the world.

The word of God says, the word of God teaches, the word of God demonstrates that mercy can rebuke. When needed. Christ did plenty of rebuking, but also demonstrated true, real mercy. Mercy can correct even as it weeps, even as we are broken by the sin that we see in the life of others.

We don't just accept the sin, even while we're weeping for them, we correct. It can also speak hard truth without necessarily having to have a hard heart about it. Or even hardening the heart further.

Again, Christ stands as our perfect example. Think of as Christ lived, the mercy that he demonstrated to the weak, the outcast, the guilty, the needy. But he never baptized their sin. He never condoned their sin.

He never accepted their status quo in the name of compassion. One of the greatest examples in all of scripture that the world loves to point at is the encounter with a woman tossed at the feet of the master accused of adultery.

And they love to point to the fact that as Jesus stoops down and begins to write whatever he begins to write, that one by one they begin to depart. And that as Christ stands up, he looks at the woman and he says, neither do I condemn you.

And they go, see, God didn't condemn her. Jesus didn't condemn her, why should we? Because they stopped reading. Because immediately after that, he says to the woman, neither do I condemn you. Then he says to her, go and sin no more.

Mercy restores. The mercy of Christ restores. It never endorses evil. Jesus said, come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. That's mercy. But he doesn't leave us there.

He gives us the Holy Spirit to transform us, to continue the work that was begun as our heart was regenerated. And we are not left where we were. Which takes us from verse five, or verse seven, into verse eight.

Purity of Heart as Internal Transformation

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. And so if we look at mercy, and mercy helps to guard us from loveless orthodoxy, in other words, just going through all of the motions, making sure that we have all of the actions correct, never demonstrating any love, never demonstrating any compassion, that we just move through the motions.

If mercy guards from that, purity guards us from demonstrating false compassion. Mercy shows an outward movement of grace towards individuals. Purity shows the inward movement of grace within our lives.

And you'll notice Christ doesn't start with the outside here, does he? He doesn't say blessed are the really clean. He didn't say blessed are those who washed seven times, completed all of the sacrifices, did all of the things that they were supposed to do in the temple.

What he says is blessed are those who are pure in heart. Blessed are those who are pure in heart. Not blessed are those socially respectable. Not blessed are those who appear upright before man. Blessed are the pure in heart because man looks on the outside, God looks at the heart.

Spurgeon said, until the heart was pure, the life could never be clean. The Pharisees, in that day, they were consumed with outward defilement. They washed ceremoniously, religiously. Everything had to be perfect.

Everything had to be done according to the exact and it was done in such a manner as to this is how you achieve salvation. You remember Jesus tells them you tie the tent all the way down to your spices, but your heart is wickedly corrupt.

Later he describes them as whitewashed tombs, as broods of vipers filled with rottenness on the inside while the outside was nice and shiny. Every time I hear whitewashed tombs, it always makes me think back to Tom Sawyer and the whitewashing of the fence.

If you've never read Tom Sawyer, I'm sorry. You should do so. Tom was supposed to be cleaning this fence up, making it look pretty and Tom was more focused on doing other things. Christ exposes a deeper corruption.

He goes to the heart because your primary problem and my primary problem is not our hand, not our eye, not our ear, not our nose, not our mouth. It is our heart. It is a heart problem. It is out of the heart that precedes the evil thoughts, that precedes the murders, that precedes the adulteries, that precedes the false witnesses.

It is out of the heart that all of these things happen. Our great need is not a nose job. It's not a facelift. It's not a tummy tuck. It's a heart transplant. We need a new one, one that only God can provide.

Thomas Watson says the holy God calls here for heart purity. A .W. Pink adds needed precision because he says that purity is not sinless perfection in this life, but includes undivided affections, sincerity, and genuineness.

So many times we see those who think that this is all about white knuckling it, grinning, bear it, and attain some flawless perfection in this life. It's not what he says. He says the pure of heart shall see God.

Brothers and sisters, if we had to attain some level of perfection to see God, you have no hope. I have no hope. It will never happen. We can sit in here and fool ourselves all we want. Oh yeah, man, I show up to church every Sunday.

I give my tithe. I teach Sunday school. I sit on the board of this or that. I run this committee. I do whatever it is that you do. That's great, but that's not gonna get you there. That's not gonna get you to the place where you see God.

Christ is describing those who have been transformed within. Those who have been truly cleansed by God, whose hearts have been renewed, regenerated, replaced. That heart of stone has been removed. That heart of flesh has been put in.

That law has been written on that heart. We desire Christ. We desire God. Our love has been reordered, and our lives are marked by sincerity before God. If you don't know what sincerity means, you should look that word up sometime.

It originated from a form of removing forgeries. In the ancient world, they would fill wax cracks in plaster as they put it back together. And so the root word there, sincere, it literally means without wax.

The idea being that the way you would determine if it was a forgery was that you would put it to a test. It would be heated. The wax would melt away. And so a true peace, a legitimate peace, would contain no wax.

You see, we're put to the test. The question is, is are we sincere? And so when we look at purity of heart, it includes at least three things. Number one, and understand, when you get a list of things like this, there's usually a reason that it's a list.

Typically, there's a foundational statement. Here, I'm just gonna say the foundational statement is number one. That's why we call it number one, right? Purity of the heart has to include cleansing from guilt through the saving work of Christ.

No saving work of Christ, no justification, no peace. If you aren't made right, if you aren't declared right in the eyes of Almighty God, you will not see God, nor will you have peace with God. And the only thing that can provide that justification, the only thing that can answer that defilement of our record is the blood of Jesus Christ.

The pure in heart are not self-purified. The pure in heart are washed by the blood. Second thing, that purity must be because that heart has been regenerated. It must have been because that heart was regenerated.

Now we can say, oh, well, that one should have been first, and yes, there is an argument to be made, but we have to understand that apart from the blood of Christ, this doesn't happen. The heart of stone must be replaced with that heart of flesh.

The inward man must be made new. And then the third is that the purity of heart includes the continued sanctification provided by the Holy Spirit. John MacArthur described this particular beatitude as one of the greatest utterances in the whole of Scripture.

Think about that for just a minute. One of the greatest utterances in the whole of Scripture. Why? Because this particular verse begins at regeneration and moves all the way to glorification. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

It tells us what God has done and is doing in the heart and the life of a believer now. And it tells us what God will do in the heart and the life of a believer in the fulfillment, in the final consummation.

Purification now, sight then. Cleansing now, full communion then. Again, the words here, in heart. In heart. Like I said earlier, Jesus goes straight to the point of the matter. He cannot let us sit with this idea that external religion, external things, external options will grant us anything.

Listen, you can be very orthodox. You can know a creed inside and out. Maybe you can quote the 1689 London Baptist Confession from one end to the other. Maybe you know the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed and all of the other, the Athanasius Creed, and maybe you can just spit all of these things out.

Maybe you've read every one of Calvin's Institutes and you can quote them to us by heart in the original French. But let me tell you something. That's just as much as lost as somebody who is active in service, who's polished in their conduct, but they are impure in their heart.

You can know this book from Genesis to Revelation. Quote chapter and verse. If your heart isn't pure, you shall not see God. Listen to the pure in heart. For they shall see God. Heart, that spring, everything flows from it.

And if the spring is contaminated, so are the streams. And although it may look good, sound good, it's poisonous, it's deadly. Ultimately, it will be revealed. And so Christ continually turns us inward towards the true issue of humanity.

Pink warned against what he called a hand religion and a head religion. A religion of service, a religion of knowledge. One who is busy with the hands, but has an untouched heart. One with very clear thoughts, but untouched heart.

Christ is not impressed with un-mortified hearts clothed in religious usefulness. To say that a different way, your service, unless it is true, from a truly purified heart, is unimpressive. Isaiah wrote it as, all your righteousness is like filthy rags.

So it means that we have to look to the heart because at the heart, in the heart, that there's this, we see demonstrated motive, right? Why do you pray? Why do you serve? Why do you sit and listen to me talk for an hour and 15, 20 minutes?

Why do you give? Why do you abstain from certain sins? Do you do all these things because God's watching you? Do you do these things because Christ is lovely? Do you do it because holiness is beautiful?

Or are you trying to preserve a reputation, maintain an appearance, maybe even win an approval, or just to soothe your own conscience? We will do many right things for profoundly wrong reasons. For those who have been regenerated, for those who have been made new, we will see God.

Look at this promise. Think about the beauty of that promise. They shall see God. Listen, church has devolved into this thing that's all about relief from worldly stuff, right? How to live a better life, how to get along better with your spouse, how to have your best life now, how to be healthy, wealthy, and prosperous.

That's what it's all been about, right? But here's the thing. The promise, the greatest promise that we have, the greatest promise to believers is not that we will get relief from pain. It's not that we will escape hell.

It's not that we will have relief from sorrow or suffering. It's not that we will be reunited with those who we love who have gone on before us. It's not even the perfection of a new creation. All of those things are great, and they're wonderful, and they're glorious, and absolutely, that is what will happen in the final end of things described for us right here in the pages of Holy Scripture, but that's not the greatest promise.

The greatest promise, the greatest promise of God to the people of God is God himself. That's the promise. All the other stuff is dressing. It's great, it's beautiful, it's wonderful, but if you take away God, it doesn't mean anything.

The greatest promise to us is God himself. Listen, the desire to see God, the desire to be in his presence is the consummation of what has been wrought in our lives by grace. That's what we move towards.

That's why we study the pages of Scripture, because we wanna see and know Almighty God, and he's revealed himself to us in these words. He's an old book preacher. He's also revealed himself to us in creation.

Absolutely, but what he has revealed to us in creation is not sufficient in and of itself to lead unto salvation, which means that we see him face to face. That is reserved for the special revelation of his word, and we don't need a new one.

We don't need a fresh one. We just need the one. We just need the word that he's already given us. We just need to take the book off our shelf, dust off the jacket, get rid of the 150 copies you got, find a good one, and get to reading, because you don't need all of that other.

You just need this, and you need to seek him and pursue him and put aside all of the notions that you have about him, and when it challenges what you think, it's not wrong. You are. Just because you don't like what it says doesn't make it wrong.

My kids have not liked a lot of things I've said over the time of my life. Didn't make me wrong. Sometimes it might have, but not always, right? But God's word is always right. It's always true. It's always perfect.

Otherwise, it's just another book. You and I as believers don't just want a better condition. You and I as believers desire, we need Almighty God. Now there is a sense, obviously, in which the pure in heart see God even now.

Spurgeon was famous for saying that we see him on every page of scripture. Yes, we can study, we can see, we can reveal the heart that has been regenerated, perceives the beauty of God in scripture. We see the beauty of God in his providence.

We see the beauty of God in the church that he has given us. We see the beauty of God in the worship of our lives. We see the beauty of God as we study Christ. The natural man, the man who has been unregenerate, the man whose heart is not pure will read the word and the word will make no sense.

As Paul writes, to dead men it means nothing. Natural man may hear the word proclaimed and remain unmoved. He may look out and see creation, but it has no effect. When we are brought into the kingdom, when the eyes of our soul are opened and by faith we behold God, we see his holiness, his goodness, his mercy, his love.

And even though his ways are often mysterious and we absolutely don't understand them, we delight in them. Pink wrote that the pure in heart enjoy intimate and delightful communion with God. We do enjoy a communion with God.

There is a deep tie in scripture that purity and communion are tied together, but understand that this has not attained its fulfillment. Scripture says in Revelations that we will see him face to face.

You won't need the word to discern God anymore because he'll be looking at you eyeball to eyeball or whatever he has that satisfies for an eyeball. You understand? But that's the difference. That's the fullness.

It reaches beyond the present to eternity. We see him as he is. What we see by faith now, we see by sight then. The partial becomes full. The interrupted becomes the unbroken. Thomas Watson called this glorious and beatifical vision.

The idea described for us in Revelation that we stand face to face beholding the true God who made us, who redeemed us, who sanctified us, who kept us, and who brought us home. If that is the destiny of the believer, how careful should we be with our hearts?

What I mean by that is you don't trifle with inward corruption. You don't make peace with hidden sin. You don't see something in your life that you know and identify and can absolutely know is sinful and say, you know what, it's probably okay.

I'm gonna keep doing it anyway. You seek to put it to death. You seek to mortify that sin, to literally put that sin to death, to kill that remaining flesh. We come to the word of God. We come before God, bearing our heart, asking the Holy Spirit to reveal the sin in our lives.

That's a dangerous question, isn't it? When you ask it, when you pray for it, are you truly prepared for it? I'll tell you how unprepared we are. We're so unprepared he won't answer it all at once because we cannot handle that truth.

But then as he reveals the things that we cannot see, we confess what it exposes. We put to death what is condemned. We run again to Christ whose blood cleanses us from every sin and whose spirit alone drives us in sanctification.

The Inseparability of Mercy and Purity

And so once again, as we see here, Christ is not and will not be satisfied with outward religion. We may know the words, we may keep the customs, we may appear serious before men, all the while our heart remains untouched before Almighty God.

But listen, the Lord Jesus Christ did not come and call us to struggle and by our own strength manage some type of appearance. He said, come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

He didn't say, go put your burdens down, go get rid of all that weariness and heavy ladenness, then come see me. He said, bring it to me and I will give you rest. I will provide. And so he calls to us to come for cleansing, for renewal, for transformation.

For those of us who are believers, he calls us to come grieving remaining sin, taking courage in the truth that the spirit will continue to work in us, that he who is faithful to begin a good work in us will be faithful to bring it to completion.

You notice that there's none of you in that except for the one that's receiving it, right? He began it, he'll complete it. Doesn't move your responsibility. What it does is says that the strength to do it, the ability to do it, the truth of it occurring is all on him.