Trust His Steadfast Means & Ways | 1 John 2:27

ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church

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I want to go ahead and read once again from 1st

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John chapter 2, verse 27, we'll read a little bit further on to verse 29. God's Word says,

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And as for you, beloved, the anointing whom you received, note the past tense, from him abides in you continually and permanently, and you have no need for anyone to teach you.

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But as his anointing actively teaches you about all things, including discernment, through his

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Spirit and means of grace, and is true and is not a lie, and just as he has taught you already, abide in him therefore.

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And now, little children, abide in him so that when he is manifested, we may have confidence, full assurance, and not shrink away from him in shame at his coming.

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If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone also who does righteousness has been born of him, and that him, of course, is none other than Jesus Christ the righteous himself.

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It's pretty neat to see how the Apostle begins the chapter with Jesus Christ the righteous, and he ends with Jesus Christ the righteous, who is righteous.

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And I want us to, we need to dig a little deeper today in order to properly understand this passage.

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This is a very, verse 27 has a lot in there. It's very packed with some important and fundamental truths that we don't want to pass by, and we want to do this by, of course, rightly dissecting, rightly defining, and distinguishing the doctrines therein, using the right tools, the right means, his means and ways for us to know

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God's Word, as the sermon title says. Namely, of course, we should all be familiar with these tools, the analogies of Scripture and of faith, the law gospel distinction, the historic confessional systematic reformed faith that was once for all delivered to the

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Saints. All of these tools are very important to properly understand God's Word. And so far, we've seen many parallel passages all throughout

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John's letter. A lot of them are strong restatements and re -emphasizing the same fundamental, important, big -picture doctrines that we all need to know and meditate on and live out.

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God is instructing us here on matters largely about discernment, about knowledge, about the anointing of knowledge, and about how we determine right from wrong, good from evil, truth from lies, sound doctrine from false teaching, true from almost true,

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Christ from Antichrist, right? This is a very prevalent focus in John's letter.

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Now, if you take a look at the middle of verse 27, I want to focus, zero in on a specific phrase there where it says, where God's Word says,

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His anointing is true and is not a lie. His anointing is true and is not a lie.

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And that's exactly why we can and should trust His steadfast means and ways.

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Not our ways. Our ways are not like His ways. His ways are steadfast and true and faithful, like that hymn that we sang today.

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I like how that that hymn puts it, that it's all about His ways and His means as to how we carry on in our life and in our doctrine.

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So, that's very important. And this results, then, in actively growing our knowledge and understanding, and helps us to actively grow in the grace and knowledge of our

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Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. That's the command from 2nd Peter 3 18. That is one of the primary responsibilities that we have as believers.

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Like the Lord Himself said, truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my Word, abides in my doctrine, my

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Logos, he will never see death, ever, because His Word saves us.

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His truth, means, and ways save us and preserve us to the very end. Amen?

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Now, it's important to recognize that we who believe already abide in the anointing of the triune

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God of truth, not by our own mere efforts, right?

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It's never by our own mere efforts, but by God's Spirit, who continually works in us to follow

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Him, to follow Him, and participate, then, consequently, in His means of grace and of deliverance.

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Like I've mentioned many times before, the six S's, all the way from Scripture, sound doctrine, the sacraments, self -awareness, and self -denial, sage counsel, and spiritual warfare.

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And we've seen this throughout, all throughout 1st

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John, how he'll often jump back and forth between subjects for emphasis and repetition, because they are vitally important truths that God wants us to always remember and abide by, abide by, remain in.

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To, once again, abide in, remain in Him, in Him and His Word, by His steadfast means and ways, not ours,

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His, because He anoints us continually and permanently with His logos,

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His truth, which is the truth. You know, you may have heard the saying that all truth is

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God's truth. That's actually backwards. All truth is not God's truth. God's truth is all truth.

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That's a very important distinction. People will say, oh, well, you can find truth in even false religions and stuff like that.

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Well, if it's true, it's only because God said it first. God's truth is all truth.

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That is why the Word of God is the first principle for us as believers. That is God's truth, and that is all truth, because Christ is the truth.

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Amen? Now, we know by this that He abides in us, by the

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Spirit, by the Spirit whom He gave us. That's actually from 1st John chapter 3, verse 24, which we will revisit in a little bit.

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I mean, it's very clearly laid out here. It's His means, His Spirit. Our abiding union, union with Christ, that's another important doctrine, being united to Christ by faith and by His Holy Spirit and means of grace, will progressively, continually sanctify us unto holiness, and our final state, perfection and glorification, to become partakers of the divine nature, like we will see shortly.

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Critically important to understand this. Now, we saw back in verse 20 of this chapter that the anointing, in Greek, it's the word chrisma.

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The anointing refers to doctrine, teaching to a body of knowledge of Christ and His Word, of His incarnation and of His gospel, right?

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So, but note here that because the word anointing is neuter, not masculine or feminine, neuter, nouns have, they have gender, and so there is another parallel form or phrase here in 1st

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John chapter 1 verse 1. If you turn back over there, we will see, we've dealt with this before, this very similar construction that John the

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Apostle writes for us and reveals to us. The very beginning of this letter starts with that which.

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That which was from the beginning is also neuter. That which.

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The LSB, I think, says what. What is, what was from the beginning, but it points to a masculine noun.

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It points to a masculine, which is namely the Word of Life. The Word of Life is masculine.

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And similarly, then, in verse 27, the very last clause of verse 27 says to abide in Him.

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Him. The Greek word there is also masculine, but it could be referring back to the anointing, which is neuter, right?

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So the genders don't always have to correspond to what they're pointing to.

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So it could actually be translated as abide in it. Abide in it.

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What is that it? It's the anointing of knowledge and truth and of doctrine, right?

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That's what a big focus of what John is revealing to us here. Or it could also, just as in 1st

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John chapter 1 verse 1, it can refer both, to both Christ incarnate and the gospel message, which is the anointing.

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It's the gospel. The power of God. Even though, however, since His anointing is true and is not a lie, okay, remember that phrase, it is true and is not a lie, this more clearly points to the saving doctrine of Christ.

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Because doctrine and propositions, specifically, can be true or false or a lie, like the passage says.

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You know, you can say that God is true, but to say that God is a lie is a little bit more awkward.

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When you're talking about something being true or false, that more typically refers to what's referred to as propositions.

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Subject, copula, predicate. Such as God is holy.

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God is the subject. Is is the verb to be the copula, which connects the subject to the predicate.

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And the predicate is holy. So those propositions are what's true and false.

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So it's pointing to doctrine, knowledge, and this is where, this is also where we need to rightly divide the word, however, and not lose our doctrinal balance here, because we also need to avoid the imbalanced, pietistic error of separating

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Christ, the person, from his words and teaching and doctrine.

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All right, and we've all probably heard this before. Trust in a person, not belief in a creed.

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That's what Christianity is all about. It's about trusting in the person of Christ, not in, not believing in some creed, some impersonal creed.

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And that's totally contrary to Scripture. It's totally contrary to Scripture, because what did

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Jesus say all throughout the New Testament in his ministry? What did he respond to constantly with people and opposers and people who he spoke to?

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He said, it is written. Written, right?

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There is no such disparity between the living word that is Christ and the written word.

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They are, in fact, one and the same in many respects.

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And let's, let's go there. Well, let me, let me introduce this, and then we can go to the passage in the

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Gospel of John, because after all, to believe Christ, to believe

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Christ, is to believe his words, just like John 5, 46 to 47 says, his doctrine, his logos, because his words are spirit and life.

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John 6, 63, and just as his words are spirit and life, he himself is the way, metaphorically speaking, the truth, metaphorically speaking, the life, metaphorically speaking.

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He is the author and source and giver of life. He is the way. He's not literally a road, right?

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He's not literally the door. He is the way to the Father, to the truth, and he is the truth because he knows all things.

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He is omniscient. He is the source of truth. Turn with me to John chapter 5, verse 45.

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The gospel there, we will find a powerful truth.

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This is so important to properly grasp, because so many, so many churches and superficial movements, like that of pietism and related movements, they tend to undermine or say that, oh, well, doctrine and propositions, that's not as important as the living

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Word, the Spirit of God. Well, how do you connect? How do you connect to the Spirit of God?

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How is all of this? This is why the sermon title is so important for us to grasp. God uses means, his steadfast means and ways, and to go against doctrine, to go against knowledge, to go against what is written, is to go against the person of Christ.

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John chapter 5, verse 45. God says, Christ says, do not think that I will accuse you to the

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Father, Father God. The one who accuses you is Moses, the person in whom you have set your hope.

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For if you believed Moses, the person, you would believe me. For he did what?

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He wrote about me. Believing Moses is to believe what he wrote about Christ.

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But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?

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Right? There you see, it is so emphatically, unequivocally, plain as day.

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Christ, in both occasions, equates the person of Moses to his writings, and his words to Christ himself.

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He wrote about me. If you do not, you would, if you believe Moses, you would believe me.

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But then how would you believe my words? He's equating the words with the person.

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Very important, very important to understand. We must, therefore, learn to measure and judge our growth and maturity in the

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Lord, and I mentioned this last week, by our knowledge, by our discernment, our doctrine, and not just by what we know, but also by how we live it out, by living out our doctrine consistently, without hypocrisy, in other words.

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As the Apostle John also continually admonishes us to do so.

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He who is righteous, and also the ones who belong to Christ, does righteousness, like we saw in verse 28 and 29, right?

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So, all of this goes hand in hand in a system of doctrine that the

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Lord has revealed in his written word. The primary means by which we connect to the person of Christ is his words, and through the preaching of his word, and the praying of his word.

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It's all through his steadfast means and ways, his word.

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To go against that is to go against God himself. You cannot have one without the other.

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It's impossible, and this is how we judge our maturity, our spiritual maturity.

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It's not, rather than by some emotional sensitivity or output, it's not about how emotional you get when you sin, or when you think about the things of God.

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Do some people react emotionally? Sure, but that varies depending on your personality. That should not become a barometer for measuring spiritual growth, and in many cases, emotional flux, to have a lot of emotional ups and downs, that's a sign of instability, a sign of imbalance.

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But so many people in church today, they act like the emotion, that's what it's all about.

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That's what shows, and a lot of churches will fake it. They will act out in church to make it look like they're spiritual and holy, because that's what they use to judge people's spirituality, and it's a farce.

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It's a lie. That's not how we measure maturity, based on what the

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Word of God says. So brothers, do not be children.

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Do not be immature in your thinking, in your understanding. Rather, in evil be infants, but in your thinking, in your thoughts, in your knowledge, in your doctrine, in your understanding, be mature.

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Right? 1st Corinthians 1420, and I could preach a whole series on this very reality, truth, that God repeatedly emphasized all throughout the

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Word of God, His Word, all throughout. The Apostle John, also going back to 1st

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John now, he elaborates much of what he addresses here, in chapter 2, in the following chapter.

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So if you turn with me to 1st John chapter 3, starting in verse 18, we will see that very thing.

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In 1st John chapter 3, verse 18,

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God's Word says, little children, remember that? That's the same phrase he used back in the passage in the end of chapter 2.

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Let us not love merely with word or with tongue, in other words, not hypocritically, but also in deed and truth, indeed in truth, in good works and truth, believing the truth as well.

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And by this we will know that we are of the truth, and will assure our heart, give us confidence before Him, in whatever our heart condemns us.

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For God is greater than our heart, and knows all things. Amen to that.

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That is so powerful. I want to read that. For God is greater than our heart, and knows all things.

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Trust then in the God who works in you, not yourself, not yourself, not your subjective state.

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Beloved, if our heart, verse 21, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God, and whatever we ask, we receive from Him, because we keep

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His commandments. We do justly, righteously, and do the things that are pleasing in His sight.

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And this is His commandment that we believe, first and foremost, in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as well, just as He gave a commandment to us.

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And the one who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in Him, through the mystical union of Christ, union with Christ, that we have by the anointing.

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We know by this that He abides in us by the Spirit, by the Spirit whom

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He gave us. Amen, right? The Spirit is the anointing

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Spirit that anoints with knowledge and conviction of the truth and of our sin.

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So before we move on, though, let us meditate a little bit more on that phrase, this phrase in verse 27 of the chapter 2.

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Chapter 2, verse 27. I want to focus in a little bit more on this with some stuff that's relevant for us today.

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His anointing actively teaches you about all things.

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It teaches. It teaches what? It teaches doctrine. It teaches knowledge, knowledge, truth, through His Spirit and means of grace, and is true, and is not a lie, not a lie.

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That's an amazing reality. We have an all -knowing, omniscient

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God who teaches us all things. So who needs

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AI? Who needs artificial intelligence when we have everything we need already?

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God's anointing is better than any AI we can hope for.

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His steadfast means and ways of grace. His. And you know, you have a bunch of antichrists running around, people like these intellectuals like Yuval Noah Harari.

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He wrote a book on sapiens, I think, and books like that. And he says, you know, he's talking about how

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AI and artificial intelligence and technology will create our own gods, our own religion, because it will figure out everything for us.

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It'll be God for us. These AI systems, much of like what you see in movies,

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AI taking over everything and stuff. That's a delusion. That's an antichrist delusion, which, because God's means of grace and His ways and means are steadfast.

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They are consistent. They are, He is faithful, and they are always true, always true, and never a lie.

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It is not a lie, ever, like 1st John teaches us, which cannot lie to us, because our

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God is a God of truth who cannot lie, like Hebrews 6 .18 says.

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Countless other passages teach. And is always and forever faithful and exposes,

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He exposes the darkness. He exposes the light, the darkness, and the lies.

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And He teaches us to do the same. He empowers us to become and do likewise in His image, to be agents and ministers and ambassadors of truth, discerning lights that expose darkness, like the work commands us to do,

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Ephesians 5 .11. Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them, because we have the light of truth.

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We have the truth, and that is why we don't need any man to teach us in that respect.

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But we'll revisit that phrase a little later as well. Seeing that His divine power,

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His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the full knowledge of Him, through His anointing from the

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Holy One and means of grace, who called us by His own glory and excellence.

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For by these He has granted us His precious and magnificent promises, by His full knowledge that He has given us, so that by them, not by your own efforts, but by God's promises,

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His truth, His word, you may become partakers of the divine nature.

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Remember that? We become partakers of the divine nature, glorified because of His knowledge of His truth.

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Having escaped the corruption, the darkness, the lies that are in the world by lust.

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2nd Peter 1 and 3 through 4. Amen. Sound doctrine then is the power of God.

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That is the most important truth, foundational presupposition and teaching that Christ and that God and His word shows us is that the entire reason

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God put His truth in a book, in 66 letters, books, for us was because the power of His words are

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His saving power. It is His power. The same power that God used and exercised by creating all things by the word of His power is the same powerful word that saves us because the gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

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Amen? Romans 1 16. Unlike AI, unlike artificial intelligence, because every type of AI you will find, whether it's whether it's copilot or chat

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GPT or grok, they're all programmed with particular agendas and biases.

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Some worse than others, some more nefarious than others, and they are not always true.

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They are not God. They are not God. You know, Google's AI really did some, exposed itself, the developers, because you would ask for historical figures like George Washington and they would show you some black guy because, oh well, we're trying to diversify and mitigate your biases for racism, so we're gonna show you a bunch of black people that were actually historically

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Caucasian Europeans. It was the most stupid absurdity. They utterly exposed themselves, showing you pictures of Africans, even of Christ, I think, as some black guy because of this.

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Now, of course, Christ wasn't white. He was a Jew, right? He was a Semitic Jew, but it's just absurd, utterly absurd, because there's agendas that are programmed into these algorithms, these

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AIs. Rather, let God be true and every man and every man -made and man -influenced machine a liar, right?

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Romans 3, 4. That's the reality. Beware of AI because it can mislead you and even deceive you, okay?

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Even the better ones, even the better ones, you know, Elon Musk and his Grok. I've been experimenting with it.

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It's a pretty fascinating algorithm, but, you know, there's an elder,

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James White, another fellow Reformed Baptist. He recently mentioned that Grok has proven to be historically reliable in what he's asked it, and he's a church historian, so he has a pretty good knowledge and grasp of church history, but based on mine,

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Grok kind of messed up a few times. He messed up. I had to correct

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Grok's views, in fact, and he apologized to me. Grok actually apologized to me because he said something wrong about Count Zinzendorf and about Luther's works.

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When I asked Grok about Count Zinzendorf and about his unorthodox views of the

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Trinity, he basically said, no, he's very Orthodox. He just maybe said some things that are mainly for application, but he said some things that he was

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Orthodox, and it's like, well, no, look at this, and Grok had to digest it and realize, oh no, yeah, that is definitely, that's definitely unorthodox.

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That's definitely not normal. That's not the Christian doctrine that's had it as it's been historically expressed in the history of the church and in the

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Bible, and also when I asked, see, but they can be useful for finding certain things, like I asked

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Grok to show me where in Luther's massive 55 -volume collection can

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I find one of Luther's tracts pamphlets called Against the

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Executable Bull of Antichrist, but he gave me the wrong book.

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He gave me the wrong book. It was in one volume, and he gave me the wrong volume, and so I had to correct him about that, and then he apologized to me again.

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So you have to be careful, and it's not just with what they do say, but also with what they don't tell you.

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It's what they don't say that also matters, or what they leave out, right?

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You have to be very careful. It's much, it's similar to the way that you judge somebody's doctrine or preaching or teaching.

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You have to judge what they say, but also what they don't tell you. What are they leaving out?

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Are they not calling out false teachers and Antichrist like the Word says you're supposed to do, in addition to preaching the truth?

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So, verse 27, I want to make this very clear, very, very clear, to not be misled or confused by what

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John says here. Verse 27 does not, in John chapter 2, 1st

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John chapter 2, does not mean that we no longer need any pastors or teach us to oversee and instruct us in the faith, okay?

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Notice how back in 1st John, in 1st John chapter 2, verse 27, the

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Apostle tells us, and as for you, the anointing whom you have received, past sense, from him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you, right?

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You have no need for anyone to teach you, but as his anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as he taught you already, abide then in him.

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Okay, we have to be careful though, because this does not mean what fundamentalists and pietists often make it to mean.

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You know, again, you probably heard these sayings before on the radio, or in a sermon, or in a book, by Christians who say things like, no creed but Christ, right?

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We don't hold to creeds, historic creeds. Who cares what the church taught? No creed but Christ, the person of Christ.

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No book but the Bible, right? Who cares what other men wrote? Who cares what other teachers and pastors wrote, even if God called and ordained them?

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Who cares? No human teacher but the Holy Spirit alone is all we need, and that, folks, is a lie.

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That is a lie that will cause you to believe lies and falsehoods, because that itself is false.

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How can you say no creed but Christ, when all you have to do is ask, what Jesus are you talking about?

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What Jesus do you believe? Just like Christ told Peter, who do you say that I am?

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Because some people think I'm a prophet, some people think I'm a false teacher, some people think I'm from the devil, but which

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Jesus is the right Jesus? It's the Jesus who Jesus said he was, in his word, and that the faithful church of old has preserved down through the ages, through sound doctrine and confessions and creeds, all of those things.

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So to say those things that these folks tend to say, these pietists and things like that, would be a denial of what

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John's letter itself teaches us, and a denial of God's steadfast means and ways that he uses to sanctify us, to sanctify us into maturity and perfection, glorification, including other believers.

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He uses other believers to edify us, not just Christ.

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We can't become so spiritually minded that we're no earthly good and ignore what people around us tell us.

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That's dangerous, very dangerous, and it is a denial of Christ's revealed doctrine of the church.

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It is a very denial of the doctrine, of Christ's doctrine of the church, as revealed in his word in Ephesians 4 11 through 16.

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If you turn with me there, very important to understand these things in proper balance and to rightly divide and dissect the word and not compromise one doctrine at the expense of another, of overemphasizing or becoming imbalanced or extreme on the other end of the counterpoint doctrines.

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Like I mentioned it before, these things are vitally important.

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So yes, the Bible says you have no need for anyone to teach you because you have the anointing, but what does that mean?

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What does that mean in light of also Ephesians 4 11, which is a counterpoint doctrine, and God's word says he himself,

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Christ, gave some as apostles to be apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelists, some as pastors and teachers.

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For what? For the equipping of the saints for the work of service to the building up of the body of Christ, of God's people, until we all attain to the unity of the faith.

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Okay, so notice that 1st John says you have no need for anyone to teach you because you have anointing, but this passage says he has given us prophets and apostles and pastors and teachers to this very day until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the full knowledge of the

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Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ, so that we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of false doctrine, but by trickery of men, deceptions, right, of Antichrists, by craftiness and deceitful scheming from Satan's devices in the spirit of Antichrist, right, but speaking the truth in love, speaking the truth in love as fellow believers and as pastors preaching of the word.

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We are to grow up in all aspects unto him who is the head, that is

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Christ, from whom the whole body, us believers, being joined and held together by what every joint supplies, every one of us supplies and has a part to play according to the properly measured working of each individual part, each and every one of us, of you, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

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So what is this saying? What is this saying? It is the fundamental doctrine and one of the most fundamentally important doctrines to help us maintain a balance of all of these things that John is teaching us and the word teaches us.

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It is that God always uses means. Rarely does he do anything directly.

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He almost always uses means, okay? God never meant for us to live out our

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Christian faith in isolation. Never. Oh, it's just me and God. Just me and the

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Lord. That's how people go insane. You'll hear people say, oh, God showed me this and he showed me that.

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People like that are usually go insane because they're so detached from reality and from being grounded in reality and from the objectivity of other people who see what's going on in your life and can speak into your life and show you what's wrong with you and speak truth into your life and build you up in the faith.

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Like this passage says, we cannot live, we're not supposed to live apart from Christ's church, apart from his people, for we all are a part of the same spiritual body, the bride of Christ and we must therefore act like it.

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You can't have an arm detached from the body. That's not how the body is supposed to work.

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We're all supposed to be working together in one body and one local body.

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Ephesians 4, 4 through 7 says consequently that there is one and only one body and one and only one spirit.

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It is the same body and spirit that we all belong to and all have in us.

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Just as you were called in one hope of your calling, one hope, one Lord, one faith that was delivered once for all to the saints, one baptism, one

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God and father of all who is over all and through all and in all, all who believe.

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But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift.

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So again, this is telling us that we all need each other's gifts to help each other to grow.

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We all need each other. We all need each other, not just the preaching and teaching gifts from the ordained officers of the church.

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We all need each other. We all have a part to play. That's an amazing thing.

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That's a beautiful thing how God orchestrates and he uses all of us as a divine symphony of sounds lived out in the local church because we all need each other.

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Several gifts and there's a lot of gifts that are talked about in Corinthians as well. There's a diversity of ministries and of gifts and as iron sharpens iron.

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So one man, one brother, one believer sharpens another, right?

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I'm not making that up. That's from God's Word. That's Proverbs 27 17. God uses means.

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Always and his means are steadfast, true and faithful forever.

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God uses means including other men and women of God, brothers and sisters.

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What John is explaining therefore is that the anointing of truth that we receive from him already and his spirit which abides in us already and teaches us about all things does not require anyone to teach us because we already know the saving truth of God and this truth protects us against Antichrist lies and deceptions.

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What he is saying is that the reason we have the anointing is because we believe the gospel.

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We believe the truth already and we have no need for anybody to keep teaching us that truth.

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We already know it to be true. We already believe it. So you can't believe something that you don't already know.

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That is what God's Word is teaching us here. It's not saying that you don't need a teacher anymore or that you don't need a pastor to...

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that's not what it means. It means that you already know the truth because you believe it by faith and that faith saves you.

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That faith is an instrument. It is the means that God uses to save us.

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The bridge that connects us to Christ and his benefits of regeneration, justification, sanctification, salvation, glorification, all of it is through the union that we have with Christ through faith.

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The gift that God gives us of faith. That is why we don't need anyone to teach us and that is why we have the truth and therefore can discern the lie, the false gospel and not be deceived by unfaithful, unstable, antichrist men and women.

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So that is incredibly important for us to know in this last and evil day, beloved, because you will hear so many even well -meaning

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Christians who teach contrary to this and as a result they will show and demonstrate an imbalanced, immature faith and life.

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So always remember that sound doctrine is the power of God.

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It is the means. It is the means that God uses to sanctify us, okay?

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Now, of course, this is not at all to deny what

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John and the rest of the Bible clearly teach us about how God ordains these various and specific means and ways to reveal and teach us his word, as I've already made very clear.

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Again, what are they? The church, the local church and his means of grace, the preaching of the word, the sacraments, the

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Lord's Supper, baptism, fellowship, prayer, corporate prayer, these are all administered by a church that has been or that has ordained officers, men called by God himself for that specific work to build us all up, just like Ephesians shows us, okay?

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You can't preach to yourself. Reality check, right? You cannot preach to yourself.

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You can't do it. You need to be preached to. You need qualified and ordained men of God to preach to you within the context of a local, faithful, and true church that preaches sound doctrine, that has the true gospel.

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That is how God designed us to work and operate as part of the kingdom of God.

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Never forget his anointing, which is sound doctrine, is the power of God, which sanctifies all of us.

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Beloved, I hope that's unmistakably clear now, irrefutably clear from the word.

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So then, therefore, continue to abide in him, beloved, to grow in him, not by your own mere strength and efforts, but by the anointing of his spirit in the truth of the saving gospel and of the rest of the counsel of God and his word and his doctrine.

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By how? Now, I hope we understand better how.

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By his ways, his steadfast ways and means of grace lived out in the context and the fellowship and the worship of a local, faithful, true church, right?

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What we do together as a church is vitally important to our edification and sanctification and admonishment.

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Sometimes, many times, we deceive ourselves, even as believers. We don't always see clearly our sin or our deception or our bad decisions.

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Sometimes we need somebody else to show us. Hey, brother. Hey, sister. I noticed you said this.

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You got to be careful with this teaching here. It's not sound. Whatever it may be, we all need that.

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Even pastors need that. We all need each other. So, very important, beloved.

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Take comfort and joy and confidence in God because this anointed gospel doctrine and promise of eternal life that God himself gives us is once again because my sheep hear my voice and I know them.

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I anoint them, you could say, and they follow me.

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They follow me and I give eternal life to them. Why?

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Because they believe my words that are spirit and life and they will never perish, not ever.

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We will never perish, beloved. Those of us who believe will never perish because God so loved his people, the world, that he gave his only begotten

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Son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

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John 3 16 And no one will snatch them out of my hand, out of Christ's hand, all by faith alone and not by the

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Antichrist's lies of works salvation. Amen. You know, only begotten

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Son. I mentioned something about Islam last time how Islam in their

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Quran denies that God begat or is begotten a son and the issue here because the

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Quran has a misunderstanding of the Trinity and of some certain Christian doctrines which is it's ironic because if they believe that Allah is the

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God of truth and why did he misunderstand Christian doctrine to the Trinity but the doctrine of the

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Trinity teaches that Christ is eternally begotten. It's not that he was begotten in some kind of a he wasn't there and then he was there.

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No, it's not. That's the heresy of Arianism and of Islam because they don't believe that God has a son.

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God has an eternally begotten Son. He is the Son and the

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Father is the Father. So we need to make sure that we are not misled or deceived by these things because we have the anointing.

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Amen. And with that beloved let us go ahead and bow our heads with God's one of many

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God's ways and means of grace in a word of prayer. Our dearly beloved and precious

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Father we thank you so much Lord for loving us first and for anointing us with the truth of your word

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Father. We're so grateful that you have provided and given us everything. Everything that we need for life and godliness as your word says through the full knowledge of him of your beloved eternally begotten

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Son. That is such an amazing peace that comes with it

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Lord through being united eternally and permanently in your Son Christ Jesus who has given his life for us to save us to satisfy the wrath and the debt the sin debt that we couldn't pay ourselves.

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Lord we ask that you would help us to live boldly in confidence and to continue to grow together

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Father in this true koinonia and fellowship that your word teaches us to have to not forsake the assembling of ourselves as is the habit of some as so many have come and gone even in our church

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Father help us to still be encouraged to do to do this very thing to not to not ever stop forsaking

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I mean I'm sorry to not forsake the assembling of each other

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Lord to congregate as your people locally in the church a true church and to be the church the true church and exercise the means of grace that you have given us and participate in them

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Lord as your amazing precious word teaches us that is always true and is not a lie and cannot lie and is never a lie because you are true and faithful we ask these things

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Lord and Jesus Almighty all -powerful all -powerful name amen thank you for listening to the sermons of Thorn Crown Covenant Baptist Church where the

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Bible alone and the Bible in its entirety has applied to all of faith and life we strive to be biblical reformed historic confessional loving discerning

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Christians who evangelize stand firm in and earnestly contend for the Christian faith if you're looking for a church in the

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El Paso Texas area or for more information about our church sermons and ministries such as Semper Ephraim on the radio and Thorn Crown Network podcast please contact us at thorncrownministries .com